Podcasts about like i've

Learn Australian English in this episode of the Aussie English Podcast! This is no drill, Victorians, we are on Lockdown #5

The Braves get back in the win column thanks to the Herculean efforts of a player most people thought should've been buried in the bullpen before the season began. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today we are fasting from the thought that says, "I feel like I've failed," or "I've failed in my relationship with God, in my faith, and in my life, etc." The feeling of failure can be disheartening and depressing. It can keep us in a cycle of defeat. YOU HAVE COMEBACK DNA IN YOU Even in what seems like the worst situation, the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you. Expect your comeback! You have resurrection DNA in you! FALLING ISN'T FAILING Proverbs 24:16 says, "A righteous man falls seven times, but he rises again!" You are righteous in Christ. See yourself as someone who rises up. When you’ve fallen, you have the right to get back up. JESUS GETS HIS PRAYERS ANSWERED And He is praying for you, that your faith would not fail. Luke 22:32 tells us that Jesus said to Peter (and to you), "I have prayed for you, that your faith would not fail." You are not going to fail. No shame! Get up. JESUS IS TURNING TO YOU, NOT FROM YOU! In Luke 22:61, Jesus turned TO Peter after he denied Him. He didn’t turn FROM him. You are accepted! This acceptance transformed Peter’s life after he hit rock bottom. God accepts you, just like He accepted Peter, even when you’ve failed. EVEN WHEN YOU'RE DOING POORLY, GOD WILL NOT FAIL YOU He’s going to make sure you make it. Your relationship with Him was His idea, not yours. He will finish what He started. IN ONE MOMENT, GOD CAN TURN AROUND YEARS OF APPARENT FAILURE In Esther 9:1, God’s people were about to be destroyed, but God suddenly delivered them. In only ONE DAY, the tables were turned, and God transformed certain defeat into total victory! If God could accomplish this for them, He can do it for you! THINK IT AND SAY IT !!! I have comeback DNA in me! It’s my new nature to always rise, even when I’ve fallen. I have the blood-bought right to get back up when I’ve failed! Jesus doesn’t turn from me when I’ve fallen; He turns to me and prays for me. I cannot fail. He will not fail me. His love will never fail toward me. I am expecting God to turn my failures and frustrations around beginning today, in Jesus’ Name! --- 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/felicia721/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/felicia721/support

              I grew up in a strict Catholic family and went to a Catholic college that was definitely more strict than probably a lot of Catholic institutions of higher... The post Trish T: I feel like I've had a whole couple of lives since then appeared first on The Suddenly Single Show with The Danielle Daily.

Talking to my guest for this episode was as thrilling as watching her race. Emily Dugan was just 22 years of age when she started racing in theSeries X3 NSW, after buying a race car on Gumtree, a suit on eBay and a helmet from Aldi. Self-taught and self-funded, she became the first female driver to race in the Super3 V8 Touring Cars Series in 2016. Since then, she has competed in events including the Toyota 86 Series and Supercars S3 Series. She’s also highly accomplished off the track, working with major brands like Penrite and Special K and being a finalist for Cosmopolitan’s Sportswoman of the Year in 2017. Emily is passionate about breaking down the barriers that prevent girls and women from achieving their dreams, and she is an ambassador for Girls on Track, originally launched by British F1 driver Susie Wolff. She has been described as the hardest-working racing car driver in Australia, and she’s done it all without family support. These days she clocks speeds of up to 270km an hour, but Emily’s first experiences behind the wheel were driving herself to school every day after her parents separated and left her living on her own. It’s an incredible story and I feel privileged that she shared it with me on the podcast. She has a maturity beyond her age and a unique approach to problem solving. Our conversation was a wild ride, with lots of hairpin bends and unexpected turns. I hope you’ll tune in to hear Emily talk about hitting the gym just after midnight, practicing times tables while running, and how her appendix might have cost her a championship. Follow the Influence Unlocked podcast on Instagram@ https://www.instagram.com/influenceunlockedpodcast/ Follow Samatha Dybac on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samanthadybac/ Check out the Influence Unlocked podcast videos on YouTube here: https://bit.ly/3fq8dJ5 Producer: Andrew Menczel http://www.piccolopodcasts.com.au/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Today we are fasting from the thought that says, “I feel like I've failed.” If you want to join me on this 40-day Fast from Wrong Thinking and receive a daily email devotional, visit https://fastfromwrongthinking.com --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/gregorydickow/support

What are some practical ways you can return good for evil?

As a little bonus episode I'm joined virtually by Maffew the masterful creator of the YouTube hit among the whole pro wrestling community known as Botchamania. Maffew and I do a full review of the cult hit event from 2007 "Wicked Hanuman"

Patriots offensive lineman Michael Onwenu addresses the media via video conference on Friday, December 18, 2020.

After speaking to Dr. Laura about her recently deceased father, Nancy watched hours of home movies and calls back to discuss the impact they made on her.

After 12 years of suffering with Parkinson's disease, Nancy's father has died and she's having trouble remembering the dynamic dad he used to be.

Hollywood likes to remake everything so today we talk about some movies that should or shouldn't be remade along with the last movie Jose watched Faults.

In this episode, the guys respond to viewing the 2012 documentary film by Joshua Oppenheimer, The Act of Killing. The discussion starts with an overview of the premise of the film, immediate reactions to some of the personable executioners who participated in Indonesia's 1960 genocide, and overall thoughts and feelings on the film. The episode continues with Hayden touching on discovering a new-found capacity for forgiveness for even the most monstrous atrocities, Damon's lament towards lack of closure in the face of evil deeds, and the surprising level of connectedness one feels with the film's perpetrators. Damon's was actually referring to Crime and Misdemeanors by Woodie Allen not Crime and Punishment SUPPORT US Watch The Act of Killing

Portsmouth (N.H.) High School assistant athletic director Tom Kozikowski reflects on the day he was hired by Rus Wilson and the Portsmouth Recreation Department. Wilson died on Monday, Aug. 31. He was 64. See omnystudio.com/policies/listener for privacy information.

Portsmouth (N.H.) High School assistant athletic director Tom Kozikowski reflects on the day he was hired by Rus Wilson and the Portsmouth Recreation Department. Wilson died on Monday, Aug. 31. He was 64. See omnystudio.com/policies/listener for privacy information.

This episode springs from a question asked in the #AmWriting Facebook group (if you’re not in it, you should be): Sarina has talked about her decision to be independently published, but we’ve never heard from Jess and KJ about why they go the traditional route.We discuss the three things you should think about when making the Indie/Traditional call, why you need to think hard about airport bookstores and finding the print ratio—and the good and bad reasons for making this choice.#AmReading Sarina: Boyfriend Material by Alexis HallKJ: The Exit Strategy by Lainey CameronJess: The Mountains Wild by Sarah Stewart Taylor(listen to the #AmWriting episode with Sarah here)As we say every week—we’re so proud to be sponsored by Author Accelerator and Dabble. If you’re wondering—why Dabble and not Scrivener? For us, it’s that plotting tool and the intuitive way it works, but others have weighed in—check that out here with a little Dabble v. Scrivener scoop.And if listening to all of our conversations about book coaching has made you think, hey—that’s the career for me—then you’ll want to head to Author Accelerator’s BookCoaches.com to see how you can make that happen. Here’s what we don’t always say: Man we love recording the podcast. But every hour spent on it is an hour not writing! Our production costs are now covered by our lovely (and carefully chosen) sponsors, but our time in pulling it all together is supported by you, our listeners. We’d love it if you joined that team (if you’re not already on it!) Supporters get weekly #WriterTopFives like The Top Five (Free) Ways to Get Your Shiny New Book Cover in Front of People’s Eyeballs or #Minisodes like Don't Make the Same Mistakes Twice—and thanks to the magic of substack, those minisodes drop right into your pod-player once you’re set up. Want in? Click the button. KJ Dell'Antonia 0:00 Writers, it's KJ. The #AmWriting podcast is excited to tell you about our new sponsor, Dabble Writing software. We invited Dabble to join the #AmWriting team because we are in love with the plotting tools and intuitive interface. And I want to tell you something else I love about it, what they call the focus fade. I barely even noticed when it first started to happen, but any details that are open in the sidebars of your Dabble document fade away automatically as you write, leaving you with nothing but a beautiful clear space to work in until you need them and send your cursor in that direction, then they're back in a flash. It makes for a great distraction-free writing environment. Find out more and do a free trial at dabblewriter.com. Is it recording?Jess Lahey 0:47 Now it's recording.KJ Dell'Antonia 0:50 This is the part where I stare blankly at the microphone trying to remember what I'm supposed to be doing.Jess Lahey 0:54 Alright, let's start over.KJ Dell'Antonia 0:55 Awkward pause. I'm gonna rustle some papers. Okay, now one, two, three.Hey, I'm KJ Dell'Antonia. And this is #AmWriting. #AmWriting is the podcast about writing all the things, fiction, nonfiction, books, essays, pitches, proposals long form, short form. In short, this is the podcast about sitting down and getting your work done.Jess Lahey 1:25 Hi, I'm Jess Lahey, and I am the author of The Gift of Failure and the upcoming The Addiction Inoculation, which will be out in April of 2021. And you can find my work in lots of places, including the Atlantic, The New York Times, and Washington Post. Sarina Bowen 1:39 And I'm Sarina Bowen, the author of 35 romance novels. You can always find my work at sarinabowen.com or wherever e-books are sold. KJ Dell'Antonia 1:52 I am KJ Dell'Antonia. I'm the author of the novel, The Chicken Sisters, which you heard it here first is now not coming out until December at the earliest. But that's okay. Really, totally fine, whatever. I'm also the author of How to Be a Happier Parent, the former editor of the New York Times' Motherlode blog, still sometimes a contributor there. And I'm just wrapping up a revision of a draft of my next (hopefully) novel. So that's what I'm doing. And I should say that I am not recording where I normally record because, you know, I lost the the officemate battle of of the the work at home universe.Jess Lahey 2:45 I know we have a topic today, but before we get to the topic, I just wanted to say, KJ mentioned that she just finished a draft. And it has struck me that I knew from the beginning from a long time ago that your deadline for that first draft of the next book was June 1. And it has been a crazy, crazy time. This was a self-imposed deadline. No one made you do this by this by this June 1 thing, and yet you hit it and I just I don't know if I'd had a chance to tell you this before but I was just so impressed that given everything that's going on and the fact that it was a self-imposed deadline, that you made itKJ Dell'Antonia 3:52 Well thank you. It probably should be said that it was not the first deadline. I was looking back at my bullet journal and noticing that in April, it had draft to Karen (that's my agent) as a goal. So it took at least an extra month beyond what I was hoping. But, I did get it done. I did get a draft to her. She's made some comments, which were extremely helpful. And I have done the hardest part of the revisions and I expect to have the revisions back to her this weekend. And then we shall see if it's time to try to sell it or time for me to just take another pass. Jess Lahey 4:37 It's exciting. It is super exciting.KJ Dell'Antonia 4:39 It is. I'm feeling really good about it. But you know, ask me tomorrow.Jess Lahey 4:43 Who wants to announce our topic today?KJ Dell'Antonia 5:02 We have an actual topic. This is how people know we're not a scripted podcast, we could be because we could have like this really smooth flow could be like, and Jess will say, and I can tell podcasts that are like that. And it isn't that I don't love them. It's that I'm too lazy, I think.Jess Lahey 5:19 They're very time intensive and I have to say from the beginning we knew what we wanted out of a podcast. This is what we wanted. So welcome to our world. KJ Dell'Antonia 5:29 Well, somebody asked on the Facebook group, I think and if you're not in our Facebook group, you totally should be. Someone said, 'We've heard Sarina discuss her decision to go indie, but we've never heard Jess and KJ, talk about their decision to go traditional.' And also, Sarina has been traditionally published in the past as well. So, we thought we'd just talked about that.Jess Lahey 6:00 There are very specific reasons, but it also challenges sort of the status quo, which, you know, get five years ago even, when Sarina started this, you know why you would choose to go traditional isn't a question anyone asked just because there wasn't the landscape that there is now. And we wouldn't have had our amazing role model of Sarina Bowen to look at at the time. But I mean, you're so good at it. The nice thing about having you as a friend is I don't ever say she makes it look easy, you do make it look easy, but I know how much work you put into this. And it's a mind boggling amount of work to do self publishing well, and to do it the way you do it. So that's part of the equation for me, but I love the fact that we can even ask this question now of, you know, why do you go traditional versus self publishing because a couple of years ago it would have been a really clear cut decision.Sarina Bowen 7:02 That's true. I mean, I knew people in 2014, 2013, who were turning down traditional contracts for self publishing. But that was a super rare thing to do. And those people, you know, had extraordinary circumstances and extraordinary insight that, you know, most of us didn't have. And if you go back 10 years, the traditional route was always the right choice. And now the landscape has changed so much that it is sometimes the right choice. But now there's a more interesting decision matrix associated with with who goes traditional and who does not.Jess Lahey 7:51 Well, and I remember, about 10 years ago, there was some story of a woman who had a I can't remember what her name is now, but she had, I think, a fantasy series that she had self published. And the big success story was that she was able to get a three book deal with traditional publishing so she no longer had to slum it over in self publishing. And that was seen as a huge success story. But that's not the case these days. I mean, there are a lot (especially in fantasy or romance) that would look at that and say, 'Well, why would I go over to traditional publishing if I have the platform, and she was very successful, which was the reason she got the deal in traditional publishing.Sarina Bowen 8:33 I do remember that story. And honestly, the reason that it was such a big story is because the numbers attached to it, I believe she had a seven figure deal on that book.Jess Lahey 8:47 Yeah. Well, I brought up the fantasy and romance thing. And Sarina, could you address why I brought those two categories up?Sarina Bowen 8:55 Absolutely. So I have identified sort of three major ways of thinking about an author's approach to self versus traditional. And I feel like the one that you're referencing has to do with gatekeeper's audiences. So romance and fantasy readers tend to select their books right on their phones from the Amazon store or from the Apple books app. And they're not really using gatekeepers for book recommendations. Maybe they're even using Goodreads for this or some sort of crowd-sourced decision making process about how to pick their next genre fiction read. And so it's those places where readers have stopped looking at who the publisher of a book is, where independently published books have been so successful. So one of the first questions you're going to ask yourself when you think about this question is, am I in a gatekeeper genre or niche. So if school librarians would be primary in spreading the word about your book, then you know maybe self-publishing is not for you. If you are in an area of publishing where trade reviews are going to really matter, then traditional publishing is the way to go if you want that starred review from Publishers Weekly because you have an informed decision about how that is going to help your book get seen then yes. So also, if you want to be in a big box store, if your book really is perfect for the end cap at Target, and you know you fit right there. Well, the only way to get into that big box store on the end cap at Target is to be published by a pretty big publisher. So that's a tricky bargain, as it turns out, because I had a traditionally published book with Penguin more than 10 years ago. And it did not get picked up by Target. They told me it was seen as too East Coast. So, I missed the end cap at Target based on the topic in a way that I couldn't really have foreseen. But you have to be fairly far along in your decision making before you'll learn if if that was gonna work out for you. So you know that's difficult. But and the last bit of this is award dominated sectors. Like if you write poetry, or short stories are your mode of expression, then awards and shiny stickers on covers are going to matter to who and how many people see your book. And so that's another gatekeeper audience.Jess Lahey 12:13 Well, and then there's this in between space too, that's really interesting. Like, I still write in education. And there's an in between space of these sort of independent publishers within education. So there's sort of traditional publishing and then there are these like smaller independent publishing, which are kind of self-pub, but not really. Or started out as self-pub and then they became something bigger. And then there's self-pub, self-pub, which is what you have been doing. And I think that that's a really good point that understanding who your audience is going to be, who your intended audience is, really will help you determine if self-pub or traditional pub is the right place for you. And for me, I was writing a book that was really meant for a sort of general audience, it was nonfiction. To do nonfiction in the self-pub world is really hard. I haven't seen a ton of examples that have done really well. And I get sent a lot of self-published books in the education. KJ Dell'Antonia 13:16 I think it's extremely platform dependent. Jess Lahey 13:20 Yeah, that's true. KJ Dell'Antonia 13:21 So if you are Marie Forleo, you've got this massive audience. And I would say that if you had been wanting to self publish your second book, you would have approached the first book.... You would have had to really intensify your email address gathering and your speaking to that audience directly. Like you could probably have set yourself up better to do that. But you would have needed to think about it like from the minute that your book took off, which of course it totally did. You will have needed to be going okay, I mean, how am I gonna collect these people? How am I gonna put them into a pie that is my pie and not the publisher's pie.Sarina Bowen 14:06 You know, there's one kind of nonfiction that actually does really well with self-pub, but it's probably invisible to you. And that is highly prescriptive books.Jess Lahey 14:22 I thought you were gonna say highly prescriptive business books because I was gonna say, those I have seen and that have been very, very successful self-pub.KJ Dell'Antonia 14:33 I was gonna guess that, because if it's like How to Raise Sheep on a New Zealand Sheepholder's Farm When You Are Actually from Norway, you know ten people might buy it, but you're gonna find those ten people.Sarina Bowen 14:49 Yeah, and I'm sure there's people just raking in the money on highly prescriptive nonfiction that is very trend based. But as a writer, that's not really interesting to me. But let's just say you were a CrossFit guy, like at the moment when CrossFit got really big, and all you wanted to do was write about this niche, new little method for working out to like minded individuals, that could have been an amazing self-pub project just based on finding those people in a place where a traditional publisher might have looked at you and said, cross what?Jess Lahey 15:36 Yeah, but then you need people in that field, in that industry, in that hobby, interest, whatever, talking about your book a lot and recommending it to other people within that. Sarina Bowen 15:49 Because I think if it's a very prescriptive thing that people are searching for on Google, then you don't, but if you wanted to write a book about the guy who started CrossFit, then that's different.Jess Lahey 16:07 That's a good point.Sarina Bowen 16:08 Yeah. So one way to look at this decision is to think about an airport bookstore. And everything in an airport bookstore is in a print-centric market, basically. And a lot of people haven't stared quite as hard at airport bookstores as I have, but there's very specific stuff in there.Jess Lahey 16:31 Oh, I stare really hard. And I've wondered a lot about that rack that sits at the edge of the store halfway out in the terminal aisle, that's very prescriptive, either books about faith or books about business. Like I've never heard of any of these books. And they're like, over a quarter of a million copies sold. I've always wondered about those.Sarina Bowen 16:55 They're prescriptive about your mind, but not about like how to rebuild your car. You know what I mean? Like they're practical in like a meta sense, like the big expansive thoughts you want to think about when you're sitting on that plane. And sometimes the decision of who should publish your book is complicated by the author not allowing herself to be honest about whether her book would fit on that shelf. And that's where all the difficulty comes from.Jess Lahey 17:36 Well, the airport bookstore is frustrating to me simply because when you look at what's for sale in many of the smaller ones, it's really only the books that are on bestseller lists in the top, you know, 10 positions.Sarina Bowen 17:48 Yeah, and there's no genre fiction in an airport bookstore, even though people read genre fiction on planes and the reason for that is that you have to think about like how print-centric is your market. So, if you are writing in a very print-centric niche, then traditional publishing will always be a better deal for you but there are different reasons to be print-centric. Like if your desired reader is 12 years old. That's a very print-centric reader in any genre. If you're writing a cookbook, or a workbook, or something where it's actually useful to have this thing on the counter in front of you, again, print-centric. Older readers, like mysteries with older characters in a demographic that has been slower to adopt e-books, also print-centric. And sometimes the only way to find this information is to ask an author who writes in a genre like yours - what is your print ratio. And I'm always surprised that authors don't know their print ratio. Like, the Penguin Random House portal makes this very easy to see. If you log in and look at your numbers. I can tell you that Rookie Move in its first year of publication was 84% e-books and 16% print. And when I saw those numbers, I said, Oh, geez, I should have self-published these books. Because the math just works out that way. But if I had been writing in market women's fiction for Penguin, instead, it might have said 55% print, 45% e-book, and then that would have been a totally different decision matrix. KJ Dell'Antonia 19:41 I want to talk for a minute about a couple of author reasons for doing both, for example, Gretchen Rubin, obviously, a hugely popular traditionally author of books about how people find happiness. She self-published a book that was basically all of her emails (I could get I could be getting what it is wrong, but essentially everything she had emailed to her subscriber list every year because people kept asking her for it. And very few of us have that kind of audience, but I thought that was sort of an interesting one. And then there's another author and I'm looking for her name. So she's a romance writer, and she's British, and her romances are traditionally published, but her books about riding horses, which fall into that sort of sporty, prescriptive category that Sarina was talking about, are self published. So I think that's interesting. Yeah, I mean, they're really fun, but you know, I've read them for a very specific reason, which is that I have an interest, it's exactly what you're talking about. If you're passionate about training your horse in a non-aggressive way, then you're tend towards wanting to read everything you can by people who have already done that, and you don't care how it was published.Sarina Bowen 21:27 Well, if you think about, if I were to write a book about horse training, and I could say to myself, you know, that's not an airport bookstore book.KJ Dell'Antonia 21:44 Tanya Kindersley and her horse books are in KU, you but I don't think her romances are. Yeah, that's not a book for an airport bookstore because that's just not what you're thinking about when you're getting on a plane.Sarina Bowen 22:00 So I also, I tried to make a list of good reasons to go traditional and bad reasons to go traditional and good reasons to go independent and bad reasons. And of course, the way this works is that the bad reasons are much more fun. Okay, so let's start with bad reasons to self publish your book. Bad Reason number one - I'm tired of querying agents, and I'm feeling very impatient.KJ Dell'Antonia 22:34 Oh, yeah, that's a very bad reason. Jess Lahey 22:39 Well, the impatient one is a big one, like, Oh, this would go so much faster if I could just push it out there now, I wouldn't have to wait for a year and a half or whatever to get my book out. That's a biggie.Sarina Bowen 22:49 It's true. And we are all impatient. I mean, I'm just as impatient as the next guy. So that's, that's a bad reason. Another bad reason is I haven't been honest with myself about the quality of this piece or its market readiness. And when people look down on self published books, they're really looking at that. Jess Lahey 23:12 Like I said, I get sent a lot of them and they just needed an editor. They just needed to go through another editing process. They needed a better spell check. You know, that kind of thing. And then that's what leads people to say, oh, self published books stink. I'm not going to read them. And that's simply because there are a lot out there from people who were impatient just pushed them out early.Sarina Bowen 23:37 And even the people that say I'm never reading a self published book have probably read one and didn't know it? Because if it's done right, you know it you don't even notice. KJ Dell'Antonia 23:49 Yeah, if I find myself going, Oh, who published this? That's a bad sign. I never ask that about something that's really good.Sarina Bowen 23:59 Sure. Well, my last bad reason to independently publish was I have unreasonable expectations about the discoverability of my book. So, sometimes people just want to write that book that's half horse training, half memoir. And the reason they haven't found a place for it with a traditional publisher is that they keep getting rejections that sounds like this. 'Well, this is fascinating. We're not sure how to sell it.' It's so tempting to write your story and then say, oh, anyone would read this. Anyone could enjoy it. But the truth is, that same person is super picky about their own reading, right? And so it's it's so hard to really be tough on yourself and say, 'Well, actually, not everyone is going to want to read this.' And it belongs to a highly specific audience. And so if you end up with a beautiful book that you're proud of, but it's really hard to define that audience, well then your next trick is you have to get busy defining it, whether that helps your traditional publisher or your eventual self publishing.Jess Lahey 25:22 And sometimes that can happen by looking at other books (if you can find them) other books that are out there that have sold within that audience, because occasionally what will happen is in a proposal, like in both of my proposals, I've put competing titles in there and my agent Laurie has come back and said, yeah, we need to explain why you included this book because it only sold 800 copies. And so if you're trying to say that there's room in this market, because, look, there's this other book, but it did really poorly. You need to differentiate your book and explain why more people would want to buy it than that book. Sarina Bowen 26:04 So bad reasons to go traditional. Are you ready? Oh, okay, well, bad reason number one. My agent will be upset with me if I don't accept this deal. Bad reason number two, I'm afraid to ask my publisher or my agent to break out the math for is this a good deal for me. Bad Reason number three, there's a stigma attached to self publishing.Jess Lahey 26:54 But don't you also think you have to say there's a stigma attached to self publishing in this category. Sarina Bowen 27:03 I actually have the asterisk and I was about to say that, unless you're trying to reach an audience that is sensitive to that stigma. Bad reason number four, this deal stinks but they'll pay me more next time. And that one's tricky, of course. Because if you're offered no advance, which happens a lot lately, then your publisher has no skin in the game. And that's a really tough decision.Jess Lahey 27:34 Yeah, not good for when it comes to marketing, because there's no impetus to invest in the marketing and publicity for that book.Sarina Bowen 27:43 Yep. And the last bad reason to go traditional is I need a publisher's validation. Who doesn't want to be wanted?Jess Lahey 27:55 Well, and it's tough because, you know, when writers get together and talk, they ask who each other's publisher is and you know, it's still a loaded conversation.KJ Dell'Antonia 28:05 In our genres they do. In Sarina's genre I think they probably don't. You're probably already kind of vaguely aware, right.Sarina Bowen 28:14 Yeah, but in romance, where it's we're like the canary in the coal mine market for independent publishing. And when I meet an author who has a long string of traditionally published titles, what I think about that author is, she must be awesome at writing. Because if you're not, you're going to be dropped on your head by your publisher pretty fast, right? But when I meet somebody who is very successful at self publishing, I think she must be a great writer, and she definitely knows a lot about the market because self publishing your work forces you to learn a ton about what readers want and how they make decisions. Whereas in traditional publishing, it might suit your life better to be published by someone who isn't you, but you will not learn as much. You just simply can't. Because a lot of those decisions are made out of your viewpoint.Jess Lahey 29:16 Yeah, and it's a lot of work to do all that stuff and to learn all that stuff. I mean, it's a lot of work. I guess the other thing you have to think about along those lines is you have to do a lot of work that does take away from your writing time. And if you hate it, I mean, that's the other thing. You really like the business stuff and you like analyzing markets and you like figuring those things out. I don't know that I want to do any of that. And so that's another part of the decision, too. Is is what do you like doing about this and what do you hate doing about this and is it going to drive you crazy and make you sad to have to do that work? You know, the background stuff, the marketing, and the business, and all of that stuff.Sarina Bowen 30:04 Definitely. And with regard to romance, because we've already established that that's a perfectly good market to independently publish in. After I started doing it myself, I flipped quickly to well, everyone should do this, because I saw the ways in which that it allowed me to cut the line and build a readership faster than traditionally published romance authors were able to do because their publisher held on to all the information, like who's reading the book, and what's their email address. So I was able to more quickly build a readership that really belong to me. But then as the the work of self publishing ate my life in an increasingly aggressive way, I softened on my stance of you know, what might work for me might really not work for someone else. If I had a day job at the Pentagon, like one of my colleagues does, then self publishing would just be like having a third job. Everybody has to make her own decision.Jess Lahey 31:13 Yeah, like I love the PR and marketing stuff, but some of the things that you do and are so good at and love because that's the money stuff and the numbers, you love that stuff. And it's just not my not my bag. KJ Dell'Antonia 31:30 I definitely did not think about self publishing the novel that I sold exactly because I didn't really, I always intended to go out with it. Because my position was just so good for going out as a traditionally published author and getting a decent advance. But what I sort of always had in the back of my mind was if this career as a traditionally public hopefully book a year, author of women's fiction doesn't work out the way that I want it to, I have your model of doing it. But what you do is different and I know that. Like I would have to be able to write books more quickly and develop the audience. If I wanted to do it like that, I would do it like that. I don't know if that makes any sense. I mean, because, because I love what you do. But I didn't think it was quite what I wanted to do right now. And I don't know that I could either. Your success is pretty astonishing. Sarina Bowen 33:04 I know what you mean. And the word astonishing comes to me sometimes too, when I do consider the luck involved, and timing, and all kinds of things like that.Jess Lahey 33:16 Well, the word astonishing comes into it for me, mostly because from when I first started looking at whether I was going to get traditionally published, I could put my arms around that, I knew what that looked like. And we call it traditional publishing because it's traditional, but until Sarina started doing it, I had no idea what that looked like. It wasn't something I could even envision because I didn't know what was involved and when you can't envision something, it seems completely overwhelming. But now that I've been watching Sarina do this, it is something I can get my arms around and it's much more of an option to me mentally if there isn't all of this sort of mystery out there about what's involved. So I think very few writers have someone to look to that have done this and can break it down for you and show you exactly what it is and exactly how it works. And I think that's part of why people tend to think about traditional publishing first is simply because it's traditional, and you can look and there are a million books out there on how to do it. But I have to assume there are a lot of self-pub books about how to do self publishing. And if you start googling them, you will find them and they are very niche books, as you said about giving very practical advice about how to do a very specific thing.KJ Dell'Antonia 34:41 You know, there are books that if I wrote them, I would totally sell. If I wrote that natural horse training memoir, or a dog training memoir, or something like that, I would totally self publish that. I'd be doing it for a different reason and a different audience. Jess Lahey 35:09 Well, and the other thing is, it has to do with knowing who the people in the landscape are again, too. Like, one of the things that Sarina had to do is figure out who's who in the romance publishing world. And now you know who's who in the natural horsemanship world and knowing those who those people are and who to reach out to and who to advertise to and do your PR with. That's another big hurdle that makes it more comprehensible to you that you would do the self-pub thing.Alright. Sarina, you were the one who had the wonderful list, have we hit everything that you wanted to talk about?Sarina Bowen 36:02 We have pretty much and I would just like to leave it with this idea. And that's that every author who's contemplating publishing at all, should really do their level best to define their own audience. So that could be something like the audience for this book is nursing students, or ComicCon attendees, or fans of James Patterson, just the more granular and precise you can be about defining the audience for your work, the easier it is to convince a publisher to take you on or to just figure out how you're going to sell the darn thing if you publish it yourself. Jess Lahey 36:46 And we've talked about this in book proposal writing, too, that saying, oh, everyone will want to read this book is like the first big mistake. So yeah, that granular look is important for traditional publishing, too. So you're gonna have to think about that no matter what.Sarina Bowen 37:00 That's right, some of these decisions and self honesty exercises are going to be undertaken no matter what decision you make. Jess Lahey 37:11 I love that you called it self honesty decision. That was really good. I like that because that's what it is, you know, that's absolutely what it is getting real about who's gonna read your book.KJ Dell'Antonia 37:23 Fellow writers, before we get into what we've been reading, let me flag for you the big message of this episode. If you're going to indie pub, you better be honest with yourself about what you've written. If you've got some doubts about your ability to do that, and who doesn't, a book coach might be the answer, both to help you assess what you've done, the strengths and the weaknesses, and to figure out what else if anything you might want to do before grabbing one of those self publishing how-to books we talked about and getting out into the market. Author Accelerator book coaches know their stuff when it comes to both traditional and indie publishing to find one that's right for you head to authoraccelerator.com.Jess Lahey 38:07 Speaking about reading books, let's do that part. Let's talk about what we've been reading because oh my gosh, I've been reading such good stuff.Sarina Bowen 38:15 I've got one. I am reading Boyfriend Material by Alexis Hall, who is a man. And he is always hilarious and I recommend him wholeheartedly.Jess Lahey 38:31 Ooh, that sounds like fun. What do you got KJ? KJ Dell'Antonia 38:33 I also have a fun one. I have just finished The Exit Strategy by Lainey Cameron. It is a super fast moving story of two really go-getter women in Silicon Valley, which always fascinates me in and of itself, who discover that they are both - one is married to and the other is engaged to the same really, really rotten con artist. So it's got overtones. I mean, it's not like he's having an affair, it's like full on con artist stuff. So they're sort of race to get away from him and out from under him and they have to work together on something, it's just super fast, and entertaining, and kind of a juicy read, and I really enjoyed it. So that's The Exit Strategy from Lainey Cameron, and it just came out last week I think.Jess Lahey 39:32 But speaking of listening to things because that's how I've been doing just about everything lately because I've been outside a lot. I have been listening to Sara Stewart Taylor's The Mountains Wild and it just came out this week, the week we're recording, and actually we'll link to it in the show notes, but we did interview Sara Stewart Taylor early on in the process, we interviewed her about mystery writing, because that's what she does. And she's really good at it. And she has a whole bunch of books that I have read of hers. But this Mountains Wild book is really special. And the reason I want to talk about the audio version is that when you do an audio book and you need to find a narrator that can do other languages, lots of accents, I'm assuming it's a really tough get and the woman who narrates Sara's book is fantastic. She gets the Gaelic, she does the Dublin accent, the Northern Ireland accent, the Long Island accent, and she does male, and female and there's no moment where I'm saying, Oh, this isn't a full cast of characters, this is one person pretending to be lots of people and it's really, really good. Sarah's writing is beautiful. And the audio narration is spectacular. And so congratulations, Sara Stuart Taylor on the release of your book. This is what's fun about this podcast, I think is having this long view like, you know, we interview them early on when they first got their book deal, and then come back to them when the book is actually out. So anyway, I'm proud of Sara. It's really good. Alright. I think that's it for this week.KJ Dell'Antonia 41:28 I think that's it for this week. I want to remind everyone to sign up for our weekly email with the shownotes because that is also how you will get all the book recommendations with their links, as well as links to our fantastic sponsors, and links to our Facebook group and links to everything that we talk about. Plus, it's your little announcement that there's a fat new episode waiting for you in your podcast player. And if you want to go one step further, you can support the podcast financially. And as a result, get weekly mini episodes or writer top fives that are super good and super fun. And those mini episodes also drop right into your podcast player once you support the podcast, which is a fun little trick that our friends at Substack have figured out.Jess Lahey 42:22 In fact, I'm recording one today. I love recording those little mini episodes. They're really fun. And if you want to, actually, we mentioned that today's topic came straight out of our #AmWriting Facebook group and we keep really tight reins on. There's no mean stuff and people are nice and supportive and it's moderated and it's just a bunch of writers supporting each other and it's a really fun place to hang out. And if you ask any questions there who knows it may be a topic on a future show.KJ Dell'Antonia 42:54 This is true and you can find all of those links at amwriting podcast.com. Jess Lahey 43:01 All right, everyone. This is it, until next week, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game. This episode of #AmWriting with Jess and KJ was produced by Andrew Parilla. Our music, aptly titled unemployed Monday was written and performed by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their services because everyone, even creatives should be paid. This is a public episode. Get access to private episodes at amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Dr. Ginger Campbell is the host of Brain Science, a very large neuroscience podcast, and one of the earliest neuroscience podcasts created. In this episode, she discusses the podcast itself, why and how she started it up, as well as what it takes to run a neuroscience podcast. Top three takeaways: If you want to make a scientific podcast, you must understand the workload that comes with it. It takes a lot to generate accurate scientific content for your listeners. When doing a scientific podcast, it is critical to think about your audience. It can be very helpful to try to reach those outside your field, especially in science, as there is a need for this communication. When picking a topic for your podcast, pick something that you are passionate about, and something that you can talk about easily. [0:00] Ladan introduces the episode and the guest, Ginger Campbell [3:30] Campbell explains why she chose neuroscience as the topic for her podcast [6:45] The subject that Campbell is most interested in right now is the intrinsic activity of the brain [10:15] One author suggests that we should do away with the idea of the mind, and focus more on how the brain as an organ interacts with the world around it [12:45] To make a scientific podcast, one must realize that there is a tremendous workload involved. Creating accurate scientific content for a podcast is much different than making a podcast talking about your favorite TV show or sports team. [16:30] Authors enjoy coming onto the podcast for the publicity, as obtaining publicity can be very difficult, and being a guest on a popular podcast can be very beneficial [19:00] When doing a science podcast, you need to deeply think about the audience you are trying to reach. Communicating with those outside your field about what your field does is very beneficial in building a good audience, as there is a need for this type of communication. [22:15] Be careful of goofing off at the beginning of shows and going off on irrelevant tangents early in the episode, or it may prompt some audience members to stop listening [26:00] Campbell started the podcast because she has an interest and a knack for explaining science, the same way she explains medicine to her patients [29:30] Due to the current economic crisis happening, podcasters depending on advertising will likely suffer within the near future [31:00] For those wanting to do a podcast, it is important to pick a subject that you are passionate about. Talk about what you know and what interests you. [34:30] It is easier to make a podcast about neuroscience than about quantum mechanics, because everyone has a brain, whereas quantum mechanics do not affect people’s lives [37:00] Listener feedback is what will really keep you going when it gets tough [39:00] Ladan gives further thoughts on the discussion and discusses the services of Neural Implant Media   TRANSCRIPT (Auto-generated): Welcome to the neural implant podcast where we talk with the people behind the current events and breakthroughs in brain implants and understandable way, helping bring together various fields involved in Euro prosthetics. Here is your host, Latin Yara. Check. Hello everyone, and welcome to the neural implant podcast. Today we have a special guest. It's ginger Campbell of the brain science. Podcast, and I'm really happy to have her on the show. She is an O, G original gangster of the neuroscience podcasting space. She's been doing this since 2006 and the really one of the pioneers of podcasting, she says podcasting started in 2004 so she's not completely. The first person to do this, but that was like 1415 years ago, so you know, we can call it pretty much like that. So really interesting stuff. She's had over 10 million downloads on her show and really an honor to talk to. One of the people that started out Pluralsight is podcasting ginger Campbell. Pleasure to have you on the show. You are the host of the brain science podcast, which is a huge neuroscience podcast, and I'm really excited to have you on. We've actually been talking about this for awhile and do you want to introduce the podcast a little bit? Yeah, thanks. First I want to mention that the name of the podcast is. Brain science podcast is not part of the name anymore. Just in case you happen to be searching in your podcasting app. I think I took the name, I think I took podcasts I will name about five years ago. Actually, I don't remember exactly when I did it. I decided that putting podcasts in your title had become sort of redundant. Back when I started in 2006 it was really common for podcasts to be part of the title, but you know, now it's not so much. So anyway, just plain old brain science, neuroscience for everyone. Now you're making me rethink the name of my podcast. And so basically the idea of the show is to explore how recent discoveries in neuroscience are helping unravel the mystery of how our brains make us human. And my tagline is. The show for everyone who has a brain, because I want to communicate. The show doesn't require a scientific background. However, the listeners are very diverse, ranging from people who haven't gone to college. I've got a house painter and a plumber, and then actual neuroscientists, so that makes for a challenge when I'm creating my show. Interesting. And you said you started back way back in 2006 I think that's pretty much when a podcasting started. How was that? Well, podcasting officially started in 2004 and then it appeared in iTunes in the summer of 2005 which is when many of us early people became aware of it because before that you had to be able to. Code your own RSS feed and stuff like that. So I wasn't that much of a pioneer. And then it took me about a year to figure out what I wanted to make my show about. So, so I think I started about two years in which now that I'm on my 14th year, I guess, represents almost a pioneer. Yeah. I think for those looking back nowadays, they would, they would see very much as to see very little of a distinction. It's like, Oh, when did you, you know, when did you come to America? 1492 or 1512 or something. Like I said that at some point it's kind of like, ah, it's kind of, you know, splitting hairs, but so why did you choose neuroscience. Well because it just happened to be what I was reading at the time that I decided to start a show. I didn't want to show about my job, which I'm a physician, so I wanted to show that was about what I was just interested in, and at the time, neuroscience hadn't been quite become quite so popular, but I would be listening to people say things that weren't quite right because mainstream media. Coverage of science and neuroscience is, you know, pretty bad, and I wanted to share the things I was reading. I figured lots of people weren't going to read the books. I wanted to share the stuff I was learning with others. That was really my motivation and I wanted to make a show that was accurate, that told people what the science really shows. That was my, that was my driver. So you're working as a physician, but not necessarily in the field of neuroscience. It was just kind of an interest of yours then, right? Yeah. I actually came through it through philosophy of mind. I was reading Western philosophy for the first time in my life. I had been through Eastern philosophy, which is actually very mind oriented, but not exactly science oriented. And then I decided to explore Western philosophy. I discovered there's this whole subset of philosophy called philosophy of mind, and that's when I discovered that neuroscience had come a long way since I had last. Got it. Which was like right before I started medical school in 1980 that was in the days of huge glass electrodes and, and so I got really fascinated with neuroscience because like I said, it, it, it's, it helps us understand who we are. Yeah, definitely. And I mean, but that's still pretty interesting. I mean, there was a, to keep something up for 15 years or to, to maintain, you know, as somewhat expensive habits and a very, very time consuming habit of podcasting, you know, really is, is more than just a passing interest. I would have to argue that there was something bigger driving you, like how you were thinking, why you were thinking and the science. So maybe what were your favorites. Episodes or favorite subjects like this philosophy of mine. Specific topics, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. Early on, I was really interested in the question of consciousness. That would be a major theme that still carries through on the show. My favorite early episode was one about exercise and the brain. With John Rady, unfortunately, as a horrible sound quality, but, but that was my favorite early episode because that was something people could use. He explained why exercising is good for your brain, and since the people who tend to listen to my show oftentimes care about their brain health, that one was one that had a personal impact for people. So it stands out out for me. Really? Yeah, definitely. Yeah. And then of course, learning about brain plasticity. That was something that was new at the beginning of the show. Now it's kind of old hat everybody knows about brain plasticity, but the subject that really, the subject that I'm really fascinated by right now actually has to do with the intrinsic activity of the brain. And this actually might be relevant to your listeners who are interested in neural implants, because I've been reading a couple of books about the idea of the intrinsic activity of the brain. One is called the brain from the inside out by URI Misaki, which is, he's the guy who's very well known as a pioneer in brain rhythms. And I have another one. I can't think of the name of it right the second, I think it's called the spontaneous brain, but they're both on the same idea that we need to start looking at the brain from the inside out. It's intrinsic activity is really a key feature, and the reason why I think this might be relevant to people interested in neural implants is that I think it may explain how something like say the cochlear implant. Is why it's so successful. I don't know if you're aware of this, but when the cochlear implant was first invented, people didn't really think it would work because the amount of information in the signal is very poor relative to normal hearing. And what they found was that people learned to make sense out of what they were hearing from the cochlear implant. You start out making sense, but eventually their brain just kind of decoded it. And so. Bruce hockey's idea is that the brain is going along, making signals, making it, throwing signals out, throwing signals out. And then when we're lippy as a part of life, we associate through the timing of brain rhythms. A spontaneous signal was something else in the world, and we make a match. So if that's really true, then that means our brain can be more flexible for, you know, learning, you know, new ways to interact with the world. For example, a brain machine interface. You know, we could learn to, to generate a different brain pattern, to do a thing, say with the computer. And that seems to be what people are actually experiencing, right? When they're trying to create these interfaces. Are you familiar with what I'm talking about? Yeah. Yeah, I know. I know. Boost hockey has a boost hockey, uh, array the Tetro and everything like this, and, and some of my colleagues have worked with them, but yeah, it's, it's definitely, you know, the amount of plasticity that's in the brain. And you, you might remember this actually, you might've been around like when this was, people were saying like, Oh, there's no, you know, change in the brain. There's no neurons being created after, after childhood. Right. And essentially that everything's kind of set in stone, but you know, that that basically negates all of learning. And, you know, people like kind of, kind of like with the cochlear implant, like, you know, people can learn crazy, crazy stuff like Morse code. I mean, people learn beeps and boops, you know, and, and translate that into, you know, speech almost. And, and like, I think I heard, I was hearing about like, people that are really good at Morse code, like they almost here. Writing or speech in that, you know? So yeah, it's crazy stuff. All this, all this about plasticity and how dynamic the brain actually is. And this other guy that I'm reading, and I'm, I can't pronounce his name, so I'm love to say it, but the name of his book is the spontaneous brain. He actually argues that maybe we should even do away with the idea of the mind and just talk about the world brain problem. That is, how does the brain. Interact with the world. And in, in his book, he, he talks about the empirical evidence. It's very similar to be sockies because they both talk about the evidence that faster rhythms are nested into slower rhythms. And also the fact that when you look at the brain's response to an external signal, it's. Influenced by whatever the brain is already doing. They're not additive. There's an interaction. So I think that idea, the idea of just doing away with the idea of the mind, he calls it a Copernican revolution because he's saying instead of having this, you know, like sort of mind centered view of the world, which gives us this, this, you know, mind body problem, which we can't seem to solve that. If we just shift our viewpoint from. To the interaction between the brain and the world. We can just do away with the whole mind body problem. It's just kind of an interesting thought. Yeah, definitely. I think, I think there definitely is a fallacy that lies there. But I want to talk about the podcast. So, you know, you have written here that you've passed 10 million downloads and are very influential. You've been ranked number one on iTunes and Libsyn, which is a big, you know, podcast, hosting a site. They're also have you as one of the proud, you know, like, Hey, look, who goes with us? You know, look who we have, you know, is one of our customers. But what has been your experience with hosting? One of the biggest. Well, unfortunately, science podcasts are not, you know, the most popular in terms of big numbers. I mean, my numbers are very good for science, but because of the way advertising works, you need really big numbers to, to make money. To give you an example, I don't know if you've heard of the person who does grammar girl. She's. Made a business out of her podcast, a Minoan Fogarty. She actually started as a science podcast and back in 2007 she told me she gave up science podcasting cause it was too much work. And, and that really is a reality. I mean, if you're going to, I know you would like to encourage more people to do science podcasts and so would I. But I think that it is important to be realistic about the work. Load involved. You know, if you make a fan cast about your favorite TV show and you just get together with your buddies and talk about it, you know, every week it's not, I mean, it's time consuming, but it's not the same kind of work as trying to create accurate science content. I think it's a level of challenge that the people that the average podcast or doesn't appreciate. That's funny that there's more money in grammar than there is in science. Yeah. Well, everybody needs grammar, and a lot of people don't think they need science. Yeah. No, it's very helpful actually. So what has been some of your, I don't know, responses or what? What kind of feedback have you gotten over? Geez, almost a decade and a half that you've been doing this, huh? Well, the two most surprising things. One is feedback from students. I never. Expected the feedback from students. I thought of my show as being a show that would be sort of the NPR adult kind of person who, who was curious about about neuroscience, but I have students of all ages, and I actually have one listener. Who is now in his first year of residency, who's been listening to the show as a psychiatry resident who's been listening to the shows for eight years since he was in high school. So that's pretty amazing. And I've had people write to me and say, I'm going to go into neuroscience because of listening to the show, so that. That was a total surprise. I did not expect that. And the other surprising thing is when people with with neurological or mental health challenges write to me and tell me that. That might show helps them to cope with their challenges. I had a listener once who said he was listening to the show with his father who was dying from Alzheimer's, and I recently actually had a patient, sorry, excuse me, habit, a listener, right? Saying that he had recently been diagnosed with early onset dementia, and he was still listening to the show that he felt that was helpful to him. So. It's as a physician, I have to say that the most amazing thing is realizing the show has impacted so many people, so many more people than I'll ever reach as a physician. Yeah, that's pretty amazing stuff. I mean, and that's something I, I, you know, talk about on my show as well. Like, you know, a good scientific paper might get, you know, a hundred views and like five citations or something like this. And that's, you know, you can be proud of that. But with our shows, you can get hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of downloads and that reach, although maybe not as deep and, and like, you know, in the specific subset it breaches, it goes much further. And I think that really. Gives your research and your message much more value as well. Yeah. I don't have any trouble getting guests. Uh, even though I do focus on scientists who write books, I occasionally interview people who are involved in basic science, especially people that are, uh, extremely good at communicating like Seth grant, for example. But the reason that I focus on books is that it gives my listeners a place to go if they want to learn more. The average person doesn't have access to the literature. You know, they don't have access to an academic library. All these, lots of these papers are still behind paywalls. But by talking to somebody who's taken the time to put a bunch of research together in a book, if a person you know, wants to go to the next level, their first choice is just go and read the book and people actually do that. So authors are very happy to come on my show cause they, most of them really do understand that. Yeah. They, they want as much, you know, public publicity as I can get. Cause it really can be hard to sometimes break above the noise. And yeah. I mean there is something special about like having somebody who's worked in the field and you know, potentially. Simplify things and, and, you know, get it from behind the paywall because that's actually, that's the reason I started this show as well, was, you know, trying to get to the research. I was outside of the paywall at the time, but I wanted to learn what everybody was doing and who the big people in the field were. So, uh, I figured I might as well help other people with this as well. So, yeah. That, that's really interesting. You, you're very much into books. You have a different, you have another podcast about books actually as well, right? Yeah, so it's called, it's called books and ideas. It has a pretty small audience because it's not niche enough. You know, in podcasting, it seems to be an advantage to be, to have a niche. And even though books and ideas clearly describes what the show really is, it, it's not quite, I mean, it's really the place I put everything that doesn't fit. So I might talk to a science fiction writer, or I might talk to a scientist. I might talk to, I, I've interviewed. Astronomers physicists, a woman who's written video game novels. So I mean, it's very, very, very diverse, which I enjoy, but makes finding its audience difficult. So it's truly my passion project. Yeah, for sure. That's a, that's interesting. So what do you think, I mean, do you think, uh, the world would be better if there was more podcasts if more people were doing this kind of stuff, or would it be crowded or what's, what's your kind of opinion on science communication? We definitely need more good science podcasts. I mean, many years ago, I actually tried to start a website. It was called, this was back in 2008 I started a website called science pod-casters dot org and I tried to recruit Joe's to come and basically share their. Show notes all in one place so people may be, would find them. And I closed it down in 2010 because the national science foundation started their site, which I think is called. Science three 60 I'm not sure. Anyway, it's a very good clearinghouse for good science podcasts, and there was a way I could compete with that, but I do think that if you're going to do a science podcast, you really do need to think about what is the audience you actually want to reach. If you want your show to be, you know, the inside baseball, you know, really highly technical. Fine, but realize your chances of getting an audience is going to be, you know. You could, it's okay to have a small audience, but you need to know that that's what's going to happen if you want. If your passion is you want people outside your field to understand what your field is about, I think that's really, really valuable, especially these days because science journalism, you know, the newspapers aren't paying for science journalists, the television networks. Obviously aren't paying for good science journalists, so there's a huge need for somebody to go out there and communicate to people what science is really about. To give you an example of another great Lipson podcast that I'm promoting right now, for obvious reasons, is this weekend virology. I mean, if you want to hear a great show, that's really the science of coronavirus. This week in virology, which is a Lipson show and Vincent ranch and Ella used to be a part of my science podcast or.org organization. This week in virology launched in 2008 so it's not a, you know, Hey, let's jump on the bandwagon. You know, I had to get that in there cause I really think this is an important show for people to listen to. I just think that, I think it's really valuable. We need, I'd like to see some good physics shows that, you know, tried to explain things to regular people like me. You know, I guess maybe Sean Carroll does a little on his, but he, his show is, I don't think it's. It's really focused on physics, even though he's a physicist. Yeah, but if you're going to do it, I would the run recommendation if I had anything to do different, I don't know if you're planning to ask me that question. If I was going to do something different, I would want to have a cohost. I mean, you know someone to carry the load so that you know it's not all on you. If you can find a cohost, you'll probably have a better chance of, of lasting and not pod fading. And plus listeners enjoy, you know, hearing the relationship between the cohost. And that's something that, that, that I, I've never had the opportunity to do. Yeah, definitely. I agree. Like I've, I've had, I've also co-hosted some, some other podcasts, you know, with some colleagues, and that does get go much better because you get a different perspective. I mean, obviously, you know, the questions that you ask, you know your way of thinking, but then the cohost might ask a question and that's just like, Oh wow. That is actually very interesting. I'm very curious what the answer is. I think that's a very good piece of advice. But beware of the excess chitter chatter. I can't tell you how many podcasts I have turned off at the beginning because everybody's talking about. You know, it doesn't matter what TV show they watched or whatever. Most of us can't pull that off. I mean, if you're like a celebrity, maybe somebody wants to know what you did last night, but otherwise they probably don't and they're probably going to turn off your show before you even get to your interview. If you make it a habit. Of doing too much goofing around at the beginning. And that's, that's just my opinion. But I've heard other podcast listeners say the same thing when talking about what shows they turn off. Most of us aren't as funny as we think we are and know, get to the point. For sure. I completely agree. It has to be substantive. So, okay, so what's, what's your plans with the future of brain science and what kind of goals are you hoping to accomplish with it? Well, you know, this year it's hard to know what's going to happen. I was really hoping to take the show to another level this year. I actually experimented with going back to twice a month, which I, um, did the first two years of the show. But I've decided to go back to once a month, which has worked well for over 10 years. I'm trying, I was planning to release the second edition of my book. Are you sure? The unconscious. Origins of certainty next week, but that's been held up just in the layout. Um, stage, just because of uncertainties with, with the pen dynamic, and I'm not sure how people are going to get books. Amazon's society books are very low priority. If you order a book right now from Amazon, it'll come whenever. So it's probably not a re the best possible time to be releasing a book. And I really want to write that book. Are you sure is really just based on several older episodes of the show. And what I really want to do is to write a truly original book because I mean, I got almost 15 years worth of material. I got lots of material. I want to write an original book, mainly because let's face it, there's still a lot of people who don't listen to podcasts. And. The reality is books are still, you know, the gold standard. So I want to write a really good, but it's called, it's going to be called why neuroscience matters, because really my, my whole premise is that understanding how neuroscience works should be a basic scientific literacy skill for the 21st century. For example, if you understand what cognitive dissonance is. Politics make a lot more sense, but at any rate, so that's really my focus for this year is to get those books out. And then I w I hope they will help grow the show, but the main thing is to reach new people. Okay. Yeah. Just kind of educate the world on, on everything that's going on, how we think, why we think, I think that's a really good idea. But I would, I would argue that, you know, books are, you know, obviously they reach different type of peer person than, than podcasting. And maybe more, maybe less, I don't know. But I would say that even better. Methods of teaching. And a big part of that is actually video is, you know, lot more people. For example, watch YouTube, then read books. Yeah. And I'm not going to argue with that. I don't see myself as a video person. If somebody came to me and said, Hey, do you want to be part of a video project? I'd say, cool, but I'm not, you know, I'm not gonna. Take that on as a solo project. Audio podcasting is enough of a challenge as a solo project. I appreciate the fact that that a lot of people still, you know, now learn by video. I happened to be a person who learns by reading and believe that there are still those of us out there. We learn by reading and I'm willing to accept the fact that. Someone else may be reaching those video people. Yeah. And if somebody wants to come to me and say, Hey, here's your great book. How can we put parts of it into a video? You know, I'll be, I'll be up for that too, but I know what my strength is. Yeah. I mean, I got into podcasting because I realized almost immediately that it was just something that, that, um, really excited me and I felt like I was good at it. Explaining science is a lot more like my day job in which I explained medicine to my patients. So it kind of, you know, trying to translate things into English is something that sort of comes naturally, or at least I've been doing it so long. It feels natural. Yeah, definitely. Kind of, I mean, essentially you're translating from Latin into English. Well, it's not quite that bad, but close enough. Yeah. I did want to talk about one other thing that was related to the book, and that was, I had. I've had half a listener who's been just sort of hounding me about making an audio version of, are you sure? Which I'm not planning to do, partly because of expense and partly because of the content is already available mostly in audio. Format, but when I do my big book project, I definitely do consider making an audio version of it to be essential for the exact reason that you just mentioned that the format of audio is so good for reaching people. And the thing I love about audio versus video is that a person can be. They can be driving their car. They have been going for a walk. They can be cleaning their house. They can, I don't know how you would mow the lawn because I don't think you'd be able to hear it, but you can do a lot of stuff while you're listening to audio as opposed to, you know, video, which if you're actually really paying attention, you know, you kind of have to. Look at it. So that's why I'm comfortable with not doing video, although I appreciate the fact that, that it's, it's a very powerful tool. I mean, I'm the person who, when I go to the website, I don't watch the videos. I say I look for the, where did they put the written instructions? In fact, I have a coach who has all these videos and she's learned that she's just going to send me the PDFs because I don't want to watch the video. So it may be a generational thing, but. You know, I'm a baby boomer. There's plenty of people in my boom's still left. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mean, I think also like audio is kind of the sweet spot where it's easily accessible and you also, like you said, you can do it while doing other things, driving, transporting, you know, basically all the stuff that I've stopped doing. So actually I've had my podcast kind of pile up because I've stopped commuting to work and I stopped, you know, doing all this stuff that where I, where I used to listen to podcasts. It's been a, it's been pretty bad. I'm going to have quite a backlog once I get back to everything. Right. And that's, you know, that's why it's hard to know what's going to happen. Rob Walch from, from Lipson, he, he's been talking on the feed about how the last slump in, in podcast advertising happened in 2008 with the, with the financial crisis in 2008 and I remember that because I had one. Really great advertising campaign with the Navy, and then the rates just went through the bottom. I mean, they just, they went way down. So people, podcasts, which you rely on, on advertising, are really going to be, you know, hurting in the next, you know, foreseeable future. And then the people who are making their living off of production, you know, audio editing and things like that are probably also gonna, you know, struggle a little for me. My show's established and I can survive on a plateau for a while, but if I was somebody just starting out, I'm not saying you shouldn't start now. But this might be a good time to be in the planning phases, right. And, and really get everything aligned up. Maybe if, I think if I was starting a new show at this point, what I might consider doing is getting a large number of interviews in the can, right. And then launching in the fall, maybe when people are hopefully going to be back on a more regular schedule and then you won't have that time pressure of trying to put out a show every week. So we can make the best of it. Yeah, definitely. Don't have this be dead time. Have it be useful, actually. Yeah. So what is, what are some, what is some advice that you have for people in the neuroscience field? Neurotechnology in general, like through your experience in the field and, and having talked to so many people. Well, I always, I always ask my guests to give advice to students because I have so many student listeners, and one of the things that, that many of my guests say, which I think applies to us whether or not we're students or not, is to choose something that, that you're really passionate about. In other words, if you were going to do a podcast. Unless you are intentionally planning a very short run series that's gonna like say go 12 episodes in and, but if you want to do it for a prolonged period of time, you've got to pick something that you're really passionate about. I picked neuroscience because I felt like I wasn't going to run out of material, which has certainly proven to be true every time. I think that I've kind of gotten. You know, into a stuck point. I turn around and I've got a bunch of new books in my mailbox and I'm like, and I get enthused again. So if the subject doesn't light you up, you're not going to last. I think the, the old writing advice, you know, to re, you know, which is write what you know, probably applies to podcasting too. Yeah, definitely. I would completely agree. I mean, you know, even even in the field of, even in the sub field of neural implants, you know, especially the guests that I have a little bit more familiarity with, it's much easier for me versus something like, you know, computational stuff or you know, programming or whatever, and they're just like, Oh shoot, this is a bit outside of what I know and what I can intelligently speak about. But also, I guess not. What I'm interested in. I am interested in it, but maybe not to the extent to the other stuff. So I completely agree, and I think you've shown this very well. It's, it's not a sprint, it's a marathon, you know? And then when you're, when you're planning your interviews, I think they're, the most obvious rule is read ahead of time. You know, you know, if you listen to interviews in the mainstream media, you can lots of times tell that they haven't read anything by the person that they're interviewing, right? So even if you're interviewing somebody who's only who's written a paper or whatever, you want to have read their work. And then when you're thinking about your interview, I recommend making your questions. Ask yourself, well, what is the one thing about this person's work that I want my listeners to understand? And then gear all your questions to that. And most scientists don't mind if you say to them, can you back up for a minute and explain what you meant by XYZ? If you're making a show for nonspecialists, they don't have to understand everything, but they need to be able to understand the big picture and they don't like being talked down to. I mean, the show I do basically goes against all the, all the dogma about how to do science. Broadcasting. You know, if you look at mainstream media, everything is so watered down. There's this assumption that people won't understand it or that you need a bunch of special effects, which of course obviously don't have and neither one. I think neither one of those things are true, but you do have to be able to make it clear. Why should I, the guy off the street care about this? I mean, you're doing a show about neural implants. I think probably, you know that. That's not as hard as it might be for some other show. I always like to joke that it's a lot easier to make a podcast about neuroscience because everybody does have a brain, and neuroscience really does affect us as individuals, whereas like most of us are not affected by quantum mechanics, so it doesn't matter whether we understand it or not. Yeah, I mean, I know we are affected by quantum mechanics on some level, but you know what I mean? We're not making day to day decisions based on her understanding of quantum mechanics. Yeah, exactly. Kind of make it relevant. Bring it, bring it all home. Right. And I'm not mean telling them what to think. I am also a big believer in trusting that the science can speak for itself. You know, decide what the key idea is. Help your guest to share that key idea. And then you have to trust your listeners. Yeah, for sure. This is really interesting stuff. I love it. Um, you know, especially coming from, you know, like I said, one of the biggest science podcasters, you know, of our time and, and somebody who's been doing it all, I'll say pretty much from the beginning. Yeah. There's a couple of science podcasts out there. They've been around longer than mine, but not many. Yeah, I mean, I, I, I'd have a hard time believing it honestly. Like, unless it was like radio program before, I was just like, Oh, we might as well do podcasting in addition to this, like science Friday. That's kinda what I'm thinking. Right. I don't care that I don't count those because those are repurposed radio shows. So you're right. One of the oldest ones is probably a repurposed radio show, but there is a show called the astronomy cast, which is Pam Hamlin. Gay's done over 300 episodes of that show. I think she launched in three 2005 while she's in the podcasting hall of fame, the only science podcast in the podcasting hall of fame, like actual hall of fame. Well, it's called the Academy of podcasters, and now it's been bought out, so it's probably going to become the Hollywood podcasting hall of fame, but the people that are currently in it are true pioneers. Just Google Academy of podcasters hall of fame. She got a star on the Hollywood walk of fame. No. But yeah. Yeah, it's, it's, it's a lot of work creating a science podcast, but I think it's, it's, it's a great way to share pot. I think it's a great way to share science. It just, it's just a lot of work. You have to, the thing that will keep you going if you decide to do it, and I don't know if this is your experience, but for me, it's listener feedback. Every time I think I'm going to quit. I get an email from somebody who said, tells me, you know how it's made a difference to them. And, and that, that keeps me going. Yeah, definitely. Like the, the feedback is, is great. And the really, it's amazing kind of the connections that you create for others and then you create for yourself as well. But another thing for me too is because I can go to conferences and I have gone to conferences kind of helping out on the meta side of things with some things, I, I'm basically in the room of, you know, a few hundred people that, you know. Portion of them who know who I am and listen to the show and everything like that. So that's kind of an amazing thing because I have a, I have a travel podcast as well actually, and it's, it's bigger than the Nerland pop podcast, but you know, it's just diffuse, like it's all over the world. So I would never in the wild run into one of my listeners, but at one of the conferences, it really, it does happen and people are, you know, people like it, you know? And so that, that also kind of motivates me a little bit further, cause it's just like, it's not just numbers on a screen, it's actual. People and it's actual, you know, it's, it's has real life consequences I guess. So, Dr. Campbell, this has been excellent. Thank you so much for coming on. Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention? Yeah. And, and I have a free newsletter on my website, so if somebody says, well, I'd like to know when that book is really happening. Who's got a brain science podcast.com and sign up for the newsletter. You get. Show notes automatically and know when the book is finally a reality. Excellent. I'm looking forward to it and especially looking forward to the audience guys. Hopefully you enjoyed that. Yeah, it was interesting. Afterwards we talked about, you know, how hard it is to make money podcasting and how little it is, and you know, she's like, Oh, you can put some of your episodes behind a pay wall, or, you know, do a Patrion and have people donate to you. But with how niche this show is, I don't think I'd be making too much. And I don't think, I don't want to do that to you guys. Like, and only earn 20 bucks a month, you know, sell out my soul for 20 bucks a month, or you know, 30 or whatever. I might end up earning from that. But I do this for the love of the topic and the. The people that are in it and just reaching out and everything like this. I think it's really good, but I mean, please do remember that I do offer other services, and so if you're interested in either advertising on a podcast or making your own podcast, or filming a promotional video for example, or a conference, or you know, a panel or whatever, I'm doing three D animations, then I'm available for this as well. The email is. Latin@neuralimplant.media and so yeah, I can do all your media needs. Even things like making some figures in, in some journal articles. I've seen some really, really ugly figures, really ugly photos, and I can make that a little bit better. Just that much better. To, to make it more attractive. And you know, it's a small thing, but it's a is, it's a very real thing. And I've seen people close and I've seen people just stop reading. If they saw like an especially hideous graphic, then yeah, let me know. Let me know and I'll see if I can help you out. Hope you enjoyed the show and were able to learn something new, bringing together different fields in novel ways. Until next time on the neural implant podcast.

In-depth with a teenager who lives with type 1.  Stacey interviews her son Benny, who was diagnosed just before he turned two. They talk about Control IQ, explaining what diabetes is to people who don't know and what he does these days for sports and other activities. Check out Stacey's new book: The World's Worst Diabetes Mom! Benny answers listener questions and looks back on 13 years of T1D. Join the Diabetes Connections Facebook Group! In TMSG – graduation good news, two popular diabetes books get an update and more This podcast is not intended as medical advice. If you have those kinds of questions, please contact your health care provider. Sign up for our newsletter here The "Pink Panther" Book update Think Like A Pancreas update ----- Use this link to get one free download and one free month of Audible, available to Diabetes Connections listeners! ----- Get the App and listen to Diabetes Connections wherever you go! Click here for iPhone      Click here for Android   Episode transcription:  Stacey Simms  0:00 Diabetes Connections is brought to you by One Drop created for people with diabetes by people who have diabetes. By Real Good Foods real food you feel good about eating and by Dexcom take control of your diabetes and live life to the fullest with Dexcom.   Announcer  0:20 This is Diabetes Connections with Stacey Simms   Stacey Simms  0:26 this week in depth with a teenager who lives with type one, okay, it's my son Benny. We covered a lot of ground here answering your questions including sports, what he tell his teammates when they travel for sports and stay overnight.   Benny  0:41 I tell them that nasal spray thing - Baqsimi if I don't wake up or if I pass out, do that and then go get coach.   Stacey Simms  0:47 We talked about feeling self conscious about diabetes gear, what he remembers about being a little kid with type one and his feelings about the new Control IQ system. I think this interview was a good idea? Tell me something good graduation news two popular diabetes books get updates and more. This podcast is not intended as medical advice. If you have those kinds of questions, please contact your health care provider. Welcome to another week of Diabetes Connections. I am so glad to have you along we aim to educate and inspire about type 1 diabetes by sharing stories of connection. If you are new Welcome, my name is Stacey Simms. I am your host, my son Benny, who you will hear this week was diagnosed right before he turned two. He is now 15. My husband lives with type two diabetes. I don't have diabetes at all. But I have a background in broadcasting and local radio and television and that is how you get the podcast. Before we get to Benny and oh my goodness. Like I've already said I'm hoping this was a good idea. I think he has good information to share. It's a little odd to interview your own son. But before we get to him, I have some great news of my own to share the world. First diabetes mom, my book that's been out for a couple of weeks now won an award, my publisher sent me an email. And by now I've probably shared it over social media, as you're listening to this spark publications announces that the world's worst diabetes mom has won an award of distinction as part of the 2020 communicator awards. This is part of the Academy of Interactive and visual arts. I'm really excited about this. Of course, it's not just about the writing, but about the design of the book. And we work really carefully on that the cover alone, we went back and forth quite a bit, but then inside to make it really easy to read. And a nice experience. I mean, oh, my goodness, I was who knew so much went into things like this. I mean, when you think about it for more than a minute you get it. But Wow. If you've ever been involved in any kind of book publishing, there's a lot of steps to it. So it's very exciting to see all of our hard work rewarded with this award. So thanks for indulging me and letting me talk about it a little bit. The book has really been an incredible excuse. For me, and I hope if you've read it, you've enjoyed it. I hope if you haven't read it, you'll consider giving it a chance. You can always learn more, of course at the website Diabetes connections.com. But the book is for sale on Amazon paperback ebook, you know, Kindle and audiobook which I married. And if you're listening to this episode as it first airs on Tuesday, the 26th of May, then tomorrow night I'm actually doing a world worse diabetes mom event with jdrf a couple of the southeast chapters got together we're doing a zoom presentation all about it, sharing our mistakes and mishaps what we learned from them and why they're just the best way to go right? You got to make all the mistakes when it comes to diabetes or parenting in general. And I'll put more information about that in the Facebook group and on social media. I'd love to have you join us. All right, my conversation with Benny in just a moment but first Diabetes Connections is brought to you by One Drop.  Getting diabetes supplies is a pain. Not only the ordering and the picking up but also the arguing with insurance about what they say you need and what you really need. Make it easy With One Drop, they offer personalized test strip plans plus you get a Bluetooth glucose meter test strips lancets and your very own certified diabetes coach. Subscribe today to get test strips for less than $20 a month delivered right to your door. No prescriptions or co pays required. One less thing to worry about not that surprising when you learn that the founder of One Drop leaves with type one, they get it One Drop gorgeous gear supplies delivered to your door 24 seven access to your certified diabetes coach learn more, go to Diabetes- connections.com and click on the One Drop logo.   My guest this week was pretty easy to book because I know his schedule. He lives in my house. He is my 15 year old son. And if you've listened to the show for a long time, you know I really try to balance how much I share about Benny's experience with type one. It's a balance of, you know not oversharing to compromise his privacy, but also sharing them To help people, he's always been a really good sport about it. And we've really weighed and measured over his entire life because he was diagnosed at 23 months, how much to talk about him. I mean, even really before that, because I was on the radio when he was born. I mean, both of my kids, I was a local TV reporter when I was pregnant with Lea, my daughter, and I was in radio, I was at WBT where I worked for a decade doing the morning show there. I think I was there for a year before I got pregnant with Benny. And so my listeners went through that process with me. You know, they saw me out at events and it was a whole big deal about, you know, how much are we going to talk about how much are we going to share, and when he was diagnosed with type one, and my listeners wanted to learn more, we had to go through it all over again. So I err on the side of sharing less, which may strike you as bananas because I just talked to my book where we talk about all our stories and our family stuff. But I really do I mean, if you look at a lot of the mom bloggers out there, and especially the Instagram people, you know, I really don't share our day to day. I don't think that's fair to him. I'm saying all this I'm sorry for the big lead up. Because it's hard for me to interview Benny, it's hard for me to kind of push and probe for more. He's funny, as always, he gives great information, I think, of course, he is 15 years old. A couple of quick notes to that. 15 years old, and really goofing around on the microphone. There's probably more editing than usual in this episode. So please forgive us if parts of it sound a little choppy, although I'm sure my editor john, you can smooth most of that out. But really, there were times where I really I just, we were goofing around so much, I had to cut it out. And there's a little bit at the end to give you a taste of that. And I mean, the very end of the show, I included it's not really a blooper, but it's just oh my god, what he was doing with the microphone. Also, he does say this is the only correction I'll make. We talked about Control IQ and he says he's in range 80% of the time. I wish. It's still excellent. It's closer to 70% of the time, which is wonderful and it's certainly a lot less work. We talk about that a little bit too. But I have to correct that he is not in range 80% of the time. And the only other thing is listening back to this. I don't want anybody to misunderstand. We are mean to each other. I mean, I call him a couple of mean names. It's just our relationship. I mean, it's kind of the way we pick on each other. If you don't know us, too well, I'm just a little worried that you might think we're really mean to each other. I think you can hear that. It's all in good fun. We are so fortunate to have a great relationship. But it's been a while since I had him on the show. And you all had a bunch of questions for him. So I asked, he answered. Here's my conversation with Benny. Stacey So how are you holding up? I'm good. All right. Well, we got lots of questions for you. From listeners and the Facebook group, you started on Control IQ at the end of January. And we were well past three months now. Use any perspective Any comments? What do you think Vinnie? You'd   Benny  7:55 No, it's much better than it was before cuz I'm in range. Like 80% of the day?   Unknown Speaker  8:02 Yeah, it's wild. What have you noticed in terms of me?   Benny  8:06 I'm curious if you're much more now you like, Is it working? Is it working? Is it working? No, I'm not.   Stacey Simms  8:15 Any tips or tricks? You don't bolus when you're on the higher side, right? Because we found that that kind of   Benny  8:21 plummets you. Yeah. Don't do to see but in Control IQ, it won't bring you up from lows.   Stacey Simms  8:27 But you still do to receive and Control IQ   Benny  8:29 because I like juice.   Stacey Simms  8:31 Cuz you like juice? Yeah. You're an idiot. What?   Alright, so you use Control IQ, and you still take a daily shot after Seba, even though your insulin needs have gone way down. Why do you continue doing that your Seba?   Benny  8:47 I don't know.   Stacey Simms  8:48 Well, you know your mother mentioned you might want to stop and you said no, I thought you had a reason less insulin usage. You mean like in the pump, you don't use the cartridge. You should try it. You're not really using balance. Well, now we have to talk to the endo again and okay. Would you think of the telehealth visit that we did by the way? That was rough.   Benny  9:08 It was rough about it. You guys couldn't find any. Oh, yeah, we had probably his first one.   Stacey Simms  9:14 And he didn't have clarity and he didn't have to connect up even though the office said that they did. So it was a little weird, but were you okay with just talking to him that way? Well, yeah, I mean,   Benny  9:22 it's better in person. Because that our interests are pretty cool guy. Let's get to the questions   Stacey Simms  9:29 in the Facebook group, Rodney Miller. Hi, Rodney, who runs bolus and barbells he said Why am I Benny's favorite? strong man diabetic.   Benny  9:38 My favorite strong man diabetic actually for your information? Cuz I'm the best Oh, you're those favorite strong man. Oh, all right. Well, we'll see you guys in competition. Maybe I can guide when armwrestling contest. I don't know man. my biceps are massive friends for   Stacey Simms  9:52 life. 2021 showdown. Rod me and Betty. Okay. Ronnie says does he feel does Betty feel like having Such a strong advocate for a mom has provided him unique opportunities to connect to the diabetic community.   Benny  10:06 Yes, would have never met Rodney. Ernie almost got the chance to meet the rock was very close to that. Brick bassinger those people are pretty cool friends for life is a lot of fun. Justin Thomas, Jeffrey, those guys are pretty cool, too. I don't think I would have really met them without mom. You know, no one's putting us in trials. So you know, is that   Stacey Simms  10:30 isn't that funny that we can't get you into a clinical trial?   Benny  10:33 I think they it's obvious that they know we're just too cool. They don't they don't want to risk something not working on people that are just so awesome.   Stacey Simms  10:41 But we'll keep trying. All right. Shelby wanted to know, when you were younger, what did you say when other kids asked about your pump or CGM? How did you handle the curiosity of other kids   Benny  10:52 said I'm a robot. I still say I'm a robot and then I actually explained it. I remember one time a gorgeous went What's this and ripped up my pump? Wow, that was Fine. I don't really remember anything. Besides that.   Stacey Simms  11:02 I remember when you were, and this might be the same story when you were in preschool. They told me that you were all kind of like lining up to go to the bathroom or something. And the kid behind you said, Hey, what's that and started to pull on it, and you turned around, and you were like, three? And you're like, that's my diabetes. And you were very straightforward. Like, don't mess around with that. Don't touch that. That's mine. Or I guess, like, touch my diabetes. You're like, but you were always we're very lucky because you were always very straightforward about it very open about it. And you never have seemed to minded   Benny  11:36 Well, yeah, no, I don't care. Like if you don't like me, because I have diabetes go away. You suck by God, what am I gonna say? Like, Oh, no, darn.   Stacey Simms  11:45 Well, you know, you're not self conscious about it, which I think is, is wonderful and made it easier for us. But I don't know how you teach that to somebody, right? You just have always been that way.   Benny  11:55 I just kind of like I need it. Don't touch it.   Stacey Simms  11:58 So I guess the answer is you've been very straightforward about it little humor, but mostly not hiding it and saying here it is.   Benny  12:03 Sometimes I trick my friends into thinking they're giving me insulin, I disconnect my pump and I give them the pump and they still think it's connecting. They go, can I kill you? I say yes. And then I let them give me like six units, and they think that I'm gonna die. And it's really funny. Why would you tell me that? Because it's funny.   Stacey Simms  12:20 Why that is terrible that your pumps all messed up, especially with Control IQ. We think I don't   Benny  12:25 do that much anymore. Okay. So like, once, once, once every other month. This is more like a fifth grade thing. Yeah. Please tell me you don't do that anymore. I do it like once. Maybe I did it once with Jackson.   Stacey Simms  12:37 I'm gonna kill you. Okay. Let's see. Dee writes as a teen athlete. What are your best tips to manage on your own during a sports event or overnight sports trips. We have a lot of those this year.   Benny  12:49 We have but I wasn't   Stacey Simms  12:50 competing. I know which is why I wasn't which is why it was very easy for me   Benny  12:55 to let you go. I don't think it's very smart to be on your own with anything. ports, you should have at least one person with you that knows what's going on. Just you know, just in case but like, if you are alone, which is again, not smart,   Stacey Simms  13:08 she means on your own without your mom or dad, because you're on a trip is not going to be like the coach is going to be there. The team is going to be there. So why don't you talk a little bit about what you told the kids when   Benny  13:18 I first joined the team coach made us all sit down and made me tell everyone what was up. Basically all I told them was I have diabetes. It sucks. If I faint there's a thing in the in the pouch that you stick up my nose or you go to coach or the athletic trainer. Don't let me die.   Stacey Simms  13:39 Well and when you go on overnights you're not alone in the room, but there's not an adult anymore. Yeah. So what do you tell the kids that are with you?   Benny  13:48 I tell them the thing like the the nasal spray thing. So like see me if I don't wake up or if I pass out, do that and then go get coach.   Stacey Simms  13:57 What do they say? Are they like okay, yeah, they don't Nobody seems freaked out in there.   Benny  14:02 I mean, a bunch of them are scared of needles and it's fun to mess around with them but   Stacey Simms  14:07 and I do send you you know you have a kit, we make sure that there's lots of food and drinks and all that stuff. And you have your snacks and your your Welch's fruit snacks. That's one thing that made it easier in a way last year you weren't competing because you had your knee injury. So I wasn't too worried about the ups and downs this coming year, assuming all goes well and you wrestle again. I'm not exactly sure what I'm going to do for those first couple of overnights. Well, you said it like I was gonna ask you what to do. I'm not I'm either going to come near and stay nearby. Oh, no, dad,   Benny  14:43 if anyone's coming is that   Stacey Simms  14:44 that's a great idea your father can go. I don't think I would like I'm not gonna make you stay in the hotel room with me. You can still say with your friends, but especially with wrestling until we kind of figure out what your body's doing. I think it's really important to get a baseline and then get some protocols and figured out out from there, but I don't I don't intend to sit on You don't worry. I like this one. Kristen says, Is it true that Benny has the best mom ever?   Benny  15:08 No. Oh, you're off the show. No one has the best mom ever. It's literally not possible. There's like a couple billion moms. You know, Mother's Day is just passed.   Stacey Simms  15:20 But that was a missed opportunity, my friend.   Unknown Speaker  15:22 Um,   Benny  15:26 I mean, she's pretty good, but   not the best missed opportunity.   Stacey Simms  15:31 Best you ever had. Okay.   Right back to our conversation. And the next question is going to be advice. What would Benny tell his younger self? We'll get to that in just a minute. First, diabetes Connections is brought to you by Real Good Foods. And on their website. They have real reviews from real people, which makes sense because you know, this is all about real food. You feel real good about eating. And what's nice is with the record As you can see, it's not just people who eat super low carb or who eat keto. There are people who have celiac who can't eat grain. There are people who just love the way the food tastes right? There are people who talk about the airfryer, which is a great way to make so much of their food. It is delicious. We are big fans of their they can put this in the airfryer we're big fans of their new ice cream. And we really love the cauliflower crust pizzas as well, which do really well. In the airfryer find out more, just go to Diabetes connections.com and click on the Real Good Foods logo. Now back to my talk with Benny asking him your questions.   Mary says what advice would he tell a younger version of himself about being a teenager with diabetes? So I guess she means what would you say to yourself back   Benny  16:52 then? Keep doing what you're doing. You'll be fine.   Stacey Simms  16:56 I think that's an excellent advice.   Benny  16:57 Yeah, I was a pretty good child. Questions like, Oh, I wish I had depression. No, I was the best.   Stacey Simms  17:04 I think the only advice that you should give your younger self is, if you take your pump off to play football in the neighborhood. You might want to put it someplace smart like a mailbox, just because I lost it a couple of times worse,   Benny  17:17 just because I lost it a couple times. It doesn't mean you have to bring it up again. We always found it. Yeah, I'm pretty good. You're pretty good. Yeah. Your mother had to go your mother. Who is that? Oh,   Laura says does he have any good one liners when people ask about his tech? I'm a cyborg. You have so bad. And people believe me and it's really funny.   Stacey Simms  17:39 Okay, so here's an example. We'll go to someplace brand new and you make friends everywhere you go, which is   Benny  17:43 amazing. I'm kind of jealous of that. So we'll go to the beach where a smile. Yeah, we're just I just wear a smile, where it doesn't have to be real. Where I   Stacey Simms  17:52 smile. We'll go to the beach. And you will, you'll make friends but you have your shirt off your decks calm with the beginning. Put thing on, you know, either on your arm or your stomach. Do people ask about that? And they want to   Benny  18:04 tell him I'm a cyborg.   Stacey Simms  18:06 I'm so serious. And then do you kind of go into any more detail? Not if they don't ask. They just leave it at that. Most of them most of the time. They just leave it at that. That's funny. Okay, so this the next couple of questions came from a different Facebook groups. So while I know a lot of people in the podcast group, these came from a different on a group of moms with elementary school aged children, you know, saying this just as much for the listeners as I am for you. smart alec. has been he ever been bullied over having diabetes. So   Benny  18:36 let's talk about that. Then. No. Okay, unless I don't remember.   Stacey Simms  18:40 No, no. Let's talk about why you think you haven't been bullied about diabetes or picked on? I think part of that is because you were always a bigger kid. Right? So nobody was mad. No. As you listen, I've been trying to edit out that I'm saying And he keeps saying it so now we just have to leave it but but you were you were a bigger kid and you were a nice and fun kid. So nobody ever picked on you for much of anything. Right? I mean, I think the only time that we were in a quote bullying situation was when you were in like fifth grade and a little kid was so trying to pick on you. And you he was like it was like poking the bear with a stick. Luckily, you didn't you didn't take the bait. But I think one of the reasons why nobody picked on you is because nobody picked on you anyway. But also, you were so upfront about it. Yeah, that there was what are they gonna pick on you about   Benny  19:38 how your pancreas doesn't work? What if What a nerd   Unknown Speaker  19:42 but you were always there first to tell people about it and to explain and I was also like, the most popular kid in my elementary school. So   Benny  19:52 there's that too modest to ah, am I wrong?   No, I remember explaining At least there was a time where we were in the gym, and I was running around giving everybody high fives. And they were all chanting my name.   Stacey Simms  20:08 Well, that was I don't want to burst your bubble. There's fifth grade. Well, yeah, but it was also like a jdrf event.   Unknown Speaker  20:13 Oh, that was that school?   Stacey Simms  20:15 Oh, really? Yes. It was gonna be like one of the beam team. No, that that was   Benny  20:19 that was beam team at school.   Unknown Speaker  20:20 frayed right. I'm saying it was a purpose. Yeah, but I'm okay.   Stacey Simms  20:25 But that's a perfect example of how a diabetes thing made you feel great. Yes. And it's hard because I think some kids don't embrace it naturally, which I understand everybody's personality is different. I don't understand it. Well, you will when you grow up. But like, you know, your sister has a completely different personality. She's very introverted. She would not have enjoyed that. And I think she wouldn't have had the same experience you did. So as I'm talking as you're listening, I'm not talking to Betty right now as you're listening. I think it's harder for kids who are Shire, and I don't have that kind of advice so much because Benny's not that way.   Unknown Speaker  20:57 Some of the best. Well, you think you're the   Stacey Simms  20:58 best and as I said, And modest rude, but I think it's okay if your kid isn't out there saying I'm a cyborg and yeah, diabetes and get well not you never said da da da da let's rephrase, yay, beam team and jdrf and all that kind of good stuff when you were younger. I think it's okay if that doesn't happen. But I think that can also the more you keep it into yourself, the harder it can be when other people ask about it, and I think that can kind of lend itself to some difficult situations. Let's put it that way.   Benny  21:27 The lesson from all this tell everyone you have diabetes so you can't get bullied.   Stacey Simms  21:31 Well, I think it helps to be upfront about it. But you know, it's it's not my lessons. Your lessons better also be a big dude. always have a smile on your face. And I hate that you're thinking I'm talking about when you were like six or seven years I was still chunky.   Benny  21:47 I was cute though.   Stacey Simms  21:49 Hey, let's talk for a second because you're bringing it up. Let's talk about your   Benny  21:54 weight loss lost 50 pounds since the summer 50   Stacey Simms  21:56 pounds which is bananas.   Benny  22:00 Turn on, keep going.   Stacey Simms  22:01 Okay, that's fine. But can you talk about how you've done it a little bit only because as your mother, I was really worried when you start it, our dog is going crazy. I was really worried when you started because between diabetes and just body image and eating disorders and all this stuff, I was really concerned, but you seem to have done it in a really great way.   Benny  22:19 I'm gonna be so honest, I've absolutely no idea like how to describe what I did. I ate when I was hungry, but just enough, and then I drink a lot of water and Gatorade.   Stacey Simms  22:27 I can also chime in on just a little bit of what I observed. Because I was, you know, you know, I was making sure you were eating, you know, I was worried.   Benny  22:33 Yeah,   Stacey Simms  22:34 um, you seem to really just cut out empty calorie stacking. We never had a lot of junk food in the house, but you know, no crackers or you know, or things like that. And you stopped eating dessert. Not, not all the time, right. You do have dessert sometimes. But you really stopped eating when you're on the computer. Yeah. Because I think our house helped to now we didn't move until the beginning of March so you were already losing weight. The reason I bring up the new house is because In the old house, the playroom where you had your computer and stuff is right next to the kitchen. Yeah. So obviously it's really easy to snack. Yeah, but you get a lot of willpower and you stop that. But then we moved here. You have been away. The playroom is upstairs and the farthest corner of the house which is, which is great, because we have to hear you screaming. So do I know. But when you play Xbox, you're so loud and I don't really hear you until the hall has this quiet, dude, just don't scream. No, you   Benny  23:26 don't understand. Screaming it's part of the enjoyment.   Stacey Simms  23:28 But the point is, you've you've been able to have a lot of willpower. And also it's helped that you are farther away, but you eat dinner. You know, you eat breakfast, you eat food. It's really been amazing to see I would never have said you had 50 pounds to lose. So, you know, to me, you look you look really thin. Are you okay? I mean,   Benny  23:48 he's kilo. 15 pounds to lose.   Stacey Simms  23:49 Yeah, well, we're gonna talk about that off the year. With wrestling. We'll see   Benny  23:53 17 actually. All right.   Stacey Simms  23:54 The idea here is to be safe and be smart and get where you want to go without the interoceptive Okay, all right, you know, I'm right. We're gonna talk about that off the air. But, you know, the other things that comes with weight loss is you know, you're using a lot less insulin to, which has been really interesting to say, but you're doing great. Okay, and you need some new clothes.   Benny  24:13 Just an entire new wardrobe. I mean, we can't go shopping because of the quarantine stuff. So it's been wild.   Stacey Simms  24:20 I'm not taking you shopping. Okay, this is an interesting question. Elaine says, When did he start total self care, and then separately waking to CGM alarm. I don't wake up to CGM alarms.   Benny  24:32 Okay, I woke up to my blood sugar.   Stacey Simms  24:33 Oh, I was gonna say I know that. I was gonna say it wasn't true because I know you treat overnight and stuff so you feel that you wake up to your body. Yeah, I   Benny  24:39 never once woke up to an alarm. I'm a deep sleeper. When   Stacey Simms  24:45 I don't know because I'm not in your face all the time. But it seems to me that I've seen you go low and I know you treat and then you go back up. So you're waiting on wake up to alarm you're waking up because your body is alright. I've never woken up to an alarm. I will as the mom We'll let you say that I'm going to slightly disagree all   Benny  25:04 tell me about what happens if you wake up and you're filled up. And I'm sweaty. And I'm like this does not feel right. And then I stumble out of bed and if there's low stuff in my room, I take it and if not, I go downstairs and get juice and sit down there until my blood sugar goes back up.   When the dog comes, visits me, Oh, that's nice. When the dog comes as it comes visits,   Stacey Simms  25:25 that's nice when the dog comes to visit. I said I said, to answer the question here, too, we still use Dexcom. Share. We got the Dexcom when you were nine. We started share two years later when it came out. But we spent the first seven years of diabetes with no CGM.   Benny  25:41 That was scary. wasn't scary how we did it.   Stacey Simms  25:44 Well, you really you think that was scary?   Unknown Speaker  25:46 No, you don't remember it? Yeah.   Stacey Simms  25:48 How did we do it? We did it and it was a lot of blood sugar checks. We'll do a show on that sometime. Or at least a discussion of like the olden days, but I'll tell you what, I never really remember being scared. Well, that's not true. There was one time when you were low and you would not come up. That's when I was scared. But I knew you were low. Oh, well, it happened at home and then you threw up and you were fine. You just need to throw up and then retreated. And you were great. I don't know what that was all about. Well, you're gonna say,   Benny  26:15 so I had a counselor at a CCT diabetes camp. Yeah, name, Chris. And the entire week his blood sugar was just like 60 I remember that. He was not like a big dude. Like he was a tiny scrawny little dude. And he ate so much food. And his blood sugar just didn't go up.   Stacey Simms  26:35 Now. I remember he telling me about that. It's crazy. Maybe he needed to throw up   Benny  26:40 there, but it was the entire week. It's crazy. Like I had never seen a person eat so much food. And his blood sugar just didn't go up.   Stacey Simms  26:48 But it didn't go down. Right? It just   Benny  26:50 it was just 60 it was like 60 to 65 the entire week.   Stacey Simms  26:55 Well, the thing I was getting to with CGM is that I used to check You overnight when you were very little. And then as you got a little older, we would only check you overnight if we'd had a weird day, like we just knew something was going on, or you know you were very active. But I also went to work at 330 in the morning, so I would check you at 3am. When I got up, it was kind of easy. That was I wouldn't in my head. That wasn't an overnight check, because I was getting up to go to work. But obviously it was an overnight check. So when you got to CGM, and now that we have share, you might not wake up to the alarms, but I do so I mean, with Control IQ. And with our living situation with you upstairs here. I think I've treated one overnight low. And it was a compression though, right? You were laying on your CGM and I came upstairs and just enrolled you over and went from there. But to answer Elaine's question for real is he hasn't started total self care. No, no. Well, I don't think it's appropriate. You're 15 years old, and you're wonderful, you're independent. I could send you away for a week with anybody and you'd be fine. But in terms of real true self care, we're saving that minute do that it can you do that? A Ken Coleman right. But we're saving self care really here at home until your senior year of high school to give you a year at least maybe. Well, that isn't always talking about that's nice that he thinks that was that really threw dead under the bus. Yeah, well, that's what I do. I were thinking senior year, you're only a freshman. You're finishing your freshman year here. So we're we're still working on it. But I think senior year is good. And yeah, you do total self care when you go to camp Coleman, which is your regular month long camp.   Benny  28:30 The stories I could tell about the nurses. Well, some interesting ones. There's   Stacey Simms  28:35 a medical staff there but not a diabetes staff. So   Benny  28:38 there's a couple that are very good, though. Yes, that's a story for another But no, she only has to stay for two weeks.   Stacey Simms  28:43 We love Karen. Okay, so the best   Benny  28:45 she's the only Karen I like   Stacey Simms  28:46 no that's me. Like how can my best friend grant was a Karen weird name. All right. What were the most helpful accommodations for us school asks Heidi, I'm going to be very interested in what you say here. Repeat. What were the most helpful accommodate for you at school,   Benny  29:01 What was her name Miss? Oh, Miss Hyman Simon?   Stacey Simms  29:05 Yeah. Okay, so Miss Iman was absolutely. I guess the school called her a floater. She was a teaching assistant, who in kindergarten would come in and help you know, she was like the our elementary school always had a teacher and a teacher's assistant for kindergarten, but in first grade they did not have that. Your first grade teacher though, who was a take charge and take care of business lady. Oh, Harrigan, Miss Harrigan? Yeah, she was like, we are not fooling around with this. We need more help. So she got permission to have this time and float in and out and do and help you with your blood sugar checks. And then by the end of first grade, there was another kid by the beginning of second grade, there were four kids in elementary school and Miss Hyman was like the diabetes lady. And she would just help. That's so nice that you remember that?   Benny  29:51 I remember. Like I was with her all the way to like third grade.   Stacey Simms  29:55 Yeah, well, she left the school it was in   Benny  29:57 first grade to third grade.   Stacey Simms  29:58 Yeah. And then you Didn't you really didn't need any of the diabetic nurse? Oh, Julie, who has diabetes? Yeah, she was on the islet cell thing, right? Yes. She had an islet cell transplant. She's been on the show before. So as you listen, yeah, she told all about her islet cell transplant. And yeah, she's a really interesting story. So we'll, I'll link that up in the show notes. You can go back and listen to that past episode. Like Kumbaya,   Unknown Speaker  30:21 like if I Oh, yeah.   Benny  30:24 Um, do you have merge? conflict? The merge?   Stacey Simms  30:26 I don't have any marks. Yeah, one of these days I have my book. The thing that's nice about my book,   Benny  30:31 Lincoln bio,   Stacey Simms  30:33 Instagram, it's audio.   Um, but I would say for accommodations, we had a very, very light 504 plan. And our 504 plan revolved almost all about testing. Because in our school district, unlike many school districts, we actually had a written out diabetes management plan, and every child with diabetes whether you're on a pump or shots or whatever you would Have a de m MP diabetes medical management plan. And you had to fill that out. So that was kind of like your 504.   Benny  31:06 I have a question. Yes, of course, if like, let's say my 504 says I have to have my phone with me, right? Yes. And a teacher takes my phone.   Stacey Simms  31:13 Yes. What do you do? That's a great question. If you felt that your health is at immediate risk, I would excuse yourself and go to the administration office and call me. If you felt your test was at risk. I would take the test. And then upon completion, I would like does that teacher get in trouble? Like what happens? Oh, it depends on the school district. If it was a mistake, it depends on the parent. Okay, so let's say that happened to you. And you were like, I took the test anyway. Okay, and you got a 95 on the test. Okay. I would go into school. And I would say or call the school and I would say, Hey, I understand there's a misunderstanding. Let's talk about it. Let's talk through it. And I would escalate if she was like, if she was great and said, Oh, my God, I'm so sorry. I didn't realize that's one thing. She says. That's outrageous. You couldn't possibly then I escalate, right? We go to the next person, we go to the next person and this person, let's say you take the test, you get to 65. I would lobby for that score to be thrown out. And you could retake the test. We've never had to do that. Because everybody's good. Yeah, everybody's been very cooperative and accommodating. But I'm all for fighting for you. But I wouldn't start out with a fight. Yeah, I would start out with a Hey, what happened? and go from there. But I don't think it's fair to make you totally advocate for yourself.   Benny  32:29 I would hope you would. I mean, oh, yeah. No, if I knew something was wrong, I would leave the class I'd be like, ministration something's wrong.   Unknown Speaker  32:37 Right. me right.   Stacey Simms  32:38 Like if your blood sugar was high, and they wouldn't let you see the nerve. Here's a really good example. And let's not name the teacher. You used to have migraines. Oh my God, when you were growing up.   Unknown Speaker  32:50 Your teacher didn't believe you.   Benny  32:52 Even after I threw up right in front of her.   Stacey Simms  32:53 Well, I think that was that was the action I was gonna say. What do you think you did that made her listen a little throw up right in front of her threw up in the classroom. I'm right in front of her all over the books. Now, if you were not in the what was that fourth grade? Okay, so let's say you were a freshman in high school, you probably would have left a classroom and vomited in the bathroom and then gone to the nurse. But because you were in fourth grade, and you were probably really nervous to leave, or, you know, there's all these things going on. It's really unfortunate that had to happen. But, you know, it's good to talk about, but back to accommodations, because we have the diabetes medical management plan, which spells out how diabetes was treated, and also said things like, you know, you have to leave the classroom to the bathroom, you're not limited to water, how much water you can drink, all that kind of stuff that was laid out our school district, which is a huge one in the Charlotte area is wonderful about that. So our 504 was all about how he's going to take tests. And we started it in. I had a 504 plan, but we never really used it because of the testing situations. Don't ever use it. Well. Yes, you do. It didn't come into play until third grade finals, right into grade. So in third grade, we started kind of testing at different ways. Big to take tests, the beginning of grade tests. So we decided for For Benny, he wouldn't do anything differently except he's allowed to have his phone with him. He doesn't need his phone right now, really, because your pump has everything on it. But you still take it in, I assume you lay it on the desk at the front of the classroom, sometimes you'll keep it your pocket. Well, so   Benny  34:13 normal testing, like not finals and stuff. It's just in my pocket. But teachers are like, just don't cheat, but during and agree, like finals and stuff when like they like go and collect your phone. I just like, it depends on who's there. Sometimes it's just don't cheat, or sometimes I'll keep it at the front of the class. And if it buzzes, I'll tell you.   Stacey Simms  34:31 Yeah, I think for us, we're gonna find out this year about accommodations for the AC T and the SA T, and things like that. And that'll be an interesting thing to go through as well. If your child is diagnosed younger, this is really easy. Because you you figure it out as they get older. Right. And by the time they're in middle school, I think High School is when testing really starts counting. But I mean, it counts in middle school too. But by the time they're old enough to take these tests that really matter. Yeah, you're understanding what they need because some kids need a lot more money. than you do, your blood sugar doesn't skyrocket because of test stress. We have friends who they walk into their final exam and their blood sugar goes to 300. Really? Yeah. But I think right in terms of most important accommodation, I would say it's actually on the parents side. And that is being able to work with the school as a team, being able to go into those meetings and say, I want to be I want to work as a team. I want to see how this goes like let's work together, which sounds very Kumbaya and woowoo. But it really helps it helps me rather than going in and saying, I'm gonna fight for my kids rights. Like there are a lot of situations, unfortunately, where you do have to fight. But you know, going in without guns blazing is very dark principles.   Benny  35:37 Cool.   Stacey Simms  35:38 Well, your elementary school principal was he loved you.   Benny  35:41 I was his favorite. I don't know he was he didn't name favorites, but I was   Stacey Simms  35:44 he was fascinated with diabetes. He was really interesting. I mean, he wasn't he wasn't fascinated, in a weird way. But he just he admired the kids with type one. He really did. I was his favorite. Well.   Benny  35:55 He didn't say   Stacey Simms  35:56 he really admired what you guys were doing. It was interesting. School. Yes, your school counselor was great. He was a good guy. He and he did our 504 plans, we would meet with him to go to the fiber floors and he was he was very nice.   Benny  36:09 He was the guy that like if you got to go into his office, you were one of the cool kids.   Stacey Simms  36:15 We were very lucky to have a great Elementary School. Okay, and has been principal   Benny  36:19 had a lifted red Jeep. Like how much cooler does it get than that? I guess cool was an elementary school. Principal is the eye of the beholder.   Stacey Simms  36:29 has been he had burnout. If So when did he have it? How long did it last? And how did he deal with it?   Benny  36:33 Yes, yes.   Stacey Simms  36:34 Yes. Ever? Yes. So explain.   Benny  36:37 I don't want to do diabetes. Too much work.   Unknown Speaker  36:39 You get that often.   Benny  36:41 Yes. But how do you deal with it? video games?   Unknown Speaker  36:44 Do you just change the subject? Yeah.   Benny  36:46 I find that most of the time I just go Oh, well. It is what it is.   Stacey Simms  36:50 Well, I find it interesting cuz I wouldn't have said you've reached a lot of burnout.   Benny  36:53 Like I have my own opinions about that. I have been able to shoulder shrug a lot of things   Stacey Simms  36:59 like kind of compartmentalize. I don't know what that means, like, put it in the back of your brain and move on with your life. Yeah. So what helps you should play video games? Is that also like, just you're with your friends? Yeah. Do you ever talk to people from Camp or no? Well, you mentioned Justin and Jeffrey early on, is it? Like knowing that they're there? You'd have to call them?   Benny  37:18 I mean, I guess but like, I've never been the kid that's like, and life is terrible. I gotta just like, yeah, it is what it is.   Stacey Simms  37:27 All right, I have two examples that I want to bring up and see how you react. And we don't have to share these two examples. The first is when you were about 10. And you want them to take a pump break. Do you remember that at all? Yeah. What was going on? Like, can you share anything about that?   Benny  37:41 I remember talking to Michael. And like, the pens just seemed a lot easier. But then I was like, wait, there's too much math.   Stacey Simms  37:49 Well, your pump requested about three days, but that's when you started because   Benny  37:51 I was like, wait, there's too much math.   Stacey Simms  37:52 Yeah. And that's when you started giving yourself your own injections. Because you had only used us we don't use syringes. Remember before that, I don't   Benny  37:59 ya Yeah, I remember when I was like four.   Stacey Simms  38:04 And so to switch to an insulin pen seems really scary to you, but you did it, which was awesome. And it's helped us a lot since then there's too much math. Yeah. And there's also too many shots because you'd eat breakfast, then you'd get in the car and want an apple. You'd be like, what I do another shot. But then the other time, I wouldn't call it burnout. But we had I actually wrote about this in the in the book, you had a really bad night, you had a night where everything hurt, your inset hurt your Dexcom hurt. I think you had to do the same night. You're doing both and it was tough. You were really upset about it. And those things happen. I think it's important to acknowledge even for a happy kid like us, that was a terrible night.   Benny  38:40 But tomorrow morning, I was fine. The next morning, tomorrow. Ya know why?   Stacey Simms  38:47 But really can do mine. You don't have to share about it. But can you talk a little bit about?   Benny  38:51 I remember one time, like my incident didn't work like three times and then my Dexcom didn't work like twice. I gave up and I was like, I'll do it. The morning   Stacey Simms  39:02 that was the week that you actually met Rodney, the pan guy who we already mentioned him he was the first question dangling. I love Rodney and, and Colt Scott, the American Ninja Warrior dude. So we met them a couple nights later because we were out to dinner and you didn't talk about the night that you were so upset. But I think don't   Benny  39:20 remember what we talked about. I remember is Ronnie eating a lot. And I was. It was really fun.   Didn't barbecue there too.   Yeah. It was a fun night.   Stacey Simms  39:29 Yeah, but I think that just helps to kind of breathe the same air as other people with diabetes. Even though you've had a crummy night, it helps to be with your people because your mommy is helpful, but only to a certain extent. All right, I don't know that you can answer this question, but this is one of the last ones. Okay. How did you realize like, when did you realize you had diabetes? And how did you feel about it? You know, I can't answer that. I just I've just always had it. This mom says I keep wondering for those who are diagnosed early like my daughter with the healthiest way of thinking about it is and how I can help with that.   Benny  39:58 It's life. What are you going to do?   Stacey Simms  40:00 Well, I think a non 15 year old person answering that question a parent might say, I think that there are ways of explaining it that change, because there's different age appropriate ways of talking about it. When Ben he was teeny tiny right after he was diagnosed, my parents got him a Curious George doll, who we'd love Curious George, and he's just not better. Right. And we thought that he would do like imaginative play, right demo demonstrative play right here. I'm gonna give he did not do that with the curious church, but he did. Oh, yeah. And so Elmo got shots. Elmo had juice boxes, Mo got insets   Benny  40:34 mo love juice boxes,   Stacey Simms  40:35 right Elmo love juice boxes. And that's something that helps kids process that they have diabetes when they're very young. And as he got older, we would read stories, we would tell other people, we did a presentation for your class every year that changed as you got older. And then we started talking about age appropriate stuff. So when you're talking about like independence, what has to be done? When you're talking about driving what has to be done right Later, we'll talk about about when you're living by yourself, right? Well think about it as a parent, how much?   Benny  41:04 It's fine. You guys have no responsibilities,   Stacey Simms  41:08 I'm going to touch on driving just a little, because somebody did ask about that. You're doing really well with driving. But you   Benny  41:14 want to talk about what you have to do before you drive. I checked my Dexcom.   Stacey Simms  41:18 And right, that's it, you check your blood sugar. If you're below 80, you can't drive. That's our simple rule. And we have to make sure there's stuff in the car. And I'll be honest with you, I'm going to make sure that you have low stuff in your car for the first year or two because it's just like anything else. You have to learn. You have to get used to it, they'll be independent. So with driving that's, that's I'm terrified, but not really because of diabetes, but you're pretty good driver,   Benny  41:39 the best   Stacey Simms  41:40 and modest to I am honest,   Benny  41:43 like I'm really modest. All right, and then   Stacey Simms  41:44 do you do any diabetes goals in the next couple of years like are there certain now   Unknown Speaker  42:00 You're listening to diabetes connections with Stacey Sims.   Stacey Simms  42:05 See, Why weren't you about how we are to each other, I can't believe I said, I hate you there at the end. Oh, although I gotta say, Oh my goodness, I am going to play a little bit more at the end of the show the very end so you can understand what I was putting up with for a lot of that interview and some of the stuff that we had to take out, but I hope some of that helped you. I'm also going to link up a few of our previous interviews with Benny, I've talked to him a couple of times on the show. And it's interesting. Not only is his voice changed a lot as you can imagine, but just to hear how things have changed. I'll do that at the episode homepage. There is always a transcription. I have no idea what this transcriptions gonna look like the first time I run it through the computer. That's gonna be fun, but we'll put that there as well. And update. Interestingly, after this interview, he really did agree to stop taking the true Seba. So for the first time in almost two years, we started the trustee but in August of 2018, he is not taking long acting With his pump it because his insulin needs have gone down so much, obviously with the weight loss, but also with puberty. He loves what I talked about that, and I'll keep you posted on how that's going. I'll tell you what, so far what he's not eating. It is amazingly steady just like it has him with Control IQ. It's maybe on average, 10 to 15 points lower. So if he was running at like 110, he's now running at 85, that sort of thing, because just that little bit more control of the algorithm is really helping, at least in the short run. But for the last two days, I swear that kid has forgotten to bolus for every single meal, everything he eats. I don't know what's going on. But I'm trying not to make a big deal about it. We're just gonna move on. We're just gonna remind we're not gonna nag. I'm sure he would say something different. All right. Well, anyway, I'll keep you posted on that, but he really is doing great. And I like that he comes on and talks about diabetes, even if it may not be what I want to hear or I want you to hear something. Tell me something good in just a moment, but first Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Dexcom when Benny was very little, and in the bathtub or at the pool, I always noticed his fingertips. I mean, you know exactly what I mean, right? When you've got diabetes and you're checking and checking and checking and poking and poking, when your fingertips get wet, somebody in the community called it Franken fingers. They were just full of little pinprick holes that you could really, really see. And you know, he is 15 I don't see his hands too much. Although I did peek when he was looking at the microphone and hanging out in the studio here, studio. Well, it is a studio, it's my office. I noticed and his endo looks at them every single time we go in that they are just normal. They are not those Franken fingers anymore. I mean, we've been using Dexcom for almost six and a half years now. And with every new iteration, we've done fewer and fewer finger sticks. The G six eliminates finger sticks for calibration and diabetes treatment decisions. Just thinking about doing 10 finger sticks a day, which is what we did in the past. I mean that was pretty every day makes me so glad that the Dexcom has helped us come so far. It's An incredible tool. If your glucose alerts and readings from the G six do not match symptoms or expectations, use a blood glucose meter to make diabetes treatment decisions, learn more, go to Diabetes connections.com and click on the Dexcom logo.   And tell me something good this week, a quick book update, not my book, but some other terrific books in the diabetes community. And these are books that have been out for a while that are highly recommended. And we all pass them around to each other, but they're getting updates. And I think it's really important because Gosh, think about how much has changed just in the last couple of years. So the first one I want to tell you about is understanding diabetes. This is better known as The Pink Panther book. I still have no idea why the Pink Panther is involved in this. And it's the actual Pink Panther. I mean, they had to have gotten a trademark but if you've seen this book, you know what I'm thinking. This was the first thing I thought when they handed it to me in the hospital. Why is the Pink Panther affiliated here, but that's a mystery for another time, I suppose. Anyway, they're on the 13th edition which you Come get us a discount because the 14th edition is coming out this summer. This is put on by the children's diabetes foundation. I will link this up in the show notes so that you can order a new book, let your endo know as well, if they're interested and it does come in Spanish. It is also available in an ebook form in a Kindle, so you can get them in lots of different ways. The Pink Panther books, the mystery continues though as to why that character How do they get the trademark anyway? All right, the next book is think like a pancreas, which is a must have, in my opinion, A Practical Guide to managing diabetes with insulin. Gary doesn't need my seal of approval here he is already the number one new release in nutrition and medical health sciences on Amazon. But I think this is really important because I recommend this book all the time. And this is the newest update for it. It's a paperback and an E textbook. And as the description says the all in one comprehensive resource for the millions of people living with diabetes who use insulin. The updates here include, as you would expect new medications, new technologies, injection devices, dietary recommendations. We've had Gary on the show many times he describes himself as a human guinea pig, because he lives with type one and he tries all of these devices, but he also talks about the science behind them in ways that I think is really clear. If you've listened to my interviews with Gary, you know, I generally feel kind of like a goofball. When I talk to him, he's very calming as well. If you haven't gotten this book before, highly recommended. If you have and you're looking for the update, probably the textbook is your best bet and I will link that up in the show notes as well. And finally, and tell me something good, lots of graduations to celebrate. Of course they're not the usual graduations people got very creative with how to celebrate their kids this year, but I know a lot of you were hoping for bigger ceremonies and more tradition. I want to take a moment to highlight just one of the many valedictorians that were spotlighted in some of these Facebook groups that I saw Jeremy bright was valedictorian and thank you so much to his parents for letting me share his story. Jeremy was diagnosed with type one at age 14 and he has a scholarship to Florida Polytechnic University to study computer science this fall. And once Jeremy's parents posted about him in this Facebook group, several other people chimed in with my tea Wendy is a valedictorian as well and you know, they kind of went and listed a few other kids didn't get permission to share their names and or their stories and and that's okay, but I think it's great that so many kids are at least getting the credit that they're due for working so hard through high school I don't know about you guys but it seems sometimes that for these kids I know the workload on my daughter High School was almost worse than college maybe it's just the pressure of you know, they have to do so well and I tried to eat that off for my daughter, but man it is hard when all the high schools are telling them you know, take this class get this college credit all these tests AC t sad. Oh, all right, just a little bit of editorial on my part and we shall see Right with all the wackiness that's happening this year with some colleges not you know, counting the standardized tests, we'll see what happens going forward. But anyway, congratulations to these great kids. If you have a Tell me something good story, please let me know you can reach out Stacy at Diabetes connections.com post in the Facebook group, you know, send a carrier pigeon, whatever it takes. I would love to feature your child or you in our Tell me something good segment.   Before I let you go, it's worth noting that we are right at the five year anniversary of the podcast I had Episode 300. A couple weeks ago, I made a bigger deal about that. The five year milestone is something I'm sure I'll mark on social media and talk about a little bit but I'm bringing it up here because well first of all, I can't believe it's been five years. I can't believe that I'm still doing this. I didn't have a timeline in mind when I started the podcast but I don't think I thought five years later I'd still be doing it and loving it as much as I do and it would still be growing but I bring it up because If you're listening to this point in the show, then you are a true listener. And I appreciate that. And I would urge you to please join the Facebook group Diabetes Connections, the group, I'm going to be doing some polling in the next couple of weeks. I'm not sure what we're going to do with the podcast in 2021. And I know it's a little bit early to start thinking about it. But I plan for the next year. I mean, in terms of sponsors, let's be frank, I usually have all that sewn up by August or September. And I don't want to be in a situation where I decide to make some changes. And then I'm scrambling at the end of the year. So I'm going to be asking questions like you know, frequency length, what do you want to hear? I think after five years, it's time to take a tough look at this like a hard look at it and decide what do we really want to do? Where are we going with this right? And if it stays the same, fantastic. I love doing it. But if there's something that you would prefer to hear, you know, maybe it's all technology news, maybe we go once every two weeks, but we only do news updates, that sort of thing. Maybe you really like the personal stories and we stay with that we do a mix. Maybe we make up Longer show a shorter show, you know, there's lots of options. But I want to hear from you. So please watch for surveys over the next couple of weeks. But you got to be in that group. I'm not going to make these public. I don't want people who don't listen weighing in. I mean, come on. And I really can't thank you enough, five years later, to have as much fun as I'm having and to keep doing this and hearing from people who enjoy it. That's the best. Thank you as always, to my editor john Buchanan's from audio editing solutions for making sense of this week's interview and everything else that he does. And thank you so much for listening. I'm Stacey Simms. I'll see you back here next week. Until then, be kind to yourself.   Unknown Speaker  51:41 Diabetes Connections is a production of Stacey Sims media. All rights reserved. All rounds avenged   Stacey Simms  52:04 You can you can take that to your room when we are done.   Unknown Speaker  52:09 Disgusting.   Unknown Speaker  52:11 No, take it with you Why? And I   Stacey Simms  52:13 have a place to put it or leave it over there because I'm going to throw it away. If I well why would I keep it I take that two places with me like here. Let me interview with a man with a microphone that's been inside my son's mouth. I think you would love it especially in this day and age.   Transcribed by https://otter.ai

What can give us some serious trouble on this path? Body acceptance. How on earth are you supposed to accept your body when you don't want to be where you are?! I'm talking body acceptance with a twist. Sometimes hearing a different explanation can make it click in a way that it didn't seem to before. Check out the YouTube video here and the podcast here.

Tahnee is joined by Erin Lovell Verinder on the podcast today. Erin is a fully qualified Herbalist, Nutritionist and Energetic Healer who has worked in the healing realms for twenty-one years. Erin is deeply passionate about individualised treatment approaches, empowering others to reconnect to their innate ability to heal and rediscover the primal foundations of thriving health. Working deeply in one on one sessions, Erin enables her clients to unfold profound change in their health and wellbeing by bridging together herbal medicine, nutritional medicine, energetics and lifestyle change. We're thrilled to have Erin on the show today, sharing her experience as an intuitive Western Herbalist. “There's medicine everywhere.. There really is” - Erin Lovell Verinder Tahnee and Erin discuss: Erin's journey into energetics and herbalism. Embodied healing, physical, mental, spiritual. The medicinal powers of culinary herbs. The beauty and strength of medicinal weeds. Wildcrafting and plant identification. The restorative powers of time in nature and adequate nutrition. Herbalism as activism. Herbalism in Australia - how the institutionalised regulation of the craft has stolen some of the magic. The lack of knowledge and understanding that surrounds our native Australian herbal medicine. Folk medicine in America.   Who is Erin Lovell Verinder ? Erin is a fully qualified Herbalist, Nutritionist and Energetic Healer who has worked in the healing realms for twenty-one years. Erin holds a Bachelor of Western Herbal Medicine, an Advanced Diploma of Nutritional Medicine and a Diploma of Energetic Healing and is a member of the (ATMS) Australian Traditional Medicine Society. Walking the plant path, Erin is a woman in tune with the natural world. On a full hearted mission to educate, assist and up-level how we can all heal with the rhythms of nature, through the bounty of plant medicine and gentle innate interventions to unearth thriving health and wellbeing. Marrying the wisdom and philosophy of naturopathic medicine as the golden compass, to treat the whole- not just the symptom is the pure guiding force in Erin’s practice. Getting to the roots of ill health is the solid intention and directive, addressing the drivers and encouraging the body gently to return to balance and harmony with food as medicine, medicinal plants, lifestyle changes, functional testing and energetic medicine to deliver a wholesome high vibrational experience and to ultimately promote healing. Resources: Erin's Website Erin's Instagram Erin's Book - Plants For The People   Q: How Can I Support The SuperFeast Podcast?   A: Tell all your friends and family and share online! We’d also love it if you could subscribe and review this podcast on iTunes. Or check us out on Stitcher :)! Plus we're on Spotify!   Check Out The Transcript Here:   Tahnee: (00:00) Hi everybody, and welcome to the SuperFeast Podcast. Today I am here with Erin Lovell Verinder, I hope I'm saying that correctly.   Erin: (00:09) That was very fancy.   Tahnee: (00:12) She's a beautiful herbalist and naturopath that I was fortunate to meet a little while ago, and she does Western Herbalism, so I'm really excited to have her perspective on the podcast today. She also has a really great and interesting background as an energetic healer as well, so I'm really excited to weave that into our conversation today, because I think your journey, Erin, from coming from energetics to herbalism is a really exciting one. She is just kind of an all-around, on the ground, herbal earth lady wise woman. She lives out here in Byron. She has a really beautiful hubby and puppies and lives in a church, which is kind of my dream. I'm really excited to have you here today, thanks for joining us.   Erin: (01:02) Thanks so much for having me. I'm so stoked to be here.   Tahnee: (01:05) Yeah, and I have a copy of your book here. Plants for the People. I really want to talk about that today, because I think, given what's going on in the world, it's such an empowering read, and it makes herbalism seem really easy and kind of accessible, but I really wanted to get back to your roots, because you say, in the book, that you had an uncle who gardened and fostered a love of plants in you, so I was wondering if you could kind of tell us about your childhood and your special uncle, and any other little seeds that might have been planted at that early stage for you, as to why you are now the wise woman that you are.   Erin: (01:41) Thank you, yeah. Definitely, he was such a beautiful force in my life. He was really like my adopted grandfather. Both my grandfathers passed when I was quite young, so I didn't have that sort of figure in my life when I was growing up. He was our neighbour, actually, started as our neighbour, and just like dear friends over the fence, and as it all evolved, he ended up moving in with us when his wife passed away. We lived with him for years, he just became a part of the family so I call him, he was my Uncle Les, but he really was like my grandfather and I just adored him.   Erin: (02:21) My parents, there was not a green thumb in the household, really. My dad's a structural engineer, very very, super cerebral, dad particularly. Earthy mum, but not in the way of translation into connection to nature. Uncle Les just, he was an old Englishman and he just adored his garden and had this kind of relationship and magic with his garden that really inspired me. His roses were always the best in the neighbourhood. He had so much fruit growing on his trees, his veggies were always bumping. I was so impressed that he could plant something and it would just take off. That seemed magical to me, because the only place we got roses was at the corner store. You know what I mean? Get your veggies at the veggie shop.   Erin: (03:10) I learnt a lot from him, and he introduced me to growing and getting my hands in the dirt, and just all these really simple tips that totally inspired me as a child. I really was just so drawn to that. That definitely was early-day seeds of how I thought plants were magical. My mum reminded me the other day of also my connections to nature, but my entrepreneurial side, of I used to go around, it's so funny. I used to go around the neighbourhood cutting people's flowers from their garden, making arrangements, like making them beautiful, and then I would literally knock on their doors and sell them back to them.   Tahnee: (03:52) That's hilarious.   Erin: (03:58) [Crosstalk 00:03:58] though. I would come home with gold coins, which is major when you're little, gold coins, and she would just be like, "How did you do that?" I think I just thought it was cute. I just noticed, even when I went and picked their flowers, I just was really enamoured by nature, and in the suburbs in the '80s and '90s, growing up in the suburbs of Western Sydney, everybody had gardens. It was very tame though, but I was still deeply connected to the gardens, and I was always seeking as much wildness as I could. There was a reserve up the road with lots of eucalyptus and kookaburras laughing, and I was just so deeply in love with being outside always.   Tahnee: (04:41) I think we're super blessed in Australia, because even if you do grow up in a city, you typically have access to more nature. Like I've been in Sydney and seen lorikeets flying around and parks and trees, so I think it breeds a little bit of, I don't know, that kind of connection to the natural world. Even if we do grow up around white picket fences.   Erin: (05:05) Totally, yeah.   Tahnee: (05:08) But also what I think people probably don't appreciate in their suburban area, and I'm sure you probably do now, but as a little girl, you weren't aware, maybe, of how many of those kind of things that we might have once piled Roundup onto, and hopefully people aren't doing that anymore, are actually really useful medicinals.   Erin: (05:28) Surely.   Tahnee: (05:30) This time right now where we're all kind of at home more, and kind of in our natural suburban habitats, there are so many accessible plants for us to get to.   Erin: (05:41) Absolutely.   Tahnee: (05:41) At what point did you kind of realise, "I can actually start to create medicine from this natural world," as opposed to just being kind of obsessed with it?   Erin: (05:52) A novice. A young, obsessed novice. Even when I was small, with Uncle Les, he would point out things that were medicinal. Although he didn't, he wouldn't really make remedies or things like that, but he would sort of point out what he knew about them. So I think that definitely planted seeds to me. He would point out something about dandelion, and how dandelion had lots of nutrition in it. It's very nutritious. He would say things like, "When spring springs, spring awakens, and the dandelions really wake up." He'd say, "The medicine, or the nutrition of the leaf is at its highest." He'd say things like that. Even though I wouldn't really see him eat any dandelions, I think this is just knowledge that were passed down through his family as well.   Erin: (06:53) Little seeds like that. My grandmas also used herbs to heal, so I think, for me, it wasn't like someone was actively teaching me herbalism back in the day, but there were these real little nuggets that were planted that I was quite enamoured with and it just stayed with me.   Tahnee: (07:12) So you actually started more in the esoteric realm, which is kind of, I feel like normally people would go for the more tangible things and then end up [crosstalk 00:07:24] certainly that's my experience, so it's interesting to me that you went kind of backwards in some ways. Can you explain how a 16 year old from Western Sydney gets into the woowoo... [Inaudible 00:07:37]?   Erin: (07:37) Totally. Especially with, again, coming from my family, where it wasn't really, it was so foreign to where they were at, but really inherent in me. My grandma's, both of them were really intuitive in different ways. One of my grandma's, who I was closest with, her lineage was Russian, Romanian, gypsy. It was kind of known in the family that there was this alarmingly psychic line that had gone through the family, aunt's and even her half sister. She had a lot of skills, my nan. I only got to spend three, four years with her. I was tiny when she passed away, but she really imprinted on me. My mum always says to me it's just insane how similar you are to her, even though you really didn't get to spend that much time with her. So I do feel like that was inherent in my cells, in my blood and my bones, and in my lineage.   Erin: (08:42) I just was always fascinated with anything mystical, from a really young age. And my Uncle Les's wife, who I always named Auntie Maureen, so cute, she was the first person to introduce me to crystals. I was probably like 10, very little. She had a little bowl of crystals, and she would always talk me through them. Even then I was like, "Wow, what are those?" When I was 16 I was really into tarot, and I was really into runes, those Celtic runes. Anything divination-based, I loved it. Palm reading, I'd have all these books on palmistry, and I got a few books on aromatherapy and herbalism, so I was just starting to read about all these kind of things and learn about them myself.   Erin: (09:31) I actually came up north here when I was around 16, 17. I was visiting a friend in the hills out here, who'd moved up here, and it was, she was living with this beautiful woman who was just so intuitive and was absolutely a medicine woman, is a medicine woman in her own right, and they introduced me to reiki, and they introduced me to sitting in circles, and sitting in circles with women, and healing circles and holding space, and I was 16, 17, and that's just where it all began for me, in a deeper sense. That's when I went and learnt reiki. That's when I sort of did all the levels. I started just doing different courses and learning things outside of my schooling, and that's when I was about 18, I went and did the two year energetic healing, just solid two year energetic healing diploma as an 18 year old.   Tahnee: (10:28) Good times.   Erin: (10:30) Totally, so kooky, but it was great.   Tahnee: (10:32) Did you actually do that as a career, then, until-   Erin: (10:36) Yeah. Yeah, no I didn't go solid into practise. I dabbled, and went and really cultivated and studied other things as well, over the years, and then went and retrained as a herbalist and nutritionist, so I did dabble, but I got out, Tahnee and I was like, "Oh my God, I'm like literally," I think I was 20 when I got out, and I was like, "This is nuts. I need to go live. I don't really know what to do with this." All this auric healing and kinesiology and sound healing, I didn't really feel ready to hold space for people in that way as a permanent thing, and also I was trying to figure out how you even do that. Back then-   Tahnee: (11:19) I know, it wasn't an option.   Erin: (11:20) That was so different.   Tahnee: (11:22) Yeah.   Erin: (11:22) No. That was like 18 years ago, guys. It was really weird back then.   Tahnee: (11:27) I remember wanting to be a yoga teacher when I was 16 and being like, "There isn't such a thing." Like seriously, there were two yoga places in the entire city I lived in, and I was like, "Well." And now it's like-   Erin: (11:37) Everywhere.   Tahnee: (11:41) You can throw a rock and hit a yoga teacher. That's a pretty huge jump in such a short period of time. How did you get drawn to a career in herbalism, though, if you're kind of in this more esoteric realm and still finding out who you are as a 20 year old you know?   Erin: (12:00) Yeah, totally. A few things happened. Lots of big things happened to me around the age of 20, 21, 22, those few early, formative years. I met my husband when I was 21, so we've been together for 17 years, which is a long time. Growing together through those years. I met him, I lived in the States, I lost my partner before him, he passed away from cancer. I just learnt so much in those few years. It was huge. When my ex-partner passed away from cancer, and it was really an aggressive cancer, and within five months he was gone. It was so intense, really. I watched him do all of these things to help his spiritual bodies, because at that point, his physical body was, he was really advised to not do treatment. There was really nothing they could do at that point, because it was a reoccurrence and super aggressive. I watched him do all of these things to shift his spiritual body.   Erin: (13:13) Now, here I am sitting there, an energetic healer. Young, novice energetic healer, but still, having studied for years, three years, let's say. Watching him go through this, do all of these things to shift his body spiritually, to try to shift his body on the spiritual levels to try to make a physical effect, and he died.   Erin: (13:34) I understand now that the work that he did was absolutely healing, and he was able to let go of his life by doing that work. He was just so brave, truly. Such a brave person, so courageous. I look back and I'm so impressed that a 21-year-old could do all of those things to let go of his life like that, but he didn't heal his body, and I was just broken man. I was so broken about it, because I was like, "Why didn't those things help him heal his body?" Because he was doing all the things, and when we work on ourselves, on those more etheric, energetic emotional levels, in my brain, at that time in my training, I understood that technically should actually impact your physical body, and that didn't happen. I was just broken about it.   Erin: (14:30) Fast forward some years later, where I had processed a lot more, I realised that I just wanted to know so much more about the body, and I wanted to know how to heal the body, because we're these spiritual beings having this physical experience. How can I impact and support people having the physical experience, not just supporting them on a spiritual, etheric level, because we're here, you know? In that way in our bodies.   Tahnee: (14:54) What's actually changed for you. This is a tricky question. I have thoughts around this, I'm curious to hear yours. If you're trying to affect change that way, spirit-down, what are your thoughts now on the effectiveness of that process to shift a physical, especially a really deep physical, let's say, process that's maybe negative for the body. Do you have-   Erin: (15:27) I think now my understanding of the body and the being is that all parts of the being need to come onboard. I actually believe that that can be so powerful as working on the spiritual level, but of course coming at it, as well, from a physical level, is just as important. That's my understanding of it now. People absolutely might have different opinions, and I respect all of them and honour all of them, but my understanding is that we need to come from both sides and all parts to come on board to really heal a physical issue.   Tahnee: (16:01) Yeah. My experience is also it's such a subtle form of energy and the energy required to transform that kind of, I see it as more dispersed, subtle. To actually concentrate it and bring it into a physical expression requires a lot more, we would say Jing, a lot more of your strength to really be able to kind of do that, and if someone's really suffering, I think it can ease their transitions, obviously. I think that's probably the gift that your ex got out of that process, but yeah, I think often the more gross effects can be easier for people to then cultivate that spiritual awareness, and that spiritual kind of healing, but you kind of need to have a bit of capacity in the physical body, sometimes, I think, for those things to all integrate. I guess my teacher talks about it as they all knit together through the chakra system-   Erin: (17:04) Yeah, totally.   Tahnee: (17:06) So if we're weak in, let's say we have a stomach cancer and we can't fully integrate on that level, it's just going to be tricky for us to do that. It's definitely something I think is interesting and worth talking about more, because, especially in this area, I'm sure, we have so many people proposing their way as "the way", and I think we have to be really conscious. We are physical beings having a physical experience, and we have to treat the physical body. It's such an essential part of our healing journey, I think, is to integrate and fully land here.   Erin: (17:43) It really is.   Tahnee: (17:45) Was that kind of what you feel like happened in your 20s? You became more at home in your physical and in the physical?   Erin: (17:51) Totally. I think journeying through so much in my early 20s, I realised I had gone so far out of my body to learn about healing that I was almost a little uncomfortable in just being in my body. I think I'm actually a naturally very grounded person, so being out of my body actually felt more challenging for me. I'm not very sort of Vata, I'm quite like Pitta/Kalpha, kind of more in my body in that way, and I think just coming more into it, I found my power more as I grounded more into my body, not out of my body.   Erin: (18:33) Really, with my ex-partner, it really inspired me to want to understand more about health, and that's actually, that was a long answer to how I got to herbalism, but it really kind of brought me to I know that plants have powers, and I know they impact the body. I really just want to know all about their mysteries and really learn more about them, and I became a nutritionist as well, really learning about food as medicine and how to heal the body with food.   Tahnee: (19:01) Yeah. I think when we talk about these things that we ingest, that we transform and alchemize through our internal processes, we are talking about physical, energetic, it's on both levels. Herbs don't just work on the physical body. They work on the energetic body and the subtle body, and they give us that strength, I think, for these spiritual processes and practises. That's what I love so much about your work, I think, is there's that intersection where there's still a really intuitive kind of feminine knowing and relationship with the plants. It's not just, oh, they're full of, I'm looking at a reishi right now, triterpenes.   Erin: (19:42) Right, right.   Tahnee: (19:43) You know? To me, to look at that and think of, I'm holding up a red reishi right now, if you're listening, to think of that as a triterpene pod has no romance for me, but if I think of that as a Heart tonic or a Liver tonic, and on the energetic level, a Shen tonic and a Blood tonic, then I'm starting to get a little bit more in romance with the kind of relationship I'm going to have with that plant when I ingest it. I think that's what you've done so beautifully in the book, Plants For The People. There's stuff in there to appease the western mind, and I read that, you were like, "We're all educated, we need that little bit of reassurance that these things are actually researched and safe," and all that stuff.   Tahnee: (20:27) But on another level, there's this kind of relationship that we develop with herbs when we take them and when we work with them and when we harvest them and forage them and when we learn to see them. I think it's actually a really fun line to walk, so I wondered if you could talk a little bit about that, in practise and in clinic, like how you, I read in your book that you were saying you learned all the western herbal stuff when you were studying at uni, but when you're actually in clinics, you had to develop that more intuitive relationship with the herbs. How did that work for you? What was that process like?   Erin: (21:05) It is interesting, because herbalism now, particularly in Australia, naturopathic studies and herbal medicine studies, western herbal medicine studies, it's very clinical. It's gotten more and more clinical, so it's heavy sciences. You get a, I remember back in the day, I don't even know if they do it now, but you get a tiny portion of making medicines and also identifying medicines. I remember we went, for one, a weed walk, into the botanical gardens or something, into the herb garden in Sydney. It was like, "That's it." Which is to me, totally, my whole degree. It was incredibly cerebral, all through books. Through books, through clinical studies, through sort of evidence-based, clinical-based knowledge, and a lot of the teachers were great.   Erin: (22:09) I think what actually got me through something like that was the inspiration of these amazing herbalists and naturopaths giving you all their experiences of having relationships with the plants over the years, and working with them and seeing them work their magic and alchemy. It was still very inspiring, but gosh, it could be dry. It was so dry, some of the studies, and I know people listening are probably going through that right now. It's a lot. It's a lot to go through.   Erin: (22:38) Also, you get all the knowledge and then you've got to figure out how you want to then actually take that knowledge and mix it with your unique offering, and offer it out. So whether you are going to be a practitioner, you're going to write, you're going to research, you're going to create products, whatever it might be, it's a huge learning curve and commitment. For me, I just felt like there was a lot lacking. I did feel I'd got a great education, but for my individual spirit and what I know I have to offer and what I am drawn to, it was much more about really bringing the plants to life in a deeper way, so I had to do a lot more study outside of my studies to actually get to know the plants, to be able to identify, to be able to learn how they like to grow. What is the energy of them? How do they feel? And sit with them and get to know them, and I've done that for years and continue to do that.   Erin: (23:42) A lot of it actually has been self-taught, self-directed, or learning from older herbalists who I've been lucky enough to cross paths with, but a lot of it is you actually have to step outside of that traditional training now, because it's so clinical.   Tahnee: (23:59) Yeah. I speak to a lot of my acupuncturist friends about this, because you go through this degree and then you come out and you actually don't know how to take pulse properly, and that's the foundation of Chinese Medicine. Things like that.   Erin: (24:13) Totally.   Tahnee: (24:16) I mean I even know, with naturopathy friends, you don't learn, often, a lot of the more subtle aspects of the herbs and how to treat the energetics and all that kind of stuff I don't believe is really covered. I think they talk about it, but they don't really teach it. So it is a tricky, we did the, and I know you're a big fan of Tierra, Michael Tierra's program.   Erin: (24:37) Yeah.   Tahnee: (24:39) I found he was really big on the practical stuff, and I really felt, for people who were kind of learning, it's like to really do it and touch it with your hands and make mistakes and have everything go mouldy and do all of those dumb things.   Erin: (24:57) Totally.. Just learn, really experience.   Tahnee: (25:01) It's part of the process. It's like learning to cook. Some of the cakes just flop.   Erin: (25:05) Don't rise. Totally.   Tahnee: (25:06) It's like I've got a brick. But yeah, I think that's part of it. People are so afraid, we have this fear around plants and weeds and that they're dangerous or poisonous. We went to an event you hosted with Kate and Jasmine at the Church Farm, and you were talking about how so many of our culinary herbs are medicinal and we don't even think about that. What are some herbs people would regularly encounter in their daily lives that they might not realise are actually medicinal allies?   Erin: (25:36) Medicinal. Just the most basic ones come to mind. Oregano, thyme, turmeric, cinnamon, ginger. All of these herbs that you cook with most days, or you have them in some food in your life, in your cupboard, they're all highly medicinal. They've so smart, because they've masked themselves as these culinary herbs and worked their path into your everyday life, but they're actually really potent medicinals. Also most of those are super easy to grow, especially your weed herbs, like your oregano, your thyme, your rosemary, your sage, so easy to grow, and can actually be used for so many different medicines, and I use them a lot in the book. You'll see them repeated a lot, because they're just very easy to come by and accessible and approachable for people as well.   Tahnee: (26:27) Yeah, and even if people don't have fresh ones, right, they can use dried herbs.   Erin: (26:31) Dried, totally. To be fair, a lot of medicines are actually easier to make from dried herbs, because again, you won't get that mouldy spoilage as much you mentioned as well. In the book, I use a lot of dried herbs, and it's also easy for people to find them or order them online, access them without having to cultivate a whole garden or wildcraft...   Tahnee: (26:53) Yeah, buy expensive weird herbs.   Erin: (26:56) Exactly. Totally.   Tahnee: (26:57) That's what I think, we do, obviously, the Taoist Tonic herbs, and some of them are expensive, but I think you don't have to take fancy herbs. Really a lot of herbs are super cheap. We just harvested a whole bunch of dandi from our yard, and the roots were huge, and it's like, you know, dry those up, eat the leaves. We've got a great Liver herb there now, to sit in the cupboard and boil up whenever we want it. Yeah, but that took all of two seconds. My toddler loved it, because she was, you know, destroying the lawn.   Erin: (27:28) Digging them up. Yep, totally.   Tahnee: (27:31) It's like, yeah, that's great. There's lots of beautiful, potent medicine around that's free or very accessible. So people are kind of, if they are interested and feel the call to plants, but they're not really confident, and obviously get the book everybody. It's called Plants for the People. Is it teas that you recommend people starting with, or just learning to identify edible leaves? What are your favourite starting points for people?   Erin: (27:59) Teas are so great because they are just such an accessible way to take your medicine. Again, all cultures are really, all of our ancestors, that's the way that they utilised their medicines. They were boiling them, infusing them. I think getting the added hydration is really positive for your health as well. Tea is super easy. You seriously can't go wrong with making a tea, you know what I mean? Even if you forget about it and brew it for a long time, then you've just got a strong tea.   Tahnee: (28:28) Dilute it and drink it.   Erin: (28:30) Exactly. Dilute it and drink it. It's just an easy way, and also it gives people the chance to play with dried herbs or fresh herbs, but understand flavour combinations and what feels good and what works for their body. I do think tea is a great place to start. I am encouraging people to really go out and look at what's in their yard, and it's something that I say in the book a lot. I give some little golden tips on wildcrafting which, first and foremost, is about identification, because we all want to be safe, right? So you need to practise identification and really be sure. But there are many things growing in your yard, like my yard, you mentioned we live in a church, it's an old, flat churchyard. We've lived here for a year and a half, but it's interesting for me because it's such a different landscape than I'm used to, because I lived in the Blue Mountains for 12 years, and I had all these English gardens that were just so grandiose and beautiful, and this is a flat churchyard.   Erin: (29:35) But we've been growing a lot on this land. It's very fertile land. We've got a great medicinal herb garden growing now, but because I never planted proper grass, I think, on this block, it's just full of weeds, really. I've watched them over the seasons, and what I have on my block is I've got a lot of gotu kola, I've got plantago, I've got dandelion, and I've got chickweed coming up now, because it's cooler. We eat a lot of our chickweed, we eat our dandelion leaves. I'll eat a few gotu kola a day as well. A bunch of those are edible, super nutritious. They're free. They're weeds, so the energy and the might of weeds, they persist, you know? They're strong. They're such good tonics for our bodies, so nutritive, and also you can make medicines from them, and that's just growing in my backyard.   Erin: (30:37) I know some people will be living in the city, so we've got to be mindful of sprays and, for sure, pesticides. You've got to find some wildness where you don't think it's sprayed, so a park where you don't think it's sprayed, do a bit of research. Even in parks around cities, there's medicine everywhere. There really is.   Tahnee: (30:57) [inaudible 00:30:57].   Erin: (30:57) I just encourage people that, yeah.   Tahnee: (31:02) I often, I have personal rules about thievery. I won't go into someone's property, but if it's over the fence it's fair [crosstalk 00:31:11]. Mason's mum used to live in Gladesville, which is kind of inner west of Sydney, and I would go for walks with a green bag and come home with kumquats and lemons and rosemary and sage and thyme and we'd brew up things. There's actually quite a lot of medicine out there if you [inaudible 00:31:28].   Erin: (31:28) There seriously is.   Tahnee: (31:31) Just obviously don't steal from inside people's yards.   Erin: (31:34) Don't do what I used to do as a child and go and trespass and pick from someone's garden. You can get away with it when you're like eight.   Tahnee: (31:44) Oh yeah [crosstalk 00:31:44] story. It's a great story.   Erin: (31:46) You can get away with it when you're little, but maybe not now. This morning we just went for a big walk, and we just walked through the paddocks and just the edges, there's a school here, and just the edge of the school had this giant rosemary bush. It was insane, it was so huge. Then I also found a whole lot of lemon myrtle trees.   Tahnee: (32:05) I love lemon myrtle.   Erin: (32:06) Because I walked past and I was like, "Oh my God, the smell," and I touched the leaf and I was like, "It's lemon myrtle." So I picked a few leaves just to make up a cup of tea this morning. It was beautiful.   Tahnee: (32:15) Yeah. Medicine is all around.   Erin: (32:17) It really is.   Tahnee: (32:19) And so, if people I guess if they're learning identification, I typically say if you're not sure, don't eat it.   Erin: (32:31) Don't eat it.   Tahnee: (32:31) If you have a friend who's better at identifying, share it with them. For a lot of the ones we're talking about now, like dandy and stuff, even the ones that look like they aren't toxic, and gotu kola, there's that violet that looks like gotu kola.   Erin: (32:46) It is.   Tahnee: (32:47) I've eaten that. It tastes bad, but it's fine. I've done that. If you eat, there's a native yellow-flowered plant that looks like dandy, it's the same thing. It's just like-   Erin: (32:58) Like cats ears?   Tahnee: (32:59) Yeah, cats ears.   Erin: (33:01) Yeah, they're fuzzy. No, they don't taste good. The difference is dandy is smooth and it's more serrated on the edge, so there's no hairs on it. Cats ears are a little rounded on the edge, and they've got hairs all over them. If you're thinking what that is, is it hairy? If it's hairy, it's not dandelion.   Tahnee: (33:22) Yeah, people can start to work that stuff out.   Erin: (33:24) But totally, if you don't know what it is don't eat, yeah definitely don't eat it, there are actually a lot of great Facebook group identification, garden identification things that you can join as well, and you get a lot of expert gardeners coming on there and giving you tips or giving you a link to a YouTube video to watch for identification. It's very helpful, but yeah, you've got to practise. A lot of the things you can't, like rosemary and sage, you can't really get those too wrong. But they're cultivated, obviously, in someone's garden.   Erin: (34:01) Just get to know them. That's why, in the book, when I taught the 40 plants, I really tried to teach 40 most common or relevant plants. A lot of them are super common kinds of kitchen herbs. We shot a beautiful photo of all of them.   Tahnee: (34:20) They're gorgeous.   Erin: (34:22) Thank you.   Tahnee: (34:22) Just gorgeous. Oh, I've got chickweed.   Erin: (34:26) Yeah, look at that.   Tahnee: (34:26) They're just stunning. I was just going to ask, because I think, one of the things we try and help people kind of get their heads around, it's a tricky conversation because yes, these things are medicinal, but they're also, we consider herbs as part of our diet, and that's something Mason and I are really passionate about. We don't just take them when we're sick. We're not taking them even, always, for medicinal reasons. I love eating chickweed in a salad, and yeah, it's mucilaginous and high in vitamin C and great in all these, blah blah, but it's just a delicious salad green and same with dandy. Yes, it's cleansing for the Liver and the Blood, but it's also bitter and it stimulates your appetite, it's great to have before a pasta or something. It's a yummy herb.   Tahnee: (35:16) When you work with people one on one and when you're talking about that, is that something you encourage and foster, relating to plants as more than that kind of, I think that's that allopathic, it's a chemical constituent that's good for this and good for that.   Erin: (35:32) Yeah, totally.   Tahnee: (35:32) Is that something you teach people and get them to think about?   Erin: (35:36) For sure. It's funny, I think, for me, I work on lots of different levels with different people, and being a practitioner, it's so interesting, because as I've learned over the years, the art of being a practitioner is being a good shape shifter, and being able to shape shift to people's needs and to people's energies, because if I'm seeing six, ten people in a day, they're going to have completely different stories, completely different needs, and the way that I need to come at them is all really different. For some people, I will keep it more on a, I wouldn't say clinical, but there's a little bit more, I'll keep it on that level. For other people, so we'll do more diagnostics and testing and we'll get to the roots of things in those ways. With other people, I might be just using drop doses of herbs and totally tiny energetic doses, because they're very sensitive and I can feel that they just need very gentle interventions, and I'll be talking in that way as well.   Erin: (36:38) And then for other people, I'll be talking more about nutrition and how to eat those wild foods, and how to change your nutrition to support what's going on. It just really changes, honestly, and that's working on all those different levels with different people. I would love, one day, to be able to have a place where people can come and experience with me how to heal with the plants in a more tangible sense. I think that's the next few chapters away, maybe, for us, which would be beautiful, but yeah, for now, I just merge all of those skills together of how to inspire people to connect back to plants and connect back to how simple it can be as well, because I think wellness and wellbeing has gotten really complicated for a lot of people.   Tahnee: (37:28) Totally.   Erin: (37:29) Yeah, and it's intimidating for a lot of people, so my job is to try to really demystify that, support people through very complex health issues and help them shift and get better. So I really just try to meet them wherever they need me to meet them.   Tahnee: (37:43) Yeah. So which herbs do you work, I imagine you're fairly intuitive with what you work with for yourself, but are you working with anything in particular, any herbs you're really drawn to at the moment? What's your process for selecting and working with them?   Erin: (38:01) Totally, yeah. What am I doing right now? It changes everyday, because I am just like, like probably you guys too, it's kind of like, "What do I feel like? How am I? Where am I at today?"   Tahnee: (38:13) [inaudible 00:38:13]. I don't even know what I'm taking.   Erin: (38:14) Mase just makes them for you?   Tahnee: (38:17) Right.   Erin: (38:18) I'm sure. So it changes with what I'm feeling, but just also, I know we're in the time of corona, but for me, knowing that the autumn shift is coming, we're starting to go into that cooler inward cycle, so I will support my immunity more. I've just been doing a lot of nice hydration and mucous membrane support for my throat as well. I do long days where I talk and talk and talk, so I'll do a thyme, lemon and manuka, just tea, yesterday, that I was sipping all day with clients, that felt really nice. A little elecampane sometimes in there as well, but I actually am using a lot of medicinal mushrooms right now, and that's really going into all my tonics and smoothies. I don't really drink a lot of smoothies, but into my warming tonics more. I make a really nice dandy root cinnamon tonic base, with coconut, almond milk, or whatever milk we make, and then I will put in some mushrooms with that, so right now, very much so doing my Reishi, my little bitter Reishi, my Chaga, sometimes I do Mason's Mushrooms as well, just as the combo, or I've got a seven shrooms mix that I use as well from Orchard Street. I just mix up what I feel like, all the different things.   Tahnee: (39:45) That's what I think I so [inaudible 00:39:47] about having an abundant apothecary. You get to be able to really feel into what you need.   Erin: (39:52) Play.   Tahnee: (39:52) Yeah.   Erin: (39:54) Yeah, totally. For me, I do work with a bunch of adaptogens, because historically I have a sensitive adrenal system, though I'm in such a better place than a few years ago, when I was quite burnt out, I really do need to lean into the medicine of the adaptogens and sort of pulse dose those. Some days I'll go a lot stronger on them. Other days, I'll feel like I really don't need to bring them into my body. I am quite intuitive with them. I'm not prescriptive with something being an everyday thing with herbs. I'm at a point where I'm not on an actual prescription with anything. I just kind of go in and out with them and dance with them a little.   Tahnee: (40:35) When you had that healing crisis a while ago, when you were going through that whole adrenal thing. Was that when you lived in the mountains, as well? You kind of had to get out of that flow?   Erin: (40:46) It was.   Tahnee: (40:47) Yeah. You were just burning yourself out through work, right? Is that kind of-   Erin: (40:53) Totally. Not so much, it was a lot of different elements. I think, for me, I had some really intense tender fertility interventions and just went through a lot of experiences there. One of my best relationships was breaking down, this whole life we'd cultivated in the mountains I was like, we were about to build a house, then we were like, "We don't want to do that. We want to leave. We're ready to go." So we worked so hard at something and then it was just telling us that it was complete, really. The next chapters of our lives, my husband and I, were not going to be there. We'd worked so hard, we were holding on really tight to this life that we thought we should be having, and this life that we cultivated all this space, even to have a baby, and there was no baby. Which was okay, and we're in a very different place about it now, but it was like, "This is meant to happen," and then I think I was holding on so tightly was causing me so much emotional stress.   Erin: (41:51) I was also holding so much space for other people's healing process, and doing these huge long days in Sydney from the mountains. It was just a lot, and I think it became really a loud storm, and my body just told me I needed to rest, and it was really intense, the way it told me I needed to rest, and I just had to listen to that. Yeah, totally slammed me down on the ground.   Tahnee: (42:16) Thanks body.   Erin: (42:18) Like full on darkest days, in the bathroom crying, thinking, "Oh my God, is this ever going to get better," because I couldn't control my stress response, and I was just getting cortisol panic rashes all over my body constantly, yet my mind was totally calm.   Tahnee: (42:35) Your body was really-   Erin: (42:36) It was really scary. Wigged out.   Tahnee: (42:38) Do you [crosstalk 00:42:39]. Do you pull up your bootstraps and sort it out yourself, or do you go and have someone you work with in times like that?   Erin: (42:47) I actually went straight to my most wonderful naturopath. I did a bunch of things, actually. I did the herbs and the nutrition and testing to see what was going on a little bit more, and I went and saw, I actually could only do acupuncture right at the end when I was a little bit more robust, because I was almost too sensitive to even have needles in me. I was too sensitive. I did that, and I also did a lot of kinesiology, so a lot of energetic work from that, sort of more etheric, but coming into the body as well with kinesiology. I have to say, the food, for me, nutrition, my nutrition changes, and time in nature, so balancing my blood sugar with nutrition and the time that I spent under the oak trees swinging in my hammock, honestly, was the most healing thing for me, truly, because my blood sugar was so wigged out.   Tahnee: (43:47) Yeah, and I don't think, that's probably, to me, the most poisonous aspect of this wellness thing, is how food has become demonised. Just people living on liquids. We need substance and it grounds us. It nourishes us, especially if we are stressed or we have things going on like what you're describing. You were doing all those drives from the mountains to Sydney, that's a long time in the car and your energy [crosstalk 00:44:15].   Erin: (44:15) A long time.   Tahnee: (44:17) -By that. It's a lot. There's a lot there [crosstalk 00:44:23] hearty meal and a lie-down.   Erin: (44:24) Totally. And I just did that. I did that, and it really, really helped, and of course I did all the herbs, I did a lot of supplementation to support my body. I was in a crisis, so I needed to be supported in quite a major way. It wasn't a few things that came on board, it was a lot of things. Even coming back to the beginning of our conversation where I said I feel like all parts of the being need to come on board. That was truly one of the biggest experiences that for me, where I had to actually come on all levels to really work on healing my body, and I got better really quick. I know people struggle with this for years and years, and within a few months I was really able to turn around my picture of adrenal fatigue and dysfunction, which is amazing.   Tahnee: (45:12) Did it change, for you, though, how you worked? Because I think, often, certainly some of the people we work with, they want us to help them find the solution that they can go back to how things are, and it's one of the hardest things to communicate, but it's the reason this is happening is unfortunately due to this kind of lack of resonance between the way you're living and what you need. Was that a big shift for you in how you did things?   Erin: (45:40) Everything changed. Everything changed, yeah. My husband and I both acknowledged we were done with the mountains and we needed to let go of this concept of the house and everything we'd worked with. The mountains are beautiful, but it's also a very potent place, and traditionally, from an indigenous perspective, what I know of it, is that it was somewhere you'd come to do deep healing and then you'd leave. You really wouldn't need to, don't outstay your welcome, it's time to go. I think for years, actually, there were messages of we were complete, and we didn't really listen to that.   Erin: (46:15) Yeah, so for me, in that time I knew that we needed to let go of that, and I also needed to totally transform the way I was working, for sure. Only maybe a year before that I had sold my multi-modality wellness space that I'd started, so I'd sold that in the mountains, and I was heading up the Orchard Street Clinic in Sydney, and loved it so much and had been there for nearly five, six years, I think, towards the end six years, from the beginnings of Orchard Street. I just knew I had to let it go. I knew that I needed to go digital and give myself a whole lot of room to breathe and really change the way I practised, and in that moment, we sort of realised, okay, well if I go digital, I've sold my business, we've let go of the land, my husband leaves his job, we don't actually need to be, like we can let go of being here.   Tahnee: (47:03) Be wherever you want to be.   Erin: (47:03) Yeah, be wherever we want to be. And then honestly, the next day, we talked about moving up here, and the next day a friend of mine posted that she was leaving this beautiful church house.   Tahnee: (47:14) Ellie.   Erin: (47:15) Yeah, Ellie posted, bless Ellie. She posted on Instagram and I saw it, and I was like, "That's it. Let's move to the church." We got it very quickly. We'd moved in about two, three weeks.   Tahnee: (47:27) Wow.   Erin: (47:28) And that changed everything.   Tahnee: (47:29) Was Plants for the People born in the church or up in the Blue Mountains?   Erin: (47:33) Plants for the People was born in the Blue Mountains. I signed the book deal in the church, so I suppose it was really anchored in the church and I wrote it in the church, but it came to me when I was in the peak of the adrenal dysfunction and I was just laying there, surrendering to the universe, and just going, "Oh my God, what am I meant to do now? I can't keep up my practise like this," and then boom. The book just dropped in. In the absolute breakdown of the space, I had the hugest breakthrough, which was amazing.   Tahnee: (48:07) [inaudible 00:48:07].   Erin: (48:07) As always.   Tahnee: (48:07) Yeah, such a classic story, isn't it? But you have to create space for those things to be born. It's a lot like the process of birth. There's that moment where you're like, don't know if this is going to happen.   Erin: (48:21) Really.   Tahnee: (48:22) That's the strength. You dig deep and find the strength to transcend it.   Erin: (48:27) To bring it through, totally. Yeah, so I did change. I changed to a completely digital platform. Over the last year and a half I've been seeing clients digitally, so kept a lot of my beautiful clients from Sydney, which was wonderful, but I've just expanded into different spaces, working with people worldwide, all over, and it's been so wonderful, from this beautiful place that I get to call home. It's just been so grounding and nourishing for me. In that way, then I can show up, and I can really hold that space for other people so much more, in a more fortified light for all of us, which feels really good.   Tahnee: (49:03) Yeah, that's such a tricky line to walk as someone in a healing kind of industry, because it can drain you so much if you don't have a strong sense of what you need to stay supported and grounded. It's amazing that you've had that journey, because I think you can help other people then navigate it for themselves.   Erin: (49:24) Yeah.   Tahnee: (49:25) The final thing I really wanted to talk to you about, especially at the moment, it's just this idea of herbalism, this kind of activism. Something that, I've spoke to Sarah Wilson recently, and we were kind of discussing that activism doesn't have to be these grand, because I think a lot of us are devastated by what's going on in the world and we feel disempowered and kind of lost sometimes and it's often these grassroots traditions like gardening and herbalism and learning to build and cook, they kind of bring us back to what it means to be human, I think, in a lot of ways. I think especially what's going on in the world right now, there's this opportunity where people maybe do have a bit more time to jump online, order a book, or get on YouTube or Facebook and start to actually dive deep into the herbal practise and empowering themselves to treat their families and themselves when things go awry, but I know you do know a lot about the kind of historical origins of herbalism. For me, I was really into witch books when I was a kid, so [crosstalk 00:50:34], all the ones about the Salem Witch Trials and all that.   Erin: (50:38) Yeah.   Tahnee: (50:38) European witch tradition and stregas in Italy and all of that stuff.   Erin: (50:43) Amazing.   Tahnee: (50:43) Yeah, I don't know-   Erin: (50:45) I wish we knew each other when we were little. We would have been awesome.   Tahnee: (50:50) It's funny, because what you said about, all those things, when I was little, I was really into them, and then I got with this guy who was really scientific and for like.. I was with him for 11 years, and that was a really important time for me, because I actually learned how to think that way. I think I would have been pretty woowoo, I think, if I hadn't have had those years with him, but it also killed me a little bit, my spirit. I got depressed for the first time and I had eating disorders and I went through, and it's not just, obviously, but just that kind of reductionist way of thinking about things, for me, was really painful. So yeah, it's been interesting for me to come back full circle to a more holistic way of being and to reintegrate a lot of the things that I was really passionate about as a younger person, so it's interesting talking to you.   Erin: (51:41) I'm so glad you did. We would have missed out on so much gold if you didn't.   Tahnee: (51:45) Well, I think with all of us, I think we have these, and even those dark nights of the soul kind of times, the kind of a potent force for igniting [crosstalk 00:51:56] in us.   Erin: (51:55) They're important.   Tahnee: (51:56) Yeah, like pushing us to go back to what's true and real for us. So yeah, a lot of what we've talked about still really resonates. But yeah, I guess what I really got out of reading a lot of those books as a young woman was how much fear and power, when people were empowered, how the institutions and the structures were really threatened and challenged by that. In those days it was the Church and all that kind of thing, and now we've got all this crazy stuff going on in the world. I wondered if you could share some thoughts. You've got such an interesting background with your Italian and Romanian ancestry, and where you kind of see herbalism as almost a subversive, how it holds that [crosstalk 00:52:36].   Erin: (52:35) Yeah, totally. I wrote in the book, there's a sentence that is coming to me. I really wanted this to be a bold page of typography in the book, but it's a subtle line, when you guys read it. But it says, "We are activists reclaiming the right to know the medicine of self and soil." Right? Like, oh man. It gives me goosebumps too, because just that little message coming through me when I was writing, I was like, this is just bullshit that we are told that we have to go see somebody to access this information. In Australia, it is so highly regulated to be a herbalist and a naturopath. We've talked about my four years of study. I did seven years all up of study, but with the energetic healing, nutritional medicine, it's so much structured study. But four years of structured study, I understand, I totally respect and understand that study because it absolutely has its place. You definitely should see, if you're able and you have the means and you have things you want to work on with your health, it is so lovely to be supported by someone who knows, really, they really speak the fluent language of the herbs and they can really, really helpful.   Erin: (53:56) Yes, of course, that's me, right? But I also think that everybody should have access to working with the plants and healing with the plants. There are so many different layers and levels of how you can do that. It is the people's medicine. Plants medicine has been and always will be the people's medicine. I say that in the book as well. It's like, traditionally, all of our lineages have utilised plant medicine to heal. Every single one of them, I'd say. That is the oldest form of the ancient practice of healing with plants. My Romanian Russian lines, my Italian Arabic grandmother, my dad's side, they're English, so traditional folk medicine coming through Europe, coming through those Arabic bloodlines, even those Celtic bloodlines. There's so much power in those bloodlines that we have as well, and really we're just waking up and remembering.   Erin: (54:58) What's been taken away from us has been, particularly in Australia, it's like in the '80s, and I was talking to these beautiful old herbalists that live round the corner from me. They're just such gorgeous elders for me, and they both have these beautiful medicinal gardens, and they helped me out with a few herbs I couldn't find in the book that had been photographed. One of my favourite photographs is the big, gnarly chunk of turmeric. Yeah, I love it. It's got the dirt all over it.   Tahnee: (55:26) I was just looking at.   Erin: (55:28) It's so pretty, and the ginger as well, and they were grown in their garden, because I wasn't growing those at that time. Being welcomed into their garden was so healing for me, because they were just such lovely women, and they were telling me about their experience as herbalists back in the '60s and '70s, and how in the '80s, basically, all the legislation changed in Australia, and we were no longer able to make our own medicines for our clients, and all the bigger companies came in to make the medicines for the practitioners and it all became regulated, so the right to actually make the medicines for the clients were taken away.   Erin: (56:05) Now the flow on effect that that's had as well, it has been enormously disruptive for herbalism in Australia, because that hands-on approach has been taken away, even from the practitioners, you know? I think what's been lost is a lot, in that sense of making. I also think that generation of our grandmas, I know your mum was a trained herbalist and she was amazing and onto it, but for most of us, our mothers and fathers kind of lost that traditional folk knowledge, but our grandmothers and the generations before, so grandmothers, great-grandmothers, they were still quite in tune with that traditional folk knowledge. My grandmothers were, because they were, like my grandmothers were immigrants, right? They immigrated, and they had lived that immigrant life where they lived their way of life from where they came here.   Tahnee: (57:02) Old country.   Erin: (57:03) The old country, right? But my mum and my dad, who were, sorry, they actually immigrated here as small children as well, but they were just told to fit in and lose their roots, because they were new to this place. My mum had a thick Russian accent, my dad had a Liverpudlian accent, and they were weird, you know? They were just like, "Fit in, get in line. Be as Australian as possible," so they lost a lot of that. They didn't want to know about the traditions of their parents. I've talked to my mum about this, and that's been lost, that wasn't handed to me. We've lost a bit of that because we were all told to fit in, which is so sad, you know? It's sad. For me, I'm honouring my bloodlines by remembering.   Tahnee: (57:50) [inaudible 00:57:50] feeling, isn't it?   Erin: (57:52) Right. That's it. So yeah, I do think that a lot of this is about, it is almost an act of activism to remember. To reconnect, and to honour where you came from, and to honour where you are now. It's an act of activism to honour the land and to say, "I honour you," and I want to have a relationship with you. Even if it's this little patch of whatever it might, it doesn't matter what it is. It doesn't matter. The little patch is a microcosm of alchemy and universal energy. We're getting cosmic here, but it's like, just tune in, wherever you are. You're actually fighting the system by tuning in and taking that into your own hands in a lot of ways, and you're creating waves of healing by doing that as well.   Tahnee: (58:43) I think when we have people around us and children, those things, they become, they sort of, like viruses, move through communities and they change people. Look at this area, we have such a strong culture of health and healing around here because people have persisted with that culture in the Byron area. It serves all of us so strongly.   Tahnee: (59:10) I wonder, though, something I'm really sad about and still trying to solve, is my relationship with the actual endemic plants of this land, because I grew up with Western Herbalism, so it was plants that don't really naturally grow here. [inaudible 00:59:27] here, but they don't grow here on their own. Then we obviously work with Chinese herbs which, again, I'm really passionate about. I've been told I was a Chinese person once upon a time, so maybe that's-   Erin: (59:41) I believe that.   Tahnee: (59:42) Yeah, possibly. Part of me is really devastated that I, apart from lemon myrtle and some of the really obvious famous ones, I don't really know much about, I can't walk through the bush here and go, "Oh, that's medicine." Have you had any experience with our native plants?   Erin: (01:00:02) You know, I'm getting asked this all the time, which I really appreciate the question, but I'm getting asked this all the time, and I was just saying to my husband, "Wow, this is really coming up strong in conversations with me." The truth of it is, is no. I wish I did. My training is so classical Western Herbalism, which, as you said, it's really plants of Europe and North America. That's sort of traditional Western Medicine, and now we've got, it's interesting, the more Eastern plants are also coming into our training as well.   Tahnee: (01:00:38) Yeah. Using a lot of Ayurvedic and Chinese herbs.   Erin: (01:00:42) Yeah, a lot of Ayurvedic and Chinese herbs have come in as well, but traditionally it's those folk medicines of North America and Europe, and I feel so fluent in them, which is such a weird thing when you don't live on a land where they totally grow. Obviously we grow a lot of them ourselves, but I'm not walking in the fields of yarrow. I was in the States shooting the book, we shot a lot of the book in the States, so that wildness that you see with the fields of valerian and yarrow is in the States. I'm not walking in those fields. I spent a lot of time in America, so I feel very connected to those plants as well, with my experience of them and the land there, because my husband's American, but I really honour that that is a bit of a debacle. Also, how then do we practise bioregional herbalism?   Tahnee: (01:01:34) Yep, totally.   Erin: (01:01:35) Right? As Australian herbalists, when we don't know the plants of our land intimately? Now a lot of the weeds grow, like we talked about, the weeds in my garden grow here and that's great, but I don't know the medicine, the indigenous medicines. Because a lot of the indigenous medicines are cloaked in a lot of mystery [crosstalk 01:02:00].   Tahnee: (01:01:59) -Everybody, really, that a lot of wisdom has just been-   Erin: (01:02:01) Right, a lot of the wisdom has been lost-   Tahnee: (01:02:06) [inaudible 01:02:06], yeah.   Erin: (01:02:07) Is either held really dear, which is totally understandable. It's hard to access it, even as a herbalist. There was no training, actually, at all for me in my course on indigenous medicine. That might be something they're doing more now, but I see there's a bunch of courses up here where there's a little bit more knowledge being shared up here. I've been seeing those and thinking, "Oh, I'd actually like to start to feel into it." You know, Tahnee it's funny. My husband's American, we're very drawn there. Given what's been happening in America and whose governing it, we haven't been drawn to move back, but I feel such a big call back to the land there, and I think the plants are calling me. I feel like they're calling me really loud over there. For me here in Australia, I'm a firstborn Australian, but my lineage is so different. I feel like I'm so new here.   Tahnee: (01:03:05) I think America has such a strong folk herbal tradition.   Erin: (01:03:12) Oh my gosh, it really does, yeah.   Tahnee: (01:03:14) Yeah. We're members of the American Herbalist Guild and we go-   Erin: (01:03:17) Guild, awesome.   Tahnee: (01:03:18) Yeah, we've been over to the Oregon-   Erin: (01:03:19) That's awesome.   Tahnee: (01:03:24) Just how much knowledge and wisdom is held there. I don't know, for me, how free they are, really, to practise, and how free the sharing of information is. It might just the culture of the event that we attended, but I think it was a week-long or five day immersion [inaudible 01:03:47] basically, with talks from early morning to night time. I was going to herbal medicine for abortion clinics, and there just these beautiful women who had been working with women to-   Erin: (01:03:58) And supporting people.   Tahnee: (01:03:59) Yes. Through miscarriage, abortion, and here people are terrified to even speak about that. The stigma around using a herb in that case, I don't know. It was such an open-hearted, free conversation around how herbs can help. We went to a clinic on using herbs for AIDS patients. It was just a beautiful [inaudible 01:04:23] dialogue.   Erin: (01:04:23) It's amazing.   Tahnee: (01:04:26) People like Christopher Hobbs are there and Tierra.   Erin: (01:04:28) So cool.   Tahnee: (01:04:31) I'm like being part of their wisdom.   Erin: (01:04:32) Totally, yeah.   Tahnee: (01:04:34) I think that sort of makes me sad, I think, here, that it has become so clinical and so regimented and controlled. Every naturopathy clinic is using the same brand of [inaudible 01:04:44]. Kind of like that.   Erin: (01:04:44) Yeah, really true. Honestly, this is why I wrote Plants for the People, truly, because I was like, "This just needs to come back into people's homes and hearts." We all need to feel free to practise kitchen herbalism. Seriously, because it's like, this is what a lot of traditional folk medicine in America is. It's kitchen herbalism. It's things that you can make in your kitchen from your garden or from your surrounds that are super easy and accessible. I'm so grateful that the book got a UK and USA release as well, because that feels so good to know that that's also spreading into those spaces, but I was just so stoked that it's all over Australia and New Zealand, because I do feel that we really have lost that connection here. There are no rules about those things. These are things that you can bring into your everyday life. That is the spirit of activism around it.   Erin: (01:05:44) America is different, I think, in their sense and the way that fol

This week, Bran watched Judge Faith & Dan watched Hot Bench! Plus, our very first brief case!!!

Show Resources: LinkedIn Learning course about LinkedIn Ads by AJ Wilcox: LinkedIn Advertising Course Dayparting Contact us at Podcast@B2Linked.com with ideas for what you'd like AJ to cover. Show Transcript: Are you ultra limited on budget and not sure if LinkedIn Ads will be a good channel for your company? Then this strategy is for you. 0:13 Welcome to the LinkedIn Ads Show. Here's your host, AJ Wilcox. 0:21 Hey there LinkedIn Ads fanatics! People reach out to us all the time asking, saying things like, "hey, I've heard your recommendation for making sure that we have at least $5,000 a month for budget, but I just don't have that much money or my boss, I just can't convince him or her to do it". Well, you're in luck. Today, we're going through exactly the lowest budget strategy is to test out LinkedIn Ads as a platform that we've found. 0:46 Let's hit it. So as for the news, LinkedIn has reported that they've seen an 8% weekly increase in posting on pages, which is pretty exciting. I've been asked by several people during the COVID crisis, "what's happening to organic usage of LinkedIn? Is it going up? Is it going down?" And there are a couple stats here that LinkedIn has released to us partners letting us know that yeah, it sure seems like usage is increasing. The first stat here is that weekly posting of pages is up 8%, which is fantastic. That means more people posting for whatever reasons, maybe they're trying to get additional business or they're trying to just connect with people, either way, and 8% increase in posting on pages is awesome. And at a partnership conference last year with LinkedIn, one of the senior executives at LinkedIn told us that creating in the newsfeed was up 40% year over year, and that was fantastic knowing that people are just spending more time in the newsfeed and they're posting. We just found that the statistic now is that year over year increase in creation of posts in the newsfeed is up 60% this year, so wow, I thought 40% was huge last year now at 60. It gives me a lot of hope for the future for where I see organic usage of the platform going. And what's so exciting to me about the organic increase is the more people who are using the platform organically, the more ad inventory is created for us to use. So I think they really go hand in hand. I wanted to highlight a few reviews that we've gotten just on the podcast. Thank you guys so much for reviewing the podcast. Like I've been asking for the last few episodes. Thank you so much for reviewing the podcast in your individual podcast players. I wanted to just say thank you and shout out to a few people who've reviewed so far. "There's this one excellent podcast packed with value. AJ is the go to resource for all things LinkedIn ads. Thank you for this great podcast." That one's by Greg Tosi. Greg, thanks so much for leaving that. The next one "Ain't nobody no LinkedIn ads like AJ. Not only does AJ know his stuff, when it comes to LinkedIn, but he's entertaining and does a great job making things easy to understand to boot. If you are considering running LinkedIn Ads or scaling existing campaigns, then this is the podcast you need to be listening to". That one's by Tucker Stoffers. Tucker, thank you. I know you. I know how great you are at Facebook ads, at Google ads, and even LinkedIn. So thank you, that means a ton to me. The next one, "the OG of LinkedIn Ads, AJ pulls back the curtain on LinkedIn Ads and doesn't hold anything back. He speaks from real world experience, not repeated secondhand information. AJ is the authority on LinkedIn's advertising platform". That's by George Krahn. George, thank you so much for the kind words. Seriously, these mean the world to me. I put in hundreds of hours into this podcast so far, and I want to make sure that it doesn't join the graveyard of podcasts out there. So we're gonna keep going. Thank! Every kind word, every review that you leave, helps me keep going. Alright, so let's jump into it strategies here. We know that LinkedIn as a platform is expensive. And we know that the traffic really reacts and acts like more of a top of funnel type of traffic. And on top of that, the user interface really isn't all that kind. And there's a pretty steep learning curve to all of it. So of course, testing out LinkedIn Ads can feel really daunting to someone, because I think you're wary of screwing something up on the platform. And of course, any mistake you make on an expensive platform becomes an expensive mistake. So follow these steps to ensure that you're properly evaluating the channel at its very best. And I read a bumper sticker one time that said, "If you can't handle me at my worst, you don't deserve me at my best". So my recommendation here is and this is what you'll feel from all of these recommendations, test out the channel at its very best so that you can see if it's worth expanding and increasing your volume to see not that you're going for the worst. But,see if it's even worth it at its best to consider it and expanding the program. 5:05 For any sort of test on social media, I use the acronym AMO. And it stands for your audience, your message, and your offer. Now, these are the three things that you need in order to have any sort of an ad happening on social media. And so what you're looking for at very first of any campaign is you want AMO alignment. You want to know whether you're reaching the right audience with the right message in the right way. And without testing, you won't actually know any of this for sure. But give this a shot with your best gut guesses and then you can start testing from there. On the audience side, don't worry about not fitting every potential prospect in your I'm giving you permission to be ultra picky about who your audience is, in your targeting. Then your message, you want to take your best shot at what you think motivates your audience to click and then convert. You may not have this fully dialed in yet, but give it a shot. And then your offer, you've got a couple different directions you can go here. You can either try what we call a bottom of the funnel offer, where you're saying something "like, click on this ad, this is what we do, click here to talk to our sales department or click here for a demo". And you can try that out about 95% of the time, that type of offer fails. But maybe you're in the 5% that this can work. So if that's what you're trying, I would say your risks are pretty low. Because if you're only paying when someone clicks, if you have an offer, that's not interesting, the worst thing that can happen is that no one clicks and LinkedIn just kind of shuts it off. And it didn't cost you very much except for your time. Of course, those who do click it will be a pretty expensive cost per click. But all in all, it's a pretty low cost kind of test. So sure, go ahead and try that first. 7:00 If you are going the content route though, which I recommend the vast majority of the time, go take a look at your analytics and find what is your best performing content offer. Look specifically at the conversion rates that you see on your various offers, or come up with something that you think is going to be far and away the most valuable thing that your audience could have. Diving into more detail to your audience here. You want to keep your audience to the very most core. Of course, you could get business from a lot of different industries or roles, but just keep it to the ones that you know are a perfect hit. And then of course, once you've tested the very most core, the people who very most feel the pain of what you solve. Sure, you can always expand to their colleagues, their bosses, other decision makers, but start with just the ones that you know are feeling the pain. Then with your offers, if you're using a content offer, look for conversion rates that are over 15%. That will tell you that this is a rockstar offer that people want and really appreciate. And if you're using a bottom of funnel type of offer, realize that you're probably going to see in the long term, conversion rates between 1.5 to 4%. So this is very low, which means if you're using a bottom of the funnel offer, look for any conversions. Any conversions within the first few days is going to tell you that yes, it really seems like there's something of value here for them. Early on, the signs that you're watching for, you're very first looking for high or low click through rates. Because your click through rate is in effect going to tell you whether your audience is interested at all in what you're offering. If no one clicks on the ads, you're obviously not presenting them with a value that they care about. If it's a sponsored content newsfeed ad, watch for click through rates in excess of .4% because .4% is about the average. And so you know, if you're performing above that, you're doing something right. And if you're doing something right, that tells you that you have some alignment in your ammo, your audience, your message, and your offer are doing something here. And of course, at low budget with very few clicks, you may or may not get conversions along the way, you probably won't. So the first little bit, you're looking just for click through rates, and then as soon as you get enough clicks, that you start to see conversions. That's when you can really start to make a determination about whether or not your offer is converting. Okay, as for ad formats, I would recommend using sponsored content first, because these show up in the newsfeed. Now I would recommend there are lots of different variants of sponsored content. I would recommend the single image version first, because it's the easiest to troubleshoot. So realize that sponsored content is the most versatile ad format out there and will probably give you the most traffic. But bids, if you take them all the way to the floor, you'll probably still spend between $4 to $6. At least in North America. So if you're working with budgets between let's say $2,000 to $5,000 per month, then sponsored content is a probably a great way to go. However, if you are working with ultra low budgets, I had someone reach out this morning and say that they were trying to spend $300 a month on ads, then you really only have one option. And that's using text ads. Because text ads, you can take them all the way down to the bid floor of $2. So think of this as just dipping your toe in the water. You just want some traffic from LinkedIn to see how it works. Because text ads only have a click through rate of about .025%. Again, that's two and a half clicks out of every 10,000 times they're shown. You really need to have a pretty large audience for this to really spend any money at all. However, if you're just trying to spend $300 for the month, you can definitely do that off of pretty much any audience size that you want. Text ads are also very, very easy to troubleshoot. Because there's only two things you have, well, I guess technically three, you have a little 50 x 50 pixel image. Sometimes it's 100 x 100. You have a 25 character headline, and a 75 character ad line. So if it's not working, you know you get to adjust one of those three things to make it work. Whatever you do, no matter how sexy they look, avoid sponsored messaging ads at all costs here, because sponsored messaging ads are LinkedIn's highest risk and oftentimes most expensive ad format. 11:47 Okay, what about bidding strategy? We've talked a little bit about how we're bidding by cost per click. We've talked about how we're going to be at the floor, but let's go into a little bit more detail here. When you very first create your first campaign on LinkedIn. LinkedIn's defaults will set a whole bunch of different things. They will set you to automated bidding, which is what you don't want. You want to change automated bidding, to cost per click or CPC, whatever you're doing, go and find the CPC version of that. And that's because it takes away your risk as an advertiser, you're now only going to pay when someone clicks, as opposed to paying every time your ad gets shown, and really removing that whole issue where you're going to pay even if people aren't actually interested in your ad. The next thing you want to do is LinkedIn will tell you a price range that they suggest you bid at. But just ignore that entirely. You're not interested in the bottom of the range, you're interested in the floor price, that means the very minimum that LinkedIn will let you pay. Because on low budgets, it does not make sense to set high bids. You will blow your entire month's budget In just a few clicks, and you don't want that. You won't learn anything and then you'll feel robbed. So what you do is you go to that bid, that maximum CPC field, and you go and enter in $1, and then click away. LinkedIn will then pop up in red lettering saying, oh, the minimum bid for this audience is actually and then they'll tell you a number like $4.75 or $6.26. Now, you know, the absolute floor, the very minimum that LinkedIn will let you bid for traffic. And if you can fill your entire budget, at that level of bid, then you just won, you just spent your entire budget at the very cheapest cost per click for your ideal audience. Now there is a chance depending on your ad, if it's if it's not interesting or it's not providing a whole lot of value, there's a good chance that you'll have to increase your bids to start spending enough but at least this gets you started out on the right foot. And only increase your bids if you aren't getting enough traffic to actually spend what you want to spend. And then of course, only increase your daily budget, if you're hitting the budget. If your budget is $10 a day, which is the minimum, and you're only spending on average $3 a day, then it's okay, you can leave your daily budgets at $10 because you're not hitting them. But if you look and see that you're spending on average $10 every single day, you know that that audience is hungry for what it is you're doing. And you could spend more if you want, and of course, make any changes you want later. You don't have to cement yourself into a bidding or a budgeting strategy yet, you can always change those things in the future. 14:50 Okay, here's a quick sponsor break and then we will dive into the targeting 15:00 Thank you for listening to the LinkedIn Ads Show. Hungry for more? AJ Wilcox, take it away. 15:10 B2Linked is the LinkedIn Ads focused agency. We manage many of Lincoln's largest spending accounts worldwide, and are official LinkedIn partners. Contact us on B2Linked.com to get in touch, and our team can help you enact these and other strategies to help get you the very best performance on your ads. 15:28 All right, now let's jump into the targeting aspect. As you're trying out LinkedIn's targeting, I would recommend you use job title targeting along with your ideal company size, and or industry here. And job title I recommend because it's so tight, you can get so specific around who someone is. And if you're only going to be spending a limited amount of money here. You might as well spend it on exactly the right people. There's not leaving anything to chance. If your product or service is expensive, where you know, only certain sizes of companies would be able to purchase it, then make sure you segment to exactly the right company size. And don't be afraid to segment down to individual industry as well. Because you may say I'm going after, let's say, HR reps, maybe decision makers, director and above. But you may decide, oh, if I had someone come in from the arts industry, or if it was an ad agency, it wouldn't make sense. So go ahead and use industry to make sure you're hitting the exact right people. Because on low budget, you don't want to waste a dime. You might also consider doing what we call account based marketing here, and that is targeting only specific companies. If you have a list, like this list is the most qualified buyers are the most likely to purchase from us. Yeah, go ahead and target just the companies that you know would be a good thing. for you. If you do target by exact account, though, I would recommend get away from the job title targeting that I recommended before, and instead use something broader, like skill or job function, and probably attach onto it a seniority layer as well because job title targeting is really tight. So if you have a list of just companies, and then you add job titles on top of that, you're probably going to have an audience that is too small even to advertise. Or if it's not, you might just not be able to spend your budget even if it is small. Remember that we're hoping to test our very most likely to be valuable here. So don't worry that there is someone who could purchase your product or might be interested who fits outside of your targeting. That's okay. Right now you're going for just the core just the people who are feeling the most pain. And of course, you can always expand later as it's successful. We had a client who sold only to IT decision makers, in companies with 50 or more employees. But they told me in the course of advertising, that their ideal audience was actually those in the 500 to 1000 range. So because we were just testing and starting, we went ahead and changed our targeting to just 500 to 1000. So they were bringing in the highest grade prospects. And as soon as we saw success, we went ahead and lowered all the way down to the 50 person and above companies. But we started out with the most core. 18:37 So let's talk about timing, because I get asked all the time when I mentioned that I suggest budgets of over $5,000 a month for LinkedIn Ads, and people go, "ah, but what time period do I have to spend that $5,000 over? Is that a month? Is that a day is that six months?" And what I want to remind you here, we're generating this data for data and now analysis. So it doesn't necessarily matter that it's over a particular period of time, it just has to be enough data to actually analyze. So whether this is spent over the course of two days, or over six months, the data will be relatively the same with one caveat that if you're running ads over some serious seasonality, like over Q4 in December, when people are checked out and getting ready for for Christmas and New Year's and the holidays, or if you're advertising over a crisis like COVID that we're going through right now, then, yeah, I think user behavior will change over time. But for right now, I would say if it takes you six months to spend that much money, great, go ahead and do it because this is a long term play. You're in this for the long haul. Make sure that you just get enough data to make sure you know whether or not it's working. Okay, so I mentioned about budgets that I see suggests budgets of $5,000 a month or more. But of course, it's possible to advertise at lower budgets. So let's talk about what you need to keep in mind as you're doing this. So here's the amount of data that you need for each type of analysis, we find that we usually have to spend about $1,000 advertising before we can get statistical significance around our click through rates. So that means if our goal is to find out what sort of message is most engaging, we can do that after about $1,000 in spend. And if we have a content type offer something like download this free ebook or guide or checklist, we usually have to spend about $5,000 before we get statistical significance around the cost per conversion, and around conversion rates. That means if you're spending less than those amounts, it means you just have to spend for more months. And until you spend that much money, you will likely not know whether or not it's working. Of course, if it is totally hitting it out of the park, like you have the lowest cost per conversion you've ever seen. Yeah, even if you haven't spent that much money, maybe the programs working great. And you may spend that much money and have zero conversions. So you might tell yourself, okay, maybe this isn't working for me. But if you're really anywhere in between, you probably need to spend more money to have confidence that this is working. Remember, this is a marathon, it's not a sprint, and you need to be in this for the long haul. So don't call the test early if you're spending $300 a month, because it's going to take lots of months to get a large enough data sample size, to have any sort of significance. And of course, you might be really lucky and close a massive deal after $300 in ad spend. Or you might be equally as unlucky and not see anything come from that. So side with statistical significance here and make sure you have a large enough sample size that when you analyze it, it's enough to actually be meaningful. It usually takes 100 clicks before we're starting to look at conversions at all. And it usually takes 20, 30 conversions before we're looking at that to try to assess lead quality as well. So adjust your expectations for how fast this is going to happen. There are some default options that LinkedIn will select for you when you're building a campaign. The first is audience expansion. And what this is, is you tell LinkedIn who your audience is, and then you check a box. And then LinkedIn will go and find more people that they think are closely associated. Now it sounds like a good idea. But remember, what we said here is that you're going after the exact audience who's feeling the pain, and you don't want to leave anything up to interpretation by LinkedIn, either algorithmically or of course, they're not going to be putting things in manually. So make sure you uncheck that box. You don't want any traffic outside of the exact audience that you're selecting here, Then if it's sponsored content as an ad, one option you have is called LinkedIn Audience Metwork or LAN. And this is actually pretty cool. But what it is, is the ability for your ads to show up to the right people, even when they're not on LinkedIn. So maybe they're flipping through the Flipboard app, while they're checking out their news, they could see one of your ads there, or maybe they're on the homepage of Wall Street Journal, and maybe they see your ad there as well. What's nice about LAN is your cost per click overall will come down, because those placements cost less. But in this test that I'm recommending to you, I would say you want to make sure that all of your traffic is in exactly the right and same mindset so that you can analyze it properly. And if someone comes from a site that is not LinkedIn, you don't know what mindset they're in. So I would uncheck that box and make sure that if you get 30 clicks, you know, all 30 of those came from people who are on LinkedIn, which means they were thinking about their job or their career and making them better. Another big problem for small budgets is they are oftentimes spent during the middle of the night. So let me explain to you how this works. LinkedIn bases all of their timing off of the Greenwich Mean Time, or Universal Time, that's in the UK. So that means here in North America, I'm in the Mountain Time Zone, and I'm six hours behind that. 24:36 So that means that when I have an account that hits its full budget for the day, it then becomes eligible to show again, at like 6pm for me. So that means a small budget where you're going to fill the entire budget if you get, you know, two, three clicks, is starting at 6pm the night before and it's likely going to be spent by the time that someone comes comes into the office at like 7am and starts actually being ready to convert. So you're getting traffic during the worst time of the night, when people are not going to convert, you're just getting the night owls and insomniacs. It's not the traffic you want. Now, there are services that will do this for you. But chances are, you're probably not going to invest $500 per month or more for a tool when your ad budget is small anyway. So I would recommend go ahead and plan on manually turning your campaign group on and off during business hours and after business hours, just to make sure that your budget is spent during the most valuable part of the day. And we are going to have a whole episode about day parting in the next couple months. So watch for that topic, because this whole thing will go a lot deeper and B2Linked is actually coming out with a tool to help people do this that will have a freemium version. So watch for that. Make sure you are actually you know, turning things on, turning things off manually right now. So you can take advantage of the best part of the day, and then realize that at some point we'll have a tool and we can bail you out. Okay to recap, I want you to focus in on your most core audience with the offer that you expect to be the most successful to them. Clean your audience targeting out of anything that could muddy the waters like audience expansion, or audience network. Make sure you're bidding by cost per click to start out with to take away the risk and bid the very minimum, not what LinkedIn says is the minimum, but the actual floor minimum and only raise your bids if you're not getting the traffic that you need or enough of it. And finally, run your ads only during the most successful parts of the day to make sure that you're not wasting all of your budget to just the night owls who aren't going to convert and make good leads for you. Okay with that I've got great episode resources coming up for you. So stick around. 27:08 Thank you for listening to the LinkedIn Ads Show. Hungry for more? AJ Wilcox, take it away. 27:17 All right, as for resources, make sure you sign up for the B2Linked newsletter so that you can know when we come out with our day parting or ad scheduling tool. I'm sure this will be super helpful so that you don't have to manually turn things off and on again. Believe me, I did it for years. If you're just dipping your toe into the water, you are going to love our LinkedIn ads course that we launched on LinkedIn Learning. There's a link right in the show notes down below. So check that out. Also look at your podcast player right now and make sure you hit the subscribe button so you can continue hearing episodes like this. If LinkedIn Ads are important to you, you are going to love this content. And please rate and review the podcast on whatever player you listen. I would love to highlight your reviews and give you a shout out. So make sure you do it and watch for your name being shouted out on a future podcast. If you've got any ideas for shows, or any questions, feel free to reach out, Podcast@B2Linked.com. We'd love to hear your feedback on how to improve the whole show. We'll see you back here next week. And we're cheering you on in your LinkedIn Ads initiatives.

Do not confuse online teaching with crisis teaching – we are in crisis! Rather than fighting to maintain normal, consider ways of survival, ways of being realistic, and humane while teaching during the pandemic. Dr. Nancy Lynne Westfield hosts Dr. Almeda Wright (Yale Divinity School). 

Sometimes you just need simple strategies to give yourself a boost. In today’s episode, we’re going to cover ways that you can increase your sense of wellbeing and connectedness - by harnessing your own biochemistry to foster oxytocin production. This can all be done solo - no partner required (though you can do them with a partner too). Our guest, Dr. Jessica Zager, is a Pelvic Health Physical Therapist, and one of only 5 physical therapists in the world with an AASECT certification in sex counseling. Along with these simple oxytocin-boosting strategies, you’ll also learn a bit about how pelvic floor physical therapy can help with pain during sex. It’s a lighthearted conversation full of practical ways to keep you feeling good, and connected, that you can use whenever...but especially during these times of social distancing. As always, I’m looking forward to your thoughts on this episode and what revelations and questions it creates for you. Join us in the Relationship Alive Community on Facebook to chat about it!  Sponsors: 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. This episode is also sponsored by Native Deodorant. Their products are filled with ingredients you can find in nature like coconut oil, which is an antimicrobial, shea butter to moisturize, and tapioca starch to absorb wetness. They don’t ever test on animals, they don’t use aluminum or any other scary chemical ingredients, and they’re so confident that you’ll like their deodorant that they offer free shipping - and returns. For 20% off your first purchase, visit http://www.nativedeodorant.com/alive and use promo code ALIVE during checkout. Resources:  Check out Jessica Zager's website to pick up her free cheat sheet to boosting oxytocin, and to find out more about her work. FREE Relationship Communication Secrets Guide Guide to Understanding Your Needs (and Your Partner's Needs) in Relationship (ALSO FREE) www.neilsattin.com/oxyboost Visit to download the transcript, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the transcript to this episode with Jessica Zager. 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. It's an interesting world that we're living in right now with social distancing or sheltering in place happening in most parts of the world to combat the spread of COVID-19, the coronavirus pandemic that's affecting the world. And I think that there's probably not many of us who can escape the impact that it's having on the degree of closeness and intimacy that we're experiencing with the people in our lives. And if there aren't people in our lives, like if we're single or solo, or if we're separated from people who are important to us, then it brings a whole different dimension to it. Potentially, loneliness and missing out on the benefits of even just connection with close friends or going out on dates. Neil Sattin: And then, of course, those of us who are cooped up together, that has its benefits and also the challenges as well. So it's an interesting time and for the past several weeks, I've wanted to give you a wealth of resources to help you get through this time, staying sane, staying connected, and feeling connected not only to yourself, but to the people in your life that matter. Today, we're going to cover a special subject. We've talked on the show before about oxytocin, which is sometimes labeled the love hormone. Maybe a bit of a misnomer if you really dive into the scientific literature. But what we do know about oxytocin is that it is one of the chemicals that is in our bodies, and is primarily responsible for pair-bonding and it is also a chemical that helps us feel really good, and when we are connecting to ourself or to others, we can enter into blissful states of transcendence which are different than the ways that we feel when we're focused on activities that are more dopamine-driven. Neil Sattin: So a long time ago, in Episode 37, we had Sue Carter on the show, who is one of the leading researchers, who discovered oxytocin and its effects on pair-bonding. She was studying prairie voles at the time. But since that research has gone on to cover what happens within humans as well as prairie voles and if you want to listen to that episode, you can visit neilsattin.com/oxytocin. Now, I wanted to have someone new on the show. We were... This person actually happens to be a friend of mine, and we were talking the other day and she mentioned to me that she knew a lot of ways to foster oxytocin within us during these times of social distancing. So I thought it would be great to have her on the show to talk to you about these special techniques. Neil Sattin: Her name is Dr. Jessica Zager and she's a doctor of pelvic health physical therapy. She's also a sex counselor and a sex educator. She is one of the five physical therapists certified by AASECT, which is the American Association of Sexual Educators, Counselors and Therapists. She is one of the only five physical therapists certified by them in the entire world, which is pretty amazing. And so, she's here to share her vast knowledge of this particular narrow topic, and we'll get also a sense of some of the other things that Jessica does as well. But she is, in my experience, a profoundly kind and generous soul who has lots to offer the world. I know that she does sex counseling for people who have pain during intercourse or who have trouble with desire or libido and arousal. She also works with people around gender identity. And she's friendly to... No matter where you are on the gender spectrum or the kink spectrum, she is a open-minded, open-hearted person who is doing great work in the world. Neil Sattin: It's a pleasure to know her and call her one of my friends. And Dr. Jessica Zager, it's a pleasure to have you here today on Relationship Alive. Jessica Zager: I'm so excited to be here with you, Neil. Thank you for that very generous introduction. Neil Sattin: You are welcome and you deserved every word of it. I just want to let you know that we will have a transcript of this episode as always, you can get that if you visit neilsattin.com/oxyboost, that's O-X-Y as in oxytocin, and boost, B-O-O-S-T. And the things that we're going to talk about today, Jessica also put together a little cheat sheet guide that you can download, that'll have it all listed out in a condensed form for you and you can get that if you visit her website, which is drjzager.com, that's D-R-J, and then her last name, Zager, which is Z-A-G-E-R.com and you'll be able to download the free cheat sheet to all the things that we're going to talk about today to boost your oxytocin in a world where we have to stay six feet apart from each other. Neil Sattin: And I was just seeing, Jessica, an article today that had this picture of people who were all hanging out on their... In their pick-up trucks, and in their backyards and they were six feet apart from each other. And apparently, this is not what they mean by social distancing. The idea is if you go out in the world, stay six feet from people. But you're not supposed to just like hang out with people staying six feet away from them. That defeats the purpose and you might still... We don't know enough to know if that over a longer period of time would expose you to something from that person or expose them to something from you. Jessica Zager: Correct. Neil Sattin: So it's really important, I think, to be observing these... What do we call them? Orders from on high? But they're really kind of orders from within, 'cause we're trying to take care of each other, and at the same time, we don't want to miss out on some of the most treasured aspects of the human experience, the ways that we feel connected to ourselves and to each other. And anyway, that's why we're here, so... Jessica Zager: I think that's why this has been... One of the reasons why this has been so difficult for people right now is because we're in the midst of this global, worldwide pandemic, and we're being forced to be apart, and it's necessary, and it's beneficial, and then it's what we all need to do in order to help slow the spread, to, as they say, flatten the curve so that we're not overwhelming the healthcare system with as many hospitalizations and crisis situations at one time. But the drive for human connection is so strong that I think it's easy for people to do things, like you just said, and convince themselves that, "Well, as long as I'm six feet apart from my friends, we can hang out." But you're absolutely right, we don't know a lot about this virus, and we don't know exactly how it's transmitted. We keep hearing over and over again that if you are within six feet of somebody for 15 minutes, that puts you at a greater risk for catching the coronavirus. But we don't know about extended periods of time near others but greater than that six feet. Neil Sattin: Right. Yeah. And I like what you're bringing up, that there's such a drive within us to connect, and I think for many of us, we don't realize just how pervasive... If we're people who are connectors, we don't realize just how much we get from bumping into a friend every so often, and getting and giving a big hug. Or if you're dating, that even if you're just going out and you don't have a steady partner, just that act of being out with someone is igniting something in us that helps sustain us. Jessica Zager: Definitely. Whenever we are in close contact with people, especially people that we care about, to begin with, that will help to... Help our brains to start to release oxytocin. And as you mentioned, sometimes it's called the love hormone, it's also nicknamed the cuddle hormone, which I think is a little bit more accurate than the love hormone. Neil Sattin: Well, the challenge, though, is in this world, it... The state of things as they are right now, it's challenging to do the things that would typically ignite oxytocin. But I'm wondering if you can talk a little bit about why we care, like, why focus on oxytocin in the first place? Why would we want to produce that within ourselves? And also I just want to mention to you listening that we're going to go over these things. We happen to be in a time of pandemic right now, but these are things that will be helpful for you no matter when you're listening to this episode, because they're the kinds of things that are always there as a resource for you to boost your own inner experience and reserves of the cuddle hormone, as Jessica was just mentioning. So yeah, why? Why do we care? Why do we want to boost oxytocin within ourselves? Jessica Zager: When oxytocin is released in our brains, it fosters an increased sense of well-being and a sense of social connection, like, we're not just isolated beings that exist and are walking around in the world, that we're actually connected to a larger network of others. And so oxytocin helps to really drive that sense of connection to those around us, and I think that's really important, because part of that drive helps us to be responsible for caring about others in times like this. And so it's kind of a catch 22, but right now, the best thing we can do to care for others is to stay away from people, yet when we're with people, that's what helps us to care more about others and create that sense of connection with others. Neil Sattin: Yeah, so it's super complicated, [chuckle] the intricacies and how we're interwoven with each other. And it also strikes me too that the ways that our desire for connection might lead us to choose irresponsibly if we really start to feel like we're at a deficit, that I could see that being another reason why we might want to supplement our internal production of oxytocin so that we aren't doing anything stupid for the sake of a hug or a cuddle. Jessica Zager: Yes. And there are many, many other benefits that are derived from oxytocin that can help us get through this time of social distancing and fear and worry about our loved ones and ourselves. So it also helps to decrease our blood pressure, it helps to decrease our anxiety in general, it helps to mitigate stress levels. So oxytocin is actually released during stressful situations to help counteract that stress response, which obviously would be a beneficial thing right now. Neil Sattin: For sure. Jessica Zager: And it also... You know, you already mentioned pair-bonding, which that I think is a lovely benefit, but also maybe one that is difficult right now, [chuckle] but it helps to decrease our sensitivity to pain... And one of my favorite benefits is because it stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system, it helps to improve our gut motility and our gut health and relieve constipation. So as a pelvic floor PT, I love that. Neil Sattin: Yeah. You have like the sneaky side benefit of helping keep people healthy and regular. Jessica Zager: Exactly. And that just makes everyone feel better. Neil Sattin: For sure. For sure. Can you talk a little bit about what you do as a... I know that it's only one aspect of what you do as a pelvic floor or a pelvic health physical therapist, what does that even mean? I know it's a very specialized thing that not a lot of people do. Jessica Zager: It is. It's a specialized field of physical therapy that focuses on the muscles between your hips that are responsible for bowel, bladder and sexual function. And so, as a pelvic health physical therapist, I specialize in helping individuals improve and enhance their bladder, bowel and/or sexual function because oftentimes a lot of issues can be interconnected. For example, when I treat people with pain with sex, it's not uncommon to have constipation as a side effect as well, but we don't often think about our bowel movements being related to our sexual function. But as a pelvic floor PT, it really helps give me a perspective on how the human body works and not just as an isolated unit, but because I help people with sexual dysfunction and pain with sex, I'm also looking at their connections with other people. Neil Sattin: Right. 'Cause it's not a... It's not a closed system, those things are often... We're being impacted by the people that we're with as well as whatever physical condition just happens to be occurring in our bodies. Jessica Zager: Exactly. Neil Sattin: Yeah. So... And just... You know, this is something that will... Maybe we'll have you back on the show to talk about painful intercourse, 'cause I know that that's a problem for a lot of women, having pain during sex. What... For a woman who's experiencing that and thinks like, "Well, that's just how it is," or "My doctor can't see anything wrong, like there's no irritation, there's no obvious sign of why I should be having pain." Like I've heard that from women in the past. Can you just give us a teaser of what is sometimes going on in a situation like that and how the work that you do can actually help? Jessica Zager: Yes, definitely. So what you just said is a very common experience for women experiencing pain with sex, but I will tell you that pain is not normal unless it's a planned part of the sex that you want to be having. And so, pain during penetration, for example, or pain with clitoral stimulation is never normal. And so, if you are experiencing those symptoms, I urge you to see your doctor and they might... To be honest, they might not even know what pelvic floor physical therapy is, but in my experience, if you ask for it, you will get it. So most physicians, especially if they're scratching their head trying to figure out why you're experiencing these symptoms, are very open to referring you to pelvic floor physical therapy. Jessica Zager: And when somebody comes to me from a physician who has been having pain with sex and there doesn't seem to be a known cause, there's always a cause, it just hasn't been identified yet. So it's not in your head. It's not something that, you know, is... You're doing subconsciously, and what I do as a pelvic floor PT is I will help to assess your pelvic floor muscles to see if there's something going on with the muscles themselves that are contributing to your symptoms. So when a gynecologist looks at somebody's vagina who's having pain with sex, they usually push, they move the muscles out of the way with a speculum to take a look at the organs. So they're mainly concerned with how does the cervix look, how does the uterus look, they might do a scan to see if there's anything going on that they can identify with the ovaries or if there are any cysts that they think might be contributing to your symptoms, but if they can't find anything wrong with the organs, then the next step should be referring you to a pelvic floor physical therapist who can assess your muscles to see if there is any increased tension in the muscle that is actually contributing to your symptoms. Neil Sattin: Got it, and then I gotta think that someone here, I know the answer to this, but someone's probably wondering, "Well, what do you do, how do you actually treat that?" What's that experience like? Jessica Zager: So what I do is when somebody comes to my office, I do an examination, but the type of examination that I do does not involve a speculum. I use one gloved lubricated finger either vaginally or anally, depending on where the pain is and other factors to first of all see how the muscles function. Are they contracting well, are they relaxing well, do they know how to alternate between the two, how strong are they, how coordinated are they? And so, I gather all of this information about the muscles and their function and then based on that information, there are often patterns of things that I see happening when somebody has pain with sex, usually there can be increased muscle tension, there can be trigger points in the pelvic floor muscles, just like you can get trigger points in your shoulder if you sleep on one side for too long at night or you sleep with your arm up and then you wake up with a knot in your shoulder and a headache for the rest of the day. Jessica Zager: The same thing can happen in the pelvic floor. And so as soon as we can identify what's going on, we can then address that specific component of the muscle function and treat it. And so I use a lot of manual techniques, using my hand, sometimes we'll do something called dilator therapy, which involves using graduated sized wands in the vagina to gently stretch the muscles. I also do dry needling in the pelvic floor and to trigger points, and that can really be beneficial as well. Neil Sattin: Wow, so there are all kinds of possibilities for how you would treat that. And we said beforehand that we weren't going to go down this road, but it's so interesting, here we are. And if people are listening, and this is impacting them, I guess I want them to have a sense of what the course of treatment is like. So what you, everything that you said is super helpful. Do people recover, like people who have had pain with sex and had it, not known what's causing it and been able to work with the pelvic floor physical therapists. Do they get to a place where they don't experience pain during sex? Jessica Zager: Yes, they do, and it's usually very, very successful. So I highly encourage anybody that's having pain with sex to please build up the courage to see a pelvic floor PT. I know it takes a lot of guts to go, 'cause this is a very emotionally charged type of pain and the idea of this therapy can sound very foreign to a lot of people because they haven't ever experienced anything like this before, but I will tell you that the people that come to pelvic floor PT almost always get better when it comes to pain with sex. So if this is something you're really struggling with, I highly encourage you to find a pelvic floor PT in your area. Neil Sattin: Great, great, I'm glad that we... I'm glad we talked about that. And now, when I have a weird pain down there, I'll just know that I slept on my pelvic floor funny and... Jessica Zager: Exactly. [chuckle] Neil Sattin: I just need some treatment. Jessica Zager: And this is worth being said too, but men also have pain with sex, and I treat men as well as women, so it's not just women that have pain with sex, men can also have pain with sex as well. But again, that could be a whole other podcast. Neil Sattin: I was wondering about that, I can imagine that would also potentially impact their erectile function and... Jessica Zager: Oh, yeah, definitely. Neil Sattin: Or their ability to orgasm, and all of that. Yeah, okay. Jessica Zager: Yeah. Neil Sattin: Good stuff, Jessica. So we'll have you back at some point to talk more about that. And of course, you can always visit Jessica's site, drjzager.com, to find out more about that. And let's go back to... Let's pivot now back to talking about oxytocin, and here we are. I think we made a pretty good case for why it's a good idea to want to boost your own oxytocin in this time of feeling particularly disconnected from others potentially, and then these are things that you'll be able to always use as a resource for yourself, so to boost your well-being, your sense of connectedness. Neil Sattin: As a side note, I was reading some of the literature before we spoke, and I saw that in one study, people who were given a nasal spray of oxytocin, they were actually less friendly to people that they perceive to be outside of their social group, or outside of their clan. So if you start doing these things and then find yourself feeling particularly xenophobic or something like... Just know that it's the oxytocin at work, that you haven't suddenly become someone who doesn't like people other than you. But I didn't read enough to know if that was a widespread phenomenon, or if that was just something they happened to notice in this one study. So, proceed with caution as you boost your oxytocin, but don't let it stop you, 'cause I think the benefits outweigh the risks. Jessica Zager: I would agree. Neil Sattin: Neither one of us is a medical doctor, I'm just going to point that out right now. Jessica Zager: Good to note, yeah. Neil Sattin: Yes. Though you are a doctor of physical therapy, and that took lots and lots of training. So important to know, plus your AASECT certification. Alright, so let's get into the good stuff, Jessica, where do we start with boosting our own oxytocin? Jessica Zager: So one of the first things that you can do to boost oxytocin is give yourself a nice, lovely light massage. Sometimes I call it tickling, but it's not the tickling that makes you want to squirm away from somebody, it's like lightly brushing and stroking your skin. And this can be done all over your body, this can be done on your scalp, If you have one of those head massagers that looks like it has little... Neil Sattin: Little spider leg thingies... Jessica Zager: Yeah, and it goes on your head, and massages your scalp, that's a fantastic thing. Or you can just get some nice lotion or oil, you can make it into a whole self-care experience, but lightly, stroking your skin, that light pressure is important for stimulating the release of oxytocin in your hypothalamus. Neil Sattin: Yeah, I'm doing it right now. It feels really good. Jessica Zager: It does feel good. Neil Sattin: This reminds me actually of something else, which is that when... Light touch massage is something that was encouraged as part of the natural child birth or hypnobirthing courses that I did with my first wife before my kids were born. 'Cause oxytocin also is part of what can encourage uterine contractions during labor. Pitocin that people give to encourage childbirth to begin is actually oxytocin that's being applied in the body, right? Jessica Zager: Definitely. So oxytocin is great for swift birth. Neil Sattin: Oh. [chuckle] Jessica Zager: And so it's most known for its effects on labor and facilitating labor and giving birth and allowing the uterus to contract to make that happen. So yeah, it's... You're spot on with that. Neil Sattin: Yeah, so if you're in the late stages of pregnancy, maybe talk to your doctor before you do some of these things, just in case. Though I will say that I remember practicing light touch massage on my wife at the time, and nothing bad happened. In fact, it was a nice part of our night-time ritual together was practicing for the main event. Jessica Zager: Did you do that for an extended period of... A certain period of time before her due date? Neil Sattin: Well, the purpose was, I believe, to really just kind of perfect the technique. I'm really good at light touch massage. And also because you want to be able to rely on those things when you're in the intensity of labor and birthing, which can be pretty intense. So having that as a set thing that you can rely on. I don't remember there being a specific length of time. I think we would often do a little meditation or something, imagining the different colors of the rainbow or something while we were, or really while I was doing, I was giving the light touch massage, I didn't get much light touch massage during that time, I have to say. I'm making up for the deficit right now during this interview. [chuckle] Jessica Zager: Well, you can continue with the light touch massage. Neil Sattin: Alright, I'm going to continue while we keep talking. Jessica Zager: Yeah, so... Neil Sattin: I'm going to feel very connected to you by the end of this conversation. Jessica Zager: Well, oxytocin actually helps people feel connected to the source of the stimulation. Neil Sattin: Oh, how about that? Jessica Zager: Part of me wonders if that can be extrapolated to... If you're doing these techniques, on yourself really fostering a sense of self-love, I at least like to think that it would. Neil Sattin: Yeah, I think we should have everyone report back after you've been light touch massaged... Light touch massage yourself for a week, not constantly, but over the course of a week, and then report back to how much you love yourself just from that alone. But we're going to give you more... Jessica Zager: Yeah. Neil Sattin: So okay. Jessica Zager: Also stimulating the inside of your mouth. Neil Sattin: Oh! Jessica Zager: So your oral mucosa can facilitate oxytocin, so you can do this with sucking behaviors. Again, this kind of goes back to labor, but also breastfeeding. But sucking behaviors, like gum, hard candy, using a water bottle with a nozzle, sucking on ice, hell, go buy a pacifier, whatever gets you through this COVID-19 is fair game. There is no judgement here. Neil Sattin: Right, it's all going to be happening in the privacy of your own home anyway, so. Jessica Zager: Exactly. You can massage the inside of your mouth with an electric toothbrush, massaging your gums with it, the inside of your mouth with it, but gargling is a way to also stimulate the inside of your mouth and your hard palate, and the hard palate is connected to the vagus nerve, which is the nerve that's responsible for the parasympathetic nervous system, which is our rest, digest, chill out nervous system, which is one of the reasons why oxytocin helps us decrease our stress, decrease our anxiety, decrease our blood pressure. Neil Sattin: Wow, yeah, and I don't think we mentioned this on the show. I think enough time has passed that I can mention it now that one of the leading researchers around the polyvagal theory, as he calls it, Steve Porges, he's actually married to Sue Carter, the oxytocin woman, and Steve was on the show as well talking about polyvagal theory and its role in helping us stay regulated and feeling safe under stress or in relationship. He was on an episode 34 of the podcast, in case you were curious, but that's so interesting about the hard palate. I didn't realize that it was part of that, that it was wired into that system. Jessica Zager: Yeah, I know. And also gargling is shown to help with upper respiratory tract infections. So it's kind of a... Neil Sattin: Win-win. Yeah, yeah, salt water, I think, can be good. So... Jessica Zager: Yeah, nice salt water... Sea salt water gargle. Neil Sattin: Yeah, then a little mouthwash in case you are stuck with someone, they might appreciate that as well. Awesome. Jessica Zager: Another thing that you can do is make yourself warm. So literal warmth. For example, the easiest way to do this is maybe taking a bath. You can create your own oxytocin ritual, like COVID-19 social distancing, I feel lonely ritual, where you would take a bath, and maybe you come out of the bath and you use oil on your skin, and you lightly stroke your skin, and then you brush your teeth, and you gargle, and you go to bed. And so all of those things would help to stimulate the release of oxytocin. Neil Sattin: I like it. And I think it's so interesting that, one, there are probably a lot of people who are doing that sort of thing anyway and not totally getting like why it's so beneficial for them. And I also think that in general self-care practices like that when there's more attention paid to the intention behind it. So even if it's your ritual to have a bath, and brush your teeth, and gargle, like knowing, just knowing that that is going to be boosting your oxytocin I think enhances the effect of that on your physiology. Jessica Zager: I agree. I think we tend to go through our rituals without thinking about what we're doing and without being present during these activities, and really feeling what does it feel like when I brush my gums, what does it feel like when I apply lotion to my skin, what does it feel like when I'm taking a bath? Because our minds are in so many other places typically and right now it's really easy to do that with, if you're constantly looking at the news and it can be difficult to get in the moment, but if you use these guidelines, these ways to bio-hack your oxytocin as almost like meditations in and of themselves, like to practice being in the moment and experiencing what you're feeling in that moment, you're going to get multiple benefits from doing something as simple as brushing your teeth or gargling. Neil Sattin: Yeah, absolutely. I can't wait till tonight with my kids where we go to do our self-love ritual, which they like to do as quickly as possible and I'm like, "No, this is how you love yourself, kids. We're going to really brush our teeth tonight, and now brush your gums. See what that's like." Yeah, it's going to be good, it's going to be a beautiful thing and I'll set them up for a lifetime of self-love and hopefully cavity-free teeth. Jessica Zager: There is a myriad of benefits. Another thing that somebody can do to release oxytocin is fostering positive warm interactions, and those interactions don't have to be in person. So FaceTiming with somebody you care about. And the research was very particular about this in that it works best if you're talking with somebody you have strong warm feelings towards. If you have a tumultuous relationship with your mother or your father and you're FaceTiming with them, that's not going to help you release oxytocin the way that we're talking about. Neil Sattin: Sorry, mom. Talk to you tomorrow. Jessica Zager: So choose wisely. Neil Sattin: Yeah, yeah I like that. And that connects in with one of the techniques that I often offer people for regulation, is this heart-centered breathing technique that the HeartMath Institute promotes. So it's all about increasing your heart rate variability as a way to down-regulate your system. And one important part of that technique is to focus on an image of a scene or a person that brings you joy. So it strikes me that that... It makes sense that that's an important part of choosing wisely around who you're FaceTiming with, like think about who brings joy to your life and make sure that person's on your speed dial. Jessica Zager: Exactly, yeah. Neil Sattin: Do we even have speed dial anymore? I don't think that exists. Jessica Zager: That's such an outdated term. I know you can program people into your phone buttons or can't... Neil Sattin: Can you? I don't know. Jessica Zager: I don't even know. Now, we just talk at our phones. Neil Sattin: That's right, I just let Siri handle that for me. Jessica Zager: That's what she's for. Neil Sattin: Yeah, she manages my Rolodex. [chuckle] Jessica Zager: Again, another very outdated term. Neil Sattin: Yeah, no, I don't think, however, that Siri is very good at fostering it. For the number of times that I've sat with my kids, or I'll admit, alone, trying to get Siri to respond in ways that are connecting and amusing. I don't think, I wouldn't recommend that you rely on Siri or Alexa to foster your oxytocin needs. Jessica Zager: No. There hasn't... We have yet to have a lot of research about the release of oxytocin in human-robot interactions, but I don't think there's a lot of empathy and warmth coming from Siri and Alexa. Neil Sattin: Not yet, although we probably just had everyone's iPhones and Amazon devices like going a little bit haywire if they're... Sorry about that if you're listening to this, you'll apologize to Siri and Alexa for us later. Okay, so we've got a pretty good list. What else comes to mind? Jessica Zager: So this is something I know you do very well, and that's singing. Neil Sattin: Oh! Jessica Zager: So singing out loud, like with gusto for 20 minutes, helps to release oxytocin in... Neil Sattin: For 20 minutes? Jessica Zager: 20 minutes, that's what the research says. It helps to release our oxytocin and foster increased feelings of happiness and decreased feelings of sadness and worry. Neil Sattin: Very cool. Jessica Zager: I don't know, four or five songs. Neil Sattin: Yeah, I can do that. Jessica Zager: Yeah. That's easy. Neil Sattin: I mean, not right this instant, but I did just put something on the quarantine karaoke group on Facebook. I don't know if that was actually started by someone here in Maine, where I live. Last time I checked, it had over 150,000 members now. But it's a Facebook group where people are singing popular songs to each other doing karaoke style. Now, we know, isn't that interesting, 'cause not to necessarily be promoting Facebook here, but as a way to stay connected during these times and add in the singing component, it makes sense why people are responding so much to that. Jessica Zager: It really does. And I always find it amazing how as humans, we tend to figure out ways to create what we need, what our bodies are lacking or missing without even really realizing it. And I see a lot in pelvic floor PT, people will come in and say, "I started doing this particular stretch," or "I started doing this other thing and I don't know why." And there will be a very good explanation why they've done that, and it will be something that I often recommend people do in their situation. And it's just amazing how our bodies figure out what they need. Neil Sattin: Yeah, there's this innate intelligence, especially if we're listening. Jessica Zager: Yes. Neil Sattin: Yeah, I like that one, singing. Neil Sattin: And then this next one is, I alluded to it earlier, when we were talking about sucking. But nipple stimulation is a really big one. So labor and breastfeeding are the two activities most associated with releasing oxytocin, and so stimulating your own nipples can be a way to facilitate oxytocin release and create that sense of well-being and closeness, and decrease stress and anxiety, and all of those wonderful juicy benefits of oxytocin in the comfort of your own home. I was looking to see if this was just studied in women or if this was studied in men as well, 'cause as we know, men have nipples. Neil Sattin: Yes. Jessica Zager: We don't know why. Neil Sattin: I just discovered mine. [chuckle] Just this moment. [chuckle] Jessica Zager: Surprise, you have nipples. And, but there is some research to show that nipple stimulation in men works the same way as it does in women, even though men don't breast feed. So stimulating your own nipples can really help to release that hormone. I was also reading this really interesting article about nipple simulation that was conducted at Rutgers and published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, about how nipple stimulation lights up the same part of the brain as clitoral stimulation or stimulation of the vagina or the cervix. So that kind of helps to explain why nipple stimulation for some people and in men too with the nipple stimulation lit up the same part of the brain as the genitals, so that kind of helps to explain why for some people, nipple stimulation feels really good and can even lead to orgasm, and, but also aside from that, it is a really big avenue for releasing oxytocin, so even if generally your nipples aren't very sensitive or you haven't really enjoyed nipple play in the past, doing it for non-sexual purposes, and for mitigating the effects of social distancing, it can be really effective for this particular reason. Neil Sattin: Is there a preferred way to or a length of time or... Jessica Zager: There wasn't a length of time associated with it. Neil Sattin: Okay. Jessica Zager: In the research, and when they study it, they often look at actions that mimic like a pulling or sucking, kind of like a baby's mouth would do on the nipple. But there are multiple, I would say again, do what feels good and play with it and your body will kind of lead you in the right direction. Neil Sattin: Trust your body, got it. Well, I've been, while you've been talking, I've been experimenting with all these different ways of playing with my own nipples, this is a very interesting interview. It's... [chuckle] Can't say I've played with my nipples while I've spoken to anyone else before, but I feel comfortable with you, Jessica, so thank you for giving me this experience. Jessica Zager: I take that as a compliment. [chuckle] Neil Sattin: Cool. Well, that's a lot. Have we exhausted the list yet, or is there more? Jessica Zager: We've exhausted the list. Neil Sattin: Okay, well, those are some... Jessica Zager: We don't want to overwhelm people. Neil Sattin: No, that's a healthy number of things to try to boost your oxytocin, which will have the benefit of increasing your sense of well-being, increasing your sense of connectedness within, because you will be the source of your own stimulation as well as your connectedness to others. And I'm really curious to hear from you. So if you put these oxytocin-boosting practices into use in your life, keep track of what that's like and let me know. You can find me in the Relationship Alive community on Facebook. You can email me, Neilius, N-E-I-L-I-US, @neilsattin.com, yeah, let us know and I'll make sure to pass this along to Jessica as well, 'cause I think it's really helpful to hear your experience and how this sort of thing has been helpful for you, and it seems obvious that everything we've mentioned is something that you could then, you could do that with a lover, knowing what it does, you could do that with yourself as part of being with another person or just as part of your own rituals, even when we're not forced to be apart from other people. That, all of these things we can bring into what we do to our repertoire of how we enhance the way we feel in life in general, to be more connected, more attuned. Yeah, I see you nodding. Jessica Zager: That's beautifully stated. Neil Sattin: It's powerful, powerful stuff. Well, I'm really glad that you let this idea fall just so casually in a conversation that we were having, 'cause I think it's perfect for the time that we're in right now, and I'm really excited for everyone to try this out. And again, if you want to download the condensed version of, like the cheat sheet version, then definitely visit Jessica's site, drjzager.com, D-R-J-Z-A-G-E-R.com and she has it there available for you to download, you can also find out more about the work she does helping people with sexual issues, or issues around gender identity, painful intercourse, etcetera. Neil Sattin: And thanks also, Jessica, for being willing to talk a bit more about your work as a pelvic health physical therapist. I had never heard of that before, when we were talking about it. And so, I'm going to guess that a lot of people haven't and, as you mentioned, even there are many doctors who don't know that it exists, and yet it's such a huge resource for people who are experiencing very common problems. Jessica Zager: Definitely. Neil Sattin: Yeah. Jessica Zager: And I hope we do get to do another podcast about that, because I think it's really important that everybody know that this exists because there are so many people suffering with issues that can really be easily treated. Neil Sattin: Yeah. Yeah, we will. We'll do another episode together. In the meantime, if you do also want to get a transcript of this episode, visit neilsattin.com/oxyboost, so you can get the full transcript, and I'll also have links to Jessica's site there as well. Or you can always text the word "passion" to the number 33444 and follow those instructions. Dr. Jessica Zager, such a pleasure to have you, thank you so much for offering your inspiring wisdom and being willing to handle me touching myself while we spoke. [chuckle] Jessica Zager: Always a pleasure, Neil. It was great. Neil Sattin: Awesome, we'll have you back soon. Jessica Zager: Sound good, I'll hold you to that.

Like I've been sayin the whole time, the Dalt wasn't here to stay. Now we have Brosnan and he is here to bless us with his puckered lips for the long haul. Say goodbye to your Father's James Bond, say hello to your cool young uncle's James Bond.

Yesterday was a pretty tough day for me. If I can be completely honest. I couldn't shake this sense of fear that I had, that things were never going to work out and that we were going to lose everything. And I want to talk to you about how I handled that, because when we're faced with that kind of fear, we have two big ways of responding to it. [00:00:20] Number one, we can wallow in fear and. Get paralyzed and not be able to move forward. Or number two, we can face it and take certain actions that are going to help us overcome. So I'm going to share with you today what I did to help overcome the fear that I had yesterday and put myself into a much better place today where I'm excited. [00:00:43]I am hopeful and I'm being driven by positivity and not fear. [00:00:48] [00:00:48] So yesterday I released eight podcast episodes and I did a new show with my photographers called the bright side show, where I focused on the wonderful positive things that were happening in the photography industry. And I just got stuff done. Like we are talking one of the most productive days ever, and by mid afternoon I was starting to feel a lot of anxiety because I was doing all this stuff. And it wasn't working. Like my industry is struggling in such a big way right now. So even though I'm able to help photographers book clients, because there are still people booking clients, most people don't believe it's possible. [00:01:46] And so they're not even trying. They're even discouraging other people from trying. And it's so frustrating to see that. And I just got really down seeing that. and even when they are booking clients, like they're keeping the money because they need to, things are really tough right now and they're not buying my course. [00:02:05]I've had a bunch of people cancel and my membership because money is suddenly tight without all the sales and the clients that they normally have. we're down at least, I think we're down about 20% right now. If I, if my really quick glance at the numbers is somewhat accurate. And it's a scary place to be. [00:02:20] And so I was doing all of this work and just feeling like it wasn't going to go anywhere. And so the question at the forefront of the mind and my mind, so the question at the forefront of my mind was, how long do I keep doing this? How long do I keep pushing and pushing and pushing. And just seeing results drop. [00:02:43] I mean, seeing my income go down, seeing no new sales coming in, like when do I throw in the towel and make a massive pivot and how do I do that? Like I have a photography audience. I don't have a massive audience in the entrepreneur space. You listening right now, this podcast is the only thing I've done intentionally to really try and serve entrepreneurs. [00:03:08] Or anyone outside of the photography business. And so it was kind of daunting. Like I've always wanted to work with entrepreneurs, and that's what part of why I love personal brand photography is because I get to serve both entrepreneurs and photographers, but I haven't ever really went after that directly because one, I believe that having focus and consistency in a business is one of the most important traits you can have. [00:03:33] And I didn't want to get distracted by it, but to. The photography stuff has always made us the money. I mean, I've been doing that since 2011 it's been fully supporting our families since 2011 and so there was never really time or space to go after a new market or new clients or do something completely new where I'd have to start audience building from scratch. [00:03:57] Because this is where we needed to put our focus. This is what I needed to spend my time on because we don't have other outside income. This fully supports my entire family, all our benefits, everything. And so stepping outside of the realm that I was used to doing and used to serving that was supporting us felt really risky. [00:04:17]. In fact, this podcast has been my pet project to really be able to serve entrepreneurs. And I know like the more you understand the value of personal branding, the more likely you're going to be to hire a personal brand photographer. So it builds the entire industry. [00:04:33] But I haven't really done much of anything to monetize this podcast, and it's been the thing that's gone on the back burner when things were really busy in the business doing other things because it wasn't a moneymaker. And sometimes you just got to put your head down and focus on the things that make money So I found myself really anxious and I saw all of this frantic work, which made me feel better because I accomplished something. But it wasn't getting results and I kept hearing the story go through my head every once in a while when I was talking to other people. You've heard it here on the podcast, or even just as I was thinking through stuff, I kept hearing we might lose everything. [00:05:13]Go through my head and there's absolutely the possibility that we might lose everything, but that was starting to replay in my head over and over again. Now, I came to a really healthy acceptance of that fact a couple of days ago where I'm like, you know what? It's all stuff. It doesn't matter. It's, I mean. [00:05:33] First world problems truly to, , have to downgrade your house and your living situation or whatever else. Not a big deal. , I mean, if we can come out of this healthy, I'm going to be thrilled. so I came to a healthy acceptance of that, but when it came to what I was hearing happening in my mind, those voices, those stories that we tell ourselves in our mind. [00:05:53]It was coming up more often than I liked and I wasn't hearing the narrative of this might be the best thing ever. We might come out of this much stronger than we ever were. All I was hearing was we might lose everything and it was. Really putting deep fear and anxiety into me in a deep way, like super deep way. [00:06:14] I was stuck in my head and it was just giving me this low level of anxiety underneath the surface that I could feel was building and welling up. And so when I start to get that way, I know the best thing I can do is to get out of my head and get into my body. . Now. I didn't appreciate this in the past. [00:06:33] I didn't really understand the value of being active and really feeling how my body feels until, I don't know, six to nine months ago. Last summer I did a lot of physical activity and it brought so much stillness into my life and so much peace into my life. And I found that it was one of the best ways to raise my spirits. [00:06:54] I mean, it's chemical. You get all the endorphins. It just makes you feel phenomenal when you're done. [00:06:59]So when I'm particularly anxious or stressed out or just feeling like junk, getting out for a walk or a run or a ski or whatever it is, getting out and moving my body and really being in my body is one of the best things I've found to do. It helps me get out of my head. It helps me find peace and it helps me really calm all of the craziness that's going on. [00:07:25]So it was really actually kind of fun because I got out on the trail and I felt like junk and I was so down on myself because, , I have a 50K race in the books for may. If that's going to happen, I doubt it'll happen. And I knew that I was going to have to do a lot of training to really build up to being able to do a 50 K trail race in may. And there weren't a lot of weeks between my big ski and the trail race. We're right in the middle of all of it right now. [00:07:49] And so I went out on the trail and there's still tons of snow and I just, I felt awful and I just got really down on myself for a minute. And then I actually remembered. Episode five from the season two where I talked about how , you can't judge things by the first mile. [00:08:04] the start is always the hardest. And I was thinking about how even in this. Pandemic, how we've come into it doesn't determine how we're going to come out of it. It was like I was listening to my own lessons and hearing it again for myself in a new light, and I realized that I needed that message that just because I came into this scared and just because they came into this with a business that is failing didn't mean that I was going to fail or that this wasn't going to take off some other way and that. [00:08:34] It wasn't an indicator of how I'm going to go through it. So as I was out there, I came across this big opening in the snow . where there's a little bit of water going through and a bunch of rocks, and I was able to go down into it. It's about 18 inches down, and I just listened to the water running and dripping [00:08:51] and I sat there and listened to it for probably a good 15 minutes. Just feeling the peace, feeling that calmness, feeling that stillness. And settling myself, and that felt. Amazing. And then I kept going and I was listening to this book from Glennon Doyle called untamed, which by the way, is freaking amazing. [00:09:18] I cannot recommend it enough. It'll really help you figure out who you are, what you really want in life, and really help undo a lot of the constructs that you probably don't even realize you have that we get when we're young and from our culture. That's fantastic. But one of the things that she does is she talks about writing a new story, like what is it you really want? [00:09:41] And I've always known how powerful writing and journaling is, and I, I was still disturbed by this. The story going through my head. things not working out. And so I realized I wanted to take this journal prompt that she gave us for our life and use it in the context of our business. , [00:10:01] so when I came back home from my snowshoe, I felt 100% better, by the way, and I didn't feel nearly as bad after that first mile. Just to put things in perspective. But I went in and I talked to my husband and I just said, Hey, can I spend the night out in our cabin? So we have a guest house, it's, we call it our cabin. [00:10:18] And normally we have guests who stay here for free, but right now with all the virus stuff, it's wide open. And so I said, I just need some time to think and to journal because I've been so frenetically moving and doing and taking action. That I haven't really sat down and thought about what I would do if this doesn't work in a really practical way. [00:10:40] I mean, I'd talk to the bank. We've looked at the finances, and I faced where we are right now and what is going on, which is a huge win for me in the past. I just want to avoid that, but I knew that if I was going to move forward with any ability to think, I had to know. Because if I didn't know, it would just paralyze me with fear and I'd think it's worse than it is. [00:10:59] I don't really think it could get much worse than it is, but , it would just paralyze me. So I faced that, which was great, but I was keeping myself so busy in the hopes of what I had done before continuing to work. If I just put enough effort into it, and it's not that I needed some time to regroup and to rewrite that story in my head about us potentially failing. [00:11:21]And so I came to the cabin and it's, it's right on our land. I walk, I don't know, 50 feet from the house to get to it, and I sat down with my journal. And I took the time to rewrite my story and I did this. I literally wrote it out because there's studies that show that when you write something down, you begin to believe it. [00:11:45] I believe it was in influence by Robert Cialdini where they talk about the power of writing things down and the consistency principle, but I'm pulling that out from the top of my head. So fact check it before you quote me on that. I'm not going to fact check it right now because I'm in get her done mode. [00:12:03] But just I think that's where it's at and I really started to say, okay, what is it about this story of failing that actually serves me? Like why does my mind keep going to that idea? What there's gotta be something there that might have some benefit. there's some obvious things like, , the financial burden to keep our family afloat will be much less because we wouldn't have nearly as many monthly expenses. [00:12:29] Now the reason we're here is for this cabin. It's to provide a place for family, friends, people in ministry to come and rest and find rest. [00:12:38] And I love that we do that, but having this place is really expensive. It's not a cheap place. And so there's a part of me that feels like it's a really heavy burden to bear, even though I feel so strongly that we're meant to be here and be doing this, and I love that we do that, but that's a benefit. [00:12:55] Like if we fail and lose everything, then whatever we do next would be so much easier to sustain because it wouldn't be nearly as expensive. So when you have those fears and those stories, it's really helpful to ask yourself. What are some of the ways that these fears actually serve us? Why is that kind of appealing for our mind? [00:13:15] And I just wrote down as many benefits as I could think of of us failing, which sounds really weird, but it was really super helpful. Then I also wrote down all of the lies that were flying through my head about why this might be happening, about, , myself and my abilities and all of the stuff. I just got it out and some of it was like. [00:13:35] Embarrassing to even write out into a journal that nobody else will ever read. Just because I couldn't believe I was having those thoughts, but getting them out of my head was so helpful. the question that really helped the most was this question from Glennon Doyle's book untamed, which was what's the most beautiful and true story I can imagine about my business during this time? [00:14:00] Now that's modified a little bit from her actual question in the book, and I'll let you go read the book on your own to get the full version of that question, because it is a beautiful book and you should read it. , but I sat and journaled about it and I thought about the experience that I wanted to have and I thought about me in a year from now and a year from now. When I look back on this time. What will I wish I have done? Like how do I want to have approached it? Because in the moment it's really easy to get totally paralyzed by fear, but taking that time to say, who do I want to be during this? [00:14:38] Who will I have wanted myself to have been during it when I'm removed from it? And I know that's kind of a weird way to look at it. But it was so helpful to think about my identity and what the most beautiful and true story could be for my business through this. And what I discovered and the story that I rewrote in my head was amazing. [00:15:03] And I'm absolutely going to share that with you in the next episode because it means I'm going to be making a massive pivot in my business. But before I get to that. [00:15:14] here's what I want you to do right now. If you're feeling that fear and anxiety, if you're stressed about your own personal situation, and especially if you are hearing a story in your mind or you've started believing a story in your mind that isn't what you really want to see happen, that's more fear-based than it is based in hope, then I encourage you to take some time to move your body. [00:15:43] Drink some water, find stillness, and I know that can be really hard for me. I really great way to find stillness was to sit on a cliff and let myself feel the anxiety, like actually try and make it worse. I know that sounds funny, but when I actually sit down and I just let myself be still and I feel in my body, wherever I'm feeling, the fear. [00:16:08] And I give myself permission to go into that feeling and feel it, which I don't like to do. I like to stay in my head and not feel things, and I notice how my physical body responds. It actually lessens and goes away. I know that's super weird and super un-intuitive, but I literally say, okay, now is the time for me to feel the fear. [00:16:29] Let me focus all my efforts on that feeling of fear and try and make it stronger. And inevitably when I try and feel it more, it just goes away. Like I don't even know how to explain it. It's just the most magical thing ever. But the physical feelings, I can't make them worse. , it lessens them. And now maybe that won't work for you, but it is the most amazing thing I learned from this wonderful lady named Lorraine. [00:16:53]never fails. I go into the anxiety and say, okay, my chest is tight. It feels like a weight. Let me make it more heavy. Can I make that feeling even more? And something about letting myself feel it and just embrace it, makes the physical aspects of that start to melt away. And I know that sounds super woo, but it's just something that I've found works really well for me. [00:17:14] That might work for you. And then I can really breathe through a lot of that. And. Like, except more of that piece in stillness. So if you can find the stillness and do that, move your body, get out of your head into your body, and then think about, these stories that you have in your head, are they serving you or are they hurting you? [00:17:32] Is that really what you want for a reality? How does it serve you? What are some of the lies you're hearing, and what's the most beautiful and true story you can imagine about your life and your business during this time, one year from now, when you look back at how you handled this time. What do you want that story to look like? [00:17:52] What do you want to say? What do you want to have done? write it down and then read that every single day so that you can move forward through this time as your very best. And sometimes when we just think about it a little creatively and out of the box like that, it helps make everything a little bit better. [00:18:13]. now, I am not a counselor and I am not a professional, therapist or anything. So take all of this with a grain of salt. [00:18:21] If it works for you, great. If it doesn't and you need real help, don't be ashamed or afraid to get it, but know that you're not alone. Know that we will all move past this that. We can do this and that. There is definitely hope to be found. Maybe for you, you'll find out that you want to make some massive pivot like I do. [00:18:44] I don't necessarily want to make it, but I definitely feel drawn to make it and I feel this compulsion in a really great healthy way to make this. Or maybe you'll find that you need to just go deep into what you're doing now, or maybe you need to rest and allow this to just play out. I don't know your story or your situation. [00:19:03] But I just want you to know that you're not alone. You can do this and that. I believe that one year from now you can come through this and look back and be proud of how you handled it. That's what I want for you. So, Hope you found this helpful. I will tell you more about what is happening in the next episode for definitely. [00:19:22] Check that out. I'm going to be podcasting a lot because I want a podcast this whole journey, and I don't know about you, but when I'm super stressed and there's craziness going on in the world and I'm backed into a corner, that's when I do my best work, and that's when I learn the most, and I feel like I'm learning several amazing new things. [00:19:42] Yeah. Every day, like almost every hour. It's crazy. I don't even know how personal growth can happen so fast, but I want to be sharing that with you as I go. So if you haven't yet, please subscribe. If you're finding this really helpful, there's two big things that you could do that would mean a lot to me. [00:20:00] Number one. Leave a review on whatever platform you are listening to this too. So if you're on iTunes, leave an iTunes review or Stitcher, wherever, that would mean a lot. I'd love to hear that this is helpful for you because it's definitely taking time out of my, you know, day that when I could be doing other things to try and grow my business, but I just feel so compelled to help even one person, like if it just helped one person saved their business or overcome the fear. [00:20:28] All of this time and effort would be worth it. And I believe that this is my time to step up and grow. So if you could help me do that by leaving a review to encourage me to let me know what you think, but also if you could spread the word to anyone else, you know who might be really struggling through this time, who's a small business owner. [00:20:44] I would appreciate that so much. you can either take a screenshot and send it to them in Instagram, however you communicate with them, you know, maybe you're on Voxer or Marco polo or , Facebook messenger, Instagram, whatever it is. If you just have one or two people or better a group of people that you know would find this helpful. [00:21:03] Spreading the word is one of the best ways that you can thank me for putting this content out if you find it helpful. So. Please spread the word, tell everyone you know who would be a good fit for this and leave a review. That would be amazing and I will catch you in the next episode and I will share with you the big pivot that I'm going to be making as soon as I can possibly make it in the next episode. [00:21:25] See you there.

We are truly living in a time when the world needs love, and we have an interesting sextile between Neptune & Venus in Pisces and Saturn/Pluto in Capricorn...although it is offset by the Mars square. We'll talk about that + I have a special request for those of you who enjoy what we're doing here - that's at the end. And...thank you!TRANSCRIPT:And welcome in to the Tuesday edition of the fun astrology podcast. Thomas Miller with you. Thanks for joining us. Hope your moon in Gemini today is going well. Let's talk about astrology, and then at the end I have a special request, especially for those of you who are enjoying the work that we are doing.I'd like to ask for you of you a very. Big favor and a little exchange in value. If you would take just a couple of minutes, I would really appreciate it, but we'll talk about that after we talk about what's going on in the chart. So the moon today is in Gemini - right about in the middle, starting out, near 15 degrees.And with that it's throwing a really nice trying to the sun and Aquarius at 15 degrees. You know, there's a lot that's said about a moon sun trine, but one of the things that is especially of note is an extra [00:01:00] grounding feed on the ground. Good solid balance of that radiant energy and that reflective energy.So that will be with us all day today. Now somebody on iTunes, uh, on the reviews had made a comment that they would like to see more how this applies to other areas of the chart. And we could talk about the moon being a mutable sign in Gemini. Uh, that this also might affect Virgos or Sagittarius, or Pisces, or then we would also have to talk about Aquarius being a fixed sign and that it might affect you if you are a Scorpio, Leo or Taurus.But you see why I don't do that? Because there's a really thin line in astrology between understanding something and just getting something you can use. And glossing your little eyes over because that's too much. And also I try to keep these shorts. It's like [00:02:00] if a, I will try to expand. These may be just a little bit, but not so much that it's going to make your eyes gloss over or scale over because that's not the intention of this.And I think when astrologers get talking to Astro speak, don't we all gloss over? I mean, unless you have a chart in front of you right now. Then this is hard to put together in words. So anyway, that's one of the a, that's one of the main aspects. The moon is also throwing a square to Neptune today. And that's a real good segue of the other little aspect that I wanted to talk about.So Neptune is in Pisces now. Neptune takes 164 years to move around the chart. So when was the last time that Neptune was in Pisces? We've, we've talked so much about Pluto, basically. Uh, and it's transit. Back to Capricorn, which takes 248 years. Well, we've got another S. the next slowest mover is [00:03:00] Neptune, and it takes 164 years.So it being in Pisces is a rarity. Now it's sitting at 17 degrees. So again, it's almost halfway through. So we're going to be talking about Neptune and Pisces for quite some time, but it right now, along with Venus. Has a sextile aspect to Saturn, Pluto. Okay, here are the numbers. Pluto in Capricorn 23 degrees, Saturn in Capricorn, 25 degrees.Okay, let's shift over to Pisces. Neptune is at 17 so you can see that's just barely still clipping Saturn, but it is definitely within the bandwidth of Pluto. Venus is at 26 degrees in Pisces. Now, Venus moves quickly, but at 26 degrees, that's basically a dead on sextile to Saturn at 25 I mean, that's a one [00:04:00] degree orb, and it still catches Pluto at 23 three degrees.So this is a big deal with Neptune and Venus in Pisces, sextiling Saturn and Pluto. Now, the duality of this, the polarity, if you will, is that Mars is still square to both of these guys. So there's been that Mars pull on this thing that we've been talking about over the last two weeks. But I think it's amazing that we have this Neptune Venus sextile to Saturn and Pluto.Now yesterday we talked about some of the things that have been happening over this past week that's in yesterday's episode, but add to that now something that was a shock to me because I loved the sport of skiing. Mikaela Shiffrin the US Olympic gold medalist, she had to fly home, they were in Russia.And her father had fallen in at their new home in Edwards, Colorado, hit his head, was taken to the hospital in Denver where he died, fortunately after they got there. But what a blow to the ski industry and to the shift and family. And then of course, the big announcement yesterday that's been all over the headlines is rush Limbaugh.Announcing that he has advanced stage lung cancer. And look, I don't care where we are politically. This is a soul that has embodied a human flesh and under those circumstances, I just think the best response obviously is love. So while we have this unique dynamic with Neptune and Venus in this favorable relationship, we are seeing some still, I mean, this amazing tension around Saturn, Pluto, this thing has shaken.Like I've just like, wow. And yes, I get it. People have challenges. The human experience is a challenge. People [die, celebrities die. We see news in the headlines all the time, unrelated to this. I get it, I get it. But the thing is collectively, when you ask any group of people, have there been more challenges recently?Every hand in the room goes up. So what do we do about it? Well, I, the thing that keeps coming back to my mind is just stay conscious, stay awake, stay aware, and do your spiritual practice on an amped up scale. We've talked a lot on here about various things that you can do to increase your spiritual practice, and some of that is obviously personal.It's what you do best, but take it up a notch and realize that this perception of Neptune, this intuition, this dreaminess, this connecting with the, with the higher consciousness realm, also supported by Venus, is in a favorable [00:07:00] relationship. Even though it has that Mars overshadow. Now, speaking of Mars overshadowing Venus, you want an example of this?And basically the astrology is over, and now here is my request. If I may just have another about two minutes of your time. Here's Mars spiking Venus. Okay, so over the weekend I ran the same podcast on Saturday and Sunday. There were a couple of reasons for that. One is. You know, it's a lot. It is a lot to do a daily podcast, even as short as these are, it's a lot to keep this thing going every day.And magenta and I had some internet based work that we wanted to do and we just wanted a clear space for that. The reason I put it up there twice is that I just thought, Hey, you know, uh, it's just easier, right? And respecting your time to come on on Sunday and say, Hey, if you listen to this yesterday, uh, no problem.Move on. I'll see you tomorrow. Well, somebody left a really negative comment on iTunes, and the reason that iTunes is really important to me. Is that I would like to elevate this. I have other plans for this podcast that I'm not going to go into right now, but I would really like this thing to be toward the top of the astrology search, and that is greatly facilitated by people who leave five star reviews and positive comments.I've said on here a number of times. If you love what we do, leave a review, and if you don't send me an email, let's talk about it offline. And to this person. Pick a Trix who left this a very scathing, didn't like it, said that a repeating the same podcast was lame. Like, wow, really? Okay, we'll pick a tricks.Let me tell you the rest of the story. Uh, I have a heart condition that I've lived with for six years and sometimes it flares up and last week I was in Colorado and it flared up. [00:09:00] Big time to the point where for the first time in six years of living with this, I was actually scared. I wanted to get down to lower elevation.I couldn't, I was up there by myself. Majona was not there, and when I got back home, I was still not right. And even through the weekend had a really sluggish, low energy, couple of days. So the global lesson to me is before you go striking out at somebody - you’d better know what's on their side of things because you know, you probably would feel pretty small in your grandiose, uh, pontification online, which is so, you know, the, the online bullying thing, especially among the young people is a, Whoa, wow, let's don't go down that road because it is huge.But you know, the point is, is you could take that astrological chart and wipe all the stuff off of it and just draw a great big heart connecting all the houses and signs, and that supersedes everything. It is the highest energy in the universe. So would you guys who like this program do me a big favor.Those of you who are on the iTunes or Apple podcast platform, which still is about two thirds of everybody listening to podcasts does. So from there, would you mind jumping on there and do two things for me just to, uh, just to help keep this bullion NSI that we've built up over the last nine months.Would you go on there and find that February 2nd from pick a tricks post? And when it says, was this review helpful, would you click no. That is if it's in your heart to do so, and if it's in your heart to do so, would you write a positive review? Because for the Apple algorithms, if about 10 or 15 or 20 of you get on there and just bury this thing, then we'll be back up where we were.It did knock the posting, the listing of the podcast down a couple of notches. I would greatly appreciate that and pick a tricks. I'm sorry that, uh, that what I did over the weekend did not suit you. I truly am. I cannot please everybody. And I did what I thought was best. And you know what? I'm just going to picture for the rest of the day a great big heart…in that chart, because right now there are a lot of people that are hurting and the world needs love. So maybe what we do with all of this is we just kind of, I don't know, but all the rest of it aside, let's just focus on sending love out into the universe. Doesn't it really need it? I think so. Thanks a lot.Thanks for listening and I'll see you tomorrow. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

I talk about 2016 Your Name by Makoto Shinkai. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/ek-rjm/message

Show Notes: Speaker 1: (00:00) Hey, what's up Doc? Welcome back to the simplified integration podcast. My name is Dr. Andrew Wells and this is episode four a high ticket highway. Speaker 2: (00:13) Leonardo da Vinci once said that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication and I agree. You see the problem with the way that most consulting groups approach medical integration is anything but simple. In fact, it's the exact opposite. It's expensive, it's complicated and quite frankly it's exhausting. Enough is enough. There are far too many amazing integrated clinics that are struggling. Well, I'm on a mission to change that. What I've come to find from over five years working with integrative practices is that simplicity really is the secret. The old saying of less is more is true. Through a streamlined approach, I was able to create multiple successful seven figure integrated clinics and now I'm going to show you how you can do the same. Join me as I share with you the secrets to successful medical integration and practice growth. Join me on a journey to greater sophistication through innovation. I'm Dr. Andrew Wells and welcome to the simplified integration podcast. Speaker 1: (01:09) All right doc. So it's great to have you on this episode. Now this is, this is really fun topic. I want to share a story with you to kind of explain this concept of the high ticket highway. When we first introduced, um, uh, regenerative medicine to our office, what we do, who we launch it to, our existing patient base. So we, we like sent out emails and talked about in the office and we said, Hey, we've got this amazing new therapy called regenerative medicine. It can help you with your knees and hips and back, that kind of stuff. And so we held an internal seminar in her office. I don't want to say we had like maybe 30 to 40 people. I don't remember signed up for the seminar. And, um, we knew it was a, it was actually a packed house. It was the, it was the biggest S uh, show up for an event that we ever did in our office to our existing patients. Speaker 1: (01:53) We had a couple of guests as well. And so we did the, uh, we did the seminar and then we booked consultations right after that. And I remember the first patient I met with, we went back to the consultation room and she's like, wow. She's like, this is amazing. I didn't know this was even possible to use regenerative medicine. And she goes, and I already kind of knew her health history and she said, I really want this for uh, both of my knees and my shoulder. And she goes, how much is that going to cost? And I, we had like a special promotion and stuff. I did the math on my calculator and I said, well, it's about 9,600 bucks. And she goes, can I put that in a credit card? And I said, yeah. And I say, she's like, okay, let's do it. When can I have it done? Speaker 1: (02:32) And I said, well, Hey, tomorrow. So I remember walking out of the room on what was probably a 15 minute consultation and the same day I did this seminar, I remember walking back to the front desk thinking like, I almost felt like something was wrong. Like, Oh my gosh, like we just collected 9,600 bucks for a therapy. That was like a one time therapy patient was super excited about it. And I remember thinking like, wow, like I sometimes like you get in your own head about like what, like what the patient will value for a certain thing, right? Like are they really gonna pay 300 bucks for chiropractic care or 10,000 bucks for regenerative medicine care. And really the value is in the eye of the beholder, so to speak. And this lady was, and her husband was extremely happy to pay 9,600 bucks for a real solution, for a joint pain. Speaker 1: (03:23) And I remember walking to the front desk and I'm like, wow, look, we have, this is so cool. It's so cool for the patient. And it was really excited that we collected 9,600 bucks in 15 minutes. And then I remember, uh, another doc working in my office came up to me and he had done the same day, did another consultation with another patient and she's, he said, yeah, she's doing two joints. So that was 7,000 bucks. So within the scope of like 20 minutes we had collected, what is that like 16,000 bucks. And as a, you know, the course of the week went on. I think we in our first seminar we collected, you know, it was like 60, 70,000 bucks I think with our first, our first seminar that we launched to our existing patients with no ad budget. So this was the first time I really tasted that concept of selling high ticket therapies to our patients in our office. Speaker 1: (04:08) And it was a huge revelation for me. I'm not just the the revenue collection but also um, especially I talked about this on the last, uh, the last episode was how much effort you really have to put into regenerative medicine. Cause remember it's a one time injection. So, um, that really changed my perspective on how I viewed introducing new therapies to the office. The alternative to that would be, so if it's not a high ticket highway, the other thing or high ticket therapy is, well, you know, what else can you offer? You know, you have nutrition plans and you have weight loss options in decompression. And functional medicine, like it takes a, it takes a lot of tickets, so to speak, or smaller tickets to equal one regenerative medicine ticket. So this saves, saves you so much time in. So ma, so many headaches in so many different ways. Speaker 1: (04:57) So for example, when you're, when you're running a, uh, an ad campaign, let's say you do a Facebook ad campaign, like how many ads would you have to put out and how many phone calls would you have to answer for a typical chiropractic patient? Right? It's a lot, right? You have to collect a lot of leads and, and get on a lot of calls and take care of a lot of patients to equal the amount of one regenerative medicine patient. Whereas with regenerative medicine, because it's a small niche therapy and it's a smaller demographic, you don't have to handle as many patients, right? A busy clinic may see five to 10 regenerative medicine patients per month. So let's, let me give you an example of that conservative month. Let's say you're, let's say you see five regenerative medicine patients and let's say on the low end, their case average, you're collect $4,000 per patient. Speaker 1: (05:47) That's $20,000 you made in one month just seeing five patients. That's the beauty of high ticket sales. It's less patients, it's less demand on you, it's less demand on your staff, it's less demand on everything and you benefit the patient benefits. So this is why, uh, I'm really, really passionate about high tickets. You know, high ticket items, and this is the response I get from a lot of doctors is they're, they're very uncomfortable with that. Uh, they don't know if they can sell high ticket therapies. They don't know if there are enough people in their town to make that work. Um, lots of different like, um, objections or kind of hangups people have in their, in their mind. And what I'll tell you is this, like the demand is out there. If you don't believe me, uh, walk into an orthopedic, a surgical clinic, like show up on a Monday morning or Tuesday morning at nine o'clock and, and just look around and see how busy their waiting room is. Speaker 1: (06:42) Like these are, there are, there are, there is an endless supply of patients in your town who are, who have joint pain or back pain and they're looking for solutions other than drugs and surgery. And that's where regenerative medicine fits in, right? Your main demographic is going to be your patient 55 years and older. They have a bad joint. They've already been to the orthopedic surgeon. They're looking at, they're staring down the barrel of surgery. They don't want to do that. They want other options and uh, they will pay for nonsurgical solutions to join pain because what are they getting in return? Right? You're like, well, why would someone pay that much money for one injection? Because what you're giving them in return is their life back. So many times we think of it as, well, it's a little Viola stuff. It's not worth 5,000, 10,000 bucks. Speaker 1: (07:28) Well it is for the patient because now they can, they can, uh, they can garden again. They can play with their grandkids again. They can travel. We had a patient one time, her whole goal was she wanted to be out of pain so she could go to Europe and she wanted to travel for like three months. And then she said, she goes after that. If you can get me out of pain for three months after that, like I'm, I'm good to go. My husband's passed away. I don't like, I don't have any other reason to be on earth anymore. I'll be happy if you can, if you can provide that for me. Um, and we were able to do that. So, um, that was like, she, she would've paid anything to have that experience in her life. I'll give you another example. We had a patient, um, this was a really severe case. Speaker 1: (08:07) It was a lady who came in on a motorized wheelchair and she was overweight. She was diabetic and she had severe, severe knee pain. And I remember this lady because she was like, she was desperate. She was out of options and, um, and she was so unhealthy that her surgeon refused to do a knee replacement on her because they were afraid that she wasn't gonna survive the surgery. And so I said, listen, like you're likely not a candidate, right? Cause you came into, you're not even, you're not, you're not, you're not walking on your own. You're using this motorized wheelchair. And she goes, what? Just if you can get me some relief, I just want some relief. And we x-rayed her knees and her knees look really awful. And I said, listen, regenerative medicine is not, is not going to help you the way that, um, I would like it to. Speaker 1: (08:52) And I said, you're really not a good candidate for this. She said, well, what, what type of relief could I get from this? And I said, you'd be lucky to get 5% relief. And she goes, that's worth it to me. And I said, well, what do you mean by that? She goes, I'm in severe pain. I don't want to live anymore. I can't do surgery. I can't be on these drugs anymore, but I just need to be out of pain. And she was in tears and I was, I was half until like I was tearing up listening to the story and she said, if you can provide me with a 5% relief, I want to do this because that's my only option. And this was like 7,400 bucks I think for both of her knees. And I said, listen, it's 7,400 bucks. Is that a lot of money to you? Speaker 1: (09:30) Like is this going to cut, like keep you from eating and paying your bills? Cause if that's the case that it's not going to be worth it. And she said, listen, we'll find a way to pay our bills. We'll find a way to keep food on the table. Uh, and, and her husband looked at me and said, listen, if you can provide her with some pain relief, we will find a way to make it work. And it was, it was like a lot of money for them to spend. And for me, I'm like, ah, like I had this kind of like moral dilemma, but I was very upfront with her and said, this is not, it's not going to fix your knees, but it may potentially help you get out of pain. So she ended up doing the injection and she came back, um, uh, three months later for like a checkup and she's still in her motorized wheelchair. Speaker 1: (10:09) And I'm like, eh, I was kind of dreading walking into the consultation room cause I, my fear was I kind of slid, let's lay, it didn't get any relief. Like she spent 7,400 bucks. I don't want to like, I don't want to have that conversation. I'd feel really bad if that were the case. And I came in the room and, and I said, you know, I asked her how you doing? And she started crying and I'm like, God, this is not good. And she goes, she goes, you have no idea how much he helped me and I will, what, what do you mean by that? I see you're still in the chair. And she goes, I said, how are you feeling better? She goes, yeah, I feel better. I said, how much? Cause I'm probably 10% better. And I'm like, well that's not a lot. Speaker 1: (10:45) And she said, yeah, but you have no idea. She goes, now I can actually stand up long enough to cook dinner for my husband and I can, I can, it's tough, but I can do dishes again. I can do laundry again, I can help her help out around the house. She goes, those little things have given me my life back. I feel like there's a reason to live. I can, I can take care of my husband, I can even go to the grocery store again. So like in my mind I'm like, Oh, this is not going to be worth it for her. But all she wanted to do was do these little things around the house that gave her value, that was valuable to her. And she and her husband like thanked me profusely because she felt so much better because of the injections. And I'm like, wow. Speaker 1: (11:24) Like I've, I've felt really, really good about that. And she was so happy and less left us a great review on our, on our website. And so like that, like that, that's worth it. Right? And so when you're, when you're thinking about like, will people pay for it? Are there people in my town that want to have this done? They're out there. They're looking for solutions. They're just looking for the right office and the right doctor to provide this therapy for them. So, um, if that's your thought, like you need to like get out of your head, like you put people barriers in, in their, in their brain that aren't really there, this is a real solution. People are looking for these types of results and you just need to connect with these people in your community. So, um, so this is the value of high ticket, the high ticket sales and high ticket highway. Speaker 1: (12:07) Um, I can't say enough about how much value this provides to your community and your office when you don't have to see a thousand patients a week to be profitable in your office. So listen, dog, I hope you found this valuable. This was part four of, uh, of the seven figure shortcut. And make sure to jump on the next podcast, which is, uh, episode number five and we'll cover that on the, um, on the next podcast. So thanks for joining me. I hope you have a great day, doc. Hope you found this valuable and I'll talk to you soon. Bye. Bye. Speaker 2: (12:40) Hey, innovators. Thanks for listening to the simplified integration podcast. Fact that you're listening tells me that you're like me, someone who loves simplicity, and the truth is those who embrace Implicity are some of the greatest innovators. So hope you got a ton of value from what we covered on today's episode. Be sure to subscribe and share with other docs that you feel could benefit from greater sophistication through simplification and innovation. If you've got specific questions that you'd like answered on this podcast, or you've got specific topics that you'd like me to discuss, just shoot me an email.

  Sleep is absolutely critical to being healthy. But do you know how to get your best sleep? Answering that question and SO much more is my dear friend and business partner, Matt Gallant. We start the show by talking about how he got interested in the topic of sleep. When he was in his mid-20s he wanted to do it all: he wanted to record an album, learn all about marketing, work out at the gym and he had a full-time job. So he decided he would cut back on sleep. And he took the resistance training approach by doing it in small increments. He shaved off 15 minutes at a time and thought his body would adjust if he did this gradually. He eventually got down to 5 hours of sleep and experienced some side effects when he did: he had to be pristine with the food he was eating and keeping himself hydrated or his body would completely crash. Matt also shares another story about his experiences with sleep that showed him it's the quality of sleep we get more so than the quantity. We explore that story, plus Matt’s best sleep hacks. At night, Matt recommends wearing glasses from True Dark or Swannies about 2 hours before bed to help your body block out any type of light that might keep you awake. He also recommends using a program called f.lux on your computer, which lessens the amount of blue light emitted by your computer. Iris is a similar program that Matt likes best. As far as actual sleep, you want to keep your bedroom cool at night (16-18 degrees C or 60-64 degrees Fahrenheit). But you also want to keep your mattress cool because otherwise your body heat gets trapped underneath you and you will sweat. The sweat will dehydrate you which leads to poorer sleep and waking up tired. Matt gives us his specific tech recommendations for greater sleep on today’s show before we dive into which supplements can enhance your sleep, and how they work plus the reason 15 minutes of meditation before bed can help you fall asleep faster. You’re going to hear those fascinating topics, and you’ll hear Matt explain why he’s not a fan of melatonin. Join us for this illuminating discussion on sleep. Resources: True Dark glasses Swannies glasses f.lux Iris chili pad Tim Ferriss The Ooler sleep pad EMF shielding tech Faraday cage Oura ring Dreem headband Delta sleeper EarthPulse Dream Tea from Anima Mundi Magnesium Breakthrough Read the Episode Transcript : Wade Lightheart: Good afternoon. Good morning and good evening. It's Wade T Lightheart at the Awesome Health Podcast and I got my good friend, buddy, business partner and co experimenter Matty G. How's it going today at the biOptimizers extreme lab? Matt Gallant: It's going great man. Always, you know, I always love talking about health with you and I think we're going to be sharing some more deep gold today. Wade Lightheart: So I'm excited about today's podcast because we're going to talk about something that we've been in I think a circuitous conversation for I think almost the entire time that we've known each other for around 20 years, certainly 15 very deep. And that is sleep. And for those who don't know the statistics and what's happening, sleep issues is one of the biggest issues in America today and is expanding worldwide. And there's a variety of reasons for that, why that is. We're gonna dive into that. If you're struggling for sleep, you definitely want to listen to this podcast because of all the people I've met in the health industry, I don't know anybody that has gone as deep in sleep is Matty G and we've had a lot of discussions about it's, I'm a guy that wants to sleep the the, you know, for years I was like, if I could just throw sleep away, I'd be, I'd be happy. Wade Lightheart: When we started out, Matt was like, no, you need us. Like he wanted to get as much sleep as possible. But now we've both come for circle on this where we're kind of in what is the optimal sleep amount? How do you get there? Why are we in trouble for sleeping? How important is sleep and where does sleep play as far as hormone optimization, brain functioning, recovery from training. What are the hacks? What are the tricks? What are the tips? And Matty G, if he doesn't know all of them, he knows everybody who does know all of them and he's probably tried more of them than anybody on the planet. So Matty G, Mr sleep, where are we going? What are we doing? How are we, what, what's happening today? Matt Gallant: I will start with the story of how I really started to understand the need for sleep and the importance of it. So at the time I was 25 years old, maybe 24, I was living in Moncton were Wade and I are from, and you know, I had the same mentality that you have. I'm like, you know what, I, I want to work like a hundred hours a week. I want to record an album, I want to learn marketing, I want to work, you know, literally 80 hours in the gym. I don't really have time for sleep. So, so again, like little, I was working 80 hours at the gym at a four 40 hour job, plus 40 hours of personal training clients. I'm recording a hard rock album in the studio and then I'm spending about 15 to 20 hours learning about marketing. So I did the math. It was like a hundred to 105 hours plus I was training twice a day. Matt Gallant: So in order to do all of that, I'm like, okay, I got it. I started cutting sleep. At the time I was probably sleeping, you know, normal seven hours. I'm like, okay, here's the plan. I'm going to start cutting my sleep by the 15 minutes slices and keep going down. My body will adapt. I was thinking like like resistance training and all adapt to the, to the stress, so you know things were going decently. When I got to about five hours, there's an interesting oxide effects that started happening. One of them was my hypersensitivity to water and food, so literally that's how I really got into water because if I was dehydrated like a micro amount, like I had to literally like be drinking water all the time. If I dehydrated even like a little bit, I immediately just kind of crash. Right? Same thing with food, it's like any food that my body wasn't really happy with. Matt Gallant: I would crash so I had to eat like flawlessly and be drinking water all the time. It otherwise it just crash. Then I kept going and then I finally crashed and burned at around like I think four hours or three hours and 45 minutes. You know, I, I just pulled the plug on the experiment and then I read a book called power sleep, which, you know, started educating myself about the need of it and the power of it and then kind of went the other way. It took me about two months to recover, you know, it was like nervous. It was pretty deep nervous system burnout and I was sleeping eight, nine hours now. So for the longest of time I was the kinda guy that, you know, needed eight, nine hours and whatnot and I didn't understand the quality of sleep is really what matters, which is what we're going to be talking about today. Matt Gallant: Not, you know, everybody's heard you gotta sleep eight in a seven to nine hours, which may be true for some of you, but I think in my opinion, the quality's really the key. So another story four and a half years ago, I, I crashed in a different way. I went on a big European tour for business, came back my testosterone at crashed an all time low and my body fat was at the highest that I've recorded it on a DEXA. And I realized right then that my S and I, and I've got an oura ring. So it was kind of like this, this convergence of all these events. And on the oura ring I was getting zero to 15 minutes of deep sleep at night. Like I was basically having no deep sleep. So that's when I realized that my sleep was garbage. Matt Gallant: You know, typically I would wake up at that time in the morning, I'd be really tired and you know, dehydrated. And even though was sleeping like eight and a half, nine hours, I felt like I've slept for, and of course the oura ring validated the, the the data, the experience. So that was the turning point and I realized, you know what, in terms of up leveling me as a human being, probably the number one thing, like the one thing that would improve my body fat composition, improve my brain, improved my ability as a, as a businessman improve myself in relationships was sleep. Like I realized right then it was a huge kind of revelation that if I slept better like every part of my life would improve and it has. So for me sleep is, you know, very close. It's hard to say which one is number one, a number two, but I'm going to make this bold statement. The top two things in my opinion you can do to buy, to biologically optimize yourself as a human being is high quality sleep and resistance training. I think those two, you know, in terms of improving across the board are the top two things. I'm just a lot of other things you can do, but if you sleep well, do resistance training, I think your quality of life, your health span and probably your lifespan will, will have a big impact. Wade Lightheart: You know that you make a couple of interesting observations with that conclusion. If you look with the advent of electricity and the advent of technology, particularly computers, digital screens, television and blue light, and the shifting of circadian rhythms, which is plays a big point in that this is the one area of humanity where we've have, I'd say civilization has throttled the endocrine system or the normal patterns. It's not normal for all this light to be present at night and over, you know, literally billions of years. Every creature is, is running on a circadian rhythm that is related to a light cycle, which there's a hormone cascade, there's an energy cascade, there's an awareness cap, there's this, there's just so many things that are tied to that. And so all of a sudden with the civilization, we've accelerated that curve. And then the other part of that is over the last, particularly the last hundred years and even more so, maybe the last 50 with, I would say with the beginning of the remote control in cars, we really don't push our physicalities that much. I mean, if you'll think back to the great statues in history, the Greeks and the Romans have these, you know, really idealistic bodybuilder type bodies. It's obvious that people were walking around looking like that to be the Wade Lightheart: Inspiration for those artists to develop those Herculean like qualities. And if you look at the population today, Herculean qualities is something that's only reserved for Olympic athletes, for professional athletes and the general population is anything but so based on all that what have you learned? What are the big, what are the things that mess people up first? Let's start there. What are the big don'ts or the things that people might not think of that are really affecting their quality of sleep and their quality of their life? Matt Gallant: I'm going to get into that, but I just want to answer the why first. It was really quick. No, why is sleep so critical? So first of all, let's look at it from a physical level. So your growth hormone, all you're, you're this, there's a whole prolactin cycle. That's where your GH gets released. Thus when most of your testosterone gets produced prolactin. Matt Gallant: Yeah. So it's this whole cascade that starts with the melatonin and then it triggers your prolactin is another hormone in the body. So, but what matters is the healing hormones though, the fat burning hormones, the muscle building hormones all getting released in that cycle. So if you're having no deep sleep or not enough, you're basically not producing these really powerful anabolic healing, anti aging hormones that you know we want. It's critical. So that's the first piece. The second thing, which gets produced typically during REM sleep, which is the end of your sleep cycle, the bulk of it is your neurotransmitters. So that's what allows you to feel good, to be happy for your brain, to function, for you to think that's when that happens. Then there's also memory consolidation. You know, when you're moving things from short term memory to long term memory, a lot of that also happens during the, the light sleep cycles as well as during your REM. Matt Gallant: So basically, and then let's talk about weight gain. You know, let's and grill in, all of these things get thrown out. So if you have a bad night's sleep, your hunger is going to be typically out of control. So the odds that you're going to snack and cheat, you know, your blood glucose is going to go up. So like literally if you, if you want to gain fat, like if your goal is to gain fat as easily as possible, if you have bad sleep, that's the formula. So, and I really feel that, you know, the weight gain, the fat gain epidemic that we have in around the world, a lot of it is being driven by poor sleep. And, and that's just again, just, it's just a physiological reality. So if we just look at all of these and pretty much every part of your body gets negatively affected, even your DNA. Matt Gallant: I read some recent research like a month ago where one night of bad sleep like four hours, you know, affected all of these epigenetics. So, eh, the, the consequences are extreme. Now let's the shift over to the fundamentals of how to maximize sleep quality. And it's really about eliminating the five sleep disturbances. If, if you just eliminate these disturbances, your sleep quality is going to transform. So the first one is light. You mentioned light. So let's just explain a little bit why light is so critical and there's so many components to light. We'll get deeper into it. But the big picture is as, as you said, that we're not programmed. Like I've got this massive light shining in my eye right now. Plus I've got two computer screens, plus I've got this other light. So I've got like four sources of blue light that are completely unnatural hitting my eyes. Matt Gallant: It's, and it's hitting my brain. So, and this is fine at this time of the day, but if I, let's say I had all of these things on and it's 11:00 PM, I'm going to be wired. And like I know I think a lot of night hours, you know, and, and I'm one of them right in the chronotype call them, call us wolves. We are hypersensitive I think to blue light more than other people cause I used to be able to like, you know, work on the computer till three, 4:00 AM and it's like I just wouldn't get tired. And I think this, the light is just stimulating my brain. So that is telling my brain that it's still daytime. Right. And like you were saying back in the day where it was candles or no, you know, just no light. As soon as it would get dark, our brains, it's like okay let's start shutting things down. Matt Gallant: Let's start priming the melatonin and then you'd get tired and go to bed, prolactin cycle, all of these things. So light is probably one of the biggest disturbances. Now let's talk about the basics, which is managing light during sleep. So you want your room like pitch, pitch black, dark as possible, you know, and if you're living in a city, it's even more important now for those of us. And I used to wear a sleep mask and then I found out that your skin has these photo receptors. In other words, when you're, when the light hits your skin, it will disrupt your melatonin production. So even having a mask, even those protecting your eyes and it does help, it's not going to be as good as a pitch black room. So that's light. Now that's not enough. We'll get back to light in a second and just want to cover the other four. Matt Gallant: So second is heat and this is very well researched. I mean I read that in power sleep back a long time ago. We sleep best in a cold room, especially our, it's important that our heads get. And then there can be heat disturbances where your is touching the mattress. And I'll talk about that in a second. The third one is blood flow restriction. That's another one. This is where a bad mattress comes to play because if you're lying on your side, like I'm a side sleeper. If you're a back sleeper, this is not as critical. But if you're a slide size sleeper and you have let's say wide shoulders and you don't have a good mattress, the blood flow gets trapped in your shoulder, in your arms, and then your body's going to toss and turn because your body knows, okay, there's not enough blood flow, it's time to move and you're going to move. Matt Gallant: So, and you can track that with a lot of these apps that'll tell you how many times you've tossed and turned. Fourth is noise, noise will disrupt your sleep. And you know, of course there's ways to mitigate that. And fifth is electrical magnetic disturbances. So wifi signal, cell phone signals, Bluetooth, all of these waves that are flying all over the place as we speak will disrupt your sleep. So what our goal is to, to use technology and tools to minimize the disturbances of those five things. The more we can do that, the better sleep gets. Wade Lightheart: You bring up something really important there about, I mean, there was really no way out of the technological advancement that's going in. Of course there's a lot of concerns with things like 5g being rolled out across the world and how that's going to have profound effects perhaps on our, on our biology. And there's a lot of people in the area that are concerned about it. Some people say it's unwarranted, some people say it's the worst thing for humanity coming. What are some of the things that you do specifically to mitigate these areas of your life? Like what, or like, okay, we've got the five main things. What can a person today go out and do in regards to that? And then we'll kind of get into some of the more advanced tax after that. So what are, what are the go-tos for, for Matty G. Matt Gallant: All right, so let's start with each one and I'll give you kind of my list of hacks. So let's start with light. Wade Lightheart: Get a pen and paper. Folks are gonna want it. You're going to want to write fast and furious cause Matt, by the way, Mat, how much money have you spent in total on your sleep systems? Matt Gallant: It's, it's around 30 grand. I mean, and I could add a couple of more devices on top of that movie, which would take people over 40 so, and you think it's one of the more valuable things that you've spent money on for sure. Right? Yeah. Like I, you know, if again, the way I look at it is if I'm 10% more effective, which, which I feel a more than 10%, but if I was 10% more effective, it's an incredible ROI. If my health span improves 10% or my lifespan improves. Like if I look at it from any of those three perspectives, it's a no brainer ROI. You know, people spend so much money on cars and these, these deep dish, the right appreciating assets where I think in this case it's like it's a compound health benefits. So your number one asset is health. Matt Gallant: And again, to me this and resistance training on the top two things. So speaking of lights, the first thing is let's talk when you wake up. Okay. So our bodies had these circadian rhythms. And one of the things that surprised me how effective it is is when you wake up, and this is a really huge travel tip to this, so we'll talk about how to reset your circadian rhythm when you travel. But this is the first thing that you do. So you wake up, you want to blast your eyes with blue light. Now you have two options. One, you can go outside and you know, go stare at the sun but get sun hitting your eyes. That's the natural organic way. And for those of us that live in, you know, one day or it's winter time and you don't want to do that. Matt Gallant: There's a device called re timer. It's not Australian company and he's these, it's kind of like these white glasses that literally blast your eyeballs with blue light. There's also the human charger, which are these EarPods like earbuds that blasts your brain with light. So the best time to use that is in the morning. Like, as soon as you wake up and let's say you want to start waking up earlier, if you wake up and okay, the first time's going to be tough, but if you wake up and blast yourself with light, like it's amazing how tired you get around, you know, 16 hours later. It's like, it tells your body this is the beginning of the day. So in terms of hacking your circadian rhythm, whether you're traveling or you want to just kind of start shifting your, your, your wake up time, I think it's incredible. It's very, very impactful. Matt Gallant: Now let's shift to the end of the night. So before you go to bed, probably around two hours is probably optimal. So as you want to go to bed until 11 was around 9:00 PM, you would put on blue light blockers. I'm a fan of the, the probably the most intense ones. The best ones is true dark. The, the red ones. This is a company that Dave Asprey's invested in great glasses. I mean, they're the most intense. The only thing is you're going to watch TV. It's like if they're so intense, it's hard to read. The more stylish ones, I would probably start the Swannies from James, my friend James Swanwick. And those are really good for like going out and you know, the block most of the pool. So that makes a big difference. That is, especially if you're using technology like TV or computers or your phone or your iPad, those will have an impact. Matt Gallant: Now if you're using your phone or your computer, you know, I use something called the, it's called, there's flux, which is really good, but I use a nuts by the way, is a, is a computer program that will actually change the screen color so you're not getting as much blue light. Yep. Now there's another one called Iris, which I think is better. It's a little more, a little more control and a little more aggressive. He's got all, all kinds of options. So I use that. So either flux or Iris and, and on your phone there's also built in like it'll start shifting and you can hack your phone where I'll show you what it looks like. So you see my phone, if I triple click, it becomes red. So this is more aggressive and, and you know, you can search on how to create tense in your phone and then you can control it with the home button. Matt Gallant: So those are all the things I do to, to manage, mitigate light in my room. I had double blackout curtains cause one was still literally the light coming here and there. I just put two layers of 'em and it solved the problem. So that's the light equation. Second is heat. You know, obviously if you're living in, if it's winter time in Canada, you don't need to worry too much, you know, it's going to be pretty chilly. But for those of us that are in summer or in hot climates, I live in Panama. You know, AC is mandatory, but that's not enough because going back to when I used to wake up tired, I was, I was sleeping in AC, I was losing around four to five pounds of water from going to bed to wake up. Like I would weigh myself for bed and wake myself. That's a lot. Wade Lightheart: I think a lot of people don't realize how dehydrated they can become sleeping. It's not, I mean, I watched that fluctuation as a way to monitor my own health to see how much water I lose in a particular leaving. For me, it's somewhere between two and three pounds is generally where I'm at from breathing. But if you go beyond that, I know that I've got some, there's some, there's some challenges. Matt Gallant: Well, you're going to wake up dehydrated if you're dehydrated, you're tired. Right? I mean, you know, you know any top water experts in the planet, he knows, he knows. He knows this as much or more than anyone else. I mean, you know, your brain, everything drops. You're dehydrated. So the answer is the chilly pad and you know, God blessed Tim Ferriss for talking about this on think it was you know, eight or tools of Titans is in that book. Matt Gallant: You gotta love Timmy. Yeah. Tim. Tim delivers the chilly pad is this machine and then they got a new version called the OOLER that they just released. So it's this machine that you put distilled water in it and it cools the water and then pushes the water in this thin layer, a thin mattress that you put underneath your bed sheets. So all that heat that would typically get trapped because again, the room can be 16 degrees Celsius, which this is pretty much what I sleep in. But you're still sweating where your body's touching the mattress, your body's trapping the heat, the chilly pad or the OOLER solves that issue cause it's getting, you know, you can control the temperature, you put it where you're comfortable and it'll prevent the sweat from happening. So now I'm losing like one to one and a half pounds of water while I'm sleeping. So that's a big reason why I'm not as dehydrate. Wade Lightheart: Quick, quick question on the chilling effect and it's power. Cause I, I grew up in as we both did in freezing cold new Brunswick. And when I was a kid, there used to be frost on my bed sheets on certain mornings and, and, and, and I, I can recall that the total label being frozen, going to the bathroom. So extreme cold. Is there an optimal level of cold? Like have they done research on, on how cold is optimal? Like is there a point where there's a benefit and a point where there's a liability? Do we know what that is? Are people doing Wim Hof sleeping? What's the, what's the deal? Matt Gallant: Um yeah, it's between you want your room to be between 16 and 18 degrees Celsius. That's, that's optimal. Cause your head needs to be above one degree core than the rest of your body. Matt Gallant: And it'll, it'll do that. So here's a trick too. Like I go in my room, I turn on my AC about four hours before I go to bed. So I walk in my bedroom, it's just super cold. Cause if, you know, if I go to bed and I turn on my AC at that point, I mean it, you know what I mean? It's gotta be still warm for about another hour. So if you want to fall asleep faster, that's one of the things now and another, does that change? Wade Lightheart: Just a quick question on that, cause that's the thing is important, but you live in Panama, which your base temperature on any given day is in the, in the high 20s or you know, low 25 celcius here with, with, yeah. With high humidity though as well on top of that. So if you're living in a colder climate, does that variance differ for people? Do we know, uh, is there any cause, is it the, is it the absolute temperature that's important? Or is it the variance from kind of your waking state energy? Matt Gallant: It's the absolute temperature. Now the difference is your metabolic rate, you know, and I'll give you an example. So I do a massive reef eat on Sundays, on Sundays. My body temperature is one to one and a half degrees hotter than if I'm fasting. Fasting like my second day of fasting. Like my body's dropped one degree. So second, you know, at that point probably go like more like 17 degrees or 18 degrees and I'll adjust chilly pad versus on spike day it's 16 degrees and I dropped my chilly pad down to like 14 cause otherwise to counteract that thermic effect. Correct. And you know, like men typically run a little hotter. You know, if you have a really fast metabolism, the more food you eat, women tend to run a little cooler. Matt Gallant: So there, there is those adjustments and that's the cool thing with the chilly pad. You know, if you're, if you're a couple you can get a couple versions so you can control her side and your side so you can adjust the temperature accordingly. But as far as what the research has shown, it's 16 to 18 degrees in the room regardless of where you're at is optimal temperature. Got it. One more thing too that I experimented with. It was kind of an accident. So I had these, these ice best, okay. There's these cool fat burning vests. You know, we'd be, we do a whole episode on, you know, we're in fat loss hack, so I was using it for fat loss. And, and you know, this is a well researched thing where you lose body heat with, you know, eater cryo or ice baths, but use these vests that you could wear that have you put them in the freezer and you put them on and it's really cold. Matt Gallant: So you know, you lose some body temperature. So when I use those, and I have even this cryo helmet that you also put in the freezer and it was recommended by our friend Katrine and you put these on. So when I was wearing these my deep sleep went up a pretty significant amount. So when I do that, I don't do it every night just cause you know, it's a little bit of a hassle. But when I do do it, my deep sleep goes up. It's almost like it's priming my body. It's like the, the, the temperature drop before bed would probably kicked start the prolactin cycle again. I don't know the exact science. All I can tell you is that the ring the data said, yeah, it's improving your deep sleep. Wade Lightheart: So, so what a cheap hack would be to take some bags of frozen peas and strap them together, a duct tape and kind of create a little helmet. Would that be the cheap, would that be the cheap, the cheap pack versus the cryo helmet Matt Gallant: And then the cool vest? Yeah, and I've seen what's interesting too, I've seen recently they did a research where like a hot bath also improved. So it seems that you're kind of, and that's more of a relaxation thing. So I think it's hitting different mechanisms like the heat. It's probably relaxing your nervous system. Wade Lightheart: Well also if you're doing a hot bath with magnesium as a big fashion term, we'll get into magnesium in an upcoming podcast. Cause I know we're going to go deep on that. But maybe the most important mineral to mankind is magnesium. So let's, but anyways, I'm diverting of course. Matt Gallant: So yeah, so that's the heat components. Next is the blood flow restriction. So that's really the mattress. Now I, I spent like months doing research on mattresses and the conclusion is you want up, especially if you're a side sleeper, you really want a memory foam because you want even weight distribution. Let me explain. If you have a hard mattress and you're a side sleeper and like let's say you have like wide shoulders or you're a woman wide hips, what's going to happen first of all is you're going to sleep like this, right? Cause I'm not going to sink in enough and it's going to tilt my body. So you're gonna have a spine curve which you don't want. And second of all, it's gonna really trap the blood in my shoulder. So it's a multitude of issues. Plus some people say that Springs are creating other sets of problems because of the waves and it's hitting this praying. Matt Gallant: So anyways, I'm not going to get too deep in the spring problems, but the point is you want to kind of sink in and how perfect with distribution. Now the rule of thumb is if you're, if you're really tall and you're light, then you don't need to sink in that much. If the heavier you are the diff, the softer you want your phone, right? So there's a company called Essentia, Canadian company. They're available in the States as well and they make a memory foam mattress out of a tree sap. Now you know there's other mattress companies like Tempur-Pedic but they're using oil based materials to make the mattress. And there's pretty significant offgassing that happens for petroleum based products is what you're meaning is petroleum base oil base. So for the first six to 12 months there's a pretty significant offgassing that happens, which you know, I wasn't interested in. Matt Gallant: Plus they tend to trap heat a little more. So that's why I went with Essentia. Now send you has all these different grades of softness or you can get a custom made mattress, which I did cost about 10 grand. And what's cool with the custom made is, you know, my wife got her side optimized for her shape and weight and I got mine optimized. So you know, personally, certainly improved and minded as well. So that's the blood flow component. Next is noise. Now you kind of have two options here. Either you go with white noise, which is what I do, which is not the best, but you know, if you're sleeping in a city, for example, I'm in Panama, you know, we'd notice how noisy you can get here. You know, it's the only alternative. So I had the AC running, I have an air purifier running and I had the chilly pad running. Matt Gallant: So it kind of creates this ocean of white noise, you know, cause all three of them, I mean kind of produce level of white noise and there's white noise machines that you can buy as well. And they do a good job of kind of hiding background noise, I think optimal. And when I go back to my parents' house, it's like there's no noise. And I think that makes a big difference. Right? Does ignore cars, there's no nothing, no technology earplugs can help a lot. I think your plugs have another set of benefits where you're hearing your breath and when you hear your breath, it has this calming, hypnotizing, a brain swelling effect. And we know that from meditation, just, you know, classic meditation, just focus on your breath and we have earplugs like you're hearing yourself breathe. And I think that that has a big impact on latency, which is how fast you fall asleep as well as cutting off the noise. Matt Gallant: So when I travel and I don't have all my gadgets, I, I'll, I'll use earplugs. And by the way, as far as the earplugs, my favorite ones, they're like almost like a wax based thing. So you don't put it inside the canal. Yeah, put, it's like a put that you put on top and you just smash it in again. That was another Tim Ferris. Not with a hammer by the way. You just, with your thumb, your thumb, you just kind of press it in and it does the same effect without kind of, sometimes you'll push the wax in or whatever and I don't like those, those old school cheap foam ones. So yeah, those, that's the noise component. Now electromagnetic disturbances is the last one. That your only option if you're living in technology is a fair day cage, which I, which I have one. So there's a website called less emf.com and they sell EMF shielding materials. Matt Gallant: So they have one that looks like a mosquito net. It looks pretty cool. It was a little worried when I bought it. I'm like, is this going to look really bad? But it looks like those, you know, African mosquito nets and it blocks, you know, all the waves from hitting, you know, hitting your body cause they're gonna I'm in a penthouse, you know, if I pull up my phone I think there's like 15 wifi I can find on my phone. So all of these are hitting me, you know, plus all the other waves that you know, self waves. And that said you got 5g coming. So sleeping in a Faraday cage cage, probably a smart move. Now for those of you that live out in the countryside and you can shut all your technology down in your house, I mean that would be the ultimate, you know, or if you're building a house from scratch. And when I, when I do build, you know, my next house or build the house, you, you can actually put all the shielding in the walls so you can actually build like a Faraday cage, you know, in the walls themselves. It's just absorbing all of the waves. Uwhich would probably be the, the ultimate. Wade Lightheart: That's great. I think that's really important of course. If you're living in a city and so for example, I spent a few months last year in Venice, California, which is like just an electromagnetic crazy zone. I think the leveraging technology yeah. Is really, really important. Or if you're, you're in a city, I think also there's just a subjecting to light light and noise is usually pretty significant. So putting in some of these little even little things is, is really key. So one of the things I think is important to reveal to people is what are the key components, cause I know you're a real data component. I think one of your stains is data shapes destinies. And you've literally tested all of the sleep technology. What are you using for data collection? What do you think of the best data collection devices about monitoring your sleep so that you get out of the realm of out of the realm of opinions and theories as you like to say? And where does someone get that or what should they look for for S for these types of things? Matt Gallant: Yeah, so probably the most popular one is the oura ring, which I'm wearing right now. So it's, it's a, you know, three to 400 bucks depending on which model you get. That's the one I started this journey with around four years ago. I bought it as soon as it came out. And you know, it's really, it was really good data. Now, about a year ago I bought was called dream D R E M and we'll get all this stuff in the show notes. Yeah. It's a headband that is measuring the EEG. So I used to wear the zeal. Kendra was a predecessor, like a great product way back in the day, right? Even in a business or whatever. Right. So the dream is kind of new version of it. And the thing is with sleep, like the oura ring, and I think they've done as good a job as you can using what I would call secondary metrics. So the primary metric would sleep is your brain waves, right? That's how you directly measure your, your sleep. Now the oura is using heart rate, heart rate variability, motion, body temperature. So those, what I mean by secondary metrics, the primary metric is your brainwaves. The dream measures all of the secondary plus the primary. So you, you know the oura. As much as I like it, it cannot match the accuracy of a dream in terms of the precise sleep cycles. Here's what I can tell you. The oura. And I, and I've talked to other people that have compared the data and actually look at sleep labs as well. Matt Gallant: The oura ring will actually be accurate at tracking the overall deep and REM. So let's say your overall combination of the two is four hours. Now the, the oral might say, okay, you had two and a half hours of REM and 90 minutes of deep. Okay. Now on the dream is going to also give you a say four hours of the two, but typically the oura is under measuring deep sleep and over measuring rep versus the dream. It will be more accurate on, on the, on the deep sleep. Now the one thing I love about the aura that you don't get from the dream is your readiness score. So your readiness score is basically how fried you are, is giving you a really good, accurate measurement of your nervous system. And you know, it's really powerful. I'll give you an example. Like recently my heart rate went up like 10 to 15 beats. Matt Gallant: My heart rate variability crashed and I knew there was something going on. So, you know, I, I hired Katrine who's one of the people we've worked with for health. And you know, I, I had had an infection, so I had had an issue that I had to deal with. So it's really good for that. It's good for measuring. If you're over-trained, you know, and you know, classically the two measure over training, if your heart rate goes up 10 beats per minute over three days you're over-trained that was the classic tool. But now with their, where the oura ring, we can really see, you know, a lot faster when that happens. And you can adjust your training accordingly. You know, just maybe take it easy. It doesn't mean you don't train, but you might not go do squats and dead lifts and sprints that day. Matt Gallant: You'll, you'll do more of an active recovery type of workout. So those are the tools to, to measure sleep. And you know, all the things that I've done have improved. Now don't forget things compounds. So you might do one thing and improves your deep sleep like 20%. You do another thing that's another 20%. No, you had 44%, you do another 20%. Now you know, you're, you're at 70 ish percent. So keeps compounding. And that's how, you know, an average now went from like zero to 15 minutes of deep to probably like 75 to 90 minutes. And then my REM is usually like two to three hours. So that's what I've found. Now I'd like to shift over and talk about other techs to improve and, and hack your sleep. So the first one is the nano V. The nano V is a machine that you put distilled water in it and hits the water with a very precise signal. Matt Gallant: You breathe that water in and it starts repairing your DNA. Okay. It's improving, scald the protein folding in your body. Now for sleep, what I've noticed is if I use it for like 90 minutes, my HRV will will go up significantly. It'll actually improve it by, you know, 15, 10 to 20 measurements on the HRV, which is pretty significant. So in terms of of restfulness and quality of sleep, it definitely makes an impact. Then I use what's called the Delta sleeper every night. You put this on your carotid artery, you can actually put it on your forehead as well, and it's sending the Delta pulse for like 20 minutes and it shuts off. So in terms of falling asleep or shifting you into Delta faster, it's a great little, you know, one else thing. And if you wake up during the night, you just hit the button and then you'll fall asleep faster. Matt Gallant: So I'm a big fan of the Delta sleeper. The next one is the earth pulse. So it's another PEMF device and you put these under your bed and you can control the, the frequency. So you gotta be careful. This thing is really potent, is very powerful. You know, when I first got it, like has like four built in programs and a level one program one and two completely wreck my sleep program. Three and four were great. So four is like just pure Delta and you know, three kind of brings you down and brings you back up and you gotta you know, you gotta control, you can control the, the strength of it, you know, for me, you know, I'm kind of a maximalist in nature and extremists. I started really high, but I found that, you know, dropping it to like 30 to 50% work better than like 80 to a hundred are going. Matt Gallant: It's a really strong, it creates a pretty strong field. So I like that. The vice, it's a good one. Then. what else do I use tech wise? That's pretty much it on the tech side. We can shift over to supplements unless you have any other thoughts. Let's, let's talk about supplements because I think you've kind of cracked the code on some powerful integrations around that. Okay. So first, you know, it's all about controlling brainwaves and your transmitters for the most part. So lavender oil pills are really powerful to increase alpha. So lavender oil and L-Theanine have been scientifically shown to increase alpha, which means that you're going to slow your brain waves down for those and listen to our other podcasts that when I just did around your nervous system. We talk a lot about this stuff and the issue is a lot of people are kind of stuck in beta and for the people that had a hard time falling asleep, that's what's going on. Your brain is just stuck in beta, which is a high fast brain wave and then it takes you a long time to shift it down. Wade Lightheart: For people are listening. That's like if you're the type of person that can't shut the brain off at night, the thoughts are still into this and that and the other thing, chances are that means you're, you're in a, in a, in a high beta state. Matt Gallant: Yeah. Your brain is kind of stuck there. Yeah. It's kind of like the beach ball of death that comes up on your computer just keeps spinning and spinning and you know, you can't get that, you know, that conversation in your head or that, that deadline that you have or that that conversation or relationship issue. Matt Gallant: Now you can hack that with meditation. I mean, which is a great pre bed ritual is you know, meditate for like 15-20 minutes, which slows your brain waves down. Then you go to bed. So that, that's a really good, good tip. But as far as supplements go, the lavender oil and the L-Theanine will both hack that and L-Theanine is probably one of my favorite supplements for sleep dosage wise. I would start at 200 milligrams and if, you know, I'll go up to like 600 sometimes. If I want a plane, I'll tell you about my plane stack. Right now it's 800 milligrams of L-Theanine and about 50 to a hundred milligrams of CBD. If it's legal where I am, I'll pass out like, you know, and you can dose a little bit of melatonin with that. I'll talk about melts on a second cause I'm not a huge fan of melatonin but that, you know, and I don't sleep easily on planes. Matt Gallant: I usually just pass out with that dose. Now typically though, it's more like two to 400 milligrams of both evening and around one or two Lavela oils. So if you're GABA deficient, GABA supplementation can be powerful. You can use, you know, GABA doesn't absorb that well, but it's an option. There is a Philippian route which also hits the GABA pathways. That is another option. And you know, I want to try injectable GABA so I'm, I'm the stream and the extreme optimizer here at BiOptimizers and I haven't tried it yet, but it is on my agenda to, to experiment with actually injecting GABA straight in. Cause when you take it orally, the absorption rate is really low. Wade Lightheart: I think for people just as a commentary,uif you're a coffee drinker, caffeine drinker, I think theming is a great, you're probably going to get even more benefits. It seems to be really works counter counter counter balances. The caffeine like L-Theanine is present in a lot of teas and not so much things like coffees or some of the more darker caffeinated and I'm a big tea fan. I'm going to get a topic about that one day. Umhe other thing is I think holy basil, if you're GABA deficient the L-Theanine, holy basil. Umhe Athenian holy basil combo is, is great to, to throw in there with, with your CBD. And a lot of people get a lot of power out of that. Matt Gallant: Yeah. yeah, I have not tried to obey as well. I'll, I'll add that to my experimentalists. Now. CBD works well the, for most people will disrupt your sleep. So, you know, personally Wade Lightheart: It'll make you dopey in a lot of cases, but not improve your sleep. And there's a difference there. It's kind of like if you're, and that, I think that's a difference between pharmaceutical sleeping, pharmaceutically enhanced sleeping, which you pass out and go out. But the quality of that sleep is often countering. And of course we w in on the extreme cases, I think it's Roseanne Barr, and when she kind of went on that crazy street, she was on a heavy tranquilizer called Ambien, which a lot of people use for sleeping, which has all sorts of serious negative consequences about what happens when you don't sleep properly. So I think that's the difference between chemicalized nation asleep, which is just looking at the sleep as an overall result as opposed to optimization sleep, which is what you're into by using elements that are natural and indigenous to our bodies and using those in a constructive optimized way. Matt Gallant: Yeah. Now I'm really excited about CBG and CBN. I actually ordered some, and this should be arriving any day cause for sleep. They're supposed to be even way more effective than CBD. So you know, we'll, we'll talk about in a future podcast. Haven't tried it, read the research. I'm excited we're come back. Some other things ashwagandha, a gram of that can work really well. One to two grams of reishi can work really well, but one of my favorites and you know, we are really excited and pumped to be releasing this product is two to four caps of Magnesium Breakthrough. So one to two grams of a blend of magnesium. So like the glycinate is a great one to help trigger sleep and improve sleep. The L-Threonate will actually be really good for your brain. So we have this seven magnesium blend that releasing very, very soon in the next couple of weeks. And you know, we've been experimenting with it. So two to four caps of that should move the needle on your sleep. Wade Lightheart: Especially well, especially if you're deficient. So you know, it's the most common mineral deficiency in the world and magnesium's responsible for 350 different known chemical reactions and it's one of the things that they put Epson salts for example, or actually magnesium salts in are used to calm and tone and magnesium is essential for relaxing muscle tissue both stride at muscle and smooth muscle has a very powerful effect. And if you're deficient in it and almost every North American is because it's a ratio between calcium and magnesium, magnesium is the control on a two to one ratio. You have two parts, calcium, one part magnesium. And we have a very high calcium, a component in her diet. And it's interesting, it's like when you have high calcium in your diet, it actually creates bone loss. It creates muscle cramping. It creates dis balances in the chemical processes. Wade Lightheart: And I've seen literally dozens and dozens of my clients who had trouble sleeping. We just add magnesium to their diet and that's it. All of a sudden, or people who suffer from cramping. And that's other big issues, particularly people get older in combination with dehydration. They cramp at night time. They wake up, they're very stiff because they're not only dehydrated but their D, magnesium and magnesium. And I used to use the word, so you want to not just, you don't want to be de magged, you want to be defragged. So the bottom line is, is a magnesium is super, super powerful for people. It's one of the reasons we've done so much research on. I mean, there's like 30 different types of magnesiums. We found the seven best, which we'll talk about in another podcast as you said. So I carry on with this Matt Gallant: Yes, we're ready. We're here the last 90 seconds. I'm gonna go rapid fire. There's a great tea called Dream Tea from a company called Anima Mundi. It's a blend of herbs, really big fan of that. Put your pajamas on. Ah, let me talk about melatonin really fast. Melatonin is a hormone folks like to me, I look at melatonin as seriously as I do testosterone, you know, and like in Canada for an example, like you can't, you can't buy that. And, and that's true for a lot of countries. So melatonin, I only use it when I travel. If I want to reset my circadian rhythm, that's the only time. And when you do you want to microdose like people will wreck their melatonin production by just going to crazy dosages. And what we found is that microdosing melatonin, if you go to use melatonin, like 0.3 milligrams is all you need is kinda like a little kickstart. Matt Gallant: And again, I'm not a fan of it. I only use it when I travel or when I want to reset my circadian rhythm. Otherwise I strongly recommend you stay away from it. Next thing is five HTP that hits the serotonin pathway that can have a positive impact on sleep. Some people. And the last thing I will share is a human growth hormone product or secretagogue you want to use before sleep. I have not experimented with these yet, but a lot of people report much improved deep sleep. I am planning on experimenting with a growth hormone, secretagogue very soon. Wade and I at BiOptimizers several years ago we did have a growth hormone releasing supplement. And I mean the, the dream, like it was affecting sleep. I didn't have the tools to measure it back then. But man, the visibility boost is a great product. It's insane. They shut the labs down. Unfortunately we couldn't find the sources of the, of the ingredients, so we had to stop it. But that, that was powerful. It was very interesting, very interesting product. So anyways, so I think that summarizes all the sleep things and again, you know, he, brain physiology is very unique and you need to experiment and find what works for you. And that's where the data comes in with the dream or the aura. So you know, you've got to try things one at a time and see what works. Wade Lightheart: So what we're going to do, folks is we're going to actually put this all together in a little book for you at the BiOptimizers sleep optimization handbook, which will be put together with all of these components, these hacks, we will be upgrading it, but you're going to be able to get a copy of that in the very near future. If we don't have it right here on the show notes, you'll be able to go to the BiOptimizers site. Check that out, download it as part of your biological optimization program. I want to thank you for joining us. Check out the show notes. Come back to the podcast, hit your comments, hit the likes. We love to hear that it helps us get the message out about biological optimization. I want to thank our guest today, the radical edge biological optimization maximization experimenter himself, fresh in the labs and Panama, Matty G. Thanks for being here and I'm delighted that you're coming onto the show more often because you're very knowledgeable in a course. A, if it's bleeding and it's the edge, you're there Matt Gallant: Awesome. A great, great fun. We'll be back soon talking about some more great stuff. So have a great day. Everybody.

Press B to Cancel... evolution! After 8 episodes we get all poetic about our earliest Pokemon memories, and discuss the inspiration for our podcast name. 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. Wulff 0:00 This week on presby to cancel, we discussed the evolution of Pokemon Gotta catch them all. AgainWulff 0:29 Hello everybody and welcome to presby to cancel I figured eight episodes deep might be time to jump into a topic reflecting the podcasts namesake presby to cancel so, with that in mind, we're going to be talking about Pokemon today to cancel that evolution. Wait what?Palsh 0:48 Sorry, I just had to do that I was trying to think somethingWulff 0:50 witty, Ching goo Jayco magic keys make you feel all better?Palsh 0:55 We ran. Okay, so here's our intro You may continueJake 1:03 or be very proud of. SoWulff 1:06 today's episode, I know I normally do things a little bit more structured, but today I'm going in a little bit more freewheeling. So we're going to discuss things a little differently. But I'd like to start with Pokemon beginning in the West. So I remember seeing I had kind of gotten into import games and stuff like that shortly before Pokemon released in the West. And so I remember seeing Pocket Monsters merge at import stores and stuff there was a place I used to go called game cave in Southern California. I don't think it's around anymore, but I I'd go there once every month or two and I just see all this pocket monsters crap wall scrolls, stickers, cards, you name it was there and I was like, What the heck is this and they tried to explain it to me and I just didn't get it. Bought a year or two later, it finally released in the West. And I remember seeing a new story on TV about Topeka, Kansas, changing its name for a day to Topeka to Kansas. Nintendo, I'm guessing threw a big sack of money at Topeka, Kansas and said, Hey, we want to change the name just for a day have a big event there. Kick off the Pokemon North American events in Topeka and they were like, Yes, please. So they have people I'm pretty sure they had pretty sure they had people dressed in Pikachu outfits and they had the, the fleet of 10 Volkswagen beetles done up like Pikachu that said, gotta catch them all on the side. And from there, they just started sending those beetles out to everywhere in North America to do the events. Do any of you recall that at all?Jake 2:55 No, but I just find out where they didn't do. Topeka, Kansas because took a piece of Cute little Pokemon.Wulff 3:02 But I think topi was generation toJake 3:05 shows you the extent of my knowledge.GP 3:08 Actually, I do remember this as somebody who lives about two hours south from I love that we're saying Topeka. Sorry, everybody in Kansas says just tipica like it's to a PK, but it's, it's spelt Topeka, but it's like Quebec or Quebec. It's to be here. But I love that you say, it's like saying Comanche instead of Comanche. Anyway, doesn't matter. Gotcha. No, I remember this and trying to figure out why the heck I should care about it. Because it got, you know, like you said, national coverage and all this stuff. It's a big deal. And I just remember, how do you wanna say it looked and seemed so bizarre? Yeah, it seemed like not just the people my age were getting into it. But it was these adults, you know, wondering are not wandering around but stomping around and, and these these thematic and brightly colored anime type shirts. And to that point, all I'd ever really seen of like anime and then that kind of stuff was Dragon Ball. So I'm like, why are we not having a Dragon Ball Z day? What the hell this picture? But yeah, so I remember the event from Topeka, but I just remember being, like, bewildered and confused.Wulff 4:20 Yeah, I was just I was not into it at all when I had first heard about it and then I saw this new story. And I was like, and I lived in Vegas at the time, so it got that far at least. I was like, What the hell is Pokemon like, why is this such a big deal? And then I think I had Nintendo a Nintendo Power subscription at the time. So when my Nintendo Power came in, they started like really hamming it up with Pokemon and everything. And I was like, Hmm, okay, I can see. And then I got a little curious and I think because of the craze, my parents decided to get a copy for both me and my Brother interestingly enough, they got us both blue.Palsh 5:04 I was about to ask do they get the same color each? Because that would be justWulff 5:08 yeah. So we yeah we had a we had a house without a few Pokemon but I remember I was so into that game at the time I played the crap out I was playing it on Super Gameboy mostly because I I lived in Vegas I had lived there for a short while didn't really have any friends so I wasn't wasn't playing it at school. I just played it at home so I didn't care. I got super into it. I I'm pretty sure I beat it. Within a couple weeks, like caught new to everything. Or maybe I missed my chance to catch me too. I think I wasted my master ball is what happened. Now what was I talking about?GP 5:51 You had missed your chance to get to you? Oh, yes,Wulff 5:54 I I had missed my chance to catch me too because I blew my master ball and I think zapped or something. And so I was kind of disappointed and I ended up starting my file over and played through the game a second time over the next few weeks to finally catch me to it. That's how into it I was I do need the master ball to collect to catch him. I don't think you needed it but I think it was such a slim chance to catch him without it that it was just a pain in the butt.Palsh 6:23 Okay, that's fair.Wulff 6:25 I probably tried 2530 times and failed every time as I now I'm done. Yeah,Palsh 6:32 piece ofJake 6:33 you every time I looked it up the guides always said just save your master ball from YouTube. You want themWulff 6:37 But see, they'd sold me on the birds being the legendary Pokemon. I kind of thought I needed the master ball for that.Palsh 6:43 You know, I would have probably done the same. I wasWulff 6:45 tricked. Anyway, moving on from that. That was my experience with Gen one. How about you guys?Jake 6:52 So my Express Pokemon will see I was a pretty cool kid in high school. I know. I know. Hard to believe but all the cool kids used to play Magic the Gathering during recess and lunch. So all my friends play matches the game we played for years. And then I used to do the occasional tournament. He's one of those guys went to the local comic book store the coolest place on Earth, everybody knows. Anyway, after a while, I realized that a lot of adults stop playing magic and start playing this new game with colorful, weird, bizarre characters. And I didn't quite understand it. And one of the mentioned to me was Pokemon. And then pretty soon within a month, they stopped doing Magic the Gathering tournaments. They stopped doing Star Wars tournaments. They didn't do Star Trek anymore. They didn't do miniatures, all the all the grown men were playing Pokemon the card game, it sweeps my area. Like I've never seen anything. be such a fad before. for single lonely middle aged men in conference stores. I can't believe it.Palsh 7:50 I just like to say that pokeyman is how Canadians say it just like how we say merio not Mario.Jake 7:56 Exactly. It's the Pokemons so my experience was was here about the franchise from that. And then a friend of mine showed me an episode the cartoon and kind of went from there. And after the cartoon I've watched a few episodes cartoon, which we can talk about later. But from there I tried the video game and actually I quite hooked on the game, but I didn't play Pokemon until a couple years after the fad kind of hit. And I was probably considered too old for the franchise. I was not a kid but I played the first game. But for an RPG I've always been a fan of RPG and despite the you know, the aiming at a lower younger audience, the game is quite good. This is very solid game challenging and parts collectible hit all right, you know the edges for you. And it's great fun.Palsh 8:37 See, I I'm like from nowhere in the middle of nowhere. So we were always late when it came to getting games like that. So I remember reading it and magazines Of course. And the show Actually, I caught first before I actually played the game and I was like, Okay, I'm not a big anime fan, but this one caught my attention. I was probably in grade eight going to grade nine. Maybe I was in grade nine, something like that. So just just catch my attention. I was like, this is kind of cool. And, of course, when I watched the show made no sense because it was never aired in order. So I remember seeing probably the end of the season first and then like, then I see ash start off, you know, so I get really confusing. But I remember one guy had the game and he had both of them. You had one game boy, he had two of the games, and he had the transfer cable, but he didn't have another game book. So he gave me I think, read the play. And so that was my first experience. And I was like, Okay, let's try it. And I was like, okay, where do I get Pikachu? You don't have pika choo. I was like, Oh, you know, and so you know, I chose Squirtle because I was like the water Pokemon Pokemons over the fire ones. And I just remember, it was really fun, and I wasn't expecting it to be. So I don't know what the word is like. So straightforward. Like it felt almost like a beginners RPG I thought my head at first, but then it had, like, very simple strategies and stuff, but it was easy for me to catch on to and it was just kind of addicting. Right, right from the get go. And it's just, I remember playing it, I don't know how far I got because I didn't own it. And then, you know, my friends like deleted my game so he could play it and I was like, but I just remember seeing a meme about 10 years later, and I'll it shows the intro screen like when you first start a new game. And it says, no matter what you do, you'll never be able to experience this the same as your first time. It was like rip from like, you know, it's supposed to be like your first time with a significant other, but they basically didn't, and they dressed it up to make it look like a Pokemon game and I thought that was hilarious and ever since then, like the intro to the very first game. I was thought was really cool because of that. It's just like a very Personal feel to it. And I'm not even that huge, a Pokemon fan, so I just thought that was really nice. I thought they had, they couldn't have nailed it better.GP 11:10 I growing up had been into like tabletop type games like hero quest and like x men Mutant Chronicles and all those kind of ones. And I had itGP 11:22 here, right.GP 11:24 I was just slaying Poon, left and right. No, sorry, I shouldn't say that. I was 12. But I had a friend who had just a ton of Pokemon cards. And it's time I was living in Missouri. And he tried to show me the game and explain it to me. And I'd stayed the night over at his house one night, and I loved it. Not enough to go out and buy him. I didn't really see the need because my friend Adam. I loved you know, doing like the deck And you know it's back when you played with like the marbles or the bubbles or whatever they're called you know and not just all these things that I have is completely new and and awesome. And then he of course went out and he just had all the Pokemon stuff so he ended up getting the first two Gameboy games Forgive me for not remembering exactly which colors they were and I played one or both of them. I don't exactly remember which, but I loved them and then all of the generation to stuff started happening and I immediately lost interest. It was almost like Mega Man seven came out all over again. And I just to me, it was already this big well thought out thing. And now I've got more that I have to learn and I just, I honestly hardcore fell off after generation two and it was kind of the same with pokemon go if we end up talking about that later, Pogo came out and I loved it until like Gentoo came out. And then I'm like, Well, that's it for me. But I that's my memory of it. I loved it.Palsh 13:06 Yeah, I gotta say I'm the same way. When I played the first one, I was like, I'm the kind of guy that wanted to go for all all of them. And I knew I couldn't because you know, there's multiple playthroughs I knew I'd have to do it all myself because there was nobody to trade with. I was like, I just couldn't do it. And then I found out you can do it all over again with the next next game. I'm like, No, no, no, sorry.Jake 13:28 You mean I gotta walk bore man.Wulff 13:32 See, I was I was actually excited about golden silver. When I when I first learned about it, I was I was on board. But then a friend of mine got both of them. And he played through one of them. And then while he was playing through one, he was like, you can borrow the other one for a while, if you will. And I was like, all right, so I bought it for about a week or two. I tried playing it for a little while, and I got so annoyed with the fact that not only was it across different versions, but now The Pokemon only spawned at certain times of day. And under certain weather conditions, I guess the game had weather. I don't remember if that's if that was implemented in that one yet. But even just the morning, daytime and nighttime, completely threw me I was like, dude, I have other things to do throughout the day, I can't be expected to play Pokemon to try and catch a specific one at a certain time. I'm not going to fire the game up at three different times in the day to try and catch a certain thing or see if something different appears like it was just outside of the realm of reality for me, being a high schooler. It's like Okay, first off, morning and afternoon. They're just not going to happen.Jake 14:46 Yeah, I used to work night shifts. So try and catch Pokemon the daytime muscles be sleeping. No, thank you.Palsh 14:51 I think that's one of those things that would be really good in theory more than execution. Like if they had like an end game clock. MaybeWulff 15:01 Yeah, I thought it was a great idea. But it was not practicalGP 15:05 but right. And the reason they would never do that, like with an in game clock, and we've kind of talked about this before Simon's quest, and so I'll leave that there.Palsh 15:16 Now all of a sudden, we need Pokemon Gold and Silver redacted.GP 15:19 Oh, yes, that'll play.Jake 15:21 Well, okay, I got a question then. So if Pokemon were available during night and day time, Pokemon, generally is targeted children. Kids have to sleep at night. So does that kind of skew the game to either keeping kids out of bed or kind of doing a non to adult surveillance series? It's kinda interesting.Wulff 15:41 I think Yeah, I'm not sure I believe the timing on it was from something like 5am to 11am was considered morning. And then 11 to six or seven was day and then after that was night Okay, wasPalsh 16:00 this like based on your console's timezone? Like, how does it work onWulff 16:04 your cartridge actually had an internal battery that maintained the time of day? Okay?GP 16:10 Which one? Which game was the dinnertime Pokemon? Cuz that one would be okay.Palsh 16:17 I just send it to my friends on the West Coast Hey, hook me up.Wulff 16:21 So I I did get into the card game quite a bit as Jake touched on earlier, I had some friends who played magic but I didn't have any magic cards. And I had some other friends who liked magic, but they also didn't have magic cards. And we all kind of felt like well, it's a little late to jump on the magic train at this point. Everybody's got these badass decks, we can't really keep up. So let's try Pokemon. It's got one set out right now there's 150 cards won't be that hard to start getting into Fred right off the bat. So we did that. And I do believe at one point I actually collected the entire first set and then Pretty much the moment I did it, I was like all right, well now I don't want to have all of these anymore I'm going to start trading them to get the best deck I can make. So away my charas are away with my Venus or I started making other decks and I actually created a deck that was really overpowered that was just water type it was basically blast toys and gear it was to just own everything. We ended up spending so much time playing Pokemon and we had friends who wanted to join in to start playing with us that we altered the rule set at it at a point in time to where we figured out analogues for everything to where it could be played like magic.Palsh 17:42 Oh, nice.Wulff 17:46 That's That's how similar they were is that we figured out a way to wear anything like if the rule said one thing in Pokemon. You change it to match another rule in Magic the Gathering and you're set. See wipe off the zero On the HP and you've got it covered.Palsh 18:02 I like that because I didn't touch the card game so I could have just went straight into that and played.Wulff 18:07 Yeah, it was it was pretty wild that we did that. Some of our friends were like, Well why are you doing that? Or like, I don't know, we just we played so much Pokemon. Now we want to try it as magic.Jake 18:17 You could just by magic, you know?Wulff 18:21 Evil we already had the Pokemon cards.Jake 18:23 damn kidsPalsh 18:26 get off my lawn.Wulff 18:27 Plus that friend and I had art class together and we never did the actual assignments in that class. SoPalsh 18:35 we just blew all that time playing Pokemon or turning it into magic. Were you the kids that were making your own magic cards and Pokemon cards?Wulff 18:43 No, no, no, that was another friend of mine.Palsh 18:46 Oh man. I've never tried to no good with Photoshop now so I can't even do that to this day.Wulff 18:51 Oh, no, no, he drew them.Palsh 18:53 Oh, wow. Okay.Wulff 18:56 Anyway, um, so yeah, from the Gen one that's kind of where that stood for me. I don't think I touched so I don't think I touched the franchise again until it hit GPA. And even then it wasn't the first generation that hit GPA was when they remade red and blue as Leaf Green and fire red. I was like I haven't been into it for a while I haven't been able to but since this is a remake, maybe it'll be able to recapture that that I have been missing with the previous games. And I jumped into it. It helped me for a while I think about 3540 hours and then it lost me again. I never beat it.Palsh 19:35 That's good. That's the intro to like an Elder Scrolls game right there.Wulff 19:39 All right. 3540 hours is nothing to sneeze at for holding you But yeah, pretty sure. I mean, I played through 80 hours of the original blue the first time and then probably another 40 hours to get to the everything the second time soPalsh 19:53 respect, I played the Sapphire one on Gameboy Advance because my friend I'll never forget Get this this is what got me into it again because I didn't touch it again like after like after you said, you know just kind of dropped off like with GP you know, you got to do this all over again now. So I'm minding my own business working. I was working at a gas station I was probably 18 maybe 19 my friend came down just to visit me at work and like I'm working in the shack like it's literally smaller than a sheet of plywood is the shack that I was working in. And my friend came in so there's barely enough room for both of us stand up and he takes his pocket takes his thing and it was pocket and I thought it was like a makeup kit and I was like you bought makeup. He's like Nah, man. scam boy. I was like what so he had the Gameboy Advance SP and I never even heard of it. And what is it he goes game is the advanced is the Gameboy Advance SP. I was like, okay, and he opens up his I got Pokemon. I goes really? And he goes, Yeah, they made new one. So he had Ruby in there and he let me play it. He basically brought it down and immediately gave it to me and let me play And just like pick up and I was just collecting stuff for him and I was playing it for like 40 minutes at work, you know, I take a stop to run out and serve a customer and come back and I was playing the game. And I instantly was like, This is amazing. This is amazing. So, but I didn't have an sp right I just had the old school Gameboy that you need to be under a fluorescent light to play. And so he said, You know what, how about I get, I get the original one and you can get one and we'll play I was like, okay, cool, because you know, we could play together that way. And so we ended up ordering red for him because he had Ruby and I got blue. We're both playing it That was really mad because I had to play out in the basement in my house under fluorescent light while he was in my room, in like hanging down like in the couch that I had in my room. And so the first thing I did after I went on, I went to go to school, I went to Walmart bought an sp bought a carrying case, but Sapphire and started playing incessantly until Christmas. And then I came back and absolutely wrecked him because he stopped playing a month after I left. Wow. So I felt like a king and I still do to this day. So if you're listening thanks for we have an up buddy.Wulff 22:13 So Jake and JP Did either of you touch anything else from Gameboy or gameboy advance?GP 22:20 No, not so much I. Honestly, my exposure after that really has been from Twitch and from watching other streamers who have that deep rooted devotion to the franchise, which I do admire. But it's one of those franchises for me now, where I get a little bit of nostalgia for the old stuff. I enjoy watching the new stuff, but I don't know that I'll pick it up again.Wulff 22:49 Yeah, I'm kind of on the fence about some of that. I don't think I touched it again until Diamond and Pearl for the DS. And that one held me even less than Leaf Green and fire red. So I kind of learned Lesson and I haven't bought another one since now, when go released Of course, it was free to play. I had a smartphone. My wife had a smartphone so we were like sure let's give it a shot. So we downloaded it and played the crap out of it for about two weeks. Were like our phones were just never ending we plugged inPalsh 23:24 yeah I invested in those cigarette lighter chargers two weeks from now I'm a millionaire because of that.Wulff 23:34 Oh invested it No we bought some that's what I mean by invested in chargers we we just bought itJake 23:41 I can retire on us cables and car chargers. I'd be rich by now. But for me, I I also work I worship the Gameboy Advance SP I love that system. It's one of my all time favorite system especially very handheld. I think it's King and what kind of sold me When I first saw the commercial and advertisements for fire read, and just that wave install Joe, you know, I had read, I put the hell into that game. Sure. And then you know when the game starts up, and you see ash first leaving town and that hero rock soundtrack kicks in. It just nails me it just hooks me right in. I love the hell it if I read, but then after that after I and I played that, I mean dozens if not hundreds of hours. But after that generation, I kind of fell off and I didn't touch it for years. And it really wasn't until which McCall it was new Gameboy called Gameboy 3dsPalsh 24:36 the 3ds watch mycologist chocolate,Jake 24:39 right, it's not a Gameboy. Hopefully, if you pretended really hard with the power of imagination, it could be the 3ds I end up getting 3ds and that of course every system has Pokemon games and I played Sun and Moon. I think I played the moon version. And I enjoyed it. I love how they took the game into 3d, a little bit of the models. They kind of I mean, they always alter the formula from generation to generation. But for sun and moon that kind of moved away from the idea of going to various gyms to battling Gym Leaders instead of this kind of weird Pacific Island you know quest fighting looking for these let these special Pokemon to learn from them. It was kind of a weird take on it. I didn't quite get into it. So I actually don't ever finish moon I got a couple hours into it and kind of give up.GP 25:24 And at this point, it's not that it's saturated. But he really you guys talk about like, Pearl and Sapphire and, and I just, I don't know what the differences are anymore. I think I would be tempted if I ever got like a super Gameboy. I think I would be tempted to find the the original two and replan. But aside from that and Pokemon Go like you know werewolf was talking about earlier a bit night we put in so many miles with the kiddos just wandering around Wichita, and we even we would go and take over Jim's Like actually we had one in Topeka to bring things full circle there for a little while Topeka and so I really did love polka when it first came out and again it's just the the de generation to drop down like man do I hope they do what they did with wow classic World of Warcraft. Just bring back g one everything and I'll be happy I'll go back through it.Jake 26:24 Well the fire fire red is is the perfect way to experience the first generation Pokemon again it's the same game just remastered it just looks better sounds better, but it's the same gameplay same story if you're into that there was there a storyWulff 26:39 Yeah, I think it added an island that had Pokemon from other generations like selected Pokemon, butGP 26:47 well that I can do pretty much itPalsh 26:48 Yeah, I would check that out. Like I said, I love the game when it first came out on Gameboy but one thing now going back to it and watching somebody else play it or playing it myself is the audio and it's just because mainly because Because of the sound is you know, so limited on Gameboy but the low health warning. I remember one time it gave me a headache to the point where I got a migraine. So now I just cringe when I hear. So I if I ever play it again, I'm just going to go for five red or Leaf Green.Wulff 27:17 Yeah, it's that sound kidding. Great. A. That is one thing video games have from any era, when they have that you're almost gonna die beep it just starts to get on your nerves. I don't know why that's a thing. Like I get it. If the game is really in your face with a lot of action and stuff. And it's like beeps delay, you know, Zelda is not that fast paced game. And they just throw those beeps at you until you get enough hearts. Pokemon is the same way you're in a turn based combat you all that's on screen is your Pokemon and health bars. You know you're dying.Jake 28:00 The top 10 worst sounds and video games i'd agree that the Pokemon death sound is probably up there linked to the past is probably number one but Pokemon death is up there.Palsh 28:10 I'll put it that number one it seriously it like wearable says it greats and it's just I think it's just because it's ingrained in my head now at this point where I had that one one experience I'm just like, oh no.Jake 28:23 What about the Pokemon sound effects themselves? Do you find those charming or just annoying? I thoughtPalsh 28:29 actually it was pretty impressive to go from watching the show, you know where they all basically say their own name was how the hell they make noises. But then when you actually play the Gameboy game, the original ones and you know Jigglypuff makes the same music that Do you know, it? They they kept true to that and I think even with the limited audio hardware they had, it was really impressive.Wulff 28:58 At least with some Pokemon it didn't Seemed like the they were trying to make it almost sound like they they were at least inflecting their Japanese names because a lot of them didn't have the same name in the US like bigger two and right you pretty much it least from Gen one a lot of them had very different names aside from that.Palsh 29:17 Anything noteworthy thisWulff 29:21 I think Squirtle was zinna Gamay oh wow yeah rolls off the tongue.GP 29:25 Yeah, I'm not hearing the difference my brotherWulff 29:27 had a my brother had a toy that he picked up at some toy store in Florida at one point I guess it was an important because all he said was like he hit the button and he goes and Danny You know, he was saying his Japanese name he wasn't saying the western name.Jake 29:44 My favorite Pokemon is trash bag. He balls to the trash fire.Wulff 29:51 Some Pokemon are just horrifying, like drif Loon. I don't know if you guys know of drift or not. I don't remember what generation It came from but it's a Pokemon that looks like a balloon. And what it does is it hangs out near children to try and coax them into grabbing this like going and chasing it down because oh boy, cute, pretty balloon. I must have a balloon. I'm a small child, and it'll grab their arm and steal them away.Palsh 30:20 Wow, that's like,Wulff 30:21 it just takes the children away. It's like Billy's balloon from what is that guy's name? Don Hertzfeld with all the little balloons taking the kids up into the sky and dropping them.GP 30:37 horror movies are you guys? Well, I'm sitting here thinking about penny. Well,Wulff 30:40 dude, this is a cartoon. Okay. Little tangent here. If you guys remember the Pop Tarts commercials with the really weird people, like the weird looking handwriting people were they were like chasing the Pop Tarts duranium. Those were done Hertzfeld animations for pop tarts. So Billy's balloon was an independent piece he did years before that, where it didn't have to be market friendly. It just exists.Palsh 31:11 Just exists.GP 31:13 Well, I have to chime in real quick for two things. One because I just remembered, and two is a callback to a conversation a moment ago. I completely forgot about this until just now. Pokemon Snap. I love that game. Still love that game. That game is rad. You guys can find me. I don't know if that game is popular or if everybody hates it, but I fucking love it. That's a great game. Okay. Wait, what?Wulff 31:37 It's think snap is pretty well received.GP 31:40 Okay, cool. And the other one. The other comment I have to get in here was about the most hated beeping noise in video games. And I would like to point out the soundtrack to 1942 because that doesn't just be Pichu when you're about to die. That's just the soundtrack.Jake 32:00 You know the real speed runs 1942 you have to blur the soundtrack otherwise cheatingWulff 32:04 oh my god have real speed run is to beat it in 1941GP 32:09 that is some some Marty McFly stuff that I'm not prepared for. That's okay, so yeah, that was my two cents. Pokemon Snap THUMBS UP 1942 shit soundtrackJake 32:23 when you guys mentioned like badly named Pokemon like Drake foon the one that stands out for me and ash, he's a favorite of mine in Pokemon moon. It's me muku. And it's let me just read the descriptions from Sun and Moon just so you have an appreciation for why like this one. Its actual appearance is unknown. A scholar who saw what was under its reg was overwhelmed by terror and died from the shock.Palsh 32:46 WhatJake 32:46 after going through all the effort of disguising itself, its neck was broken. whatever is inside is probably unharmed, but it's still feeling sad. Wow. It's literally a Pikachu. It's a rag on a stick With a crudely drawn Pikachu face in ears it's hilarious Pokemon as you can tell if it's a description What is this thing called? Me Miku it's just it's just hilarious I it's sad and disturbed but I love the Pokemon origin stories are terrible like they're frightening for kids game.Wulff 33:15 One Which one? The mimic you? Okay, my firstJake 33:19 sudden moon by a Maven in an earlier game.Wulff 33:22 Yeah That thing is nightmare fuel.Jake 33:25 I love it though, because it can take a free hit and then it's disguised goes away, and it's basically invisible to ghost Pokemon, but it gets that free hit no matter what. So it's a fantastic Pokemon. It's my favorite.GP 33:35 It looks like one of those yarn doll versions of a Pokemon from like little big world or whatever it was. Oh, sackboy Yeah, yeah.Wulff 33:45 Little Big, Little Big Planet. Thank you. sackboy was the main character.GP 33:49 Okay, I thought maybe it was a translation difference between the lower 48 in Canada.Palsh 33:58 There's a metric equivalent in there somewhere. Yeah, sure, sure, sure.GP 34:02 Yeah, so I at some point, I do feel like it's not that they haven't kept trying when it comes to the naming and designs of some of the late Gen Pokemons. But they have kind of become Forgive me for this the equivalent of like, Stephen King novel plots. It's like are you really trying right now? Is This Really? Is this really part of what you're What were you just joking? Like that's how that's where it's at. for me. It's like how, how many Pokemon are there as of September 2019. Something like 800 I'm sorry, I had a stroke. How manyGP 34:40 800 807GP 34:45 I can barely keep up with 151 that's all I'm saying.Palsh 34:49 Yeah, sameJake 34:50 Okay, Pokemon wrap. Let's go 123 anybody?Wulff 34:56 Okay, man, Pokemon GOGP 34:59 ninja. Ninja rap. Yeah, I thinkWulff 35:05 I just couldn't remember the Pokemon rap. So that's where I went.Palsh 35:08 Slow po YouTube dedeker route aerodactyl. That'sGP 35:13 right. We got we're going to have to pay some money. No polish.Palsh 35:17 Yeah. Okay. Let's go make instead let's go make a toe mimic you instead of Topeka, choo. Oh,Wulff 35:27 speaking of Topeka to you. They they actually did it again. Last year and 28th anniversary.Jake 35:37 Oh God, they did it again. Same city.Wulff 35:39 Yes. Same city for the 20 year anniversary of it. They did it again for a day. Okay. thought that was interesting, butGP 35:48 that speaks a lot to the mentality of Kansas. Here's what I mean by that. Topeka has to be come to peek at you. There's a place here that is called Hutchinson better now. North of where I live, and that is widely considered as Smallville what Smallville from the Superman mythos would be if it were real. And so where I'm going with this is the idea the ideology for Kansas tourism is, Hey, come here and we'll pretend it's somewhere else.Jake 36:22 It's like trying to bring back the rim sunglasses. They're terrible idea and tacky in the 80s to bring him back now in 2019 is just pathetic.Jake 36:32 Is that a thing? I've seen some people were in I'm in my city. Every every 10 years yeah,Palsh 36:37 that they Yes. You see a trend. Come back.GP 36:40 You say that. But the matrix is coming back. So that's cool. So it's hit or miss.Palsh 36:45 But yeah, never went away.GP 36:47 Yeah, that's if you come into Kansas ever. The state line sign says, Welcome to Kansas. We're sorry.Palsh 36:57 It's the Canada of the United States.Wulff 37:01 So, moving back on to the Pokemon I did actually get to try let's go recently Oh yeah, my kid got it a while back my brother actually got him the, the the poker ball plus. So we started playing that a while back and he he loves it he has a blast with it because he gets to pretend he's a Pokemon trainer throwing the ball and catching the Pokemon. It's a blast, right? And when we fired it up, it said that there was a gift inside the poker ball. And when it told us that the poker ball made one of the sounds that you know one of the Gameboy Pokemon sounds from way back when and I didn't know what Pokemon It was. It was like I spent ages I don't know, I don't even think I knew which Pokemon made what sound back was back then. You know. So we played far enough to see about opening up this gift and seeing what was in it and then we opened it and it was a freaking newJake 38:00 Wow that's pretty awesomeWulff 38:01 he's not even at the first gym yet and now he's got a mew is randomized or does everyone I don't know if everybody gets a mew or if it's kind of random for rare Pokemon in general and we just got really lucky or oneJake 38:17 of us part of it didn't look into the only way you can get them you in that game is if you pay the 6070 bucks for the Pokeball accessory oh wow like in the original game that I think they gave me away there's usually had some kind of like public event and they let you get access Yeah,Wulff 38:31 they did mall events all over the place. And you had to go wait in line and have your Gameboy and your cartridge just fired up trade get your meJake 38:44 wants to do that again recently with sun and moon or pokemon go one of the two there's a new one that is literally a bolt like a nut like a metal and steel not that's a Pokemon now I think his name is meltin and I want to say done locket. You had to go What was events?Wulff 39:01 But I do have to say I kind of enjoy how let's go plays it feels less tedious since encounters with wild Pokemon or just throw balls at it and catch it move on. There's no beating it up to try and catch it there's just smashing the A button over and over to get it over with because every interaction if it's not a trainer battle, it's over in like 15 seconds. If that is you try using enjoy. So that was actually kind of nice. Um, no, we haven't played it with the joy con yet. He's just been playing with the poker ball playJake 39:33 with the joy con because you can play with two players kind of in that game. I play with my kids and we don't have the pokemon ball. But joy cons are hot garbage with it. And you spend 10 balls trying to hit a goddamn Pokemon. But it's all trade.Wulff 39:46 Oh, he catches it every frickin time with the poker ball. Plus, it's ridiculous. The little tiny circle. He's getting excellent, amazing. Yeah, I don't know what it is. But he's also playing like five feet from a 42 inch TV. That At his eye level soJake 40:02 well clearly he's destiny a Pokemon master he just said him outside world with a baseball hat and a backpack and said Good luck.Wulff 40:09 Yeah, well he's not 10 yet he's only five he's halfway there.Palsh 40:13 Hell I'm 35 and I'm not ready for thatWulff 40:18 Alright, so let's let's let's touch on the anime and the movies a little more. I'm going to openly admit and open myself up for mockery here. I saw a Pokemon the first movie Pokemon 2000 and Pokemon I don't know what it was called Pokemon three. I don't know if that's what it was called. Something else the one with MJ. I saw all three of those in theaters. I never saw a single one of them to be honest.GP 40:43 I'm sorry. What was it? Hint hint? A No You saidWulff 40:48 I it was some big orange dog thing that looked kind of like a growl either andGP 40:54 it was bigger googling hint a right now and it's it's not popping up anything like what you're talking about?Wulff 41:01 That's that was the last one I saw that I was kind of like and now my phone crashed but but when I when I saw the first one in theaters, I legit teared up. I don't know if you guys have seen that movie, but toward the end,GP 41:17 I think the only one I saw was Pokemon 2000 and that was at a drive in theater. That was also showing Casper Do you guys remember that with Christina Ricci? That was like the double feature, and I think that's the only time I saw Pokemon 2000Wulff 41:37 pretty sure that movie came well before Pokemon 2000GP 41:40 Oh yeah, I'm not saying it was topical. I'm just saying that's what was playing.Jake 41:44 It was a classic. For me it was the less the movies and more the cartoon the first season and Pokemon the anime that's like a guilty pleasure for me. I watched it with my kids not too long ago and every time Pikachu I know it's me fine. I know his will never die ever. But anytime he's in mortal peril and he's just beaten up, and he gives that little cry and clutches them tightly like a baby. I should have single tier every time. I don't care who hates mePalsh 42:14 hates you. Everybody relates to you now.GP 42:17 Yeah. Who would show hate? Like how dare you have feelings toward this cartoon? Yeah,Wulff 42:22 it's it's funny how much more prevalent Pokemon is these days than it was when you know generation one released but with Gen one they had what two or three musical albums that released with the anime and it was ridiculous and I don't know what they they do that stuff anymore. I'm pretty sure it's just the games and plushies mostly at this point.Jake 42:44 In terms of merchandise. Oh, there's all kinds of merchandise. Yeah.Wulff 42:48 My my brother had one of the CDs that to be a master album. Attract microphone master. Turn offPalsh 42:55 the tape right the ghetto blasterUnknown Speaker 42:58 Exactly.Palsh 43:00 That's That's some 41Jake 43:01 but I went over overseas to Tokyo there. We actually went to other Pokemon centers, but we didn't even we didn't need to go to that store. There's Pokemon everywhere in Tokyo I guess that goes up saying but from cookies to juice, the vending machine to underwear, literally everything. And I still see a lot of that over here too. I still I still see the occasional Pokemon figurines and toys and stuff.Wulff 43:21 We went to the mall a couple weeks ago here and I saw a little like one of those stands and it wasn't really a kiosk but it was like a standalone vending machine kind of thing. But it was called a Pokemon Center and it had a vending machine on one side with a bunch of Pokemon merge in it, and then it had a poker decks on another side where you could like look at the different Pokemon and it was kind of wild.Jake 43:45 Well, I was just actually just at the CME in Toronto. It's basically a big fair exhibition in the UK carnival games, that kind of thing. And some of the prizes are obviously knockoff Pokemon merchandise, right? And I saw a family like with three kids and strollers One of the kids was clutching a I mean a gigantic Pikachu. Like it was probably two three feet long. It's huge. And this pair of guys and I mean, buff, gym looking dudes, six and a half, seven feet tall, just the toughest guys walking down the street or the the avenue and they see the kid with the giant Pikachu and they walk up, hands on hips like yo yo, would you get that Pikachu and the basketball game? Oh, thanks so much and then they just ran ran for the carnival game but the games to get their own tickets you know just to show you that the generation who love Gen one are all like you know 30 plus now for the most part and have that just love a peek into stuff.Wulff 44:45 Oh yeah, Pikachu. I mean, they knew that was a gold mine from the get go. It they were in Topeka you there was friggin Pokemon Yellow. I think to this day, they still brand pretty much Every console with a Pikachu to some extent, even if it's a limited release, ridiculous. But yeah, I gotta say I'm I do like the older cartoons. There's probably only one line I still remember from the original movie. Or maybe it was the second movie I don't know is from one of the movies, there was a really bad line that I choose, you know? No, no, no nothing. And I'm pretty sure it was the second movie because it was a bunch of people on a yacht. I don't know, it might have been the first movie I really don't remember, but there's a bunch of people on a boat and you overhear them talking like there's people at different tables eating and talking and it passes by one table and you hear a guy go, and I said, No, I just had crab bees and everybody burst into laughter. I was like, Oh my god, that is not a kid friendly joke.Jake 45:56 Even crabs is a Pokemon.Jake 45:59 Gotta catch mallGP 46:05 Okay, here's a question. Because I legit don't know, in the Pokemon universe, are there what we would consider normal animals? Like is there like a like a dog just a regular canine? Or is every single animal in that universe of Pokemon?Wulff 46:27 I feel like generation one the way we were introduced to Pokemon made it sound like there were other animals that were not Pokemon. But the further we get into the franchise, if you like, the less, that seems to be the case. Right? Which is really bizarre because I'm pretty sure oak said that all the Pokemon shared a lot of common genes. Okay, and so that means they're like, all these Pokemon are just weird mutants and we're just living on their planet.GP 47:00 Just how uneventful and underwhelming and potentially scary would it be to be like a dog? Or like a regular domestic house cat in the Pokemon world be horrifying, and you'd be let down to everybodyJake 47:17 with your account Oh, you're sure the cow will eat you will grind you into burgers but you know mu tanks or whatever the cow pokeyman is? Yeah milk bankWulff 47:27 andJake 47:28 Toro him. He's a Pokemon special. Eat that goddamn cow, rightGP 47:38 Okay, thereWulff 47:40 we go question can you carve up a milk and eat some of it leave it alive take it to a Pokemon Center and heal itJake 47:49 the question doesn't want you to think aboutUnknown Speaker 47:52 right yeah.Wulff 47:53 With the with the hard questions will be getting that cease and desist very soon.GP 47:59 There's always He's that kid at school who runs up and you're like, oh, man, check it out. You know, I got this cool new thing that everybody has. And it's the offering thing that you know, you had to get from the dollar store that that was me growing up so I can make this year. But that kid shows up with a pokey ball. He's like, Can I just check it out? I got like a Meowth. And he opens it and it's just like a cat. Like, damn it, Randall. You know, go back to the corner. That's horrible. That's how bullying starts. And it's not funny.Jake 48:34 Robots aren't real transformers. Back to eat and paste. I'm just picturing now somebody's taking a cat into Pokemon battle. just pulling in a cat carrier like the opponent's like charges are going from smokey ball. And then some guy with a cat carrier. Smell with go nuts.Palsh 48:53 And it's like I said house can literally a house. Yeah. And it's like way more feral than the He hasGP 49:00 a Pokemon delivers takes down the gear dose, and it gets disqualified but like kindaPalsh 49:07 like Karate Kid, you know wins with that illegal kick to the head.GP 49:12 Yeah, but at that point everybody had already stormed the man. I'm sorry. Effective.Palsh 49:20 Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, the press beat cancel. This is how we normally talk. Yeah, I apologize. SoWulff 49:28 I think it's almost time to hit be so let's go ahead and go around and see what everybody's favorite point in the series was. I think for me, it's pretty safe to say it was just Pokemon blue period. I that's I played the crap out of it. I played through it two or three times. I traded for every single Pokemon And that my friends and I figured out how to do the missing no nonsense and all that. It's blue holds a special place in my heart that no other entry in the game has in the French has been able to replicate.GP 50:02 Cool, cool. I think for me, my favorite moments, or era of Pokemon is the day after I was introduced to Pokemon, because I got the idea of what it was. And my mind was like being expanded to see what the rules were for the card game and then gradually introduced to all this other stuff. And it was just this amazingly fun idea. And so to be at the front door, of all the stuff that you know, you're about to learn, it's going to be awesome. That was that was magic. That was absolute magic. So for me, that was my favorite part.Jake 50:43 You know, for me, it's Pokemon. It's when's the spin off? That's the stuff I enjoy the most and actually quite like what they're doing today or nowadays with it. Detective Pikachu is probably good. Good spin on I believe there was a game on the 3ds for that. And I just love how to peek at you with a little character, and he's in he's in this combat situation or you think he's going to be with his friend there who has tried to peek at you. And he's like Pikachu use Thunderbolt. And detective Pikachu just looks at this guy and says use Thunderbolt. And to me, that's just like, the funniest thing in the planet, right? Like, humans order around animals do battle, and the animal turning to you and say, What the hell are you talking about? I love to pick at you that the recent movie, the CGI movie, I thought was actually really great. And I hope to do more crazy stuff like that. Like the mainline games are fun at all. But when they take Pokemon and put it into different situations that spin off, I love that kind of stuff.Palsh 51:39 Yeah, that's, that's really cool. I like that. And I haven't even seen the movie yet. So now I really want to see it. But for me, it's definitely I want to say Sapphire because I was playing it so much like it was probably from like August to December. I didn't really play anything else. I'd be watching the movie gravity. We're watching a movie and I playing the game. But I think it's just that introduction to Sapphire, by playing Ruby is probably my fondest memory of the entire franchise just because my friend came down out of the blue. And it's just one of those things like we were both at a high school and I just remember that it was just is a memory that I'll always cherish and I don't know. It was just cool. It's It was like a new era of video games for me, soWulff 52:27 I think that's fair. Alright, so I think we can go ahead and wrap upPalsh 52:34 this list of her favorite Pokemon real quick,GP 52:37 Ryan Reynolds.Wulff 52:38 Oh, I see. I can't talk today. debido Danny DeVitoWulff 52:47 could youGP 52:50 honestly, if I could have like a real life Pokemon. I'd want it to be a growl if they're so cool looking. Yeah, they are pretty cool. And I feel safe and cuddly? You can't cuddle a gear a doseWulff 53:04 I'm not even a cat person but I liked Persian don't know whyGP 53:10 I think that silence is a little bitWulff 53:13 it was a cat that could literally create money out of nothing soPalsh 53:18 yeahGP 53:18 yeah that's a great option only keptWulff 53:19 the least if you evolved it from mouth and Persian was way cooler than me out soPalsh 53:24 that's true that's good solid logic I'll agree with you for there Matt that it's not gonna be my favorite but it's respectable. Jake What do you just like the one you actuallyJake 53:35 I like them we're actually gonna go with Ryan rattle on that goes right right I love rock Canadian Ryan Reynolds is a fantastic Pokemon But no, I like the one I don't even know his name. But it's basically a steel ring with keys attached and that's a Pokemon. I love that one. I'm not I'm not even kidding. I don't notice they marryWulff 53:53 you coming up with the jinglingJake 53:54 key Pokemon is the best of all.GP 53:58 The okay real quick, just to Bring this whole thing home. Sick Jay, did you play with Gobots I think somebody who's played a trick on youJake 54:08 know Gobots I had one Optimus Prime and I had my toy that was itPalsh 54:13 turns out he's kept attacking YuGiOh or, or digium on all this time.Wulff 54:19 This is Pocket Monsters not digital monsters.GP 54:24 Also, I think if if you have a life that you know, you want to escape your life than the me the the Mewtwo sorry, is the Pokemon that you want. Because then if he's cool, he can just get in your mind and you can live whatever life you want. Yes,Wulff 54:41 that's true,GP 54:43 too, and introduce people like, Hey, this is my Pokemon. It's kind of a dick. Or you'd be like, Hey, I don't feel like doing anything today. Can you get in my head and making things that I'm on Jupiter.Wulff 54:53 So you're wanting you to be your own personal Total Recall.GP 54:58 That is exactly what I'm saying. That was perfectly stated where I was going to say he wanted a pet Dr. ManhattanPalsh 55:03 but okay.Jake 55:06 A pet What? Whoa, wait a minute 12 his penis and a Pokemon sounds good to me.Wulff 55:11 I got that reference.GP 55:17 Okay, first off, I have to point out stick Jake uses metric. I don't think he knows what bobbins means. Man I think Sorry guys, I'm sorry. I've loved this this episode, but I'm sorry that I've been the main reason we've gotten off track. I'm so sorry.Palsh 55:44 I think it's fine. minds fit my favorite Squirtle By the way, dicks.Wulff 55:52 Oh, yeah, there's a good question. What was your starters from Jen one Squirtle realPalsh 55:57 quick. I always go with the Pokemon if given a chance,Wulff 56:02 mine was CharmanderPalsh 56:03 sucka.Wulff 56:05 Being original I named him Bernie.Jake 56:08 I use I always wanted the fire type or the ones that look like a cat. I was a cat person and like half this team, and I usually named them stupid things like dog food, frozen peas, creamed corn, stuff like that. Don't ask me why, dude. My dude, no.GP 56:26 Actually, I was watertight to I went with with Squirtle. And I kind of want to change my answer to my favorite being cubone because of how heartbreaking The story is that yes,Palsh 56:36 I love the cubone Yeah, let's not bring it up here because I don't want to cry. But, uh, anybody who's listening, if you don't know the story of a cubone, you should check it out. Because it's Yeah, it is actually worth looking up. SoGP 56:49 just yeah, here's all you have to Google is whose skull is cubone wearing And if that's not the most emotion you've ever heard Yeah, I love it. Also, I mean but yeah, the key chain one is nice to J it's fineJake 57:05 I have look his name upWulff 57:09 anyway this has been presby to cancel I was your host this week thank you for having me for a second week now.Palsh 57:14 Who are you aWulff 57:17 werewolf? You can find me on Twitch and TwitterPalsh 57:21 w ar EWL ffWulff 57:25 I was going to leave it to the imagination this time but thank youPalsh 57:28 all right Polish take it away Hi my name is sick Jake you can find me on Twitter as well as a weight not I'm post one on you find me on Twitch at pulse 109 pls HWulff 57:41 and GPGP 57:43 know go for it. Go for it Jay.Jake 57:47 Thanks GP. For the record. His name is Cliff key cholesky the key chain Pokemon it resembles a key ring with four keys aspherical head and a small pink oval on his forehead anyway That's that's his life story. That's pretty much it. It's also dark and jiggli My name is sick Jake you can find me sick Jake on Twitter or on Twitch. I'm a part time by annual never streamerWulff 58:10 and then our resident derailer Gp.GP 58:14 Yeah, this is GP. Typical spelling. Sorry. And you can find me on the retro therapy, which is of course on Twitch. We're also on Twitter and Instagram, as the retro therapy.Wulff 58:29 Alright, thank you everybody for tuning in. band EQ pqPalsh 58:36 certain music here. Wait, that's not how the song goes.Jake 58:45 Special thanks for music go to Arthur, the ancient found on Soundcloud or the last ancient on YouTube. The more episodes please visit our website presby to cancel.com as well Feel free to like or subscribe at Apple iTunes, Google podcasts or anything. Where else you'd like to listen to your favorite shows? As always, thank you. This has beenWulff 59:06 a do againSpecial 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.

Today, I share a part of my story of loss. Elaine Brenner is my guest host as I move behind the microphone, telling the truth of my collision with death and surgery. As I listened to this episode, I still felt the loss; there is so much more that I would like to tell or share, the ways that Mercy and Moses and pain have impacted and changed me. But I offer this glimpse into my story, hoping it will help you as you live through your own challenge or help a friend through theirs.   11:01 – Liesel Mertes But once you bury your child it's like. Oh there's nothing more to be done. You know there's nothing more to be done and you're just left at the finality of it all. It's hard because I feel like grief is such a profoundly isolating emotion. You know everybody's grief is singular to their experience.   INTRO   Today, my dear friend Elaine Brenner is guest-hosting, interviewing me as I share my story.  I talk about the death of my daughter, Mercy Joan, and the multiple open heart surgeries for Moses.  I consider on the limited tool-kits that we have for grief, the fear of forgetfulness, and releasing myself from the expectation of doing grief “well”.   - Elaine Brenner So tell me a little bit about yourself please. Well how do you spend your days?   - Liesel Mertes Well, I'm the mom of four busy young kids. They range in age eleven down to almost five. Moses has a birthday at the beginning part of June. So that's Ada is eleven. Magnus is nine. Jemima is six and Moses is almost five. So, they're busy in their own kind of way. Luke is my husband; we have a rescue dog named Tozer who he's been running away this summer but is hopefully going to replace the battery on his electric collar so hopefully he'll spend a little bit more time at home.   And we love the outdoors. We love hiking around Indianapolis. We're big fans of paddle boarding and kayaking. These are some of the things that we like to do around the city backyard bonfires.   - Elaine Brenner And do you stay at home with the kids? Do you work outside the home?   - Liesel Mertes Yeah I'm in the midst of launching this new entrepreneurial venture. For about the last year or so of which the podcast is one part of it.   What we want to do is to be able to Handle with Care create a software based tool that really helps managers and co-workers be able to know what to say and what to do as people go through disruptive life events. They feel usually pretty overwhelmed and under equipped in that kind of deer in the headlights moment where they say, oh no I have no idea what to say. And to be able to provide like targeted real time instruction of just behaviors that communicate care you know somebody who's come back from a funeral and their manager is going to see them in the next five minutes to be able to watch a little two to four minute micro learning module that says hey here two good things to say here.   Three things that you should never say and they can chance to practice and to be able to go in and then confidently be able to say something that communicates care and that's something that's really missing. Yeah.   - Liesel Mertes As I talk with people around town you can just see it in their eyes you know I was with a woman over coffee who's a prominent lawyer here in town and, and she goes:  Oh yeah, you know the year where my mom and my only sibling died within six months of each other and nobody knew what to say or what to do.   So, I think there is I think there is both a market need and a human need.   - Elaine Brenner I think there's a human need outside the workplace too. I don't think there is a lot of expertise or knowledge around what to say what to do how to handle when friends or family go through times like that.   - Liesel Mertes Yeah. And that I mean most of us have had that experience at least at some point of even you reflect on the comfort that you've just offered and you go Oh my gosh, I said the wrong thing too, shoot.   - Elaine Brenner Yeah yeah. So tell me about your own experiences with the grief where you crossed paths and that same way.   - Liesel Mertes Yeah, well I didn't really have that many people die or super sad things happen in my youth. I had a grandmother die which was sad but expected until it wasn't really. You know my major intersection with a disruptive life event first happened it was I was getting ready to start a grad program down at the Kelley School and they, they offered me acceptance and a week later I found out that I was unexpectedly pregnant with our third child.   - Elaine Brenner And how old were your first two?   - Liesel Mertes They were three and one, so little at the time, they were little. And I thought that's OK. We can manage it well we'll figure it out. I was even prepared I was gonna lead a student trip to Ghana in the second semester and I remember pitching to the student services and saying, I will have delivered you know this little girl a couple weeks before but I'm sure that she can come I've travelled internationally with babies before like they're super easy. Like, I had a very blithe sort of an idea of how the young having a baby in grad school and all the things I was going to look at that was in 2010 but my 20 week scan they saw that Mercy.   - Liesel Mertes That's what we named her, Mercy. Joan had a pretty profound gall hadn't closed. There's a category called a neural tube defect. So, if it's lower its spinal bifida if it's higher it's anencephaly, which is always terminal. But with this encephalocele, she had this large fluid filled sac on the back of her head and the doctors weren't sure. They said there's a range of outcomes we could be able to do surgery. She could have know mild disabilities all the way to this could be terminal. So, we were meeting with neurosurgeons and hospice and still going like to finance class and traveling out from Bloomington.   - Liesel Mertes  And I had taken care of two small and taking care of two small children. And Luke, Luke was helping. I delivered her on February 15th in 2011 full term full term. And it was it was clear that doing anything would be doing things to her and not for her.   - Elaine Brenner But you didn't know that priority for those 20 weeks you're operating kind of limb right.   - Liesel Mertes Just waiting and her spinal column was hollow and she had this lack of connectivity. She couldn't breathe on her own she had to be intubated right away.   So, so they, they took her and got an MRI right after she was born and they came back and they said you know she's not a candidate for surgery which is horrible. I mean it's horrible. We spent two, she lived most of her days in the hospital. It felt important to not have her be alone. We had we had a family that had come from all across the US. She was always being held we had people take different night shifts and everybody knew that what her diagnosis was. So my sister would play the ukulele for my brother.   - Liesel Mertes  He wanted to show her a clip from Last of the Mohicans because he felt like no, no one should that's an important life experience, just seeing this. And she died after eight days of life. We were able to take her to a home hospice.   - Liesel Mertes And then like you wake up the next morning to your still two living children and you know that the life that extends beyond that moment is   - Elaine Brenner So for you as I've been thinking about this one thing, I wondered there is a particular kind of grief that happens when you're faced with the unknown. For those 20 weeks of maybe it could be mild disability maybe it could be death. And then the grief of post mortem you know post Mercy having died. How did those times differ for you?   - Liesel Mertes That's a good question. As, as she was still in utero you know we had a reason to be hopeful. You could still, I mean I remember like pray and every time going for these scans we had to come up to Indianapolis and thinking like maybem maybe it's possible maybe she could just be, she'll just be right. You know maybe she'd be OK. Which was profoundly disappointing. You know in its own way although, although I didn't necessarily think like it's gonna have you know every time it's like now it's still there.   - Liesel Mertes  Right. Still there. And there's also that time is full of still a lot of like planning and logistics and you figuring out like care for your older children and hospital visit. So, there's something like distracting in its own way of all the things that need to be done. But once you bury your child it's like, oh there's nothing more to be done. You know there's nothing more to be done and you're just left at the finality of it all. It's hard because I feel like grief is such a profoundly isolating emotion.   - Liesel Mertes  You know everybody's grief is singular to their experience. Luke, my husband, um you would want to think you're the other parent like you've shared this thing with me if anyone can get me in this. It should be you. But he was so compromised in his own way that you realize like the support you can offer the other person is really limited. And his grief journey was colored by his own moment. Like, I would have moments where I would feel like I can't do anything I can't go on. I'm so sad.   - Liesel Mertes  And he would feel important for him to be like, no I need to just get a house we've got to do something we need something normal. And like the way that you miss each other in those moments I think it's hard.   – Elaine Brenner I think it's hard in any relationship but especially in a marriage relationship. It has to be hard to allow the other person to do the thing that they need to do. If it is absolutely not the thing that you yes. To be able to grant that like OK this can be your journey.   - Liesel Mertes It also necessitates, I find for me, like finding supportive people who were they can sometimes talk about like circles of grief like people who are most closely impacted and then as you get out then there's like OK family there next and then there's maybe like friends and then there's acquaintances and the further out you are from the circle, like that interior circle, the more you have a capacity to actually offer care because you are not going through your own stuff in the same kind of way.   - Liesel Mertes And there are definitely people that really stepped out for me in that and I realized how much I needed that like I couldn't just if I was just depending on like Luke. You have to be something for me. I would be profoundly disappointed and I would be disappointing. And the question like you asked about their grief afterwards. I was just I was tired.   - Liesel Mertes I'm someone who, something I like about myself as I have a pretty wide capacity to like take on tasks and relationships. I like that I can handle a number of things and to just know in a physical sense like, no I can't, like I can be a fraction in all of these roles of what I was and to set with like I'm not like in my mind I was like I'm not a good daughter right now. And like I'm not a good mom I'm not a good student. Like, compared to what I was I felt like I was, just operating on like, two cylinders and that was more of an internal thing would be like I don't like myself right now.   - Liesel Mertes  All right I feel like I'm such a I like shadow version and to wonder like do other people like being with me because I don't even really like being with me right now.   - Elaine Brenner Well it takes grief takes up so much of the margin in your life capacity wise emotionally physically everything else but there's just so little left right to take on anything else.   - Liesel Mertes Exactly. I was like I'm, I'm so much less, .   - Elaine Brenner  So this really is the best version of myself.   - Liesel Mertes Right. And I don't like, I don't like it and I'm sure you don't like it. Yeah yeah. So.   - Elaine Brenner So what ended up happening from a grad school standpoint? And how did you continue with the program?   - Liesel Mertes I did. So, Mercy was born. I don't know if it was a serendipitous timing. There's never a great time for a child to die but it was right at the beginning of spring break that actually my water broke and I delivered her so is this interesting time in that there was this totally intense week. And then for us, I was in the midst of grief; you just feel things really, there I felt in my experience the things I knew I wanted I wanted very strongly and there were lots of things I didn't know I wanted but it felt really important.   - Liesel Mertes  I was like, we have to get out of town like we have to. So, I called the woman who was, she didn't know me that well, she was my mentor within the program and I said, Can you please use your house in Arizona? And my daughter just died. It's just hard to say no to that. So, we went to Arizona for a week but then we came back and it was time to start the second semester   -  Elaine Brenner And talk about the challenges there.   -  Liesel Mertes I'll step back for a second. Something that was that made that return to what was ostensibly my place of employment easier was actually, I you really I look back in this work that I'm doing and think, I was well met by people there, they um they had a director of Student Services Gayle and Gayle had just, you know, kept her abreast of what was happening but she she showed up like in the hospital room in Indianapolis She had with her a handwritten note from the Dean of the business school and again.   - Liesel Mertes She she said at the time, she said you know, is it would you be OK if I let all of your professors know just so you're not having to explain it all the time. She functioned as something of a point person. She got all the news of like funeral details. I had a number of people for my MBA cohort that showed up actually to the funeral of the Dean of students was there. Gail was there all of which I didn't actually change like the horrible reality that she had died. And it was super hard but it did make me think when it was time to return of like OK.   - Liesel Mertes Like people have seen me. It's not gonna be this orphaned experience but still there were the challenges coming back because I'd been so visibly pregnant and some people had known like that it was kind of a complicated pregnancy other people just knew I was pregnant right. So, I come back and I'm not pregnant. And, of course, you know people are like you had the baby and like they're excited.   - Liesel Mertes Right. And that you know it's just passing in between classes and then is that choice of like, I feel like I have what.  So, it's and it's a strange thing that can happen then you find yourself like managing their response because they're obviously like devastated they thought they were just going to finance class.   – Elaine Brenner Right now I'm the person that asked a woman and child and then you find yourself sometimes uncomfortably.   - Liesel Mertes I mean I had to I had to actually coach myself to not do that because you can get in the mode of being like No it's okay. I know you didn't know.   - Liesel Mertes And then that's like doubly emotionally draining to me. So, I had to be like you know it is not my job to manage them but I mean that was exhausting some way. And some people were like some people did find I just remember one, one woman in the bathroom and I told her and she's trying to care for me and she's just like she's, she's running through her mental database. And when she came on she was like You know I read this this story and I think I was like a Maori tradition that dead children become butterflies.   - Liesel Mertes And she just left it hanging there. I just remember like I wasn't so much I was deeply offended but I was just like, I don't, I don't even know what do I do. To say it and I was like well there's a lot of butterflies this time of year.   - Elaine Brenner Let's get back to class. I got it.    -  Liesel Mertes I decided I was taking a fuller load. I was taking an Excel spreadsheet modeling class that everybody said was like a super great class to take. And I remember, it was like two days before classes were about to start. I remember looking at my schedule being like, I don't have to take that class and I I'm not going I'm not going to take that class. Same thing, the summer internship is a big thing in business school and I'd had it like all lined up I interviewed and I remember taking stock and thinking, you know there are a number of reasons this would be good to do but I don't actually have to..   - Liesel Mertes And that took its own, I mean, I felt for me and wanting to please people and do the right thing it took its own amount of courage to be like, I'm not actually going to definitely I'm not I'm gonna like have some time to be a year to be present with whatever is going to come up so that that summer and that spring like I made time to like, I'm just gonna go for super long walk and be with myself and try to distract myself.   - Elaine Brenner So when I think something that has always, always impressed me about you or I've always noticed about you is your intentionality around grief that I didn't know you at that time but I think I met you pretty shortly after that and the way that you honor your grief and probably your family's grief too. And Mercy and how that even all these years later it's still a mark for you. You know you still come back to it and you honor it. You don't push it away. That was a long time ago. I don't need to worry about it.   - Elaine Brenner  I don't need to feel it but you allow space for it. So, what types of things do you do now that allow you to kind of visit that and give it the space it needs?   - Liesel Mertes So, it is something that we've tried to, to build into our family rhythms to talk purposefully about with our children we wanted to you know that's a that's a that's another like, very broad and important you know conversations like, how do you how do you do that with children?   - Liesel Mertes I've gone through the loss and you know how do I attune myself to their grief was still in the midst of my own and honor that it's been important to talk about with our children our two children that have come after Mercy of understanding like this. She is a part of our family her picture, so we have pictures that are up in our house and a prominent sort of a place some tactile things. My mom, she makes beautiful quilts. She had made to she, she felt just in in her spirit like that she would die. So she, ahead of time, it just felt important to her that we're making these two little quilts to bury Mercy.   And one for me to have so that's still like I'm very prominently atop my desk in my room. So it's important to see things. And that's something that people gave us like different gifts. There was photographers. We have a friend who is, he is very artistic photography is one of his expressions, Mark. And he came down from Chicago to take pictures of Mercy while she was still alive. So I treasure those thinking and to have them.   People give us things like shawls or, we have a box that has like her physical memories in it. And I can't quite bring myself to like, I still I think I have I think I wrote a note on the back of a receipt that I taped to the door in the hospital of like hey I went down to get food. You know if anyone visits but even that like it is just like a physical marker of the time right. Can't quite bring myself to like get rid of this scerawled note that I got the receipt right.   - Liesel Mertes But year in and year out from the time of year February is um, I still feel it like physically in my body the anticipation of it. Those days feel momentous. Luke and I for a while we, we would go away together around that time which was its own mixed bag.   - Liesel Mertes Sometimes when you're missing each other then there are years where I feel like I was I just got away by myself. I tried to share this with you not so much about him but about right. I don't know, I never quite know what I need or want right because and I've had to like learn how to release that in an annual way.   - LIesel Mertes So we've tried a number of different things. What I have to release emotionally is that no matter what we do it never feels good like it never feels right. And I can get into this cycle of like   -  Elaine Brenner I haven't quite scratched that itch.   - Liesel Mertes I haven't done it like especially from my personality like I haven't executed well the grief. I want to honor a lot of. And I just it was like I don't know maybe six years ago or seven that I really like it's always gonna feel bad because she's always dead.   - Liesel Mertes That's sad. And like you can't ever get around that like it can be the day that like touch it you know checks all these boxes and I will always feel like exhausted and incomplete because it is incomplete like right then it isn't right. It's not right isn't right. And it feels like   -  Elaine Brenner Cupcakes don't make it right.   -  Liesel Mertes Cupcakes are great right. You get it from a good place. But yeah they they don't touch that reality anymore.   - Elaine Brenner I'm wondering after Mercy died what ways because part of your job was school and part of your job was mom. And so, what ways did you find or looking back do you find that you were missed and those capacities? And did people tell you or did you just intuit it because you're you?   - Liesel Mertes How Mercy's death intersected with aspects of like faith or purpose or who you know I was in the universe or who kind of like those were major themes like me you have something horrible happen. There was a lot of those things called everything into question. And there is a certain way that people of faith can talk about death which can, can feel really packaged and switching. Kind of like cliched and it was out of a number of well-meaning places but like well there's, there's a higher purpose in all this.   -  Elaine Brenner And I made an angel.   -  Liesel Mertes Oh that was one of the worst statements like that God needed an angel just those like pat phrases that I felt like flattened out the reality of like you're seeing me like you just saying a thing even if I might come around and like the thing you're saying like that deliver you right.  It felt abrasive and it felt like there was no great way to respond to that. Like even if I was at a place where I just thought like, That's crazy, you're like you, you can't really say that somebody is dumb.   - Liesel Mertes So you left to the position of just like nodding kind of I and maybe, maybe if I had a little more chutzpah. I think it's I think I would artfully say that now to people who like who I observed saying those things, you know, I might pull him aside after that think, like, I do really want to imply what is being implied in that?   -  Elaine Brenner Right. Yeah. So I think it's it's a lack of those ways and lack of knowing. Again, I think this speaks to the work that you're doing the lack of knowing what to say right in the void of options. People pick the thing that's most palatable to them. What was recently said to them right.   -  Liesel Mertes They have a limited toolkit. Yeah. Like I've got a hammer, I've got a wrench and I've got God has a purpose. So and like, the upside people who did things well I mean I am what I really I didn't even know what I wanted.   - Liesel Mertes I can't even say like I wanted this and people failed. But something that felt meaningful was that people were just like, that's really hard right. I can remember telling someone and, and he was he just drives like that's just one of the worst things I've ever heard. He, he, he dropped an expletive he was like, Yeah. And I felt like resonant in its own way.   You know it is physical gestures. I remember like I'm Mercy died, she died around maybe ten thirty p.m. And then there was this like process wanting to like spend time with her body that felt important and you know we wanted to do things like get footprints or handprints, where you didn't wanna do that while she was alive.   - Liesel Mertes So my mother and father-in-law and I were doing that, but by the time the undertaker came, you know it's such a strange thing you know this person who arrives at like 3:00 in the morning in a black suit. And he came with like a quilt that they put, I have always appreciated even that little attunement. I got him to say waking up the next morning…   - Elaine Brenner And you'd given birth giving birth eight days beforehand. So, all of this like regardless of the outcome you're still a person who has recovery   - Liesel Mertes Um but I remember waking up and you don't even know like having encounter that day and my sister came downstairs just kind of silently with an English muffin. And I was like, yeah, I do just like one in English you to eat and eat um and, and especially in the immediacy, like people showed up to clean my house or detail my car right give us gift certificates. Easter was not so long after and I just felt horrible, it felt horrible to be doing like Easter. I felt horrible, like the weather was crummy and, you know, we had an MCL gift certificate which at least I was like, well at least we can get something that's you know we can eat.   - Liesel Mertes So those, those physical gestures felt like deeply meaningful and right it somebodies frames couldn't quite hit the mark.   – Elaine Brenner So and talking about those kinds of gestures and talk about say the ensuing months were there things that people did. You've talked about Gail and Mark from student services and the photographer to me. Those things strike me as things that only that person was able to do or that that person specifically was able to do maybe that, you know, Gail couldn't have shown up and taking great photographs you know. So what were things, what are the things that stand out now as you look back over the ensuing months that people did to support you that were unique or specifically very helpful?   - Liesel Mertes That question makes me think of people who gave out of there, like you said, people came out of a specific skill set, like the person in detail my car and I'm like, he was just really good at cleaning out cars. So, he felt like, you should have this. I could do it. You should have a clean car when you drive to the funeral, which I never would have thought of asking for.   - Liesel Mertes I didn't I, I in my mind, didn't think I cared about my floorboards and I probably didn't you know notice that but to, to ask yourself, what what am I good at doing that I can give freely because sometimes people offer help to people in grief like, let me know if there's anything I can do and what if someone says to you I'd like for you to watch my children and you think I hate children and   -  Elaine Brenner You don't want me to watch your children.   -  Liesel Mertes Right. So, to be able to think specifically like, I am really great at mowing the lawn and I do it on Tuesdays and Thursdays.   – Elaine Brenner Well plus, I say the hard thing about when someone says, let me know what I can do I'll do anything. Then you're just putting the onus back on the person that you know barely has the energy to shower much less put together the schedule that they have or whatever.   - LIesel Mertes Exactly so to be able to do it what you can offer meals were great. As I as I said we were living in Bloomington. So, there were people who drove down you know the like clean our house. I. It was later, I mean Mercy died in February, by Christmas time that you know even that next Christmas time, I felt still it's like such a low ebb. My mom was like, I'm going to decorate your house for Christmas like, which was great. I always appreciated people checking in. I think sometimes there is this fear of like if I bring this up you're gonna be sad.   - Liesel Mertes  And I remember even, you know, just my, my business school classmates who would who would ask like, hey you know, how are you doing with your sadness? And even to the level of people who were insightful enough to say, I know this can be like hard on your marriage how are you doing with you and Luke. And there were sometimes that I didn't want to talk about that like that's also it's good to ask those questions.   - Liesel Mertes You also should be prepared that sometimes people want to talk about that and sometimes they might not and not be offended and be like, you didn't want to I asked you this. So, people who can like take that with an open hand. And also, I think something that was helpful was like there were times where I was I was just doing my work like I was facilitating conversation or preparing for a presentation and like doing a good job and to be able to just recognize that like you did a really good job in that presentation. I think for me and a lot of people you you can doubt your competence and capacity. So for people that come alongside and be like that's a great point.   - Elaine Brenner So you then had Moses and the experience with Moses could potentially have been similar. So talk about that a little bit.   - Liesel Mertes Well so, it's this totalizing thing to have a child that we knew when I have children after Mercy. Jemima was our next little baby. She's delightful she's almost seven. Thankfully, I actually didn't feel like that was a pregnancy that was overshadowed by a lot of apprehension or fear. It could have been it just wasn't, in my experience. There was something that I felt was different with Moses. We were we were going to go on vacation over with, with extended family over New Year's. And I remember feeling as we were down on this beach just thinking like, and I had a 20 week scan coming up in January and just the sense of, I just, for whatever reason, like I can't wait for that to be over. And it was just this like kind of like hang, hanging I haven't felt that with Jemima, I just want it to be past that in a roundabout way. That felt like aspect of confirmation as we went in. And once you've had a complicated pregnancy, they tend to take you for a more in-depth scan and that the doctors were up in Indianapolis. They said it's a boy.   And um and they left and Luke and I had maybe five minutes of sitting there and we actually said to each other isn't it so great to be in this space so many people are getting such hard news. Isn't it great. Just not. And look we're going to have sons; he'd always wanted a brother. So this was gonna be the second boy. And so, then that moment where the doctor comes back to tell us about Moses his heart condition, which is unrelated in any way to what Mercy had to say.   He's he's entirely missing one of his valves. Tetralogy of fallot with pulmonary atresia. It's, it's different in the last 30 years what they can do with the heart is staggering, that I heard someone say I think was my father. The brain is much more like a complex computer. If something goes wrong with that, you know just the impact is huge and very complex. Whereas the heart is much more it's like a pump, you know and how they show this condition actually and Riley specifically is a fantastic hospital doctor John Brown pioneered some of the cutting edge procedures and he was Mo’s surgeon.   So all those aspects of prognosis were better. You know if you're going to paint a rosy picture of like, well this is better   -  Elaine Brenner But 20 week scan 20 week scan.   -  Liesel Mertes Right. Right. And the horrible thing of just being confronted again with like there's something I can't control for my child and I'm so sad about that. I didn't, somebody could very legitimately feel like, why me like I, that actually, I felt occasional aspects of that but it was more this sense of like, oh I've stepped in the world of now like I've heard so many stories like this complicated things wrong miscarriages disabilities young children dying. If anything it felt like, it is a crapshoot. And totally random. Why not me again.   -  Liesel Mertes It's a different journey with surgeries and medical intervention and preparing, you know Moses had his first surgery when he was six days old so I remember like, again, delivering a baby. We couldn't even be in the same hospital; he was taken by ambulance I delivered him at Methodist he had to be taken by ambulance to a different hospital down the road with Luke. So, we're not even in the same building. I'm having to get chauffeured over there by taxi. He's gonna have surgery five days five or six days later.   So I'm figuring out like logistics for my other kids. Magnus is having preschool graduations. I'm three days postpartum bringing cupcakes to Magnus and then going to Riley where Moses is in surgery and just all of these like moving parts. And Moses has had subsequent surgeries, he's had a couple of catheterizations and few open heart surgeries. The support around our family of like preparing for surgery again. Meals, help with children. Something that was so particular is we have had a group of people who have stayed with Moses through the night at the hospital. You Elaine are one of those lovely people because we can’t stay 24 hours.   -  Elaine Brenner But I think that speaks to your again your ability to kind of honor what the needs are in the moment because I think there are many people who certainly could benefit from having people around them do that and probably have the people around them willing to do that. I mean I know I felt both I don't know. Honored and sort of special that you would trust me to stay with this baby you know and in the hospital and while you could sleep and liking to be asked and liking to be able to do it. But I think there are a lot of people who don't know themselves well enough to know that they would need it or even if they know it feel that they couldn't write well   -  Liesel Mertes And maybe, maybe that circles around to like I don't remember ever feeling shamed by asking for help although that was a fear right. Like, I think if anybody would have done that to me it could have caused significant shut down like, if somebody had met me and been like why do you need. Like, shouldn't you be with your baby through night.   Which maybe gets to like the importance of healthy people if somebody does actually ask try not to make them feel like a burden. I can have its own, but yeah I feel like people honored that and it was super helpful and important. And then there's, like you just need this new support in the aftermath of you know like after heart surgery he, you're kind of homebound for a while because he can't get sick. He can't go out. So, having people come and visit and or take the other children out there are people who is a great thing to be able to do.   We had people friends of my parents who they've taken upon themselves that anytime Mo’s having surgery like they're going to bring a bunch of food to the waiting room because we're usually there through lunch.   I think you've been there and so you know I think in the past we've gone. Indian food delivered or brisket. It was great like the last time we had this fantastic barbecue and the physicians came out these this surgeon and the attending surgeon and they gave us the news and it was this gift that we've been given to have food but we're able to actually extend that to them. Dr. Brown would you like to have some? Yes he does. I'd like to do that before. So there's things that we're good.   I like cards; I like it when people check in. You didn't ask this, but I think sometimes, especially people who are far away and they wonder how they can be supportive. I've had friends likes and Starbucks gift cards or just emails and I always appreciate that.   -  Elaine Brenner So do you think your experience with Mercy when you got the news about Moses. Were there things that you thought you know. Again not not the same but you were sort of dealing with that limbo feeling of, of what's going to happen here and just the grief of I know this isn't going to be smooth sailing from here on out. So were there things when you got the news about Moses that you thought, OK I know I need to handle this differently I know I need to do this?   -  Liesel Mertes Yeah I think that I, I feel very refreshed by being outside by moving like to be in like to go on a walk or to be on a trail run or paddle board feels it's something that fills my cup in particular ways. So, I think I knew that about myself in a different way. That's, that's not a selfish thing. That's an important thing. So, I should honor that. I think I knew I knew more about that stage of life how I, I wanted a community of people that were like in it.   I had realized actually that to be able to talk about your struggles or the hard things actually I had found opened up a vulnerability in other people. And like, they move towards me and support, like I had found, whether that was in a women's study group that I was in or just like friends at that stage of life had actually been a really true way of connecting. So, so I was much more comfortable like putting that out there and expecting that people would meet me right.    - Liesel Mertes I, even though we anticipated it. I mean, it's hard on your marriage and there's a reason statistically, I mean, people will quote anywhere from 60 to 80 percent of marriages where a child dies end in divorce. And it was, even though I anticipated it would again, be super hard and stressful in my marriage in a way that you know, we've, we've had to revisit in subsequent an important marriage counseling. And even, even like knowing that I would actually say that the stress of there was the stress of Moses but like the stress that it was in my marriage and in my relationships only like compounded and exacerbated that I don't evenm, I mean maybe if we had had better self-knowledge and counseling prior to that we'd had counseling but yeah, I'm sure it was impactful. We've had more targeted better counselling since then.   -  Liesel Mertes I wish that could have been different, but it almost felt like inevitable because for both Luke and I so value our parenting. You know, we will take our stress out on your kids, but there is this sense of like, I am so stressed out there's so many things I shouldn't take it out on my children I'm gonna really try hard not to. And they're just relentless. Children are relentless. They, they kind of know, they kind of have a sense but they just need a lot because they're kids. And so, you can spend all day keeping it in check and trying to do a good job. But then when it comes to the other adult in the household if they need anything or step out of line it can feel so like deeply offensive like you to like how great you need something or how could you drop the ball.   And that is its own, you know I don't want to be that way in any of my relationships like that begrudging of like, there's no space for you to be weak but in a roundabout way, like that would be the outplay of it. So, I wish I could have been different. I'm, I'm glad that we weathered it enough but that was like a painful aspect of something that even I could see coming. But almost like it couldn't stop the train right because it was so immediate.   - Elaine Brenner You're just surviving better.   - Liesel Mertes We don't do that as much. But then again, we don't have a child like in medical crisis. And our kids are a little older. It changes it.   -  Elaine Brenner So so, given that now you've gone through these two in some way similar but very different kind of grief inducing experiences, what insights do you have to share with someone else going through something similar?   - Liesel Mertes It's going to be really hard. It's just really sad, especially if it's touching on the health of your children. I mean it is. You never think that you would have to bury a child is horrible, horrible. It's universally recognized as horrible.   I, I felt, you know for me again like God and purpose, like I felt God as gentle towards me in the midst of that. And especially like there are people that might encounter like someone might be listening and you might not have a great community you might be surrounded by people who are like rushing you or don't have time for your sadness. And that's really hard. I hope that people can be gentle with themselves to allow themselves the space to be like a day might be full of so many complicated emotions.   You know, you might be like sad detached happy over like, in the space of an hour and just, like give yourself the space to have grief be messy and nonlinear. But I have also experienced that there were chapters like beyond the immediacy of that grief. And that's not to paint some rosy picture like oh it's all gonna be better because I mean sometimes it's worse or different but just that like it will not it will not feel the same as it does right now.   - Liesel Mertes Knowing, knowing things that are life giving you might not know much. You might only know like I love eating french bread right now. Or like I just I really need to go for a walk or you know I, if, if you know it like, it's good to pay attention to your gut and what is leading you in. And that there's like, I don't know there's different ways to carry it. There is a hardness but also a sweetness to like…I, I am, over the years like integrating Mercy a lot more into my life. But like my, I think that fear is like, that this person will be forgotten like no one might, my child will fade.   I don't know. I don't even have something like that a real thing. But I find, year in and year out like, she continues to be an important part of our, our family and our, I think and this is like a roundabout way for, for anyone who is in a caregiving position like, you work with someone or you care for them, that that with a child who has died like that is a real fear:  no one, one I will.   I, I mean, I was even feeling this last year. It is important to be able to carry that memory with them, you know, if you're someone that remembers their name and they remembers their birthday that is willing to speak that it's always meaningful to me.   - Liesel Mertes It like, even people who, you know, maybe they read like the blog I was keeping at the time and they told me years later and it feels like, well it feels like one more way that Mercy is made real in the world. But even this last year I was I was reflecting on my, my parents died, like I was picturing myself as an 80 year old woman, should I live that long. And I was like, right now my kids like, I take them to remember Mercym like we do things but I'll probably be living their whole lives like when they're in their 50s or 60s like, will this day still be important to them?   Like I hope they still remember, but like my mom will be dead, my dad will probably be dead. You know, all these people. And I was like, I'm going to be like celebrating Mercy's birthday all by myself. So, I called to my sister, I was like well you do like little road trips with me? We could do that because from your entire life know that might still be the case but I'd love to just hope that I have the necessary resilience to deal with that.   MUSICAL TRANSITION   It is a particular thing to really listen to and reflect on your own story. I can hear some themes that remain the same over the years and others that have shifted and changed with time. We are always in the process of becoming alongside of our stories.  But for today, here are a few key takeaways that I have, after listening to my story.    When you offer help to someone that is hurting, give specific examples of ways you want to help instead of a vague, “Just let me know if you need anything.” This statement puts the pressure of imagining tasks and organizing logistics back on the grieving person and sets you up for failure if they ask you to do something that you can’t or don’t want to deliver on. Be purposeful and careful with your language around purpose and meaning, especially well-meaning clichés. Take a moment to pause before you speak.  Trite turns of phrase are rarely comforting and often hurtful.  Instead, offer a hug or a sincere, “I am so sorry you are going through this.”  You don’t have to make meaning for a person that is hurting. A real fear for parents of dead children is that their child will be forgotten. Take time to write down important dates like birthdays.  Remember the parents around Mother’s or Father’s Day. Take time to say the child’s name or ask the parent to share a memory.  These acts of attention and intention are so meaningful.   OUTRO

Hi everyone, and thank you for tuning in to another episode of the We Make Books Podcast - A podcast about writing, publishing, and everything in between! We’ve recovered from Submissions September and we’re back to our regular schedule this week!  And after going through the whole process of preparing and submitting your novel, we thought what better to talk about than what comes next?  Writing, editing, and publishing after your debut book is different in every way - the writing, editing, and even just coming up with the ideas are all changed this time around.  This week we talk about what it’s like on the other side of debut and what happens when you get the question “What are you working on next?” We Make Books is hosted by Rekka Jay and Kaelyn Considine; Rekka is a published author and Kaelyn is an editor and together they are going to take you through what goes into getting a book out of your head, on to paper, in to the hands of a publisher, and finally on to book store shelves. We Make Books is a podcast for writer and publishers, by writers and publishers and we want to hear from our listeners! Hit us up on our social media, linked below, and send us your questions, comments, concerns, and maybe a cute picture of your pet? We hope you enjoy We Make Books! Twitter: @WMBCast  |  @KindofKaelyn  |  @BittyBittyZap Instagram: @WMBCast  Patreon.com/WMBCast Rekka: 00:01   Welcome back to another episode of We Make Books, a podcast about writing, publishing and everything in between. I am Rekka, I write science fiction and fantasy as RJ Theodore. New Speaker:  00:10   And I'm Kaelyn. I am the acquisitions editor for Parvus Press. Rekka: 00:13   And today we are finally done with Submissions September. New Speaker:  00:18   We survived. Rekka: 00:19   We survived. Kaelyn: 00:19   It was touch and go there for awhile. Rekka: 00:21   Which you know. Okay. So this is funny timing on these episodes. We talk all about submissions in theory. By the end of submission September you've got a book deal. New Speaker:  00:29   Yes. Rekka: 00:30   So immediately what do you start working on? New Speaker:  00:33   Your next book. Rekka: 00:34   Something else, right. So this is what this episode pretty much boils down to is, Hey, um, whenever you have a break in the production of the book that is coming out next, make sure you're thinking about the book after that and we'll get into why and we'll get into how a little bit. Um, it's going to be personal, like whatever works best for you. But really, um, the advice in this episode is, um, is pretty sound. I think you've got to - New Speaker:  00:59   Yeah, it's um, it's a daunting prospect I think sometimes. Rekka: 01:04   Like, what do you mean I have to do that again? Yeah. Well the good news is at least submission. September will go differently the second time when you're selling it to a book or you're selling it to a publisher who already wants it. New Speaker:  01:13   Exactly. Yeah. Rekka: 01:14   That cuts out a lot of the anxiety and that sort of thing. Um, and you're moving into a like, yeah, I've done this, I know how this works kind of thing. And so you have a lot of insight. Um, you're a veteran now. You're, you're, you're wizened and sure enough the submission was seasoned and, and ready to hit the next one. In theory, you want to make a career of this. So a, that's what this episode gets into is what's next. You sold your book, um, submission, September ended in triumph and now, um, and now we look ahead to the next project. You stay creative, stay writing, stay drafting. New Speaker:  01:48   So, um, yeah, it's a little more of a, you know, I won't say emotional, but you know. Rekka: 01:53   I think it was pretty dry. I mean, this is just like, Hey, this is the, the truth of it. New Speaker:  01:57   Yeah. Rekka: 01:58   Thinking about it. This is the hard facts people. New Speaker:  02:00   Yup. Rekka: 02:00   So enjoy the episode. Here it comes. Speaker 2:       02:13   Music Rekka: 02:17   Now I've turned off the phone. New Speaker:  02:18   So the volume is up, the fan is off. I have tea, we're ready to go now. Rekka: 02:27   And were wearing sunglasses. New Speaker:  02:30   Is that a Men In Black reference? Rekka: 02:32   Blues Brothers. New Speaker:  02:33   Oh geez. I'm embarrassed. Rekka: 02:35   That you should be. New Speaker:  02:36   That was sad for me. Rekka: 02:37   Like I feel like you should represent Chicago even though you're mostly in New York. New Speaker:  02:41   I'm all New York. I've been - Rekka: 02:43   No your, your a little bit Philadelphia. New Speaker:  02:45   Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well more of that. Like I've been to Chicago once and it was to go meet the Baker and Taylor people. Um, I flew there, sat in the United lounge with Colin and worked on stuff for five hours, got in an uber, went to the Baker and Taylor people, got an Uber, came back, had dinner, got on a plane. Rekka: 03:05   So you got there early and you just sat in the airport for five hours or was it? New Speaker:  03:08   Yeah the way the flights work you kind of, and it was also one of those like I'm just going to get up at four in the morning, get on literally the first flight out of LaGuardia because I do not want to risk that there is a problem and I get there late. Rekka: 03:20   Fair enough. New Speaker:  03:20   So yeah, we sat in the United lounge, got a lot done. It was super productive. Um, so that is all I've ever seen of Chicago. Rekka: 03:28   The United lounge, that's about it. I don't think there's really much more to it than that. New Speaker:  03:31   They had an excellent tea bar in there because, um, well I don't drink coffee. So usually like you go to those places, it's like, Oh, here's some hot water and a tea bag, I guess. Rekka: 03:40   Yeah. New Speaker:  03:41   They had honey and different kinds of sugar and mint and lemon and orange slices. Rekka: 03:46   Okay. I'm impressed when you get to mint, everything else. I was like, well that's just Panera. New Speaker:  03:50   They had fresh mint and it was um, do two different kinds of honey. I was very impressed. I was like, Oh, actual sugar cubes. Rekka: 03:59   Hmm. New Speaker:  03:59   Yeah. I don't know why I'm so excited about that. But it was, it was fun. Rekka: 04:02   You do drink tea. New Speaker:  04:03   Yeah. But I don't put sugar in it. Rekka: 04:05   But it's nice to know that someone's considered your tea drinking. Kaelyn: 04:09   Absolutely, yes. Rekka: 04:10   It's nice to be appreciated. New Speaker:  04:12   Because you coffee drinkers, you guys get all the - Rekka: 04:15   Oh no worries. Um, ever been at a gas station? New Speaker:  04:18   You guys get all of the like fancy stuff and like it's nice to see someone go, tea can also be fancy or - Rekka: 04:23   Are you just sad that there's no pumpkin spice now? New Speaker:  04:26   You know what? I'm not a big fan of that. Rekka: 04:30   Are you a tastes like soap person? New Speaker:  04:31   No, but I will say pumpkin bread. That's my jam. Rekka: 04:36   Well that's very different from a pumpkin spice tea. New Speaker:  04:38   I know. And I'm saying like it's - Rekka: 04:39   Not a coffee is not. New Speaker:  04:40   Yeah, I'm not into all that like pumpkin spice, whatever. It smells good. Rekka: 04:46   You know what? This is really topical for the first episode of October. I feel like we nailed it. We totally didn't even mean to do that. New Speaker:  04:52   It was 100% intentional. Rekka: 04:53   Okay. Yeah. So this is the first episode of October. New Speaker:  04:56   Yup. Rekka: 04:57   This one's mine. New Speaker:  04:58   This one's yours. Rekka: 04:59   Kaelyn got to pick the last full topical episode topic. Then she looked at me when we were trying to decide the next one blank from eyes to soul going, I have no more ideas. New Speaker:  05:13   We um, yeah, we mentally did some things to ourselves with Submissions September. We're kind of like, is that it? Are we done now? Rekka: 05:22   Like did we nail it? Is the podcast over? New Speaker:  05:24   I think it's over. Rekka: 05:25   Okay. Let's go play mini golf with me. Kaelyn: 05:27   Yeah, exactly. And then we came to our senses and we were like, no, there's probably still a lot going on here. Rekka: 05:32   Writers still write, editors still edit, acquirers still acquire. Kaelyn: 05:37   We and we always will that's what we do. We gather. Rekka: 05:42   You accumulate like so much catamary. Kaelyn: 05:46   So today where I'm kind of kicking it back over to a more author centric sort of thing. Rekka: 05:53   Yeah. So when we were trying to come up with topics, I mean like I'm blank except for what's on my mind pertaining to my own writing. So, um, at this point, you know, there are things that come up, like you've been writing a series and suddenly like the end of the series is in sight. And the question is, Kaelyn: 06:14   This is in no way relevant to anything that's happening to Rekka right now. Rekka: 06:17   No, no. Well that's what I said. You know, it's, it's on my mind because it's on my mind. And so when you can see the end of this uh series in sight, or if your book was a standalone, someone, probably an agent or a publisher, your editor, someone is going to say, so what do you got next? Because chances are in your contract, there's a, there's a funny little clause in there that they get to see your next thing, um, before you send it to anyone else. Kaelyn: 06:42   That's true. Rekka: 06:43   So, um, when they start looking for that thing because they're planning their calendars out maybe two or three years in advance. Kaelyn: 06:51   Yeah. Actually. And you know what, that's a good thing to kind of stop and take note of is that we do plan these things out quite a bit in advance. We've talked before about, you know, understand how long it's gonna take to get your book published. Rekka: 07:05   Yeah. Kaelyn: 07:06   So then on top of that from the publisher side, they've got a factor in how long it's going to take you to write something then go through this whole probably 18, minimum 18 month - Rekka: 07:17   Usually. Kaelyn: 07:17   - process. Rekka: 07:18   Sometimes more depending on that publishers slate. Kaelyn: 07:21   So yeah. Rekka: 07:23   Yes. I have heard from um from friends, I will not name publishers, but they're, you know, there are some publishers that are already looking at 2023. Kaelyn: 07:31   Yeah. Rekka: 07:31   Which is, which is a lot to think about as a writer. Like wow, that seems really far away if you are submitting to them. But if they're turning around and saying, Hey, what you got for us next? And you're like, I don't know, you had any, I gotta write something, have me, you kind of wrapped up in those revisions or something, you know, then it's, then it seems really close. Kaelyn: 07:50   Yeah. Rekka: 07:51   Or at least the fact that they want to buy something for that year now seems like, Whoa, okay, hold up there. I gotta breathe for a minute. You know? Um, so yeah, that's one of the things that you know, to think about as you're working. Say you're, this is your first contract, um, your first sale of a, of a book or a series. You go from writing in your own time, determining how fast you're going to finish it, um, what you want to work on. Everything's kind of in that creation mode. Then once your book enters a publisher's calendar, now you have revisions line at it, copy edits, then there's promotion. And chances are, as an author, you're going to have to write either some interview questions or some guest posts for other people's blogs. Um, there might be some articles for your own website. The publisher may want you to put, you know, put an article somewhere. There's always something to do to work on this book, like right up and sometimes even after it's released. So, um, that can take up a lot of time. And if you are already balancing uh, something else in your life, like a full time job, maybe you're a caretaker for somebody, maybe you just have gobs of doctor's appointments to go to and um, every spare minute is kind of predetermined. Then all that writing time that you used to find for yourself and you probably had to wrestle for that too, is now like your revision time or your reviewing your copy at its time or you're proofing your layout's time and then the book goes out and you have not really been potentially writing as much. Kaelyn: 09:34   Well, because I think you, think about like, Oh my writing time, but then what it becomes is really it becomes your book time. Rekka: 09:39   Right. Kaelyn: 09:40   Don't think about it as - Rekka: 09:41   That was my writing time. Kaelyn: 09:42   That was your writing time. That was you're working on your book time. Be that, you know, writing it, revising it, prepping for release. Rekka: 09:52   It's all working on your book. Kaelyn: 09:53   It's all working on your book. Rekka: 09:54   Those are just the phases of the process that you aren't maybe drafting creatively anymore. I mean sometimes revisions, there's significant chunks that are basically starting over from scratch kind of thing for certain scenes or even sections. But um, yeah, it starts to feel like that time belongs to someone else where it used to belong to you because these are things that publishers asking you to do. Kaelyn: 10:18   You're going, well, so then what's going to happen is you're going to get some of it back. Rekka: 10:22   Yeah. Kaelyn: 10:22   Because you're done. And now it's, now what? Rekka: 10:28   Well, that's tricky for me is because when I'm working on things that are like, I want to say like logic brained. A revision is solving problems. A proofing pass is thinking analytically about things. I'm writing a blog essay that's nonfiction about your writing is very different from just writing creatively. It's a totally different mindset. You're, you're forming these things more like an essay with, uh, you know, opening in a conclusion and all these things. And when you go to sit down to write again, it's, it feels like you're using muscles that have atrophied while you've been doing these other things. Kaelyn: 11:11   Yeah. I think, um, I think one of the hard things to really do is to mentally shift back to the, I don't want to say creative side, but I will say creating, Rekka: 11:21   Well it's almost like when you write a draft, you kind of fall into a flow state when things are going really well, you are in a flow state and that is not your, your logical processors are not engaged for that. You are just, you know, letting this inspiration flow and it sounds muse-y and um, poetic or whatever. But you get to a point where things are just kind of happening in, you're more like a stenographer for your story than you are actively engaged in making decisions about your story. Kaelyn: 11:53   Well, and the other of this is also that going back to mentally shifting and changing, you know, changing gears here, there's a very good chance that you're going to be starting on your next project long before your book comes out. Either it'd be a standalone or the last in a series. And to be clear, that is what we're talking about. We're not talking about wrapping up a series. We're talking about an entirely new thing happening now, Rekka: 12:20   Right. We're talking about what's the next idea that you've got to sell. Kaelyn: 12:25   Yeah. And you're probably, if you want to maintain a schedule where you are, you know, than putting out another book as if you know, you were in the same, uh, production schedule is before you're going to be working on that long before your book, your final book comes out. Rekka: 12:44   Right. Kaelyn: 12:45   Um, so mentally kind of getting yourself over to, okay, now I've got to come up with something else. Rekka: 12:54   Well, some people may be lucky enough that they have these copious ideas and they just have to write them down and then when it's time to pick something else, they just go to their bucket and they say, what looks good today? And that's fantastic. If you have that. Um, it's still tricky because you've got to fit in working on this, around these other things. Like your revisions come back or your copy of it comes back. So you may think like, Oh, it's July, I'm going to start drafting that book and maybe I'll get to like 20,000 words or something. And then your revisions come back halfway through the month and while they need to get back to them. So you stop everything you're doing and you work on your revisions during that time that you would normally schedule for writing this new project. Kaelyn: 13:35   Yeah, and something that I even struggle with just as an editor is, is getting in the zone. Rekka: 13:42   Yeah, oh bouncing between, um, different worlds basically. Kaelyn: 13:46   Different, this sounds silly, different writing styles, but mentally kind of, you know, it's one thing like, okay, I have last book in this series. I've done the developmental edits, I've done the revisions, but then getting it back and having to work on the line edits if you're then drafting something new at this point, that's, it's a huge mental shift. I have all these tricks that I use for like when I've got to jump between books. I have um every book I work on gets a playlist. Um, at one point I had different teas that I would drink when I was working on different books, just to kind of trick myself into like, ah, yes, I remember what I felt like when doing this. Rekka: 14:26   Yeah, I did that with incense before my throat to bother me. Um, I would come out here and whatever project I was working on would have its own scent of incense and then I've developed my throat problems. So incense was irritating it and I haven't been able to use that one. But yeah, music definitely I switch music. Um, background sounds bef- between different projects. Kaelyn: 14:49   Yeah, it's, I think people underestimate how difficult that is to kind of get back into the mental state you're in when working on one thing. Rekka: 14:52   Plus for me, you know, if I have like two hours in the morning before I go to work, I know I'm not going to finish that. Next thing I want to do so I know it's going to take me multiple days to work on. So if I expect that I'm going to have to break and do something else in two days, then I have a really hard time allowing myself to shift modes. Like I will lose two days worth of work because I know in two days I'm going to be working on something else again. And it just kind of ends up being wasted procrastination time because I know that there's something looming and it prevents me from feeling like I can really get back into the one thing that I was going to try and do before that came back and I am a hybrid publisher, which means I am traditionally published through Parvus but I also work on my own stories and release them in my own ways. I've got um, Patreon content that I then um, edit and release as final versions, which I just recently did and I have novellas in the same world that Parvus is publishing longer novels in and um, check your contracts kids, this may not be permissible by yours, but I was pretty careful to get that written in. Kaelyn: 16:12   Rekka is allowed to do that. Rekka: 16:13   Yeah. This is in my contract. I'm allowed to publish and non-novel length stories in the same world. Kaelyn: 16:20   Again, everyone read your contracts. Rekka: 16:22   Don't - and make sure your publisher, even if it's in your contract, make sure your publisher is aware of what you're planning because they might have like either a suggestion about what might work better or in terms of how to like release things. Um, or like, Hey, we're concerned that that's going to cannibalize your sales or something like that. Kaelyn: 16:43   That should be our next thing that we print or make just stickers that say, read your contract. Rekka: 16:49   We, uh, yeah. So, um, so yes, by my contract I'm allowed to do these things, but it means that I'm producing a lot of stuff all at once and various stages. And, um, so switching back and forth between those things, it helps me to um, go in and say like, okay, this week I'm working on revisions for all things because when I finish one and go into the next, it doesn't feel like that, like uphill slog to change tracks, but doing all these things and then having day job on top of it means that it's really hard to sort of find the open space that I can start to create new ideas and stories in. And so that's sort of one of the things I wanted to talk about today was not just like find time for it and figure out how to switch back and forth. But like we said at the beginning, be aware that your publisher's going to be thinking further out then your next release with them and they're going to come back and say, do you have for us? Kaelyn: 17:50   Freaks me out how far in advance I have to think about things. I recently had to go into my calendar and put something on there for the middle of 2021. And I'm like, Oh my God, that, that doesn't even sound like a real date to me. And that's what they hear. But then I'm like, Oh God, that's, that's less than two years away. Rekka: 18:06   So when you put something on your calendar for 2021, it was just over a full year away. But it's. Kaelyn: 18:20   Two, almost two. Rekka: 18:22   No, it's October. Kaelyn. Kaelyn: 18:24   Middle of 2021 is almost two years away. Rekka: 18:27   Nah, not, not when you start rushing toward it. So you have to subtract back, you know, say you're on an 18 month publication schedule, you have to subtract back from that. And that's like the latest that you need to be sort of getting a new draft of something, honestly, unless you've got a real plan and a real solid. Kaelyn: 18:46   It is. Even though it's funny because it's something that I know these things like I do every time. So, you know, we acquire a book, we get the contract signed, we, you know, ritually, uh, do what we need to, to the author. Don't worry about that people. It's nothing. There's, there's certainly no sacrifices involved. Rekka: 19:05   Just bottles of alcohol. Kaelyn: 19:08   Um, and then you sit down and you go, okay, the release dates going to be this and you start working backwards in the calendar and yeah, it never ceases to freak me out. Rekka: 19:16   Yeah. Even though it seems like it's really far away until you back all the way up to like okay first draft needs to be turned in on Oh shit. Tomorrow Kaelyn: 19:24   and but you know what, that's the thing is when you, I think we think about the ultimate goal of publication and it's so far away and then when you see all of the things that you actually are going to have to do leading up to that and some of them are next week. Rekka: 19:37   Yeah, some of them are. Yeah. Like make announcements to things or update the website to add your author and like watch out for this exciting new project that's coming your way. We'll announce it soon. You know, newsletters should be going out pretty regularly and so an author is going to release new newsletters too. That's one more thing on your plate. That's nonfiction, non-creative, non flow state kind of projects. So be aware that your publisher is already thinking that far ahead. And we mentioned recently that when a publisher picks up an author's book, they're also expecting that that author is going to be part of the publishing company's brand. Kaelyn: 20:18   Yeah. Rekka: 20:18   So they're looking to continue to expose you to their audience. Kaelyn: 20:22   Yes. Rekka: 20:23   And so that means no, you don't really want to wait three years from what you're one stand alone to the next or from the end of your series to the next project. Kaelyn: 20:31   And that, I mean that is a definitely a thing we consider is that like, you know in Rekka's case, you wrote what we, we don't even know what to call it. So many fricking genres here. Rekka: 20:43   Hey, what can I say? I'm a collector. Kaelyn: 20:46   Salvage is, is out now. So I can, can I, can I say - Rekka: 20:50   There's dinosaurs and zombies, people. There's an a bank heist. Kaelyn: 20:52   It's freakin zombies at the end of this one, okay? So, um, but Rekka as a brand where like, well Rekka writes, great things in space. So we have a little legion of readers that enjoy Rekka's writing about things in space. So obviously the next thing we're going to want out of her is not the same but it's something that will also appeal to - Rekka: 21:16   Right. You don't want me to turn around and write like an urban fantasy noir. Kaelyn: 21:21   Exactly. Rekka: 21:22   That's just going to confuse the readers. So when you are thinking about your future projects that you know your publisher's going to want because you've read your contract and you know that they have a, you know, next book kinda um, section in there, you know that they're going to want you to write something similar. Now if you know that they're having trouble positioning your book because you've written in 12 genres per chapter, then you might want to do them a solid and pick like one pretty solid, pretty marketable thing. But that's only if it inspires you. Kaelyn: 21:54   I mean, growing, you know, in Rekka talks a lot about this and I think it's an important thing, is that you, the author are a brand growing. Your brand is actually growing your audience. And no matter what your publisher does, no matter what the marketing is, a lot of your audience is going to follow you from book to book because they like you, you like your writing. Think about how many books you pick up that your dislike. Oh, I read something else by this person. I really liked it and just grab it. I do that constantly. I have so many authors that I follow because I just like the way they write, how they tell a story. Rekka: 22:35   Yeah. Kaelyn: 22:35   It can be a deciding factor for me. Rekka: 22:38   Yeah. So some of your readers are going to pick up your book no matter what you write, but your publisher is going to be aware that if you write something completely like turned around from the last thing that you might also have some readers who leave bad reviews because it's just not what they expected. And so that's a whole other thing. But you know like that is part of the mental calculation that's going on. It may not be the whole thing, but um, it's definitely something to consider. And maybe you as an author are writing tangentially to a position that the publisher wants to fill. They may have a conversation with you like, Hey, we'd like you to sort of write something like this. Do you have anything like that? And then so you know what they want. Hopefully you've got a couple ideas in your pocket that you can say, Oh well I have this one project that I, you know, it's backburnered at the moment, but this is what it is. Rekka: 23:31   And right here you're doing an elevator pitch now with someone who already knows and trusts you. Yeah. So that's, that's helpful. But you can still suddenly feel super on the spot and go, uh, well, um, so, uh, I guess, I mean like, give me a minute, you know? But yeah, when you have these ideas, you've also got the experience now of having a book published. You've seen what your query ended up looking like. You've seen what your back cover copy looked like. So you sort of have a rough idea of how to pitch things. You've gone through the process of trying to find comp titles. So when you are presenting these ideas that haven't even been outlined yet, maybe. Yup. Um, those tools will help you say like, you know, like you might even pull the comp titles out of your head. Like what if it's, uh, you know, dances with wolves but on a planet far away and with blue people. Kaelyn: 24:31   I mean, isn't that Avatar? Rekka: 24:32   Yeah. Nobody wants that. But you know, I'm just trying to, I was trying to create one that was was a story already. Um, so it's completely conceptual at that point. You've got an eye, a hint of a plot because you've mentioned one movie and you haven't said like, Oh, it's the um, you know, friendly animals have dances with wolves. You know, you've said like, well, so how do you come up with these things? You need to create room in your life to come up with new ideas because when you are churning out work, that's actually not a great way to generate new ideas unless you're procrastinating. And then in which case you go, Oh, this project would be really cool. I wish it was working on that and not this like that's, that's fine, but get, get to work on the thing you need to be working on. Rekka: 25:21   Like stop procrastinating, you'll be happy you did. Um, but so in those moments of procrastination, you are, you are going off and kind of refilling your well in a little bit of way, but like in a weird way that also generates resentment. But um, but yeah, you gotta refill your well, you've got to take breaks. You've got to create space in your life to observe and not be producing so that your brain can relax. This is why we get all our good ideas in the shower. Kaelyn: 25:51   That's, it's 100%. No, I mean this was like a scientific thing is that your, your brain is constantly, there's a thousand little processes running in the background that we don't know or see about and look, some people can sit down and go, all right, I've just got to come up with something and come up with something. Rekka: 26:09   And this is, I'm always reminds me, I think it was Family Guy where um, an editor is talking to Stephen King in his office and he says, so what have you got for his next? And Stephen King is just kinda like, you can see them eyeballing the room to sleep were says it's about a lamp. That family that gets attacked by a lamp monster. Kaelyn: 26:30   Yeah. Rekka: 26:30   Cause he looks at the lamp on the guy's desk and the editor's like fine, I'll buy it. Give me a draft. Kaelyn: 26:35   Just get me a draft in a couple months. Rekka: 26:37   Yeah. So I'm obviously mangling the quote cause I haven't seen this in years, but I always think of that scene when it's like someone like, what's your next story? I'm like, Oh shit. I don't know. Speaking from personal experience, I got a call from Colin of Parvus Press one day and he's like, Hey, so what are you working on next? I'm like, the third book you get out of here, please go away. But then, I mean, as Kaelyn said, your brain is always processing. So over the next week or so, maybe even a couple of weeks I had this input, you know, like this query that had been entered into my brain, what are you gonna work on next that isn't in the world of Peridot? Rekka: 27:14   And um, so like eventually my brain sort of engaged on something and I came up with a thing and I email or I think I texted him, I texted him the, the comp titles basically. Kaelyn: 27:24   You do text a lot. Rekka: 27:25   Yeah, I like to text, sorry. It's quick, it's easy, it's bite size. You can just ask one question and if the person on the other end feels so inclined, they can answer it. And um, so then he's like, cool, sounds good. I'm interested. And I'm like, all right, cool. So I think I might've sent him two or three and I kinda had an idea of when he was interested in and then the conversation came up again a little bit later like so, um, you know, you thinking about writing something else for as soon. Yeah, I guess so. Kaelyn: 27:59   Yes, so and by the way, I'm going to jump in here real quick on the publisher side of things, I especially, you know, my authors that I like, which like I don't have any authors I don't like. Rekka: 28:11   RIght. As part of your, your submission September process, you make sure that you will like the authors you're going to be dealing with. Kaelyn: 28:18   But I want to help them publish more things because I, we obviously like their writing and we like the readership that comes along with it. So I mean if you want to put it in strictly capitalists terms, it's good for business, but it's good for everyone. Rekka: 28:33   Yeah. Kaelyn: 28:33   Because I like working with this person. I know that they've got a certain built in readership that's going to follow them. Also, I want to help them be successful. That's like, that's one of the things that I take very seriously is that I want to help you, the writer be successful. Rekka: 28:48   Yeah. And part of that is generating content for your readers to glob onto and love forever. Kaelyn: 28:53   Exactly. Rekka: 28:53   Yeah. And so I just described this process of coming up with an idea, and I will be honest, it was not hours and hours of work. It was just having the awareness that I needed to be thinking about this. So those moments in the shower, watching TV, you know, looking out the window, going out in a drive there, - Kaelyn: 29:14   And you gather, it's like stray little thoughts, what about this? What about this? And then you kind of get them all into a bigger idea that will eventually unfold into a story. Rekka: 29:25   Yeah. And so the nice thing about this process, like I said, I didn't put a whole lot of effort into or like, okay, I won't say I didn't, it wasn't effort, but you know, it wasn't a lot of my production time. The other things that I had to be working on, it wasn't coming from that. It was those moments that I was already quiet and just knowing to keep it, like keep a eye open for incoming ideas. And then because I already had a relationship with this publisher, um, you know, this might be your agent, this might be your editor who's asking you for these, um, ideas. You can throw them out there before there is something that you've put two years of drafting into. Kaelyn: 30:07   Yep. Rekka: 30:08   You know, when you query a story for the first time or you put it out on submission to a publisher, this is something that you've worked on for years and it's pretty much as done as it can be without more help. Kaelyn: 30:17   Yes. Rekka: 30:17   And that is a huge investment of time to get your foot in the door to even be noticed by somebody else. Now you've got their attention so you can have a thing. Like I was just thinking about like what if bubble guns were like, you know, lethal acidic and there's a secret agency and they go into space with the bubble guns to do something. I don't know. You know? Kaelyn: 30:43   Well, and it's interesting what you're hitting on is you're not doing this by yourself this time. Rekka: 30:48   Right. Kaelyn: 30:49   This is probably, and you know, depending on the state your series was in when you came, if like some people have a lot of it written already, some people are writing it as they go. Um, you did not have your series completed. Rekka: 31:01   It was not completed, but the first two books were drafted. Kaelyn: 31:07   Yes. But working on drafting while you have an editor is very different than working on your own. Rekka: 31:12   Which is funny because you now have this person that you can reach out to and share this stuff with and then you start to, you know, like when you're writing it on your own, you're just, I've got to finish this, I want to finish it. Now you have somebody that you can throw the first few chapters at, but then you really have to be conscious about continuing to work on it while you wait for feedback because that feedback may not come back like that afternoon at 4:00 PM before you even have a chance to sit down and write again. So, um, yeah, I don't want to chase that idea too far because that's not really the point of this episode, but it's, you know, when you're tossing out ideas for future stories to somebody who's already interested in your future stories, um, you can toss them out in, in sizes that you will get pretty quick feedback on and you'll be able to gauge the enthusiasm before you even really invest in writing an outline or anything like that. So if they trust you to write a story, they may be like, well, I don't really see where you're going with that, but it's, I mean, an outline. Good. Kaelyn: 32:16   Okay, let's see where the, what happens. Rekka: 32:17   But like you're a cool author, we like you, we really like how you tell stories. So whatever you do, it's going to be interesting. Kaelyn: 32:24   Yeah. And you've also, you've heard some friends, some creds as it is, you know, you've got some, some style. Rekka: 32:31   Yeah. Kaelyn: 32:32   Yeah. You've got some money to play with. I guess when I say money, I mean like, Rekka: 32:37   Yeah. Kaelyn: 32:37   You've got some chips to play. Yeah. Rekka: 32:40   So they're going to give you a little bit of room for doubt. But also, you know, as we already said, they're looking out on their calendar. So you start to tell them about this one story and they're like, yeah, that's not really what we're looking like. We've already got something like that. Can you, maybe we'll angle it more toward this. Yes. Kaelyn: 32:57   Which then there's another thing about when they're looking at your calendar, you are writing a brand new story on a deadline now. Rekka: 33:03   Yep. So whatever they decide they want, they're going to give you a date that they need the draft by because now they're going to put you in their calendar and yeah, they may write it in pencil at this point, but they are going to mostly commit to it. Kaelyn: 33:24   I mean pencil within a couple months. Either way. Yeah. You know, either direction and it's, it sounds very far away and then it's like, I need to write 120,000 words in four months. Rekka: 33:32   Right. Basically, because when they put it out on the calendar, they're going to know and you're going to know and you're probably still working on finishing up other books. Kaelyn: 33:44   And the other thing to keep in mind here, like when we put something on a calendar, we let people know it's on the calendar, right? Because we put it in the trade publication, we put it in catalogs, and as soon as that contract signed, they're going to be announcing it. And here's the other thing, on our end ,Amazon punishes you if you miss the date. Rekka: 34:02   Yeah. So if they put out a preorder date, yeah. You better stick to that. So, and of course you want as long a preorder period as possible because you don't really want to start talking about the book before. It's available to order. So when they want to start talking about the book, they want to preorder up and which, and that means a whole lot of faith that they're going to hit that publication date. Yup. So everybody needs to be working to make sure that's happening, including you, the writer. So you may need to be drafting that while you're still, you know, working on your copy of it. Kaelyn: 34:38   So, a new and scary thing for a lot of people after they published their first book or their first series because I have never met an author that published, that had a series and had no idea where it was going. Like, you know, there are definitely the George RR Martin or the world that are kind of just like making it up as they go. But the thing is, he knows how game of Thrones ends. He just isn't sure how he's getting there. Rekka: 35:03   Right. Kaelyn: 35:03   Um, or how much of a rush he's in to do. So, you know, I used to be terrified that he was going to die before he finished the series. Now I'm just kind of like, you know what? Okay, cool. Like if he goes, then we get a ghost writer and maybe they'll just do it. Yeah. Rekka: 35:16   Yeah. A Brandon Sanderson takes over his series. Kaelyn: 35:20   One can only hope. I'm kidding. Um, a lot of authors, you know, they at least know where their series is going. This whole coming up with a new idea on a deadline is a very scary thing. Rekka: 35:34   Okay. To be fair, you don't have the deadline until you have a contract. Kaelyn: 35:43   Agreed. Rekka: 35:43   So don't get in - Kaelyn: 35:44   But you know what, that's not always true because, and the thing is, I don't think this is going to be happening to people who just released a standalone or a duology or a trilogy, but there are definitely authors that sign agreement saying, I'm going to give you this many books over this number of years. Rekka: 35:59   Yeah. I do know somebody who has a contract for a book and an unnamed book, you know, so that means that unnamed book has a deadline. Kaelyn: 36:10   Yeah, I mean we have put contracts together like that. Rekka: 36:13   Yeah. Kaelyn: 36:13   Where it's an unnamed. Rekka: 36:15   It's true. Standalone science fiction novel of at least a hundred thousand words or something. Kaelyn: 36:20   Exactly. Rekka: 36:20   So, yeah, so you have a guideline and if you could sign a contract like that, um, while they're reviewing your draft for your, your revisions, it's time to start thinking about that next book. Um, and that can be tough because sometimes you really just need to decompress after the stress of going through submissions and everything like that. And other times you need to um, take care of other things that got put aside while you were finishing up your draft for submissions. So it can be tough, but the earlier you start thinking about it, like it is really the point of this episode. The earlier you start thinking about it and the more aware you are that you need to have that, that processing running momentum is important in this. And you know, that's true. You said capitalism before momentum for Amazon will help your book sell. Kaelyn: 37:09   Momentum in general does. And I think a lot of, I think we like to think like, Oh well if they write my, like my book, they're going to, you know, wait for however long for it. Rekka: 37:20   This day and age, nobody even remembers you two years later. Kaelyn: 37:25   It's not that so much as like, I mean there are authors that, you know, I really liked their stuff and then they dropped off the planet for three or four years and then it's not that I'm not interested in reading them anymore, it's just that there are other things. Rekka: 37:39   Yeah, your, your attention is grabbed by something else. So people will come back if you can keep grabbing their attention with your own name but they will go find something else they like if you don't have anything for them. Kaelyn: 37:50   Yeah. Rekka: 37:50   And the process, you know, as we've already mentioned, 21, 18 months, something like that. Like the process is slow enough that that's always going to be happening to a certain degree anyway. So don't encourage it to happen by not thinking about your next book until after the release and the recovery from your final book in whatever contract you've got. Kaelyn: 38:08   Yeah. And you know, we talk a lot about this, like we like to think that, you know, this is art, this is not, you know, don't force it, don't force it. But like if this is something you're serious about and this is, you know what you want a big part of your life to be, then you know you've got, it's the same thing of it like as a, you know, a professional athlete. Like if you're a baseball player, Rekka: 38:32   You finish one season, you don't stop, don't stop. Kaelyn: 38:36   Yeah, you stay in shape, you train, you keep going because the other seasons coming up, you also don't go like, you know what? I think I'm going to stop playing baseball for like two years, not really do anything. I'm going to go sailing and then show up and make the all-star team, right? Rekka: 38:51   Yeah. It's, these are muscles that you have to work consistently to perform consistently, so you want to be doing the creative work throughout as much as you can. Even if like one thing that I would advise is when you aren't working on revisions, when you aren't working on reviewing your copy edits in your proofs, when you have that time in the morning to be in your author mind space, if you don't have anything pressing, write something creative. Even if it's not going anywhere. Kaelyn: 39:20   Yeah. Rekka: 39:21   Just be in the habit of using that time creatively so that at least that's not an obstacle when it is time to sit down and drop the next thing in grade. So, but yeah, that, I mean the, the moral of this episode is to - Kaelyn: 39:33   We don't have morals. Rekka: 39:35   Like, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. Okay. That's another discussion. Uh, morality aside. Um, the point I wanted to make with this episode was that provided that you want to continue your author career in the same direction that you started at once you sign that first contract, um, be looking for your next idea because someone's gonna ask you when you're not ready. And so having a few things, at least you know that you can go grab and say, Oh, you know what? I do have, um, a whole bucket of ideas. Let me go in and see what, what's tingling now and then I'll get back to you in a couple hours or something like that. And hopefully you've got a word document or a notepad document or something on your phone. There's just a list of random process. I mean at this point they're prompts cause you wrote them down and like made total sense to you when you wrote it down. Rekka: 40:23   But now you're like, I don't even know what I was doing with that, but I have an idea or that sounds interesting. I'll have to think about what I meant by that. But you know, so you can come back to the person who was asking what your next idea was and have a maybe, you know, if you've got three things to throw at them, that's fantastic. But um, you know, just have something in mind because you can't write in one book forever. You can't write in one series for, I mean, some people would make a career out of a series, but you, you are at some point going to have to present either the next part of the series for a new contract or a new standalone or a new series or something like that. So just be aware that when you start publishing, like you, you get a publisher, um, to buy your book or you start self-publishing that now you are a business and every business needs to release a product every calendar year, basically. Kaelyn: 41:17   This is don't be caught off guard by this kind of thing. And I don't, I don't think there's many writers out there that are genuinely shocked when someone asks them what's next. Rekka: 41:25   Just might be a little unprepared. And that's what I'm just trying to like help people avoid that because it's a very awkward conversation. Go. I don't really have anything else on my mind. You've been working me too hard. Like that's, that's not how that conversation should go. Kaelyn: 41:39   You know what I have on my mind? Rekka: 41:42   Oh, all of the things I'm going to do when I'm done with this, I was going to sleep. Can I write a book about sleeping? Kaelyn: 41:50   Sleeping, yes. Rekka: 41:51   Can I write a book while I'm sleeping? Kaelyn: 41:52   It's going to be what happens when I put my face on the keyboard. Rekka: 41:55   Yeah. The cat will, will provide the first draft. Kaelyn: 41:58   Yes. Yeah. So, okay, well I think that's, that's a good stopping point. You know, just, um, take good care of yourselves, everyone. Rekka: 42:06   That's taking care of yourselves and look for places to be creative when everything is bogged down in productivity cause they're two different, you know, gears in your brain and um, don't let one get rusty. Kaelyn: 42:18   But it really, it's true. So, um, you know, stay active, stay mentally fit. Yes. Rekka: 42:24   Take care of yourself, rest, recharge. Um, do things that make you feel creative or inquisitive and that will help you, um, find your next idea and uh, then you can work on figuring out what, how to pitch that to your agent or publisher. Kaelyn: 42:39   Yup. Yup. So, well thanks everyone for listening. That was a little more, it was funny cause when we were talking about this we were like, well we just did a whole month of really information heavy stuff. Maybe we'll do something a little more abstract, not as tangible, sorry, as other ones. Rekka: 42:56   Not tangible. Kaelyn: 42:56   No, it was great. Yeah, but like it's, you know, it's good to get the feelings out there. Rekka: 43:00   Sometimes it's just one basic thing. Okay. Be ready to write your next thing. Kaelyn: 43:05   Yup. So I'm well thanks everyone so much for listening and uh, we'll be back in two weeks. We're back to our regular schedule now. We gotta we gotta rest and recharge and come up with more ideas for episodes. Rekka: 43:14   Yeah. So look for us online. If you have questions you can ping them to us @WMBcast on Twitter or on Instagram. We post a little fun, um, photos to go with each episode cause we get together and get goofy between recordings we do. And um, you can also find us at Patreon, uh, patreon.com/WMBcast. And if you enjoy this episode, if you found it useful, if you said, Oh crap, I should probably get on that. Um, leave us a rating or review please, please. It looks like we're still collecting those through iTunes as far as I can tell. I don't know what happened with that whole separating them out thing. Rekka: 43:53   Um, maybe by this time that this airs we will have an answer but have for now it looks like ratings still go to iTunes. So if you could leave a rating, we have some ratings, fantastic ratings, but reviews themselves, we could use a little more info help. Kaelyn: 44:07   Very helpful just with the algorithms and things. Rekka: 44:09   Yeah. So if you could leave us a just a couple like 30 seconds to just write down what you like about the show. It doesn't have to be super informative. It's just feeding the algorithm and that would be super helpful. And we will talk to you in a couple of weeks. So. Kaelyn: 44:20   Wait, wait, wait. Guys Rekka's book's out also. So - Rekka: 44:24   Yeah, we did the, the um, party for that last, I'm gonna, you know, I'm going to mention it again here because it's been a month now. Kaelyn: 44:31   Yes. So Salvage is out RJ Theodore, the second book in the Peridot Shift Series. It is fantastic. You should all, if you, uh - Rekka: 44:39   If you like zombies dinosaurs, so, or some bank heists if you want to see how that fits together. Kaelyn: 44:46   Yeah. If you're really curious what the, you did, what now? Find out what the publisher said. Yeah. So absolutely go check out Rekka's book. You know, it's - Rekka: 44:54   Later this month. As I mentioned, I have a novella in the Peridot World, ah, read, Salvage first cause this comes after that and it's definitely got spoilers. Kaelyn: 45:02   Yes. I, I got to hear a little rundown of, uh, what's going on here - Rekka: 45:06   A non pitch. Kaelyn: 45:07   No, it was, it was great. I enjoyed it. Um, I'm excited for it. Rekka: 45:10   So, so, all right, well thank you so much everyone and we'll see you in two weeks.  

In this episode of "In the Word, On the Go," author and Executive Vice President of The Good Book Company, Carl Laferton, discusses how God give "more grace." Carl says, "We're only really going to be able to confront our spiritual adultery when we know there's grace for that sin. And we're only going to be free to repent honestly, if we know that there's grace to cover our sin." "In the Word, On the Go" is sponsored by the New Growth Press (https://newgrowthpress.com/?aff=26). Special Guest: Carl Laferton.

Toppie has joined the Cult of the Mask, and shows off his new CPAP skillz. Mostly... Write to Toppie at Smellcast@aol.com. Leave a comment on Toppie's blog theSmellcast.com. Follow him on Twitter. Friend Toppie on Facebook by emailing him YOUR FB name and link, then Toppie will find YOU and friend you! Please to subscribe! It's free! Go to iTunes Preview. Rss feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheSmellcast Don't forget to keep your ears peeled and your recording device handy to capture a new "Stick It Out Your Back Door" submission for Toppie!

Epic VeganWild and Over-The-Top Plant-Based RecipesBy Dustin Harder Intro: Welcome to the Cookery by the Book podcast with Suzy Chase. She's just a home cook in New York City, sitting at her dining room table, talking to cookbook authors.Dustin Harder: I'm Dustin Harder. My latest book, Epic Vegan: Wild and Over-the-Top Plant-Based Recipes, is available now everywhere books are sold.Suzy Chase: It was so fun meeting you last night at your book party. [crosstalk 00:00:31] The burger, oh my God. It was so much fun. I have to talk about the burger. It was over-the-top fantastic. I have a photo of it on my Instagram, but can you describe it?Dustin Harder: Yes. Oh, of course. Last night, we had at the launch party the bacon macaroni and cheese barbecue blue burger, and I partnered with Beyond Meat who's being doing lots of great stuff lately, so we used them for the plant-based patty, and it was a double-decker burger, so you had the burger, blue cheese dressing, lettuce, onion, tomato, pickles, and then bacon macaroni and cheese, which is basically mac and cheese with my quinoa bacon bits from the book mixed into it, some pickles on the burger, as well, and then top that with a little barbecue sauce.Suzy Chase: And it looked like it would be heavy, but it wasn't. It doesn't just like sit in your stomach. It was super light.Dustin Harder: I'm happy to hear that. It was interesting. I ended up having one at the end of the night. There was like two left, and I was like, "Can you please hold one for me?" And I was so excited, and I ate it, too, and I felt the same way. I was so happy. I was like, "Oh my gosh. I don't feel like stuffed. I feel satisfied."Suzy Chase: So, I even saw Chloe Coscarelli.Dustin Harder: Yeah, that's my girl. I love her so much.Suzy Chase: And I heard somewhere that you started out as her intern.Dustin Harder: I did. So we both went to the Natural Gourmet Institute, and at the end of your ... And she went several years before me, and at the end of the chef's training program there, there was a hundred-hour internship period, and I started working with her. I recipe-tested as an intern with her, lots of stuff for her restaurant endeavors, and then I also did for the last two cookbooks, I recipe tested stuff with her. Yeah, and she's been the most supportive, beautiful light in my life ever since. She's always been very encouraging and has become a great friend that I'm very grateful for.Suzy Chase: First off, give me the back story of your decision to go vegan and how long have you been living a plant-based lifestyle?Dustin Harder: Yeah, it's been 10 years, and I essentially did it because I was, I mean, I just grew up in the Midwest, and food was just a way of, you know, all the things. Like all the fast food restaurants and all that stuff like that, and as I was getting older, I was like, "I want to maintain my weight. What's another way maybe?" And I started reading, and when I started realizing, "Oh, I could like switch this out with that," you know, plant-based products for that, I started just trying things, sort of trial and error.Dustin Harder: And I noticed I started losing a little bit of weight, so then I, I went full-plant based, and definitely saw a difference, not just in my weight, but in how I felt and how I was sleeping. All of the things everybody talks about, it all became true. My skin looked better, everything. And I was just like, whoa, there's really something to this. And then, I got into cooking with it because I got obsessed with sort of veganizing comfort foods that everyone goes, "Oh, well, if I go vegan, I can't have cheese. I can't have macaroni and cheese. I can't have pizza." Everyone says, "I can't, can't, can't." And I was sort of determined when I went vegan to be like, "No, that's not the case." Like we can still have all of the delicious food. So that's how it spiraled into the cooking arena.Suzy Chase: So talking about comfort food, Epic Vegan is all about comfort food. Where did you get the inspiration to write an over-the-top vegan cookbook?Dustin Harder: Well, there's two ... There's different variations. The main thing that happened was I started looking ... It goes back on saying, "Oh, well, people can still have these foods that they don't think they can have." So that's always been inspiring, to sort of like create foods that people think that they can't have. Because in the book, there's also some recreations of like, the Doritos Locos Tacos, so like the fast food sort of arena. There's a recipe for Cray-Cray Bread, which is the Little Caesar's Crazy Bread, essentially.Dustin Harder: So recreating some things that I knew people thought they couldn't have anymore was some inspiration for it, but then also, that crazy big boom of over-the-top milkshakes happened like a year or two ago, and I always look at those, and I'm like, "Well, this is ridiculous." Like you can't eat this milkshake. There's a cake and a brownie, and, you know, a volcano of stuff sitting on top of it. Like, how does someone even tackle that? And I was like, "Well, what if we create something that like still looks sort of big, but then people can actually eat, as well?" And that sort of, the milkshake sort of pushed this along. And then, truth be told, I was pushing this proposal idea around with my literary agent, and I got on a flight one day about a year and a half ago, I guess, and there was a big article about over-the-top milkshakes on the inflight magazine, and I was like, "Okay, this is a sign." I'm going to take this as a sign. I'm going to move forward with this.Dustin Harder: So I did it. And I still have that magazine to this day. I look at it. I'm like, "Look what you did, you crazy milkshake."Suzy Chase: And you had one last night at the party.Dustin Harder: Yeah, we definitely ... It's one of those things where it's, you know, it had to have a milkshake that night, and I just had to choose which one. I was like, "Oh my gosh, which milkshake are we going to do, though?" But, you know, it was the ultimate caramel cookie brownie milkshake we did last night, and everyone's always happy with salted caramel milkshakes and brownies and cookies, so we went for it.Suzy Chase: Tell me about your original series called The Vegan Roadie.Dustin Harder: Oh, my baby. That was born out of, so my background's in theater. And I took a break from theater, and after I did a Broadway show and I went to culinary school, the whole time going, why am I here? Knowing I was going back out on the road in six months from then. And then, as the job was coming up to on the road, I was like, "I'm going to mash the two together. I'm going to put food and then create this series when I'm on the road that's the vegan version of Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives."Dustin Harder: So that's sort of how The Vegan Roadie was born. And it was all with, there's this stigma around vegatism ... vegatism-Suzy Chase: Vegatism.Dustin Harder: Vegatism! Stigma around being vegan, especially at the time. And it happened to me when I first went vegan, you know. A lot of people judge vegans and the vegan community tend to be judgemental on how you're going vegan and you're doing it for the wrong reasons, and oh, but you're still doing this, so you're not fully vegan, and like, the fact is, people are going to go at their own pace, and people are going to try things when we're nice to them. So I thought, "How can I create something that is accessible and welcoming and tells anybody if they just try a meatless meal that, like, hey, they're making a choice to try something meatless, and that's positive." You know, regardless of anything else they're doing, like that's a positive step.Dustin Harder: So I wanted to highlight the cuisine that was coming up in America. I mean, now it's exploded even more, but at the time in 2014 when I started, there were all these fantastic restaurants, and most of them are mom and pop owned, which is so cool to see. And it's all people creating these businesses with amazing plant-based food that just want to see change in the world and be part of the change and create something better for people to eat. And so I set out on this path to create this series. And meeting the people and eating the food was amazing, but we did three seasons. Two seasons in North America, and the third season we did in Italy. So it's all up on YouTube for people to watch for free.Suzy Chase: You even found lots of vegan food in my hometown, Kansas City. I was shocked!Dustin Harder: Oh my gosh, we did! Do you know ... What's been interesting about filming something like that, though, is in some cities, some things have closed. But I will say, and in Kansas City, like two of the restaurants we filmed in, they closed. But now more other ones have opened. So what used to happen back in the day was a vegan place would close and everybody would go, "Oh, shame. Nobody's ready for it." Now one closes, and it's like the vegan army rallies and like, they're like, "No, no. We're ready. We want this. Let's do more." And people come. So there's more stuff opening in Kansas City now, so it keeps going, no matter what.Suzy Chase: So in every episode, you also do a five-ingredient challenge. I thought that was so clever.Dustin Harder: Thank you. That was ... That goes again with my main mission to bridge the gap between vegans and non-vegans and show that vegan eating is fun but also accessible. So it wasn't, my point was never, "Hey, I can cook with five ingredients in my hotel room. You should cook in your hotel room." It was like, "If I'm doing this in my hotel room, you can definitely do it at home." Like you can get five ingredients and make something super delicious that's plant-based, as well.Suzy Chase: Talk a little bit about stunt foods and what they are.Dustin Harder: So Epic Vegan is full of stunt foods. And if you think of, like, well, so, one perfect example I already brought up is the Doritos Locos Tacos at Taco Bell. So that's a combination of the Dorito shell from Dorito brand and Taco Bell taco, essentially. So that's a stunt food. In the book, I think I compare it to stunt casting on Broadway, when you know, I'm always mashing my two worlds together. But like, when you know, if a musical were to bring in, I don't know, back in the day, like if they were to bring in someone like Paris Hilton, who's clearly not that talented. Sorry, Paris. But is going to bring in a draw of tickets from her reality show and stuff like that. That's stunt casting.Dustin Harder: So I always sort of relate it to that. And in these foods, it's like, "We're going to sell more tacos at Taco Bell by bringing in the Doritos shell." So those are super fun and popular and people love them, and it heightens interest. And I wanted to create something, a way for people to do it at home. So it shouldn't just always be at the restaurant. I think it's fun to get in the kitchen with people and say, "How can we make this big, over-the-top thing?" You know, one of the craziest ones in the book ... Because it's about crazy ideas, too, not just always bringing Paris Hilton into the mix, you know.Suzy Chase: Thank God.Dustin Harder: Right. Right? But there's a bacon cinnamon roll peanut butter burger in there. Like things like that. So it became like, "Okay, how do I combine like the craziest things?" So that's sort of what a stunt food is, too. Combining sweet and savories together. There's a pad thai cupcake in there. All that sort of stuff like that. There's a French onion pasta bake instead of a French onion soup. So sort of looking at recipes and deconstructing them and saying, "Okay, we love these like really hearty robust onion flavors." How can we transfer that into something else someone loves besides just soup, you know, and putting it into a pasta. All that sort of thing like that. Just like really sort of taking things outside of the box, deconstructing them, and putting them back together in a different way.Suzy Chase: So this cookbook is a choose-your-own-adventure sort of good time. Talk a little bit about that.Dustin Harder: Yeah! Well, that's my favorite part. I was so nervous about creating a book that had, okay, well, you've got to like layer this on top of this on top of this. So it was important for me, again, my firs book's called Simply Vegan, and it's full of recipes you can make in like 30 minutes, right? So great, that book's been done. It's out there. I'm not the only one. Lots of people have done it. But I knew I had to do that before I went on to this book.Dustin Harder: But in this book, it was still important for me to create some recipes that made it accessible, easy no matter what. So there's two ways you can choose your own adventure. You can either go to one of the first three chapters and make like just the Philly cheesesteak. So you can make a delicious Philly cheesesteak sandwich that you can make in about 25 minutes, maybe. Or you can take it further and you can make some pizza dough and make a Philly cheesesteak pizza. Or you can make, there's a bowl in there for a Philly cheesesteak baked potato bowl, which is this delicious bowl of kale and baked potato and the cheese sauce and the Philly cheesesteak filling.Dustin Harder: So you can choose your own adventure by either, you know, hey, I'm just going to make this Philly cheesesteak tonight or you're going to make one of the epic options. Or you can also go the store-bought route. For example, like the book, the burger that we talked about already that we served last night and was on the cover, the bacon macaroni barbecue blue burger. It's got the burger. It's got the mac and cheese. It's got the bacon. It's got all that stuff. It's got barbecue from scratch, blue cheese from scratch. Guess what? All that stuff is now available, vegan versions, in stores. So you can either make all of those things from scratch from the book, or you can choose your own adventure, and I applaud this just as much as I do making things from scratch, especially in the vegan world. Go into the supermarket, get a burger, get the vegan blue cheese dressing, get the barbecue sauce, get the vegan boxed mac and cheese, get the vegan bacon, and then you can make it all that way, as well.Dustin Harder: So you have options in terms of like how involved you actually want to get. You can choose your own adventure.Suzy Chase: That's so smart. And last night, when I was waiting in line for this burger, I was looking at everything that the Orchard Grocer had, and they have so many great options now that I don't think were around like maybe even one or two years ago. Like I saw caviar.Dustin Harder: Yeah. It just keeps, the vegan world just keeps exploding with options for everybody, and it's the coolest thing to sort of watch. Since I'd started, you know, 10 years ago vegan, but you know, 2014 I started Vegan Roadie, and I've gotten to know all of these businesses and companies sort of producing all these wonderful things, and not only do they keep making their products better, other people keep popping up.Dustin Harder: And there's a great sense in this vegan community of like, community versus competition. Like we're not here trying to squeeze you out. We're here trying to lift each other up. Like I've met owners of two different cheese brands who promote each other, and they're like, "Oh, you may like theirs, but you may like mine better. But at least like we've got this plant-based version available for you."Dustin Harder: So there's this sort of love that's in all of those products, too, that you can't really, you know ... It's not out there in just your run-of-the-mill products that you're getting at the grocery store, you know?Suzy Chase: You're a mac and cheese crazy person.Dustin Harder: Yes.Suzy Chase: What is the key to creamy, delicious vegan mac and cheese? I feel like it's hard to make. Drum roll, please.Dustin Harder: Yeah. It can be. I think for me, I need to have ... I always need to have that little sharp quality in my mac and cheese. And that's something that I've always sort of been trying to find. I mean, the cheese sauce in this book has been through the ringer in terms of testing, and I've had so many people try it, and I'm grateful. I feel like this one ... I have lots that I love, even in the first book, I have another one that I love, but this one really, really came out to what I like, and my secret is actually there's sauerkraut, and it adds this sort of like zest and this little punch to it, and then also Dijon mustard.Dustin Harder: But then you want to get like a little bit of a sweet flavor in there and a salty flavor in there, so it's really balancing all of those flavors to get like a nice, smooth, robust sort of cheesy flavor at the end.Suzy Chase: Let's talk about jackfruit.Dustin Harder: I love that you're like, "Okay, now. We're going to bring this down. We're going to talk about jackfruit." Let's do it. Let's talk about it.Suzy Chase: Okay. So I had it for the first time a few weeks ago at a place called Urban Vegan Kitchen here in the West Village.Dustin Harder: Yes, yes.Suzy Chase: And it was so good in the quesadilla. But, wait. You don't like it. How come?Dustin Harder: Well, I actually, I have grown to like it. It depends on how it's prepared. I actually haven't had the one there, but I do love their stuff there, so I have no doubt it's delicious. If you get it from the actual fruit, to me, sometimes it tends to be a little too mushy. I need there to be texture to it. And this is ... Again, this is why I always say to people in the beginning when you're trying, not even beginning. As you go through it, like trial and error.Dustin Harder: Vegan food is just like normal food. You're not going to like all of it. So people who are not vegan sometimes try vegan food, and they're like, "Oh, well, I didn't like that, so I can't like vegan food." And I'm like, "No, just try something else." So for me, it was the same thing with jackfruit. I was like, "Oh, it's terrible. I can't stand it." But I kept going back to it, and eventually, there was a place in Kansas City where I had a barbecue jackfruit sandwich. She was like, "You have to have it. It's the best one you'll ever have." She's like, "We invented the jackfruit."Dustin Harder: And I'm like, "I don't know if that's true, but I'll certainly try it."Suzy Chase: I know. I saw, I saw the episode, and I saw her say that, and I was like, "Mmm, I'm not sure."Dustin Harder: But it's a pretty big claim, right?Suzy Chase: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-Dustin Harder: And I was like, but then I had it, and it was absolutely delicious. And the trick that I think I learned in that is that, for me, when I make it now, I always make it from the can. It's been in brine. And I sear it up in the saucepan so that it gets some texture and crispiness to it. And then sometimes, I'll also put in some mushrooms with it to give it just a little bit of a heartier texture, as well.Dustin Harder: So I don't, I no longer dislike it. I'm just, I'm a little picky about it, I guess you could say. I'm a little jackfruit finnicky.Suzy Chase: What's a vegan trend that may not be on our radar yet?Dustin Harder: Oh my goodness. I don't even know. That's a very good question.Suzy Chase: I think it's the caviar that I saw last night.Dustin Harder: Oh, well, I mean, there are so many things. Absolutely. The caviar. I just feel like there's got to be more that I can think of that's not like, you know ... The big ones are like yogurt and cheese. Those have been exploding and obviously, the meat alternatives have been bananas. There is a new burger coming out called Uncut, and it is delicious. I just tried it at the Plant-Based Expo a month or so ago, and it was ... It might have been better than the Impossible and Beyond Burger. And I don't know if they're going to do just service or if it's going to be available in stores, but it's so, so good.Dustin Harder: What I would like to see more of, and there were a couple ... The one I saw went off the shelves, and I know it sounds silly because it's cheese, but I would like a ready available, like vegan cheese sauce that I can just use with like everything and that I can pick up at the store. They have them, but they're few and far between.Suzy Chase: It's summertime. And we're all about lobster rolls. What is your trick to a good vegan lobster roll?Dustin Harder: So that one we've got one in the book, and again, just like the cheese sauce, that one went through the ringer. It almost, there were times I pulled it out, because I was like, "I just don't feel good about this yet." With, I say, I use the dulse in it, which is like a seaweed, but I would ... You have to let the flavors set to marinate. If you can let that sucker sit overnight, it's going to be so much better for it the next day. And that's kind of for any sort of, when you're trying to mimic any sort of seafoody thing like that, I feel like. Where you can't like, it has to be marinated for some time, you know?Dustin Harder: So you can enjoy that lobster roll in the book like right after you make it or a few hours after, but if you're able to let it sit overnight in all of those spices ... Old Bay is always a great one, and all of that seafoody stuff. Then you can, the flavors really meld together overnight and it's delicious.Suzy Chase: Do you have a favorite recipe out of this cookbook?Dustin Harder: Oh, and I also just want to say to toast your buns. When you're making anything-Suzy Chase: Toast your buns!Dustin Harder: Toast your buns, boo! You've got to toast your buns for your burgers. Toast your buns for your lobster rolls. Put a little vegan butter on there or a little spritz of canola oil and toast that sucker. It makes any sandwich 500 times better. And I'm sorry, that was my sidetrack. What was the question you were asking?Suzy Chase: That's going to be the name of my next novel. Toast Your Buns.Dustin Harder: That's good. It'll sell.Suzy Chase: What's your favorite recipe in this cookbook, if you have one? The tough questions.Dustin Harder: I do. It's called the Almost Famous Buffalo Chicken Lasagna. And it is exactly ... It's like a buffalo chicken dip in lasagna form. So it's got a tofu blue cheese ricotta, seitan chicken in it, and then the buffalo sauce from the buffalo cauliflower bites. Just in it and delicious and baked and then with vegan mozzarella cheese. It's so, so good, and it's not too spicy. It just has like a little bit of kick, so you're getting like some sweet in there, savory, and then a little bit of spice. It's one of my favorites.Dustin Harder: And then a second one is actually, if I may, another pasta dish. And when we filmed in Italy, my fiance David was with me, and we were obsessed with the carbonara. We had it like two or three different places, vegan carbonara. Everyone was very proud of their vegan carbonara. So when we got home, we tried really hard to recreate it. So it's called David's Carby Carbonara in the book. So that's two of my favorites are the pasta ones, but I really do, I love them all.Suzy Chase: Okay, are you going back on Broadway any time soon?Dustin Harder: No. No, no, no. So I was an actor for a long time, and then I worked with rescue animals with Bill Berloni, who does all animal training for like Broadway, film, and television. And so that was sort of my last ... I did that for about six years, and I was acting and doing the dogs. And now, I love it. I want to, we're moving to Atlanta, actually. And I'm thinking when I get back to ... So I don't say no in a bad way. I say more so that like, when I get to Atlanta, I'm thinking I might, like, dip my toe back in the theater world a little bit, just because in New York, the stakes always feel so high. So I'm wondering if in Atlanta, it might not feel so much like a pressure cooker, if I'm auditioning and stuff.Dustin Harder: I used to get really high anxiety with auditioning and everything, so I'm not saying theater's ever done, because it's definitely a part of everything I do. It's part of the books. It's part of the series, you know. But definitely not auditioning to be on the Great White Way any time soon.Suzy Chase: Now to my segment called My Last Meal. What would you have for your last supper?Dustin Harder: Okay. It's going to sound so basic, but it's where I live. I would have like the most delicious slice of vegan cheese pizza.Suzy Chase: Would you make it, or would you get it somewhere?Dustin Harder: I would make it. I would absolutely make it. I want to say mac and cheese. You know I want to say mac and cheese. So now I'm struggling with, well, do I do the, like the macaroni and cheese. There's a macaroni and cheese pizza in the book. So maybe I do that so I can have both. Let's just say both so that I feel a little calmer about this answer. We're going to say the macaroni and cheese pizza, which is a franks and, franks and mac pizza, basically, is the hot dogs and macaroni and cheese on pizza, basically.Suzy Chase: Final answer?Dustin Harder: Final answer. Franks ‘n Mac Pizza from Epic Vegan.Suzy Chase: Where can we find you on the web and social media?Dustin Harder: Yes, please! You can find me at VeganRoadie.com, and I'm going out on a book tour, so there's lots of dates there over the summer. It's under the book tour tab. And then on social media, on everywhere, @TheVeganRoadie.Suzy Chase: When it's all said and done, cooking is about joy. And I'm so thrilled that you came on Cookery By the Book podcast. Thanks so much.Dustin Harder: Oh my gosh. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.Outro: Follow Suzy Chase on Instagram @CookeryByTheBook, and subscribe at CookeryByTheBook.com or in Apple podcasts. Thanks for listening to Cookery By the Book podcast, the only podcast devoted to cookbooks since 2015.

Robert Orfino, real estate investor and expert, joins Casey Eberhart on the "Expand the Business" podcast for an incredible interview about the present state of real estate, real estate investing, and even house flipping. Robert is a master at leveraging traditional media and social media to expand his brand and marketing message online. Born and raised in New Jersey, Robert spent countless summers on the Jersey Shore.  When not vacationing, Robert worked with his father doing construction. Robert later attended Kean and Rutgers University, and set out to find a “good job.” Aside from his knack for creating things, he has a life-long relationship with education and is constantly seeking self-improvement.  He also readily admits he is a die-hard NY Giants fan and a long-suffering Mets fan.  At the age of 42, Robert had been working for someone else’s fortune for 20 years and began to understand the importance of wealth and how to create it. In 2007, Robert caught the entrepreneurial bug and left his job to start his own green consulting firm. Within the first year of business, the firm was directly impacted by the financial crisis in 2008. However, Robert persevered through the major financial setbacks that followed and began working as a So-Cal contractor rehabbing Freddie and Fannie Homes.   In 2012, Robert took an opportunity to work on flipping homes for private investors. During this time, he flipped almost 200 different homes. Robert continued to work in the So-Cal Real Estate Market until 2014 when it made a major comeback and deals became scarce.  By 2015, Robert sought out a market gap for flipping houses in New Jersey, the number one foreclosure state in the country at the time, and proactively assembled a team to build business back up again. Although the market had been tumultuous for quite some time, Robert saw an opportunity to raise capital for the New Jersey and New York Real Estate Markets and founded a Distressed Real Estate Investor Fund.   Here is the transcript of the podcast interview between Casey Eberhart and Robert Orfino: Casey Eberhart: (00:01) And welcome everybody to today's episode of expand the business. My name is Casey Eberhart. I am your show host for this hour of amazing insight in helping you, the business owner expand the business. So we are super excited to bring to you guys, everything that we can come up with to help you expand your business. Whatever business you're in, whether you're in traditional business, brick and mortar, business, network marketing, investing, whatever businesses you this show is designed for you. So as an upfront, if you want to download a quick audio, on getting more referrals, just head over to www.ExpandTheBusiness.com. Oh, we've got some goodies over there, some surprises for you over there. And I'm super happy to have you do that again, go over to expand the business.com so super excited today because we have an amazing interview with one of my favorite people on the planet. Casey Eberhart: (01:00) Robert Orofino is one of these guys that you just can't help but to learn stuff from because number one, he's super open and willing to share his ups, his downs, his wins, his breakdowns. In order to help you and I expand our business and really kind of create the life that we all dream of. He is a real estate investor. I've happened to be friends with and have known Robert for several years. I know that Adam, and ask him to go a little bit in depth in this, but you know, one of the things that he and his partners have been able to do in the real estate game as they've made, as far as I know, at least three moves. They've moved from New Jersey to Los Angeles, Los Angeles to Houston. And then from Houston they've really expanded out. They have a radio show that's on drive time in Houston, Texas. Casey Eberhart: (01:47) Every single day they've got podcasts, they have webinars, they have meetup groups, they hold live events, they hold live meetings. They've created a real estate investing fund for investors. Maybe you have a little extra money that you're scared of a scaredy cat. I've been in the real estate market. You don't want to, you don't want to get too much exposure. You can talk to Robert and they've created a fun. So people that are scared still have an opportunity. They have their fingers in every piece of the pie in the real estate market that you've probably or possibly could come up with. And if they don't, they're going to go out and really create the network and the relationships to be able to bring that into the fold. So I thought, well we would do today is really have kind of a deep dive in sort of the structure, the blueprint, the layout, the architecture of what Robert has been able to do in the real estate game, especially in the market he happens to live in at the moment. And I say at the moment, which is Houston, Texas. So He's a partner in Mr Texas real estate, which we'll talk about. He and his partner in a minute. And he also runs and owns Dana point marketing. So with that being said, Mr Orofino, welcome to the show was a Robert Orfino: (03:00) pretty amazing introduction. I'd like to meet that guy. Right? So that was, thank you very much for all those kind words. And it is certainly, um, I always point out that Steve jobs speech we talks about, you really can't connect the dots looking forward, turn around and look back. You can see them. Well, you're one of the dots. Casey Eberhart: (03:21) Well I appreciate that. I appreciate that. But those dots are created by all of us being just connecting, right? So thank you for saying that. You're also one of the dots all and my network, but also many, many others. So Robert, take me back, uh, in the wayback machine to when you were in New Jersey and when I first met you, you were a contract investor slash flipper in, uh, and for those of you that don't know the term flipper, it's somebody that buys a piece of real estate, put some equity into it in terms of capital as well as um, um, not only capital but sweat equity contract or build it out, make it pretty, and then turn it back on the market and sell it off from there. Kind of walk me through how you got started as an entrepreneur back in the flipping days. Robert Orfino: (04:10) Sure. So back in New Jersey, I was a, I was a consultant. I was a green consultant, energy efficiency, that type of renewable energy. Um, you know, I was uh, back in for anyone understands it, uh, the uh, green building. But that was, that was I did right. So the US GBC am original member of that. Um, and I did a lot of consulting out there and I said, okay, I want to become an entrepreneur and the green industry's taking off in southern California, so I need to get the southern California. So I left my job there and I started my own consulting business and within the first six months I booked over $300,000 worth of consulting. It was great. And then September, 2008 hit and the whole world got turned upside down financial world. And I was out there alone with not a lot of, of safety net underneath me, just a couple of retirement accounts. Robert Orfino: (05:10) And I, uh, I found myself in a very large hole very, very quickly. By 2009, we had some bad deals and we had some bad partners and um, we had a lot of the projects just stopped. There was a bond on those projects, which means you're going to eventually get paid, but the eventually it could be 2012, 13, 14. Right? So here I am, entrepreneur trying to figure this stuff out, working both coasts and it, it wasn't working and we're going down a slope in a whole very, very fast. I remember 2009, everyone's still sort of in denial, right? And in 2010, now, everyone's like freaking out. In 2011 was the bottom of the market. So in 2011, I had no more consulting gig. So maybe one or two right here. But I had a buddy who was doing construction for Fannie Mae at the time. Robert Orfino: (06:06) There was tons of foreclosures. They're fixing them up. He says, I have too much work. Can you help me run it? So I came out to California full time, took over the San Fernando Valley, and I started with doing deals, doing rehabs for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, um, all those FHA stuff. Um, but by that time I was already 450, $2,000 in personal debt in the, I owed for $52,000. And next to every single one of those, those dollars was my signature. So you can imagine how panicked we were and how crazy everything was. And we got into real estate and started climbing out of the hole. So 2011 wasn't a bad year for us. But then 2012, Fannie Mae says, we're not rehabbing homes anymore. Now back out of business. But I have a construction business. I've gotten loans on that business. I've got employees. And um, I'll just tell you the, the low point for us is we're, I was down to $6,000 in my bank account and I have a $12,000 monthly nut, right? Robert Orfino: (07:10) And I don't have any jobs on the horizon. And I think to myself, I'm not the smartest guy. And from this moment on, I'm just going to do what smart people do. So I did a little mantra about wealth and all that stuff coming to me and I won't bore you with that. Um, but right after I did the mantra and I was driving down the four oh five, you know what I'm talking about, I got to go to, I got to get to Ventura Boulevard. That's where my po boxes, I go to the Po box now 10 minutes after the mantra about all good things of being positive and wealth coming to me. I opened up the Po box and there's a check for $6,000 exactly what I needed to get through the month of February. And from that point on, I do not want to figure it out or double think it or overthink it. Robert Orfino: (07:59) I just do the mantra. Right? And that turned me on and I got through the month of February, I got a kitchen job, I got a bathroom job. And then later on that year I got picked to work for the best way to call as the clearing house where the hedge funds and for those who don't know the hedge funds, Blackstone is a big one, call me homes. There was another one who worked for, they put billions of dollars of capital on the street buy houses and so we literally could have as much construction work as we can possibly handle. We are doing now 11 jobs, nine 11 jobs a month and we're running through that in 2012 was great. Um, 2013 slowed down, but we had made a name for ourselves. So we are the top two contractors in that clearing house and we kept working all the way through 2013, 2014 I started doing some more green work, slowly climbed out of that hole, but I had always now around real estate business, I'm trying to network with these folks and try to figure out how to get more work. Robert Orfino: (09:01) And I started reversing engineering how this whole business works. And in 2015 I said, hey, I'm going to go do this myself, except I go back to New Jersey to do it. And I go and do it in New Jersey for two years. We did fairly well. We flipped a bunch of houses out there. Um, I was all about just creating cash to pay back my debt. They create a little nest egg so that we felt secure. Right? So just like everyone else in 2013, 2014, 2015, everyone's thinking security, right? They want to have security. We're no different. Um, then I started networking and meeting a lot of people we carry on. And then in 2017 I met some friends from Houston. They introduced me to the marketplace. Um, we had a hurricane that came and I was working the opposite and the, all of the leftover deals in New Jersey from superstorm sandy. Robert Orfino: (09:58) So I understood how flooded houses and when a wind damage houses work. Uh, when the hurricane came here, I already had a base here I'd already done and started doing some education stuff. So we decided we were going to move to Houston and I moved there about 14 months ago. I've, I've been here in Houston for 14 months. Since then, we're able to acquire about $3 million worth of properties. I've doubled my net worth. I'm using all the things that I learned from quite frankly, failure on my, on my last 10 years of being an entrepreneur. And so we, we definitely believe there's no such thing as failure. It's only learning. Sometimes the lessons are very expensive. Sometimes you can shrug them off, right? But there's only learning in coming out of failure. And, uh, with that mindset, I was able to partner up with Jason Bible out here. Robert Orfino: (10:53) He had been very successful. Now we started this new venture and like you said, we have a fund. We have our, our own rehab crews. We have a real estate office, a team that we bought. We work with Keller Williams platinum. So we're able to work on all that stuff, uh, in this marketplace based on all the things I learned. And when I say learn, I'm mostly saying I failed in the past. And I can remember sitting in the lobby in, uh, Gora hills. There's a company out there that nobody knows about. They don't have a website, they don't advertise, but they do $1 billion in real estate transactions every year. They touch every single piece of it. And I sat there and I said, if I ever have the opportunity, meaning of the market opportunity, this is what I'll build. And now I'm here in Houston with the opportunity and we're building a very massive real estate machine. Yeah, it is unbelievable to watch. So I have several that I kind Casey Eberhart: (11:54) of want to push in and, and drill a little bit in on. So when you first moved from New Jersey out to Los Angeles, you said that in your first six months or first nine months, I think that you had $300,000 worth of consulting gigs on the books. How, how did that come about? How did, how did moving from New Jersey to Los Angeles, just because we, you know, I live in Los Angeles, we be, we are, uh, we are very, and I'm doing air quotes. For those of you that are listening green out here in California, what, what allowed you to get in the door? What allowed you to book that kind of book of business? Because I think a lot of people are, you know, get so stuck on, oh it, I'm afraid, I'm scared. I don't know where to go. I don't know what to do. I'm terrified of failing. So on and so forth. What allowed you to like break into that $300,000 market? Robert Orfino: (12:48) I want to say within the first 90 days of me having my own business, I picked up two mentors, both sales and marketing and Robert Orfino: (12:58) they said, Hey, forget this, forget this 30 page proposal and all that. There's all the, all there, all the folks that are collecting those proposals are making do is free work. Yeah. And they said, we've got to figure out a way to get to the decision maker. Once you get to the decision maker, have an honest conversation and they'll say yes or no. And that's, that's where I learned from, from two folks. And so we were able to get to some very big decision makers in the automotive world. Dealerships were one of our bigger clients. We are able to meet with again, really, really big companies like sonic automotive, Penske automotive, auto nation. We want to treacly the manufacturers like Mercedes Benz. Um Oh we worked directly for a Volvo and a lot of those, a lot of the green companies that wanted that for that we were able to go right to the manufacturer and talk to them Hyundai and get real honest conversations. What do you, and then ask them, what are you looking for? How can I help? So going out as an entrepreneur, I learned within the first 90 days to forget what I, what I want and ask how I can help and just give me that. Just how can I help? What are you looking for? Do you want a green, a bigger green footprint rate, I can help you with that. And that's how we land that we forgot the forget the whole sales process, finding the decision maker and help them. Casey Eberhart: (14:25) So it was really about building, I mean essentially, you know, uh, I think a lot of people, um, skip the part of building relationships and building out a network of people that you yeah. You know, sir, um, service that network for lack of a, for lack of a better word. You also said something that I think is really interesting and I think a lot of people kind of Miss Nuance, um, because they are being trained and taught by people that went about it the hard way. So you could write a bunch of proposals and you know, you are absolutely right. The people that are receiving those proposals. If you don't know a lot of proposal type, um, work that's given out, the reason those companies send out requests for proposals or RFPs is so that they can get a bunch of ideas from a bunch of different consultants all for free. Yeah. They may ultimately hire one or they may not hire them, but at the end of the day, they've essentially allowed the bigger game players too, give them free advice and may not ever even call them. And what I loved was that you bypassed all of that and really went in and tried to have conversations with people that were meaningful and figure out how to help them when I'm assuming not every single person you are able to help win. But in that event you then went off and figured out how to help them when once they were done. Speaker 3: (15:51) Yeah, no, we got, we got, um, a very, um, polite thank you's, but not very many followup calls. Yeah. Casey Eberhart: (15:59) Yeah. And so, so Robert, as you were, as you were kind of building out that network with the automotive dealers and, and putting those folks, how important in your success today, if we go all the way back in the wayback machine, how important was it or is it, do you think for entrepreneurs, even if they're just a marketing, not just say, but a marketing firm or a sales firm, or they've got a specific product or maybe somebody just a network marketer or whatever, how valuable is the skillset of building an actual network of people? Speaker 3: (16:37) It, it's everything. Well, you know, we all, we hear all the cliches about the network, right? There's a ton of business cliches and we love to post it on Instagram and Facebook, but you have to actually do it right? And you know, your network is your net worth. That is absolutely true. Um, and we just kept building out and out and out. We, we, we would, we would take meetings from seven o'clock in the morning to 11 o'clock at night and we'd be in crazy places. I'd be at five star hotels smoking a cigar on the beach front deck at 10 o'clock at night, and the next morning I'm at someone's, uh, auto body shop, right? And, but it's just constantly taking these meetings and networking and what can I do? Right? Um, what can I bring? How can I bring value to the folks in my network? Speaker 3: (17:29) How do I connect people in my network? Right? How do I make them, I mean, I've gotten, I've sat down in front of the general manager who complains that he doesn't have a good sales manager. I go to the, three days later, I'm sitting in front of a sales managers saying, I gotta get out of this, this place. I'm like, Hey, do you know this new tire? And over here, why don't you give them a call? Low and behold, I got a a sales guy, right? Well, let me just connect. And so when you start playing that person, that connector in the middle, it becomes extremely valuable. But here's the key, Casey and we, we just went over to this with our real estate team this week. We said, someone will come up to you and say, uh, Hey, do you have an inspector? Speaker 3: (18:11) And what a lot of these big real estate firms do like Keller-Williams and remax on, they say, here's the sheet, here's all our our vendors and just go ahead and call them. And I'm like, that is such a great way, because it took someone time to put all that together to build that relationship with those vendors. And you're just about to just share it and throw it out there. Like it's meaningless, like it's worth nothing. And so, you know, I have a personal rule and I've extended that now to the real estate teams really simply. I just had a guy sitting right here in my office before we got on here worth several million dollars. He's an investor of mine. He's given us money, he works with us, he wants to work with us more. Just told me he's going to invest in my next project. And he said, hey, I need a property manager over here. Can you just text me a number? I said, no, email me. And then I'll do the warm introduction Casey Eberhart: (19:07) because here's the way, hang on a second. That's gold. Go go by. W if you, if you are listening to this, I want you to listen to what Robert just said with a, a very cleaned out here because this is probably the best or biggest lesson we're going to have on this. Go back and let's say it again. So you've got a guy that's, these were sort of several million bucks. He's going to invest in your fund, he's going to do some projects with you. He needs a property manager. And instead of just giving him the sheet of, of, of people saying, hey, Robert Orfino: (19:37) or texting it to them, I said, no, email me and I'll do the warm introduction. And what, what, what does that means is I'm in, it's like I'm collecting interest on the currency. He wants an introduction to a property manager for his third ward and, and, and cashmere gardens. I mean he, nothing too. You are, you know, it's a section of town that's a little rough and he wants to find the right guy. And I said, I have the right guys. He's a good guy. And so I'll just give me his number as I know you mean the email and then I'll do the introduction. So I'll introduce both of them so they both understand the value that I'm doing, bringing them together. Here's the most important thing. If I just gave him the number, he may say, Hey, I got the number from Robert Orofino. Right. But that will be soon forgotten. Casey Eberhart: (20:29) Yup. Robert Orfino: (20:29) That email and that warm introduction, we'll sit there and when the property managers got to go back and find John's email address, he's going to look for my email. I don't remember that I handed that over. Now I'm happy to exchange the currency of my network, but I want to get a little interest Casey Eberhart: (20:48) when I do that transaction. They'll both remember me for it, hopefully. Absolutely. And so it's so funny. Um, obviously you and I work together. Um, and I know this, I know this, I'll call it a strategy, although I don't really even think as a strategy. I think it's just at this point for both of us, just kind of a way of being, but you know, here's the thing I used to, I used to, when I would get on stage and present my first slide on every slide deck was a slide that says, if you learn nothing else, it's this connectivity is today's new currency. For sure enough people who will argue as Bitcoin, some people argue that it's real estate. Some people are gold bullions and people will argue that's oil or dollars or whatever connectivity. Your network is. Today's new currency. And so let me take what Robert said and kind of expand it one more layer deep so that like a social bank account. Casey Eberhart: (21:38) When you meet somebody, you have some in your network, you have a social bank account. It's, it's like you've opened a joint checking account with someone. Every time you deposit something into that account, it gives you the ability to withdrawal later down the road. If you try to withdraw out of a checking account that there is no money in or there's nothing in, you're in the deficit, you're in the hole before you ever start. So let's go back to Robert's example of the property manager. Where I would, where I would do it is I would leverage it out even further. So, so I've got a guy in front of me, he says, I want a property manager in the lower ward. Is that what you called it? Lower Ward. So what I would do is I would say, okay, listen, Bob, or Sally sue or whatever the investor's name is, I'm going to make a few introductions of the top three property managers that I would recommend. Casey Eberhart: (22:29) So what I would do is I would call all three of them ahead of time and tell them, hey, you're going to get a call from Sally sue or Bobby investor. I'm going to send an email, but I want to make sure that you know that I vouch for them. They're great guys. I know a little bit about them. So when you call you when they call, you have a little bit of backstory. Then I would do a warm introduction just like Robert said to all three property manager firms knowing full well that the investor is going to pick one, but what the other two are going to get out of it is they know now that Robert's working on their behalf. Number one, it gives him more bank account, more bank account juice in that social bank account. The other thing does is it also psychologically limits the liability that Robert has if something goes wrong with the investor and the one person he introduced him to, so let's say Robert Introduces Bob the investor to a property manager a and something goes to hire a Toro horribly wrong. They get in a lawsuit they hate each other for what Robert is looking for is that extra interest that could also come back to bite him if something goes gets crazy or unravels or they're not great personalities or whatever. If Robert only gives him one investor or one property manager. Then Speaker 3: (23:46) the other thing that that does is if that property manager is not a good fit, then we leave the investor high and dry. He's going to go find somebody else to give him another referral for another property manager. So I always like to give two or three referrals on the same thing so that way all three people know I'm out working on their behalf. But also it gives them the ability to pick the one that works best for what they're looking for. And it's psychologically go, I can go back to the investor or Robert can go back to the investor and say, Hey, I know the property manager Adan work, but you've got B and c here. Or if something goes haywire, you go, hey boss, that's why I gave you three. Let's go back to the other two and see if those, one of them is the better fit, don't to work. But the leverage is massive. Speaker 3: (24:36) So Robert, I know that you used, um, I know that here in Los Angeles you really built out meetup as a platform and started to build your network using meetup. I talk a lot about meetup, I work very in depth with meetup groups and people that organize meetups. Talk to me a little bit about kind of how that worked for your business and how that helped you grow the network here in Los Angeles. So you know, probably listening understands what meetup is and if not, it's, it's a, it's a platform that allows you to organize an event and use that platform to broadcast out. It is a little labor intensive. Um, they don't have a really good email CRM set up internally for you to use. That's probably by design. Um, however, here's the trick. Like I've done it. I, we have many, many meetups across the country. Speaker 3: (25:33) We, a lot of them are webinar based, some are acts or are, are in-person based. And I've, I've seen a lot of the folks in my industry say, well, I'll just do what Robert's doing right? And then three months down there meet up is gone. Right? I pick a lot of those meetups up Soto. I absolutely. So do I. We, we, we pick up these old, these you said meet up all the time, revive them and put them into a webinar based meetup. So you really, really, really have to have thought on content, right? Like you can, you can get your friends to come out to the first one and the ones, your friends who didn't make the first one will probably come out to the second one. The third meetup is really are you getting any traction? Right? And the third meet up might be as small as three or four people, but don't freak out, right? Speaker 3: (26:26) Is the ones that get traction are the ones that stay. People will go to meet up and look at all the past meetings to say, oh look, there was that. This guy knows what he's doing. This guy has traction. You've got to build out the traction. You've got to stay with it for six months. Once you do that and you'll have three, four, 500 contacts, maybe a thousand after six months, um, that you can tap into, that you can work, that you can make introductions to, that you can rely on. And um, you know, in that world, you're gonna find some, as you call them, raving fans and your raving fans will support you in no matter what you do. And so that's a really, really good way to do it. Again, it becomes a little labor intensive. So we've hired someone just to sort of Julian house stuff for our meetups, but it is a very good platform that caused, I don't know, a couple hundred bucks a year. Speaker 3: (27:19) It's nothing much that allows you to start positioning yourself as an influencer or an expert. Right. And at this point, you know, the joke is that me and my partner, it's like we're not going to any room that we're not on stage for now that might sound egotistical and all that other stuff, but we understand at this point in 10 years of doing this that it is much better to the beyond stage than it is to be in the seat. Right? And so meetup allows you to position yourself to share your expertise to the marketplace. Um, and it's a, it's a very, without paying a lot of money to the coaches and all this other stuff, you can positioning yourself as an expert, share your expertise, share with say what you need to say, share too, because people want to know the things that, you know, I don't care if you're a florist or a real estate investor, people want to know. Speaker 3: (28:14) And so you can position yourself as an expert in the delivery, your expertise to that room versus trying to figure out how to get on everyone else's stage. And then when you figured out that a lot of these stages are revenue driven, you're never going to get on that stage. So if you could just deliver your expertise to the marketplace or meetup, we find it to be, and the very, very exciting platform for us to use. Yeah. So let's, let's unpack that a time a tiny bit. So if you're not aware of how meetup works, you guys as an organizer of a meetup, they will basically play matchmaker. So you have a whole bunch of people that are out in the, in your local community that are looking to be around likeminded individuals. And so they go to meetup and they search on criteria, real estate or network marketing or you know, I want to go hikers, florist, whatever. Speaker 3: (29:03) Yeah. I want to go hiking or wedding professionals or photographers or you know, motorcycle riders, soccer players. It's, it's basically a place for people to go find people of likeminded. Well, as an organizer of meetup, it allows you to say, Hey, my meetup is based on these 15 search terms or these 15 categories or criteria. So when you start a meetup, meetup is gonna send out an email to the millions and millions of people that have said, hey, notify me when a meetup starts with this particular topic. You know, I, I'm, I'm a, I'm somebody that wants to knit and quilt and I'm a beekeeper and love hiking, right? Casey Eberhart: (29:42) So it'll, it'll start to match make and it is essentially a free or almost free lead generation machine. Yeah. So what Robert is talking about is he can start a meetup group on real estate investing in San Fernando Valley. Meet up is going to put a bunch of people in there. Now he could email all those people individually. You could email them all as a group. He could set up a Webinar to let them all come to a webinar. He could, um, create an environment for him to bring in other speakers, other folks as well. So if I take this step, take a half step further. If you are afraid of public speaking and you don't want to be on stage, use it to leverage and bring in other folks that might have more knowledge in the particular area that you have. You could say to Robert, hey, um, come on in, come on in. Casey Eberhart: (30:31) Uh, I want to have you do a half hour to my real estate group and he will because he wants to be onstage right now. The reason you want us to be on stage is because there is a phrase in the world of business, um, that not a lot of people use anymore. It used to be used quite frequently back in probably the seventies and eighties, but it goes like this. He or she who has the marker, makes the money. And essentially what that means is most of the time, all things being held constant, the person doing the presentation almost always as the expert and that expert is going to be positioned and seen as the guru, if you will, more than somebody that's just sitting in a chair. Right? So if Robert is doing a presentation in front of 40 people or 30 people or 20 people or 400 people, he is at that point perceived as somebody who has the marker, who's making the money, the, the, the cache and the influence goes to him. Casey Eberhart: (31:28) Now, one other, one other thing that is, uh, a great meetup strategy is Robert said they don't go to events if they don't, um, if they're not in the front of the room, well, here's the thing. A lot of events, they're either going to have to pay to sponsor to beyond or they have to do a big revenue split, so on and so forth in order to get on those stages. Well, what if somebody, like you has a meetup group and you've got 50 people that are all about real estate and you're kind of the guy or the Gal in your local market, and then you look at Robert and you're like, Robert, wow, he'd be amazing to come have speed. Well, here's the thing. He also has rooms where there are people. And so you could do what's called in the business a stage swat. You know, Hey Robert, you come speak on my stage, I'll come speak on your stage. And then, um, it's a great way to leverage of those folks and give the content or give the audience the best possible experience. Yup. That's how it works. Well, you got to put your time in. It is a little labor intensive when you, you've really got to deliver expertise to the marketplace or people won't come. Casey Eberhart: (32:39) Absolutely. And here's the thing, the number of people that aren't consistent, aren't willing to put the work in are super lazy. Those people won't survive, but their meetup groups will survive. So those lazy folks that come in and start it and they do one and two people show up and they're like, ah, this is stupid. I'd rather just go sit in an audience somewhere and listen, um, and network better. Well, here's what happens, guys, like Robert and I, as soon as that organizer gets so lazy that they don't pay their bill or they stepped down as an organizer, meetups are going to actually send an email. I'll say, hey everybody, that's a part of this group. We're desperate to have somebody step up and step in as a leader. Robin, we'll own that group before the end of the day. He's just, if there's 200 people in that group, he's just generated 200 leads in his ideal absolute market with, with, with not being lazy with one click of a button. Speaker 3: (33:33) Yeah. And we think them all the time. We pick them up from, uh, it's, you'd be surprised how many, how Vegan influencers that people are. They let these things drop and you know, guys doing million dollar slips up and down the, the, uh, Pacific coast, that's one drop. I pick it up. I started doing my webinars six months later. He remembers he had a meetup emails me and says, Hey, what happened? I want to, I want to do some more. And it's like, hey man, you let this thing go now, normally if it's in the first 30 days case, I just give it back. Yep. Yeah. Here you go, man. That, that's fine. Sorry. Hey, how's it going to keep it going? This what I do. But if you want to do it, if it's just a real oversight, but I'm met people come back to me a year and a half late. Speaker 3: (34:19) I used to own this meetup. Where were you when you have an obligation? Well if people are, are, are taking the time they're picking you, they're subscribing or allowing you to enter an email box, which is a pain in the ass for everyone. You have an obligation to deliver. And if you're not delivering then you know, meetup season in my way. Yup. See who say, hey you, you didn't respond. This is too bad. But again, it usually in 30 days, okay, you can have it not a problem if it's six months or a year. People coming back to me cause they see the, I've grown the group from 265 to 1500 people. No, he can have that back then. I'm looking, I'm working at now. These people are getting value and expertise for me so we don't, uh, we don't hesitate to jump on some of these meetups when they become available. Casey Eberhart: (35:10) Well, you brought up a really valid point is that number one, um, the labor is really you guys, the Labor that Robert's talking about is, is not as heavy duty burden as most of you are spending on your business anyways. It's about finding a, a banquet room at a local restaurant or a small hotel meeting room or go talk to your Keller Williams franchise and see if you can use their conference room or you know, your insurance agency that has a training room. Heck, we have here in the valley, in the Fernando Valley in Los Angeles. We have a Ford dealership that has an amazing training room where they train all the reps that you can, that you can rent. And then being able to provide as much value as possible. And if you become the person that provides value to the network, the reality is then your influence in that network is going to be huge. Casey Eberhart: (35:59) Right. You know, and it can be a super old school. Like I was just showing my little nephew, I have a 17 year old nephew who, uh, just graduated from film school camp and direct and he wants to be a director and I showed him my own, my old networking book. I used to back in, in the wayback machine. I used to have my network in a three inch binder and that binder had sheets in front of it that had names and phone numbers on it. Then there was business card sheets where I'd put business cards and I'd write notes on the business cards. Then there were sheets that were profiles of people so that if I knew Robert's wife's name was Katherine and he was in my network, I'd write Catherine, what is she interested in? She has an amazing life insurance business where she can help you create a bank for yourself, um, as an investor using the, using the tool of life insurance. Casey Eberhart: (36:48) So I'd write Katherine Orofino Life Insurance, I'd get her phone number, and then I would literally my daily activity that would be to work that notebook. How can I connect people? How can I make connections? How can I introduce Catherine to somebody else's if it's somebody else's network. Right. Because the better off you get at staying in touch with your folks. Staying connected. Now I have been to use a greeting card and gifting platform to be able to do some of that in conjunction with a CRM system in conjunction with kind of old school. Um, your network is so unbelievably valuable in terms of expanding the business. Robert, what tools do you guys use down in Houston? Oh wait, before you answer that, let's, so let's move to Houston. So you basically said, hey, I've got an opportunity in Houston, I'm going to pack up the fam, we're going to move down to Houston and we're going to kind of make our mark in Houston. What percentage of the architecture of your marketing plan in Your Business Plan did you take from Los Angeles and basically start to recreate down in Houston? Robert Orfino: (37:58) Oh, Robert Orfino: (38:00) everything at work. So we immediately started doing meetups for sure. Um, and, and what I was, what I was able to become in, in La, the little niche that I built, cause I was the guy who told you all the dirt, right? All the inside baseball stuff. There's no secrets with me. I, I'll sit up there and tell you, hey, I'm going to sell you a product products, not 1000 bucks. I'm going to make $400 for everyone I sell and it should work for you. And if it work, call me up and I'll give you your money back. Right. I was able to sit, just go, just completely honest with everything we did open books, right? And that was a lot easier, uh, to, to deliver to a marketplace like, like Houston, I was, everyone else is doing the whole, you know, you can become a millionaire and lot, you'll be, have this great lifestyle and all that stuff. Robert Orfino: (38:59) I'd stand up there and say, that's nonsense. That's nonsense. That's nonsense. This is what works. But oh by the way, you've got to put in 35 hours a week. So if you don't have 35 hours a week, it's going to be very difficult for you to do this. And we started breaking things down. This is the real amount of time. This is the real cost, right? And you know, my joke is if, if you can really do real estate for no money down and bad credit, why does the guru won $1,000 on your credit card, right? Because they're making money off of that. Then it's, you're in real estate. Guess what? You need money, right? So you may have a dream of doing this for no money, but I'm, I'm the dream crusher when it comes to it. And then I can really explain why this can work this certain way, what you really need and how your resources need to come together. Robert Orfino: (39:56) And we, we've had people come to our rooms and say, I don't want to do this. I want to do. And I'll say, great, what's your, what's your phyto? How much money did you make a year? How much money you have saved? And they're all bad answers, right? And I turned to him, I'll say, Casey, I'm going to give you the best advice you're ever going to get, that you're probably not going to take. You need to get in your car and drive Uber for the next year and save every dime that you made from Uber so that you can then have a deposit to go buy a house, or you have enough money to start a marketing program. Or You have the money so that you can do a flip. But you're gonna have to put the time in. Most people, you know, come to us and in our world I'll say, hey, what are, how are your sales and marketing skills, right? Robert Orfino: (40:44) These are like the real conversations we have. I'm not very good at, I'm a bit of an introvert. Okay, well you're not going to do well. You've got to break down that wall. And I would highly suggest you just go spend $500 with a, was an organized multilevel marketing business direct sales program where they've got tons of marketing and sales coaching already up on the website, make a small little investment. And I don't care what it is, candles, pills, lotions, oils. I don't care what it is, bottle that program. Because when you follow that program that someone's put a lot of time and effort in, just follow that program so you can get better at marketing one yourself and your expertise and products and too you become a better person on the clothes. And so you can break out of that for $500 versus going down in real estate, man, I feel a charging 25 $50,000 for coaching program. Robert Orfino: (41:42) Stay out of that rabbit hole and for $500 just work on your skills. Know that I'm going to go sell post it notes for the next six months so that I can hone my skills and move into this other space. So we, we give the hard truth and some people respect it. Some people don't. We don't have big rooms of a thousand people like some of these other events because we tell people once they come in the door, hey save here Saturday, there's, there's no magic here. There's no pixie dust. This is all work and resources. And if that's not what you're looking for, I tell him straight up, Casey, you should probably leave right now. Go to the park. It's a beautiful Saturday. Enjoy the day. Casey Eberhart: (42:31) Yeah, you know, you, you brought something really, really valuable and it's obviously near and dear to my heart as well in that, you know, somebody that goes, if somebody comes to me and I'm in the same situation, I have a lot of people come to me and say, Hey, I want to.dot, dot. Finish the sentence. Right? And what it really comes down to is they want to have what somebody else has, but they don't want to do what that person did to get there. They want to leapfrog it or, or, or take the, shortcut it with somebody that understands the power of investing. And I always go back to rich Dad, poor dad, Rich Dad, poor dad, the cashflow quadrant. You know, you want to own businesses, you want to invest in businesses. You know, something like a network marketing business is one of the best investments in terms of return on capital that you could ever get. Casey Eberhart: (43:28) Not only the entry point is not millions or hundreds of thousands, it's usually a few hundred bucks. It's going to teach you skills like marketing, Internet, social media, shaking hands, getting nos, building up your thick skin and the money that you make can be astronomical and it can also be zero. But if you go into it looking at what is the skill I'm going to get out of this experience and not focused on the money piece, it's huge. You know, like I've, one of my best friends, uh, this was when I very, very first started my coaching career. He was one of my very first clients and he said, I, um, I want to start a consulting firm. And so we have this conversation. And He, I said, well, what skill do you think you need as a consulting firm? And he understood the market that he was consulting in, but he had zero skills in sales, right? Casey Eberhart: (44:23) So we didn't really know how to talk to people. He was a super nerd computer. He can write code, he can be total nerd, um, nerd and geek, but he can know interpersonal skills. He had no um, no experience and so I was like, look, let's go find out. This was in Seattle who is rated the best sales training program in the country and let's go to work for them. And it just so happened to be xerox as though he went to work for Xerox for a year and he basically cold called high rise building offices trying to sell them copy machines. The skillset that he generated out of that was massive. Yeah, right. Same with people that, that that you know will say, oh, I'm broke. I'm working in a whole foods for 13 bucks an hour. I have no money. I'm super in debt. Casey Eberhart: (45:16) What do I do case? What do I do? I'll say, go join a network marketing company that the products or services or something that you can kind of get behind and understand that you are there to learn the skillset of building a network, interpersonal communications, how to maybe play a little bit on social media and focus on the return on that dollar for dollar investment and Start Your Business Mind in how do I look at a balance sheet? How do I look at a profit and loss statement? How much money do I put in every month? How much money do I get out every month? The the network marketing space is a mimic of real life business. Robert, you and I have both owned brick and mortar businesses. You know, I've, I've owned a bunch of businesses. You first off, you don't go buy a business for under 500 bucks. Casey Eberhart: (46:05) Number one with employees that have already taken into account websites and insurance and customer service and shipping product development, you're going to do that all on your own. You're into millions of dollars or you can go tap into a company or in a firm that's done all of that. And your job is simply to bring customers and other distributors to the table and then run it like a business. So you've got your goals, you've got at the end of the month, you look and you go, okay, well this month I spent $400 on vitamins, but I was able to move $300 worth of vitamins. So I'm now in the whole 100 bucks. And then I got paid $400, I'm net 300 up and run it and get into the habit of running that business like a business. And so often I think most people will start a business and then they run it like a hobby and then they get irritated and agitated that it, it throws off hobby money and then all entrepreneurial is bad or network marketing is bad or real estate investing is bad. You know, Robert Orfino: (47:04) it happens all the time. And that is one of the key things is to run like a business. Um, you know, we, I'm a big believer, there's a book out there by a Michael Kollwitz a the pumpkin plan. It's a really good sort of, hey this is how I'm going to start and make sure I'm putting the things away. Make sure I understand what a balance sheet is. Difference between a balance sheet and a p and l, right. Cause there is a difference. Um, make sure you understand those things and run it like business for sure. Um, it's almost like you're playing in my head. I, I have a webinar coming up this Saturday called run it like a business because too many people get into the real estate game and don't understand, um, Robert Orfino: (47:43) all the benefits you can get from running like a business. I always say, hey, there's five ways to make money in real estate. It can be a wholesaler between, you can pedal paper contracts around and wholesale a contract, one person to another. You can flip a house. That's HDTV. Look at all the, how beautiful my kitchen is and I'll make some money there. It could be a landlord. Everyone knows where the landlord is. Um, you could be just an investor, a person who just what's funny out and owns the notes or a mortgage, right? Private mortgages, there's a fifth way. If you get to the fifth way, you're doing really well. That's called depreciation. And a lot of people will buy large apartment buildings or are expensive properties just for the depreciation. But we understand that there's a massive tax benefit for real estate and you have not prepared yourself to take advantage of that tax benefit. And you're right, it's a hobby. It's just a hobby. And so when you start running it like a business man, there are two types of tax codes in this country, one for individuals and one for businesses. I'll let you decide which one you think is better. Casey Eberhart: (48:55) Yeah, yeah, Robert Orfino: (48:56) and if you've read that it's the business passcode is better than why don't you own a business? Why aren't you running your hobby like a business? Casey Eberhart: (49:05) We've kind of touched on real estate and network marketing is kind of cool that way. You know, I always crack up. It's like if you're going to buy products or using network marketing company, you guys understand that that's a business you have. You get open up to just a little taste of what Robert's talking about in terms of tax deductability things like your haircut, your, your clothing, your office. Did you use your Internet, your cable TV, your magazine subscription has all become tax deductible for 50 bucks or whatever your distribution distribution thing is. You have been fantastic at attracting and doing deals with partners and I know that a lot of times people get scared from partners. They had a bad partner or their mom's brother's girlfriend's dog catcher was a bad partner. How, how do you help? Not a, do you, I'm assuming that you like doing deals with partners. What makes a good partner? How do you, what, what are some pitfalls? What are, what do you look out for when you, when you are looking to partner with someone? Robert Orfino: (50:04) Yeah, so this is that learning process, right? It was $125,000 lesson. Um, I had a bad partner and I use a lot of my own capital to push a deal forward. Only at the end of the realize that, um, what was being told to me wasn't reality. And so I had spent over $125,000 for some green energy projects and I lost as at all. And then we're going to do that again, obviously. Right? And so I much prefer a joint venture and illimited joint venture, meaning there is a clock ticking. So the most I'll stay married to any one partner at this point is about five years. Right. Even even my, my partner would've been everything. Everything we're doing. Jason is a partner or mine. I've already told him, Hey, I'm done. Like I got a five to seven year horizon. I'm done. You're 10 years younger than me. Robert Orfino: (51:04) You want to keep going. God bless you. Keep me on as a, as a consultant and I'll let me own a little bit and I'll sell my share to someone else. And you feel that you want to bring in, we can get, you can walk away clean on this stuff, but I'm done. I have a number in my head, I'm very close to that number and I'm done. Right. I'll go start a little cafe will be my next business. I like making breakfast. Um, so I, I would tell people that you are going to do jvs joint ventures, you're going to have a really defined the roles in which people are supposed to do. Um, and then have a time limit for the partnership. That's really important. And the big thing is what happens when it hits the fan. Yup. And the way we do a lot of it is we have an attorney journey that we both respect and we say he doesn't like you, the one who was anymore. Robert Orfino: (51:59) So let him in him, let him do the, uh, the wisdom of Solomon move. And I don't have to pay for arbitration mediation or lawsuits. Right. And if he, if he says, Robert, you're wrong. And Jason is right, I can accept it. Right. And so we have the worst case scenario decided upon while we're still friends. Yep. And that's, that's the thing with partnerships and, and you know, be careful, I'll just tell you, in a real estate world, a lot of people will call it a joint venture, but it's really not. It's a, it's another form of passive investing, which is kind of illegal. You got to make sure you're, you're really have a role responsibilities for folks and what they're going to do. And we have, um, you know, and making sure your partners are taken care of is really, really important. I'm making sure that all the goals are laid out moving forward. Robert Orfino: (52:53) It's very hard for partners really to move forward at the same pace you all to beginning and then something happens and this happens. So you've really got to define the roles and what the expectations are. I would be spending probably, I mean, I would literally probably go to a hotel or something and just shut my cell phone off and sit down with my potential partner and stay there for three days and work out every detail. Who's gonna, who's this role? What's this role? Who gets hired first? Who gets hired last? Who through all of it. Really, really planned that business. It's still, when there is a problem with an event, Evan, there always will be. Yeah. Well what does our agreements say? Oh Lo Casey, you're supposed to be doing this. Are we changing the agreement now? Dude, I'll, I can take that onto, I get a little bit more of the, of the ownership. I get a little bit more of the cash. How are we feeling about that? Uh, so having very good partnership agreement. I like to do a joint venture limited five years sort of maximum. Um, then that's the best way to do it. Casey Eberhart: (54:05) Yeah. I was actually listening to, I've become recently, I've become obsessed with a real estate podcast other than do a ever, ever, I try to listen to an episode or so every day, especially as we grow the, expand the business podcast here, and the guy that was being interviewed today was talking about joint ventures and partnerships and that there's essentially a real estate delta, which is three prongs to a triangle. And it is, somebody needs to come and show up with the hustle. Someone needs to come and show up with the knowledge and someone needs to come and show up with the money. And good partnership is when you can come with at least two of those three, those, those three things. But the key is that you don't want to find a partner that has the same two of three or the same one of three of those Delta points that you do Robert Orfino: (54:57) for sure. And most importantly, when we're starting out, be aware of the person who has none of the three be the partner, right. That's, that's a, that's a red flag right there. Casey Eberhart: (55:08) Awesome. So Robert, I want to touch on one last area before, before we let you run. Um, and that is the idea of the importance and maybe you don't think it's important, but maybe you do a of how important is it for you since you guys, since you and Jason are kind of the pinnacle influencers in your ecosystem in Houston. I know you have a, a radio show you do every day, you guys are doing tons of Facebook stuff, tons of Facebook lives. You kind of become the B guys that have been able to cherry pick some of the deals that come through just by your influence. I know that in a lot of situations you're the smartest guys in the room. So I want to flip this and ask how important is it to you to have coaches or advisors or mastermind people where you have somebody that's pushing you guys that's making you stretch, that's making you think rather than, you know, I'll say it differently rather than you always being the smartest one in the room. You're involved in scenarios and situations where you're not necessarily the smartest one in the room, Robert Orfino: (56:14) right? So I will tell you that I wake up every single day and one of my quick little mantras is, is you know nothing Speaker 3: (56:25) and we're going to learn something today. So I take life in general as I'm the dumbest guy in the room and everyone here can teach me something. And it's because when I get caught up with being the smartest guy, I have failed. I have absolutely failed. Now My, my partner, Jason is very smart. He is clearly, Eh, it's clearly 10 IQ points or more higher than me. I could see it in the conversation. I become a very good reader of prison. I can see it in the conversation. I have to ask questions about the formulas in the words. I'm like, Hey, can you go over that? And a little bit different way. And he has the patience to work with me on that. Um, he, he's a genius when it comes to this stuff, right? Um, no I don't. He can't do what I do on a lot of places and we wouldn't be successful if we tried to do this alone. Speaker 3: (57:24) Um, but for sure he's a genius when it comes to business and real estate. It looks at things much, much differently. Comes up with a lot of great ideas. Just being around him is very humbling. Uh, but it's also a very exciting, every day when his outside the box thinking hits my, I've been punched in the face many, many times. Practical thinking we can come up with something that no one else is doing. And so I get coached every day by my partner. We pay for coaching. Um, we are in, we've, we, and I'll tell you, um, I've been asked to coach a lot. Uh, I don't have a for you. Say yes, let's have a chat. Yeah, let's, let me put it this way. I don't cook, but I don't say no. Someone who says, Hey, I could really use a couple hours of your time and I'll say, great, I'm at $7,000 an hour. Speaker 3: (58:23) And they're like, whoa. I'm like, yeah, okay. So you can just join my membership where I kind of give all this stuff away anyway. Or you can join my mastermind, which is where I really like to work. What I have found over this last 10 12 years does that that mastermind format is where I excel because I can walk into a room again with that mindset. I'm a dummy and I'm going to soak up so much knowledge today. Right now I enjoy the one on one hour with my coaches. It's absolutely critical. I need it, but for me, I would rather present a mastermind to the public for real estate and to do coaching because here's the reality of Real Estate Coaching Siren. Good job. I'll get back to, but on the reality of, I know I'm all over it, and the reality of Real Estate Coaching is 90% of everything you need to be a landlord, a house flipper, wholesaler [inaudible] is on the Internet the last 10% really the loading order, how you do things and when, which order is what you will pay people to learn. Speaker 3: (59:33) And in that case it could be a coach, but I would much prefer a mastermind, um, masterminds and maybe have lots of Q and a so you can get your questions answered, throw it up on a Facebook page, like your groups have a question to ask them for the group. And a lot of people give you that wisdom of the group. It's really important for me. Um, I will, I will take on a coach when I have a very specific problem, right? How do I get more contact through Facebook platform, through Instagram, through youtube. And I'll sit down with you every month and an hour and we'll go over it. Are you doing this? Are you doing that? Hey, I just heard someone do a speech on this. You guys go look it up and see if that applies to you. So we'll, we, we like that coaching but in a mastermind event and I know you also run a mastermind, um, those are phenomenal and those masterminds you want to walk into and absolutely take on the understanding that I am the dumbest guy in the world. Speaker 3: (01:00:36) Casey, you mentioned a name to me, Roland. Yep. And I was like, boy, that name sounds familiar. And I went back and I was like sure enough, I'm in his, I was in his mastermind, I paid him, he and Ken Colder did a mastermind together in that room. I was in that room with him when he had just bought the survival opening survival life.com and he was giving my all these knowledge bombs and I was like, for sure I'm a dummy in that room. Well man was I getting my money's worth right now? And being in that room with that mastermind, having access to those people, being able to call an email and text them is critical. I don't think you can do it on your own. I think it's, I think one, it's just foolish. It's, it's, it's, it's foolish to think you're going to reinvent the wheel. Casey Eberhart: (01:01:30) I think there's a lot of people that have the personality type. Well if I'm going to do it, I've got to do it myself. Cause it's the only way it's going to get get really done. And in these mastermind groups, what really occurs is that you're paying or you're investing in access of the people, not only in the group, but access to the person who are running it in terms of who their network is. I mean, you know, Roland now, um, is one of the owners of a mastermind room called the war room. That is phenomenal. I mean, Roland, Roland Frasier is, is one of the most astute business people on the planet. And uh, uh, I can't wait for him to know that this has come up. He'll get it, he'll get it to kick it off and just let me get his podcast a huge shout out. It's called the business lunch. You, you, if you're not subscribed to it, go subscribe to Roland Fraser's business lunch. It is phenomenally Leery, sits down with guys that most people would never have access to and just kind of has a conversation over lunch. It's fantastic. So, um, Robert, before we wrap this up, Robert Orfino: (01:02:34) okay, Casey Eberhart: (01:02:34) last kind of words. I want to give you kind of the floor for a minute or so and just kind of give some advice to the listeners on the show and kind of how they can help expand the business. Robert Orfino: (01:02:45) Uh, I will tell you that obviously we talk a lot about networking and that's a really big thing for us here. Um, by becoming, dropping ourselves into a lot of existing networks and saying, hey, we're here. We're going to tell the truth. We're going to give you sometimes the ugly truth, sometimes good truth, um, just okay. You know, the Internet, the Internet and Facebook and that whole world, that whole social media world is, you know, they're filled with people that look like they're leaving a good life and looks like their business is killing it. But I always say, Hey man, give me 20 minutes with any real estate investor and I'll figure it out. You know, how close they are to jumping off a cliff, right? Because there's a reality there. Um, and I think what happens is people look at this and say, Oh my God, am I, why am I failing? Robert Orfino: (01:03:38) Right? And it's, here's, here's the reality of it. They've all failed. Some of them just fell a lot faster than you. And so they race ahead of you. Um, we think that being in this business is a fantastic way to create wealth. And if you're not in this business for ego boost, you don't need to post. You're, you're betting in Vegas full of cash or pose in front of a lambo or a private jet and you can just go about your business and doing it. So in the Internet world, right, there are people that are creating wealth and growing their business and there are people that are positioning themselves in the marketing world. You don't need to do both. Casey Eberhart: (01:04:24) Yup. Robert Orfino: (01:04:25) You can just put your head down and say, I'm gonna retire in five years. And those are the folks we love to have around us. Um, I'll also say that a big thing for us was, uh, multiple streams of income. I know you hear it all the time, Casey, if you could just focus on one thing, you'd be a billionaire, right? Yeah. I to thy own self be true, understand your limitations. And what motivates you to get out of bed every day and follow through on that. And I know that I cannot focus on one thing at a time. Casey Eberhart: (01:05:03) Me Either. Robert Orfino: (01:05:04) I can focus on being a really good manager

EP013 - Auto Intel Summit Recap with Joe Overby http://www.vehicle2.getspiffy.com Episode 13 is an interview with Joe Overby, Senior Editor of Auto Remarketing & Auto Remarketing Canada; recorded live at the Automotive Intelligence Summit in Raleigh, NC on Wednesday, July 24th, 2019.  Joe makes his return to the podcast to talk with Scot about all of the happenings at AIS; from their favorite sessions and what was covered to the diversity of this year’s show.  If you enjoyed this episode, please write us a review on iTunes! The four pillars of Vehicle 2.0 are electrification, connectivity, autonomy, and changing ownership models. In the Vehicle 2.0 Podcast, we will look at the future of the auto industry through guest expert interviews, deep dives into specific topics, news coverage, and hot takes with instant analysis on what the latest breaking news means for today and in time to come. This episode was produced and sound engineered by Jackson Balling, and hosted by Scot Wingo.   Transcript: Scot:               [00:56] Welcome to the vehicle 2.0 podcast. We are live recording here at the 2019 Automotive Intelligence Summit from sunny Raleigh, North Carolina. It's Wednesday, July 24th. It's been a long day. We're here at the end of the day, end of day two. So two thirds are a little bit more than that through the show. And excited to have Joe over beyond Joe is as a reminder to listeners as senior editor of auto remarketing. Also, you're the first guest we've had on the show twice. So, so you're famous. Joe:                [01:24] That's awesome. That's a come back, man. I feel special. Scot:               [01:29] So in addition to your role there, you guys put on this show. So you've been kind of, you know helping with a lot of the content and everything. So we thought we'd check in now that we're through the bulk of the show can get a read from you. What's been kind of the topical top of mind with it? Joe:                [01:45] Yeah, I, I think I think yesterday some of what stood out to me kind of in the, in the general sessions at least was the cybersecurity. It was, I, I don't know if scary is the right word, but the the ability of, of hackers to be able to generate, to get into you know, dealership systems and automaker systems and, you know, even even you, our personal data or personal credit card information, I think it was really eye opening, especially that, that last panel a with or that last a fireside chat with Ryan Bachman. GM financial. I thought I thought, you know, I, I got to sit in on your session yesterday, Scott. And I thought it was a couple of things really came up in that session that was interesting to me that just the I think it was one of the first charts you showed with how fast the rate of change and digital automotive has been compared to what I would the last 50 years prior. That the retail model is just you know, changed so quickly. And then you know, I think look Scot:               [02:52] At how fast Carvana came out of nowhere. Like I've never heard of them two years ago, maybe 18 months ago. And you know, you've got the Joe:                [02:59]  Vending machines everywhere and, and you know, everyone here is talking about their experience. I, I'm new to this digital retailing that's kind of, it has been a big topic that I've picked up on. Yeah, absolutely. And I thought, I thought today, you know, really was a big kind of digital, digital retail day. The particularly that dealer panel where we, we had four, four dealers and the, the president of the North Carolina auto dealers association talk about for a good bit of their time, you know, on the panel they talked about the digital retail experience and how, you know, I believe it. Okay. I think it might've been the, the gentleman from, from flo who talked about how dealers have the infrastructure and an inventory to do digital routes, the best of that to do their best position that guests to do digital retailing. Joe:                [03:52] And you know, they had some, some interesting thoughts on Carvana as well. And you know, as part of that panel and then also a couple other, you know, just discussions was the fact that I guess the key to digital retailing, you know, whether you're a dealer or whether you're, you know, Nordstrom's or whomever is offering kind of a blended experience between the online and in store based on what the customer wants. And I'm sure you've seen some of the same things with any commerce's. We, there was a long phase where we called it Omni channel and now they call it harmonized. So omnichannel was kind of trying to just like make your inventory counts work across online in the store, just kind of the basics x's and o's. And then harmonized is things like I add something to my cart on a tablet and then I go into the store and the sales associate can like know what's in my cart. Joe:                [04:47] So it's interesting to see the same conversations going on here. The dealer network makes it more complicated. It's almost as if every store was its own little business. Yeah. So imaginary Nordstrom's was independently owned and operated in a way, you know, a, or a franchise. I bet that's gonna make it really hard because you may have one dealer that's kind of, you know, within a, an OEMs world, far along the spectrum. But then another one's not. If the consumer starts at the OEM site, they're gonna have very different experiences. They go into different dealers. So it feels like a lot of it's going to have to come down from the OEMs. And I haven't heard a lot of talk about them. And it's interesting too, because a lot of these digital retail, you know, providers that work with dealers, you know, if a dealer wants to do digital retailing and you know, they work with one of these tech providers, you know, to do so, you know, you have these companies that are providing it on a dealer level, kind of a dealer group level, and then also the OEM level. Joe:                [05:46] So it's, it's Kinda, it can be, you can imagine where the messaging kind of gets mixed up in that process. Yeah. Yeah. The consumer wants to look across inventory, right? Yeah. You don't just, you don't, as long as the target, you're looking at it, you know, the target store is within 10 miles and you're looking for a very specific thing. You have some flexibility there. So it's gonna be interesting to see how that Nav, how that evolves. Yeah, absolutely. The another, another thing that jumped out to me today was it was also during that, that dealer panel where the head of the NC auto dealers association, Bob Glazer, he asked the panelists, the, the dealers when they thought, you know, he was using Raleigh as an example when Raleigh would have fully autonomous vehicles on the road. And, and you know, one of them said, Oh, you know, 2020, 23, another one set out, it'll be like 20, 40. Joe:                [06:41] And then the woman from crossroads automotive, who's there, she's there, court corporate counsel. She said, you know, this is the lawyer speaking to me, but never, you know, she said it's the insurance companies will be playing a bit of a, her term was, you know, having a punting match on who's going to take liability. So I think that that just illustrates some of the, you know, I don't know if I would say never, but it illustrates some of the complicated you know, issues out there with autonomy. But I think you could say the same thing about, to certain degree about subscription and other shared shared usage models. You know, who's gonna take insurance liability, who's going to pay for x, Y, and Z. I think those are, those are issues that are going to be raised for sure. Yeah, it's interesting. I can kind of argue either side. Joe:                [07:31] I see, I totally see your point. But on the other side, if you believe some of the stats, like even just kind of the level two in three stuff reduces accidents by like 80%. The insurance industry should be happy for autonomy and you know, I think they have a business reason to get around it and say we'll take on more liability because the liability we have today is going down by 80 or 90%. So that's how I talked myself into the other side of that. Again, and they, I think one of the one of the panelists or not panels, one of the sessions talking about the, you know, there's insurance companies now that are working with some of these subscription platform providers to figure out, you know, they, they to write specific policies that, you know kind of all the different usage cases of subscriptions in it and what kind of policy that driver would need and the you know, companies would need to do those types of things. Joe:                [08:24] So to your point, I think a lot of the companies are seeing it as a business opportunity. Yeah. Okay. Any other big trends? Well, I think that one of the funnel sessions was interesting to me. The the startup portion where they were talking about, you know, just opportunities for collaboration. And Quinn Garcia, who the managing director of, of autotech ventures mentioned that, you know, a lot of times we see startups as, or they're referred to as disrupting, but you know, in a, in in many ways they kind of help solve problems within a traditional industry like automotive because they, they have the ability and willingness to, to innovate and move quickly. The other side of that, he said they're challenged. Scaling can be a challenge, but what they're really good at is innovating and, and, you know, changing you know, being willingness to change and, you know, company we refer to lift, you know, and their their ability to work with some of these more traditional players in automotive. You know, for working with dealerships, for example, to provide loaner fleets or transporting service customers to and from dealerships. I thought that was an interesting point. And as a side note, I thought it was interesting that when he was talking about having two guys live at his house and while they started Lyft, I just immediately thought of the show Silicon Valley Scot:               [09:57] There Erlich Bachman's house. And started the company there. Yeah. He always says that co that car that's like from like six companies again, he always says it was Bob before its time. Wait, none of us, I don't think we've ever learned what that company did. That's funny. Yeah. And then they lived in his parent's house or something. Yeah. Very silicon valley thing to do. Yeah. I thought that was arresting. We, we see that in the retail world where a lot of retailers have these innovation centers. They kind of go through this cycle where they'll open up the Silicon Valley Innovation Center and they realize how expensive that is to hire engineering talent out there. And then also it creates a weird thing internally, right? So imagine you're not in the innovation center and you're just aligned level executive or developer and you just feel like you're outside of the innovation. Scot:               [10:40] So then that, that's one cycle they'll go through and then they'll, then they'll, they'll kind of make it more of their overall DNA. And then part of it is being able to partner with startups and, you know, definitely spiffy. We're feeling that from the automotive industry where a lot of these parts manufacturers, so for example, Mon humble is a, an investor in us and they are a filter company, you know, what you'd think is a very boring uninnovative innovative space. But they've realized that, you know, they need to understand what the consumer's behavior is changing. So, so we're seeing a lot of the auto companies you know, really I think very quickly invest in this space much more, you know, the retail industry took kind of 20 years, but it seems like the auto industry is moving very fast. Joe:                [11:20] Yeah, absolutely. And I would add one of the one of the other points that kind of stood out to me in the past couple days was one that you, you raised yesterday about the car sharing companies, the two largest ones having raised a combined $900 million combined. And it's interesting to see that, that that there's that much interest in car sharing, which I don't, I don't know that car sharing is as talked about as other segments of, of this mobility. Scot:               [11:53] Yeah. It's kind of under the radar. Joe:                [11:54]  So they, they, those companies go out of their way to kind of call themselves rental car companies, but they're essentially longterm rentals. So they're kind of like, I think their average is three or four day kind of rental kind of things. And so, so the two companies are Touro and get around. What's other, what's also interesting is you kind of see kind of to quote unquote godfathers in the auto space forming. So you've got Interactive Corp IAC. We were talking to the folks at honker and I didn't realize they had, they had led a very significant round for those guys, for example. So I see a, I see bought they have their own Angie's list. They started Expedia. So it's a very Diller's company and they have this whole suite of family home service type businesses and then in travel. Joe:                [12:41] And then they're also in the dating world. Oddly enough, this kind of smattering of Internet companies seems like they've got a directive to, to get really involved. And then the other big one is Softbank. So Softbank you know, just investing, they have like this $80 billion fund and they're investing a ton in the auto space. I know they're in a bunch of parking companies. They're in they're the ones that are funding get around. So, you know, there, there's two really big anchor investors there that are, seem to be driving a lot of that investment. Yeah. I think there's you know, just moving, moving appetite from Silicon Valley and even Wall Street, you know, towards, towards automotive and, you know, cause it's, you know, it's an industry that has been around for, you know, a hundred years and has only, it's only been in the last you know, five to 10 years. We're seeing this level of disruption. And then, you know, of course, the, the huge part of that is, is the used car market, which is 40 million annual sales. And then you have and that's just retail. Then you have a whole wholesale market that's 20 million each year. So it's, it's a, there's a lot of room for, for such investments in growth and quote unquote disruption. Scot:               [14:02] Yeah. I think, I think Amazon has shown us that, you know, digital technology can create such a better zero friction experience and then every time you do something in the car world you'd kind of, or you know, you encounter a lot of friction. So I tried to buy a car about a year ago and I had set it up where I was, I only had two hours cause I knew they would try to drag it out and it took like four hours and you know so and then, you know, no one ever gets really excited about, Gee, I'm going to go and get my car, you know, my oil changed or anything like that. So there's, there's a lot of opportunities to really increase the user experience around everything auto, which I think the VCC and they're pouring a bunch of money into that, just like Uber and lifted with taxis effectively Kinda saw that there was a really bad experience there that that could make much more 2019. Absolutely. Joe:                [14:52] And I think, you know, the, one of the biggest pain points automotive at least in the consumer buying process is that, is that financing process, you know, that it takes hours to get in there and find it to deal. And you know, one of the couple of the panels that we've had particularly the, there's one we had with Alex Mertz Zach with, with Ernst and young and he had three folks from the, the, you know, the, the finance world kind of go in and just speak about how, how they're changing the process. And I think that's probably, you know, the one area that it's pretty ripe for disruption as well. Scot:               [15:32] Yeah. Insight. Yeah. Yeah. You should. Yeah. It should be a lot faster. I don't know why it's so long. I think that it's a profit center and they, they've turned it into a pain point for the consumer to make profits. There's misalignment there and any company that flips that back the other way is it's going to be really making a lot of money. Yeah, absolutely. Joe:                [15:51] The another kind of the session that kind of stood out to me that I was able to get in today was the a one on the from Pala skier with the, with Nice Nielsen Auto Cloud. And she had some interesting interesting takes about, you know, she was sharing some data that I think for for Gidic for brand recognition that TV is the best form of advertising, but on the opposite in that axis you know, for actually decisions to buy that something like direct mail, digital retail or rate way higher than TV. So the key is not one or the other. It's kind of, you know, doing that, doing a blend of both. And I think that can be, you know, as she was saying that I kind of related that to what we were talking about with digital retail, that it is an Omnichannel approach, you know, a harmonized approach to, to to blending a lot of different methods based on how the consumer wants to interact with you. Scot:               17:01] Yeah. The, the challenge with TV is, you know, people that are kind of like 40 and younger, don't watch what they call kind of analog TV anymore. They're on Netflix and they're waiting for the next, you know, they're on, on Hulu and they're going to be on the Disney. It's going to get worse because we have a whole raft of new new subscription programs launching. So, you know, you're, you're almost kind of creating this challenge by just being on TV in that traditional OEM world because that's, that's, that's not the audience they all want. That kind of millennial kind of person are harder to find. And it'd be interesting to see. Yeah, Joe:                [17:33] Yeah, absolutely. I think you're at on point there. Half the shows. I, I still have a cable subscription, but I, you know, half the shows, I'll watch her either on Netflix or Amazon or I'll watch it on HBO Scot:               [17:45] Or something. Yeah. The only live TV is sports. Yeah, exactly. Certainly Joe:                [17:50] Watch, fair, fair. Share that with the, with NC state football starting up in about a month. So I'll be tuning back into the TV for that. Cool. anything else do you want? Huh. Well, you know, what, I, I think the only other other thing that stood out to me was just the diversity of, of companies here and different players in the market. I mean, you know, we're for 20 years we've had some iteration of what we call our, our used car week or in national remarketing conference where it's, it's, you know, for pretty much, you know, dealers, auto auction can signers and banks and, and it's interesting that to have a conference like this because in addition to those folks that they still come to this conference, you know, we get companies that are startups or investors or you know, people like the Nielsen's and Ernst and Young's and, you know, the spiffy is of the world that, you know, maybe are new to us, but they're, you know, getting into automotive and it's, it's really interesting to, to watch all these companies kind of come together. Joe:                [18:54] I mean comparing this conference to say, our fall event there, there's a lot of people here that haven't yet met each other. And so you get a lot of that. Oh, I met so and so at Auto Intel summit and you know, we're gonna work together. We're, you know, our fall event. It is, it's a lot more people who have, have known each other for years. So it's just, it's an interesting dynamic and it's Kinda fun to watch. Yeah. Yeah. One's more kind of like get business done today and the other one's more forward looking. Yeah, absolutely. It's the, you guys can balance the two of those. It's good to be able to provide two shows with a different flavor. Yup. And I should, I should add that our used car week conference is going to be November 11th through 15th at the Red Rock in Las Vegas. So thanks for the quick plug there allowing me. Yeah. Awesome. Cool. So start saving up those pennies for, for the  bandits. Scot:  [19:50] Cool. And then, so tomorrow the conference wraps and I'm sure you're looking forward to that. You can kinda go and take a couple of personal days. I'm sure these things are stressful. So tomorrow we've got Costco, there's a fireside chat about their car program, which is wildly popular. And then some interesting things around the finance side. And then a bunch of us get to repeat our sh are toxic. And so if, if, if folks missed the ones on Tuesday or had to choose between x and Y, you know, it can go to the other one tomorrow. So I think that's good though. We will be at my previous company, we ran several shows and you always get people to complain. You know, I, I couldn't make it to all the content, so I think it's good you didn't play that. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Well, thanks for joining us. I know you're, you're busy and look forward to seeing how things wrap up tomorrow. Joe:                [20:34] Well, Scott, thank you so much for being here and doing all these great shows and, and for your presentation the other day. Thanks. Scot:               [20:40] Thanks for having us.

Justin Womack, the owner of JMack Media LLC, a digital marketer, copywriter, podcast manager, and Fiverr Pro joins Casey Eberhart for an interview on Casey's "Expand the Business" Podcast. In this interview, Justin discusses how earning the Fiverr Pro designation has impacted his business as well as how becoming a podcast host of two shows has moved the needle. Justin Womack is the co-host of the Marketing Geeks Podcast along with Andros Sturgeon. Marketing Geeks is a top 100 Business - Management & Marketing Podcast on Apple Podcasts and has hit as high as #1 in the category of management & marketing. Justin is also the host of a podcast that he runs for the company BannerSeason where he interviews top promoters within the company about how they leverage the company's technology to grow their businesses. If you'd like to connect with Justin Womack and take him up on a few of his offers if they are still available, check out the links below: Visit Justin Womack's website for JMack Media LLC: https://jmackmedia.com View Justin Womack's Fiverr Pro Gigs at: https://www.fiverr.com/justinwomack1 Listen to the Marketing Geeks Podcast by searching "Marketing Geeks" on your favorite podcast platform or by visiting the website: https://marketinggeekspodcast.com Register for the Marketing Geeks Podcast Launchpad Webinar on July 31st, 2019 by going to: http://podcastmasterycourse.com If you have missed the webinar, the recording will be made available to all people that donate $5 or more to the Marketing Geeks Podcast. If you'd like to make a donation to receive access to this webinar replay, please visit: https://anchor.fm/marketing-geeks/support After making a $5+ donation, please send an email to info@marketinggeekspodcast.com so that we receive your email address and can delivered your webinar replay files. Justin Womack is also a promoter of BannerSeason, a marketing company that aids to improve customer relationships, incentivize referrals, and improve customer retention. With BannerSeason, users can mail automated direct mail campaigns that include personalized cards, gifts, and swag items that are triggered through CRM actions or mobile triggers. Check Out BannerSeason and Start an Account by Visiting the Website and Using Invitation Code "START" Go to https://bannerseason.com and enter the invitation code "START" in order to create your free account. Note: Using the BannerSeason service will require depositing and spending money, but you can create a basic account free of charge by going to the site and using invite code "START." This way you can explore the platform a bit before using. Want to listen to Justin Womack's BannerSeason Podcast? Find it on Apple Podcasts at: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bannerseason-podcast-create-raving-fans-build-lifetime/id1446755681 Podcast Interview Transcript: Speaker 1: (00:03) Hey everybody. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome to today's show of expand the business. I am your host Casey Everhart and I am so excited and thrilled about today's show. You guys, we are in for a huge, huge, unbelievable treat today. Um, you know, here at expand the business, what we really try to do is bring together experts, thought leaders, people that are out in the marketplace influencing and on the verge of well on the bleeding edge of not only technology but what's working now to help people really expand their business. So we're all about marketing and we're all about like kind of on the ground knuckles in really working on what's working now to help you expand the business. And today is awesome. I have been looking forward to this episode for many, many weeks. I'm actually really surprised I was able to squeeze our guest in for the time to record this just simply because his own agency is rocking and rolling. Speaker 1: (00:58) There's so much stuff going on. So let me tell you a little bit about Justin Womack, who is our very, very special guest today. So Justin is not only is he one of the kind of guys on the bleeding edge of diff technology and the bleeding edge of digital agencies and what's working now, he works with businesses and companies all over the world, really helping them focus on generating leads, ultimately making more money for those businesses. So he has a digital agency named, uh, you know, j Mack media. You can find that@jmacmediadotcomandisjmackmedia.com. He is a cohost of a podcast called the marketing gigs, which we'll talk about, uh, throughout this. If you're not, um, if you're not subscribed to the marketing Geeks podcast, I highly recommend it. We were joking today that, uh, you know, he goes with me every morning on a, on a walk. I literally am in obsessed with their podcasts and I'm listening to an episode every day, um, over at, uh, the marketing gigs. Speaker 1: (01:57) He also has another podcast that he is a host of for a company called banner season. We'll tell, we'll get a little bit inside of that. But this dude is all over the place. He's got, um, a lot of his business comes from fiber. He's actually a fiber pro, which simply means that he's vetted by them. Uh, really they got under the hood of the business and making sure that [inaudible] delivers and drives massive value to his clients. Otherwise he would never get that designation, which gives him some unique things to market his business and market his agency on five or so. We May, we may touch on that. Um, and uh, he's got a really cool podcast course coming up that you can find out more about out podcast mastery course.com. And of course I'll put the show notes, we'll put all these links and stuff inside the show notes. Speaker 1: (02:40) So without further ado, I don't have some fancy a clapping and, and sound effect here. So let me just welcome you to do the show. So Justin, welcome buddy. Thank you Casey. I love the introduction and thank you for having me and yeah, well we are, we are thrilled to have you here. And Justin of the things that, um, I always love talking to people about is kind of a multipronged approach to marketing and generating leads for your business. And I know that, you know, you do email creation and email automation, you know, you do copywriting, you've got podcast consulting and mass, Ya know, and, and management. Uh, in fact, uh, you know, if you're listening this, this is really kind of cool because Justin actually manages our podcasts here and is really putting this show on the map. So if you're listening to this on iTunes, Spotify, stitcher, or whatever it is completely in fact, um, basically all due to Justin and his team and his organizations kind of managing and producing the whole thing. Um, not only that, he is a, an infusionsoft partner as well as a banner season automation specialist. And we'll talk a little bit about that. So Justin, let's just, uh, let's just dive right into it. I would love to know your kind of, your core philosophy when it comes to marketing and how that relates to your client's businesses. Speaker 2: (04:02) I think it starts with visibility and, um, I think if I want to give it like a few resources that I kind of base my philosophies on a great, great book influence by Robert Cialdini. Um, one of my favorite books out there that's going to hit you with all the principles of how to influence people. And I, I'm all my marketing's really based on those principles. I mean things like scarcity, social proof, um, things, just ways of, of validating your expertise. One of the things that I like to tell people is, um, Fiverr's an interesting medium because a lot of people will get on Fiverr and you might have several gigs on there, but you'll never make a sale. And when I got, when I got recruited, I was one of the first five or pros recruited on the platform. Uh, they found me because I was a partner with infusion soft. Speaker 2: (04:51) So they brought me on. Um, I did, I went through an interview process. I had to take a few, uh, like exams kind of things to just validate my skills. But once they approved me, it was interesting because all of a sudden I was getting so much traffic and so much, um, so much attention only because they had gone ahead and validated me and they were a well known resource. So this, uh, this ability to leverage social proof from high end sources like a fiber like, um, like a Casey Eberhart or like, like people, you know, like influencers out there, it's powerful, powerful stuff. So if you're able to leverage other people's, um, other people that have more influence than you do and borrow some of their credibility, that's one of the biggest ways for people to get started, especially in the beginning. Speaker 1: (05:36) Yeah. So let's, let's spend a few minutes on that. So let's take a step back. Um, just for those folks that don't know about Fiverr and what it is and kind of the platform. Okay. Talk to me a little bit about what fiber is and what the platform is and what kind of things people can find all over fiber. Speaker 2: (05:54) So fiber was started as, it's a freelancing website, number one. And it was, it was created as a way for entrepreneurs and business owners to find cheap freelance, um, services that started at $5 from the platform, watched pretty much every gig was $5 and they slowly kind of evolved. Now we're able to add upsells to their $5 gigs and then eventually now with Fiverr pro, um, the minimum I'm allowed to charge is $100 for a Gig. And I think, I believe I'm up, I'm allowed to charge up to, I believe it's five or $10,000. I haven't attempted to do that. Um, but we're, we're able to charge big bucks for five or pro gigs because they validated our skills and they understand the value of not only finding somebody that can get the job done, but somebody that actually is validated, that has good reviews because there's a lot of, um, charlatans in the internet marketing space up there, especially I'll use the word charlatans. So having somebody validate you and being able to look at reviews and things like that adds a ton of credence to, um, to getting the job done. Speaker 1: (06:57) Yeah. Yeah. And for those of you that have never been on fiber, it is a like grab a glass of wine or a beer or a cigar or whatever your vices and just sit down and go check out fibers. F I v E R r.com. I joke that and I talk about this in presentations all the time, that I once paid a guy $5 in London to wear a hot dog suit, put my website on a piece of cardboard, go stand out in the middle of an intersection and spin around screaming my website for five bucks. And I only did that. I never used it as a marketing piece or anything. I just thought if some guy's going to do that for five bucks like I'm in, right? Yeah. I have used fiber for many things. I, you know, for $5 you can go on there and get 50 business quotes with your website printed on them. Speaker 1: (07:46) You can have. Um, you can, there are, when I was in the wayback machine and I was just trying to get my name and some practice being a podcast interviewee, I went on and paid several podcasts, five bucks to be a guest on their podcast. I mean there are so many different things that you can leverage. Five or four. So Justin, let's talk about fiber pro and then I want to come back to this influence and leverage thing. What types of things, and it's all based on a review system. So when you do a Gig, you get reviewed by your [inaudible] customers, correct? Correct, yes. And so what types of things does your agency promote on Fiverr pro? Where are you finding that or what are you finding that people are coming to you, that audience of Fiverr pro? What are they looking for and what are you able to bring to the table? Speaker 2: (08:35) Well, I can tell you that the best selling gigs that I have out there are four copywriting. So people that want a both, they're like a welcome sequence written for them. Or they want a sales sequence written because they have a, they have a product that they're introducing and they have a way for people to opt in on their website, but they don't have the creativity or they don't want to spend the time to actually write the copy and set up the automation. So my team will actually go in there, set up the automation, going to a site like MailChimp or active campaign, convert kit, infusion soft, whatever, whatever they're using, we can set that automation up for them and we actually write the emails so we have a complete package to get all that done. Um, beyond that, the other Gig that's the most popular would be a podcast consulting. Speaker 2: (09:19) A lot of people are starting podcasts. They, that medium is exploding, especially in 2019 it's been, it's been growing massively for the last about five years. Podcasting has been around for probably 15 plus years, but only in the last, I'd say three to five years have they really nailed down the advertising abilities on podcasts. And because of that, uh, that's why I see this as this massive, massive growth. And plus people are just understand now how important it is to have a platform where you can be visible and get your message out directly to people. Um, there's a ton of value in that and you're building a brand reputation about yourself. So it's a way of uh, creating credibility and just getting, getting your message out there. Just having a podcast is, um, people will look at you in a different light just because you have a show. It doesn't matter how good it is or what, I mean, a lot of people won't even listen to it. They'll just see that you have a show and we'll just think higher of you because you do that Speaker 1: (10:12) well. So let's, let's push in a little bit on this, this idea of leveraging influence and we'll kind of couch out around podcasting. I'll come back to copywriting a little bit later. So with marketing gigs podcast and the other podcasts that you do, how do you use that to leverage other people's influence? Like, like let's start, let's start back in the way beginning. Why would somebody who doesn't necessarily have the credibility to consider themselves? And a quote unquote expert, why would they consider using a podcast as a way to, or what are the benefits of starting a podcast? Maybe we'll start there. Speaker 2: (10:51) Yeah. So first and foremost, there's the perceived benefit that I just kind of mentioned earlier. The PR, the perception is that anyone that has a podcast is a greater authority than somebody that does not have one. Or if you have a book, you're perceived as a greater authority, things like that. So in a lot of ways, I compare podcasting to kind of like writing an ebook was five years ago where everybody had an ebook and that added credibility. Now podcasting is the new ebook, in my opinion. It's like you have to have a podcast to have that credibility. Now, plus if you want to build relationships with high powered people in the industry, having a podcast is one of the best ways to cold outreach to big names in your industry and get them to actually to want to be on your show. So, uh, is this coming Friday we're releasing an episode of Marketing Geeks where we interviewed Ryan Laveck and he's a, he's a pretty big name. I mean he spoken on stages like traffic and conversion is huge. Yeah, he's a big name this he's written, he's the creator of the ask method. He wrote the books, ask and choose. And so we actually have him on the show. We've had Pat Flynn on the show and Lewis, Speaker 1: (11:53) one of my, Speaker 2: (11:54) one of my favorite episodes. If you guys know pat, then you have to go listen to the marketing geeks episode where he's, where he's on there. If you don't know who pat is, you have to go listen to this episode because he is a fantastic affiliate and internet marketer. He's a love's back to the future. He's a super fun guy and uh, he really just kind of keeps it real and keeps it down and dirty in terms of really talking about concepts that people don't understand. You guys did a fantastic job of having pat on the show. What was really cool is I'm, I met pat in person at social media marketing world and one of the reasons that I even got like introduced and brought up to him was because we had one of the social media marketing world reps on our show first. Speaker 2: (12:38) Uh, she happened to be from my exact hometown that I'm from, which was like a cool, uh, icebreaker. And so I found out we actually went to the same high school, different years, but which the same high school. And then when I went to social media marketing world, she came and met me and then she walked me up to Pat Flynn, introduced me, told them about my show a he, he kind of recognized my cover art. You didn't, he had never listened to the show up. But because of that introduction I was able to get him to agree to be on, to be on my podcast. So because of the podcast, that led to an introduction that got me access to Pat Flynn. And then by having him on the show, it's now opened the doors to tons of other guests that want to be on. Because, uh, I have had pamphlet on the show now, and that's probably one of the reasons Ryan Laveck came on the show because he saw that I've had guests like John lead do, most of them had flame. Speaker 2: (13:20) So, um, as you build in, as you attract some of these higher names, uh, you're, you're gonna get tons of people wanting to be on your show. Um, and, and that provides opportunities to either monetize because these are people that might want to buy programs directly from you. The guests themselves might, or their audience might want to do something with it. So if you're, if you're doing this correctly, every time you have a guest on, you shouldn't have a system set up so that they are agreeing to promote your episode and that each and every time somebody comes on, you're borrowing a portion of their audience. And if the show is good enough, some of that a portion is going to stick and they're going to become a fan of your show in a, in a subscriber. And we'll listen. Speaker 1: (13:59) Yeah. You know, it's kind of funny because when I'm out speaking in and on stages, I kind of train on this idea of why is Oprah the most powerful woman in the world? Right? And I ask audiences, Justin, you've been in the audience gives zillion times when I've asked this question, who's the most powerful woman in the world? And Oprah is always in the one or two spot, like hundred percent of the time. And really if you look at her philosophy or her formula, it's exactly what Justin is talking about. It's essentially other people's content, which is your guests plus their reach, which is their audience equals more listeners or more people in your sort of space. So you know, when Justin Interviews Pat Flynn, he's using Pat's content, Pat's reach to bring more listeners to his show, to Justin show, and pat at the same time is doing the same thing. Speaker 1: (14:51) He gets to be leveraging the marketing geeks audience, the marketing geeks content, their reach to bring people over to him. So the listeners that listen to Justin show may not have known who Patflynn was, but once they listened to that episode, they're like, oh my gosh, that dude is just awesome. I'm going to go sign up for his podcast, which is smart passive income. He is over@smartpassiveincome.com. Uh, pat. Awesome. So you really do get to sort of leverage that audience. So Justin, I can, I can hear, um, I can already hear people kind of emailing in and talking about, well, you know, I'm a network marketer or I own a roofing business, our own and massage, uh, you know, a day spa or I own a small landscaping business. Why would little oh me want to have a podcast? Why would a little owe me a need to do things like social proof and have, um, emails written? Like, why would, why would you know Bob from Bob's roofing company consider using a podcast? Speaker 2: (15:54) Excuse me. Um, I think that the main reason is that it doesn't matter how small your niches, what matters is that you're perceived as the expert in the industry. And if, if someone's going to hire a roofer and their review in between the various options of roofers that are out there, the fact that you have a podcast and you are teaching the concept of roofing or you're interviewing some of the top roofers in the industry or your bringing on people that have hired roofers and asking like, what do you look for in a roof? Or things like that. There's so much content that you can both learn about your industry and two people are going to perceive you again in a higher light and they're going to be more likely to hire the guy that runs the show on roofing. Or are they are the, the guy that, um, that teaches the concepts of roofing. Because if you're, if you're a teacher, people assume that means that you are, um, also the best implementer of doing the work. And so again, perception is reality. So as long as people perceive you to be the best, they're going to go after the best or the majority of people will. Speaker 1: (16:52) Yes. That's what I would look at. Yeah. It's kind of funny. There's a phrase that we kind of use in the speaker world and the presenter trainer world kind of behind the scenes and it is very, so it's totally cliche but absolutely accurate and it's can apply to the roofing business even and it's he or she who has the marker, makes the money and essentially it's he or she who's up doing the presentation and writing out and training is going to be the one that makes money because perception is reality. Therefore that person is perceived primarily as the expert. You know why you were explaining the roofing business or why that person would do a podcast? I just thought of of if I were a roofer and I wanted to do a podcast, I would probably interview lots of people in the real estate space because I would interview the investors, the bankers, the uh, the hard money people, the folks that are wholesaling deals out there, the real estate agents that if I'm a local, maybe it's just in my local space, but it me in with those guys and Gals to get my name out there. Speaker 1: (17:53) But the other thing that it does, you know, and just thinking about this, kind of broadening it, if I was a roofer in, you know, Pew Olic Washington, which is my hometown, I was teeny, teeny tiny little thing. Although I live in Los Angeles now, so don't, don't hold it against me, but, um, you know, you could then, if you were Bob in Bob's roofing company, you have a podcast and you wanted to interview a real estate investor in Chicago, well maybe you have a referral agreement with a roofing company in Chicago, so that if any leads come to you from that point of view, you simply pass them off to the people in Chicago and take a cut. That's just like huge leverage. Speaker 2: (18:30) Yeah. What do you give two examples here? Um, one example is Matt broadening. He's a, he's a client of mine. Um, our agency services a lot of his infusionsoft and podcasts needs, and he runs two shows now. So the first show that we developed was called the driven entrepreneur, and it was about, uh, interviewing high achieving entrepreneurs and kind of getting their origin stories in a sense. Uh, but what he realized was that he wanted to get more speaking gigs and he's kind of, uh, exploring, getting back into like corporate speaking and things like that. So He created a second show called speaking of getting booked. And this show is where he's interviewing the bookers. So he's using this as an excuse to get in with the people that are booking speakers and he's interviewing them and asking things like, what are the criteria that you're looking for? How does somebody go about contacting you directly? What would be interesting from a cold email standpoint? Like what would get your attention? Those kinds of questions. And he's building relationships with the bookers through the show because he knows that he wants to speak more and he's going to leverage those relationships for himself while he's also adding value to a ton of other speakers that want to learn the exact same thing. Speaker 1: (19:29) Plus he's playing to the bookers. Egos, right? I mean, on some level, let's just face it, you know, as a speaker, I, I know the audience by which he's trying to talk to, right? And a lot of bookers, um, are ego ego-driven, right? Our job as speakers is to get up there and do our song and dance and make them look like rock stars to their organizations. Right. So the other thing is I, what I really like about that is it would also give the audience a, a, the audience are primarily speakers and other bookers. And so if you are a speaker and you're just getting started and you haven't quite figured out how to get inside of the heads and the minds of those booking agents, then that show would play right into that. And he's kind of going behind the scenes and given everybody inside glimpses of how to help a particular group of business owners in this case, speakers save time and make more money in their business. Yeah. Speaker 2: (20:25) Yeah. And in that same regard, he also runs a speaker training program. So, Speaker 1: (20:29) oh, I'm shocked. Speaker 2: (20:30) The, the listeners of the show are likely to be speakers or want to be speakers, you know, there are aspiring, um, and so they fit right into his customer Avatar. So those, that's one of the groups that he likes to teach because he uses, he teaches NLP, but he teaches how to use NLP from the stage to be a better speaker. So He's leveraging that. Now one other example I wanted to bring is going back to Pat Flynn. Cause we talked about kind of the roofing idea of starting a podcast like that will pat started a podcast and one of the smallest niches you can imagine, he started a podcast on food truck companies. Yup. Um, and, and although he admits that it's got a smaller audience than any of his other shows, it's been one of the more profitable shows for him because he's got a very narrow niche. But these are highly qualified listeners that, um, that he's positioned himself to be an expert in food truck businesses and how to market them. And he's gotten clients off of it, even though it's a small niche audience. So doesn't matter how small it is, there's going to be, I mean, everything has an audience. You just have to be able to know how to communicate and find that audience, um, to, but it can, it can be a big thing. Speaker 1: (21:32) Well, it's kind of funny just going back to, um, Pat's food truck deal, if I remember the story correctly because I've heard him tell this story before, is I believe that it actually started with him writing an Ebook, ironically on how to help market your food truck business. And he was selling lots of those and then he started interviewing food truck owners, um, and businesses that have food trucks come out to their, um, to their location. And that's how he's built this like little cottage industry. I mean, ironically, I, uh, own part of a, a craft beer bar, a beer house up in Seattle, and we have food trucks come as opposed to us having a kitchen. Right? And so I have told several of the food truck guys that we have there about Pat's podcasts on food trucks. So it's a, for something as small and as niche and as narrow as that. Speaker 1: (22:23) Again, if, if you have an audience or you have a set of customers, it's also a way to leverage your customers. So, so Justin, just sticking on that podcasting for a second, it would also seem to me that um, whatever business people are in, whether again, you know, using either network marketing or construction or you know, airbnb properties, you could do a podcast where you're literally just talking to your customers. Yes. Why, you know, what were you looking for? What did you find was the best of the best experience? You know, what was, how can our industry or our profession better serve you as the customer? Right? Speaker 2: (23:03) Yeah, and I, I tend to teach a number of different ways of monetizing podcasts. One of them is the target market client as your guest on the show. So one of them is, is using your target market client or your customer Avatar as the person that your show is going to be interviewing. So you're attracting that person, you're interviewing them while they're on the show. They're likely to learn what it is that you do or you're going to have that a pre interview with them and you can tell them a little bit about what you do. And because again, you've leveraged yourself as the host of this show, the expert in the industry, if there's a need for it or when there's a need for it later on, they're likely to come back to you to hire you because again, you are the perceived expert and likely the real expert. Speaker 1: (23:43) Yeah. So let's have a let's about that for, let's talk about that, that strategy for a second. Um, I have been on podcasts where I walked into being a guest on somebody's show where they were absolutely targeting me as their ideal client, but they were using their podcasts to leverage me as a guest on the show. And it has to be done with the, the art of conversation because it can be very douchebaggery if you will. Um, when it comes off as you're just like, Hey, I just want you on my show. So off the air, I can tell you about how amazing I am and you can hire our stuff, right? You have to be a little bit, Speaker 2: (24:24) I don't know. Yeah, I agree. But having the podcast is a great way to open those conversations though because absolutely if you're going to, if you're going to do like the spammy type of messages on like Linkedin or Facebook where you're messaging like a thousand people at a time and you're going to your, and I'm talking about cold, where you don't know the person, you're just cold messaging looking for sales. Well, leveraging, introducing yourself and saying you have a podcast and you're looking for guests is a lot softer of an intro and more enticing than just saying you want to get somebody on the phone call because you are going to offer a free strategy session where you're gonna offer something like that because people know that being on a podcast has value to them and it's kind of an exchange of value. So, um, so yes it can, it needs to be done with a certain amount of tact. I would agree with that. But it also can be very effective because it's a great way of opening those conversations. If you're great at sales, it's a good strategy. Speaker 1: (25:14) Yeah, and I, and I think, I know you and I talked a little bit about this, a little bit about this off the air before we came on board or came on the air. But um, I think when you do that, the reality is that as a podcast store, right, the guy or Gal doing the interview, it's our job to make our guests look so much like a rockstar that that guests will actually go out and share that episode with their network because they want to make, they want to feel proud of like, oh my gosh, I was just interviewed on expand the business. Like this is awesome. If I got on here and, and Justin and I just kept trying to sell myself and you know, I kind of, you know, I, I wasn't giving you time to talk and I was kind of, you know, being confrontational and kind of just a d bag. Then the reality is you wouldn't share this with your, with your audience anyways. And the only real play I would have is the optimization of your name in the show notes or blog posts or whatever. Speaker 2: (26:13) Which, which I think is why if you're going to take this model on, you're not, you're not pitching them on the show, you're pitching them before or after the show. It's not a, I mean, the show needs to be about adding value. For the most part, it should be free value. Andy. I mean, the show is not a webinar. You're not, you're not taking the model on where every episode you're gonna have the a $1,000 paid off or at the end of every episode because that's a, it's not going to build an audience. It might get a few sales down the line. It may or may not, but it's not going to build an audience because don't want to be sold all the time. They want it. They want value. They want free value. A lot of our listeners, um, you know, they, they tell us that they're, they're looking, I mean, they basically use us as like an education resource. They're listening to marketing Geeks to learn marketing. Um, they're not, you know, they're not looking necessarily to even hire us. They want, they want to learn marketing and we're bringing on high end guests. We're discussing high end concepts and they listen to us because of that. So, um, Speaker 1: (27:09) yeah. And, and I also think what you guys do a great job of, and I think as a podcast or, or somebody that's doing this, um, as a medium to get word out or get message out, you know, content is king. Content is coaching, content is queen. Content is kind of the basis that levels the playing field between all of the entrepreneurs. But so few people will position themselves as an expert or position themselves as somebody that has the ability to interview somebody and make them look like a rock star. Then I think it helps be, it just stops people in their tracks. And so one of the things that I think a podcast can do is create that know, like, and trust factor. You know, I would make an assumption that the more episodes you guys do of marketing Geeks, the more customers and clients you're going to have for um, Jay Mac because you will have taken the time to get rid of the scary right. You've made marketing a little bit more well known. You've talked about some acronyms, you've talked about some concepts so that when somebody is ready to hire a marketing agency or bring on a copywriter or bring on somebody knowing that they need automation, your podcast really allows you to have somebody get to know you, like you, trust you and know your sensibility, know your jokes. Um, you know how your personality is, uh, right from the podcast. Speaker 2: (28:34) It's true. I got an email actually today from somebody who listened to the show. It says like, I feel like I know you. And it's just kind of funny because if somebody I've never met, I don't even know who they are other than their name in the email, but it's just a, it's true because people listen in all kinds of ways. Like I've had people tell me, they listen well, they go jogging or they go walking like you just said too. Or they, um, you know, they're, they're, they're listening in their cars on the way to work, like things like that. So it's funny how people, it builds like this, a relationship where they feel like they know you personally. And like you said, no. Like, and trust is huge, uh, influential factor in who you're going to hire for business. So a, when I can create that up, well, I mean, and it's, it's real. So I mean, they're getting to know the personality behind the name. Uh, but when I can, when I could create that, it, it, um, it definitely opens up the, the, the bigger likelihood that they're gonna want to work with somebody that they, again, they know, like, and trust. Speaker 1: (29:22) Yeah. And the other thing that it does, and, and talk to me a little bit about this, and maybe I call it something differently than what you would call it, but you know, one of the things when I was was putting the show together, I knew that we were going to be doing lots of stage swabs or a cast swaps where I do a guest spot on your show. You come to a guest spot on my show. Both people win because we're taking different, uh, taking different roles inside the episode. You know, I have a friend, Rochelle Shaw, who's going to be an upcoming guest and you know, honestly I love her shell. I've known her for a years and years and years, but she was kind of out of sight, out of mind, not from it for any other reason that we've just been really busy. And she asked me to be on her digital summit. And in that conversation I, that's when I said, oh my gosh, you have to be a guest on, on our show as well. So talk to me a little bit about the ability to leverage the platform in a stage swap scenario. Speaker 2: (30:21) Yeah, so I think it starts, I mean, so when we launched our show, I'm going to just give a little bit of background here. We actually didn't even bring a guest on for almost 10 months. Our first, uh, our first like 10 months of episodes where maybe there was like one or two exceptions to this. They were me and Andrea is my cohost giving teaching concepts. We just covered concepts. And then as we moved into year two, we started getting a ton of people reaching out to the show, inquiring about being a guest. And, um, and they were just, I mean, cause we were in the show notes of every episode or on the show, we would mention our email address on where to, where to request to either be a guest or suggested guests on the show. And over time, that's grown now to the point where we're getting like 10 to 20 emails a week of people that want to be on the show. Speaker 2: (31:04) We're turning people down now because we have to, uh, we're booked out through October right now with guests. Uh, but one of the things that I've learned over time and working with, cause I, I manage a map. Ronnie's Podcast, I'm not managing your podcasts. One of the things I've learned is the way that you, you book these people really, really matters. So we've created a form and we're using a software called JotForm, which is a, a, they have a free version and a paid version. I highly suggest checking it out, John. That's J. O. T. J. O. T. F. O. R. M. It's a very great software for creating a, an interactive form. It can integrate with like infusion soft or different email marketing platforms. Um, but what we do is we started asking questions like, would you a, do you have a podcast? Would you be willing to do a stage like a, a podcast swap? Speaker 2: (31:49) If we have you on our show, would you be open to having us on your show? Those kinds of questions. Uh, how big your social media following, are you willing to promote the show? So we're actually, we're, we're preframing the episode so that they understand that, yeah, there is an exchange here. Um, and I mean depending on, we might go a little softer on some of the bigger names like we might, you know, but if it's people that were kind of learning about, because they reached out to us and, and they don't necessarily have like a gigantic following, then we want to, we want to make it so that there is a bit of an exchange of values that we can appear on their show, they can appear on our show or they could do some sort of alternative promotion. We're, we're, we're both getting value from each other and I think that comes with preframing the relationship and having a good, um, a good forum for people with questions to fill out and information like that really, really helps the process. Speaker 1: (32:36) Yeah. So you, you brought us something in that and you just whizzed past it. So I want to like [inaudible] and that was my, my fake, um, chief for sound effects, former to VCR. Um, you want to know how big their social media following is. Yeah. So let's talk, let's talk about that from a kind of a build the tribe sort of perspective. You know, anybody that's been around this show certainly hear it expand the business or I've seen me speak or talk, you know, I'm all about building your tribe, not social media following. I mean at this point are you guys gonna really consider having a guest on the show that has like 124 Facebook followers. They hate Instagram, they got nine, they have nine Pinterest followers and they don't have a youtube channel and they've got 12 connections on linkedin. Speaker 2: (33:27) Not unless there's some kind of a celebrity that I've heard of through television or some legacy media and they just haven't adopted social media. So it's very unlikely. Speaker 1: (33:35) Yeah. And that's because as, um, you're trying to grow, you want to be able to leverage, one of the reasons why you would do a podcast, it seems to me, is to leverage into your guests network. So I just think it's really important that all business owners build that social media following or build that meetup following or build that linkedin or whatever, wherever your customers are following. Yeah. Speaker 2: (34:00) Yes. And ideally we also want to try to vet them a little bit. If we, if, if we could find the time, I mean sometimes we get so many requests that we don't have a ton of time to vet everybody, but we want to also make sure that they're getting a good engagement on their social media because it's easy to get 5,000 friends on Facebook. We're a ton of linkedin followers. It doesn't necessarily mean that you're getting a ton of engagement on the platforms. So we also want to look at like, okay, what's their, how are they perceived in the marketplace? How are, what kind of engagement did they get on social media? Those kind of metrics are also important to look at because again, it's a you, I mean, people buy fake followers still. It's still a thing you can, it used to be on fiber. You could go buy fake followers. I think they finally, um, enforced against, Speaker 1: (34:38) well yeah, well not only that fiber and forced that, but like I used to, I have a Amazon business and you used to be able to go buy reviews and by stuff like that and Facebook, I know Facebook did it. I know Twitter did it. I know Amazon did it where they started putting up fake listings, seeing who was going to buy them and then they would basically go close those accounts down. So just kind of, again, that's not really the way I would do. I W I would expand, uh, expand the business. But um, Speaker 1: (35:09) so let's, let's stay on social media. Let's stay on social media for just a minute. If somebody doesn't have a podcast, right, they, but they know they want and, or need more exposure to potential customers, potential distributors, potential vendors, whatever they want to get in front of what, what, give me a couple of things that they could do right now if they were trying to get on your show. The Marketing Geeks, like, I'll give you an example. One of the things that when I've, when I have identified a podcast that I want to be on, um, I am very strategic in that, uh, about a month before I asked to be on the show or go fill out the form that you have, I'm going to promote that podcast on my Facebook page. I'm going to tag the host in there. I'm going to go talk about how awesome their episodes are. I'm going to go actually listen to several of the episodes. So I know how the banter is that those guys or gals have on their show. So when I come to the table and fill out that form, I kind of am right there on par. I already know what you're really looking for. What kinds of things can people do? Speaker 2: (36:19) Well, I, I, it's funny that um, we had a guest on that was a special, um, he's, his specialty was called email marketing and, and he, uh, he used a strategy on us to get our show, but he talked about it too. How when you reach out to a show you want to be on, you should always at least reference a past episode. Um, make points that you actually listened to the show. Uh, give some feedback about, you know, things like that. And if you, if you could do that, even if the rest of the message is like a template, like a cut and paste template and at least personalizes it to the point that it's like, this isn't just another like fully cut and paste template that we get all the time. This is somebody who actually took the time to recognize an episode that they appreciated. Speaker 2: (36:57) They took the time to do this and, and it does stand out more. I can tell you that, um, if the first line of the email is like, or the same thing goes on like Linkedin, if I get a private message, if the first line of that private message is, feels generic to me, I'll just, I won't even read the rest. I'll just ignore it. It just goes straight into the spam box. So, um, so by recognizing that, that's a big thing. I know think that people can do, and this is a, there's a huge industry growing of these podcasts, um, what's called like a guest promoters. So they, they're like PR companies basically that are the, you, you hire them and then they have built out relationships with a ton of different podcasts and they'll get you on a ton of different shows. So that's, that's a big industry. That's like all of a sudden developing. Um, I see ads on Facebook a lot. Speaker 1: (37:41) I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm part of that, I'm on both sides of the equation. So I have a listing, there's a, I wish I knew it off the top of my head, but it's, uh, it's an email that goes out that essentially is set to, they play matchmaker essentially. Yeah. If they've got a list of podcasters and a list of guests and they send the guest to the podcasters and the podcast or to the guests and sit somewhere right down in the center. And what's great about that is it gives you exposure to people and interesting people that might be good customers or might be good guests. You wouldn't, you or I may not have access to or not even know exist. Speaker 2: (38:15) Yeah. And that, could you give an example? We had a, we had one of those companies contact us with a list of about 10 potential guests. And what really stood out stood out about that email is like, two of them were like super well or pretty well known names and big names and the rest of them I'd never heard of. So they, but they, they understand that you have to at least they have to at least provide a few of those big names to kind of get my attention. And then it's more likely I'm going to take on these other people that are probably just paid clients that are a, you know, you know, they probably don't have huge followings. Um, but it's, that's a way that they're, I think they're leveraging that, that system. Like, for example, uh, they, one of the guesses is Dan Locke, who I actually wasn't that familiar with him, but I, and I've gone on to find out that he has millions of followers and things like that and he's going to be on our show later this month. And, um, and it, he was introduced to us by one of those companies along with another list of about eight other names. And many of those other names I hadn't heard of, but that, you know, after reading the descriptions, a lot of them were, um, intriguing enough and we're bringing on several of them on the show. Speaker 1: (39:11) Well, because, because that company is leveraging the credibility of Dan's name and, and some of the other bigger names to have their lesser known names put in front of you. Right. And if you're just starting not a podcast, if you're just starting out a podcast, maybe the bigger names are going to scare you and freak you out. So you want to do some of the lesser known names to get your chops and get your practice in, um, on really kind of how, how on how all that works. Um, I know you're doing a Webinar on podcasting. Talk to me a little bit about why w on the podcast thing. You know, I know that it is podcast mastery course.com and it's, it's really to help people kind of get started down this podcast thing. I can tell you just from a guy who has done this for years, that what stops people is they're like, oh my gosh, I'm so freaked out. I got to get a studio system and I got to get microphones and I don't know how to edit it and I don't know how to come up with the music and I don't know where to post it. All that jazz. Is that kind of what this course is going to encompass? Speaker 2: (40:15) Yes, it will in a lot of respects. Um, I wanted to go to course that's, it's simple. So it's like how you can create a podcast even if you don't know a ton about technology. Um, so even if you're, yeah, even if you're not a Wiz at tech, but you want to create a show I and, and you don't even, um, and I'm going to give you a couple of different examples of how you could do it with a limited budget to get started in the beginning. And you can, you know, upgrade as your show improves. That's when you kind of make the upgrades. So like for example, like which hosting platform are you gonna use? There's free hosting platforms out there that a lot of people don't know about. One of them is anchor.fm, um, which actually got purchased by Spotify recently and is a, it's actually a very good hosting platform now. Speaker 2: (40:56) They're, one of the fears that a lot of people have with anything that's free is that you don't necessarily have as much control over your own show as if you're paying somebody else to, to host a show. So that's a fear that some people have. So some people don't want to take that risk. And so there's options like pod bean or there's options like Lipson or this options like a blueberry or what is it called? Blue, I think it's blueberry. Uh, VLU, B, r, r. Y. And uh, so there's all these different hosting platforms out there and depending on what your needs are, depending on, you know, where you, where you're at, you're gonna find you're gonna, you're gonna find that your needs very, or their needs differ. Plus, I'm, some of the podcast platforms are better at hooking you up with advertisers. So if your model that you want to pursue is monetization through advertising, actually anchored on FM is one of the best platforms that I've found that actually hooks you up with advertisers, um, pretty quickly and pretty easily. Speaker 2: (41:49) So if you could, if you're able to build a, an audience with a lot of listeners, that's a good platform to connect with advertisers. Um, a platform like pod Lipson, you have to reach a certain threshold before they'll even consider you to be added to their advertising platform. You have to have a, I've been, I think it's like 100,000 downloads before they even look at you. So it really depends on where you're at. And we kind of go, we're going to go over all the different things like your hosting. Um, you know, what's a microphone that you can get away with on a budget versus what's a microphone if you want to, if you want to have like the highest of end show, what's the best microphone to get? What um, how do I get my cover art created? How do I create the introductory theme, music, things like that. Speaker 2: (42:29) And like where do I find good royalty free music? So a lot of that stuff we're going to cover and give you the foundations. Um, and then beyond that we're going to talk about the strategies. So if you already have a podcast, it's going to be value as well because we're going to, we're going to share like things like how do you attract the best guests? If, if I want to, um, do the advertising method, how do I find advertisers, even if I'm on Lipson, I don't have that many downloads cause there are alternative advertiser platforms that we could, we'll talk a little bit about and how you can get your podcast signed up for them and then they can connect you with a potential advertisers. So our show has been monetized via anchor and it's been monetized via a platform like advertise cast. So we've had, we've had advertisers come from multiple different sources. Speaker 1: (43:12) Awesome. And you know, we, uh, here at expand the business, we are, we've chosen strategically not to necessarily do outside sponsors and advertisers. Quite frankly, you guys, it's only because I'm a control freak. I want to control the message that the audience is actually hearing. So for me, I'm just super strict in what I would ever promote and the guests I would ever promote. So the way that we will probably do it is we will eventually get to a point where to be a guest on the show is gonna mean that you quote sponsor an episode, right? So let's just throw out a number of thousand dollars to sponsor an episode, but that will give you your episode, but then you will be talked about on three or four or five episodes outside. So it's really kind of leveraging an entire entire communities. Speaker 2: (44:00) And that's a different model of advertising too, is that you control the contract. So you either, you either hire a company like that's gonna that's gonna pay you on what's called a CPM basis, which is cost per 1000 impressions or listens to your show or you control the contract and you, you sell a, a preset deal where you're going to provide so many episodes. Um, I know of a company that made a big contract with a major bank and they, uh, they're getting, I think it's like $10,000 a month, but they also agree to have one of their high end bank representatives as a guest on the show every month if they choose to use it. Um, and they are the sole sponsor of the podcast for the period of time, as long as that contract last. And, uh, but they, they privately negotiated that deal completely without using any of the advertising platforms that are out there. So that's another way of monetizing and it's actually probably more profitable that way until you start reaching those, you know, 10,000, 100,000 listeners per episode, then the standard advertising would, Speaker 1: (44:58) yeah. And, and I want to move off podcasting, but I was just thinking one more way that you could, um, use your podcast if you're just getting started is to, um, seal the deal if you will. And let me give you an example. You know, uh, Justin's show marketing geeks is all about, um, you know, marketing and what's working now and they really kind of geek out a little bit on technical stuff and all that kind of jazz. Well, let's say that there was a potential customer that was looking at hiring j Mac media and Bob's consulting firm and all things being held constant. Justin walks in and says, well, you know, we actually have the marketing used podcast. Once we, once we start working, I'd love to build a case study out of what we're doing for your organization and have you a guest on our show, it'll definitely get you some exposure into your marketplace. Yeah, he's just leveraged and sealed the deal. I'm over Bob's consulting hut that doesn't, uh, that doesn't have that, that reach to that audience. Speaker 2: (45:56) Right? It's a big value add. So even if you're selling like a mastermind program or something like that, it's a, it's a big value add that, you know, if you become a part of my high end mastermind program, you're going to get a guaranteed guest spot on my show. Something like that. And you know, our show is, we, our average is 2000 listeners in the first 30 days of a release. So that's a pretty decent audience. And so there you're going to get a pretty good exposure by appearing on our show, uh, within this first 30 days and it'll continue to grow over time. Um, but our average within the first 30 days is 2000 listeners. So it's a, it's a very, it's a very good value add. You're getting a very big stage. You'd spend thousands of dollars to get on a seminar stage, um, with a, a fraction of that audience. Um, you know, for her. Speaker 1: (46:38) Yeah. Oh, trust me, I, I know, I, I totally get it. So Justin, I know, uh, that I introduced you into an organization called banner season and banner season. For those of you who don't know, banner season is the premiere, um, site where you can customize and personalize literally one off promotional products and have them send to your customers or clients or friends and family if you want. So you can do things like customize one water bottle or one coffee mug or one box of brownies, right? And Justin, I know that the two things that I know you've brought into banner season is number one, you've done a podcast for banner season. Um, and too, they have engaged you in writing some of their emails, their communications with their new customers, they're independent referral partners. Um, so on and so forth. Talk to me a little bit about why that was an interesting project that you would take on. I mean, I know that at this point you get to sort of cherry pick the projects you work on. Why would, why was banner season something that you would kind of go all in on in terms of, um, creating an entire podcast for them as well as doing all their email sequencing and automations? Speaker 2: (47:58) Well, I mean it starts with a concept in marketing called lifetime customer value that I'm a big believer in. And what that really means is that there's certain ways that you can make money in your business. You can either sell new products, you could sell a, you could sell to cold traffic, meaning these are people that you've never heard of. You can sell to your past customers, which are people that bought from you, but they haven't bought from you in awhile. Or You could sell your current customers and one of the easiest audiences to sell to you is your current customers, but only if you've been developing a relationship with them and adding value throughout. So what banners season does, which I love, is that they, they, their business, which is not necessarily unique in that there's other companies that offer similar items, but what they do is they tailor to business. Speaker 2: (48:41) So they're, they're built for businesses that want to run their campaigns automated through like CRMs, like infusion soft or um, or ontraport or you know, big CRMs like salesforce, even, um, where you can actually, you treat like direct mail, like it's an email marketing automation campaign. So we're, we're setting up like cards that go out or gifts that go out, like they're fully automated systems because we know that adding value to our clients is going to add to our bottom line over time. Um, whether, you know, maybe not for everybody, but the clients that do buy are going to pay for the campaigns that I put out there because we're developing, you know, not only are we developing, um, stronger relationships that we're developing raving fans and what our raving fans more likely to do, but they're more likely to send you referrals because if they love you, they're going to tell their friends about you. Speaker 2: (49:27) And if they don't, they're not going to do that. So, you know, this is an awesome tool for creating, creating like raving fans that want to promote you. And so that's, I mean, I think that's what attracted me to banner season the most and now it's, you know, it's a tool that I can apply to my podcast. So we have a guest on my questionnaire now asked for the guest's mailing address in advance. That's something we added. Um, the jot form integrates with infusion soft. So I have that automatically going into my platform. Um, and I, it can trigger a, all I have to do is apply a tag and I can trigger a guest campaign. So that card in a mug goes out to the guest automatically to, to add value to them. Because I know that by doing that, they're going to be more likely to promote the show. Speaker 2: (50:09) They're gonna feel better about their appearance. I mean, it's, it's gonna, it's gonna help build my reputation in the industry. It's only, it's only doing good things. Uh, same thing goes for fiber. If I, if I have a client on fiber, uh, and I want, I mean, a lot of, there's a lot of money and engaging your old clients on a freelancing platform and you don't, if you're not reaching out to them or you're not capturing a contact information, then they're probably gonna forget about you over time unless you do some kind of like a incredible, incredible job. But even if you do that, they might forget about you because you didn't take the time to really build the relationship with them and do that. So this is like an automation tool for creating relationships. And I, that's what attracted me to it. So I, I think intuitively I knew like how to kind of write sales copy for it. And um, and so I wanted, I wanted it to be a part of this because I really believe in the, in the platform of the product. Speaker 1: (50:57) Well, what's really cool and what you really bring to the table and you know, um, as a, as a guy kind of really in the thick of it with, with banner season, one of the reasons why, you know, I made such a pitch to bring you kind of in into the fold, was that as marketers, our job really is to communicate with our potential customers and our customers and influencers in a multitude of ways where they may hear the message. So, you know, there's text marketing, there's search engine marketing, there's social media marketing, there's email marketing, there's podcasting as a way of marketing. And being able to send out a customized personalized gift, uh, to somebody is another way to reach out and touch them. So it's, it kind of just helped broad, uh, uh, fill out a broad spectrum of being able to communicate with potential customers. Speaker 1: (51:53) And even though, you know, someone like my mom can use banner season to send out, uh, a water ball here or there were Christmas cards, Christmas cards, right? Or holiday cards, you know, you've hit the button one time and send it out to everybody and it's completely personalized and customized, customizable. Um, it's such a, it's such a great tool, like you said, an in, in thank you gifts, you know, we work with a lot of, I work a lot with people in the real estate profession and one of the things that they will all tell you is like, oh my gosh, the referrals, our bread and butter of our business. And if we lose the referrals, um, we're kind of screwed. Yeah. Right. So something like this gives us one more prong to touch those, to touch those potential customers. Speaker 2: (52:35) And I think of like, I'm Ryan dice, a digital marketer has that famous quote that he or she, who's willing to spend the most to acquire a customer will always win in terms of advertising. Well, I would say the same thing applies to he or she who is spending, willing to spend the most to keep a client is always going to win as well. Yeah, you're, you're actually, you're, you're, you're making them feel special because not many people are going to go out there and spend $10 on their clients and give them a gift even though it's not a, it's not a big deal, but they're not going to do it because they just want to put that money in their pocket and they're not thinking that they're not seeing a longterm view. They're looking at short term profits, not a long term play. Speaker 1: (53:12) Yeah. I mean take banner season again, just for an example, if you guys go to expand the business.com, um, I'm going to entice you to give me her email address, right? And I'm going to do something for you that I think is, is sufficiently valuable for you to give me your exchange of your, uh, of your email. Right? So at this point, I've got a 30 minute download on how to generate more referrals now. Right? Well, if you go to expand the business.com, put your email address in there. You get get more referrals now as a, as a gift. I say on there, Hey, give me your address. I want to actually send you a surprise in the mail you do that, it triggers, it triggers about a $10 product coming out of banners season. You're going to get a thank you card and a, a treat. Speaker 1: (53:56) I'll leave it at that. Um, if you want to check that out, you can go to expand the business.com and see for yourself. Um, and you know that investment is 10 bucks. About 80% of people that opt in to expand the business.com leave me their address. So about 80% of those people, I'm already investing 10 bucks in without them ever being a customer. Number one, about 50% of those people will take that gift and that card and repost it on social media going, oh my gosh, I got that today. Which gives me another, another place to, to, to be in front of that potential customer. But it also sets up so much goodwill that when I send a second email that says, hey, go check out this particular affiliate product, or go check out this Facebook group, there's a higher likelihood that that's going to be sticky because I took the first step investing in those customers, right? Yeah, Speaker 2: (54:49) absolutely. Yeah. You've built, you've built a relationships with rapport or you, you know, you've invested in rapport with the, with a, with a prospect. So yes, there's, I mean there's a big difference between, I'm somebody that that already provided a $10 gift in advance and there's a, one of the principals in the book influence that I mentioned the beginning of the show is the, is the principle of reciprocity. And so if you give somebody a gift like in this, this is the concept that is behind every online funnel where you have this exchange of value. You're getting an Ebook, you're getting a pdf, you're getting a free recording, something like that in exchange for an email address. The reason that's more successful is because of this law of reciprocity that people feel indebted if you give them something and they're, they're more likely to want to do something in return. So you're leveraging one of the principles of influence there. Speaker 1: (55:39) Absolutely. And influence and leveraging of influence is so massive. Um, Justin, I know we've got just a few minutes left. I wanted to touch on another topic. Um, you know, I know, um, with, with Matt, you, you are part of his mastermind and you kind of helped manage and run of that. You, you are now helping us with our mastermind, a pro

Are you tired of dorm food and want to avoid the mad rush of finding a place to live off campus before next semester? There’s got to be an easier way for students to rent houses and apartments. It’s a problem that many entrepreneurs have tried to solve.  Today, I am talking to Dave Spooner of Innago. There are few incentives for landlords to digitize their rentals. Landlord demand for a listing platform is low, but there definitely is high demand for better tools to effectively manage and communicate with tenants.  You’ll Learn... [02:50] Tenant Management Software: Making landlords lives easier with online rental payments, tracking payments, basic accounting, lease signing, and tenant screening.  [04:14] Understanding Innago: Flexible, effective, simple, and intuitive software for landlords and property managers.  [06:05] Learning Curve: Competitors’ software requires expertise and certification. [07:32] Who wants to waste time adopting ugly software?  [08:58 #1 Priority: Intuitiveness in software; speed is love language. [10:20] Different portals for different people to be more productive. [12:16] Find balance, and avoid too fast feature creep. [13:14] Possible future integration with Zapier and other third-party tools? [14:22] FAQs: Access permissions and pricing for landlords and tenants. [17:25] Innago offers unique and unmatched level of support. Tweetables Innago software is flexible, effective, simple, and intuitive. You shouldn't need a certification to use property management software. Choose features that matter, and get the biggest bang for your buck.  Big believers in early success begets future success.  Resources Innago Buildium AppFolio Propertyware Rent Manager.  Jason Fried of Basecamp Zapier 1099 Form Freshdesk HubSpot Intercom DGS 62: Property Management Accounting with Taylor Hou DoorGrowClub Facebook Group DoorGrowLive DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrow Website Score Quiz Transcript Jason: Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to another DoorGrow Show. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the unique challenges, daily variety, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it, you think they're crazy for not, because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses, and their owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change the perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.  Today's guest, I'm hanging out here with Dave Spooner of Innago’s. Dave, welcome to the DoorGrow Show. Dave: Hi Jason, thanks so much for having me. Jason: It's great to have you. Dave, we always like to get into our guest first, help us understand who Dave is, and how you kind of got into the space that you're in, and give us a little background. Dave: Yeah, absolutely, I'd be happy to, and thanks for the intro. I graduated from university in 2013. I kind of already had that entrepreneur spirit. Me and a couple other folks got together and we wanted to solve the problem of finding a place to live. We're not the first people to try to solve it, and I'm sure we won't be the last to try to solve it, but we want to make it easier for students to rent houses and apartments off campus. A lot of those markets are still mostly or fully offline, and there's usually a mad rush to try and find a place to live. We recognize those issues and we tried to solve them. As we were going about doing that, we kind of quickly realized that there's not a lot of incentives for landlords to digitize their portfolio. There's not a lot of incentives for landlords in student housing to really do a whole heck of a lot, but helps the students out because they're already going to fill other properties, which is really high occupancy in student housing.  We kind of pivoted, and listened to the market, and realized that there wasn't a huge demand on the landlord side for this listing platform, but there was a lot of demand for better tools to manage tenants, and better tools to manage and communicate with those tenants, and to manage their businesses. That's kind of how I got my foundation. I worked on that listing platform for a few years, learned a lot about the market, and then myself and the CTO of that company started and founded Innago in 2017, and we've been hard at work trying to make lives easier for landlords ever since. Jason: How do you make lives easier for landlords? Dave: Innago is tenant management software, and we call it tenant management software instead of property management software because we really believe that the focus should be on managing tenants, managing those relationships, and managing those personalities. Innago, of course, includes a lot of your classic property management tools like online rental payments, tracking payments, basic accounting, online lease signing, tenant screening, etcetera. But at its heart, it's a communication platform. It's something that makes it easier to interact with and manage those tenants. We believe that having that, having that foundation enables landlords to become better landlords, and property managers become better property managers. Jason: I haven't heard of the software before, is this something that there's a good amount of property managers already using? Is this geared towards landlords, or is this geared towards property management businesses? Help me and the listeners understand Innago here. Dave: Yeah, absolutely. We work with both. We work with landlords as small as one unit, and landlords in the thousands of units. The software is really flexible, it’s effective, but it's also simple and intuitive for somebody who just owns some properties on the side, works a normal nine-to-five, and then manages at nights and on weekends, and for a landlord or property manager that's fully dedicated. We work with both property managers and landlords. We predominantly work in the residential space. We do a lot of student housing landlords, given my background, and my partner's background. We also have some commercial landlords as well. It's a really powerful, and flexible tool, and we work with all sorts of different clients. Jason: Cool, that's exciting. Help people understand, because a lot of the listeners in our audience probably already have a property management software, I mean, probably likely. They're probably already with Buildium, AppFolio, Propertyware, maybe Rent Manager. They're probably with one of these guys. But nobody's ever fully happy with their property management. Dave: Right, of course. Jason: So help those listening, how can they see where you fit into the market in relation to these? Dave: Well, yeah, it's funny you say that. I was actually listening to one of your earlier podcasts with Taylor, and he has the accounting services, the consulting accounting services, and one of the things that he mentioned, they work exclusively with AppFolio users, and kind of what they said is, “We only hire people that have worked at AppFolio, and we will only work with AppFolio at this stage because that's the only thing that we're comfortable with,” because it's this monolithic behemoth that you need expertise to even navigate, right? Jason: Right. Dave: That's definitely true for AppFolio, and it's true for a lot of the other software. There's a huge learning curve there. The first time we hire somebody on Innago, we always sit them down, and we jump on LinkedIn, and we do a little exercise, or research the companies. We're not looking for employees of those companies, or even their company page, we’re actually looking for employees at property management companies that their job title, their role is like the AppFolio expert on T, because you need certification to understand how to use it. That was kind of the initial kernel Innago came out of is, you shouldn't need a certification to use property management software. It should be like picking up Gmail for the first time, or picking up iPhone for the first time. It should be intuitive, and simple, and elegant, and powerful, and flexible to work with a lot of different users in a lot of ways. That's really our difference, in the way that we're approaching the market, putting a lot of time, and thought into the features, and the way that they interact, and the way that the user interacts with those features. We're really proud of the features that we do have. It is an ongoing product, and we're constantly adding more. I think for a lot of property managers, and landlords on the higher end, they're going to find at this stage that it might not be a perfect fit, but for those folks with small to mid size portfolios, it's got a lot of really great stuff that it will work well for them. Jason: Yeah, I'm in total agreement. When it comes to software, the number one challenge tends to be adoption, and ease of use is right there. If something is intuitive, that's the biggest challenge, and hurdle. Dave: Right. Jason: I don't even like them using software that's ugly. Dave: Right. Jason: I just can't bring myself to do it. Maybe it's the designer in me. I don't know, but if I'm going to be living in something, I don't want it to be ugly. That's why I use Apple products because they just… Dave: Right, absolutely. Clean design. Jason: I was around my mom just yesterday, and she had a computer and she was like, “I clicked on Chrome, and it's not loading, and nothing's happening coming up,” and I'm like, “I don't know, that's a PC. I've never had that problem on a Mac.” I just don't have that problem. I just think it's funny. I was like, “I don't know, good luck.” Dave: Yeah absolutely, and a lot of property managers and landlords—many are very tech savvy, there's also many that aren't so tech savvy. It's equally, if not more important, to have something that's not incredibly complex, and incredibly challenging, and opaque, and difficult to enter into. Jason: I'm incredibly tech savvy, and I probably could’ve figured out my mom's computer thing, but it probably would’ve wasted an hour or two of my time and I don't want to waste time figuring out my software at every step of the turn and teaching my team members how to figure out software at every step of the turn. Intuitiveness in software is my number one priority. A lot of people build their whole set up internally in their business, trying to find one piece of software that can do everything, and it's usually really awful at everything in a lot of instances, instead of finding the easiest, and best, and fastest tools. Speed is my love language, I think in business, and I want it to be fast, and want it to be simple, and intuitive. I love that that's kind of a foundational goal with your software, because I don't believe that any of the other property management software, that was their foundational goal, ease of use, and to be intuitive. If it was, they've gotten long far away from it. Dave: Right, yeah, I think you're right. Jason: Yeah, and some are much worse than others, and some of them, they can do everything. They're like the ultimate Swiss army knife. Like I've joked in the past, you're not going to see a handy man carrying around a multi tool to try and do all this hard jobs. Dave: Right. Jason: He's going to have a nice tool box with the best tools. The software’s more intuitive, the software is really easy for people to use, and now you're saying on all parties for like the owners, they want to maybe check reports, is there an owners portal? Dave: There is. Jason: Tenants that want to pay rent, and do their stuff, there's tenant portal. And then for the property manager, they can manage and see their portfolio pretty easily, and know what's available, and vacant. Does this have marketing stuff connected to it yet for listing, and the getting the properties out there in the marketplace? Dave: Yeah, great question. We do not currently have marketing. We plan to roll that out, but as you mentioned, I think one of the problems that's happened with other software packages, the feature creep went too fast. They wanted to get all the features that any landlord could ever ask for out as quickly as possible, and that has not been our approach. We have said let's do this methodically, let's think about ways to integrate this into the way that the rest of the software works. Let's make sure that it's easy to use. We are constantly adding features but we're not necessarily rolling out everything that everybody wants, all at the same time. Market syndication is what we call it. The marketing piece is definitely on its way, but it'll probably be another three or fours months before we have that out there. Jason: Yeah, feature creep is a real issue. I'm a big fan of Jason Fried. He's the CEO of Basecamp. I got to hang out with him on a Skype call for 90 minutes. He cut my staffing costs in half overnight, no doubt. I'm a big fan of him. By saying he cut my staffing costs in half, I should say he doubled our productivity. I didn't just fire everybody. We just became that much more productive because he helped me understand how we had so many interruptions, we had so many things that weren't intuitive, and he changed how we communicate as a company. He has a similar philosophy when he talks about creating their softwares. Basecamp doesn't do a whole lot compared to a lot of other software, it’s pretty limited in its feature set, but it's consistently always at the top of the tools and resources people mention for project management even though I really don't believe Basecamp is a project management tool, I believe it's a communication platform for internal communication, that's how we use it. Everyone's going to ask for features, you have to really be picky in choosing about what are the features that are really going to matter the most and get the biggest bang for your buck and really make a difference without it becoming overly crazy, too cumbersome, unintuitive, and difficult to do. There's always that balance of managing all of the features.  Do you see that you guys will be doing any sort of Zapier integration so that people can create zaps and start connecting and integrating with third party tools? No software has come out with this yet. Dave: Yeah. That’s a really good idea. That is not our road map but I love Zapier. We use it for all sorts of other things, whether it's connecting Wordpress to HubSpot or whatever. It’s a really cool platform. That’s an interesting thought. We hadn’t gotten that far. We might still… Jason: Add it to your list and be the first. I'm waiting to see who is the first property management software the adds Zapier integration because everyone's been asking for it. All these people want it connected to their automation. They want to connect it to their process street processes, or they want to connect it to whatever. I think this would be a really cool thing. Dave: We’ll let you know when we do. Jason: I keep throwing that out usually to property management software that I have on my show and I'm waiting to see who's the first to have Zapier integration. Some people call it [zey-pier], but I think [zey-pier] is weird because it creates [zaps], people, so it’s Zapier. You're not [zey-ping] your business.  What else should people know about this software? What are some of the most common questions that a property management business owner might ask that they're concerned about? Dave: Well, one you hit on was the sub users. Enabling not just the head property manager from accessing the platform, but also giving out who has access to which permissions, who has access to which features. Maybe it's Bob, you want him to handle these categories for these properties, or you want your property owners to log in and be able to handle it themselves. Jason: There's the ability for vendors to leverage and use the system as well? Dave: Not vendors, that would be like a maintenance person that you either have on staff or you have on retainer 1099 or whatever. We do not have a vendor portal at this time. That’s a big one and then the other really common question we get is of course the pricing because of the sector that we’re in, that's at the top of our base mind. Jason: Do you want to tell pricing now? If you're planning on changing, don’t. Tell them to go to your website. Dave: No, I'd be more than happy to jump into pricing. Now it’s pretty unique, we're 100% free to use for landlords. There’s no monthly fee, yearly fee, setup fee, there’s no contract. There's absolutely no cost. Everything that I've mentioned is included. Instead, when a tenant pays rent online, we charge them $2 for an ACH transaction. We charge them $2.75 for a credit or debit card, and that's it. Jason: Totally reasonable. I've been saying for at least over a year to people who have listened to some of my older podcast episodes that free property management software will come and there will be the day that somebody's going to offer it, just like people aren't paying for Gmail, people aren't paying for this sort of stuff and it's making money. It manifested, here it is. Dave: That’s right, we did it. It's 100% free for the landlord. Some landlords see the value in an online payment, they see it so highly to pay actually choose to incur a cost and we allow them to do that if they want to, but for most landlords 90% plus, they're not paying a dime to use Innago. Jason: Very cool, that's really interesting. This would be fantastic then for startup PM's, startup property managers. A question that my team would care about is for the rental listings, the vacant properties, do you have some way of listing the vacant properties in some web based fashion? If they're putting properties into their system, is there some sort of code that we can embed on a website to show their available rentals? Dave: Again, there's nothing on the marketing side just yet. Everything is cotntained within Innago but we certainly see the value in that. Jason: Maybe in the future then. What else should people know about Innago? Anything else you want to throw out there? Dave: Well, we offer particularly in our sector where you do have some of the lower cost platforms out there or some of the simpler platforms out there I suppose. Oftentimes, they don't offer any sort of support beyond a 48-hour email window. With Innago, we’re a little different, we offer full phone support. We also have embedded videos and help section to ease landlords along in the system as they get started and learn the platform. We’re really big believers in early success begets future success. We want to make sure that we’re hand holding for your first month, two months on the platform, and ensuring that you understand how to use it. You can use it effectively and can leverage it to improve your business. Once you do that, then you're off to the races and in really good shape. We offer a unique level of support that many others can't really match. Jason: What platform are you using for support? Dave: We use Freshdesk, and we use HubSpot, and we use Zapier to connect certain things to other things. Jason: Cool. We use intercom for anyone listening, because property managers need some sort of support desk too. Dave, this sounds really neat. How could somebody demo this if they're curious to check out your software and how should they get in touch? Dave: Yeah. They can go to innago.com and they can request access to a free account. We’ll get in touch with them shortly after just to make sure they're a good fit, that we're going to solve some problems for them. We don't want them to waste any time fooling around on a platform that is really not going to work for them. If they request access, we’ll shortly be in touch, and we'll get them into the platform, and they can start playing around with it. Jason: Where does the name Innago come from? I'm a branding guy, I'm always curious. Explain Innago. Dave: We like to think of it as a strong three-syllable word, that's about the extent of it. It's really kind of like Google or Yahoo, there's not a whole lot behind it. Jason: Okay. Maybe we’ll have to make up the story sometime together about it. Dave: Yeah. We’ve thought about it, but we'll take any suggestions. Jason: When did you guys launch this? How new is this software? Dave: We launched the company in January of 2017. We had the product out in the market, kind of like an alpha stage really in March of that year. We've been coming along ever since. As far as a product, we're a little over two years now. Jason: Awesome. How many companies are using this right now? Dave: We have thousands of landlords on the platform and it's growing every day. I would nail that hard number, but it probably changes by the minute. Jason: Yeah. It's probably pretty tempting and pretty easy if it's free. I would imagine you guys will have some success and you guys are making enough money you think to stay healthy just through the transactions? Dave: Yeah. As you know, there's a lot of landlords out there. The majority of them are still self managed or not using any kind of software. There's a lot of tenants that want to pay online. Only about 30% of the market currently pays rent online. That's a huge giant blue ocean that’s ready to be captured. Jason: Yeah. There's a lot of blue ocean that are self managing. If you really want to super attract property management business owners, if you can figure out a way to help connect these self managers so that they can get that professional managers to take over stuff, and partner, maybe create some partners, I think you’ve got a winning affiliate business going on right there that’s good for your company. Dave: Absolutely. Jason: I know there's lots of people listening that would like to get connected to those that are self managing and work with them. Dave, super cool to have you on the show. I wish you lots of success. It would be cool to have you come back maybe in the future after you've come out with even more features if you’ve got something really cool to share. I wish you guys a lot of success with the free software. I've been talking about this for a while. I think it's long overdue. This is really great. Dave: Awesome. Thanks so much, Jason. I really appreciate it, my pleasure being on the show. Jason: Yeah, thanks for coming on. You heard it everybody, free property management software that is intuitive. If they are really intuitive, they're going to have a lot of natural success and growth, and if they're free, they're going to have a lot of growth. If they can make the numbers work which sounds like it would be pretty easy with all the transactions that are going to be occurring, it could be a game changer.  I think other property management software, they're a little bit greedy, and there's too much of that feature creep. I think this will be a competitor. It’d be interesting to watch. Let’s keep our eyes tuned, our eyes peeled and stay tuned to see what they do. Anyway, this is Jason Hull of the DoorGrow Show. If you are wanting to know if your property management website is leaking money because every website is probably leaking money. If you want to see that it’s leaking money because you don't want it to be leaking deals and leads anymore and you want to make more money and cash from your business, test your website out by going to doorgrow.com/quiz and take our DoorGrow Score Quiz that’s going to grade your website on how effective it is at creating conversions. Some of the questions are tricky. There's a lot of people taking the test and then make a bunch of changes to their website, some of them are false positive, so be careful if you're going to do that. Do that quiz and then maybe talk to our team and we can help you improve your website piece because I really don't believe that anybody's better at creating websites that make money than DoorGrow for property managers. Alright, we'll talk to all of you guys soon. Until next time, to our mutual growth.  

  Let's Talk about Self Reflection and Mental Clarity... On this week's episode of the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry I get a chance to do some self-reflection on myself for my podcast listeners to here. July is minority mental health awareness month and it also happens to be the time when new doctors across the country begin their training. I remember being an intern myself and being put in the position that I was suddenly responsible for someone else's life. It was a crazy experience being a medicine intern but one that I cherish till this day. I remember that what helped me get through the tough days was the self confidence I had that I was going to be the best doctor for my patient even if I didn't know everything I knew that I could find the answer. Self reflection is defined as meditation or serious thought about one's character, actions, and motives so I thought it would be important for you guys to see that in action with myself. I think it's important that we all take a look at ourselves to see what we are doing right and most importantly what we are doing wrong to get better. Remember to subscribe to the podcast and share the episode with a friend or family member. Listen on Apple Podcast, Google Play, Stitcher, Soundcloud, iHeartRadio, Spotify Sponsors: Lunch and Learn Community Online Store (code Empower10) Pierre Medical Consulting (If you are looking to expand your social reach and make your process automated then Pierre Medical Consulting is for you) Dr. Pierre's Resources - These are some of the tools I use to become successful using social media Social Links: Join the lunch and learn community – https://www.drberrypierre.com/joinlunchlearnpod Follow the podcast on Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/lunchlearnpod Follow the podcast on twitter – http://www.twitter.com/lunchlearnpod – use the hashtag #LunchLearnPod if you have any questions, comments or requests for the podcast For More Episodes of the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry Podcasts https://www.drberrypierre.com/lunchlearnpodcast/ If you are looking to help the show out Leave a Five Star Review on Apple Podcast because your ratings and reviews are what is going to make this show so much better Share a screenshot of the podcast episode on all of your favorite social media outlets & tag me or add the hashtag.#lunchlearnpod Download Episode 116 Transcript Episode 116 Transcript... INTRODUCTION: Dr. Berry: And welcome to another episode of the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry. I'm your host, Dr. Berry Pierre, your favorite Board Certified Internist. Founder of drberrypierre.com. CEO of Pierre Medical Consulting, who helps you empower yourself for better health with the number one podcast for patient advocacy here with the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry bringing you Episode 116. And this is going to be a solo episode and I like to take this episode as the launch episode because over the next two to three weeks we are going to be having some amazing guests talk to us about self-awareness, stress relief, what's causing stress in our life. And of course the Lunch and Learn community, you know I've talked about this ad nauseum. If the mind is not in check, it does not matter what you do with the physical, right? So I want to like really bring this next couple of weeks in where we start reflecting on ourselves and start looking at ourselves and seeing, you know, what's causing us a problem, what's causing us concerns. And of course this is actually, depending on when you're listening to this, July is actually Minority Mental Health Awareness Month. So of course, why not be self-reflective within mental health awareness month. If you got any time to be self-reflective, to kind of look at yourself and look at all the stressors that are in front of you, might as well do in July. So if your minority, I know I have a lot of non-minorities who listen to the show. But if you're a minority, this is the month to do so. So if you have not had a chance, remember to subscribe to the show, tell a friend and tell a friend and like, hey, you got this amazing podcasts I want you to listen to with Dr. Berry. Please do that asap. And before I let you go, I want to read off a couple of five-star reviews that I recently got. Like I said, I always encourage you guys not only just subscribe to the show, but also leave me five-star reviews so I know that I'm actually doing a good job. So this review says everyone should listen to this podcast, relevant information so that you can live a better, healthier, and longer life. Shout out to Nate Henry, number one. The next one says, very informative, engaging podcast to help everyday people maintain healthy and happy lives. Thank you, Candace. So again, if you have not had a chance to go ahead and subscribe to the show and then leave me an amazing five-star review like that so I can give you a shout out here on the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry. So without further ado, Episode 116 let's get ready. We're talking about self and self-awareness and getting ourselves together for the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry. EPISODE Dr. Berry: So when we talk about self, right? Because I think this is a theme that I really wanted to hit home when I get the chance to kind of think about podcast topics and I get to ask you guys, you know what stuff you'd like to hear. And mental health is always a big one. Self-reflection is always a big one. So I wanted to kind of to self-reflect on my own here on the podcast this week. Just so we can kind of get an idea of what that means and what's so important about it.   As a podcast or as a physician, as a program director and father and husband and all these different hats that I choose to wear, I volunteered to wear, I love to wear. It's one of those things where sometimes your life can get so busy. That a lot of times you don't even get to really reflect on everything that you do. Especially whether it be good or most importantly whether the bad, right? Because I think it's one thing to self-reflect and only think about all the good stuff you do. But when you're self-reflecting and you start thinking like, wow, I could probably do blank better, whatever that blank is for you. I think it really kind of hits home the onus of being okay with yourself and okay with what you're doing and how you're doing it. So as a physician here, when I think about what we're doing on a day to day basis as a hospital physician, taking care of patients inside the hospital, the most acute patients, the most sick patients, and doing everything we can to get them better and what that does to a person's psyche, right? I see it all the time. You know, again, as a program director, I take care of 18 residents who I'm responsible for from the day they set foot to the day they leave, right? And sometimes even a little bit after they leave. But most importantly, it's seeing that transition of what it does to a person, some mental clarity, right? When they're just the fresh side medical student and they become the fresh shot intern and then they become the hardened senior resident who is often getting ready to attack the world. Right? So I get to see kind of all three of these different levels at come to play within my job. And it's one of those things whereas we talk about minority Mental Health Awareness Month. I always questioned and a lot of times some of the questions I ask them really isn't about the clinical aspect of what they're doing, but the more, the mental aspect of what they're doing. A lot of my, one of my favorite attendings, Dr. Kanner would always ask us why? Why are you doing what you want to do? Why do you want to send a patient on this medication home? Why do you want to consult this person? Why are you using this medication versus that medication? He was always big on the why. Because one, he's an older physician, so he already had, you know, a little bit beef with us younger physicians who he felt did more quote-unquote cookbook medicine and didn't really understand why they were doing things. Just kinda did it because they read it in a piece of paper and didn't think things through, right? So his big thing was understanding the why process of it all. And honestly he's probably one of the best physicians and attendings I've ever had in my life because it's completely changed the trajectory only of how I do things, but why I do the things I do. And then why I do and train my residents, even my medical students the way I do. Because there's always an onus of understanding that when it comes to book-smarts, you'll eventually get the book smarts, right? So I can give you plenty of articles to read to get what the information and answer I'm looking for. But if you don't know why you're getting the answer information I'm looking for. If you don't know why I'm asking a question. That is where the learning problems tend to fall to, right? So that's not something that he was big on. So he was always big on making sure we understood the why of things and why things tick the way they did. So when we think about self-reflection and self-care and you know, those are big, obviously big keywords that you hear a lot now, especially in the mental health space. I always questioned my physician colleagues how often they're doing this because I think now one of the biggest pushes at that you see, especially in the physician space when it comes to mental health, is you know, the onus of burnout and burning out and essentially being tired of doing what they're doing. And when you think about burnout, you think about like, oh, this is a person who may have been practicing for five years, 10 years, 20 years, and now they're finally tired of doing something. But we see that this burnout process is happening much sooner. I got people who aren't even finishing residency and they're already talking to like they're tired. When I think about them being tired, right? I always questioned is it that you're tired of doing whatever job you're in at this moment or your expectations of the job that you had when you first started are much different than what they are when you're actually in a job, right? Like how many of you may have started a job or started a project or started a relationship, right? And which when they started it was looking all good when it started, everything was clicking and then something happened in the middle where that clicking didn't happen anymore. That dissociation of what I thought was gonna happen and what's actually happened suddenly got realized. And I think what's happening with physicians is that for us, a lot of us are going into fields and practices with different intentions. And a lot of us are going into these organizations are going into these situations thinking that like, oh, it's going to be this way. And then unfortunately at the end, realizing it's a totally different ball game. And that's why I stressed to my residents to understand like, hey, you know what? This is what's your future, right? So I just want to let you know so you can understand to have some outlets because as a premedical student, especially, I'm talking to my premedical students right now because they already know my attendings and my physicians already know. As a premedical student, you really don't have too many outlets because you really don't have too much time. Because most of the time you are just spent studying and learning. Again, I remember as my, like this is how I remember my birthdays, right? Which is crazy. And my birthday's in December (so trying to search terrorists). So my birthday's in December. So usually when it was my birthday, there was usually a finals. I was having a study around. So when I think about my birthday's like, key birthdays, right? Like 21st birthday, 25th birthday. I always remember studying for a certain final. Like that's how I remember studying for my birthdays. It wasn't like, oh I can't wait till my birthday come so I can, you know, party and drink or cheaper car insurance. It wasn't nothing like that. It was like, oh my 21st birthday, here comes organic chemistry. On 25th birthday, okay here it comes, I think it was like anatomy, physics or biochemical some course, right? Like it was some class that I remember having to study with for a final four and I couldn't even like I said, I couldn't even really enjoy the birthday. My birthday is always got celebrated after finals was over, because I couldn't do it during the meantime or probably wouldn't have made finals. So it was one of those things that, and I knew that as a premedical student, right? So as a premedical student, I realized very early that medicine was taking a lot of my time and I didn't like it. And I wish I could say it got better as a medical student. It didn't. As a medical student, you know, you're spending countless hours, you can ask my wife, you have spent your spending countless hours having to learn and learn and you know, you got people telling you that, hey, if you don't do well on this one test, your whole career is going to change. Like have kind of referencing the boards and we could probably talk about boards forever. But here is me, a medical student. Again, I'm happy, right? Because I did all of that I was supposed to do to get to being a medical student realized that I still got a lot of work to do because I wanted to become a resident somewhere. I didn't know what profession but I knew I wanted to become a resident somewhere. So there's another opportunity to just taking my time. And of course, I've always been adept that social media. I always saw my friends is like life in, right? Like this, I like to call it life and my friends were life in a way. On Facebook and Twitter and all like I could just see them just life was just happening and having families and you know, they're taking trips and they're working. Again, as a medical student, I didn't work at all. Right? So I see all of these like lavish things that happened and I'm like, ah, I'm just on outside. More frequently, I was on the inside of a library looking out wishing I was there. So as I became a resident, I always made it a key point to really kind of take back my time. Like I've said, I've talked about this before. One of the biggest transitions that I've made as I became what I think is, this is my trademark by now, shout out to Dr. Dre, medical mogul, right? One of the transitions I may do becoming a quote-unquote medical mogul like I said, was the fact that I wanted to take back my time. Right? Like I want it, the time that I have been giving away as a premedical student, giving away as a medical student, giving away as a resident, right? I wanted to take that back and I wanted to take it back and do something I wanted to do. Not something that I was forced to do and not something that was scheduled to do. I wanted to do something that I wanted to do. And being a physician, you know, sometimes you get kind of pigeonholed into dealing, you know, physician things, right? Going to a clinic or going to the hospital or you just keep kinda pigeonholed to do in those things. But I knew like I liked other stuff, right? Like I've always been a big tech person. If anyone who follows me on Instagram knows I recently had to switch out my Wi-Fi card and a couple other than my battery and a couple of other things. Right? Like I always liked doing those types of things. So tech and you know, messing with computers was always something that was very interesting to me. It was always something that like, you know if this medicine thing no work, I may fall back on tech. And here I was as a resident, as an attending soon to be. And you know, I'm coming into my own and I'm becoming a medical mogul and I'm taking back my time and I'll be like, what can I do? Like expand myself and like get back some of the time I want. Well I did that, right? Like I went to the tech and I, you know, even now I do a lot of tech-related things. If you go to my website, drberrypierre.com, if you check out my resource page, I do a lot of emails related marketing and funnel creations. Again, these are terms that you are probably unless you're in the know, mean absolutely nothing to you and that's okay. Right? But like it was something that I enjoy. I actually loved doing it and I quote-unquote do that on a side, on top of all of this stuff, right? And you're listening to a physician on a podcast, right? That's not actually common, unfortunately. Because I feel like a lot of physicians should be podcasting. And just a quick side note, I think a lot of physicians, I think if they journaled their experiences probably wouldn't be as burnt out as they are because I think a lot of times, them being burnt out is because they are internalizing a lot of things. And I'm big on, you know, letting people know what's happening. And I've been blogging since I was a medical student. I've been letting you know how quote-unquote shitty this system it was for a while because it's not a surprise, right? Some of my gripes with medicine, love it to death though, can see myself doing anything else, but there is some issues that need to be corrected. But I feel that if all physicians journaled, I feel like if all physicians wrote a book, did a podcast, did a blog, something that allowed them to express what they were thinking at more than anything else, I think that would be absolutely phenomenal. So when I think about this self-reflection where I’m at now. Again, now I'm an attending, now I'm starting to take back my life and I'm starting to see a different world, right? Like I'm seeing medicine for what I thought medicine was. This engine of education and this vehicle that I could be the quote-unquote captain of. And that's why I started doing all of this stuff I do in terms of the blogging and video blogging and obviously this podcast in which you listen to right now. All of it was because now I was happy and now when I was doing medical stuff, I didn't feel like it was a chore anymore. And right when I had that realization when I was able to self-reflect to say like, wow, like this is what I should've always been doing.   My life has been on cloud nine ever since. Right? Like again, I joke, but I always laughed at, I'm like, oh my God, I can't believe they still pay me like to come to do this thing. Because I would probably do it for free. Don't tell him. Right? Don't tell my job that I probably would do that thing for free because like I can't believe like they let me in charge of those residents. I got some residents who listen to my podcast so they're going to have a good laugh at this. But I can't believe that I'm the reason why someone's going to go from a medical student to be a medical resident, right? I don't want to say the sole decision-maker, right? But I got some sway in who becomes a resident at Wellington regional and it's such an interesting concept to me because it was something that I never pictured myself. I guess I never really pictured myself doing it, at least right now. I figured this was something that I'd probably do when I was old and, you know, kinda tired and I'll just kind of fall back and then, you know, this position will kind of open up for me. But, you know, God said, Nah, you need to do this right now. I need you in this position right now. And you know, we're going on year three right now. We're actually going on year three of being a program director and it's been a beautiful sight and I've met amazing people. I met amazing premeds. I've met amazing medical students. I've met amazing residents, amazing administrators long way. Right? Like all of these things that are able to come to fruition because I was able to look into myself and say like, hey, what you doing right now isn't enough. Right? What you're doing right now isn't benefiting enough people. I need you to do more. I need you to step out and do more and expand. And that's where I think the clarity of my mental health has come in because I realize that those times, you know what, this is stressing me right now. And the things that are stressing me, I need to do something about it. Again, I was an attending physician who was stressed about the way medicine was going. I was stressed about the way the job was treating me. I was stressed about the way it was affecting my family and I realized I need to do something to make this change. This was a goal that I've always dreamed of when I was an elementary student. I was in elementary, I was saying I was going to be Dr. Pierre. And here I was. I was Dr. Pierre and Dr. Pierre was not happy. And I need to change that asap. So that got changed and once I changed that, once I recognize these other stressors in my life and I got them out of there, right? The black cloud that was around me as a physician went away. When it went away, it’s been nothing but blue skies and summer rain every now and then. But it's been an absolutely an amazing experience and this is what I hope to be able to bring to you guys. Just a little reflection over this next few weeks of the podcast. I want you to be able to think of these next three, I guess next four if you include this one. I want you to think about these next four podcasts it's like a one running show where we're going to be talking about just stress in general, right? Because stress sucks. Let's be honest. It sucks when you're your stress, right? Everything is not a peachy keen when you're stressed, right? Everything is not all good when you're stressed. And sometimes some people have one thing that's causing them stress but it's causing them stress repeatedly. Some people have multiple things that are hitting them all at the same time and that's causing stress, that's causing problems. And then you have others who are like, I don't know what's going on but I know something it's over me. So that's one thing that I really want to hit home. We're going to really talk about stress over the next three weeks. And then when we talk about stress, we're going to be talking about what we can do to heal ourselves. And really I'm talking to the physicians. Of course, Lunch and Learn community, you know, I got a wide range of people who listen to me. I got some physicians, I got a lot of helper, practitioners. I got a lot, you know, quote-unquote common people, when I say common, I don't mean just not in the health care field, but who are interested in wanting to learn more about their health. I got a lot of people in different worlds who liked to talk about health, like to listen to health or maybe just like listen to me. I don't know. Right? You tell me, right? Somebody fits in some category, right? Clearly, health is on your mind because there are a million different podcasts you can listen to and you still listening to me, right? So whatever that is, I want you to grab and hold to that and I want you to think about what are some of your stressors over these next month. And think about what are you doing to try to break these stressors down. What are you doing to try to say I need to get these stresses out of here? And again, physicians, stressors, burnout. We know what happened, we know the end result. The end result means fewer physicians. The end result means more physician suicides, right? And this isn't just a physician thing, right? It's a lot of different careers that fit into the same pattern. Someone goes into a career thinking about one thing, they go into a relationship thinking about one thing, and it's a totally different thing once they get there and then problems arise, right? So we're at the stage, especially for a lot of physicians where there's a lot of problems arising because we're realizing this isn't what we signed up for or what we thought we signed up for. Because honestly, it's probably already, it's probably been like that. We just didn't know because physicians before us, they weren't doing any journaling. They weren't doing any blogging, they weren't doing any podcasting. So they never actually told us, who knows? That's my theory, right? My theory is this medicine thing probably been sucking for a while, but because the folks ahead of us didn't document anything, we had no clue. And now we just kind of walk in here looking crazy. But that's a whole another discussion. So we're going to talk about the stress this month. We're gonna talk about stress relief this month. We're gonna talk about how to be a better you this month. And then most importantly, this is something I love. And I can't wait for you to listen to this guest, Dr. Brad, when he comes on. First of all, he's phenomenal, and if you get a chance, Dr. Brad Volara, he's performance coach and he's going to get us really high. Like I said, I'm excited about the interview and that interview hasn't even happened yet. Right? But I already know it's going to help energize Lunch and Learn community and help them look at themselves and say like, okay, no, no, no. I'm worth more than I'm thinking I'm supposed to be aware of. Because me personally, I think I'm worth a lot, right? And mentally I think I'm worth a lot. But that's because I got the clarity, right? I want everyone in Lunch and Learn community to get that same clarity that I got. So they're walking around like they don't stink, right? That's what I want at the end of this month. So if you don't get anything from the end of this month, by the time August rolled around, I want you to say like, well, you know what? I know some of my stressors in my life. You know what? I know some ways to relieve some of that stress in my life and you best believe I know what my value is. You best believe I know my worth is. So if you don't get anything, I want you to get those three to four pieces of things from me and then, you know, leave the show and do whatever you want. But don't leave a show until that happens, right? So like I said, I can't wait for you guys listen to next month as it's going to be a great set of episodes, a great lineup of guests coming up. And you guys have a great and blessed day. I'm gonna see you guys next week. I better see you guys next week. Download the MP3 Audio file, listen to the episode however you like.

Welcome to Life After Losing Mom With Kat Bonner. In this episode, we’re joined by blogger Laura Duck. Laura lost her mom to a battle with cancer when she as 17 years old, but it wasn’t until four years later that her grief truly kicked in. Laura opens up about her struggle with guilt after her mom passed away and how she’s learned to manage those feelings and find ways to move forward in her life. What To Listen For Laura’s experience with delayed grieving that hit her four years after her mom passed away How Laura struggled with grief for years without being aware of it Laura’s belief that you can only be strong for so long and how things changed for her when her grief kicked in The things that Laura feels guilty about and what she regrets most about not doing with her mom when she was alive Her role today in holding her family members together and how her relationship with her dad has impacted her healing process How therapy brought her feelings of guilt to the surface and how she learned to move past them How grieving as an adult is different from grieving as a teenager Laura’s guilt triggers and what she does to work through them Laura’s realization that her grief process is a testament to how her mom raised her How her mom is still present, but in a different way, and how Laura has learned to find those moments How Laura processes feelings of guilt on good days vs. bad days The importance of telling others what you need to help with grieving Laura’s views on grief as a choice and how she makes a conscious choice to move forward How Laura’s obsession with positivity has impacted her experience with loss Why blogging makes an ideal outlet for Laura’s grief and guilt Laura shares her belief that everyone deserves to be happy and that grieving doesn’t need to equate to feeling guilty. She believes that everyone’s feelings are valid and explores this theme through connecting with other people, whether it’s her family or people she meets online through blogging and social media. For Laura, grief doesn’t rule every moment of her life, and she shares her experience in how she arrived at this positive place despite losing her mom and struggling with guilt. Resources From This Episode: Instagram Follow Kat: Visit The Website Subscribe to the Podcast Join The Life After Losing Mom Facebook Community Like On Facebook Follow On Instagram Transcript Laura Duck: 00:00 I'm like, well, you kind of like fake it until you make it. Like you kind of just keep like thinking right yet. No, it's going to be fine. It's going to be fine. And then one day you wake up and it is fine. Voiceover: 00:10 In 2013, Kat Bonner lost her mom in a tragic car accident. She figured out how to manage her grief and is helping other women do the same. On this podcast, you'll hear from other women who have lost their moms and discover the exact coping strategies you need to get through the day and be in the best place you've ever been. Don't miss another episode. Subscribe today. More information can be found at KatBonner.com/podcast and if you'd like to join a group of likeminded women had to Facebook and search for the Life After Losing Mom Community. Lastly, if you're looking for help managing your grief book a complimentary connection call at KatBonner.com. Laura Duck: 00:58 So I guess I'll be eight years in October. Um, so come up quite a while now. Um, to be fast. I feel like a lot of the people I meet through that, the kind of community on Instagram is all very new and role. Um, and it's hard to kind of find the middle ground, but yes. So it's nearly eight years ago. Um, and she died from a brain tumor on, it was the second time around. Um, so I think a kind of battle with cons, a lost and maybe like four years in total. Um, so quite a long time. Um, with, like I said, she got the Oakland. Um, and then I think it was unlike Hassad, um, scan off to that. We'd seen that it came back. So yeah, that's um, that's kind of the basics of it. Kat: 01:53 Gotcha. Well, yeah, thank you. Laura Duck: 01:56 Straight in with it. Kat: 01:58 Exactly. Thank you for sharing. Um, how would you say, so let me see. So it was a brain tumor and he said her battle with cancer was about four years. Um, was she in remission or was it just like a straight for your battle? Laura Duck: 02:14 No, it's about, yeah, exactly that. So what actually happened was she was diagnosed with epilepsy to begin with. Um, so she was treated with after that skull for epilepsy for maybe the first year and a bit. Um, and then we're actually just going on a family holiday in the UK so that it wasn't a broad, we're going on holiday and we got to the destination, which is about, I'd say three hours from home and she received a phone call from, uh, the hospital basically saying human error, misplaced her scan results. Um, and yeah, she needed to come in for a gym, um, operation on her brain basically. Um, yeah, so that was the first time. So it was removed the fast time and just had loads, chemotherapy and radio therapy went into remission and then, yeah, it was on the, for a checkup after. So I think she had gotten every three months, I want to say. Laura Duck: 03:09 Um, and then, yeah, I'm on the side one day, found that it returned, but the position of it where in the brain, uh, meant that they couldn't operate. Um, so she had kind of the rest of her dose of radiotherapy, um, and she couldn't have any more. So then she tried to chemo, um, in the march of 2011. Um, yes, she was told that there's nothing more they could do and she could kind of decide whether to keep having chemo and, and see what happens, but the chances are I wasn't going to help. Um, and she decided to stop taking medicine. Kat: 03:44 Interesting. I love how you mentioned Laura Duck: 03:48 yeah. Kat: 03:49 That she was diagnosed with epilepsy first because I feel like those cases are just becoming more and more common, I guess has medicine progress's almost, which is kind of funny to me because I'm like, yeah, okay, it's human error. But in my mind, you know, if medicine is, you know, only getting better, why are these that, you know, misdiagnoses happening. So how, I'm curious, what were your feelings about that? Laura Duck: 04:19 I must've been, so I'm 17 when she died, so I must have been like 14, 13, 14 at the time. Um, so everybody remember feeling anything and it was all kept quite harsh, harsh at the start. So when she received the call and we are on holiday, the rest of our family just stayed on holiday with us and she went home. It was like, it's really bizarre and it's all kind of blurry. I don't remember at the time worrying, I just thought, well, I'll go sort of thing. Kat: 04:53 Interesting. Yeah. I feel like, you know, 17 is an age where you can process the loss. Mm. Um, but Laura Duck: 05:06 yeah, Kat: 05:07 you know, 13 how old you are, you know, when your mom got sick. I feel like that's a very difficult age. The process, you know, the diagnoses. So can you walk me through like, you know, what you thought, I guess when you know your mom was diagnosed, like what, what's going on in your 13 year old brain? Laura Duck: 05:25 Yeah, I guess 13 year old me just kept low. Just like most people think their parents are invincible. You don't really realize the extent of it all. Um, even like four years and I'd say even the month before she died and she's in badge most of the time. It never ever crossed my mind that she's going to die because she got better the first time. So she's going to just get better again and it's just shit at the moment. But it's going to get better and it will be fine. I never, I never remember sitting right Speaker 4: 05:57 thinking Laura Duck: 05:59 she's going to die. Yep. Kat: 06:02 Yeah. I just so late maybe as to it. Yeah, I totally agree with you there. Every, even if like, you know, we know our mom is sick or whatever. Like what person I guess in their right mind thinks that their parents are going to die. I mean that's why I always say it doesn't matter. You know if the loss is expected or unexpected because it doesn't matter if you know the truth. Like it's just, I mean I'm miracles happen and then like tragedy strikes and that sort of thing. Like literally anything can happen. So yeah. That's interesting. So, okay. Where did you notice, like Laura Duck: 06:40 your Kat: 06:42 like real struggle, I guess dealing with, you know, the loss? Was it immediate or did it take a little while maybe as you know, we're out of high school. Laura Duck: 06:52 Yes. So I, I'd say I probably struggled from the star but I wasn't aware of it. Um, I say that my grief and started four years later. So when I, from basically the day that she dies on them before, but the day that she died I was very still, I'm like okay with it. I don't know, it was, it's really weird to say because I think my dad died. I'd be beside myself, but I've been through it with my mum and that wasn't the case. But yeah, I was just very much like next like I think it was the next day pretty much. Um, and that wasn't the next day and a week later. Sorry, cause it was hard to time. So we had a break from school and when I was going back to school, I had um, work experience. I have two weeks' work experience. And I remember going in on the Monday meeting where the stocks and everything meeting the lady who was like my manager at the time for the two weeks. Laura Duck: 07:51 And I was like, oh, by the way, um, my mom died last week. So like if I'm upset or I need to go home or if I'm just feeling a bit weird, like why? And she's like, oh, okay, um, you shouldn't be here. And I was like, yeah, yeah, no, it's great. It's fine. Loving it. And she's like, okay. So everyone didn't know how to take me because I was just so like, yeah, my mom died, you know, shit happens. Like it's just one of those things. So literally for years I was like that. Um, and then it hit like a ton of bricks. Kat: 08:24 Yeah. That's so funny. I was about to say, so if I do the math right, you're 25, Laura Duck: 08:30 25. Yes. I see. Yeah. 25 out one. Yes. When I was about 21 ish. All starts doing it. Yeah. Kat: 08:37 Okay. I was like, yeah, that wasn't too long ago. Seeing interesting that you say that because I was 18 when I lost my mom. So like those four years, like I really, you know, didn't grieve I guess as being in college. I mean, I'm sure a lot of people can attest to like a distraction and that sort of thing. Like when like my focus was just like surviving and not flunking out of school, but sometimes, you know, those distractions, I mean like they're ha they're helping you, but like you don't realize how much you're not grieving until you start to grieve and you're like, oh God. Like, you know, so when did, I guess you realize, so yeah, you're about like 21 or so when you're great fit. Um, how, like for you living close to your dad or, you know, did you kind of like figure things out on your own? How did that process go? Trying to figure everything out. Yes. So, Laura Duck: 09:36 um, when, um, I was in second, yeah, I would have said, um, we call it college, I don't know what you call it. Yeah. The same thing. Same thing. Um, so I just, I was living away at the time. Um, and I only came home as a couple of weekends, so I was used to being away from your family home. Um, so I had one more year with that. Um, just living away. So kind of just, I was away from it. I wasn't having to face every day. And then when I came home I was living with my middle sister and my Stepdad, um, who, when actual, I feel bad cause I have love for him, but we don't see Iti. Um, we're not the closest. And I say hi if I see him, it's one of those I don't really check in on him. Laura Duck: 10:28 Um, so when I came home from college and I was in heaven, I then moved in with my dad and my stepmom and my dad is my best friend, Mike. We're so, so close. Um, and yeah, so I was with him for three months and just because my mum and dad spelled when I was maybe like one, one and a half, so, so young. So my whole life, my mum and my dad had been separate and I've never lived with my dad. So things were tricky living with him and adjusting as an adult as well, and having never lived with him. Dynamics, we'll just straightened, not necessarily between me and my dad, but just in the whole kind of atmosphere of the house. Um, yeah. And then so I went to live with my auntie. Um, so it was all very like focusing on like the next thing. Laura Duck: 11:20 And other than that I think as well, one main thing is my family always thought that I was going to lose it. I'm sorry I wasn't a bad teenager, but I was, I don't know, rebels of Cringila to say, but I wasn't always by the book. And I think my Auntie in particular, so I was probably gonna go down some wrong roads, but, and I think that in the back one mind meant the, I focused even more on not doing that. I wanted to prove everybody wrong. Um, and so I think by being upset, negativity, grieving or negatively on a being, I don't want people to say, oh his, she goes, so I just kind of kept going, kept going, kept going. And you can only do it for so long. Kat: 12:07 Yeah, you're exactly right. Um, it's interesting that you point out that, you know, your parents were separated your whole life or most of your life and then you live with your mom. And I'm like, okay. Like she 100% like was not just your mom, obviously I'm just, you know, assuming based on what you're telling me. But I feel like that, that's how I was too. So it makes things like, it's like, okay, a double slap in the face. But you mentioned, you know, like you're not really being close with your Stepdad. Um, were they married when your mom passed by chance? Laura Duck: 12:43 Um, so they were together for a long time. Did they get together? Maybe when I was like to really, um, oh yeah, they never married. They want the typical like couple that's in love. I never felt love vibes from them. Um, but just to paint a picture, and I can say this, cause I know he's never going to listen to this. Um, a month or so before she died, we all knew that it was going to go that way. He decided he wanted to marry her and it was very, um, money related, should I say. Um, so it thought up tricky situations, especially within my, obviously my mom's family and him, um, me and my sisters and him, me and my little sister because my little sister is my Stepdad's child. Um, so it's been hard to kind of navigate that as well, taking into consideration of the, see how feelings. Um, so yeah, there are an altar call pool. I don't know, I felt like they had love for each other, but you know, when you look at a couple of things, it never was that I don't think, Kat: 13:56 sorry, I, as soon as I asked about like being married and then you started talking, I was like, okay, I probably should of rephrase that and I should have asked like, no, Yay. When were they together? No, I'm, Laura Duck: 14:08 I'm cool with that. It's fine. It's, it's cause it's one of those topics that like I, it's there. Um, but it's tricky to talk about because like I said with my little sister and stuff, it's one of those topical conversations that has been just brushed onto the carpet. It's the assumption that's there. Um, and it's tricky to actually address it. So it's all the politics of like brings up so much family politics. Like it's ridiculous. Kat: 14:34 Oh my God, you are so right. It's just my blind. I'm like, okay, this literally goes to show, I used to think the old adage, oh, blood makes family and then my mom died. I'm like, this is so not true. Laura Duck: 14:48 Definitely Kat: 14:49 just be kind of how people have acted. I'm Ah, yeah. Laura Duck: 14:52 And it's not even just like money, but it's just like those that say they're there for you on and it just goes down to the simplest of things. And I think when, because maybe some actually you, while I was living with my mom and then she passed away, I didn't only do this, my mom, I lost my family home. I lost sight of everything else. That kind of comes with that dynamic. Kat: 15:15 Okay. Literally lost everything. I mean, that's grew up as unit, like that's growing up, you know, that's what you knew. And then so do you feel, I mean, I guess it's different because yeah, your Dad's, your dad, your Stepdad, snatch your dad, but your stepdad was with your mom. So do you ever feel like any sense of guilt, you know, not being close to your Stepdad and being close to your dad or anything like that? Laura Duck: 15:46 Um, I guess I'm, I, I'm the bridge that holds everybody together to be honest. So I have my thoughts and my views on my Stepdad, but I'll never let that affect anything. Um, in tons of, like I said, my relationship with my notes and little sister, um, I have love for him because he's been that father, not father. Think of my dad's been amazing, but he's been like the man of the house, say my whole childhood. So I talked to him. He was a great step done, but it was just the last is of my mom's life. And then living there with him. I just saw the sides to him that just, I was like, I don't know if I agree with this. Um, so yeah, I'd say I have enough full him for the role that he paid the full. Um, but right now I, like I said, art, possum industry, I'd say hi, but I wouldn't necessarily stop. Kat: 16:45 Oh my God, that's such a good answer. You have nothing to feel bad about if you, even if you do, just based on what you're telling me, because I'm not close to certain people in my family. I'm not gonna say who didn't, who knows? They might be listening to this and, but people were like, oh, like you're not close with them. Like, why not? I'm like, first of all, it's none of your business. Second of all, like we were never close to begin with. And then, like you said, death changes people. So yeah. Um, do you by chance did, were you like your mom's caretaker Kinda, sorta? Laura Duck: 17:20 Um, well, she, I say we all were. Um, I wasn't solely, no. And because I was living away a lot, I didn't see a lot. Um, but she was canceled at home right up until she died, so she died at home as well. Um, and we were just lucky enough and I'm really grateful for it that we had the space in the house, um, to kind of facilitate like a hospital room, basic base. So like downstairs we have a low, well not downstairs, we have a local hospital, we have a local hospice. You're downstairs, um, co like a hospital beds. And we had carers that would come during the night and start. And then if mom ever needed some respite, she'd go over to the hospice and it says beautiful, kind of like Manna House, um, with beautiful gardens where people would like, um, take her around in the wheelchair she needed to or wanted to. Um, so yeah, I, um, I wouldn't, I wouldn't take the credit. No, I wouldn't say that I was, we were very much a part or I was a part of it. Um, but I've got to give that credit to kind of my sister's probably in the carers that came, um, during the day and night. Kat: 18:28 Gotcha. Okay. Yeah, I hear a lot about like does caregiver, um, p t s d staff, which means, you know, my mom wasn't sick and I wasn't here. Caregivers. I don't know about that. But did you experience like any, you know, negative feelings toward that, you know, after your mom passed? Yeah, Laura Duck: 18:51 it was a really big mixture of an I can, I've learned to accept that this is how I style, um, is a really big mixture of relief and thank that it was over. Um, and then the other half was like, well, what now? Like we're always kind of like, I'm waiting on different like milestones or different, um, results or vessel that we're always waiting on different things. And then it almost got to the point then when we were waiting for her to die, which is horrible. Um, Speaker 5: 19:24 but Laura Duck: 19:25 it was, yeah. Oh, 50, 50 old, thank God for that. And then what do I do? What do we do now? So, no, I wouldn't say it was intense, um, necessarily, but there was factors of, yeah, I guess kind of w yeah. What you do now, what's your, what's the parkers now? Like, what, what role do I play now? Kat: 19:47 Yeah. And why that you mentioned that because I mean regardless, nobody wants to see their parent die. I mean that's just fucking awful. But it's interesting that you mentioned like the relief and then you're like, eh, like, okay, I'm kind of lost and confused because you got so used to something for, you know, four years or however many years and then it's not just like your mom not being there, it's a whole like change in what you're used to regardless of like, I know your mom being sick or anything like that. Um, I am curious though, is there anything that like you wish you would've done or said to your mom or anything like you regret? It's like just in the back of your mind, you know, while she was still alive. Like why she was sick and fighting. Laura Duck: 20:38 Yeah. So I used to, this was like the main thing. So like, yes, I'm in afternoons and her, when I kind of, everything, the main thing that used to haunt me was because at 21 I've got a job, I'm earning money. I can look after myself. I'm no longer living at home. I'm on live in, I've moved away to a different city, so on, on the lot more independent. So what used to hold me, it was like wish I could've just taken her out for coffee or I wish I when she wanted to go for a walk, I would have gone with her or I wish I could've taken out to dinner or we could have gone to the cinema and all of these things. And it wasn't until actually I started getting counseling therapy, um, that she brought to my attention, my counsel brought to my attention that like all of these things that I'm feeling guilty for and on regretting one things that were possible at the time. Laura Duck: 21:35 So like from the age of 17 to 21 although it's only four years, but in terms of maturing and your life changing, that's a massive period of time. Um, so yeah, everything that I was failing was things I could do at 21 but not necessarily. I could have done at 17 and like things like say going for a walk when she wanted to or when she was able to, I was 17 I want us to be out with my friends. Like, like I said to you before, I didn't think she was going to die, so why am I gonna waste half an hour walking down to the bottom of the road and back up again? Whereas like now I see the importance of that and it's just those, those things. I just think, oh, it's only you noodle aura that that would make her so happy or it's half an hour of your time. Just go do that and then you can go see your friends asked. But I was just selfish and a typical teenager. Um, yeah, I'd say that's like the main things, but I do feel guilty for them, but I kind of don't really allow myself, I don't allow it to like swallow me up anymore because it's just a different perspective is different. I'm grieving as a 21 year old instead of 17. Kat: 22:51 Yeah, that's a very good point. And I mean, there's always things that, you know, after someone passes, you realize like you should have done differently or you know, things like that. But it's nice that you mention that, you know, you were just being a teenager, you know, I mean you, it's obviously that is a sign that like you're healing and you've healed from that because I mean you didn't mean any harm by it like you were just being 17 whatever. Um, but yeah, sometimes it just takes us a while to realize those things because there is a v like a difference in maturity like in a 17 year old versus a 21 year old or regardless of you losing your mom at 17 that doesn't mean you just grow up and figure things out right away. And I feel like a lot of people just assume that like, oh, like you, your mom when you were young, like you must've grown up really fast. And I'm like, yes. And No. Like once I grew up, I grew up, but was a matter of like growing up, it doesn't matter getting there because I was like, I was not mature for like a good two years. So can you attest to that or am I just crazy? Laura Duck: 24:04 No, I, I agree. I think I've always like, like to think I was mature, but like when you look back, you to say you had no idea. Um, so yeah, I didn't, I don't think I grew up quick at all. Um, if anything, you kind of pause in that moment and you're a bit like, Oh God, like what do I do? What happens now? So if anything now you're kind of one hope for a little while rather than kind of catalin intimate shorty. I don't know. Kat: 24:32 Oh God, yeah. I was like a baby. I had like a pit. I was like a pity parties left and right. But I mean, whatever, you have to do what you had to do to get through the day. I exact, so that was my philosophy. Um, how long would you say the struggle of like feeling guilty? Um, you know, lasted. Laura Duck: 24:54 Mm. Um, I think it like, it morphs, it changes. I feel guilty even now, but for like different reasons. So I'd say the guilt of not being or not doing what I wish I could have done, um, publicly maybe two years. Um, but having that conversation with the fire and my therapist have not, um, it did how changed my perspective, but then obviously you've got to then take time to accept that and kind of take control of that, but kind of ownership of that. Um, so let's say like two years, but I still feel guilty now, but yeah, let's, like I said, just different reasons. Um, now it's more that days will go by and [inaudible] thought about her, maybe like subconsciously, but some days will go by and I won't think about how once and not like breaks my heart to say that because it's horrible to admit that because you think, am I forgetting about horrible? Laura Duck: 25:59 Oh, I don't know. Yeah. It's hard to put into words, but I spoke to this lady, um, on my Instagram page actually, and I was having this really on his conversation with her bouts and I love that cause you just get so many different perspectives on people that have gone through similar things. And she was like, Dora, like you call, where do you think like that? Like, yeah, okay. Each day goes by, you might be kind of, um, thinking about how less there's only because she's just becoming more of what you do. So like a day might go by that I haven't thought about how, by the way, I carried myself in. The things I've done in words I've sat are a testament to how she brought me up. It's like how she's affecting, um, yeah, how I grow up and things like that. So it's not that I'm forgetting about her, it's just that she's present in a different way, if that makes sense. Kat: 26:49 No, it makes perfect sense. And as soon as I asked that question, I was like, okay, once again, my verbiage is probably terrible. I should have probably asked like, hey, how many years would you say your guilt was consuming you? Because obviously you're going to be, yeah, it's going to be times you know when you're feeling guilty because that just grief and grief has never ending. Um, but oh my God, you are my soul freaking sister. I, I'm in the exact same place. Like people, I feel awful. Like you were saying, there are days where I don't really think about my mom or at least I don't make an effort to intentionally think about her. And I honestly think that that has to do with the fact that like you are like healing and you were in a good place in your grief and that's okay. Kat: 27:41 Like, yeah, if there's like a sunset, I'm like, oh hey mom. But I mean sometimes we get, I mean it's just like, I feel like there were days, it's almost like talking to your mom every day, you know? And I look back on it and I'm like, did I actually talk to my mom everyday? I'm like, probably not. There are probably some days where I was just like, Hey, love you. Hey night, I love you. Like that sort of thing. So there were honestly probably days for me, my mom didn't talk just because that's life. That's the way that I have to picture it in my head. Laura Duck: 28:16 Yeah. Like even now, like that's so true because like say they were alive now all we like you say, are we going to be thinking about them or talking to them every single day? Like probably not like life happens and it like, I'll try and speak to my dad on the phone like every couple of days, but sometimes a week will go by and dad will be like, oh, like just checking in and I'm like, Oh God, I'm so sorry. Like I was managed to ring you on Wednesday. And then life happened. And I haven't even thought about in those days in between like, oh, I really should call my dad. It's not until he reaches out and I think, oh yeah, I did say that. Sorry. Um, so it's just the reality of it. But I think their absence makes certain failings bill that. Kat: 29:00 Yeah, and that's why we feel bad. That's why we feel guilty about it because they're not here and it's like this sounds bad, but I don't feel guilty about not talking to my dad for a week because my dad's still here and if my dad wasn't here and I didn't consciously think about him, I would be like, oh, okay, whatever. And then it's just feel like too, I feel like you feel really bad whenever you have like a bad day or a hard day or like shit hits the fan and you're like, oh God. Like I haven't thought about my mom and light amount of days and I'm just like, okay, this is really awkward. What now? Laura Duck: 29:36 Yeah, definitely. And I think like you say, it's when like normal stuff will happen that's maybe like a bad day. But then somehow, I don't know if you got the same, I'll be having a bad day just in general and mom could be alive and she could be dead, but this day is going to happen. And then at the end of it using jabber mom was here and it's so much different. Everything so much better. Cool down. I could have spoke to her about it, but I can't, she's not here and it just, yeah, it makes the day so watch us and it's just stupid cause it's just the normal bad day. Kat: 30:08 Yeah, it is. Do you, I'm curious, do you feel guiltier I guess not thinking about your mom when you're having a good day or when you're having a bad day? Speaker 6: 30:19 Yeah, Laura Duck: 30:20 that's a good question. Kat: 30:22 For me it's a bad day, but Laura Duck: 30:24 yeah, cause I feel like, yeah, if I'm having a bad time or something's upset me. I think just kind of instinct thing. Like you instinctively, um, the pastoral work or um, you feel to like, yeah, go to your, your mum. Like that's just like a thing that you would naturally think. So yeah, maybe if you're having a bad, if I'm having a bad day and I don't think about her, that'd be very unusual and I'll show guilty. But to be fair, if I have a bad day, I think about how so I've never really thought about it, but yeah. Okay. Yeah. Awesome. That's probably throw me that question because I never even really thought about. Speaker 6: 31:06 Yeah. Kat: 31:07 Yeah. It's interesting. Like I mean you are right instinctively like when you have a bad day you want your mom obviously. So that's when I feel really guilty about like, oh my God, like I can't believe I'm just now thinking about her because I'm struggling but like, and maybe it's just me being in the kind of person that I am. I mean, yeah, when I have a good day, like I want to tell my mom, but I was never that kind of person that like when I had a good day, she was never the first person that I told like it's it can happen. Like I have other people in my life. Then I would tell them to, I will tell my brother, I would tell like my best friend or that sort of thing. And that's still true to this day. But I think that's why the guilt hits me so hard is because there is nobody that can make any bad day better other than your mom. But there are people who can make a good day better that aren't your mom Laura Duck: 32:01 100%. Do you know what? That's so good to hear because I've never like, I've never thought about it that way, but it's so true. Speaker 6: 32:10 Yeah. Laura Duck: 32:10 Gotcha. Kat: 32:11 Well good. Uh, yeah. So how did you, like obviously I think you know, your therapy helped you with your guilt, but now and like, you know, your day to day life, like what helps you if you have one of those days where you're just really feeling guilty, like how you cope with that? Laura Duck: 32:29 Um, I just, I have a really good group of like people around me. Um, I've moved again. I've actually moved nine times. I can't say to the other day nine times since my mom passed away. Kat: 32:41 Holy Cow. A lot of time. Laura Duck: 32:44 Um, yeah. So I now live in and I'll just say, well, another town, um, which is about two hours away from home. Um, so yeah. Um, it's a long story, but I will, when I was traveling on that, I'm a girl who's now my best friend and she was here when I was missing hard stuff, just hanging out. Um, one of her childhood friends is now my boyfriend and my whole life has just kind of like walked around this area now. Um, but yeah. What was the question again? Kat: 33:17 Oh yeah, sorry. Um, how do you cope with like when you have those moments for feeling guilty? Oh, sorry. Laura Duck: 33:23 Cool. So, um, yeah, so I've now built like a license for me in a whole new place with amazing people and it's actually very few people in my little network that would, that at the time mum passed away. Um, so not the people I know now. I never actually met my mum, never knew my mom, um, which is bizarre. But yeah, the amazing group of people. So one of the unsealing guilty and it's kind of taken a toll. Um, I'm always surrounded by love and that really, really helps. Um, I'd say probably the main thing is my dad. Um, he, the relationship I have with him was always good. I've always been gotten to Oco. Um, so we've always been quite close, whereas now I can just speak to like a best friend. I can call them up and do like, Hey dad, be appreciate. Laura Duck: 34:19 This is how I still, and he's very good at like I'm seeing it from all sides or sharing his perspective or kind of sharing different ideas, not necessarily telling me how to fill or saying how I'm feeling is wrong. Um, but almost just bringing like another light to how I'm feeling and because of him being my dad when he says certain things I know want him. And my mom went together whilst I was growing up, but they worked together a long time before I was born. Um, they were like childhood sweethearts and kind of um, grew up together and stuff. So I show like, he knows my mom's a when he tells me things and he was like, no, what mom would think or mum would say, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, you know what, God, you're right. Like you're so right. Um, so yeah, I just say the people around me who have definitely helped, aside from like the counseling and kind of focusing head on, on the problems, I think just constantly having like soundboards around me when I need to vent or when I need to kind of just voice things. It's sung. It's really, really helped. Kat: 35:28 Oh yeah. Having a support system is crazy. It's the one that like you mentioned that like these people you know, weren't really, didn't know you when your mom passed. And I look on my, I look back on my life and I'm like, wow, this is sad. Um, literally friends with one person that was friends with before my mom passed, other than like my mom's best friend's daughter because we have to like each other. Um, but like my actual like friends, I'm like, okay, this is crazy. But it's nice to have like those people and then people who really just, I mean I've found it not saying that, you know, one group of people have been more helpful than the other, but it's really, really comforting to know that a, there are people who have stuck with you through this entire process. And then there are also people who, you know, you met after this loss happened who still love you for you despite this loss. Because I notice a lot in my life, especially when it comes to dudes, they're like, oh my God, your mom died. Like I'm scared shitless. And I'm like, yeah, like, like you're a dick, like go away. But yeah, when you find that you're like, oh my life is like so good. Definitely. And I think, Laura Duck: 36:52 cause I would say that my boyfriend who doesn't necessarily know what to say to me when I'm having a really bad like grieving day, he doesn't know what to say. I think the fact that he knows maybe not to NSA say anything like they're all in their woods, so he doesn't try to kind of sugar coat it or anything like that. He knows I just need my space. I just need a little bit of a cuddle and a kiss on my head. That's all I need. Unless good enough. Like you don't need people to kind of fill that hole, fill that silence. Like yeah, you don't, you don't need that. They, you just, they need to know. Yeah. Kat: 37:27 And it's important to tell people what you need. I know sometimes what you need, but once you know, it's like, okay, I need x, Y, and z from, you're like, this is not hard. Like if you have to put my mom's anniversary in your phone, if you have to have mother's Day in your phone, if you have to put my mom's freaking birthday on your phone, then okay, so be it. I expect you to just send me a text message and be like, Hey, I'm thinking about you today. That's the period. Like it's not rocket science. People don't seem to get that. But whatever. That's the conversation for another day. Um, but it's, yeah, and that's what mean so much as they literally know what you need. And they do that without you having to consistently tell them. And that's when, you know, you're like, oh my God, like this person is like a lucky charm. Like, Laura Duck: 38:14 okay. Kat: 38:15 And I don't know if that's just my mindset because of like the lost that, you know, you've been through. But do you agree with that? Or maybe I'm just crazy once again. No, Laura Duck: 38:24 no, I agree. I totally agree. And I think when you have such a great loss at a young age, you just value people and value small things 10 times more. Like it's like I'm saying like, I wish I could have gone on a walk with my mom when she wanted to. Now, like if it's the smaller things, if my best friend wants to do something and I'm like, really, I'll do it cause she wants to do that and then that moment it's not what she wants to do. That's what we're gonna do. Um, so I feel like there's just a new found like appreciation for like other people and their happiness and what sites are selling them and then kind of internal nut then circles you. Kat: 39:03 Yeah, that's a really good answer. Um, I guess Kinda like this is in my head now. Switching gears, how, I guess often would you say that like you, like they're like, you have those days, sorry, where your guilt is just like consuming you. I mean, I know it's hard to say it, but I guess if you think about it, do you think those days are expected Laura Duck: 39:26 or, okay. No, I think they can now send me anyway out of the blue. I, I have more good days than bad now and I think that's just because of time. Um, timeline hills, all it does. And like at the time when people say that to me, it's like, Oh yes, like, um, but yeah, no, I, they come out completely out of the blue. Um, I show like I deal with like birthdays, anniversaries, Christmases, things like that. Um, a lot better now. I kind of see them called [inaudible]. Why? Okay. Yeah. Come in, I'm going to fail. When I kind of prepare myself, I still feel that way. It just doesn't come as a shock. Um, but I think the guilt hits you harder. One is out of the blue, um, and it kind of just, yeah, knocks you off your feet and then, or you can do really is like be consumed by it. Um, but I'd say it's few and far between, like the last few weeks from the, I've been quite low in stuff, but last time, which has been really hard to do with actually burst last time is that it's not actually grief related. So I don't have an answer to one stating the wound fading right now and I could somehow relate it back. But really I'm just like clutching at stores. Like, really? That's not really why I'm feeling this or I'm just feeling slaves because I'm having a shit time. Um, Kat: 40:55 yeah, I mean that's just life. So don't be [inaudible] percent. Laura Duck: 40:59 That's, that's what I mean. Like I've always kind of been like, now I feel this way because mom died and then this happened and I've always had like justification for it. Um, yeah, so it's been weird, but that's not really guilt I want say it's guilt weighted right now. Kat: 41:15 It's funny that you mentioned that though because you're definitely the only one, like who would justify your mom's death for acting a certain way and there are mannerisms and like ways that we act that manifested from that loss that you know that are never going to change. But like I had a bad day because I had a bad day. I didn't have a bad day because my fucking mom died. Like I had a bad day and now that makes me miss my mom more. But it's like you feel like for most people their grief is worse when you've had a long day or stressful or whatever. But just like grief being unpredictable, who the heck is going to predict they're going to have a bad day? I mean it's the whole sort of thing. So it's funny that you mentioned that, oh my God, now that you were saying like, oh, it used to piss me off when people say, Oh like time heals all and oh my God, you are so right. Kat: 42:10 But, and I think it's because the way some people mean it, they might have meant it empty and not have and not as a very positive connotation. And I'm like, okay, like time heals all. But we can say that because like you and I have experienced that firsthand. They're just saying that proof. Exactly. I'm like, I feel like you're just saying that shit a spike. That's why it pisses me off. Yeah. But like for people who actually mean well, I'm like, thank you, I appreciate that. And it's also too like for some people it can be time, meaning 20 years for other people it can be time meaning like five years. And I think that's why people get so frustrated if it's been years and years after their loss and their not like better. And people say that then they're like, oh, like I don't believe you because it's been like 10 years. And I'm like, but that's this really terrible. I mean the world has a terrible perspective of time on slate. 100% Laura Duck: 43:11 so maybe an unpopular opinion. Please tell me if you disagree. But I also think there comes a time where not grief becomes a choice. That's not, that's the complete wrong words. But you get to a point where you have all of the knowledge that you need, you understand your grief to a higher extent. So now you have all the tools. It's kind of up to you now. Like you can either sit and feel sorry for yourself for the rest of your life or you can kind of accept that it's happened. Not the whole shit happens like I was when I was 17 but like just accept that like these things do happen. It's not gonna Change. It's gonna always be this way and you can just kind of flip it and try and make it or not a positive thing, but like you can try and carry on with your life. Like you, you do have that choice. Um, like I said, unpopular opinion. Some people think it happened in I'm going to feel shit for the rest of my life. Okay, that's fine. Um, but I do think, yeah, once you spent time, um, what's the word? Like spent time like looking into your grief and dealing with different things. You, yeah. You build up enough resources to kind of make a informed choice, I guess. Kat: 44:30 No, I hundred percent agree. Laura Duck: 44:32 And that's when I tell all these people, I'm like, everything in life is a choice. Like you, at the end of the day, you can choose to be happy and you can choose to wallow in your grief and let it affect you for the rest of your life. Yes. For a certain amount of time. It's completely, I hate the word normal. Um, but it's completely expected for you to not want for you to make the choice to not heal. But eventually you need to do it for yourself and you need to do it for your mom and the people in. Then you've lost. It's like they are happy and like hell do it for yourself. You fucking deserve to be happy like you and through hell and high water. And it's just like people have that tear Porsche effective. But if I could literally be anything into anybody's head, it is that it is a choice and like you healing as 100% a choice, you have to make a choice. Laura Duck: 45:25 Either I need to make the choice to get help because I can't do this on my own or I can do this on my own or I can, I think I can and I can try. And then that's honestly like what made me heal so much through my grief is like one day you just had an epiphany and I was like, okay. And like there's, there's one quote that really helped me, it's like everyday might not be good, but there's something good in every day. And I know it sounds Cliche, but like if you really try to find the good in every day, you realized that like grief is a journey and the outcome is so much better. Like it's worth any type of like pain. I mean that's just my view. And then eventually the more you keep choosing to be happy, it becomes less of a choice and you're just more, it can be to that because people were like, how are you like in a good place? And I'm like, Oh, I just tried and now I just am like a way of life. Yeah. I always say that people ask me similar questions. I'm like, where you kind of like fake it until you make it like you kind of Kat: 46:36 yes, yes. No, it's gotta be to be Laura Duck: 46:39 fun. It's going to be fine. And then one day wake up and it's fine. And you think, yeah, like you kind of positive mental attitude to get yourself in that zone where you just get, yeah, get to a point that you say where it just, it's good. Need to try to make it good or consciously make it good. It just, it, it's fine. Well, I think, um, I went through a stage actually last year, may be able to fall. No, last year, um, I got so like literally obsessed with being positive, being happy, being with Julius Person. Like I was so obsessed with it. I'm not in like a fake way. Like I just genuinely was really everything I did had to be fully like passion and purpose and constantly like so much energy. Um, and if I ever had like a bad day, I'd force myself through it. And as good as that was an is you also do have to allow yourself to have a day where you're just like, do you know what? I feel a bit shit say and that's okay. Um, I'm going to lay in bed all day because that's what I want to do. But tomorrow is a new day. And on the smash, it's modern. So it's like finding that balance between, not constantly, like brainwashing yourself into being or feeling a way that you've done, um, and allowing yourself to stay if you didn't have a bit of a cry or a bad day because you're just exhausted. Kat: 48:07 Oh my God. That's so funny. You hit the nail on the head. I literally, I have that. I also say, um, oh, on the random side note, how did you get in Laura Duck: 48:17 to blogging? I've always written like, even before mum died, before mom was l I just always kind of wrote, had a diary. Um, and then, um, before, must have been before I just used to write about probably like boys. Typical. Yeah. It's typical girly stuff. And then my mom died. I started writing, um, anonymous on, um, what is it? It's not, oh, that's a really old, like social media from like my space. I think it was my space. Oh God. Holding. Yeah. Um, like anonymously, just writing these different like, um, entries. Um, and I just was obsessed with also doing like the different, like decoding or might make you my patients in different. Um, and then, um, and then I went on to just like, yeah, other kind of writing platforms like wordpress and things, um, just as an outlet. Um, and I enjoy writing any way, like I enjoy, um, I've always been quite good with words I guess. Well, so much speaking right. And when I put times but it down on paper as much. Um, but yeah, so I just started writing and then I found that the expectation of say weekly entries or like, um, putting my URL out there or something, it meant that while I was writing was really forced. Um, and I didn't show like a week went by and I didn't show to write. I felt like I wasn't doing what I said to the world I was going to do, if that makes sense in a way. Kat: 50:03 Uh, no. Yeah. And it makes perfect sense. Laura Duck: 50:05 Yeah. And then I started my Instagram page, um, because it's just like in little snippets, little captions like you can like more or less or the pitcher can tell it all. Um, and again, that was anonymous. I didn't have any of my friends and family on that page on the until recently, um, to, cause I felt that way I could be a lot more honest. Um, with what I was saying. Um, cause I know when I used to write like Facebook state, since for example, I've got like my uncle and my Auntie and my dad and my granddad or saying, well I'm saying a lot of the time, my words type towel or a lot more honest than my words out loud. Um, so my wads typed out would sound ready dark. Um, and then they'd call me back. All right. And I'm like, yeah, I'm great. Thanks. You right. You having a good day? Not all. Like that doesn't add out. Like you're niche, you're pouring your heart out, typing but with your words or, okay. Oh, so it kind of hurt them a little bit to see the true side of me, I guess. Um, but yeah, so it's just an outlet. And, um, Instagram allows you to kind of do it in different ways and as and when there's no kind of expectations and it's just kind of bash for people to relate to to. Um, so yeah. Kat: 51:31 Oh my God, it's so funny that you say that. It's very, very important to find her outlet. And I feel like finding your outlet as almost an accident because you know what you like like in life and then you've like randomly right one day or talk one day about your grief and your like, holy hell this is like super comforting and then you should make it a thing and then boom, there you go. You have a blog. Laura Duck: 51:56 Hmm. It's funny though cause I'm just thinking now as you were speaking like it's almost just with the times because if I was me 20 years ago, how would I, or maybe longer ago how would I have chosen to express how I was feeling because it wouldn't be some social media cause that wasn't a thing. So yeah, Kat: 52:19 that's very true. I mean yeah, probably could have written but I might not have been able to write online. Laura Duck: 52:25 This is it. I'm like, that is some sort of, um, what is the word? Like smell satisfaction sounds really wrong. But in terms of like putting my words out there and then someone else, they're not, I'm just so glad you said that. That's 100% like I get you or I'm so glad you said that has made me feel so much better. That's fun. So I say satisfaction. I know it doesn't sound like there's a lot of cognitive, the right word, but there's something in that that kind of makes it more purposeful. Makes it, um, I guess Kat: 53:00 exactly. As long as I'm doing something them right in the world. Laura Duck: 53:02 Yes. 100% where it's like when you write on paper and no one else reads it, it's almost like it's there and that's all it is. It doesn't say, Kat: 53:10 yeah, I mean it serves you, but when you can ask yourself and other people, then why not 100%? Yeah, no, that's so true. So where people, where can people find your blog? And I used to try an Instagram. Laura Duck: 53:25 Yeah. So, um, that's mainly where it all is now. Um, so my Instagram is just my full name, uh, which is Laura and it's such a cool name. Um, so yeah, and it's just like, it started off as like more of like I said by when I was obsessed with positively for if you would go right down to the bottom, it's all very much like, yeah, it looks great, everything's fine. But saying like the last six months, um, maybe a little bit before Christmas and maybe lost like eight months, um, it's become a lot more of like an honest outlet. I say when I'm having a bad day, I say when I'm having a good day, I'll say when I'm having a day that has nothing to do with my mom. Like it doesn't necessarily have to be grief related, which I've learned. Um, and yeah, it's, um, Kat: 54:14 it's all be grief related, even if you don't mean for it to be. Laura Duck: 54:19 Exactly. Yeah. And people read it differently. And I've met like, there are people that I have in my dad's like, just messaging me. I had one girl messaged me the other day and she was so sweet. She's met. She's a psych. Thank you so much. Feel vulnerability for sharing. Like please never stop. And I just thought for me, I'm just posting a picture and throwing a true like a few words and it really like helps people in like this. So encouraging. Yeah. So Nice. Kat: 54:48 It's just like, okay, I feel so much better now. Thank you. I'm glad. I'm really glad I can help people. Um, is there anything else that you want to leave with the listeners? Laura Duck: 54:59 Um, I guess, um, depending on, I'd say like I was saying was time, like how long it's been, I fell and I want anyone who is like two you had done line 10 years down the line. 20 is downline. I want everybody to feel that their feelings are valid and even if like for example, me being a his own, I sometimes feel like, well I'm feeling question be fit in this way anymore. Like I should be over it. But that's not lie. And I just, yeah, whether no matter how long it's been grief is continuous, it's always going to be that whether you feel positively or negatively towards it is always going to be that. And it's just a case of kind of like London to live with it. Um, nodding about yourself, like self-awareness and you'll traits and like everything like that. But yeah, just I want everybody who's listening today to feel valid in what that feeling and I will guys. Kat: 56:00 Wow. Well thank you. Okay. I'm just going to let that nation, but he can think on it and yeah, pretty much go from there. Well thank you so much for being on the show. It was about Laura Duck: 56:11 last name Kat: 56:12 and I love learning about your story. Laura Duck: 56:15 Yeah, no, I feel like conflict in that way being recorded. Like I feel like I'm just chatting to, it's been great. Kat: 56:22 Oh, I'm glad. Kat: 56:24 Hey friend, I hope you enjoyed this episode. Before you go, I have three favors to ask you. First I wanted to let you know that I host a group for women where we share our day to day stories, challenges, and victories. If you want to come along for the ride, head to Facebook and search for the Life After Losing Mom Community. Second, if you don't mind leaving me a review and telling me how I've helped you in your grief journey, I would greatly appreciate it. Finally head to KatBonner.com/podcast to access previous episodes and subscribe for episodes in the future. [inaudible] Voiceover: 57:11 [inaudible]. This has been an OutsourceYourPodcast.com production.

James: Hi listeners, welcome to Achieve Wealth Podcast. Achieve Wealth Podcast True Value in Real Estate Investing focuses on key players in valuable estate investing specifically on Commercial Real Estate asset class. Today we have Michael Becker who has done more than 7,200 units, primarily, I believe in the Dallas area, I know Michael can help me fix that. But you know, he has done a lot of deals in the past few years that he has been investing. Hey, Michael, welcome to the show.  Michael: Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.  James: Good, good. Can you tell the listeners about things that I missed out about your credentials? Michael: Yeah. So, Michael Becker, I'm based in Dallas, Texas and I'm a banker by profession. That's kind of how I got into the business was loaning money to other people and went out on my own about six years ago now, so about six years of experience. And as we talk right now, we're just closing up our 34th and 35th acquisition. So puts us about 70 to 100 units that we've done in our career. So far we going full cycle on 16 deals. So we refinanced three out, return some Capital still own and we sold 13 of them. So as we talk, we currently own about 5,000 apartment units, the vast majority of those are up here in Dallas Fort Worth, which is where I'm based. We have 400 units in Tyler and then we have 900 units in the Austin markets. So we're Texas-based focused, predominately on Dallas Fort Worth and Austin for where we look to buy. James: Awesome. Awesome. So rarely, I get to interview someone who has come from, you know, brokerage business and also the landing site, right? But I always wonder why Brokers and lenders who lend money and trade deals never really become the buyer or the owner of the assets, right? So what was your triggering Aha moment that you said, hey, I should better just, you know, go on the other side of the table here and start buying deals rather than lend money? Michael:  Yeah to be a banker, you have to have a certain like mindset and generally pretty conservative and if you start becoming successful like I was as a banker making a lot of loans, they try to tie you in the bank by giving you stock options and have more investing period so it's kind of the longer you wait, the harder it is to leave. But for me, I was 35 when I left the bank, I'm 40 now, and we're just like this little fork in the road, I felt that if I stuck around it was going to be that much harder to go. And really what I did was this all day every day was making loans to other people like yourself that would be a buyer, distress deal, renovate and sell it for big profits and I kind of realized I was on the wrong side of all those deals. It's better to be the borrower than a lender.  And you know a lot of great clients, a lot of them are friends, my friends still to this day, and I was looking at a lot of them and I was like thinking myself like if that guy can do it, I definitely could do it. You know, not that they're not smart. But what I like about the business it's a really, really simple business at its core; it's not always easy to execute but it's pretty simple to understand. So I had a lot of connections, had a lot of experience, you know, I underwrote deal after deal after deal, I knew everyone in Dallas Fort Worth, I was in the industry. I just wasn't doing anything about it.  So I met my business partner, Shawn, back when I was at the bank and he was helping people out of California buy properties in Texas. I made a loan to them. And so, he was kind of sick of working for his boss the broker and I was sick of working for my boss at the bank and so we kind of went out on our own. And like I said, we're probably the second or third most active B classifier in Dallas Fort Worth and the current market cycle. So we've been pretty active here in Dallas Forth Worth.  James: Got it. Got it. That's interesting. I always wonder, I mean, what do the Brokers and lenders see in themselves that they want to continue doing that rather than owning an asset? Michael:  You know, when you think about it though, like as a banker, you don't have any money at risk, you got other people's money at risk, you got your clients' money, you got the bank's money and you know for you to go tie up a deal, especially today, I mean, you posted up six figures in earnest money or God forbid, you know, well north of that hard earnest money day one and get all this like Risk and then you got to go out and raise, syndicate the capital. So to take that to do what we do for a living, you got to have a certain amount of guts to go out and do that because you know, you're taking a calculated risk along the way and you don't have a paycheck. So if you don't do business you don't get paid. So that's a certain minority of people in the world I can go on and take that type of risk on and thrive and if you go out setting cases up like I do, you just have to be comfortable taking that kind of risk. And on top of that, you know, most of the stuff is on recourse, where you still sign and carve out. Some bankers get pretty, pretty nervous about signing, you know, I have 4- 500 million in debt right now so I mean that's a lot of money, you know, and to try to take that mentality, it's just a different type of mindset for sure.  James: Yeah, I guess the entrepreneurship mindset and whether you want to do it, I mean, especially if you have gone through the last crash in 2008, you can be very scared.  Michael: That's right, for sure. James:  So let's come back to how did you scale up to this large portfolio, right? Because I used to listen to your podcast when I started in this multifamily investing in 2015. When I was listening, I know you had like, first year in[05:47unintelligible] you had like 1000 units and now you have like 7,000 units, right? I mean maybe now you own like 5,000 units, but what was the system's process if you put back yourself back into that time and I know you made mistakes from then until now but you know, what are the teams or what are the processes and who would you hire first to grow to this scale? Because now it seems like clockwork for you because you guys have been... Michael: Yeah, so we started out, it was pretty lean. So when we first started out, I did the first four deals, first 800 units. I still worked at the bank and then I kind of had enough scale that I felt like I could you know, keep going. I had enough credibility in the market place; you buy one deal, you get a lot of credibility. You buy four like quickly everyone in town knows you're out there buying it because like I mentioned, I had a lot of resources like from the standpoint like all I did, all day, was underwrite apartment loans. I had a lot of connections to a lot of people. What was holding me back was that everyone thought of Michael Becker as a banker, they didn't think of me as a principal so I had to kind of change the perception in the marketplace what I was from a banker to a principal. So once I did that, that changed it pretty quick and then from there, we sort of started to scale. And so it was my partner Sean and I and we had one employee when we started. We kind of did a little bit everything and we all do a little bit everything when you're that kind of small. And so, you know, we were just kind of guys who were doing deals and then all of a sudden we woke up. I think we had seven or eight deals and we had all this work on us and there was still just three guys out there doing deals. So we had to figure out how to systematize so we started out with someone that's got an IT project management background experience actually, so she came in and kind of did operation; we were disorganized with stuff everywhere. So like our Dropbox wasn't orderly, you know, just wasn't everything wasn't save down. We didn't have any documentation of processes and procedures. So she came in the systematically, you know by meeting with me for two hours at a time., she'll talk about whatever, interview me and systematically built out all our policies and procedures and organize everything. You know, our chaos for life got real organized over a six to a 12-month period from there. Then we added an analyst to kind of help on top of it. And then we started layering in an administrative help on top of that and then you know, we start getting Asset Management help, hired a professional asset manager and then you know, we hired transaction people to kind of help run process the escrow and things like that. So those are the types of teams, you know, we have a third-party management company. I think you're vertically integrated when you do management in-house.  So we're able to manage 5,000 units with nine people; basically my partner and I and seven employees. We've got ahead and taken the approach. So I want to hire really high-quality people, pay them a little bit more money, but just be a little bit leaner. So that's kind of the approach we've taken because I really don't like managing people. So the lesser quality people will take a lot more of my resources so I rather pay someone that's a killer really high salaries and trust they can go out and do the job. But you know, admin help is the first thing I think you need. Someone to make sure you get organized. You have a process, make sure you get an investor database. Be really helpful, if you do syndication dropboxes, so we use dropbox all the time.  You'll have internal chat systems. Those are things that kind of we can do quick little messaging, you know, all sorts of stuff like I talk about, about raising money more efficiently if you want to go down that path or if you want to talk about operation, we talked about that too. But just trying to use technology and work smarter not harder. And every time we do a deal, at the end of the deal, we always have a Post-mortem meeting where we go over the good and the bad and we take away lessons that were bad and then we take those and try to improve the process for the next deal.  And when we first started out, they were a lot of bigger issues and now, fortunately, the issues are really small and minor because we got the list of stuff you don't ever want to do again list, got really long pretty quick and try not to make the same mistake willingly twice. James: Yeah, so can you name like top three things that you have realized from that not to do list, can you share it with the listeners?  Michael: I mean around raising capital in particular, you know, we first started out, we had a database and I needed to raise a million. I remember I had to raise a million four for a deal, I think it was a million five something like that. And it took me about 20 25 people somewhere in that range to get a million five in, a hundred thousand minimum. We first started out I'd get a package. I need be able to an investor. I set up a call and have an hour-long call, 45 minutes to an hour long call and I had to do that 25 times. Now, what will do is we'll email the list, we hit schedule webinar and it's at, you know, seven o'clock Central Time on Wednesday. People that can attend Live, great. If not, we'll send them a recording of the webinar. And then they can watch the webinar when they want to and then I have a five-minute call with them if I need to resolve. So I presented all the materials of the deal so maybe a lot more efficient that way. Whereas, you start scaling up doing like webinars a lot more efficient way to present your opportunity than one on one calls. Because, for example, we just finish up with 24.6 million dollar equity raised and if I had to do that one call at a time like that is so huge, you can't do that. It's going to be 200 people basically invested to get 24.6 million. So, you know, you'd have to have 300 calls to get that and that just isn't an efficient way of doing it. So, that'd be one thing.  Another thing that's been official, as I said we got an investor database. So when you invest with us, you go to our database or portal up our website you fill your stuff in electronically and you electronically sign your documents. And that's a much easier way of going about it and getting the old school, paperwork out, that's kind of how we started. And then finally what was another good way to be able to work efficiently. You know, I think we got more efficient the way we've kind of work it and keep people in line and we clearly communicate what's expected of people and we're really consistent with it. So those are things you grow into, those aren't things you necessarily have money to do out the gate because we, you know, spent a couple of thousand bucks a month on our investor database. So if you have zero units to spend $24,000 a year on a database doesn't make sense. But you know, gotowebinar is certainly something you can do and you can use a Google sheet instead of a set of a database until you ultimately get enough revenue where you can afford some of the more technology tools that are available out there.  James: Yeah, yeah. In fact, I just launched my investor database yesterday, which was a lot of my investors love it. They just say it's so nice for them to see their dashboard, in terms of investment because a lot of them have multiple investments with me and it's just nice for them to see. And all the documents are in one place and they can just log in and get the report. They just love it. Michael: And it'll help you when it comes to tax time to track all your distribution in there, I'm sure and then you don't have to go recall your distributions at the end of the year to do your K1s. James: Got it. So coming to I mean you must have a good number size of passive investors. I mean, how do you select certain passive investors for certain deals? I mean is it first come first serve or how is that? Yeah, so we have, let's see, I did 900K1s last year. I think I had about 500 unique investors when we closed the year out. We just raised, I'm not quite sure what the stats are of how many are a repeat, how many are new but I probably have 600 unique investors who've literally invest with me at this point in time. And we're going to do 12-1300K1s  next year easily. So yeah, we generally will so we definitely have like a blacklist, right? So if we take your money and you're a pain, we'll make sure we don't take your money again. That's certainly the thing I think everyone should do that for sure.  On the front end if we think you're going to be a pain we'll generally kind of blacklist you as well, life's too short. Yeah, too many people, we don't have time to have a little distraction. But basically when we have an offering, we'll just go in the database and you'll get together like the MailChimp will send out a little, hey, coming soon email or save the date email, got a future opportunity coming up and then you just email the database and just generally first come, first serve.  Sometimes we have a couple of guys that we know that we have a special situation with that. They're like, hey, I have this money. I want to place it with you. Maybe we'll give them a little bit of a head start to deal from time to time. But generally, send it out first for people to pay attention, fill the paperwork out, get it all done, wire the money in, those are the ones that get into the deal. James: Yeah. I mean, I agree with some investors being a pain. I mean, it's just so hard to win. Especially sponsors like us. I mean, there's so much of moving parts and so much hard money in and on day one, I mean, so much money stuck on escrow and this has so many things going on in closing a deal. And there will be some people we just had to deal with it, right? Michael:  Yeah, so, you know, it wasn't the vast majority, people are great and but you know, one of the things that I was talking with one of my buddies, he's syndicating his first or second deal, yesterday, and he was getting a little frustrated, it wasn't going quicker and I'm like well just because you have a deal in escrow and you have a deadline and it's important to you, doesn't mean that it's not as important to investors, but they have other stuff going on their lives. So you got to be able to make sure you meet your deadlines. So you got to consistently communicate deadlines and be proactively reaching out to people and you know, you gotta push sometimes to get these people. Because if you don't stay in front of them, they're going to get distracted and something else in life is going to come up and they'll just simply forget that, you know read about your deal. They don't mean to and it's kind of like happens.   James: Yeah. Yeah, I always communicate as well to make sure that everybody knows the timeline and when do we expect things and keep on communicating to them because everybody's working on getting things done, the passive investor, the sponsors and all that. So that's important. And so the type of deal nowadays that you're doing because usually I mean, I'm not sure whether you know, I wrote a book called Passive Investing in Commercial Real Estate where I categorize three different types of deal, which one is core, the other ones are light value add the other ones a deep value add. So the type of deal that you're doing, can you describe those characteristics? Michael: Yeah. So when we first started out, we bought a whole lot of[16:37unintelligible] that's kind of generally where we started out that's where most people start out. So the first probably ten deals may be more raw 1960s 1970s vintage stuff and then about two years into the business, we started to transition more in the B-class. So Texas, things like the 1980s vintage. And then really the last two to three years the vast majority of what we have done had been kind of more B plus, A-minus. So things kind of like late 90s all the way to about 2008; that's kind of my most favorite part of the market, as we sit right now.  We have done a couple of brand new deals. We had some exchanged money, we sold a BDO and we just bought a brand-new 17:16unintelligible]  and then we bought a few deals a little bit older than the 90s. But generally speaking, if you ask me, A-minus is my favorite space and a couple of reasons for that. Now one, if you go back when I first I bought my first apartment 2013, I bought a brand new class A Deal in Dallas for about a 5 cap, a BDO was like six and a quarter six and a half cap and a CDO was like eight, eight and a half cap. Fast forward to today an ADO is like a 475, a BDO is like a 5 and the CDO like five and a quarter by five and a half, something like that, right? So what used to be a big gap is now really, really narrow.  So we have the ability to track larger amounts of capital. So it make as much sense to me to be on a risk-adjusted return basis to buy a 1970s piece of crap building if I can buy a 2004 vintage building for a similar cap rate. So that's kind of what we're focusing on. And the stuff that was built that's 15 years old, stuff kind of on the 2000s. Still, most of those have like white appliances and cheap light fixtures and you know, no backsplash and you know cheap cabinet fronts. You still do similar value add things like flooring, appliances, fixtures, backsplash, cabinet fronts and still push the rent lift up a hundred dollars or maybe more per unit by doing the work. So that's kind of my favorite part on the market and then just kind of we've been fortunate enough to have a couple of deals go full cycle and return a bunch of capital. So we have a lot of money in our database and so I can't simply go raise two or three million dollars, that's just too small, you know, we need to be raising, you know, nine ten million time minimum; it's just too small. So we're just trying to do a little bit of a larger deal. And that's kind of what we've been focused on and say light value add, A-minus that's the vast majority of what we do with a couple like more newer stabilized kind of deals then thrown them in if we do an exchange or we just think we're getting a good basis on a deal. James: Got it. Got it. And also the other thing that I mentioned the book is the passive investors will be, they would like to invest based on their preference or based on their investment cycle. So when you look at your passive investor demographic, do you see some differentiation in terms of these are the group of people that like to invest in my deal?  Michael: Yeah, I mean, listen with 700 different people that invested with us you get a little bit of everything, right? You know, but that's one of the things that we always try to make sure we stress is you know, hey, here's what to expect. You know, we're really explicit about what the projections are, the timing and amount and the timing of the cash flow and when you do a syndication, ultimately most of those things need to sell at some point. It's hard to keep a whole bunch of unrelated people to together for perpetuity; forever is not a good hold in a syndication environment. That's cool if it's like you or you and a partner or a really small group of people, but when you have, you know, a hundred unrelated people that's hard. So we want to make sure when we're communicating with them that--and they understand like, you know what to expect and I also let them know if we're going to sell it and it doesn't fit what your objectives are, then this isn't a good thing for you to invest in.  So we try to be really explicit. So we match expectations properly because what I don't want is a year down the road, for you to be upset because you thought you were investing in, you know, one thing and there's really something different so, you know trying to be explicitly and very clear to our investors is what we're trying to do.  James: Yeah, that's good. That's the best way to just make sure that everybody knows what they're getting into right? So with the market at the current cycle right now, I mean in DFW Austin, you know, the whole taxes or places where you're investing it's very hot right now so, where do you think we are right now and how your strategy has changed in terms of acquisition? Michael: Yeah, I mean. You know, this has been a hell of a run where we're nine years into this thing or something like that. I mean, it's been one hell of a run. You know, with that said, the more we focus on a predominately Austin which is where you live in Dallas which is where I live and if you look at the population projections about three weeks ago, I've done this with staff about three weeks ago. The Census Bureau came out and kind of have stats for the growth 2018. So Dallas, Fort Worth from 2010 through 2018 over an 8 year period, there are a million more people in here in 2018 that was in 2010. So, we went from that 6 and a half million people to about 7 and a half million people and their projections in Dallas Fort Worth are to grow from about 7 and a half million people to almost 10 somewhere between the next 12 to 15 years. So to put that in perspective that's about two and a half million more people coming to Dallas, Fort Worth if the projections are right. So that's the equivalent of like the entire metropolitan area of Charlotte or Orlando and then putting it on top of Dallas, Fort Worth today. And everything I just quoted to you about Dallas, if you take the percentages, it's even higher in Austin. So Austin is growing even faster on a percentage basis. If you feel like just driving around, there are just more cars, more people all that. So I don't know a whole lot, James, but I know if the equivalent of the entire metropolitan area, Charlotte is put on top of Dallas Fort Worth[22:50unintelligible] have to go higher right? They just have to go higher. So what we want to do is, you know, make sure that we're focusing on the right locations within the metropolitan area. You know, we're trying to buy away from these Supply the best we can. We're buying like Suburban multifamily deals in better school districts. We're trying to focus on basis. So we're trying not to pay Crazy Prices. One of the strategies we've done here recently is focused on properties that you can come buy and assume someone else's mortgage and you get this avoids having a large yield maintenance or the [23:24unintelligible] prepayment penalty. So you get a pass along a lower cost to you as a buyer. So that's a way to kind of counteract that a little bit.  What you give up as a buyer; you give up five years of interest only on the front end as you're assuming a mortgage that's most likely already amortizing so kind of hurt you up from yield. But if you save a million dollars or two million dollars in basis, you know, one day, that's going to burn down if you need to sell it or refinance it free and clear. So that's one strategy we've been doing. And then here's another thing. I mean you own a bunch of stuff to San Antonio like those we were talking about before we started recording. You know, this is one of the things I would say, it's completely unfair business, you know, a lot of it who you know, what you know, what chips you can trade. And you know, I own a lot of stuff in Dallas but I walk in the San Antonio, you know, you have more clout in San Antonio than I do, just because I don't own. So the Brokers are more apt to sell you something than someone that doesn't know that market. So we're at this point in the cycle doing 35 deals or some like that at this point, we know everybody, everyone knows us that our Brokers are players in town. So we get our unfair share deals. So, you know, we're looking at a lot of stuff and we're trying to be selective with it. It's also as far as strategy goes, you know, the lone assumption route has been something that's been successful for us. And then two, we put up a lot of hard money. That is the other thing that helps.  So you can put up a lot of hard money, get aggressive with your terms, you know, act quickly, you know, we got a deal in escrow that we officially never got to tour, you know, so we had to go shop it and then we never got to tour it and so we just basically got it in escrow went hard [25:10unintelligible]  without ever having an official tour and I can do that because I've done 30 something deals. You don't do that on your first deal. So I know what's up, I know what's going on and we did our due diligence and we didn't find anything that we didn't already expect. So we knew what to expect and that's what experience and repetition gives you a psyche. I got my 10,000 hours and I kind of know what's going on. I kept having to make better decisions, quicker with that level of experience.  James: Yeah and brokers love it too because for them is like you're a very easy buyer because you already know the submarket. You're not going to give a surprise and they have done deals with you. They just love it things to go much smoother. They make money as well. So they love the repeat buyers and the local players, as well. Michael: Yeah, that's right. And then we're all friends like we go and have drinks together we go to the baseball game together. We all become friends and you know people do business with people they know like and Trust so being local in the markets that we own and operate in. I was at lunch before this podcast and ran from the[26:17unintelligible] Brokers because of their office across the street from me. Walking down the street and you ended up having lunch in these just randomly. And as I was walking out, one of my competitors who own like 12,000 units whose office is around the corner for me walked across me in the hallway, you know, and on the sidewalk, I mean so this like being proximity and doing a lot of deals that stuff helps. James: Got it. Got it. So let's say nowadays, what's the process of your firm looking at a deal? So let's say today there's a deal coming. I mean, it's not on the market, the broker tells you, who looks at it first, how does it come to your eyesight before?  Michael: Yeah. The way we are set up, a deal comes in, say I get it, you know comes across my desk. You know, I basically kind of where's it located? You know, what's the basic price? Right? So I'll just kind of go to Google Map. Make sure you kind of know the location I'm in and I know whatever location that they are sending us. Like we know like the markets because we're in the market. So, you know, usually, most of the deals are like, no, it's the wrong location or no, you're prices are extremely insane. I'm not paying that price per unit for this type of product. And so usually a lot of people kind of get kicked out, but if it passes kind of that basic high-level test, then at that point usually we'll do like a real get the financial statements in from the seller. And then what we'll do like a real back of the envelope analysis.  We'll spend 20 to 30 minutes doing a real high-level underwriting just to make sure that it kind of passes the high-level test and usually a lot of those deals die right then. So, you know, the deal was just like, you know the match it doesn't work. It's just way too expensive or we don't think there's not much upside in the rinse. Just whatever it is. We kick a lot of deals out that way. Then if it passes that deal usually at that point, we'll do a full underwriting and that will take this like four hours. You know, we have a CFA that's our analysts. Our analyst will go underwrite the deal for four hours. Since it's my partner and I, then my partner will go through and kind of review the model. And once you review the model, it passes that, then, you know usually, most of the deals kind of die right there then they don't really work. But the deals that kind of pass that screening that's when you know, we'll kind of get down and get serious about it. And I think that point that's usually when I go tour. So that point, they pass all the tests so we set up a tour maybe put [28:34unintelligible]  in early kind of depends on the situation. And so, you know, we're looking at you know, 60 70 deals to get one that actually makes something like that. That's probably somewhere in that kind of General ratio is what we look at. And we just have like little series of check marks along the way that we gotta like, you know, but doesn't pass this one little test and let's just kill a deal and move on. I found on the biggest cost to have in my life anymore, stop tuning cost. So if I spent a lot of time on one thing it's at the expense of something else. So my time is precious. So just trying to make sure I get, you know, use that the most widely and don't chase these deals for you know weeks and weeks. I never had the opportunity of actually making it in a day. So that's hard to do when you're first starting out and that's a lot easier to do when you have some experience.  So when you start out, you got to learn these lessons sometimes the hard way. You got to underwrite this deal that if you would have just at the end of it just kind of be self-reflective like, you know, what could I have seen earlier on this deal that would have stopped me from wasting a week of my life on it? You know, you need to start that. I think that's what separates a better apartment owner, ownership syndication type groups from the less successful ones.  James: Yeah, I agree. I mean, I don't look at more than five parameters in any P&L to decide whether I want to dig deeper. So what's the ratio of deals that you look at verses you looking at and passing it to your analyst for the four hours underwriting? Michael:  I mean, it's probably pretty limited. So if it's called 60 deals to get one, I mean it's probably, at least half just get killed or your pricing is way too high or it's the wrong location or the deal too small or something physically about the deal I don't like. So that's probably half of them and the ones I've been going to like get a back-of-the-envelope, we probably kill, you know, the 30 that make it through on the 60 we're probably killing, you know, so that's 20 right there. Then we'll probably underwrite, you know, ten to get the one type of thing.  James: What do you look for in a location?  Michael: You know, yeah, so we're Suburban multi Family Guy. So good Suburban location that is in the better school districts, you know near major thoroughfares preferably to have access to Lifestyle and Retail amenities like, you know, like they are near a Starbucks, near a good grocery store, you know, retail restaurant, stuff that people want to live in. First and foremost, low-crime area too, I don't want to buy in the hood. So, you know, no low-crime area. Those are the things I look for and we're targeting, you know, preferably 200 plus unit, A-minus family deals, but that's kind of my perfect deals. An A-minus deal with more than 10% or an upside, you know it's well located, low crime, better School District, near employers, near retail and restaurant. That's kind of what I look for.   James: So, can we go a bit more deeper into the back of napkin underwriting? So, let's say there's a $10 million deal you know, 50 unit, maybe a 100-unit deal, how did you underwrite that? Back of the Napkin. Michael: I mean, so what is the first major metric is a, you know, one other [inaudible31:51} ransom what's our basic market survey say . So, pull a [inaudible] and look at the market rent. So then how much upside do we have in rent? So, I say, so, if there's only 5% upside in rents then it's probably not ideal for us, you know, we typically 10 plus percent in upside of rent to make the mass work. So, if I only have 5%, I know when I layer in my sponsorship compensation it's just not going to make sense. All right, so you know, like it's just not going to have no margin for us to be able to go attract capital. So, that's the first thing and then we'll then obviously go down and like other income or other income opportunities, then obviously look at the expenses as well. Michael: So, you know, one of the deals were we just got awarded, the payroll is by 1600 ,1650 a unit and it should be 1200, you know, so we can on day one, boom, take 450 out of payroll that certainly helps quite a bit. So, we're looking for things like that, that's kind of what it is. And you know, basically for maybe if you think about it at its simplest form, James, like, I need to do a deal I need to be able to deliver somewhere between 13 to 15% IRR today that's what takes me to attract capital. So if I can't get a deal layer in my compensation layer in whatever capital you need to do, um, you know, talk to the purchase price and I don't have enough upside of rents because at the end of the day, if I can't produce a 14% or 15% IRR over a five year hold period, my investors don't want to invest. So, I can't spend time on deals on can produce those types of returns. So, we're just trying to find, stuff that has enough upsides would be able to produce that. So, whatever that is, reducing expenses, increasing income, the two most common things, or is there some sort of way we can get a different type of debt quotes that may be kind of juices, some of these returns or whatever the specific situation is to that property. That's kind of what we're trying to get to the heart because, if I can't produce a 14 or 15% return, I need to shoot the deal and move on. James: Got It, got It. So, coming to 13,14% IRR is it to investors, or is it overall returns on ... Michael: Investors right. So, if it’s like 15 investors 17 and a half, 18 to the deal and you put a sponsor comp in there? So, it's got to be, I gross 8 total 18 they get up 15 and our structure or something, something like that. James: Got It, got It. Yeah. It's interesting on the debt code side, no, sorry, before I go there, how do you know that the seller is not taking some of your upside? Because nowadays that's what sellers do, right? They price it slightly higher; they give you upside, but they price it higher, which erases your upside. So how do you determine that? Michael: That's the whole thing why we don’t buy c class anymore because of the same catch, so yeah you know, that's the thing so I mean, all these deals that have a lot of upside have a lot more interest and so they can again, bit up and the cap rates are compressing. So, the trick is you got to overpay a little bit, but you can't overpay too much. Right. James: Right. Michael: And that's kind of like what you're doing. So, at the end of the day I got to, I, it's as simple as I deliver a 15 IRR and if I can't deliver, I can pay up to a certain price and then you start doing past out price and I can produce the returns I need. And that's kind of when we back off. James: Okay. Michael: So that's kind of how I think about it, so, every, most of the deals we'll work out at a price. So, we just kind of get to where this is the Max price what we can do to push to push out a 15 IRR for investors. And so that works up to 20 million and 20 million, 100,000 it doesn't work. So, you got to kind of draw the line in the sand and have a lot of arms in the fire. You get a whole bunch of deals working all at the same time. Usually, they start popping. James: Yes, yes, yes. The basis of my question is because they could be $150 or hundred dollars a rent bump potential, but the seller has priced it so much or we could have outbid-- Michael: Yes. James: --so much that it's not worth it, right. So, to do that because you might be just getting-- Michael: Yes, there's that. And then you get a little nervous for some of the less-- the newer people in the business, with little less experience like you're going to pay a five cap for 19 C class, 1917 deal. Okay, location and suburban St. Tonio or Dallas or whatever and then you're going to perform like a five and a half or five 75 extra cap. Five years down the road for a c class deal, maybe that, maybe that's the right cap rate, maybe it's not, it needs-- as you go and improve the property, you're able to increase rents and by extension, you value you’re in a why. But at the same time, the more upside you take out of these deals because your turnover, 50% units upgrade them, shrinks your buyer pool cause everyone wants value add. So, the more value you take out on the deal, your cap rate actually goes up. So, it's like a weird little dynamic you're in that you got to like, you got to factor in. It's like a 3-D puzzle you're doing because what's great because you're increasing, you're why. Because you're raising your rent, but at the same time you're also expanding your cap rate, as we sit in the same marketplace. So, it's interesting, complex puzzle, the marketplaces are right now. James: Yes, I was talking to a broker and you say hottest deal to sell nowadays it’s like deals where everything is done right, 90% is done. Michael: Yes. James: Nobody really wants it because everybody wants value add right? Michael: That's probably the opportunity to go buy a bunch of that stuff. Cause that's what today is. And then if you can get higher leverage loan, you get a 75% loan and get a good low-interest rate and get a bunch of I Own and go buy a deal that's turnkey. Maybe that's a better way of going, to be honest with you. And just kind of get a little bit more your return from current yield versus a big pop on the backend. That's thought about strategy, to be honest with you, it's a lot more safer than going and doing a bunch of work on a property-- James: Yes. Michael: --and paying a 475 cap for 1970 deal. I'd rather pay a six and a quarter cap for six and a half cap for a deal that's already done. James: Yes, because the backend is not certain. Right. Nobody knows what's going to happen-- Michael: Right. James: --at the [inaudible37:58] cap rate, so. Michael: That's right. James: So that brings to my next-- Michael: And then you do all the work, you might expand your cap rate anyways. And then you're doing all this work to only get half the payment. So, I think if I could go back in time, I would've bought every deal on a bridge loan. I would not have spent a single dollar in renovations and just operate it, wait five years and you sell it in today's environment for like a freaking 475 cap, that would have been a better decision with the benefit of hindsight. James: Yes, correct. Correct. So how would you-- sorry, in terms of cash flow vs. IRR vs. Equity multiply, right? So, what do you see, what is the most important number that-- for you, right, I know you're passive investors need to look at? Michael: Yes. You know, I think everyone, that everyone's different too. Like, all my investors have different things that are most important to them. I think, honestly at the end of the day, a pair of this investment, that investment, IRR is really kind of the driven. I'm not the biggest IRR in our store. We, I think the cash on cash certainly matters because I can't pay my bills on IRR, but I can with a check every month. So, I, that certainly protects it. But at the end of the day, really, we're focused kind of when we're-- comparing this, it's up to you in the next one, really kind of IRR. Because you know, if I'm able to come in this deal, I assume a mortgage and refinance in the third year or something like that and have a partial return of capital that pops my IRR pretty, pretty good. And I keep take some of this capital and return to my investors quickly. Two-year period, you know, 30% of their money back through a refi or something like that. That certainly is attractive. So, we'll, I think I kind of focused on IRR when I'm making the decisions on which deal, I want to buy, which deal I don't. And we've been, we like [inaudible39:54], we've been focused many deals about loan assumptions recently trying to get a lower basis. So, the first and foremost I'm focused on basis, making sure I buy a deal that's a relative value to everything else is trading right now. And I, cause I was only two things. You can't change on a property; you can't change your purchase price and you can't change location of it. Everything else you can kind of modify can always refinance it. I can always improve the property, but I can't change what price I paid or where it's located. So, we'll locate a deal with good prices, and I think everything else will kind of generally work itself out. James: Got It. And got it. How do you make decent between buy and hold for long term vs. buy and buy and refi? How do you decide? Michael: Yes, so if it's a syndicated deal, we've done a couple deals, especially when it first started out doing dentures where it's like what equity partner in us. Those deals we tend to hold longer. We bought a bunch of workforces, we sold them, we exchange, like A-minus or a product. So, we did a bunch of that. And then when it's a syndication people for like forever is not a good whole period if you're in syndication. Because people want, return on their money as well as return of their money and kind of the intermediate term. So, we're typically performing a five-year hold period. I think you'd be going much past seven. Most people kind of like, you know, shoot, I don't want to tie my money up for 10 years or 20 years. Now I kind of want to get my, I kind of want to see a return of my money as well as the return on my money. So, it kind of depends on the thing, but that's a heck of a lot of work buying and selling these things. So, it was just a lot easier just to kind of hold and it's kind of operate, especially the way we're set up with a third-party management company that does all day today. I, managing a bunch of thousands of apartment units. It's kind of like adult daycare. James: Yes, it's adult daycare, it's a good one to see. Michael: It's property management as a business of problems. I mean, there's always a problem, like every day, always, problems everywhere. So, if you have third-party management to kind of oversee that and we're set up and I have an asset manager that layered in between me and them. As a principal, the way we're set up, it's really not that bad on the day today. So, what we've been kind of focusing on is we're just selling the older stuff and buying newer, nicer stuff. Cause there's old stuff, I mean, not only, it was great, and we made a bunch of money, but you have asphalt parking lots and casts on sewers and t one 11 siding, Hardie. You go renovate a deal and two or three years later you've got to renovate the deal because the parking lot needs to be redone and you painted over wood. So, then you've got to have more wood of what, right? You got to go paint over again. And you can't cast, our sewers are collapsed in every time you turn around and get, dig it up and replaced sexting sewer pipe. So, you have all these like nonrecurring items that recurrent all the time. So, doesn't impact in a live per se, but it impacts your actual cash and the bottom line? So, I'm so I think the actual net cash you can pay out, it's not that different on a higher cap rate, older deal versus, or maybe a little bit lower cap rate, better quality deal if you're going to be in these deals for a long period of time. So, we've been just trying to get younger in our portfolio, so stuff I owned a day, I'd be much more likely to want to hold than the stuff I owned in 2014, 2013 cause those were just tougher, older, older deals. And I think that's what I've seen been kind of like the natural progression of most people that do what I do for a living. Just over time. One of the things, one of my mentors told me once when I first got in the business was, you own apartments in dog years, and every year of ownership feels like seven. So, like over time, you know that statement is very, very true. The older the property and the smaller the property, the more true that statement is. The bigger, nicer. It's just easy, just easier. So, I don't know if I answered your question,-- James: [inaudible43:42]. Michael: --but those are the-- between owning or selling a deal. James: Absolutely. Absolutely. And-- so let's go back to a bit more personal stuff, right? So, can you name like three things that you think is your secret sauce in, scaling up to this level? Michael: Yes, so, first and foremost, I mean I'm pretty tenacious and I had a lot of ambition, so, that was, that was a lot of it, right? I was like, I was willing to do what it takes to get to where I got. So, we had a lot of experience, background, and training and that certainly, so first and foremost, I just really, really, really wanted it. And like last weekend I flew to Jacksonville, not check, yes, Jacksonville, Florida, I'm sorry. Losing track of where I was. So, I was in Jacksonville for 21 hours. I spoke in front of 300 potential investors. I flew back home. I did that Saturday morning, came back Sunday morning and three weeks earlier I was in Newark, New Jersey, went to some hotel conference room on a Saturday, came back on Sunday. So, I'm willing to sacrifice a good chunk of my weekend to go out and get in front of investors so I can then do these larger deals. So, if you're not willing to put in the work and do what it takes and you're only, you're going to get a moderate your success for sure. Second thing was, I had a great background being a banker for over a decade and I just did deal after deal after deal. So, I've got a great education on my, on the bank Stein. So, most people don't have that. Cause then they're not bankers. Right. But, go get educated. That's the other thing I would, I would say get educated, higher from a reputable mentor. There's a lot of people out there put the time in. Become a student of your craft, go listen to this podcast, or listen to our podcasts, read books, do stuff like that. That’s a great way of learning. These podcasts are great. Like we host the Dole Capitol podcasts or your podcast. You're going to sit here and talk to me. So, it looks like about at least 45 minutes here- James: Yes. Michael: --at this point. And you get to your conversation from two guys that own almost 10,000 units collectively for 45 minutes for free. And there's a lot of wisdom and nuggets, but I think hopefully you can take out of that. Um, so, my background, my education was certainly it. And then really just a lot of its just relationships. You know what I mean? A lot of this is as simple as just don't be a jerk. That's, that's a lot of it, right? So, the brokers want to do business with people they know, like, and trust. They want you to be honest with them. They want you to be, do what you say you're going to do. And if you could just do that and be in a good guy and be friendly with them, man that goes a long way. It really does. So those are, those are three things I've done pretty well in this business. James: Got it, got it. And why do you do, what you do, I mean, where are you? Michael: I understood back, couple of things, right? To have a better life to be able to, the monetary if you'd have done well, the very rewarding monetarily. I sit back, so I got a couple of things happen, reflecting back on this, cause you know, we've done a lot in a short period of time. When I was 2010, so my mother passed away in 2010. So, I was like 32, I'm 32, 31, something like that at the time. And, so she was like 57 when at the time she passed away and then she-- her and my father sacrificed to save all their life to then be able to retire one day and then go have all those great traveling adventures in the sunlight and do stuff that was great in life and she didn't get to do that. She works to sacrificed and saved and I never got to-- the fruits of it. So, I kind of, that was a thing that kind of burned into my mind that I need to be able to do something young, unable to take a risk young. So, then I can then enjoy a lot of stuff in life. So shortly after, that's when I really first started was in 2011. I bought a bunch of rent houses in 2011. I [inaudible 47:28] my mom passed away and that's kind of really when I started like taking risks and doing stuff because being a banker, you're just naturally conservative. You're not really wanting to go take risks. But I started small and kind of got some confidence and then a transition in the multifamily. So that was one thing. And then, and then when I was about 34, 35, I was sitting at the bank and I worked for a large, large national bank and then, I was really successful, and they're kept trying to promote me. And, when I was looking at the bank and I looked at my boss and my boss's boss and his boss and thinking about what they do all day, it was kind of depressing, to be honest with you. Like I didn't want to do that. And I felt like a, it is a metaphorical thing, but it felt like a little fork in the road. Like I'm 34, 35 and if I don't go out and take a chance like right now, and I wait one more year, every year is, we made a little bit harder to go out and take this risk. But if I like go out right now, I saw the market, the market was right. Capital was blowing and the deals are so good. And I knew that because I was in the industry. So, I was like, if I go out and I fail I can always come back and be a banker because I was a really good banker and I can, y'all are going to need to be a banker. But if I go out and I succeed, then I can have a great life and get to go to Hawaii for three weeks. Like I'm going to this summer, I'm just going to pick up the family in Hawaii for three weeks. I'm just going to work from Hawaii for three weeks to sort of be in a hundred degrees in Dallas. Right. So that's what you, that's what I get to do today. And I get to pay for my sister and her family to go to Hawaii because we've taken the risk and been successful and those are-- that's kind of, I guess some of my whys right there. James: Yes. It's, it's interesting on how you're tenacious. I mean, whether its real estate or anything. And you can do this in anything, right to, you just have to be-- Michael: Yes. James: --persistent in doing it and know your why and just push it. And I can change your life. Right? So. Michael: In every transaction, there's always a problem, right. James: Yes. Michael: So that's the thing too. And that's what I always fall back on. Like there's always a problem. There's always stress, there's always, whatever. And you just got to like push through who's going to put your head down. You just got to push through. Just kind of will it, so do what you needed to do, you know? And not that every time I feel frustrated and you were not getting a deal, right? Like I've gone months and months on a deal, I just do more. Like, you know, I make more calls, I go do this, I'm proactive. I'm just like more always answer. So, we don't get what you want to do. More effort, not, that's usually, usually tends to work out pretty good for me. James: Good. Good. We're coming to the end. One more question. Do you have any like a daily habit or daily ritual that you do that contributes to your success or effectiveness in life? Michael: I'm not the most, I don't really read a lot of books. I don't really meditate on do any of that. So, what-- I, I do find myself from time to time, I'll go down the rabbit hole of doing something and like burn off 30 minutes by all my life around the internet or something like that in the middle of the day. And I always try to catch myself and say, okay, like I just need to prioritize. So, I have a hundred things to do every single day and I need to ensure I know what the most impactful thing is. And I focus my time on that. Cause, sometimes you let the tyranny of the urgent get in the way of the important. So just cause I have 40 emails on red, I need to go clear. It doesn't mean that's the most important thing for me to do right then. Even though that's like dinging on my screen in front of me. Sometimes I'll try to shut that out, focus on what are, what is the most important thing. And then I know when I, I'll schedule time to come back and clear my emails out an hour later down the road when I kind of get done the most important thing. Because, if you're in a Sproul, I'll leave you with, it's kind of, there's this whole thing that I've, I've definitely learned in this business, as a syndicator, as someone that does, find that puts together an apartment operators, apartment investment opportunities or any sort of opportunity like that. The best way you make, the way you make money in this business, you've got to find deals and find money. Going to find deals and find money and everything else is sort of noise. It’s all really important. You got to operate; you've got to do all their things right. But, that doesn't really, that's not driving revenue. So, if you want to focus on revenue, you've got to find deals or find money. So, I'm not talking to brokers, I'm not talking to my investors, you know, everything else is, not driving revenue. So, at the end of the day, I always try to remember that when I'm deciding, what do I spend my time on. Do I spend my time on this or that, that's always in the back of my mind? James: Got it. Got it. Is there anything else that you want to share in this podcast that you have not shared in hundreds of other podcasts that you have been? I should have [inaudible51:57]. Michael: I, I think, we do a pretty good job. So, I would, if you want to know more about me, I think really there's a couple of ways you can, the easiest way to find me, just get my company's website, which is a company spiadvisory, just go to our website www.spiadvisory.com. It's spi like spy advisory dot com. There's a contact us form, fill that out. I always happen to have in 10 or 15 minutes. A telephone call, listeners of the podcast. You guys are interested in maybe working with us or really the best way if you want to know more about me or if you listen to this podcast or [inaudible] or. So, you can listen to a dual capital podcast. So that's on iTunes or Stitcher or YouTube or anywhere you're probably listening to me right now. You can find the old capital real estate investing podcast. So, we have probably 300 episodes in the archive or more at this point. So, we do interviews with other people kind of similar to this format. As well as we do a little short one where my partner Paul interviews me and asked me one question a week and I answered about one specific topic. So, if you want to know anything about and just all-around apartment investing in your or some form or fashion. So you want to learn more about me, that's a good way to kind of-- I talk, I have a lot of stuff recorded that's out there that, but if you like this, you may, you may like that and hopefully can provide some, a little nub. It nuggets on different little talk topics, to listen to those. James: Yes. Yes. I learned a lot from you. I mean, listening to you from different, different podcasts throughout my apartment investing journey. So, I'm thankful for that. And I think that's it. Hopefully, all the audience and listeners got the value that they want to get or getting from Michael and myself. I think that's it. Thank you. Michael: All right. Thank you.  

Do you ever feel like you would be more successful in your journey to better health if you had more willpower and motivation? Does it feel like everyone else has more willpower and motivation than you? Does it seem like all these changes are more difficult for you than other people? You’re going to want to tune in for this conversation with Annie and Jen for the truth about willpower, motivation and what action you can take to feel more successful.   What you’ll hear in this episode: The definition of willpower How decision fatigue impacts the quality of choices we make What’s the difference between motivation and willpower? How preparation sets you up for success Meal planning - why it can be helpful What to do when you can’t rely on motivation and willpower How waiting for motivation gets in the way of change that matters to us The magic in boredom The Habit Hangover - what is it? What keeps successful people going What a study of soda and water in a hospital teaches us about habits How to curate your environment for success   Resources: Atomic Habits by James Clear 53: Secrets From The Eating Lab: Dr. Traci Mann Secrets From The Eating Lab Arms Like Annie Learn more about Balance365 Life here Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Play, or Android so you never miss a new episode! Visit us on Facebook| Follow us on Instagram| Check us out on Pinterest Join our free Facebook group with over 40k women just like you! Did you enjoy the podcast? Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or Google Play! It helps us get in front of new listeners so we can keep making great content. Transcript Annie: Welcome to Balance365 Life Radio, a podcast that delivers honest conversations about food, fitness, weight and wellness. I'm your host Annie Brees along with Jennifer Campbell and Lauren Koski. We are personal trainers, nutritionists and founders of Balance365. Together we coached thousands of women each day and are on a mission to help them feel healthy, happy and confident in their bodies, on their own terms. Join us here every week as we discuss hot topics pertaining to our physical, mental and emotional wellbeing with amazing guests. Enjoy. Welcome to Balance365 Life radio. Have you ever felt like if you just had more willpower, self control or motivation, you would finally be able to reach your goals? We get it. We hear this a lot and it's no wonder. The diet and fitness industry have led us to believe that willpower and control are characteristics of driven, successful, healthy individuals. And if we just had more, we wouldn't struggle. But is that all we need? Do we really just need more self control? And if so, how do I get it? Cause sign me up! On today's episode, Jen and I dive into the theories and the truth behind willpower, motivation and self control and offer tried and true practical strategies to help you stay on track with your goals even when you're just not feeling up to it. And by the way, if you want to continue this discussion on willpower, motivation, and self control, we invite you to join our free private Facebook group. Healthy Habits, Happy Moms. See you on the inside. Jen, how are you? Jen: Good, how are you? Annie: I'm great. We are talking about willpower and motivation today, which is something that comes up so frequently in our community. Like how do I get more motivation? How do I get more willpower? Right? We hear this a lot. Jen: Yeah and everywhere, right? Even the messages we get out of the fitness industry talks about getting motivated and having more willpower. And sometimes those phrases are used in a way that can feel really hurtful, right? Like you're doing something wrong and everybody else, everybody else around you seems to be very motivated and have a lot of willpower and you feel like it's something you lack. Annie: Right? And if you just had that, if you had willpower and determination and motivation and self discipline, then you could achieve anything. Jen: Right? And how many times have we heard, "I just have no willpower and that's my downfall. No willpower." Annie: Right? Yeah. And so we've done a fair amount of investigation into what really is behind willpower, what's behind motivation, what's behind self discipline? Do you really just need more of it? Because that is the message. Like you said, that we've been sold by the fitness industry that like, "Hey, if you just stick to this thing, if you can just have enough self discipline and motivation to stick to this plan, then you'll achieve your goals." And so then that becomes a way in which people feel like they're feeling like, "Oh, I did this." Like you said, "I'm wrong. I'm a failure. I'm lacking in this element of my life and everyone else is doing it. And I'm not." And is there any truth behind that? And I think what we're going to share today might surprise some people. Jen: Yes. Annie: Foreshadowing. Jen: Yes. Annie: And I want to say, like, you've done a lot of writing on this too because a lot of this is in the first phase of our Balance365 programming called Diet Deprogramming. Jen: Yes. Yeah. Annie: And that's the phase in which we kind of challenge, not kind of, we challenge some of the beliefs that you might hold sold to you by the diet and fitness industry, right? Jen: Yes. And the science around willpower and motivation is very heavy. And so I think today we're going to try talk about it in less scientific but more practical terms. Annie: Yeah. Jen: That make sense to everyone. And they can implement in their lives immediately. Annie: Well, yeah, I mean, we're not researchers! Jen: That's the goal! Annie: I mean, I like to think that I'm pretty smart, but definitely not researcher level. Okay. So let's start with the definition of willpower. Let's just get really clear on that. And the definition of willpower is the ability to exert control and resist impulses. And the truth is that we all have varying degrees of willpower. And on one end of the spectrum you'll have people with almost perfect willpower. And on the other end of the spectrum, you'll have people with almost no willpower. And the vast majority of us are- Jen: Somewhere in the middle. Annie: And like Jen said, there have been a lot of studies done on willpower and a lot of theories and it's kind of an ongoing process and you might find some that kind of disagree with each other. So like Jen said, we're just trying to give you more practical advice on how you can reach your goals without maybe relying on willpower and what is clear is that one of our mentors, Steven Michael Ledbetter, he is an expert in the science of human behavior. It's said that people reporting high levels of fatigue are the ones whose lives require high levels of mental energy expenditure. And do you want to give us that marriage example that you share in Diet deprogramming? Can you walk us through that and so we can see what Steven Michael Ledbetter says applies to real life. Jen: Okay. So yes. So, you had just talked about how people who have high levels of fatigue are the ones whose lives require high levels of mental energy expenditure. So this might include having to make many small decisions or choose between similar options all day long, and so what this, what we talk about in diet deprogramming as we compare two people. We've got a stay at home dad and a working mom and I put out this situation where a working mom, she gets up early kind of before anyone else is awake and she has some quiet time, has her breakfast and then she dashes out the door and on her way out she grabs her gym bag, which is packed and ready to go right by the door and she heads up the door for work. Her day is, you know, maybe not a super high stress job. She has some responsibility, but it's not super high stress. Her lunch breaks are always scheduled. She goes to the gym on her lunch breaks. It's a automatic habit and then she returned home around 5:30, six o'clock. Meanwhile, stay at home dad. This is my dream life. That's why I use this as an example. He wakes up tired because he's been up with maybe a toddler a couple of times in the night. He wakes up to lots of noise too, maybe a baby and a toddler crying "Breakfast!" And immediately he's going, "What am I going to feed these kids for breakfast?" And gulping back coffee and then trying to get those kids dressed because they have an appointment at 10 o'clock and then trying to get himself dressed. And it's just the crazy, right? I think we've all been there. Annie: That sounds familiar. Jen: Yes. And then just getting those kids out the door getting, and then one of them saying they got to poop. So then coming back in to change a diaper, like just like madness constantly. Right. And despite his best intentions to do a workout during nap time that afternoon, he is just so mentally fatigued from everything that happened between 8:00 AM and 1:00 PM that by the time the afternoon hits scrolling Facebook and the couch have won him over. And then of course the afternoon to get up from their naps. Similar stuff, making dinner, just that whole crazy and working wife gets home at 5:30 and dinner is almost ready and they sit down for a nice family dinner. They get the kids to bed that night. They go to unwind on the couch. They might share a bag of chips and working Susie goes to bed at a reasonable hour. But stay at home husband is just mentally fatigued, is so sick of being around kids. This is the only time he has in a day to not be with kids and he ends up staying up til midnight like he does every single night. Just hoarding those hours for himself and that might lead to more chips, maybe a beer, watching TV. Then he goes to bed around midnight and it starts again the next day. And so this example I think is typical of what might be happening in a lot of people's households is, you, I don't want to say typical. I'll say it was typical for me for a long time. I don't know if it was typical for you, Annie, but and I would say that even though my partner had taken on the responsibility of earning and that was an enormous responsibility, I felt like my life was chaos, very hard to find a routine when my kids were all little, little. I had three kids under four and it was just that I felt like my mental energy was just, just chipped away at all day long. Just all those little decisions you have to make dealing with unreasonable little kids all day. And it was very hard for me to get the physical or mental energy together. And then it's a downward cycle, right? Like then you have staying up late then broken sleep, can't get up in the morning, can't get going. And you know, we know that spiral, right? Making not so great food choices. Annie: Yeah. it's hard to make great choices when you're exhausted, when you're mentally and maybe even physically fatigued, you're kind of not in a prime position to make a good choice. And the mental fatigue that comes with a long day of decision making, whether it be you, Jen, when you were staying at home or the husband that we described in the last situation, the long day of decision making chips away at your energy and your willpower. So you have the contrast of the working mom who didn't have to make a lot of choices or maybe she made those choices ahead of time. So when she was fatigued- Jen: Right? So she packed her lunch, you know, she packs her lunch the night before, packs her gym bag. Doesn't have to think about those things. And maybe, you know, I think about my husband when he would go to work, there were lots of decisions that needed to be made and he did work in a high pressure environment, but he had assistants, receptionists, you know, like there was a lot of people pushing the ball forward with him, and yeah, so, and I don't want to like create this comparison game. I just might help with conversations between partners or just reflection, right? And so yeah, like, “Wow, how can I reduce the amount of decisions I have to make in a day?” Because what we know is all those decisions is actually contributing big time to your mental fatigue. Annie: Right? And so that's why we talk a lot about things like habits. So when you walk to the fridge, you have your, maybe your lunch for the week, you know, you've got all your power bowls. That's why our power bowl challenge was so successful and we loved it so much is because you don't have to then think at 12 o'clock when you're already starving and like, "Oh gosh, what am I gonna eat for lunch now? And do I want to cook something? Do I want to go grab something?" Because convenience wins. We know that over and over and over again, that whatever is most readily available will likely win out, which we'll talk about how your environment impacts your habits in just a little bit. But essentially what this boils down to in real life that this means, although it may appear that some people have higher levels of willpower than you do, it's probably they've just have just less mental energy expended during the day on large or small decisions. Jen: Right. So that may mean they have less decisions to make, or it may mean that they have habits in place so that they are not making those decisions, right? So you know, if you've listened to our podcast for a long time, you'll know exactly what that means. But if you're new to our podcast, it's sort of how when I open up my phone each time, I don't have to think about what my passcode is to get in, right? But when you go to change your password, you put in your old code, you're like, and then you have put it in again, and then you put it in again. And then all of a sudden you're like, "Oh yeah, I changed my passcode." So that's just an example of where energy is expended in one little way, right? Until that new habit is formed and then it takes no energy for you to do that. Or I was on another podcast, a couple months ago and a farm podcast actually. And, I said to the host, I was trying to explain habits and I said, "What happens when somebody moves the silverware drawer?" And the host, the a male host, Rob, his name was, he goes, "10 years later, you're still reaching to get it out of the old drawer." And that's the thing, right? So habits, having habits set up, like packing your gym bag before bed, if that becomes a part of your night routine and then you don't have to think about it in the morning, "Oh, where's my pants? Where's my shoes? Where's?" Do you know what I mean? And so it's looking at it, you know, case by case. You think, well, these aren't big decisions. Like who cares? But it's actually adding up all those things through the course of a day where you're just like, "Ugh, brain done." Annie: Yeah. Like, you know, the term that comes to mind is just this like exasperated. Like "I can't, I just can't. I can't, I can't." I think I've said that to my husband before like, "I can't make a choice right now. I just need you to do this for me. Like I don't even care." And then he picked somewhere to eat and I'm like "But not that place." Self control is similar. In that when scientists analyze people who appear to have great self control, similarly, it's largely because they're better at structuring their lives in a way that does not require heroic willpower and self control. And in short, they spend time, less time in tempting situations. And that was pulled from also one of our mentors, James Clear, his new book, Atomic Habits, which if you haven't checked out that book or his blog posts they're great. He's hopefully similar to us really applies information to your lives really easily. Jen: Yeah. But ps, he may not know he's a mentor of ours. We may just be like silent mentees Annie: It's not like we're buddies. Jen: Annie, you took his course a couple of years ago. Annie: Yeah, I did. Jen: Yeah. Anyways- Annie: Maybe admirers. Jen: Admirers of his work. Stalkers? Annie: Creepers. Jen: We're not quite at that level. But and we also talked about this in our podcast with doctor Tracey Mann. She's actually done a lot of research on willpower and she talked about it in that podcast and what she had said is nobody has good willpower. You think, you know, nobody does, in different survey she's done when she asks people to rate their own willpower. Everybody scores themselves low on willpower. So nobody thinks they have good willpower. And this is just an excerpt from her book Secrets From The Eating Lab, which is another book we recommend all the time. "Humans were simply not meant to willfully resist food. We evolved through famines, hunting and gathering, eating whatever we could get when we could get it. We evolve to keep fat on our bones by eating food we see, not by resisting it? So is that a good segway into- Annie: Well, I think the takeaway is there, like you can take some of the pressure off yourself for not having like iron man or whatever, like discipline and willpower like, the truth is no one is like that. That's what we're trying to say is that people that you think have really good willpower have most likely, again, created their lives, created routine, created habits that make other options less tempting. They've made the choices that they want to make the most readily available, the easiest to choose, and the most obvious choice in their lives. Jen: Right? So instead of putting all this energy into kind of shaming yourself and getting down on yourself for not having perfect willpower and motivation, put your energy into what we know matters, which is curating your environment and setting yourself up for success, which I do almost every night with my nighttime routine, I kind of start getting things ready for the next day. Annie: Yeah. And motivation is also something that kind of goes, seems to go hand in hand with willpower. And we've kind of been using these terms thus far interchangeably, but motivation is actually our willingness to do things. And the thing about motivation is at times it can feel abundant. Like you have all the motivation and like, "Yes, we're going to do all the things." And then at other times it's like "I'm just so unmotivated, I can't, I can't do anything at all." Jen: Right. Annie: You've felt like that- Jen: Totally. Annie: You've felt that burst of motivation and I think the myth is, again, it goes back to that people that are achieving their goals or they're going to the gym five, six days a week and they're meal planning and their meal prepping and they're eating the foods that the meal plan and plan and they seem so disciplined also have unlimited sources of motivation. And that is not the case either. No one, no one is riding this motivation high all the time, every day. Jen: Even people who, say, prep meals in advance, I prep some or portion of food I'm usually on the weekends and that sets us up for success during the week, but by no means am I cooking and preparing all of my food. You sometimes see on Instagram, you know, like, people who, like, have all these dishes and they line them up and they post meal prep Sunday Hashtag motivation. Annie: It makes for a great photo. Jen: Yes. And they have all their breakfast, all their lunches, all their snacks, all their suppers lined up for the week. Which, honestly, all the power to you. Some weeks I probably could use that. I just don't have time on the weekends to do in depth preps like that. But I do perhaps some and I do meal plan so I know what's coming. That's when meal planning can be great because it takes away the mental energy of deciding what you're going to eat. But what I will say is even the stuff I do prep, I'm not, I don't always feel motivated to eat it. I'm not like, "Oh, can't wait!" I'm like- Annie: Yes! Amen! Jen: And I think even the people who prep all those meals in advance, they might seem really motivated on Sunday cause they've got all these prep meals, but I bet you by Thursday they're eating the same lunch that they had all week and they're just like not thrilled. Or drowning in BBQ sauce. Annie: I can't tell you how many times I have and this is something I would have done back in my deep dieting years is, you know, this on again off again thing, I would like clean out the kitchen. I'd have this like motivation usually triggered, I mean, let's just revisit the diet cycle here. Triggered by shame. I'd see a photo of myself and like, "Ugh, got to lose 10 pounds!" Clean up the kitchen. I'd run to the grocery store, buy all this produce and lean meats and veggies and fruits and like I'm going to do this so well this week. And then, like, come Thursday I'm like, "Ugh!" Because you get this burst of motivation and then to, like, continue to the follow through is, like, that's much harder and when you rely on motivation to do the things that's bound to happen. That's exactly what we would expect from a human because again, no one is riding this high of motivation, seven days a week, 24, seven hours, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It's unreliable and it's fleeting. It comes and it goes, it ebbs and flows. It rises throughout the month, throughout the day. And, like, I notice it, my motivation rises and falls throughout the day and even in particular to do certain things. If I wanted to have motivation to go work out I know that it needs to be mid to late morning. If I wait until 6:00 PM to work out, it's probably not going to happen. Maybe some days, but probably not. Vice versa, if I try to work late at night, I can't work late at night. It needs to be like three, four o'clock seems to be like a really productive hour for me. So if I have something important to do, like, you know, kind of stack your day to where the motivation fits that task. Jen: Which can work. For me, the only realistic time I have to work out is super early in the morning. So I get up at 5:30 and I work out from six till seven three days a week. And I am never, ever, ever hopping out of bed excited, like "I can't freaking wait." It's just become a habit and which can lead us into a discussion about values and goals. But ultimately for me,I made a commitment to do this to my future self. So when I get up in the morning, I just don't let myself question it. Obviously if I've had a rough sleep or a sick kid, I will not get up at that hour. You know, I have grace with myself and I'm realistic. But yeah, I'm never motivated to do it. It's just simply become a habit for me. And something that's very important to me. Annie: I think that's a common mistake people make is they're sitting around waiting for motivation to strike them like lightning from the sky and as a result they're at the mercy of motivation. So they can't take action until they're motivated. That's like this belief that they have in their head. But you can also flip it and action leads to motivation, which research has proven as well. And I think just anecdotally, you would probably say the same thing. I would say the same thing. Like you get that first set in, you get your workout clothes on, you get into the gym and you start the workout and it's like, "Okay, I can do this now." And then you'll do it, and then it snowballs and it's like, and then you retrain your habit loop in your brain, like, I get up, I do the thing. The reward is I feel good. I may be more productive during the day, in the long term I'm improving my health, I'm increasing my strength, I'm learning new skills and then that's how habits are formed. Jen: Yeah, absolutely. Annie: Without relying on motivation. Jen: Right. Yeah. Annie: Boom. Jen: And that's why a lot of people give up on workout routines, right? Like how many people start something new and within three weeks they're done because they just, they lose, they're super motivated at the beginning, everybody is, when I started this new lifting program, well, its Arms Like Annie, it's your program, Annie,, I was very motivated but that really it doesn't last. And then you, then it's boring because then you're just putting in reps. But that's actually where the magic starts happening, I think, is actually those boring stages when you don't want to, that's when you're starting to, you're not relying on motivation anymore and you are truly training in that habit cycle and you might feel yourself resisting and trying to go back to old habits. Right? When my old habit is to sleep till seven, not get up at 5:30. But that's truly when the magic starts happening. That's truly around even where the tipping point starts happening, right, into forming a habit. And so that's why it's important to push through but not push through in the way that push through and find more motivation. It's like just push through like you're there, like this is, this is where it's going to happen. Annie: So that's, inside Balance365, that's something we call the Habit Hangover often. Like, we see that it's pretty common. Like, because people- Jen: This isn't fun anymore. Annie: Yeah. When they're motivated and they're like, "Okay, now this is just hard work and I'm not near as excited as I was when I started three weeks ago. And the newness, the shininess has worn off. Jen: Yes, new and shiny is gone. Yes. Annie: And again, that's another vote that we've said it before on the podcast. We say it all the time in our community. That's why we start habits small because when that motivation falters and it will then you're not relying, you don't need like this Richard Simmons level of willpower and motivation to do the thing that you're supposed to be doing if you start a little bit smaller versus like doing all the things at once. Jen: Yeah. So actually because I had struggled with, we moved a couple of years ago, a year and a half ago, I guess, and since we moved, I really struggled with my workout habit. So it was kind of last fall sometime where I just epiphany, "Look, this isn't working. I'm not being consistent because I haven't been able to find a time in my day that this really works for me. It definitely does not work at night for me." And that's something I just kept trying to do, trying to do, trying to do and then finally I was like, "Look, you're not going to work out at night." And so that's when I started getting up in the mornings and I actually kind of had the epiphany that's really what time works best for me and I had to start going to bed earlier and I started with twice a week actually. I was doing Mondays and Wednesdays only and that felt very realistic for me. And when things did get hard, I would say, "You know what? It's just two mornings a week. Like you, you can do this. It is just two mornings a week." And then when I felt ready, which is about two months after I started, I added in Friday mornings and now that's going really good. And we're going to add in a cardio, just a cardio session. And yeah. So, and that's just, that's really how habits form, right? Like that's so boring. But you scale up as you solidify new skills and habits, then you can add in something else and something else. And then all of a sudden you're living it and you're going, "Oh, this is happening and I'm doing the thing." Annie: I'm doing the thing. Jen: Yeah. Annie: Or the things. So to recap thus far, willpower and motivation is not what keeps most "successful people" going. It's their habits. And the next kind of layer I want to add on to that, which we've already touched on, is that your habits are highly influenced by your environment. And I want to share this study, I think we've shared it before, but really quickly, this is again, something inspired from James Clear shared before, but they did this study of soda and water consumption in hospital. And what they did was they let people choose their soda and their water consumption for two weeks, three weeks, whatever. They collected the data on the sales of each. After three weeks they added, they didn't change anything about the soda. They added water to different locations, more convenient locations throughout the hospital cafeteria. So again, all they changed was made water more available. And as a result, water sales increased and soda sales decreased. And I think that's just such a simple example of how impactful your environment can be on your habits. They didn't say, they didn't promote or push the water or give any marketing about how soda was "bad or harmful" and water was better. They simply just offered it in more places. And people are like, "Oh, there's water. I'll take a water now." Jen: Totally. So in my house, Oh boy, we talk about this all the time. My veggie tray. Annie: Yes. Yes. Jen: So fruits and vegetables are often things that people struggle to get enough in. And you have to make them convenient and part of your environment. One way I do this is one, I buy bagged salads and I just kind of have no shame around that when my salads are pretty much prepped for me, I'm eating them and enjoy them, but I am just not going to start from scratch every single meal to create a salad. That's a lot of work. And or maybe, maybe it's not a lot, but it's too much for me. And a second is I make a veggie tray every, that's kind of part of my meal prep. On Sundays I make a Veggie tray. I've got like an old one of those old Tupperware ones. I make a Veggie tray and then I'm usually restocking it by Wednesday morning. And I bring that out for most meals, lunch and supper for me, my kids. And I also pull from it when I'm packing lunches for my kids school lunches. And I keep all our fruit, most of our fruit, if it doesn't have to be refrigerated, I have it on the counter in just a little fruit basket and we go through fruit like crazy around here. But I have made fruits and vegetables very, I have put my energy into making those two things very accessible and then I don't have to think about it during the week. It just happens naturally. And that's what we're trying to say here, right? Annie: Yeah. And I think the other aspect to that is visual cues are really, really important. So because when you open up your fridge, you see the Veggie tray and it's, like, there. Jen: It's there. It's right at eye level. It's not tucked, you know, it's not tucked away. It's not in the back. I don't have my vegetables tucked in the drawers and the bottom. It's like right there. Annie: Exactly. I even remember you talking about, which you've seen my Instagram videos, you know, my kitchen also houses my dumbbells and kettlebells. But, but you did the same thing too, you were like, look, I'm not getting in a lot of movement and I want to, and it would be simple to incorporate some kettlebell swings, but in order for me to actually do that, I need the kettle bell in my kitchen. So every time you walked by it, so you ended up doing, you know what, 10 swings a handful of times throughout the day. Jen: Yeah. So yeah, so I have a big round Moved Nat yoga mat off my kitchen island. There's kind of just a space off my kitchen that's just blank space. I know not everybody will be able to find a space, but there's other ways to do it. But anyway, sorry, I have this huge round Yoga Mat. The boys use it to sit and play cars on or they sit on it and read. But I also use it, like, it's just there. So if I feel like doing some movement, whether it's getting on the ground and doing some glute bridges or pushups or whatever, my mat is right there and I don't have to go on my gross floors. But, and then I also have just, you know, I have my garage gym,, but I have one kettlebell that I keep up in the kitchen and it's kind of on the lighter end, but I can do, you know, I can do lots of things with it in my kitchen and I, yeah, I see it and I'll do it right. Which I know it sounds silly, but if I'm waiting for water to boil on the stove, I'll go over and do a couple of kettlebell swings or a couple of pushups or, yeah. And I mean that just works well for me. I'm not saying it'll work for everybody, but it just works well for me. And other people might find benefit in having a yoga mat in their living room and some weights, you know, beside the TV. And so when they're watching TV, they might just feel like, yeah, I could get down on the floor, do some bridges, some presses, some, you know, some yoga stretches, anything, right? Because if it's, but it's just about looking at your environment and say, how does my environment support more of what I want in it? And then on the flip side of that, which we talked about with Traci Mann, is how can I put small barriers in place between me and things that I want less of in my life. So for me, I keep, like all our nuts and seeds and chocolates, like really high calorie, high energy foods. I keep a lot of those above my fridge in the cupboard and then I don't, I can't see them. There's no visual cue to eat them. I'm having them when I want them, right. When I think of them and want them and reach for them. Annie: Right. And then you know that if I want them it's because I actually want them, not just because I see them and then I want them, which is like marketing 101. We think that we're in control. We think we're like making the choice. But a lot of times it's like the power of suggestion. Like I've said it before, my kids don't want the Goldfish at Target until they see the Goldfish at Target, at the end cap. Jen: It's why grocery stores put all that stuff right at the checkout. Right? All the trashy magazines, all the indulgent foods, like the chocolate bars, they put it there because they know you're going to be standing there awhile, waiting at the checkout and you're just more likely to grab it the longer you're standing there. Annie: Right. And the other thing about habits too is that, habits and your environment is that we often have a set of habits per the location we're in. So if you think about the habits you have in your bedroom, the habits you have in your kitchen, the habits you have in your, in the gym, the habits you have in a grocery store, you probably grocery shop the same path every time. You have your routine, right? You like grab your produce, you move to meats or whatever it is. Same thing with the gym. You walk to the same space every time, you put your bag down, you go use the same equipment, you probably have a favorite treadmill or a favorite squat rack or whatever. The thing is important to know is that it can be easier to change habits in a new environment. So if possible, like I'm not saying go out and buy a new house, but could you rearrange your furniture so maybe, or take a TV out of your bedroom or rearrange your furniture so it's not facing the TV and it's more conducive to reading or whatever habit you're trying to change. Or put a kettle bell in your kitchen or go to a different grocery store. Like would your shopping- Jen: Rearrange up cupboards or, yeah. Annie: Yeah. You don't have to like completely like burn everything down and start from new. But can you think outside the box of how your environment shapes your habits? Like even, James Clear, and I'm guilty of this, was talking about your environment should have a purpose. So, you know, he was working at his kitchen island. But he also wants to eat in his kitchen. And then it's kind of like, there was no boundary. That's like, now I'm working, now I'm eating, I'm eating and I'm working. So he created a new small environment out of his bedroom for an office or whatever. And like that's his work. When he's working, when he's there, he's working. When he's in his kitchen, he's eating and you know, on and so forth. So- Jen: I just- Annie: Go ahead. Jen: I posted about this in Balance365 a couple of months ago. I totally had that epiphany in the wintertime when it was chilly out, I started working at my kitchen table near the fire instead of my office. And I started snacking more and more and more. And then one day I realized, it's because you're just staring at the kitchen all day. You're just staring at the cupboard, staring at the kitchen and you're just triggered to go grab something to eat. Right. And so I moved back down to my office and that problem is gone. I'm not snacking between breakfast and lunch anymore. Annie: Right. Jen: And it's crazy, right? You think, you know, you think this comes to motivation and willpower again, but you just can't believe how much your environment influences your choices. Right. And again, my goal is not perfection. My goal is balance. So I'm not like saying take all the treats out of your cupboards and all of that. I feel like I have an appropriate amount of treats in my house stored in a space that aligns with the goal I have of balance, right. Annie: Right, right. Yeah. And I think that it's, you know what all of this really boils down to for me and I'm assuming for you is that self control and willpower and motivation can work in the short term. They can be a great short term strategy. And I wouldn't want anyone listening to this to think I'm super motivated, but I somehow have to like contain that motivation or pull back from that motivation because I don't want to like misstep or whatever. Like, no, if you're motivated to do something, you can follow that. Like you can explore it. It's not that it's a bad thing, but the point is, is that a better, in our experience, a better long term strategy for reaching goals boils down to habits and environment. Jen: Right. I don't, sometimes I feel super motivated to go for an extra run or walk or I do an extra workout. But another thing I just want to note is you don't want to, when you're feeling motivated, that's not where you want to set your bar, right? Like you don't, you know, some weeks I have my baseline habits, say, like my three workouts a week and that's just kinda my minimum at this point. I miss the odd one. We just took two weeks off, actually, me and my workout partner and that's all good. We're right back to our three times a week. But the odd time when I feel like an extra run or I feel like an extra workout, I don't bring my bar up there. I don't say, okay, now I'm at five times. I just, you know what, I recognize it as a week, even a month sometimes where I had a burst of energy and I utilize that and that felt great, but I don't bring my bar up there. I just recognize. Annie: Yes. It was just a bonus. Jen: I just feel motivated. Yeah. It was just a bonus. Annie: Yeah. That's great. This is good. I hope that this helps clear up a lot of the questions that we get about willpower and also helps reduce some of the shame and guilt that people might be experiencing if they don't feel those emotions or if they don't feel like they have those traits or those characteristics innately, and then, because I think I, you know, just on a personal note, I think people think that I am motivated, for example, to go to the gym three, four times a week or five times a week. I'm not. Like Jen said, like, there's days where I'm like, "Eh, I don't know." Like I'll text my girlfriend, it's like, "I need you to talk me into this." Jen: Right. Annie: Or "This is workout really doesn't look fun. I don't think I can do this," but it falls back to habits. I dropped my kids off at school, I'd go to the gym and if I can just get my kids in the car, I know that that trigger loop or that habit loop has started with my trigger of getting kids to school. And I know the rest will just fall in naturally thanks to habits. Jen: Yes. And I do think it is really key too, I don't think a lot of people do this and I think it's such a great thing to do is to stop, pause, especially if you've gone through any life transition, like had a baby, changed jobs, moved and think about where you can decrease the decisions you're making in the day. So my nighttime routine consists of, you know, washing my face, brushing my teeth, getting my workout clothes out, putting them right beside the bathroom sink so that when I get up in the morning, the first thing I do is get dressed. I get my coffee pot out, the coffee out. So you know, so just in the mornings, I just, I don't have to think. I just get up and do, and then I head down to the gym. Annie: That's great. Awesome. If you want to continue the conversation on willpower and motivation, come to our free private Facebook group with our Healthy Habits Happy Moms on Facebook. Jen, Lauren and I are in there frequently along with some really, really rad community members that have been around for a while and have great contributions, so we hope to see in there. Jen: Yes. Annie: Alright, thanks, Jen. Jen: Bye, Annie. Annie: Bye. Bye. This episode is brought to you by the Balance365 program. If you're ready to say goodbye to quick fixes and false promises and yes to building healthy habits and a life you're 100% in love with, then checkout Balance365.co to learn more.  

Lets Talk about skin cancer... On this week's episode of the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry we have Dr. Candrice Heath. Dr. Heath is a board-certified dermatologist and actually comes tripled boarded in Pediatrics, Dermatology and Pediatric Dermatology. She is a nationally recognized best selling author, and speaker and this week she lends her expertise to the Lunch and Learn Community for National Skin Cancer Awareness Month. Dr. Candrice gives us the ABCDs of skin cancer, teaches us what to expect when we go see the dermatologist and helps me try to break down some of the misconceptions associated with skin cancer and people of color. Dr. Candrice also lets us in on some exciting upcoming news about her company My Sister’s Beauty. Remember to subscribe to the podcast and share the episode with a friend or family member. Listen on Apple Podcast, Google Play, Stitcher, Soundcloud, iHeartRadio, Spotify Sponsors: Lunch and Learn Community Online Store (code Empower10) Pierre Medical Consulting (If you are looking to expand your social reach and make your process automated then Pierre Medical Consulting is for you) Dr. Pierre's Resources - These are some of the tools I use to become successful using social media Links/Resources: Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/drcandriceheath/ Instagram – https://www.instagram/drcandriceheath Dr. Candrice’s Clinical Pearls - www.drcandriceheath/clinicalpearls Skin Care Line – www.mysistersbeauty.com Social Links: Join the lunch and learn community - https://www.drpierresblog.com/joinlunchlearnpod Follow the podcast on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/lunchlearnpod Follow the podcast on twitter - http://www.twitter.com/lunchlearnpod - use the hashtag #LunchLearnPod if you have any questions, comments or requests for the podcast For More Episodes of the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry Podcasts https://www.drpierresblog.com/lunchlearnpodcast/ If you are looking to help the show out Leave a Five Star Review on Apple Podcast because your ratings and reviews are what is going to make this show so much better Share a screenshot of the podcast episode on all of your favorite social media outlets & tag me or add the hashtag.#lunchlearnpod Introduction Dr. Berry: And welcome to another episode of the Lunch and Learn with Dr. Berry. I’m your host, Dr. Berry Pierre, your favorite Board Certified Internist. Founder of drberrypierre.com and as well as Pierre Medical Consulting. Helping you empower yourself for better health with the number one podcast for patient advocacy. This week we bring you an episode with Dr. Candrice Heath, who is an amazing person and most importantly is going to be talking to us about skin cancer. And you know, just to kind of caveat before we get into her bio and how amazing this person is. For those who may be listening, especially Lunch and Learn community. I've kind of referenced this before on a previous episode where we talked about skin cancer. I felt like this time I wanted to bring an expert and kind of get their expert opinion on to disorder, right? And if you want to know why this topic is so important, we're actually in skin cancer awareness month and when we talk about the number of cases of skin cancer that occur per year, it outnumbers the number of cases of lung cancer, breast cancer, prostate cancer, colon cancer combined, right? So it's an extremely important topic that I think a lot of times doesn't really get the fan fair especially because a lot of times when we think about dermatology tend to think about the aesthetic aspect of dermatology. But we really don't think about the fact that they are really in high demand when it comes to pathology and disease process and education, which is why I felt, you know what, let me bring this amazing guest here. And again. I just want to kind of read her bio just so you guys can understand, how important and how specialized this person is, Dr. Heath. She is a highly respected dermatologist. She's board-certified in Dermatology, Pediatrics and Pediatric Dermatology. And ladies and gentlemen, I mean she is triple certified in her specialty, right? Just so you can guys can get an idea of how amazing, especially she is. She got her undergrad degree at Wake Forest University. Her medical degree at the University of Virginia and her pediatric training at Emory. And then she ended up getting her dermatology training at Mount Sinai Beth Israel in New York City. She was elected to achieve dermatology resident during her final year of training and she went on to serve a role at John Hopkins University, Department of Dermatology. And as well as a pediatric dermatology fellow as well as a dermatology instructor. If you didn't get that right, just understand that this is definitely a very highly specialized person that we're bringing onto the podcast, really to educate the Lunch and Learn community. And most importantly, and this is what I love. She’s the founder of My Sister's Beauty, the official skincare line of the woman of color and founder of a vibrant online community associated with skincare and beauty tips for women of color. So amazing person, Dr. Candrice Heath. Again, she is a personal friend of mine as well. And she has blessed us with the opportunity to talk to us today just about skin cancer. And really, you know, what we should be thinking about when it comes to skin health, right? Because I think when we talk about empowering ourselves for better health, right? We got to understand that the whole body has to be working in unison, right? And I think a lot of times we forget about the skin. Again, I talked about the numbers, more cancer cases worldwide and the majority of these cancers put together. So you know, ladies and gentlemen, get ready an amazing episode. Again, I have Dr. Candrice Heath and we're going to be talking about skin cancer and skin cancer awareness. If you have not had a chance, remember, subscribe to the podcast, leave me a five-star review. And you know, when we leave the links for Dr. Candrice, go ahead and follow her and let her know how she did an amazing job this week. Episode Dr. Berry: All right, Lunch and Learn community. Again, thank you for joining us for another amazing episode. Again, this month being, you know, skin cancer awareness month. I was thinking long and hard and I said, you know, who can I get to really educate you to get us on far, to get us, get those bad thoughts that really shouldn't be in our mindset when we talk about skin cancer but really educated us and you know, kind of go through a lot of the fluff that I know that's out there. So of course if you listened to the bio, you know, we have Dr. Candrice here who is an amazing person in general. This is just an amazing person, an amazing physician. And I was just glad that, you know, she was able to give us some time to talk to us today, Dr. Candrice thank you. Dr. Candrice: Oh, thank you so much for having me today, Dr. Berry. Dr. Berry: We did a little bit of your bio in the introduction, but you know, for people who may not know you and you know, this is their kind of first entry into your world. Who is our Dr. Candrice? How are you going to get us together today? Especially when we talk about this discussion of skin cancer that even when I was doing like, you know, the little research that I did on skin cancer, I didn't realize how serious it was. Still the people a little bit about you that, you know, they may not have gotten from your bio, but you know, they will get, just have to listen to this episode today. Dr. Candrice: So I guess, I mean there are lots of things out there about Dr. Candrice, but what people really want to know or need to know is that I truly love being a dermatologist. I've learned on my journey that not a lot of people can say that they're passionate about what they do. They love it. But I truly love being a dermatologist and I enjoy all aspects of that from the education to what happens in the exam room, with the patients. And I realize that not only am I providing a diagnosis, treatment education but that I am actually impacting how someone feels about themselves. And that is a huge win for me. Dr. Berry: I love it. I love that. And of course, especially for Lunch and Learn community who may not realize, like when we talk about medical specialties, dermatology is one of those upper echelon specialties that if you're able to get through the rigors of medical school and conquer and do what you need to do, right? Like you can attain it, right? So again, this isn't a specialty that people just kind of walk into. Like they really have to put some work in. And again, I know Dr. Candrice as a person. I know her, I noticed she's an amazing person. I do want to really illuminate the fact that we got really a special person to talk to us today about skin cancer, right? Which again is, first of all from the numbers. Just from a sheer numbers standpoint, it was common cancer in the world, right? Boom. Like if that alone doesn't get your ears up and ready to educate yourself on this topic, I'm not sure what is. But Dr. Candice again, I’m an internist. I'm a hospital physician and you know, they've kind of heard the back story of how I got into there. What made you fall in love with dermatology? Like what was the path that kind of led you here to be able to grace us today? Dr. Candrice: Growing up, my older sister has something called nevus of Ota and it's actually a green birthmark that covers one side of her face. And so not only did we spend time going to our regular checkups with our pediatrician. We also would yearly visit our dermatologist in our local town. And I can still recall how excited and with anticipation. We would anticipate these visits because we would hope that they would have something to share that could take this birthmark away. And year after year, appointment after appointment, we were met with disappointment because there were, the technology hadn't really caught up so people with skin of color were not able to use the laser devices that were coming out to take away things on the skin such as my sister's birthmark without leaving significant scarring. But despite the answer being, "no, not yet," there's no solution yet, the dermatologist would take time to address my sister's self-esteem. And those few minutes actually really made the difference to me. And I said, wow, you know, dermatology, that is true, this is a different kind of doctor’s experience. So I could definitely experience what it was like to have a family member that had an ailment on the skin that everyone can see. So it's not like diabetes or having a heart problem where people may not be able to tell from your exterior that you're having issues inside of your body. But to be able to walk around with something that the general public can see. Man, that is an experience. Okay. So I took those observations and thoughts and also that experience that we had in the exam room. And then that's when I became interested in this whole dermatology, this skin disease. So if you can imagine, you know, 10-year old walking around and saying, hey, I want to be a dermatologist. That was me. I did not know about the uphill battle that we're following at it, know about how challenging it would become. And yes, I did set that goal based on my personal experience and I persevered to cross the finish line, but it wasn't easy. So people have to continue to follow me as I share more about that story. The great news is that yes, I am a dermatologist today and I'm so grateful for that so that I can live in my passion. But it was definitely a journey of perseverance to get here. Dr. Berry: I think that's telling because I think a lot of times when I think the common person, kinda hears about dermatology. I think they get kind of skewed, right? Because, they kind of think of more of the aesthetic, the Botox, that type of feel not realizing like no, there’s a lot more things that you know, it's scary. Right? You know, it can be disheartening especially from a self-esteem standpoint. So the pathology alone, right? Like and when we were talking about mythology, we talk about like disease courses, right? The amount of diseases that either originates from the, that show up on the skin is so vast. Again, I'm always impressed that you know, by my dermatologist because I know how much work, when did they put to get there as well as how much work they got to do while they there. Right? Like it's not a nine to five, you just chilling your junior year injecting people and then you're kind of keeping them, you know, a beautiful and healthy whole day. Right? There's a lot of clinical diagnostic procedures and treatment and discussions that go on a day to day basis. Right. Which is why I'm definitely such a fan of the field in general. Not so much offended. I wanted to be a dermatologist but enough that I can appreciate it from the outside. Dr. Candrice: And I definitely, thank you so much for highlighting that I think our other physician colleagues understand the scope of what we do. Yes. I do have colleagues who only do aesthetics, the only botox and fillers and things like that, but there is a large breadth of things that we do under the dermatology umbrella and I'm happy that our physician colleagues are excited that we can actually help them with their patients. Now the general public may just see us as, you know, a skin doctor or pimple popper or something like that, but in actuality, on a day to day basis, I am taking care of people who have severe disease and like brought up Dr. Berry as a dermatologist. It's amazing. I can go into the exam room, I can look at someone's skin and I can say, hmm, I wonder if this patient has diabetes. I wonder if this patient has thyroid disease. I know this patient has an autoimmune disease. And so it's amazing because, you know, the medical students are thinking, how would you know all of this stuff? My mind is trained to look at the skin, look at the hair, look at the nails, and come up with conclusions based on the patterns of recognition that I've seen over the years. So it is amazing. And yes, we do more than just acne and dry skin. We do lots of things and we take care of patients who have a serious disease. Dr. Berry: That was interesting. I know, and I know we're definitely gonna talk about it, you know, a little bit late on this show is the fact that you were introduced to the field very early. Cause I'm being honest, right? Like I've never been to a dermatologist, right? Like I'm 35 years old. No, don't hate me. Don't hit me. Right? I know, I know. I'm bad. I know. Trust me. You know, doctors make the worst patients, right? But I've always felt like, well, what am I going to do it here? This my skin looks okay. Right? So, I'm actually very happy that, you know, you guys were very introduced very early because I think a lot of times we hear, well, you know, let's say, skin color, you know, your dark skin, it is really nothing after you to do, there isn't nothing that he can tell you. I read the books, right? A lot of times when I'm reading books and I'm trying to get the description and I'm like, well what does this look like on a black person? Right? What does it look like on me? I don't know what this rash would look like on myself. Right? So I always kind of struggle with that. And again, we're definitely gonna talk about that later on. But I'm definitely kind of happy that, you know, you got introduced very early. Dr. Candrice: Yes, it is. It definitely has been a passion for a long time and yes, we do need more educational resources that highlight people with skin of color who had these specific things that we're trying to educate our colleagues about and the general public about. Dr. Berry: So with, with me, right, obviously we're recording this right? This is a skin cancer awareness month. I'll kind of all wrapped into one when we talk about skin cancer awareness. Like why for one. Right. Because this is the question I always get when we have these like health-related month. I like why does it stay made a whole month? Right? So like that I, I post you, right? Like why does skin cancer really need a whole month for us to be aware of? And what kind of says, you know what, I need to take this mantle and make sure I'm educating everyone about like skin cancer. Not to say that all your packages are nothing but skin cancer. I, but why is this like particular subjects such an important, I think for everyone to kind of know about it. Dr. Candrice: Skin cancer awareness month is a very important topic and yes, it should span the entire month of May and as a dermatologist, every day is skin cancer. Well you know, I could be a little biased. I mean, the thing is we all have skin and so sometimes we have been ingrained with these things that say, Oh, if you have brown skin, you don't have to worry about, you know, getting skin cancer. You don't have to worry about these things. So you just kind of tune it out. But I hope that every year when the month of May rolls around that people, regardless of their skin tone, learn something new about something that can potentially affect them, which is skin cancer. So it's all about educating, educating, educating. And if we only get 30 days out of the month to do that, or 31 days out of the month and do that, I say, let's go forward. We all have skin and we can all be infected regardless of skin tone. Dr. Berry: When we talk about just like the sheer numbers, right? I kind of alluded to it being the most common type of cancer in general, which is funny, right? Because me being an internist, I hear a lot about long, right? I hear a lot about the prostate, right? I hear a lot about breasts, I hear a lot about those things, but then when I'm looking at the numbers and they're like, whoa, those skin cancers, like I was pulling it out of water. Like I think that was more shocking to me. Obviously, you're in the field so we're probably not gonna be a shocking you. But like I thought that kinda hit me. I was like, oh I have this many people like dealt with like skin cancer. What are some of like the numbers, the stats, you know, Lunch and Learn community loves numbers from a statistic standpoint. Like, like how many people like are dealing with cancer and especially on a worldwide basis. The United States, you know, black folks, some women. Like what are some of the numbers that you kind of run across? Dr. Candrice: So I'm really, the numbers are usually broken down into the number of cases of melanoma that are diagnosed every year, which is a specific type of skin cancer than the most deadly type of skin cancer. There is the other group which is non-melanoma skin cancers. And often non-melanoma skin cancers, you're going to probably get about 5.4 million cases that had been treated in an average year. So that is a lot of cases of cancer. And then if you dive deeper into the statistics, you will find that one in five Americans by the time that their age 70 they're going to develop skin cancer that's taking all comers, all ages, all races of people putting them in the pot and you're coming up with the one in five Americans. So yes, it is definitely way more common than you think. And even when we really dissect out to the most deadly type of skin cancer, which is melanoma, it is predicted that there will be an increase in the year 2019 unfortunately by almost 7.7% so this is something that is not going away and it is definitely increasing. So we have to be on the lookout for it. The prediction of the number of cases for 2019 is over 190,000 cases are predicted to be diagnosed this year. So we definitely enough to be on the lookout for this. Dr. Berry: And what's interesting especially, and I am not sure if it's because it doesn't get the fanfare right? Like again I know we talked about breasts, we were talking about lung and just for Lunch and Learn community just from a number of sake, you know she was talking in the millions, right? When we talk about cases I'm like lung cancer, breast cancer, those are like in the 150 to 200 thousand. Just to give you an idea from a sheer numbers standpoint. How much more common it is right to have skin cancer than it is the other cancers, right? Not to say that no one is better than the other, but just when we talk about media and we talk about the influence of it, but then we had Dr. Amber Robins talked about the influence of media on our health care. This is one of the things that we see, right? Like we, we see like this is an issue that probably should get like more than a month if this many people, right. Ideally, with a skin cancer wet, you know, we got a month so we're gonna focus on and kind of do it here. And you talked about the different types of skin cancer, right? Like especially in your training when you're dealing with the melanoma and again, melanoma, we, you know, I know as an internist, you know, that's a bad word for us, right? We were as the one that's kind of scary for us as one, we tend to see exhibit an in a lot of different functions and especially when we're talking about when it starts spreading everywhere. When you're talking about melanoma versus the non-melanomas type skin cancers, right. And you just kind of start breaking those down. What is it that people should be doing? Right? Like again, what should I do? Should I start like scan to my skin now? Because now I'm getting kind of scared, right? All these people are against cancer, I'm getting kind of scared. I need to be worried about it. Dr. Candrice: Well definitely really the first step is to educate yourself. So you landed in the right spot. So we talked about melanoma being the most aggressive, a type of skin cancer. And then there are also those types which include Basal Cell Carcinoma, Squamous Cell Carcinoma, and even a rare to very rare type that we don't talk about that often called Merkel Cell Carcinoma. So there are various types. And the best thing that you can do is to definitely see a dermatologist once a year to get a head-to-toe, a skin check. But then right in your home you can actually go ahead, advocate for yourself, taking a mirror and looking at your own skin. The first step is to really get to know what is living on your skin already. You know, time and time again, I may ask a patient, how long has this been there? And they, so I don't know. I haven't seen my back in two years. That’s unacceptable. I want you to get to know what is on your skin regularly. That way you can be a better, this hectic just in case something changes or comes up, you can say hey you can go to your primary care doctor and say look I need a referral to a dermatologist because this is changing. This was not there before I'm concerned. Dr. Berry: Okay, get in tune with what your skin is so you know what their baseline is and you do recommend just like once a year? Like I said clearly I'm overdue. Right? So you're just saying just like you're doing your regular annual checkup, you should be seeing your skin screening as well? Dr. Candrice: Yes, I do recommend that people get skin checks and definitely you know if you had lesions on the skin, moles, etc. They should be checked. And people with skin of color, of course, we have to be very very careful because skin cancer can happen on areas of the body that you may not expect. So for people with skin of color that means anyone with non-Caucasian skin, non-white skin, the risk of your skin cancers are going to be higher. When we were talking about melanoma on the soles of the feet, the palms of the hand inside of the mouth. So those are areas that people may not even think about that can be effect by skin cancer. And yet that's where we find the most deadly type of skin cancer in people of color. Dr. Berry: Are we've already dealing with more aggressive types of skin cancer or is it our lack of, you know, just being aware and following up on the skin cancer? Like what would you, if you had to lean one way or the other? Dr. Candrice: The number one thing for skin cancer and people with skin of color is late detection and delayed diagnosis. The patient doesn't believe that they can ever have skin cancer, so that may delay treatment. Also, there are some primary care physicians who are uncomfortable with things on the skin and that stems from just, you know, how physicians are taught and what they're exposed to. So they may not actually get a lot of teaching in dermatology during their training. So it's an area that they may not feel as comfortable with. So it may not be on their radar to even look at the hands and feet of someone with the skin of color and to refer that patient. So basically, usually by the time that patient with the skin of color lands in my office, regardless of the cancer type, it is usually at a higher stage. So it is going to be the worst case scenario I'm walking in. So versus someone else who may have been trained from a child to say, you know, we can get skin cancers, you have to protect your skin from the sun, you have to do this, you have to do that. So they're more aware that things can go wrong on the skin. But if you have no clue that 'that' could happen, you have definitely, there's a long time lapse between when that appeared on the skin when you can actually get your diagnosis. And that definitely affects your prognosis. Dr. Berry: Wow. Okay. All right. Dr. Candrice, she's getting us together. So yeah, I'll know until right now, next week, I am scheduling my dermatology exam because it is clearly serious. And again, this is if, if you, if you had one month to choose to like do your routine skin screening exams, why not let it be in the month of May when you know, skin cancers around us. The spotlight is on from a media standpoint is on it. So this is definitely the month you should be thinking about, you know, calling your primary care doctor like right now. And if you're in Florida, fortunately in Florida, you don't even have to get a referral. You can go straight to your dermatologist. Thank you for Congressman Wasserman for that standpoint there. That's great. So I taught, I hear about skin cancer, I read Baskin cancer a lot. And I always see this is the A, B, C, D, E of the skin cancer. Right? What is that? And you know, how could my Lunch and Learn community, you know, derive and be educated and you know, get on the ball with, in the car and in regards to at ABCD’s of skin cancer. Dr. Candrice: The ABCD’s are really A, B, C, D, E. Now we've actually added E to that as well. (Okay.) It is a reminder for you when you're looking at your skin, what are some of the things that I should look for as warning signs or things that are going wrong on the skin? So let's say you have a mole on the skin and if you were to look at, if you were to imagine splitting the mole in half with, you're just with your eyes a little line. If one side does not look exactly like the other side, we say that that is asymmetrical and that is a warning sign. That lesion should be checked. So A stands for asymmetrical. One side doesn't look like the other, that could be significant. The B stands for border. So if it has a round, nice, crisp border, then we're not going to worry as much. But at the borders brace squiggly and not a very crisp, that could be a problem. Also, the C stands for color. So if your mole all of a sudden goes from being brown to having brown, gray, pink, white, basically changing in color, that could be a problem. So that's something that could trigger you to get that checked out. D stands for diameter. So typically, melanomas are in other things that are going to be problematic are the greater than this, the head of an eraser. Now I've definitely diagnosed things that were smaller than that. But anyway, it's part of the warning signs. So that may be something else that can prompt people to come in. And then the last E has been added in the last several years and that stands for evolving. So basically what that means is even if you don't remember the A, the B, the C, the D with those things stand for if you have a mole that is evolving or changing in any way that may be one that we need to look at more promptly. Dr. Berry: Okay. All right. They added E. I've been out of school for a few years. So when it was my time and they just stopped that d and maybe even add something new. Again, this is why, Lunch and Learn community I tell you all the time I get just as educated from my guest as you guys also. Like I said, I'm getting myself together, get myself mentally prepared, to see this dermatologist, right? So when I do not, again, just like when I go to see this dermatologist, like what happens? Right? I know what happens when I go and get my wellness check and I talked to my doctor about the flu. But what happens when I go to see different charges? I've never been to. So what happens when I go to the dermatologist for the first time? Dr. Candrice: Well, you have to expect to show your skin. I was not born with x-ray vision. So we have to get you out of those clothes and into a gown. Now they usually will ask you, you can leave your undergarments on if you like to make you feel more comfortable and then you will be placed in a gown. And during that visit with my patients, what I do in a very systematic way is that I look over the entire surface of the skin from head to toe looking for anything that stands out. That could be something that is an abnormal and abnormal lesion on the skin. So I definitely will take a look at every area in the extremities, the back, the chest, the scalp, the face, all of that looking to take a look to see if there's anything that looks unusual that needs to be biopsied. So yes, number one is to do expect to actually get out of your clothing, including your shoes and socks and get into a gown. And I think some people… Dr. Berry: Is that something you run into, like people in that really unexpected that part? Dr. Candrice: Yes. Roll up the sleeve, will pull up the pant leg and I said, look, I'm a dermatologist. I need to see the complete picture. You know, that part is very helpful because everybody's moles may not be textbook the same as someone else's. So I need to know your body is making molds and that can actually help me to determine. Is that something that needs a biopsy? Is this just how your body's making them? I need to get a sense of all of that. So I need to see your entire body surface area. Dr. Berry: Okay. I like that. And anything, out there, tips and tricks, get our patients to have it? To get them a full dermatology evaluation? Dr. Candrice: Sure. You know, don't ever be afraid to ask or you know about things that you may be concerned about. Sometimes dermatologist, you know, we lay over the completely benign things, but I often use that as a teaching moment. So I do give those things names and I educate the patient about what those lesions are. But it is important that you get your questions answered as well about specific things that you're concerned about. I think, you know, one of my, some of my favorite instances as a dermatologist is to walk in and you know, there's a someone there for an exam and I start to examine their skin. I see like five circles on their skin with a marker and I'm thinking, hmm. Basically, every time I inquired, basically it's usually a wife that has circles, these lesions because she wants to know exactly what those are and what's the, make sure that those species are okay. So even if you don't have a wife, this makes circles on your skin and there are a few things that you are concerned about. It’s okay to make a list of those things so that we can make sure that we address those specifically so that you leave feeling empowered about your skin. Dr. Berry: I love it. We love empowering here. Because especially when they come to see, you know, the general family practitioner or internist and they're asking a lot of questions. Like I do wonder like what type of leeway do they have when they go in to see their dermatologist? Right? Because again, obviously, you're the expert, right? And you know, if something's like, oh no, that's nothing, but they just want to know, right? Like they read it in a book, they read a blog, they've heard a podcast and they say, oh no if it looks like this, you're supposed to do something about it. Do you run into a lot of that where patients are, you know, they're empowering themselves to be an advocate for themselves. But sometimes you almost have to educate them away from doing extracurricular things that you wouldn't necessarily need to do. Dr. Candrice: Absolutely. I think that's our job as physicians to provide the education and say, this is by all accounts, this is a something that it's benign. It's something that can be observed, you know, you don't have to remove it. So I think just spending time to educate also can be helpful for them as well. Dr. Berry: All right. So I'm in the dermatology again and just kind of preface it. Because again, I remember when I was studying in dermatology type questions for boards and everything else and my number one question was always, well you know what? Like yeah, I understand like how it looks, raised, bordered, redness. Like I already understand how that looks. But like for a person that looks like me, right? Like how does that look? Does it look the same? Should I be worrying? Like is it different? Is it the opposite? I don't know. Do you, when you take care of patients of color and they're coming to you with skin related issues as well, do you tend to find that more difficult or is that just feed your training? You're aware of it? Like I always, because I always want to know, cause obviously when I'm reading a book I don't tend to see too many skin colors and I looked like mine that is examples. Dr. Candrice: Yes. I have specifically sought out training in the skin of color. So I was excited to be able to do my dermatology training with some skin of color experts. And actually my program had a skin of color center as well, so we were known for that. So that allowed me to be able to see dermatology on multiple different skin types. And you're right, yes. Some things do not follow the descriptions in the book at all. So you have to go to someone if you do have the skin of color, go to someone familiar with your skin type so that you can get a more expert exam when it comes to that. Dr. Berry: And when we talk about this is skin cancer in general, especially for skin of color. I know you talked about us 10 being caught later. So does that mean like we're from skin cancer total wise, we're dealing with it a lot more frequently or we just happen to catch it at a much later stage? What are some of the numbers especially for skin color and people with skin of color when we talk about skin cancer and diseases of alike? Dr. Candrice: And this is actually really sad, but people of color, we are less likely to get skin cancers. But for an example with melanoma, the one that is the deadliest tight. When we think about the five-year survival rate after someone has cancer, they, you know, was always these statistics. They go out to say, well, in five years, you know, what's the likelihood this person being alive for an example. So for melanoma, when you compare black patients to white patients, white patients have, you know, it's like over 91% of those patients will have a five-year survival rate. And for blacks, it's only a little over 60% or about 65% or so. So that is drastic, a very drastic difference. And so that goes back to the point of late diagnosis. Particularly when we talk about the most deadly type of cancer. Yes, we don't get skin cancer that often, but man, when we do get it, the prognosis is horrible because it's often caught very late and it has spread beyond just the skin at that point. Dr. Berry: And I can tell you from an internist standpoint, some of the patients I've taken care of, unfortunately in a hospital, you know, we've had skin cancer shows up in the lungs, we've had skin cancer show up on the GI system, we’ve had skin cancer show up in the brain, you know, Lunch and Learn community, give you an idea like this isn't a benign disease that you know a little, you know, biopsy cuts and get outta here. Like once if it does what it's, you know, set to do, it can really cause some problems. Dr. Candrice: Yes, it is very devastating and it definitely will be called metastasizes, which is what you definitely explained. It can go all over the body. Dr. Berry: So, and when we talk about this, some of the reasons why we're coming late, right? The reason why we're not seeing Dr. Candrice earlier, basically for people of color. Like I honestly, I was like, oh, what do I need? Like I'm protected, right? Like, well, you know, I'm protected from the sun, like from it from my peers and my skin color. But what are some of the biggest misconceptions that are out there? People like me, it's getting people of color really need to like kind of erased from their mind when it talks about, you know, just skin cancer and skin disease in general. Dr. Candrice: Please erase the fact that your brown skin and your melanin can embrace all potential harm. Is not true. You can get skin cancer. Let me just hit on my mic to make sure they heard me. Look with brown skin, yes, you too can get skin cancer. Take it from me. If you don't believe the statistics. I am triple board certified dermatologist that looks exactly like you. And yes, I see devastating cases. So please, please, please. It's just, it's not true when people say that it doesn't affect us, it's just not true. Dr. Berry: Lunch and Learn community I hope you I heard that. She’s a triple boarded, right? So again, this is, this isn't just you're running the mill like a physician who was trying to like, no, this is a person who really knows what they're talking about and especially for, I have a lot of listeners of color. You know, if you have not, right, again, don't be like me, right? Like, get just skin check done ASAP. Right? The month of May, get it done by the end of this month. Like, make sure that happens like today. And then make sure you bring family members too right. We didn't talk about, but make sure you bring your family members and get them some chopped too. Because I know a lot of us, a lot of y'all don't already like coming to see us for the world has visited. Right? So if y'all already not seeing us for the wellness visit, I know. Yeah. Not going to see yourselves for that, the skin can visit. So please do that. And you know, kind of get out of that mindset. Right. So, you know, Dr. Candrice can kind of help get us together and get us earlier. Again, that's sad though. 60% of us on a little bit over two-thirds of us are actually making it within five years once we're diagnosed just because we're not being seen early and it has a problem. Dr. Candrice: Yes. Devastating statistic. Dr. Berry: So let's talk about skincare, self-care and I wanna know, right? Like I wanted to know because obviously again for Lunch and Learn community even those who don't know, Dr. Candrice and I, we've been friends for about, like three years now. You know, medical always together. I know how amazing this person is and as she does so much education. That's why I wanted to bring her on the show. Right. So Dr. Candrice tell us about skincare, self-care, and why we need to be with it ASAP? Dr. Candrice: You know, I see so many manifestations of stretch in the skin, in hair disorders, lots and lots of things. And so what I thought about was sometimes for people the moment in the morning before the day gets crazy and they're in the bathroom doing whatever they need to do, that may be their only time for self-care. So I developed this concept, this really kind of mindset that yes, skincare is self-care. So focusing on your skin is a way of taking care of yourself. You walk around with your skin all day, every day, so why not take a few minutes to take care of your skin in those moments of the day when you actually have time to do it. So that really was the impetus to all of this. Just, you know, people stressing out and a lot of, and seeing all these diseases on the skin that all you have to do is cleanser or moisturizer. It's like a really quick fix, right? But people were not taking those few minutes of the day because they said, oh, that takes too long. I don't have time for that. I'm busy. I'm this, I'm that. Well, you at least can you give me three minutes a day to be able to care for your skin? And man, what I saw happening was that yes, people, skin disease improved, but also their attitudes improve. Once I started to pitch it as a self-care, their self-care moments of the day, things began to change. They saw it from being something that was cumbersome that they had to do to something that they actually look forward to doing. Dr. Berry: A highlight of their day to take care of this again. Dr. Candrice: Right, exactly. And you say that with some hesitation, but it’s dermatologist, yes. Dr. Berry: Oh no, my way, she’s about to make up that now. So I already know that when she's in that mood. I don't even mess with her. Go ahead, do whatever. I'll wait. I'm in no rush. I ain't going nowhere anyway. She got a whole routine. It's funny because she's got a morning routine, she's got to go on the bed routine as I'm like, wow. Oh, and of course I'm naive, right? And like I gotta ask you a question like, especially when it comes to men, I'm naive, right? And I'm like, why can't you just wash your face? And they're like, no, you gotta do this and this and it's so it's too funny. That's good care. So can we definitely here for that. I got to ask, right? Because I know obviously Lunch and Learn community what about the men, right? Like how much men are you seeing in your practice? How can we get, and we just, we have this issue just getting them to do their wellness checks, right? Like how are you getting them to come to check their skin out? Dr. Candrice: I see men all the time in the office and as soon as I walk in, I know whether they are there by choice or force. I don't care how you land in there. I'm just happy to see the men when they do come in because it is important for me to have those conversations with them. And then we talk about some of the things that they don't really like. People talk about how, Oh, if I wear sunscreen and, and I'm working out or doing something, and I sweay, it gets in my eyes and this, that and the other. So we have conversations about, okay, well how can we overcome some of those things? Some have been cumbersome for you to get around to kind of get on the bandwagon of protecting your skin. So I really enjoy those conversations. And so I had that segment of men that come in for skin checks. But then also what I'm finding is that even just for general skincare things that men actually care about the way they look. They may not tell you or emphasize it and you know, but they do care about it. They may be coming in for ingrown hairs on the face or a little bit of dry skin here, there. Just you know, things that cap into, to happen to come up. And I've definitely given my male patients permission to actually ask about those things. I'm very active on social media and when I look at the statistics and some of my followers, I was surprised that like 20 to 30% of my followers are men. And no is not because I'm so fabulous myself. Right? (Part of it, maybe.) No, it does not because I am definitely an, I make it a point to really give tips along the way about really, really realistic, you know, short steps that you can do to really take care of your skin. And I said, wow, you know, the guys are actually benefiting from this as well. And they make me feel good that my information can be valuable for both women and men. Dr. Berry: Okay. I love it. Before we get you out of here, I always ask my guest, how can what you do really help empower people to take better control to skincare? Dr. Candrice: I understand that my words are powerful. I understand that my interaction with every patient is important. I can remember being a child in the exam room with my physician and if that physician gave some words of encouragement to me. Oh, you want it to be a doctor? Oh, that's great. Blah, blah, blah, blah. You may have understood that depending on where on the neighborhood that you work in, that you may be the only physician of cover that this patient ever sees. I may be the only physician that ever takes a second to encourage a child, encourage their child. And that one piece of information can be the thing that drives them through their entire schooling to become a doctor because somebody told them that they could. So I always had that in my mind. So I know that I'm empowering that way. And then also empowering beyond the exam room currently. So I know that when I'm giving information to women who come in with hair loss and brown spots and this and that and the other, that I encouraged them to talk to their families about it, talk to their girlfriends about it, talk to other people at the hair salon about it so that my words can travel just beyond, beyond well beyond just my patient, but also to a community. And so I love it when patients come in and say, oh so and so referred me or Oh I heard about you at the hair salon. Oh, I heard about you at church. I love it when that happens because it means that I've done a great job of taking something that can be very scientific and complex and making it very simple enough or just my patients to be able to say, look I saw this dermatologist and she told me x and you should get into. That to me is super empowering. I have now turned my one to one patient experience into a one to many experiences. Dr. Berry: Oh, I love it. Absolutely love it. So Dr. Candrice, how can someone follow you, get educated. Like I said, again this is just one episode but this isn't, this is more of like a blip. Like cause you're doing this all the time and I want to make sure my Lunch and Learn community kind of follow along with you. Where can people find you? When's your next speaking engagement? Let us know some details so we can make sure we get you right. Dr. Candrice: I can be found @drcandriceheath on all social media platforms. That's @ D, R, C, A, N, D, R, I, C, E, H, E, A, T, H, that's @drcandriceheath on all social media platforms. Also. I have launched a beauty line called My Sister's Beauty. So I hang out there a lot as well www.mysistersweetie.com. What we really focused on simple skincare. That is also of course self-care. You know my motto, love that. Very simple. You have to tell your wife about that. And then for my people in the medical community who are always asking me about how do you get these speaking gigs, how do you do that exactly? Why are you so comfortable? How do you do that? I finally put everything into a portal. Okay. So I am debuting very soon, www.drcandriceheath.comf/clinicalpearls. So that you can actually be able to go right there. www.drcandriceheath.comf/clinicalpearls to find out what I am doing in the speaker realm for medical professionals. Dr. Berry: And Lunch and Learn community, all of this link will be in the show notes. So you know, if you're driving, take a shower, whatever you do it, you'll be able to get access to it. And I was just about, I let you go, but you gotta tell us you gotta you can't just like a drop that, you know, beauty line comes and just let you go. Right? What about that right? I know we're talking about skin cancer, were on the self-care now. Let's get us right. Dr. Candrice: I am so, it brings tears to my eyes because this has a long journey to launch this line. And really the primary focus is based on all these experiences that I've had with women. Like I told you before, you know, people feeling overworked, too busy to, you know they have the kids hanging off of one arm, the job doing this and you know the taking care of the home depot, all of these things but yet and still they want to look great, they want to feel great. And one of the main things that people often come in about it, they talk about brown spots on the skin. So I know I wanted to develop something that could definitely help to brighten the skin, give people more, even skin tone. All those things they look for so that they do look refreshed and feel refreshed. So I'm excited about the cleanser that we have. It is amazing. I cannot wait for you all to try it and it is packed with a fruit acid called Mandelic Acid and it definitely helps address those dark spots. And I'm really thrilled about it. It's packed full of botanicals so you will see ingredients that you recognize and like in the line including bringing tea. But moisturizer is my group, My Sister’s beauty. Recovery cream is packed full of aloe and it is just amazing. Like I'm so super excited about this. I have a launch party coming up in my city. I cannot wait. So it's, it's been amazing. It has definitely been a long journey and amazing journey and basically, the best is yet to come and I am just excited to finally be able to birth the thing that has been, working on for so long. And yes that really the focus of all of this is about self-care and that's the most amazing part of this whole thing. So I'm ecstatic. Dr. Berry: I love it. Whenever the launch date we'll make sure we promote. We'll make sure we let the world know Lunch and Learn community where they can get that because that's awesome. Absolutely amazing. Dr. Candrice: I would love that. Thank you so much, Dr. Berry. I would love that. Dr. Berry: So again, Dr. Candrice thank you for really enlightened us, educate as getting us together. I'm like, I said next week this skin care is being made. I'm not sure I'm going to see. I know dermatologist is busy. I might not see off for a month, but the appointment will be made at least. So we were going to get us together. Dr. Candrice: Wonderful. Wonderful. Dr. Berry: And again Lunch and Learn community, you know, this person's amazing. Please. Her information will be in the show notes. Please follow her again @drcandriceheath at all social media outlets. Wherever she's at, wherever you're at, she's likely at as well. Or she'll get there so you know, please make sure. This is a person, a friend that I value her opinion or her expertise or knowledge. And now she's about to drop a line and we're going to make sure we get some from the wife because we're going to get everyone together. Dr. Candrice: Yes. Wonderful. Thank you so much Dr. Berry and your awesome Lunch and Learn community. You really know who I am at this point. I am Dr. Candrice, your favorite fun board-certified dermatologist. I am your go-to girl for everything - healthy hair, skin and nails. Dr. Berry: I love it. Thank you. Have a great day. Dr. Candrice: Thank you.   Download the MP3 Audio file, listen to the episode however you like.

A little bit extra, every weekday morning, from LBC's longest-serving presenter.

LinkedIn is like the wild west for video creators, so what does it take to be a LinkedIn Top Voice and what the Huffington Post calls the "Oprah of LinkedIn?" This week on The Inbound Success Podcast, I interviewed Goldie Chan, otherwise known as the "green haired Oprah of LinkedIn." Goldie has more than 45,000 followers on LinkedIn and garnered 3 million+ views on her daily LinkedIn video in under a year. She's been named a LinkedIn Top Voice (the highest honor bestowed by the platform) and is the owner of LinkedIn's longest-running daily show. Goldie is indisputably one of the top thought leaders when it comes to LinkedIn video, and in this episode, she gets into the nitty gritty of how she approaches her LinkedIn Video strategy, including how she shoots her videos, writes the copy for the accompanying posts, and more. This week's episode of The Inbound Success Podcast is brought to you by our sponsor, IMPACT Live,  the most immersive and high energy learning experience for marketers and business leaders. IMPACT Live takes place August 6-7, 2019 in Hartford Connecticut and is headlined by Marcus Sheridan along with special guests including world-renowned Facebook marketing expert Mari Smith and Drift CEO and Co-Founder David Cancel. Inbound Success Podcast listeners can save 10% off the price of tickets with the code "SUCCESS".  Click here to learn more or purchase tickets for IMPACT Live Some highlights from my conversation with Goldie include: Goldie has the longest running daily video channel on LinkedIn, and has produced more than 600 daily consecutive LinkedIn videos. Goldie produces and edits all of her LinkedIn videos herself and she says the key is to start by creating a video strategy and determining what the focus of your video content will be. It took Goldie some time to build up her following and her advice for others is to approach it like a long term play and be committed to consistently producing content. All of Goldie's video content is available through her LinkedIn profile which she refers to as her "channel." She does this to accustomize people to the notion that her profile is her content home base on LinkedIn. Goldie uses the branded hashtag #DailyGoldie in all of her LinkedIn video posts and recommends that anyone who is serious about LinkedIn video use their own branded hashtag as a way of making it easier for followers to find their video posts. She does not think it is a good idea to use what she calls a "hashtag wall" - essentially a long list of hashtags - because it does not help with YouTube SEO and is confusing for followers. In terms of video quality, Goldie believes that people gravitate towards authenticity on the platform, so you don't need incredibly high quality video (and sometimes overly-produced videos can backfire). But she did say that videos should be in-focus, with good frame quality, good audio, and good lighting, and you should not be too close to the camera. If possible, your LinkedIn videos should also be captioned (and if you're only posting videos once a week, captioning is a must). Goldie has a very specific structure for the copy she creates to accompany her LinkedIn video posts, but she says you can create whatever structure you like so long as you don't use hashtag walls, you don't tag too many people, and you're not too salesy. She uses emojis in her posts but says that if you do this, they need to be relevant and contextual. She advises LinkedIn users to never use an emoji in their name on LinkedIn because it can break LinkedIn's code. Resources from this episode: Save 10% off the price of tickets to IMPACT Live with promo code "SUCCESS" Connect with and follow Goldie on LinkedIn Follow #DailyGoldie on LinkedIn Visit the Warm Robots website Check out Goldie's LinkedIn Learning classes Follow Goldie on Twitter Follow Goldie on Instagram Read Goldie's column on Forbes Listen to the podcast to learn more about the power of LinkedIn video and get specific tips from Goldie on how to use LinkedIn video to grow your business and brand. Transcript Kathleen Booth (Host): Welcome back to the Inbound Success Podcast. Welcome back to the Inbound Success Podcast, my name is Kathleen Booth and I am your host. And this week I am especially excited to say that my guest is Goldie Chan, who is known as the green-haired Oprah of LinkedIn. Welcome, Goldie. Goldie Chan (Guest): Thank you for having me. Goldie and Kathleen all smiles while recording this episode Kathleen: I am really excited, maybe a little too much, it might be a little weird. About Goldie Chan Kathleen: So I'll just say a few words about you, and then I'm going to ask you to introduce yourself to our audience. So just, Goldie, I started following her because I was, personally, interested in getting better at LinkedIn video, and her name kept popping up, and her face kept popping up. And I just quickly realized that she was the one really doing it first, and so I started to LinkedIn stalk her, and then Twitter stalk her. But she's got her own social media agency, Warm Robots, she is an influencer in the LinkedIn space, she's on the Producers Guild of America's new media council. You put your hand in a lot of different things, and I probably won't do as great a job of covering it all as you would. So tell my audience a little bit more about you, and how you came to be this LinkedIn influencer. Goldie: Sure. So I've worked, historically, in digital marketing, both on B2B and B2C side for over a decade; which always surprises people. And I worked from that ground up, I worked from the very lowest level entry level position to where I am today, and very different divergence from the traditional path. But I currently am a contributor on Forbes, I write about storytelling and personal branding in the digital age, and I absolutely love my column that I get to write about that. And I have the longest running daily channel currently on LinkedIn, I am over 600 daily, consecutive videos right now, so I started in the beta and I kept going. And one of the most interesting things, I think, is when you are doing daily consecutive content, which I'd personally never done before, you learn so much about yourself, your work ethic, your creative process, and how you can also teach that creative process and, hopefully, that work ethic to other people and explain what works and what doesn't work. And I also teach a few LinkedIn learning courses, one which is on LinkedIn video, and if you have a library card in California, Texas, or New York, I'm not sure about other states, you can get access to lynda.com for free, that's L-Y-N-D-A, and you can actually watch all three of my courses for free. Kathleen: That's great, I love that. And I want to just pause for a second and underscore something you just said, because I feel like it would be easy to gloss over it. Goldie: Yeah. Kathleen: Over 600 daily, consecutive videos on LinkedIn. So if you're listening, she has posted a new video every single day for over 600 days. I don't think you could find many people out there who have done anything consistently in their life for 600 days straight; let alone produce video and content. I heard you talk about this, I think, it was Social Media Week Toronto, I watched your talk on YouTube. And you talked about you were going into the desert with friends, and you realized you hadn't done your video and you, literally, had to leave the desert and go film it because you didn't want to break your streak. Can you talk a little bit about just that consistency, because that's pretty amazing? What It's Like To Produce 600 Consistent Daily Videos Goldie: Sure. So I had been used to doing content for clients or content in-house. And this is very different, because there's a definitive strategy behind it, you don't do content first, you do the strategy first, then you bucket the content, and you do one entire process; and when I started doing video on LinkedIn, I didn't do any of that. I was actually on a hiatus between my last role as Head of Marketing at a full time analytics startup, and getting my next role as Head of Marketing at some other sort of startup, and I was taking a month sabbatical. And during that month sabbatical, I got into the LinkedIn video beta and I decided, for really one of the first times in my life, that I would be doing content that wasn't geared towards monetization; it didn't necessarily have a goal, it was content that I would enjoy. So the first 50 videos, or so, I did on branding and metrics of pop culture phenomenons, because this is how big of a marketing nerd I am, this is what I consider fun to do. So I talked about things like Harry Potter, trains in the US, ride sharing, all sorts of really interesting, different things that have really permeated, specifically, American culture. And I think it was so interesting, because the first 10 or so I did I thought, "This is so painful." Really fun, but it's also painful because if you've never done daily video content before, and you do 10 in a row, it's a lot. Ten videos in a row, that's almost two weeks' worth of video, so your schedule changes from everyday you might create content to everyday you have to create content. And this is what got me through 600 daily videos, this is what got me, truly, through the biggest and hardest milestone, which was 365 days or a full year of video. And every single one of those videos were unique, original content; so nothing was ever repurposed, it was 100 percent unique, original content. And I think what got me through that is that there was never a plan B. Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: So in all things in life, usually you have a plan B like, "If this doesn't work, then I just won't post today, I'll post two videos tomorrow, it'll be fine." There was never, ever a plan B. I was on a flight back from London to the US and my video wasn't uploading, so I ended up uploading this video of me running across the gang plank onto the plane; that was just like a very short clip. I essentially live on airplanes too, so I travel a lot, so my fight with wifi is always ... My battle and love affair with WiFi; we have a very contentious relationship. Kathleen: I was just going to say, you can never go off grid. Goldie: Yeah, I never can go off grid. But I had this really great, edited long video, super thoughtful that I did for that day, and I couldn't upload it. So I upload this video of me running saying, "I am trying to upload this video, I'm going to see which of these videos uploads, hopefully you guys will see one of them." And ironically, of course, what video uploaded was the video of me running. This video uploads, which then it actually blew up, which is the best part because no one had ever uploaded, of course, a video a very meta video of them running to try to upload- Kathleen: To try to upload a video. Goldie: A video of them. So it's a video of me holding my laptop, which is attempting to upload the main video, and I'm on my camera phone videoing me running down this to catch my flight. So- Kathleen: I love it. Goldie: Shoot a meta video and what it takes in order to get, I think, if anybody's thinking about doing a 365 day challenge which is, to me, that's the true challenge. Can you do one day of video for an entire year? I think it really does change you to make that kind of commitment to creating content, original content, not repurposed content every single day; because repurposed content is easy. When you don't feel like being on camera, you don't feel like, say, necessarily seeing yourself, or hearing your own voice, or seeing your work. It's very easy to repurpose content, it's so much harder to create truly original content every single day. Kathleen: Yeah, I have so many questions that I want to ask you about this. Starting with, really, is it ... They say that content creation, whether it's written or video, or what have you, is like a muscle that you have to exercise. Doing this for 365 days, did you feel like it got easier? And like working out, where you get into the groove and you're like, "Oh, yeah, I can do this, I'm in a routine?" Or did that challenge persist throughout that time? How did that play out for you? Goldie: I will say it's so funny we're talking about this today, because today I struggled with ... Today was video 610 for me. I struggled with doing a daily video today, and I almost repurpose an older video, which I do sometimes; now that I've passed 365 mark. So it is a problem that continues to pop up is creating original ideas, coming up with a concept, actually executing on that concept and/or editing through my insanely giant backlog of video content that I still have. I still have several unedited videos that I will release at some point this year. You never quite get over that hump of there will be days that are really, really tough; but overall, overall, it does get easier. So it is like working out where you may just have some bad days where you don't want to go the gym but, overall, you're so used to going to the gym. I'm so used to every single day, I will upload a video onto LinkedIn, and I could not do any other content. I do social media for a living, but I could not access any of my other platforms, I could just avoid them all. But I know that I will always go on LinkedIn, and I will always upload some sort of video content period. And that is a promise I've made to myself as a content creator, and so it's a little bit different than if you were doing it for a client. But also, once again, a lot of people assume that I outsource most of this to my team; I actually don't. And I don't do it, partially, because I am crazy but also, partially, because my team has other things that they're handling, too. They're handling a lot of the client work, they're doing other things, so I don't want to, necessarily, distract my team from that. Although this year for myself, personally, because once again, I've gone over that 365 day hump, I will be giving them a little bit more, especially of the editing to do as I'm moving forward with my content creation. But I think it's really important for even if you're doing, say, a 50 video challenge to do it all yourself, because it teaches you what you need when you do hire somebody to handle this for you. Kathleen: Yeah, amen. I am currently trying to do it myself, and it's been an interesting journey; so far I managed to get a couple of videos out. But I'm not highly technical, and I think a lot of people listening probably aren't either. You have your team, that's your web developers, your video producers. I have a whole video production team that works for me, but I'm not having them do this. Because right now, it's not a business strategy, that's something I'm doing for myself.  Creating a LinkedIn Video Strategy Kathleen: So if someone's listening, I guess, you've mentioned starting with strategy; so let's actually start in the right order. When you're talking to somebody who's thinking about maybe investing in LinkedIn video for themselves, or to promote their business, how do you talk them through conceptualizing a strategy for it? Goldie: Sure. So the thing I start with is, what I start with with all my clients when I think about content in general, which is, who is your target demographic, who are you're trying to speak to? Because then it's so much easier to figure out the kind of content that you should be doing. So if your audience is very serious, or your audience is very light-hearted, this changes the kind of content that is optimized for the audience you want to speak to. So I like to think about it as an audience or demographic, first piece; so that's number one is thinking about your demographic. Number two is, what is either your personal brand, if you're coming at it from your personal brand, or what is the brand brand? What is the keywords, what is the thought process behind the brand that you're trying to promote? So those are the two really big key pieces, and people tend to hop, skip over this. And they're like, "You know what would be fun? Is a show about blog." And I'm like, "That sound fun." And I was looking at to literally do a show about blog, and then it took off, but properly strategizing for this, you want to think about who your audience is, first. And if you do run your own business, and you are looking for, say, more customers or more clients, who are those customers and clients, and what kind of content would be of the highest value to them? How Long Does It Take to Build a Following With LinkedIn Video? Kathleen: Okay, now in your case, how long did it take before you started to see traction with your videos and gain followers? Goldie: I'm laughing a little bit, which you guys can't see because this is audio only. I will say the first 30 days I did it, or the first ... I don't remember what month, I started in August; that's right. So the first month I did videos, all of my friends, including some who are content creators on other platforms, they all thought I was absolutely bananas, they thought I was nuts. They were like, "Why are you making videos on this platform? You're getting maybe 100 views if you're lucky." So giving everybody my numbers when I started, so I'd get, maybe, 100 views if I was very lucky, maybe 10 likes if I was super duper lucky, and I just enjoyed the process of creativity. So it took me a while before I saw traction, and I think it's really interesting that people now want that immediate traction, especially on LinkedIn video. And yes, you can get there faster than you can on other platforms, but I had a meeting once with this young lady, she's super nice. She had done three videos; so just three videos 1, 2, 3. And she said, "Okay, how do I land a brand like WeWork, like you have a partnership with? I've done three videos, they've all been incredibly well." It was so interesting to me to hear that she had only done, and I use that word strongly, only done three pieces of content and then expected a giant brand deal out of that. You have to put in the time, the energy, and the effort, so you have to put in more pieces of content. So the in this case, it was both quality and quantity that was being ignored. And that is one thing to think about, which is when you're strategizing and thinking about doing LinkedIn video, can you commit to doing at least 10 videos? Can you commit to doing at least 20 videos? Can you commit to doing enough videos for you to see if you can get traction over two months, three months, as opposed to thinking, "If I release one video a day for a week, I will get 12 new clients." If it works for you that way, amazing; please teach me. But if it doesn't work for you that way, a lot of it is duration and being in it for a longer haul. Because with all video content creation, you need more time to build an audience, even if your content is amazing. What Is a 'LinkedIn Channel'? Kathleen: Yeah. Now you talked about having the longest running channel on LinkedIn. And this is something so interesting to me, because I don't think, probably, 90 some odd percent of people even know what the concept of a LinkedIn channel is. So this is a two part question. The first part is, can you explain what that is and how it functions? And then, also, I would love to understand from you, if you are somebody who is going to commit themselves to a consistent LinkedIn video strategy, how important is it to approach it from, like, a channel mentality? Goldie: So as opposed to other platforms like, say, YouTube, where you have a distinct channel, so your YouTube URL is your channel, it's the place that houses all your videos. Right now LinkedIn, unless you use a third party, doesn't have the ability to host your videos on LinkedIn in a separate video tab or video functionality. So when I say 'Channel', I essentially mean all of my content, so all of my content goes through the funnel of being on my profile. So in this case, my LinkedIn profile is my channel, and when I work with brands on their strategy on LinkedIn, and then I usually call their brand page 'Their channel'. It's just slightly different terminology, but it helps people also understand that this is a place to consistently see content, because we expect a channel to consistently have content. And, once again, I have to emphasize that word 'Consistent'. Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: Now I'm completely forgetting what your second question was. Should You Have a Branded LinkedIn Hashtag? Kathleen: Well, so I'll help you out with that, because I have a second part to the question you just answered. Which is, in your case, you have your profile, which is your channel, but you also are very good about consistently using a hashtag, #DailyGoldie- Goldie: Yes. Kathleen: With your posts. And you can click on that hashtag and, actually, there's the ability to follow the DailyGoldie hashtag. So I guess the second part of the question's really, if somebody is going to really double down and commit themselves, obviously, your point about consistency is crucial; and I think that you've made that really, really clear. You're not going to get traction unless you're consistent and the quality is there. How important is it also to try to brand yourself with whether ... Like I've noticed, you've done a hashtag, I also follow Chantel Soumis, who has #ChantelShares and Alyssa Mangaoang who has #AlyssaHQ. How important is it to have a branded hashtag to make it even easier for people to really follow that feed? Goldie: So when I began doing LinkedIn videos, hashtag search in August of 2017, was not what hashtag search is now. So I actually didn't even start doing #DailyGoldie until my audience asked me to do a hashtag, so they could better find my content. Which I love this because this is such an example of chicken and the egg, horse and the cart. I wasn't actually the original one who asked to do a hashtag, my audience was the one that asked me to do a hashtag so they could better find and aggregate my content. So moving forward, one of the things I do tell people is, "Have your own branded hashtag." However, the thing that I super strongly recommend against is having multiple hashtags. So some people, if you notice, they have a hashtag block, they have what works really well on Instagram, but it doesn't work as well on LinkedIn. And why is that? It's because LinkedIn's hashtag search is not as mature as, say, Instagram's hash tag search. So if you have three or four hashtags that you're trying to own, it's much harder also for people to follow all three of those, remember all three of those, it's just much easier for people to remember one hashtag. So having one hashtag that you own that has, maybe, your name or your brand name in it will make it so much easier. And even when I started doing live streaming, because now there's #LinkedinLive, I started doing #GoldieLive, which I might keep up with and I might not just because I think it's nice just to have my live streams be a little bit more unbranded. And I know that is very counterintuitive, because everybody wants everything to be hyper branded; I, myself speak on branding quite a bit. But I think when something is so new, and in such beta form, you can look a little bit over done when you're over branded. So when everything is hyper graphics, everything has an intro screen, etc, you lose some of that genuine qua- ... especially if you're a vlogger. This is not necessarily true if you're a brand. But if you are trying to represent your personal brand, you lose that genuineness, you lose that authenticity, because people are having to watch 15 seconds of an intro to every single one of your live streams, and they all look the same too. Which is, to me, visually un-stimulating- Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: Not interesting and not, necessarily, super creative. LinkedIn Video Production Quality Kathleen: So that brings me to an interesting question, which is around production quality. I think you referenced wanting to convey a genuine feeling. And I feel the same way, like things that are too overly produced, they just don't seem authentic on. And so what are the guard rails around this? Like, is there a low end that you shouldn't go below? And is there a high end that you shouldn't exceed? Goldie: Well, it really depends. So one of the things that I tell people now is that LinkedIn is like YouTube year one. So even though LinkedIn, gosh, I'm coming up on two years now of doing LinkedIn video, even though it's maybe closer to its second year of birth, it still is so, so new as a platform, and that's why people are excited about things like blogs. People are excited about these videos that feel a little bit more unedited, because they feel more different on a platform that is ... There's so many ads that I see all the time on LinkedIn, or just things that are constantly being super salesy on LinkedIn; so it's so refreshing to see things that are a little bit more genuine on LinkedIn now. But let's go over the guardrails, so still, when you're creating content on LinkedIn, you want it to be as clear as it can be, as non-blurry as it can be, you want the framing to be nice. So I recently switched over to doing a couple more vertical videos just because I'm also experimenting with IGTV right now. And one of my personal pet peeves with vertical video that I've seen, is when people get too close. So you guys can't see this, but I'm framing my face, and I call it the serial killer face. So when you are too close in the frame, your head fills up 90 percent of a vertical frame, you are too close. So you want to make sure that your head is maybe two thirds of the frame in a vertical video if vertical video is what you want to do. And this is, of course, our beautiful rule of thirds, which is a classic rule, classic video rule, it's not one I made up. And it really is helpful for actually, subconsciously, being a more interactive and engaging video. Because you're not in other people's faces, which is attention getting for one video. And I've had other people who will dispute me on this, other marketers, who say, "It's good." They like this format because it always gets in people's faces. That's good for one video as a shock value, however, if I noticed that all your videos are disturbingly close, I probably won't want to watch more than one video, because it's off putting to me, because it feels like you're staring into my soul; and I don't know that I want that. But having the proper framing for a vertical video, if that's what you decide to do, is important. Now LinkedIn alternates between the style and the type of video that you can create that's optimal. If I have enough time, because I am extra nuts, I like to shoot actually vertical and horizontal, just because I personally like the way horizontal looks on LinkedIn video more than I like the way that vertical looks. But you'll notice that people who are, especially, doing blogs on LinkedIn, they're shooting a lot of them in a vertical format. But I even have right here, I have an LED light that I use when I'm shooting content, but for most of it, having good audio, having good lighting, these are just basic tenants of creating content, and making sure that you have a tripod that you can carry with you when you are shooting on mobile. These are just basic that will be helpful for creating content. Captioning Your LinkedIn Videos Kathleen: Now what about captions? Goldie: So I love, love, love captions and I am incredibly guilty of not doing captions recently in my content. And the reason for that is, quite honestly, I do daily content and I don't batch my content, a lot. So for people who do batch content and say you're releasing one video a week, there is no excuse, there is zero excuse not to have captions on every single piece of content. Now for me, I will literally shoot something on the way to a meeting, and then upload it 30 minutes later. So for me it's a lot harder to do captions, just because my content production cycle is so quick. But if you have more than 24 hours, you can hire people who either do captioning, or use something like Clips or Google Matic, which does auto captioning as well on the iOS devices. So there's so many solutions if you're not doing daily content, where you can get captions and yes, I may not do captions frequently, but captions are so helpful. And if there was a way for me to better do daily captions and still get the adorable filters that I like to put on my videos, I would do that. But with daily content, it is incredibly difficult. But yes, there are so many captioning services out there, it's a shame not to do captions. Kathleen: Yeah, there's a massive market opportunity out there for somebody to create a tool that makes it easier to caption. I will say when I started doing my videos, I've tried, oh my God, I probably tried 10 different approaches to recording, and then I use Rev.com to transcribe my podcasts and I thought, "Oh, I'll just use Rev to create the SRT file for the captions." But then putting it all together was a nightmare. What I settled on, which is amazing, is you mentioned it, Apple clips. It's unbelievable, it's so easy. I mean, if I can do a video with captions in Apple clips, literally, a four year old could do it. Goldie: Yeah, Apple Clips and, I personally use Clipomatic when I do do captioning in videos. The only issue, of course, with that is that it only records up to a minute of video caption and then you have to, of course, go back and edit those captions because it misspells- Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: It always misspelled my name. Kathleen: And it's all one long run on sentence, it doesn't process sentences. Goldie: And it's one long run on sentence. So it's nice to go back and edit those captions to make sure that they say things properly. But, yes, there are captioning services out there so if you are making videos that are one minute or less, then there is truly no excuse, yeah. Creating Copy For LinkedIn Video Posts Kathleen: Now for every video you post, there is accompanying copy that you put in the post itself. And I'm curious if you can talk to, what have you found works really well when you're drafting the copy to go along with a video? Goldie: I have an entire talk I do on copy on LinkedIn video, which should probably tell you how big of a nerd I am. Kathleen: That's what I say, I knew I could talk to you forever, but we don't have forever. Goldie: With copy, I have so many pet peeves with the kind of copy I see accompanying video or even imagery on LinkedIn. One is the one that I already mentioned, which is the hashtag block. It is not SEO optimized, don't do it, it will only look junkie. So if it's not going to get you the SEO push, there's no reason to do a giant block of hashtags; it's my personal belief. And the same thing, because I just talked about hashtag block, was tagging 20 irrelevant people in the post. Now I always love being tagged in everyone's post, because I do ... Even though I may not comment, I may not like, I do try to watch as many people's videos as I can; so I'm an exception to the rule. But for the most part, most people don't want to be tagged in content that's irrelevant and I, myself, don't like being tagged in, say, images that are irrelevant and not original video content, so you have to be really careful about tagging. And that is something people also put in the copy, is they do half a line, usually misspelled, and then they have 20 people in it. And that, once again, it looks junky, it just looks like it's not very well thought out. And one of the things I do like to do in my copy is I like to use my personal hashtag, so I use #DailyGoldie. I have a very distinctive structure for my copy, which you guys might now see kind of propagated across all of LinkedIn; a lot of people now use my structure. I tend to do a title, and then I do a body, and then I maybe put a link or something in there, and then I'll do which did daily number video I'm because I do daily videos and it's nice to know for me, personally, what video number I'm on for that day. The structure, of course, changes for everyone, but what it is not is, once again, not a giant block of hashtags, it's not me tagging people who are not directly related to that video. And it is also not, necessarily, a sales funnel. I don't believe in doing every video as a hard sales funnel, in fact, I very rarely do sales in my videos, even my sponsored videos. They happen pretty rarely and infrequently and I think, to me, that's because I like my content to always be of high value. So even if I'm doing a video that is driving someone towards a sale, that's a high value video that they're getting, so even if they don't want to buy the thing, they're still learning something and I think that is, to me, the most important thing you can do with a video channel on LinkedIn. Kathleen: Yeah. Now I've noticed you use emojis in your posts, and- Goldie: Yeah. Kathleen: I actually really like it. There's a lot of debate around emojis in, general, right now I feel like. For me the way, at least I've seen you use it, it helps visually break up the post. Goldie: Yeah. Kathleen: It's almost like you can't, necessarily, do bolding and italics in LinkedIn, but you can bracket things with emojis and set things apart. Can you talk a little bit about your approach to that? Using Emojis in LinkedIn Posts Goldie: Sure. So I think ... Well, let me tell you where not to put emojis; so let's actually start with there, and then we'll go back to where you can use emojis and it does make sense. So where you should not be using emojis - and I've actually talked to some of the top creators on the platform about, "Don't do this anymore" - s o I'm doing my school teacher finger waving that you can't see. Don't put emojis in your name on LinkedIn. And the reason for that is, first of all ... And I use a green heart emoji next to my name on other platforms, but on LinkedIn, it looks a little unprofessional; so you want to stay away from that. But that's not why you shouldn't use an emoji next to your name on LinkedIn, it will actually sometimes break the code. Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: So if someone is trying to tag you on LinkedIn, it can potentially break that code, which is all bad- Kathleen: Yeah, that's not good. Goldie: Because then people aren't able to tag you, and you don't get the benefit of being tagged in someone else's post. So that's the main reason I say don't use emojis specifically in your name; regardless of the emoji that you want to use. Now let's go back to where you can use emojis and it does make sense, which is in your video copy and I use them to, like you said, break up the copy. I like to use them so it gives you a little bit of fresh air, but the emojis are usually relevant to the copy. I don't like to use a ton of irrelevant emojis, like people who tend to do five or six emojis in a row and it's just a string of emojis that don't necessarily relate at all to that, but it's just a subset of emojis that they always use. Once again, I think everything should be relevant and a value, so if I'm using an emoji, it will likely be relevant to the content that I'm creating; and that makes it less obnoxious. Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: There's a lot of debate, which you were talking about, that emojis are so obnoxious, they're just so annoying to see, and the way you kind of take that down a notch is making the emojis actually relate to what you're doing and what you're talking about. So if I'm talking about fishing, and I use a fish emoji, people can't really argue with that because I'm not doing like 12 emojis in a row of palm trees and then a fish. I'm not trying to be a graphic designer with my emojis. Kathleen: Right, you're not bedazzling your LinkedIn posts. Goldie: I am not bedazzling, although we grew up in the 90s, you probably like the bedazzling. Kathleen: Exactly. I don't know, I think it was pretty tacky then and that's one of those trends that does not need to come back, the second time around. Goldie: I feel like in might just because we're seeing- Kathleen: Probably. Goldie: A resurgence in bedazzling, in general. Kathleen: If gauchos and culottes can come back, then so can bedazzling. Goldie: Yes. Kathleen: Yeah, I would agree. I mean I think it's actually, emojis are becoming much more accepted in a business context than they used to be, but it definitely requires a steady hand and some balance. Goldie: Yes, I think it just requires relevance. Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: So the more relevant an emoji is, the more people can't argue with that emoji use. I mean the same thing is true of, if we want to go down this rabbit hole, of GIFs as well. Kathleen: Yeah, exactly. So again I do feel like I could talk to you all day, but you have lots of content to create. And so a couple of questions for you to kind of bring us back home. The first is for somebody who's thinking of getting started with LinkedIn video today, any top piece of advice you would have for them that we haven't already covered as a newbie that they should have in mind? Goldie: So my number one favorite piece of advice for anyone who's thinking about starting on LinkedIn video is focus. When you are thinking about creating a bucket of content, a bucket of videos on LinkedIn, they should have a singular focus. And why is this? This makes it easier for people to understand what you're about, what your content is about, and it makes it easier for them to follow you. Because they can decide right off the bat, if they want to watch all your videos on, say, Shopify Plus. Kathleen: Yeah, that makes sense and everyone who listens to this, in some way shape or form, is a marketer, so it's all about the editorial strategy and- Goldie: Yes, and it's about editing yourself. Kathleen: Yes, exactly. Sometimes it's the hardest kind of editing. Goldie: Yes. Kathleen's Two Questions Kathleen: All right, well as my listeners know, I like to ask every guest the same two questions before we wrap up. The first one is company or individual, who do you think is doing inbound marketing really well right now? Goldie: Oh my gosh, this is such a lovely question. I recently met with somebody who I think is fantastic and has a great email strategy, and her name is, I'm going to pull it up right now because I really should have pulled it up sooner. Kathleen: That's all right, I'm catching you off guard. Goldie: For everyone who is, because I always get her last name wrong, Ann Handley. Kathleen: Oh, I love Ann. Goldie: Yeah, Ann is wonderful. We are totally going to buy matching suits and wear them to the next conference, so- Kathleen: Doesn't she have the best suits? Goldie: She has the best suits- Kathleen: Yeah. Goldie: But she also has incredibly strong email strategy. So go subscribe to her email strategy, go read her book; she also has a new book out. But I like how friendly, yet professional her outbound content is. And it's this beauti- ... It's just like her suits, which are wild, but professional. And I think that she is such a great example of just a branding. She has incredibly consistent branding both on her person, literally her person, and also on her outgoing emails. Kathleen: Absolutely. Goldie: Yeah. Kathleen: Her suit game is strong, and her newsletter which is, for anyone listening, it's called Total Annarchy, with two N's for her first name, is amazing. It comes out once every other Sunday, I think, is the cadence. Great answer, we love Ann at IMPACT. Second question is, obviously digital marketing is changing so quickly, how do you personally stay up to date and keep yourself educated? Goldie: So, I have a few resources that I absolutely love and I absolutely would follow. One of them is so funny because they interviewed me, and then I got so obsessed with them, because I just love all the content that they're constantly putting out, and that is WeRSM. And they are based in London, but they have footprints all over the US. And they tend to cover a lot of things as they're happening. So what they're great on is they will release articles, literally, the same day LinkedIn officially announced live, they will do an article that same day. So I love how incredibly up to date and feature focused they are, but for me as a marketer, it's all the kind of content and news that I'm more interested in, the new features that are released that are relevant to my user base and my demographic. So they're a really slightly unknown, but such a great media outlet for marketers that I think should have a bigger and better presence. Ad they also had a podcast, that was really, really wonderful as well, but I think it's currently on hiatus. How to Connect With Goldie Chan Kathleen: I cannot wait to check them out, they sound like a great resource. Now we've already talked about how you can be found on LinkedIn if anybody just types in #DailyGoldie, G-O-L-D-I-E. Any other places people should seek you out online if they want to learn more about you or get in touch? Goldie: Sure, so you can find me on Twitter @GoldieChan, G-O-L-D-I-E-C-H-A-N or find me on Instagram @GoldieCylon, G-O-L-D-I-E-C-Y-L-O-N, because I am a huge Battlestar Galactica fan. And I've been experimenting a little bit on Instagram, like I said before with IGTV and other kinds of alternative short form content; so Instagram also is fascinating. Kathleen: And you have to go check her out on Instagram because she has an amazing picture of herself dressed as Khaleesi from Game of Thrones that is on point. Goldie: Thank you. You Know What To Do Next... Kathleen: All right, well if you're listening and you liked what you heard, of course I would love it if you would leave a five star review for the podcast on iTunes. And if you know someone doing kick ass inbound marketing work, tweet me @WorkMommyWork because I would love to interview them. Kathleen: Thank you so much, Goldie, this was great. Goldie: Thank you so much for having me.

Evolutionary astrologer Dena DeCastro returns to the show to teach us all about Chiron, Chiron Return, and what the move into Chiron in Aries means for each of us. HOW TO FIND YOUR CHIRON SIGN: Google the year you were born + Chiron example: “1969 Chiron” or visit Chiron Sign Tables at Cafe Astrology MENTIONED ON THE SHOW Chiron Sign Tables Cafe Astrology The National Chart of the United States interpretation Actual Natal Chart of the USA GUEST LINKS - DENA DECASTRO Chiron in Aries and You Chiron in Aries: Fight for the Right to Be You denadecastro.com DeCastro Astrology on Facebook HOST LINKS - SLADE ROBERSON Slade's Books & Courses Get an intuitive reading with Slade Automatic Intuition FACEBOOK GROUP Shift Your Spirits Community BECOME A PATRON https://www.patreon.com/shiftyourspirits TRANSCRIPT Slade: I love having a returning guest/in-house astrologer, and welcoming all other astrologers to come on the show too. So one of the things that you and I have been doing in these sort of serial conversation is focusing on more evergreen kind of topics in astrology, not the day-to-day transits of what's going on. But the thing that's interesting about Chiron which we're talking about today is it kind of falls in the middle ground, right? Because it's going to be an effect for this long period of time. It's shifting signs. It's going to be there for seven years so this is one of those things that I feel like we still want to discuss and it will be relevant for several years if people listen to this conversation, right? Dena: Yeah. It's right in that middle ground where this is, when the slower moving bodies, such as Uranus, Neptune or Pluto, which are the outer planets, and Chiron, which happens to orbit between Uranus and Saturn. When those things are moving into a new sign, it will be there for a long time, generally, Pluto being the longest where it could be 15 years-ish in a sign. So yeah, we're not exactly Evergreen but it's a long time, right? Slade: Right. Dena: So for Chiron, it's going to be in total about eight years in Aries, and it dipped in last year, and it's gonna go through 2027, a little in and out at the end, you know, where it goes forward and backward, but... Slade: When was it last year that it dipped in? I'm just curious. Dena: Let's see. It was, I believe, April. I'm going to look at my notes on that, but yeah, I think it was April through September. Yes. Of 2018. And then it retrograded back into Pisces to finish up business there. We can talk a little about that. And then it moved fully into Aries February of last month. I believe it was the 18th that it moved into Aries. Slade: So I just have to say really quickly, I really didn't know anything about Chiron until very recently. In the last few months when I started seeing all this press about the change into Aries, and people who had Chiron in Pisces were celebrating that something was going to change. And I've had people talk to me about my chart since I was a little kid and this never came up. So tell us, first of all, what IS Chiron? As an astronomical body and then astrologically what it is. Dena: So it was first classified as an asteroid and it's orbiting between the asteroid belt and the Kuiper belt is that final belt of objects beyond Pluto. And so it's orbit goes in and out between Uranus' orbit and Saturn's orbit. So it can go a little bit outside of Uranus and come back in and inside of Saturn's orbit and go back out. So it goes between them. It doesn't have a completely round orbit. It's elliptical and irregular. Therefore it spends a longer time in some signs than others. And it happens to be that Aries and Libra are the two signs that it spends the longest amount of time in. So it's about an eight year time frame that it will be spending in those. Now it's being classified as possibly a minor planet which could be a combination of, is it a comet or is it a dwarf planet? What is it? But it's basically a small body that regularly orbits the sun, which is now classified as centaur or minor planet. It was discovered in 1977 so it is very new in terms of what astrologers have been looking at and developing theories about and we're still continuing to develop a meaning for what Chiron is. Slade: That's so cool. We think of all this stuff as being so ancient, you know, like Greek astronomers gazing at the sky... Dena: Yeah. Slade: So the idea that modern astrologers are actually incorporating something new into the lexicon is really fascinating. So how does it happen and what do people think it's about and what do you know about it? Dena: Yeah, well like any of the planets that have been discovered in recent history, for example, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto, are new basically to our astrological understanding, relatively speaking. We started with discovery of Uranus in the late 18th century, discovery of Neptune in the mid 19th century, and discovery of Pluto in about 1930. So this is recent history in terms of the scheme of things. And so astrologers work to develop some sense of, what does that planet's presence mean in a birth chart? Through experience. Through reality testing. Through looking at a person's chart and seeing how it plays out in their life. So it's a science in that we're correlating data. We're observing data and how it plays out in reality. So we're doing the same with Chiron. I think it received the moniker, the archetype of the Wounded Healer, as it was named for Chiron, and the myth of Chiron is about a centaur that was born of the mating of Saturn, Kronus, and a nymph named Philyra. So that story is about a being who was born with a deformity, being rejected by his mother. You know, she split the scene when this baby was born. It's a very sad story in its beginnings, but then it works out well in the Greek myth for Chiron because he is adopted by Apollo who's really super cool. Apollo shares with him all the skills that he has and he becomes then a master healer astrologer himself. Astrology is actually in the myth and a person who then mentors others and teaches others, or being who mentors and teaches others. So he's kind of this half-mortal, half not-mortal being who is brought into the world and has to figure out, like, how am I going to survive? But then he receives some help and mentoring from one of the gods. So it's a pretty incredible story. And then what astrologers do is they take the synchronicity of that body being named for that Greek myth and say, how then does that shed light on the meaning of this body in a person's chart? And we've done that with all of the planets, from names of the Greek gods or the Roman gods. So yeah, I mean, and then it's a process, right? It's a process of looking at this over and over again in people's charts. And to be honest, I didn't use Chiron for probably the first 10 years of practicing astrology. And I've been doing it for about 20. And what led me to really looking at it myself and practicing with it in charts is, in my own chart, I saw how it had been and seemed to shed light on my story. And it is prominent on my chart. And so I think that's a factor too. If it's prominent in a person's chart, then it will have more of an impact as this asteroid or minor body. But as astrologers, we can only really work from experiential, experience and data, to figure out what does this actually mean? Slade: So what's the theme then? What does it bring to our chart or is there a certain part of our life experience that it impacts? Talk a little bit about that. Dena: I believe it has to do with inner child issues, things that happened to us when we were children, that continue to affect us throughout our life. And we may be very aware of those things. But it's like the thing that keeps hanging us up. That insecurity, that feeling of lack, that feeling of less than, that we all carry around, that stems from something in the childhood. Some of us have more or less awareness of what is that, what is that wound? What happened there? Let's say, for example, someone, one of their parents left when they were a child. Going right back to the Chiron story, they might have abandonment issues, right? And they might be very aware of the cause of that. "My father left when I was three and so therefore I have daddy issues or abandonment issues." What Chiron can help with is then pointing in a chart to - can you find the healing for that? What is its medicine, by it's sign and house placement? What do you need to go into? What do you need to embrace? What qualities do you need to embody in order to heal from that particular childhood issue. And then use that healing in service. That is part of the healing too. Using that awareness of your own childhood wound in service in some way to others in your life on a broader scale. Slade: Okay, so this is bringing together a lot of threads of stories for me personally, which we'll come back to later on when we talk about the Chiron return. Let's make sure and tell everybody since, for instance, I don't think when you do your chart on astro.com that it lists Chiron as one of the planets and tells you what sign it's in. So if you want to look this up and just find out what your Chiron sign is, how do you find out that information? Dena: Well, for any asteroid or minor body, you can usually find it by typing in that planetary body's name plus the word "ephemeris" or "ephemerides". That will bring up a list of different resources, either to find a table that shows when the planet was where. Or it will go to an ephemeris that shows that. And some people cannot read an ephemeris, so that's a tricky thing. I do happen to know with Chiron, CafeAstrology has a good signs table for Chiron which is easy to read. It says, here's the date and here's the date it entered Cancer for example and here's the date that it left Cancer and entered Leo. And so you can find, within that list of dates, where your natal Chiron is. So that's fairly easy. You'll put a link to that in the notes. Slade: Absolutely. We'll have links to all these resources so you can look this stuff up, and links to some of your resources as well. Well this is really interesting because I do kind of see this theme emerging around the whole wounded healer, wounded child archetype stuff. I also had an epiphany about the centaurs in Harry Potter and the magicians. Dena: Oh, the magicians! Slade: Yes! Which are famously healers who studied the stars as well and I assume that that came from mythology but you just tied it all together for me. I get my mythology through fantasy most of the time. Dena: Me too. Slade: So what has... for instance, one of the things that brought this to my awareness were all the people who recently were posting on Facebook that they were Chiron in Pisces people and that this was nearing a shift for them. And it seemed as if they were like glad to see this change coming. What is that story about? Dena: Well, and I don't tend to look at things as wholly positive or negative, right? You know that about me by now. As an evolutionary astrologer, I don't think, as my teacher Steve puts it, don't just plug your nose through the transit of something and say, "Oh phew, that's done!" Slade: Yeah. Dena: To work with it consciously and with intention would be the aim, right? I'm not shaming those people because believe me, I've definitely been like, PHEW! after a few Pluto transits in my life. "Glad that's done!" But Chiron can bring definitely a hyper awareness of that childhood stuff that still haunts us. And if Chiron's in Pisces, then those people who are going through Pisces return in the past several years, right? Which means they were turning 50 at some point in there. 50 is, I would say, already an interesting birthday right, in this culture? I mean, you and I are both turning 50 this year, so we're coming up on Chiron return and we'll talk more about that. But for those people with Chiron in Pisces, that have just gone through it, maybe there were other challenges in their life as well surrounding turning 50, surrounding all the things that go with being middle aged in this culture. Slade: Plus it was a water sign. Dena: It was a water sign, yeah. With Pisces, there is already a feeling of heightened sensitivity, vulnerability, deep empathy and perhaps the challenges of Chiron return in Pisces were about feeling things even more deeply which, the past few years would've been a very challenging place to be, for sure. Everything that's going on in this country, lots of processing of deep and intense emotions in general, and then having that heightened awareness of everything that's going on around you, and feeling everybody's feelings, I would guess that that was a challenging sign to have Chiron return in. Slade: And I'm observing that conversation from our peers, people who are already intuitives or spiritual teachers. They're very much involved in their spirituality and healing things, their personal issues. As you said, turning that into something that they do for other people. And predominantly a lot of women in our community. So I was seeing all this back and forth and I was like, "Gosh, you guys, I'm so sorry. What happened?" It sounded really intense but it also makes sense why they are kind of having a voice within our community at large, right? Why they're on these Facebook groups talking about the things that they're talking about, it did make a kind of sense. And I was kind of excited to hear that I have another dose of fire to work with. Because I am a fire sign, I'm a Leo, but I have a lot of Scorpio in my chart. So I kind of feel more like a water sign moving through the world a lot of the times than I do the Leo energy. So to have some Aries coming in somewhere, yeah, bring it on! Sounds good. Dena: Yeah, you and me both. I don't have a lot of fire in my chart at all. I have one fire planet, Mars in Sag and that's it. So I'm like, okay! Good little boost here, some fire energy and then Chiron will be connecting. If you're a fire sign, particularly if you have early fire sign planets, Chiron will be connecting with that via a trine or conjunction. Either one. One or the other. So it will reconnect you with that fire principle, for sure. Slade: So with Chiron moving into Aries for everyone, what kinds of things does that generally do to the mood and environment and what we're experiencing collectively? Dena: You know, Chiron being in Aries for the collective, it's taking us back to square one in many ways. Aries is the first sign. It is the 'I Am' principle and just being. Absolutely 100% who I am, who I am born as, and Chiron is illuminating the wound that blocks us from being 100% who we are and who we were born as. That's intense, for sure. I mean, we can say Chiron in Pisces was intense in different ways but there's an intensity to this as well. It has to do with confronting what blocks access from being, 100% accepting and comfortable with who we are. No apologies. That's very Aries energy by the way. No apologies. Not apologizing for who I am, what I'm doing and what I want! And desire. Desire is also a component of Aries. Chiron is illuminating right now as it moves through Aries, what is blocking us from having what we want? It will show us when we get in our own way, where we let other people get in our way, but the onus of power does come back to us because that's what Aries is about, owning your personal power, your will, your desire, and the direction YOU want to take. One of the themes I can see coming of that is realizing exactly how we get in our own way, and to remove that tendency to want to blame that person, that situation. There's always an excuse I can make about why I'm not getting to where I want to go. But ultimately the buck stops with me. And that's a very Aries principle as well. So owning personal power will be, how to get to that, is through understanding the ways that we let our past, our childhood stuff, our old baggage of childhood, continue to hang us up in our movements toward where we want to go. And so, as with any transit, there's some inner work involved in figuring that out and healing that. Slade: Well, one of the things that I love about the way you speak about these things, you touched on that idea, it's not always good or bad. You're gonna get a little bit of both with anything in astrology. And one of the things that you like to do with that is say, given that this situation is occurring, or given that we've got these ingredients to work with, how can we make the best of that? What should we be looking to work on? I mean, obviously, childhood issues, things from the past that maybe are still holding us back in some way, making us timid... Am I in the ballpark? Dena: Yeah. I think you cued in on something there with the word 'timid'. That Aries is a sign of bravery and courage. And so we're being, all of us, called to become more brave in some area of our lives, depending on where that Chiron transit is happening. Whether that Chiron be touching a planet in your chart, whether that Chiron be moving through a house, well it will always be moving through a house, but what house is it moving through in your chart? It's going to point to that area being key and the need for you to develop courage, to be bold, to take steps forward in that area. And also to face the fears that are rooted in something that happened when you were a kid. That's still getting in your way. Slade: Well this is freaking me out because, not to make it all about me... Dena: I love it when you talk about you. Slade: Since it's my show and you're my astrologer, and I've already aired a bunch of laundry that you and I have talked about, the whole thing with some of the romantic stuff going on in my chart right now, which we had a conversation about. That sort of opened some doors for me that I ended up doing this episode a few weeks ago about how I had put this curse on myself when I was younger and I then did a follow up episode with Åsa Poeche about the concept of using shamanic principles to reverse or to retrieve some of those lost pieces. And so behind the scenes, I mean I'll come back and talk about this on it's own show, but one of the things that I found really quickly after talking to her was that the incidents that I was talking about and speaking about it as if it was the beginning of this curse really weren't. There were other events that led up to them and I started just to sort of jump back in time all the way back to something that happened when I was four. So I have had this big 'Aha' moment that what I perceived as some kind of issue that I had placed on myself or whatever, was actually something that happened to me at a really early age and I responded to it in such a way that that emotional wound then defined how I defended myself in a lot of areas going forward, that were connected with that. And then the whole idea of like, why do I feel the impulse to suddenly talk about all this publicly, and one of my reasons intellectually for doing that was, one of the components of a shamanic ritual is to have the tribe present when somebody's being healed. So one of the things we talked about was the fact that this community of people who listen to this show, we're kind of holding that space and so I am actually asking for my community to hold space for me while I heal this. Consequently, hopefully they will get some kind of information that they can use for themselves. But as you're talking about this idea of bravery, I feel lately, and I mean I'm kind of a brave person in some areas of my life but I do feel this sense of being more brave suddenly about things that are really deep in the closet. Like I've got a whole other layer back into storage now, you know what I mean? So I'm wondering if maybe that's what I'm experiencing. Dena: And you and I are both going through Chiron return so we can talk a little bit about that and how just Chiron return in general because anybody with Chiron in Aries is going to be experiencing Chiron return some time between now and 2027. So let me just quickly note the dates for that. So Chiron is in Aries from now through to June 19 of 2026. Dips into Taurus for awhile and then comes back into Aries from September 17th, 2026 through June 14th of 2027. So really about 8 years more, right? With a little dip into Taurus in between. So Chiron return, it only happens once in your life unless you live to be about 100, which some of us do. But at that point I don't know how much work we'll be doing. Slade: Who cares, at that point. Dena: Yeah. At that point I'm just sipping my margarita on the porch. At 50 is when most people are experiencing it, either a year either side of that, could be when it starts for you and it lasts about a year and a half to two years. This transit, this Chiron return, it prompts us to revisit the very core wound, okay, of childhood. So when you say, the thing that happened when you were four, I have a suspicion that that is a key. And interestingly enough, the Chiron glyph looks like a key. Slade: gasp Dena: I know. Cool synchronicity, eh? That that's the key to unlocking your courage, your strength, your power, now. Slade: Wow. Dena: And this is why you're feeling braver, more courageous, more able to take risks. I'm experiencing some of the same. Feeling... and I think this in part comes with being 50 as well, or becoming 50, is you start to care less what other people think. You start to really own that this is just who I am. No apologies, right? Aries energy. No apologies and for better for worse, I may make enemies. I may have people not like me. These are also very Aries themes. I may make enemies. Not everybody has to like me. And that is so freeing and so healing. Slade: Yes. Dena: Big time, right? So that's the theme in this Chiron in Aries return. Slade: Would you be comfortable talking about maybe an example of how that's showing up for you? What kind of parts of your life are you seeing that in? Dena: Doing this podcast. Seriously. I mean I'm joking a little bit. I mean, doing things like this, putting myself out there and speaking to larger groups of people, because I think the core, one of the core wounds for me was standing out, being made to feel it was not safe to stand out, or to be visible because of themes of my childhood, you know, of having narcissistic parents that made it feel like, no, you're not supposed to stand out. We're supposed to be the show! So yeah. So that core wound about, I have to blend in, I have to hide my needs, I have to hide my vulnerabilities, that is what I am working through at this time. And what I'm finding is that, there's this voice that's guiding me. I feel like it's one of my guides that's probably overseeing this whole Chiron return for me, that's saying, "You go, you go girl. Do it. Just do it. And it'll be fine. We got you, but you just gotta keep pushing yourself here. I know it's scary. I know it's not fun sometimes, but there will be gains for you on the other side of this." So yeah. It's writing more. Being in front of people more. Sharing more of what I have to say. And that Chiron in my chart happens to be connected to my Mercury. It's squaring my Mercury so for people who know a little about astrology, natally, it's squaring my Mercury and then by transit, because of this return, it's squaring my Mercury. So it's really the use of the voice for me that's showing up in a big way. Slade: That's so much something that I associate with you too. Both technically, you have great sound and audio. Your sound is always really good and you have a great radio voice and it's something that I definitely associate with your persona. So I love to be one of the people who's like holding your hand and jumping off the cliff with this energy a little bit. And, you know, I have to say that, the weird thing is that I feel strangely kind of elated by it, even though it's terrifying, and normally maybe if you picked another time period, and you'd come knocking and wanted to talk to me about some of this stuff, I'd be like, I'm not talking to anybody about that. Maybe in a therapy session or something. But the idea of, there's almost this weird kind of giddy excitement that goes along with being vulnerable in this context. Because, and I appreciate you sharing how that plays out in your life because, I guarantee you, someone else heard what you just said and really identified with it. And that's their story too. And it's so crazy how you can do something that feels like, well this is really specific to me. And you talk about something so personal and yet people are able to identify with the energy of that and to automatically mirror that in some way and it really touches people emotionally and they have this response to it that, to tell you the truth, I only know that from having blogged for a decade and felt like every time I felt really hesitant about publishing something that was too personal, I always kinda had to grip my teeth and do it, and then feedback that I would see on the other side encourages me that it's probably going to be okay if I do it. Like, I should say yes to that more. But what is different for me in this moment is I feel a little bit excited about embracing that more. Dena: Yes. Exactly. I think that's the gift and the medicine, that we're feeling the effects of the medicine, basically. We're taking our medicine. We're doing this healing work and it's like, oh, that is bringing a shift in me. And the core of that Aries message itself is really self-acceptance. There's some of that with Pisces as well. Like, accepting oneself as one is, but also embracing with Aries who I am without apology, without caveats, without anything to say, I'm making an excuse for myself. So yeah. There is a major shift going on for those people with Chiron return happening, and that shift will continue for people with Chiron in Aries for the next several years. Slade: So generally it's a little bit of this energy for everyone, but for the people who are 50, or turning 50 during this period, it's like an intensified front and centre activity in our world right now, right? Am I explaining that right? Dena: That makes sense. Slade: And you know what, it kind of takes me back a little bit to all the solar eclipse stuff that happened in Leo a few years ago, right? Because there was that whole like, Leo-Aquarius message about who am I? What's my light? How am I a star? And then the flip side of that, who's receiving it? I feel like this is like, in a way, that was a version of this type of work. That was a little bit painful to revisit, or to kind of have laid bare for awhile. Because I am a Leo, and I think it was extra hot for the Leos, but I kind of feel like this is maybe a more active version of that introspective experience. Like I felt like that was a lot of soul searching. Let's just use that term. I did a lot of soul searching about what the hell am I doing here? And then this feels a little bit more like, "Oh! There's actually something to do, and a way of processing this energy, and on the other side of it, something that's been lingering for a lifetime may have a new role in my life. It may become a source of power as opposed to a source of a hamstring or whatever." Dena: Right. I mean, Chiron in Aries, one of the themes of Aries is taking action, right? So it's about putting those realizations and those insights that you have now into action. It's about doing. And so, for the collective, as well, it's about taking action on the insights and the healing work that you're doing. It's not about keeping it locked away in the 'I'll deal with that later' file. Or I'll think about that later. It's now time to act. We've all got our marching orders, I think, to use a military metaphor. With Aries' à propos to go forth and do, based on the healing work that we're doing. Slade: How do you think this is going to affect the United States as a nation. Actually there's a lot of nations that are going through identity crisis right now. Do you think this is playing into those stories at all? Dena: Dude, yeah. I was just thinking about that this morning. You read my mind and I was wanting to look at the United States' chart which I'm actually going to do right now. Maybe you could put this chart in the Show Notes as well. So the United States actually has a natal chart, the Sibley chart. It's cast for July 4, 1776 date, as you know, the birthday of the nation at 5:10pm, which I think was the signing of the declaration of independence, around when they estimate that is. This chart seems to be accurate and where that Chiron in Aries falls in this chart will be, in its entirety, really, in the fourth house of home and family, which is, in terms of a nation, like the homeland, the homeland identity, our connection to each other as a family of Americans. That's what the fourth house represents in terms of the U.S. chart. So Chiron is illuminating, bringing to the surface, the wounds that are core to our national identity and what we were founded on. 'Foundation' is another word that I would associate with the fourth house. So what that takes me to is, what's the origin story of the United States? We're built out of rebellion. We were built out of seeking our religious freedom and freedom from persecution. We were built on breaking away from an oppressive, tyrannical order as our first forefathers perceived it so that we can have more freedom, right? More independence. Very Aries word. Independence. So it is bringing up, how do we define ourselves now? Who are we as a family of Americans and what needs to be healed so we can continue to be a family or not? This is what's at stake. It seems pretty big to me. And I'm not just saying that. If I were to look at this in some alternate universe where Trump wasn't president, which I would want to go live there right now if that were the case... Slade: Yes, me too. Dena: Even if Trump weren't president, I would be looking at this and saying, these are the issues that we're facing next. How can we continue to be a family of Americans? How can we continue with that sense of unity when there are different factions that are wanting to break off and splinter off and be independent and rebel? So we're heading into a, yeah, a rough time. And we've been in a rough time for awhile. There have been other transits in this chart that have awoken the beast, so to speak. Slade: This is so interesting. We should do a whole show about "America - the Chart" at some point. Without going too far down that road, we'll save some of that conversation, but it occurs to me that the childhood wound for the foundation of the United States was slavery. It was a big wound, the whole concept of "all men are created equal" blahblahblah, which we have seen repeatedly bubbling up and coming to light over and over again, and the whole idea of nationalism versus being the melting pot. There's a lot of mixed messages in America's identity that are playing out right now in a very... Yeah, so... Well that's an idea for our next show! Maybe we'll do that for summer when it's like, near the birthday of the United States. Dena: That sounds great, yeah. I could look at all the transits for the United States. It'd be a good check in. Slade: Let's do that. Alright, so just to let everyone know, we've got some resources. You've already written and prepared some articles on your blog, two links that I'm going to put in the Show Notes. Tell everybody what those are. Dena: Great. So the first one is a post about Chiron in Aries just in general for the collective. So, what does it mean? The symbolism of Chiron in Aries, and in that post, I also share a personal story about my having Chiron in Aries natally to illustrate what that energy might be like for the collective. And then in the following post, it's specifically about Chiron in Aries as its affecting each sun sign, so if you know your sun sign, you can get some good information about how is this time of Chiron in Aries going to be affecting you personally as that sun sign? So that kind of astrology, sun sign astrology, it can be somewhat specific but not entirely specific. So of course, if you really want to know how Chiron is laying in your person chart, definitely feel free to reach out to me for a reading, or to another astrologer for a reading, because you really need that specificity of birth time in the chart to know where it is by house and by aspect to your natal planets. But hopefully in that post, there's some good information for you in terms of your sun sign as it's affected by this. Slade: Very cool. Everybody can go to DenaDeCastro.com if they want to get a reading with you and we'll put those longer, more specific links specifically to those articles in the Show Notes and they'll also be on my blog and I think I shared them on Facebook as well if anybody has recently seen those. Dena, thank you so much. This was a really cool conversation. Dena: Thank you, Slade. As always, it was totally my pleasure.

The Member Spotlight Mini Series continues as Jen and Annie interview Beth, a long-time Balance365 members whose daily gym selfies help keep other community members stay motivated. Beth is one of the amazing women in the Balance365 community - tune in for her inspiring, down to earth perspective on healthy habits and the good that comes from them that goes far beyond weight loss.     What you’ll hear in this episode: What was going on for Beth when she joined How Beth found the Balance365/Healthy Habits Happy Moms community Getting past when you get “stuck” The habit that made the biggest difference for Beth Meal planning for a season - Beth’s approach Why Beth does daily gym selfies How Beth found habits became wellness snowballs The role of mutual support between women on social media Feminism and weight loss The problem with goal weights Setting goals you can control vs goals you can influence Beth’s advice to anyone on the fence about Balance365 Beth’s advice to anyone feeling stuck about starting the program Weight loss of a byproduct and the other benefits of eating in a balanced way Moderation as a way to reclaim the body you were meant to have Balanced eating as a way to manage existing health conditions The role of the diet industry in weight gain   Resources: New Jeans And Vacation Without Shame: Sarah’s Story Small, Sustainable Changes: A Balance365 Journey With Danica How To Fall In Love With Exercise, Even If You Hate It Vivienne McMaster Episode 21: Before You Delete – How To Handle A Photo You Hate Beth’s Instagram Learn more about Balance365 Life here Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Play, or Android so you never miss a new episode! Visit us on Facebook| Follow us on Instagram| Check us out on Pinterest Join our free Facebook group with over 40k women just like you! Did you enjoy the podcast? Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or Google Play! It helps us get in front of new listeners so we can keep making great content. Transcript Annie: Thank you so much for joining us for another episode of Balance365 Life radio. We are back today with our mini series called Members Spotlights. This allows us to introduce you to Balance365 community members who are just killing it inside the program so you can take their wisdom and stories and learn from them. They are busy women and moms just like you who are changing their habits, their mindsets and reaching their goals. Today you're going to hear from one Balance365 member who is determined to find changes she could make that produce results without taking over her life. Beth is a seasoned member of our community and is a self-proclaimed member of the slow starter team but since deciding to take action she has made great strides towards her goals including more balanced dinners and consistent exercise. I can't wait for you to hear more about Beth's experience. Enjoy! Beth, welcome to Balance365 Life Radio, how are you? Beth: I'm OK. How are you guys? Annie: We are golden, we're so happy to have you, we as in me and Jen. Jen's here too. Jen, how are you? Jen: Hi, good. Yes. Annie: We woke you up. You are in a beautiful house coat this morning. Lauren: My Instagram audience is quite accustomed to seeing this housecoat so all good, all good. Not ashamed! Annie: Now it's a signature look and full disclosure, I put one on my wish list. Jen: You don't have a housecoat. Annie: I don't have a housecoat. We call them a robe- Jen: That's bizarre. Annie: Beth, do you call it a housecoat or a robe? Beth:  So I call it a robe but what I wear is a housedress. Jen: Oh, I love that. Annie: That's next level, is that like a nightgown? Beth: Yep. Annie: So Jen- Jen: That's my 1950s dream, like but with rights. Annie:  I don't know how you can not get twisted when you sleep in house coats. Beth: I don't sleep in it. Jen:  Sometimes I sleep in my housecoat. It depends what's going on in my life. Beth: I keep it next to my bed so I can throw it on when I have to go deal with things but no, I'm not wearing it to bed, no. Jen: No, I wear my nighties, they're these silky long things, I don't. I just, you should try it. Annie: No, I'm good in my tank top and sweats. Jen: It's like that meme that went around with the spaghetti straps and the boobs out. Annie: Boobs falling out. Jen: That is me sleeping in a tank top. Beth: Remember when we were like "We're going to stay on topic" Annie: I know that's what I was just going to say, before we started recording we were like, I was talking about how I am pretty good at staying on topic but Jen and Beth are chatty cathies in the most wonderful way possible, they have a lot to say and whereas like, I'm going to keep these ladies on topic and look at us now. Jen: I heard you going for, I saw you going for the B word there and then your lips changed to ladies. Beth: I really respect where they were going. Annie:  You know what, the B word in my vocabulary is a term of endearment. Jen: Yes. Annie: But we have also labeled this podcast as clean which is very, very challenging for me so I feel like I deserve snaps for that. OK so, Beth, you have a long, long time member of Balance365 and you have actually been one of those women we've kind of consulted on across the years, I've called you personally and said like "Hey, what do you think of this? What's the vibe on this? What's the community feel on this? And you kind of been,  I don't know, like a good sounding board because ultimately we're here for you and our community and you've always been really in touch with our community, so thanks for joining us on the show, it's like about time we have you on. Beth:  Yay! I don't know what to say. I'm just happy to be here. Annie: OK. Well, why don't you tell us the Cliff Notes version of how you found Balance365. Beth: Sure, so my sister-in-law, who was recently featured on your podcast, Sarah, she added me to the public group without telling me and this is back in the day when you guys added people in like large groups and so one day and just all the stuff was in my feed. And I was a little bit shocked but it was a message that I really felt good about and it was close to what I was already kind of following in my own social media. So I was in the public group probably, well, you know, 6 months or so and then you guys had a, at the time again Balance365 was going all at once, people were going in groups and so I joined in September of 2016. And yeah, that's the Cliff notes version of how I ended up with y'all. Annie: In hindsight, do you think adding people to the group without telling them is a good start? Because that comes up a lot, like- Jen: That still happens. Annie: And then people, sometimes people are like "How did I get in this group and what is this?" Because our message is quite revolutionary and our opinions so to get and it's big, it's active in a really great way but as you said, when you join the group it can be a little bit like "Whoa!" Like. Beth: Yeah so I think that that strategy can backfire or it can go well, right, so I think for me it was great but I think sometimes for the community it's hard, like people adding, you know, kind of drive by adding their friends to the community, especially if your attitude is "My friend really needs to do the program because she's so crazy and won't stop talking about her bizarre diet, I'm going to add her to this group" like that's horrifying to the community, right, like, because then this person is in there being like "Let me show you my before and after,  I lost 100 pounds in 4 months and I never ate any carbs " and you're like "Ahh!" Jen: Totally and then it kind of disrupts the community and some people feel upset even, because they say "I'm in this group to get away from that kind of stuff" Annie: And then the individual can often get defensive and- Jen: Yeah, it's really difficult. I think it's better if people organically find us. Beth: In general I would agree. Annie: Or you approach your person, your friend in real life and say "Hey I've got a group I think you'd really like, would you mind if I add you? Or can I send you a link to join?" Yeah. Well, I'm so happy that Sarah added you and if you haven't listen to Sarah's podcast. Sarah has such a wonderful story too. She's had so many wins in our group and you can find her podcast, we can put that in the show notes too, she's just a gem of a woman. Jen: I enjoy her. Beth: She's my fave. Annie: Is she your only sister? Beth: She's actually my sister-in-law. We're married to twins so I met my husband in college and then I set her up with his brother. We were high school best friends. Annie: Oh that's perfect. I see what you did there, you were just trying to curate your family with people you like. Beth: No new friends. Annie: I love it and now look at you, you're on a podcast with 40,000 women. OK. So, let's let's get to it. You joined Balance365 in 2016. You purchased it a while ago but honestly, as you have been open and shared with us in our community, that it took you awhile to committing to the process and since fully committing you've experienced quite a few changes including weight loss. Can you tell us more about your experience with that? Beth: Sure, so when I joined in September 2016 I was just finishing law school. And starting a career at 35 and I really thought, like, now I'll have too much to implement some habits and lose weight and that was crazy. I don't know what I was thinking. I was entering a new field I was going from having not work a full time job in 8 or 9 years to working 50 plus hours a week so like, it really was not a perfect time for me to focus on implementing habits but I just kind of slowly would implement, like, you know, one habit halfway for 4 or 5 months and you know, dabbled, I did a lot of dabbling. "Oh maybe this is the one! Maybe this is the one! Maybe this is the one!" And there is nothing wrong with that. I actually think that a lot of women when they join program they kind of need a time of doing that. Because they've been relying on programs that project, that portion of my growth. I was stuck there for quite a while, like just about 2 years. And for me that wasn't great, like, I think I was there too long. I needed to kick start something sooner and I think, I see a lot of women in our community who sometimes have that problem, like they get to this point where they're like, "I have to completely address my sleep problem before I can address anything else or I have to completely address this one thing that I'm worried about before I can address something else and for me, I was getting stuck there. Jen: We, it's sort of like, it's like you're waiting for things to be perfect before you can start or something like "My life must look like this and then I can start" and Danica addressed this in her podcast with us as well and I mean, she had the same realisation, nothing changes unless something changes and there is never going to be a perfect time. Beth: Yeah, I, you know, I think it was not the right time, like it was not a good time for me to start when I joined the program. I'm not sad that I did it when I did. I'm happy for the time that I spent allowing myself, because I think that's the other thing is I think some of the women come in and they're, some people who come into a group in any kind of group and they're like, I paid for this and now I have to do it, right? And I think that's relatively unproductive a way to think about things because this is a lifelong experience, right? I can change my habits from now until I die. I don't have to change them all right, you know. And so I think there was a positive to be had with sitting and being like nothing is really changing and that's OK but if you, for me I was starting to feel frustrated with that, that kind of for me was the moment of being like "OK" but then as Danica said, if I don't change something, nothing will change and so for me, some of it was just identifying what kind of habit I can change that would produce a change in my life but not take over my life. I don't want a program that takes over my life. I think that's really important to me. I can't think of anything less interesting than thinking about food and exercise all day and so I needed something that I could make small change and for me that was, I just planned my dinners and then I just ate what I planned. And it's so boring and so mundane but it's what I did and it immediately resulted in changes to my body. Jen: So you were, I guess, that would be your dinner habit which is just one section of Balance365 that we have you address and did it dramatically change what you were eating or how much you were eating or? Beth: So really it was a matter of just, I think it changed the macro makeup of my- Jen: Right, the balance of it. Beth: Yeah, the balance. I was already eating all the all the correct things, I just was kind of addressing, you know, how much protein I really needed at dinner. I was looking at my dinner as a whole instead of just like, well, here's the meat and your vegetable or whatever, like, I was kind of looking at it as whole, you know,  like, "OK, what can I change? What will help me stay full? What will be satisfying? What will I be willing to eat? I am known, I suppose, in the community I meal plan once for a whole season because I hate meal planning, I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. So I meal plan at the beginning of a season and then we need the same 7 dinners for 13 weeks, which is not for everyone but it works for me and so by picking things that I actually knew I would eat and that were balanced I was less likely to be like "I don't feel like eating that! I'm just going to the drive through?" or I think one big thing for me is they were easy. I picked easy things, which I will say during the 2 years when I was not actually implementing the program, I for sure would see Lauren and Annie talking about hating cooking and I would be like, "Oh come on, ladies, like, it's just not that hard, like, just, like how hard is it, right? But as I implemented this career that, you know, required, like, I have to lean on my husband a lot more to do a lot of that stuff and so planning things that I knew that at the end of the day it would be, there was chicken in the fridge and I could just take a bagged salad and throw it on top of it, like, it made it so that I would actually do it and so I just did, I just ate the dinner that I planned. I think that's so boring but it's what I did. Jen:  The thing is studies show that one of the biggest contributing factors to our food choices is convenience and so this is not it's not necessarily a flaw of humans, it's something, you know, it's population wide but we are busy people, we are very busy people and that's why meal planning works. The majority of women who work with us are actually working women, like working outside of the home, women and you know and so you know, we get it. Like, I mean, Annie, Lauren and I work so you, when it comes to supper time, you know, it's just, you know, I don't have time in my day to sit down in the morning and decide what we're having for the day and go to the grocery store and get all those ingredients and you know, I used to do that. I used to really enjoy it, like, I really did enjoy that component of being a stay at home but working, being a working mom is a whole new ballgame and yeah, meal planning can be just such a stress reducer, in a working family, I shouldn't say woman, I should say family. Bring boys in close here. Annie: You know, circling back to when you're talking about how Lauren I hate cooking. Beth: Sorry. Annie: No, no, I can own that because I don't, it's not that I can't, I mean, I can follow directions and probably cook some meals but I just don't want to, like, just like some people don't want to run or don't want to exercise or just like that's just not how I want to spend my time so that's why I really love Balance365 is because I'm not like, if it doesn't work for you, it doesn't work period. And so for me to go out and buy this meal plan that requires all this cooking or all this meal prepping or all this like grocery shopping, like that's just not going to, like it to me it feels like me trying to fit a, what is it? A square peg into a round hole, like, I could maybe do that for a while, like  white knuckling, I could like stick to the plan for a little bit but eventually I'd like, that doesn't sound fun, like, that's just not like something I enjoy. So I can still balance my meals in a way that works for me that doesn't require a lot of cooking or a lot of meal prepping or on the flipside, someone that likes to cook can also do a lot of cooking with it if they want. If that's how they want to spend their time and it's like no judgment or no, neither one is better and worse than the other, it's just what works for you, period, is all we're really concerned with. Jen:  I wanted to circle back to those 2 years where you weren't inactive, that's the thing, it's not like you bought and then you were inactive, you were very active in the group particularly in, we have a spin off group and some spin off groups, I guess, it's the Facebook group that's attached to our strength program Arms like Annie and you were active in Balance365 as well as you were quite active in Arms Like Annie. So it's not that you actually didn't do anything. You implemented an exercise habit. Beth: That's true, yep, but as, I mean, we've talked about it in the community, many times, like, an exercise habit is wonderful and there's so many positive things you gain from an exercise habit, but you know, if I just change nothing about my dietary habits, my nutrition habits, you know, it may not make a big dent in my fat loss and it didn't but it did produce lots of other positives. Jen: Absolutely, there's so many, you know, I would say fat loss is the last reason to work out. I mean, that's me personally, I don't know how other people feel but there's just so many health benefits to it that you don't even have to throw fat loss on the list, so but that's so, that's wonderful for you, really, holistically to have an exercise habit nailed and then you moved on to nutrition and- Annie: You know, that's actually one of my favorite things about Beth is that she is posting her selfies, her gym selfies at ridiculous hours in the morning because sleep is, you know, a love hate thing with you sometimes, so you go to the gym in the morning by yourself and you post your selfie and half the time you're like "Look, I didn't want to do this but I'm here and now and now I feel better or now I know my day is going to like take off in a completely different direction had I hit the snooze alarm or turn off the alarm and not come at all" and I love that you own it, just like I own I don't like cooking. You don't really like exercise but you see the benefits, like, you feel better, your day goes better, the rest of your habits seem to fall in line, which you've said before, it's kind of a snowball habit, like, your day is just different when you exercise, right? Beth: Yes, that whole, yeah, there's a lot I guess I'm trying to stay on topic, there's a lot to say about my gym habit and my selfies and all of that.  I do find I don't enjoy exercise, it's not, I danced in, like, my youth, when I was pre-college I was a dancer and I loved that but I never really found that same level of enjoyment from any other kind of exercise, including like, people were like "You should take a group fitness class, that's like dance based." No thank you, I don't want to, I'm not interested. It's not the same. You know, and people are like "You should do the barre method." Please, no thank you. I will just not. I will just watch my daughters dance and I will get the same enjoyment from that and my sons. I get enjoyment from that but not with the exercise. So I am, I did, I don't like cardio at all, and so I bought Arms like Annie and I think when I bought it there might not have been a  spinoff group yet and it turned out the Facebook's spinoff group really helped me achieve consistency with my habit and I feel so ridiculous, I will be honest, like, the selfies feel ridiculous to be me most days. But so there's a couple things, I guess, on the selfie thing, one is, I was mentioned in a previous podcast about what if you hate exercise, so I do, I put selfies every day when I'm in the gym, partly to create a sense of accountability to the group that I've said I will do this and I will do it and I show up. And as weird as it feels to me because I don't think I've done anything inspirational, like, I have women both in our community and women who like follow me on Instagram who are like, they feel that it is inspirational that I get up and I go to the gym. Jen: It is. I find, sometimes I see them in the morning and I'm like "Oh, just go, Jen, just do it, Beth did it. Annie:  Beth did it, you can do it too. Beth: It's hard for me to see it as inspirational. I really try and treat my social media like, I try to treat it like a real, when I was coming, when I was having kids, I'm a little older than, my kids are older than y'all's kids and when they were coming up I found it really hard, there wasn't as much social media and I felt really alone in hating being a mom, like I hated it and I felt alone, so when I tried to put myself out on social media in any way, I tried to be really honest about who I am and how it feels. So I do say, I hate cardio, I hate that I'm here in the gym, I say "I had to talk myself into every single set I did today." And I feel like, I see that there are women who feel the same way and they do see it as inspirational that I went. It's funny because I kind of see it as just me like kvetching into the like universe but I see why people feel it's inspirational but also, I do the selfies for me. So a long time ago in the community, I think it was when I was in the public facing group, Jen had recommended something and I somehow came to to the work of Vivian McMaster, she's a photographer and she focuses on, she has programs focusing on self portraiture as part of, like, self acceptance and Annie said the same thing a number of times in the group, like, just taking pictures of ourselves and just seeing what we look like can get us to body neutrality. Jen:  We have a whole podcast, not a whole podcast but we've mentioned this in a podcast and it's the whole thing of if you don't like the way you look in photos, you shouldn't take less, you should take more and look at yourself more. You need to get used to the way you look. Beth: Yeah, so I am, I really have tried to, like, so I will say I don't post a lot of unattractive selfies of myself, I'm still extraordinarily vain. Annie: Yeah, like you're feeling yourself. Beth: But I take, literally, in a month, probably thousands of selfies, like, I met admit how narcissistic that sounds but whatever, here it is. And they are attractive and unattractive and they are from angle that look good for me and the angles that don't because when I take them and I see myself I become, like, inoculated against seeing myself. And there was a long time where I was taking a ton of gym selfies and I was feeling good because I was taking a specific angle and I was avoiding all the other angles and I went on a trip with my friends and somebody posted, you know, a picture of a group of us and "Ahhh!" It was like a wake up call that, like, OK, like, I've lost some of the honesty of this practice. And I needed to get back to taking pictures and seeing myself for what it really is and this is just my body, this is just the body that I live in and it's fine and sometimes I feel really great about it and other times I feel kind of ambivalence about the whole thing and neither of those is the right emotion, they are just how I feel in that moment and so, I, so, yeah, so I take selfies for me as well I don't just take them to be an inspiration to the community. Annie: I love it because, to me, to me it's an act of self-love and it's an expression of self-love and I think, it's, sometimes women need permission to do the same and when they see other women taking selfies at the gym from good angles, from bad angles, like, this is cute, I don't really like this but I'm going to post it anyway because this is me like it gives women the permission to do the same and in fact, along the same lines of kind of what both you and Jen were talking about is we don't really cultivate self love by just focusing on the stuff we love, it's also exploring the stuff that we maybe don't love or even the stuff we hate and like why do we hate this, what is it about this, where did this start, where did this come from? Like and how can we move through that or at least like not be so dang uncomfortable with it, like you said when you see that photo, like, "Oh my god, delete, untag, get rid of that, I don't ever want to see it again!" Like maybe just sit with it, which we have a whole another podcast on that we can link in the show notes too but yeah, so I love that about you, Beth, I love that you, you just own it and if you've ever posted a selfie on social media best sees it, she is your top hype woman. She is like, liking that stuff, she's commenting, she's responding to your story, like, "Yes, woman, yes" Jen:  Women should, they should do that for each other, we should be celebrating each other non stop because we are coming out of an era where we shamed, we were shamed and we've shamed each other. We are coming out of that era and it's time we women need to stop hiding, post all the selfies. Beth:  Absolutely. Annie: Beth will have, I'm just going to, I hope you don't mind me- Jen: I'm going to post one today now. And I'm going to wait for Beth to comment on it. Annie: I hope you don't mind me sharing, Beth but Beth, you even posted, because we're friends on Facebook, like, I think you said something like, I've had a glass of wine or something, post your selfies so I can hype you up. You were going to work, you're like "This is like, I'm going to spend, you know, X amount of time hyping up women in my life, like, telling them how awesome they are." Jen: We're doing a selfie now. Beth: Okay, sorry, i just needed to take one for the gram, I was doing it for the gram. So yes I, so I have a very boring career as a real estate attorney, it's not anything real super exciting and it's not the work that I, I mean- Jen: It's not Law and Order? Beth: No and I love what I do but it is not, it's not lifting up people, you know, the way that I want my life, the way I want my life's work to be and what I have come to realize is like, you can have a career and you can also have a life's work and they don't have to be the same thing and I really truly believe that my life's work is about helping people feel good about themselves and accepting themselves and so it's weird because, like, I'm not, I'm just a girl who has friends on Facebook. Like, I'm not, I'm not, I don't have a public facing Facebook page and on how that's not what my life is about, I can only touch so many lives because I am a busy mom but I have a community of, especially because I went to law school late in life, I have a community of women who are younger than me who, I'm like, you could do this before you're 35, you could be in love with the life that you are choosing, you could be in love with it now and you can accept yourself radically now, you do not have to wait until you're an old woman, you don't have to wait until you have gray hair to decide to love what you look like and so I do. I will, especially, it's true if I drink I'm especially likely to just troll my friends' Instagrams. Jen: Loving up on all of them. Beth:  But I will also, like, if I'm having a bad day I will ask people to post selfies in my comment sections so I can tell them how great they are because- Jen: Oh, that's so lovely. Beth: It really does make me feel better, like I feel better doing that and as Jen, I do think, I think loving yourself radically as a woman is a feminist act, like, I think it is saying to society that, like, you know, you can kick rocks, like, this is what we're doing now. Jen: Yeah, we're loving each other, like we are, this is not a woman against woman society anymore.. Beth: No and I saw a meme the other day day and it said something along the lines of "Who needs to send scandalous pictures to men when we can just celebrate each other" and that's how I feel, right, like, you don't have to, like I don't know, I don't care, you don't have to think I'm cute. Like, my girlfriends will hype me up and I am, I joke, I'm everybody's auntie on Facebook because if you post a selfie I am going to tell you how great you look. And I just, I, it's part of, I think, it's one of the things I love most about myself and so it matters. Annie: I love it about you too. Jen: I know that you have to go, Beth, so here's what I hear. I hear radical self acceptance, really bad A-S-S gym habit. Working out, building the guns every morning and as a byproduct of and you started implementing nutrition habits, balanced nutrition habits make you feel good and as a byproduct you have seen some weight loss that you are, I don't know if pleased is the right word, how do you feel about the weight loss? Because I know you are a very, you are, you've, you strongly identify with the feminist movement, I know that about you and so sometimes in the feminist circles weight loss is a touchy subject, right, because as you know it's been used to abuse women for so many years, so how do you feel as a strong feminist who has changed their nutrition habits and is losing weight? Beth: You know, I'm pretty ambivalent about weight loss, if I'm being really honest. I, some of that is because of all the things you mentioned, right, like how our bodies look has been such a weapon against us over the centuries. And so some of it's that and some of it is I have, well, I didn't do a lot of dieting in my life, I did do a lot of binge and restrict, just traditional trying not to eat the bad thing- Jen: Just the traditional- Beth: Just the traditional, you know, thing that we all do, I don't eat anything and then I eat all the things. So I have lost tremendous amounts of weight and been congratulated by the world and then have the experience of gaining it back and feeling like there was something wrong with me for having gained it back so I am a little bit ambivalent about weight loss for that reason, like, just that I want to make sure that I don't put too much of my value in it. Jen: Right. Beth: But, like, so I actually shared that my mother's in town right now and I shared this story with her the other day and I thought it was really, it's one of the things I gained from Balance 365 that I'm the most thankful for. I was in my doctor's office the other day and I told him I was, like, "Look, you know, I'm doing all this stuff and like the weight, really, like it's just, it's a slow slog. I feel like it's not coming off. I'm doing the things I'm supposed to do and it's not coming off."   And he told me, he said, "You know, you're an attorney who has 4 children. You live a very high stress life and it will be hard for you to lose weight,  like it's going to be hard, like the stress is going to make it difficult," and he said, "So, you know, I wouldn't put a lot of weight on that. I wouldn't put a lot of your focus on trying to lose weight because it may not happen, you know" and it felt really, at first, really discouraging. But there were lots of times in my life where if I had heard that message from a doctor that I would have been like "Well, I'm calling it. It's ice cream sundaes for the rest of the week and I'm staying in bed and I'm not going to the gym" and instead, I mean, this was probably 2 months ago, I have only increased my gym consistency and focused more on my eating because it really turns out weight loss is not my aim doing this, ultimately. I've stopped linking the things that I do for my health to how fat I am. Like I've just stopped linking those two things. Jen: Good for you. The weight loss is just a byproduct, like, it really, you know, it's and that's what Balance365 is about and that's what a lot of women's journeys have to be is that weight loss is not a driver, it's not like, you know, where for a lot of women it was, right? It was like wake up in the morning, OK, what do I have to do to lose weight today, right? Instead of going, waking up in the morning, saying "Hey, how am I  taking care of me today?" and the byproduct of that, you know, it is what it is and for some people that could be weight loss. Annie: And one of the kind of philosophies that we preach is that weight loss is not a behavior, it's not a habit, it's a byproduct or it can be a byproduct of our habits and that's not, that's, I mean, we're a habit based behavior change company, so we're focusing on behavior change that you're after, that's important to you, that matters to you, that works for you and if weight loss is a byproduct of that and you're comfortable with it, then we're comfortable with it. Beth: Yeah, and that was a big plus for me here because I've always been like "What's your goal?" "Well, my goal is to lose 50 pounds or my goal is to lose two pant sizes or my goal is to, you know, whatever" and it was like it was revolutionary for me for my goal to be "I'm just going to show up at the gym," like, I'm just going to show up and I may not have any strength gains and I may not lose any weight and I may not have any result, there may not  be a result, I'm just, my goal is something that I can control which is shocking because most of us have been in programs for our whole lives where the goal was something that in reality we have very little control over, right? Jen: Right. Beth: You can do all the things right, you can exercise perfectly and you still may not lose weight and you have no control over it so your goal is something you're like, I may never gets to, that's the worst, who wants that kind of goal? Jen: Yeah, I mean, I think you if you know your body well, you know, you can influence your weight, you know, that there are certain behaviors that influence weight loss but having, I mean this is why we have to be very careful with setting goal weights is that what if you, what if you are living a life you feel very healthy and balanced and you're not at that goal weight? Like, what are you willing to do, right and so it's sometimes it's just disappointing to set them, right, like? Annie: Right, well and even in our experience after coaching thousands of women, you know, the goal weight that many women have for themselves is like so unrealistic. "Where did you get that number?" "Well, that's what I graduated high school at. That's what I got married at 30 years ago." Jen: And you dieted for 6 months before your wedding day and now- Annie: Yes and I think, you know, Jen and I talk about this all the time, you know, Jen and I similarly, we're within a year apart with 3 kids, same height but Jen and I have like a 50 pound difference between us and so for me to think that like, "I could be Jen's weight," or for Jen to think "Oh, I could be Annie's weight," like that's just absurd. Like it's just, like, not realistic on either end of the spectrum and so yeah, I think that's just something to consider when, if you're listening and you have a have a goal weight in mind or if that's, like, in your back pocket it's like maybe give that some thought- Jen: Maybe focused on your behaviors and as an act of self-love you can let your weight be what it's going to be while you are pursuing behaviors that feel really good and really healthy for you. Beth: Well and I don't, I guess, I didn't, I don't want to sound like, you know, like, I sound like a Debbie Downer, like, I feel ambivalent about weight loss and you might not lose anything and I should say I have lost 15 pounds since the beginning of September so it's not as if, I'm not trying to say, like, it's impossible to lose weight or you you can't lose fat. Absolutely, it's possible but it's just for me, it's been very freeing to have goals that have nothing to do with my weight, that are just goals that I have control over so I don't want to make it sound like "Eh, lose weight" Annie: Beth, I enjoy you so much. OK, real quickly and then we'll let you get on with your day because, you know, it's a nice Sunday afternoon before the holidays, perfect timing for a podcast. If someone was on the fence and they were listening about joining Balance365 what advice would you give them? Beth: I think there is never, I don't think there's anyone who couldn't benefit from the program. So I will start by saying, "I think you should do it." And alternatively, as a second thing, if you are in a position where, like, you're worried, like, financially I don't know if I can do it, or you know, if you have reasons that you are holding yourself back that are valid ones that for you, then I do think, my experience is that there is certainly benefit to being in the group before you're ready to make changes but it's OK to wait, it's OK to wait until you're ready. So if you feel like it's not right then maybe it's not right right now but there's no one who I wouldn't say "Yeah this is a program that you can benefit from." So, you know do it, you can hang with me in the slow start club. There's a lot of us, there are a lot of us in the slow start club and I think now, kind of my purpose, it's not another life's work but like my goal in the group is to kind of try and help those people who are still hanging back, wanting to start, not knowing how to. Jen: We have a lot of Balance365ers who are listening and so if you and some of them are like, they're holding back from just getting started, so what would your advice be because I saw you tell somebody the other day in the group, I'm not sure what the post was about but you said "Hey look, I waited two years, I think, you waited two years to get started and that was a big mistake." Beth: Yeah. Jen: So what would your advice be to move people out of that zone of like- Annie: Contemplation. Jen: I've started but not starting, I've purchased but I'm not starting. Beth: I think I would say, "OK, so I think, my personal opinion is that starting with the balancing one meal is the right way to go. Now, that was what was right for me, not everybody is going to start the same way and  but I'm speaking to people that for whom balancing a meal would be a good way to start and here's what I would say to those people: you have to eat something for dinner tonight anyway. Jen: Right, you might as well balance it. Beth: You have to. It's not as if your stress means you don't eat dinner, in fact, most of us are here because our stress means extra dinner, so like,  if you are in a red zone and Annie and I, when we tried to record this in the past and I was so sick, we talked a lot about how I have ambivalent feelings about the red zone as well, like it's not, I kind of feel like "Eh, if you don't want to do it, don't do it. For me, that's a big part of what I love about the community is there's not this sense of like "No excuses," like, there aren't really truly, there are no excuses, you just, you know, you either do it or you don't do it, because you want to or because you feel like you can or whatever, it's fine. If you don't do it, you don't do it. Nobody is watching. Jen: And no one's judging you. Beth: Like, I don't care. I don't care if eat a balanced dinner, like, you're cool. I have met so many wonderful women in the community and you know what, if they don't eat a balance dinner,  I could give two, right? Jen: Well, some people don't take action because they feel like, especially in this sort of "wellness industry area" they they don't take action because first of all, taking action in the past has been this big thing, overhauling their life, it's not like, "Hey, just balance your dinner. It's just like this one thing." It's like this overhaul, right and number two is you feel like people are watching you and you're going to be judged and you're going to get this right or you're going to get it wrong and it's like, we're not here to judge you, we're not here, you can't pass or fail. This isn't a, you know, we're just working at change, all together. Beth: Yeah, I guess, so yeah, I guess my advice would be just pick a meal and balance it and it feels, I know it feels like there's 7000 things that are keeping you from doing it, I know it feels that way, because we all feel that way, we all feel like, like you said, it might be the judgment of past diets or it might be fear of failure or it might be actual things, right it might be a sick child or a marriage that's falling apart or it could be any number of things. I have interpersonal problems too. I have and that's not to say,"I have these problems and if I can do it you can do it." I mean, we're all going to live that way forever.I have yet to meet a mom who's like my day is just so smooth and I have nothing to do with my time except meal plan and make perfectly balanced dinners. Like, I've never met that woman. I've never met her. Jen: Yeah. Beth:  I don't think she exists. I think she's fake and so you're going to make dinner tonight. You are going to. You're going to eat something so choose to eat something that is closer to what you think would help you achieve your goals. So, for me that meant just planning, I'm going to be honest, like I said, I go to Pudova, I buy chicken and I throw it on top of a bag salad, that is what I eat like 3 nights a week when my children are not home because it means I don't have to do anything. It's my favorite and I probably would eat it 7 days a week if my children were not home and I didn't have to feed them. Jen: Beth, do you feel better? Like, I mean, is there anything, like, can we attach some feelings to this? So because eating balanced meals isn't about, we're not guiding women into eating more balanced meals for weight loss, that's not our primary driver, do you feel better eating more balanced meal? Beth: So yes, one, like, digestive health is better, obviously, when you eat vegetables, friends, like that's just true. Jen: It's just yes. Beth: It's just a fact about your digestive tract and my digestive health is better when I eat vegetables. I personally have some gall bladder issues and when I'm balancing my fats I feel better in that sense and I think my sleep has improved since I've been implementing more balanced eating, probably some of that is because if I'm not going through the drive through I'm less likely to drink caffeinated beverages late in the day. Jen: Right. Annie: Right. Beth: So there's a number of things that I think are positive and some of it, I won't lie, some of it is that fat loss has been a byproduct has also made me more comfortable in my body in a number of ways and so I think there's lots of positives that have come from eating a balanced dinner. Jen: Yeah, I mean, I heard from one of our members as far as the fat loss, she said you know it's the little things like bending down to tie my shoes and not having, you know, all this fat in the way, it's like physical comfort that she quite enjoys about losing weight off her body and I think that's OK to talk about, right, like there's only so much we can control each of us individually and as long as we're talking inside the constructs of what you, what is possible and achievable for you I think that's, you know, totally OK. And the other reality is that in the culture we live in that is so, so guided by diet culture a lot of women, a lot of women the bodies they are in are a result of years, decades of dieting and sometimes implementing these habits and seeing fat loss is about taking back the body you were meant to have before you got into this binge and restrict cycle that the diet industry pushed you into, resulting in actually living in a larger body than what is healthy and just your, what your natural body is, right and I'm here for that, too, right, so we say about Balance365, we're not trying to help women live at a body weight that's leaner than what's healthy for them, we're trying to get you to reclaim the body you were meant to have. Annie: I love these conversations with Beth because it's, like, not just about, like, this exterior, like, this has a very deeply rooted, deeply seated meaning of exploring, like, your relationship with yourself, your relationship, how your relationship with the world affects your relationship with your family and your other relationships and like, how, it just changes how you show up in the world on so many levels and so I just always love Beth's perspective. Jen: Me too. Annie: Yeah, OK, Beth, I know you have places to go, would you mind sharing your Instagram handle? Beth: Sure, my instagram handle is bethiclaus, beth like my name, i, claus, like Santa Claus and you can follow me, I think it's set to public right now but I'll probably get a private but if you ask to follow me and you're a woman- Jen: She'll let you. Beth:  I definitely will let you. If you're a man, who know, maybe not. Jen: We're going to link to your Instagram account in the show notes. Beth: Girlfriends only. And so yeah, I mean, yes, if you follow me and then you do an Instagram story, there's like a 90 percent chance if you put a selfie in there you'll get feedback from me. Jen: Praise emojis and heart eyes. Beth: Positive affirms only as I like to say. Annie: Yeah, it's, what a great, you know, it's like dropping a pebble into a pond and watching the ripple, like, expand out. It's wonderful. I think that's such a great way to spend your time. I can't, like how valuable is that, making other women feel good or just encouraging other women to feel good, so thank you both for joining, Jen, this was fun that you were able to join for a member spotlight. It was enjoyable. Jen:  Yes. Annie: Even in your house coat. Jen: Yes and now we can all go and enjoy Christmas. Annie: I know, I know but it's going to be way past Christmas by the time this comes out so- Beth:  Merry Christmas, y'all. Annie: Merry belated Christmas. Alright, thank you ladies, we'll talk soon. Beth: Bye. Jen: Bye.

We are sexual beings. God created us with a beautiful way of expressing deep love in marriage through the physical action of being one with our spouse, and it is the way he designed us, humans, to recreate, to multiply his image. Just like any wonderful and necessary part of God’s design and purpose, the enemy has found a way to destroy it. The last episode we talked about Aaron's struggle with pornography and how it affected our marriage. Today we thought we would share my struggle and pull into the light the truth that pornography is not just a guy problem. Dear Lord, We pray first and foremost that husbands and wives would give you their hearts, that they would obey all that you command in your word and that they would love you with all of their hearts. We pray that if any of them are addicted or struggling with pornography that they would choose to stop today. Holy Spirit, please remind us daily of Your desire for us to live holy and pure lives. We pray we would not live in hiding, but rather, may we be transparent with others, confessing our sin and repenting of it, so that it will not have a stronghold in our lives. Give us stamina to pray for protection against the enemy and against our flesh. Remind us every day to pray for ourselves, for our spouses, for our children, and for our children's future spouses. May we be men and women who choose to walk faithfully with You. In Jesus’ name, amen! Support this podcast by grabbing one of our marriage books. http://shop.marriageaftergod.com READ: [Aaron] Hey, we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God. [Jennifer] Helping you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. And today, we're gonna talk about my personal struggle with pornography and lust as a wife. [Aaron] Welcome to the Marriage After God podcast where we believe that marriage was meant for more than just happily ever after. [Jennifer] I'm Jennifer, also known as Unveiled Wife. [Aaron] And I'm Aaron, also known as Husband Revolution. [Jennifer] We have been married for over a decade. [Aaron] And so far, we have four young children. [Jennifer] We have been doing marriage ministry online for over seven years through blogging and social media. [Aaron] With the desire to inspire couples to keep God at the center of their marriage, encouraging them to walk in faith everyday. [Jennifer] We believe that Christian marriage should be an extraordinary one, full of life-- [Aaron] Love-- [Jennifer] And power-- [Aaron] That can only be found by chasing after God-- [Jennifer] Together. [Aaron] Thank you for joining us in this journey as we chase boldly after God's will for our life together. [Jennifer] This is Marriage After God. [Aaron] Hey, thanks for joining us on another podcast episode. Last week's episode was super, super powerful and impactful. We've had tons of messages from people just sharing how my story of addiction to pornography and how God freed me from it has blessed them and has brought them freedom. And again, it's not me. It's God working through my testimony. And in reality, it's his testimony 'cause of what he did in my life. But we thank you for joining us on this week's episode which is also gonna be very vulnerable and very sensitive to us, but we pray that it has an impact in your life. And if you've been enjoying our podcast and you haven't done so yet, we'd love to invite you to leave us a review, a star review, a star rating, and a text review. Those help other people find our podcast and we love reading 'em. They're really encouraging. [Jennifer] Also, we just wanted to invite you guys to take a minute to check out shop.marriageaftergod.com. That's a great way that you can help support our podcast, the Marriage After God podcast, by shopping through our store. And just to highlight one specific book, The Unveiled Wife, we're gonna be sharing on this sensitive topic today about my personal struggle with pornography and lust as a wife. And I share even more detail in The Unveiled Wife. So if you are on the store and you want to check that book out. You know, if this episode stirs anything in your heart and you just feel like you need an additional resource, check out The Unveiled Wife. [Aaron] Awesome. So here's the icebreaker question for this week. Who is the best cook in our marriage? [Jennifer] Before I answer that, I feel like I'm glad this question was a little bit light hearted because we're going into some sensitive stuff. So at least we can get all the laugh and everything out of the way. [Aaron] We'll laugh a little bit, I think. I'm nervous. We'll be careful. Yes, it is a nerve racking topic. [Jennifer] Okay, who's the best cook? I am. [Aaron] Yeah, okay. [Jennifer] You are? [Aaron] We both are. I would say I think we have strengths in different areas of cooking. [Jennifer] I was gonna say you are. [Aaron] You are an incredible baker. Your biscuits are amazing. And I love smoking stuff in my Traeger. [Jennifer] You're great at it. [Aaron] Yeah, so I think we're good. We didn't use to be good at it. We have some funny stories. [Jennifer] We were terrible at cooking. [Aaron] Remember that one time you made spaghetti and you forgot to boil the noodles? [Jennifer] Yeah, so it was baked ziti. [Aaron] Oh yeah, baked ziti. [Jennifer] And it's one of those dishes where you kind of like layer and then bake. And so I just threw everything together and started baking away, and we had friends coming over. [Aaron] We pull it out of the oven. [Jennifer] It was like nine o'clock at night and I'm like you guys, it's still not done. I don't know. [Aaron] We try eating it. It's like crunchy. We had to pull all the noodles out and boil 'em-- [Jennifer] Yup, and then mix everything back together. [Aaron] But you have totally redeemed yourself because the baked ziti you brought to church this last Sunday was incredible. [Jennifer] Thanks. [Aaron] So. Yeah, I would say we're both really good cooks. [Jennifer] I appreciate your love of cooking because it helps me out on times that I'm not interested or can't get to it. So I think we make a good team in the kitchen. [Aaron] Yeah, cool. That was a good question. Alright. So I'm gonna read a quote. We try and do a quote every week. And this is a quote from my own devotional which you can get at shop.marriageaftergod.com. It's called Husband After God. It's a 30 day devotional for husbands. And of course, we have the wife companion devotional called Wife After God as well but this is a quote from my book. And it says this on page 65. What you bring into your heart, you bring into your home. It's a short quote but I think it's a powerful statement that what's in our hearts, whether people see it, whether it's visible, whether our spouse knows about it, it is brought into our home and one way or another, it's gonna come out. It's gonna come out in the way we treat our spouse and in the way we treat our children. And it may even become visible, like you know with pornography, if it's something I'm searching on my computer, on my phone, or some roundabout way, my children, my wife, someone in my home's gonna stumble upon it. It's gonna affect the way I think, the way I act, and not just me, but us. So just a good reminder and especially going into the topic we're going to talk about. What we bring into our heart, we bring into our home and we have a responsibility to protect what we are viewing, listening to, consuming as Christians. [Jennifer] Yeah, I was gonna ask you to explain really quickly what it means to bring something into your heart. Like is it just, you know, an overall what you expose yourself to? Or do you actually have to like receive it? Like what does that look like? [Aaron] To be honest-- [Jennifer] 'Cause you know people are gonna try and justify that line of like what, well, I didn't bring that in. Just because I did that thing doesn't mean I, you know, brought it into my heart. [Aaron] No, that's a good point. I think just usually it's gonna come from things that we enjoy. I enjoy movies, right? And I used to be able to justify well, there was only that one little scene but the rest of the movie was okay. And what I'm doing is I'm allowing something into my heart through my eyes, through something I'm entertaining and enjoying. And those things, they come in. And unless we deal with them. The Bible tells us to take every thought captive. Unless we deal with the things that we're allowing into our heart. I may listen to certain music, right? And they just the kinds of salacious lyrics and the kinds of things that I'm listening to over, and over, and over again. The Bible calls that meditation. And that's how we bring the scripture into our hearts is be meditating on it, regurgitating it, going over, and over, and over again, repeating it, memorizing it. So if we're doing that with other things, that's how things get into our heart. That's how we absorb things. [Jennifer] And the bottom line is we're choosing it. [Aaron] We're choosing it, yeah. Like I wouldn't say walking down the street and then just something happens. I don't have to let that into my heart. Now, if I'm dwelling on something and I see something, or someone, or a poster, or something on a TV screen in a shop or whatever, I could let it in because I want it. So we have to be careful what things we allow into our hearts 'cause as the Bible says, out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. And so there's things that we could be allowing in and we may not think directly it's affecting those in our home, but in some way or another, it is or will. [Jennifer] Come out. [Aaron] Come out, yeah. [Jennifer] Good. Okay, so just to be real honest. I think I mentioned in the last episode that I was nervous about it and I didn't really want to do the episode but I knew it was important. And even more so, I really don't want to do this episode but I know it's important. [Aaron] Yeah, last episode, we focused a lot on my walk and how I dealt with pornography and how it affected us. But not a lot of people know your side of the story. Not just your perspective on my sin but your own walk with it. [Jennifer] Yeah. And so naturally, when we're even trying to discuss the title for this episode, it was like I don't want my name attached. I don't want the word wife in there. [Aaron] It was 15 minutes of us. I'm like babe, how are people gonna figure this out? They need to know. She's like I don't want it to be put in there, but it's about you. [Jennifer] It's so hard to talk about our past struggles, and sins, and things that just make you feel so ugly and messy. And I know that God was redeemed me and that I no longer am that person. You know, that's an old self and I don't choose to walk in that way anymore which, you know, God gets that glory for sure, but it still is uncomfortable to talk about. But the reason that I'm willing, the reason that Aaron and I wanted to share this episode with you today is because we know that there are a lot of women who struggle with pornography, lust, and you know-- [Aaron] Sexual sins of this nature, yeah. [Jennifer] Sexual sins. And it's not being talked about a lot. I think it's starting to be. I think that people are starting to recognize that you know, it's not just a man's issue, that it's not just a husband's issue or even a young man's issue. I think that there are. I mean, there are a lot of people, a lot of women who do struggle with it. [Aaron] Naturally, our world is becoming more and more desensitized. We're oversexualized. Every single commercial, every single movie. You can't watch a PG-13 movie without some sort of sexual reference or partial nudity. The oversexualization of everything in our society is making it more and more common. [Jennifer] And so accepting. [Aaron] Well, that's what I'm saying. It's becoming more accepting. And so you have boys and men who expect a certain thing and then you have women who are like well, that's what everyone's expecting now. So there's this nasty cycle of expectation, and desensitization, and oversexualization. As believers, we actually can combat this darkness, right? [Jennifer] Yeah. I think a reason that a lot of people don't say anything or say a lot about women struggling with pornography use is just because it's embarrassing or maybe they feel like they can actually hide it and get away with it because everyone's so focused on it being a man's issue. And so we wanted to bring this to light and kind of just drag this topic out into the open and say hey, if there is a problem, we need to be talking about it. And so hopefully this is that stepping into freedom for anyone who is struggling with it today. [Aaron] Yeah, our prayer before this was that God would open the eyes and hearts of believers who might be walking in this, men and women. And you said that people might not talk about it because of fear or embarrassment. But it's also possible, and we've seen evidence of this, of people just thinking that there's nothing wrong with it. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] And so they're like why would I talk about it? There's nothing wrong with it. We do this in our marriage. I enjoy this in this way and we're gonna talk about some of the definitions of pornography so we can shine that light on it completely, but that's the goal is that as believers, we would be white as snow. We would be a pure bride for our king. And so I appreciate you, Jennifer, for being so fearless. I know there's a little bit of fear in this. But for sharing your testimony in this area. [Jennifer] Well, I feel like we are, like human nature, we are sexual beings. God created us with this beautiful way of expressing our deep love in marriage for one another in this way through the physical action of being one. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] Right? And it's his way, it's the way that he designed us to recreate and to multiply his image through childbearing and expressing that love. But just like any wonderful and necessary part of God's design and purpose, the enemy has found a way to destroy it. [Aaron] He's only here to seek out whom he may devour to kill, steal, and destroy. He takes the things that God's created and he manipulates them, mutates them, destroys them, ruins them, perverts them. And so that beautiful thing that God created, you know, sex, and the confines that he created it to exist in, marriage, he's constantly attacking and saying actually no, sex is better outside of marriage. Actually, sex is better when there's multiple partners. Sex is better when you do it this way instead of God's way. And he's done that by tempting believers and everyone in many different ways. But we get to look at the word of God and the way he's invented it and created it and why it's so beautiful. And we get to walk that way. [Jennifer] Okay, so the last episode, you kind of started with just your journey and exposure to pornography so I thought I'd kind of start there with mine. So I was about 10 or 11 when I saw a shredded up piece of a magazine that looked like it had been run over by cars and things laying in a gutter. [Aaron] Weird. That's like how my story started. [Jennifer] I know. I thought about what when you shared it. So I didn't pick that up though. [Aaron] 'Cause it was in the gutter. [Jennifer] Not 'cause it was in a gutter, because it freaked me out but the image was seared into my heart like instantly. It was like okay. And then I thought about it and dwelt on it and that was my first exposure to it. And shortly after that, just some exposure through finding magazines and fantasy books at family member's houses. [Aaron] So when I think about you say it seared into your heart almost immediately. [Jennifer] In my mind. Like I could see it in my mind. [Aaron] What I realize is the way God created us with all of our hormones and the chemicals in our body, and especially at such a young age. Or think of Song of Solomon. It says don't open up love before it's time. And there's a physical reason, a physical response to those sexual hormones. You saw that image and they evoked the correct kind of hormones in you but at the wrong time, and in the wrong way, and that's why it was like so instant in your flesh because your body was like that was something that I've never seen before. That was something I don't know what to do with. And yet, your body was functioning the way it was supposed to. Just in the wrong time, and in the wrong way, and in the wrong environment. [Jennifer] Yeah. And I don't feel like I was taught about sexual purity or even my body really. I wasn't taught to guard or protect my eyes. I didn't know what pornography was. And so in that moment, I didn't know what to do with it so I just kept to myself. I didn't know if I should tell someone. I didn't know how to combat those thoughts that I got from that point, you know, onward. I didn't know how to deal with it. I don't remember my parents really talking to me about sex, except I was told not to do it. [Aaron] Yeah, sex is sin. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] Until you're married. And then it's not sin anymore. [Jennifer] They didn't even use the word sin. I just remember being told like not to do it. But no one ever explained why. I don't remember there being a strong why. You know that God created it but there was no affirmation that it is a good thing once you're married. [Aaron] Or that your body is something special that needs to be protected and kept for someone. Not many people, but someone. [Jennifer] And now that I'm thinking about it, even the idea of marriage wasn't really talked about in light of an affirming way. It wasn't like, you know. When I think about my kids, they get really excited to be married one day. [Aaron] I know, poor Olive. [Jennifer] Olive, we were driving in the car and she goes, "Mom, I just want to be a mommy right now." Like she doesn't want to wait at all and I get the opportunity and the privilege to affirm that in her and say Olive, you will be married one day. Just wait for it in God's timing. And I don't really remember having a positive perspective of marriage from a young age and I've shared this before, but my parents were divorced when I was really young, around four years old. And so even seeing the example wasn't really present from an early age. Yeah, I think that really impacted me as a young person. [Aaron] If anything, it didn't give you an environment to go, and unintentionally, I don't believe that your parents probably wanted you to feel this way. They probably didn't know how to help you. [Jennifer] They probably didn't know how to navigate it, yeah. [Aaron] But you didn't even know what to do with the feelings you had after seeing that image. You didn't know where to go. You didn't know if you'd be in trouble or if you were feeling was normal and you just didn't know why you felt abnormal. So you didn't even have the environment to help you to do that. And I don't feel like I did either actually. I don't feel like there was an intentional marriage conversation of. I know my mom always had us pray for our future wives. [Jennifer] That's awesome. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] That's so cool. [Aaron] So there was definitely positive elements but I don't know if there was a direct like hey, this is how you're gonna be as a husband. This is how you're gonna be. Maybe like here and there sporadically but. But yeah, that's probably most people's lives growing up, not having intentional, direct, like hey, if you come across something like this, if you ever feel this way, come right to us and we will walk you through it. We will tell you how to think, and how to feel, and we'll help protect you. [Jennifer] So as a note for those listening, if you're parents of just young kids, we have that obligation and opportunity to affirm them in this way and to have these conversations with them. And I think that's important that we do. [Aaron] Yeah, 'cause if we don't, guess who will? [Jennifer] The world. [Aaron] The world will. It did it for us. We were taught about sex not from the safety and Biblical perspective from our homes. We were taught from the world. And so thank you for reminding the parents that are listening if they're parents to take that responsibility seriously. [Jennifer] So the first time that I did hear anything about pornography in the church setting was when we were in our 20s and the pastor spoke on this specific issue and even didn't shy away from hey, women struggle with it too. Like that was the first time that I really heard pornography preached from the pulpit that it's wrong, and it should be avoided, and that it affects our home. And that too, I share about-- [Aaron] In your 20s? That was the first time? [Jennifer] When we were married. [Aaron] Wow. [Jennifer] So I actually mentioned this story in The Unveiled Wife, but we were sitting in church and this was right after I had confessed everything to you. I confessed my struggles with pornography which up until this point, I hadn't. Okay, so I feel like I'm jumping ahead. So let me just backtrack just a little bit. So I wouldn't say that I ever had like an addiction to pornography, but I was exposed to fantasy books, and magazines, and things like that, and so I was prone to that sin in my heart already. [Aaron] 'Cause I agree. I don't think you were addicted the same way I was but did you use lust, pornography, fantasy books, for coping with what we were going through with-- [Jennifer] Yeah, that's what I wanted to touch on before I hit this story that I write about in The Unveiled Wife. So those first couple years of our marriage were so difficult and so challenging for several reasons but one of them, the major one was we were not sexually intimate with each other. I had physical pain every time that we tried and so I was really depressed and I felt broken. I felt like my body was broken. And on the other side of things, you had mentioned last episode that you were still struggling with pornography at this time. [Aaron] Pretty regularly. [Jennifer] Pretty regularly. And you had confessed to me about your sin and we would have to find a way to reconcile. So with all of this happening, there was some things going on in my heart where because I felt broken, I was searching out the thing that I wanted to be which I wanted to be sexy in our marriage. I wanted to be a woman who wasn't broken. [Aaron] And you wanted to feel that pleasure that we couldn't experience. [Jennifer] Exactly. And then because you had confessed to me, eventually, I got to a place where I was curious. Like what is this thing he keeps going back to and I'm not participating in. And so there was all these things that drove my heart and motivation for struggling with pornography and lust. And even fantasy books like-- [Aaron] Yeah, you'd escape to these love stories. [Jennifer] Love stories. Relational things that-- [Aaron] That some of them had sexual content in 'em, but really it was the-- [Jennifer] It was the emotional affection. [Aaron] That emotional, romantic love story. [Jennifer] That I was being fulfilled in aside from our marriage. So even outside of pornography, I felt. This is why we need to define what pornography is and we're gonna get there in a minute, but I just wanted to be honest and say I did struggle and it was very difficult for me and painful. It makes you feel shameful, and guilty, and not pure. [Aaron] It defiles our marriage bed. So just like that quote I read at the beginning, what you bring into your heart, you bring into your home. So husbands listening, men listening, if you're bringing this into your home, you're involving your family. My wife, she just admitted that because she was hearing it from me, and not that I made her sin, but I invited her-- [Jennifer] There's influence. [Aaron] And showed her. I influenced her. [Jennifer] We influence each other. And that verse that you're talking about is Hebrews 13:4. It says let marriage be held in honor among all and that the marriage bed be undefiled for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. And just like we share that story about me talking to you about your addiction to pornography and how it was adultery in our marriage, I knew that as well and I really didn't want that, you know? This verse came to my mind and I came to a place where it was like I don't want to be that person. I want to live above reproach. I want to live in purity. And so before all of this, I was hiding it from you. I wasn't openly communicating the things that I was struggling with and I broke. And I knew that I had to confess these things and so I, you know, sat on our bed and told you I needed to talk to you. And about two hours later after so many tears and divulging, and exposing all of my heart. I didn't keep anything from you. I received healing, and comfort, and reconciliation with you that I hadn't before because I always had this area of my heart that was only mine. And I remember that moment being so powerful in our marriage because I had the courage to tell you what I was really doing. And I remember kind of writing about this in The Unveiled Wife that you can't truly love someone unless you really know them. Like in that moment of me confessing everything to you, you had a choice. You could continue to love me and be with me or not. [Aaron] Or stop loving you, yeah. [Jennifer] And for me to know that I could share my entire heart and life with you and you still choose to love me, that was powerful. That's unconditional love. [Aaron] Yeah, there's a song out right now that says to be fully known and still be fully loved, right? Like then that's the idea of what you're saying. That you were fully known to me and still fully loved. Now, there are still consequences to our sin and we talked about this in my episode. You know, us learning how to walk in trust, us learning how to walk in freedom and practicing righteousness, and not bringing this into our children's lives. So yes, I think that was the last time you? [Jennifer] So what happened was that happened on like a Friday, Saturday, and that following Sunday was the church service that the pastor spoke from the pulpit. Nothing's a coincidence. The Lord was like-- [Aaron] Yeah, no coincidences. [Jennifer] Out of, you know, how many people at that service? 5,000 people? 10,000 people in that one service sitting there? I felt like the spotlight was on me. I couldn't stop crying. My mascara was down to my chin and the pastor just kept speaking one truth after another about the lies and deceit about pornography use, about how it's not just a man's issue. He gave statistics on it being a women's issue too and that gets really sticky because a lot of Christian women won't even participate in surveys like that 'cause they don't want to be known in that way. And so he called from the stage and said if any of you have been struggling with this, come forward and we will pray with you and we'll connect you with people who can walk you through this. [Aaron] And did you go forward? [Jennifer] Yeah, well, so I remember standing up, holding your hand with my head on your shoulder and you squeezed my hand when he said come forward. And a song started playing and I was so embarrassed 'cause I knew if I started walking, our friends would see. [Aaron] It would be known to our community. [Jennifer] We would be known. [Aaron] Crazy. I think we have an episode about that. [Jennifer] That was such a hard moment for me but it was defining, which was important. And so we went forward. The pastor prayed and then we went off to this, they call it the decision room where some other friends of ours who had been counseling us in our marriage sat down with us and then we got to be even more fully known with them. [Aaron] I totally forgot about all of this, wow. [Jennifer] It was heartbreaking but so heart-needed. Like it was so necessary for me to address this issue and confess what I was doing, and repent of it. And I did choose that day to walk differently. [Aaron] You know what I think about when I think about like that it's painful but it's so good when there's a broken bone in our body, they don't just wrap it up in a cast and call it a day. Often times, they have to reset the broken bone. They can't just. And if you don't reset it and you let it heal, it heals broken. And then you have to break it again to reheal it, heal it correctly. And so it's almost like God's like no, no, no, I know that you're mine and I know that I love you but I have to heal you and I want to heal you. And this brokenness you feel now is so that you can be whole later. 'Cause that's what he wants from us is wholeness. And so I remember that. and I want to ask you 'cause we talked about defining pornography and I know that the men and the women listening, when they think of pornography, when I think of pornography, the first thing I think of is like videos, photos, those sorts of things, right? The internet's just full of it. We can get it anywhere at any time for free, for money, whatever. But are there other things that we define as pornography that Christians should be thinking of and being aware of, and repent of if they're walking in those ways? [Jennifer] Yeah, so I want to note a couple things. So why is it important to define what pornography is? It's important because if we don't define what it is then our flesh will constantly justify where that line is and keep just pushing it so that you can keep doing the things that you want to do. [Aaron] I'm fine doing this because it's not that. I can keep doing this. Don't talk to me about this because this isn't that. [Jennifer] And even I have a really hard time saying that I struggled with pornography because how I want to define it is videos where that necessarily wasn't my struggle. And that way, I don't have to attach my name and my life to what that sin is. I don't want to be attached to it. Even like I said, struggling with naming this episode. Like I don't want to be attached to that because I hate it so much. But I think it's really important for us to define what it is and be honest with ourselves about what it is. And I think it can include things like what we mentioned, any sort of explicit photos or immodest photos. [Aaron] Like would you feel comfortable if I was like reading Sports Illustrated? [Jennifer] No, I would not. [Aaron] Or like any men's magazine that just is-- [Jennifer] I think it's important that we guard our eyes from immodest. [Aaron] What if I was following, you know, a girl online that she's famous but I just like her movies but she's always in bathing suits and always-- [Jennifer] Immodest. [Aaron] Yeah, it wouldn't make you feel good. And I would feel the same way if you were following. I mean, I doubt very many girls do this but like sexy man online or something that's always half-dressed or whatever. [Jennifer] And I just gotta make another little side note that if you're listening and you're a wife who posts pictures that are immodest-- [Aaron] Oh, good point. [Jennifer] I don't even need to question you on it but just let that sink into your heart and what it means for other people following you. Some other things that I don't want to forget to talk about are fantasy books. You know, things that-- [Aaron] Like when you say fantasy books 'cause fantasy could be. Are you talking about? [Jennifer] Not science fiction. I'm talking about what kinds of plot lines and actions are the characters doing. And if it's impure, and sexual, and I would even go as far as to say if I was reading things that had that emotional relationship fulfillment aspect. Like we need to be careful that we're not going there instead of being fulfilled in our own marriage. And I think that's the key. Now, 'cause there are Christian romance novels. I've never read any of 'em. But would you say that someone could be falling into sin in those books also if they're using those books to escape? [Jennifer] I think if they're using them as an escape because they're not being fulfilled in the marriage, they need to ask themselves what God thinks about that. [Aaron] That's a good point. And then more directly, what about books that have explicit sexual stories? Would you say that's pornographic? [Jennifer] I would. [Aaron] Yeah, because what it does is the exact same thing. Even though it's not visual, the thing is is we are-- [Jennifer] Stimulating that part of our bodies. [Aaron] Sexually stimulating ourselves in a way other than our spouse. For me, I've made it a point, because even after walking in freedom from pornography, I would justify going and seeing a movie that had a minimal sex scene in it, or some sort of brief nudity, or those kinds of things. What do I do now? [Jennifer] Well, you have to review it, research it, make sure that-- [Aaron] I read up. [Jennifer] You usually just end up not going. [Aaron] No, 'cause every movie nowadays has something in it. What I do is now I go to Plugged In. It's a site that reviews movies. It's a Christian site but it gives a pretty full synopsis. And if a movie has sexual content in it, it's a no. And you know what? There's been a bunch of movies I wanted to see that I haven't gone and seen because there would have been a scene in it. And lots of Christians, men are saying well, it doesn't affect me that way. I just shut my eyes or it's not a big deal. I'm not interested in even having a little bit of it in my life. And so I'm constantly asking myself like hey, is this even worth it? [Jennifer] Yeah, I was gonna say that just now. Like people might look at this list we're giving them and going wait a minute. Like so everything basically? But I want them to hear our hearts on this is what benefit does it really have? Our flesh wants to fight to be entertained by these things but what benefit does it have in our marriages and in our families? [Aaron] Yeah, Proverbs says that eye is never seen enough. Like it never has enough. You know, our ears have never heard enough and I think that's a good question, Jennifer, that you asked. Like what benefit does it have? And usually, the benefit is escape, fulfillment. We're looking for something in that piece of entertainment to justify the reason for going and partaking in it, and eating of it, and devouring it, and consuming it, and allowing it into our hearts. And yeah, you're right. I used to go to the movies like pretty much weekly 'cause I love movies. Often, I was escaping my difficult life or I wanted to just. I knew I was gonna go to a movie that might have a scene in it that was going to sexually stimulate me for a moment. But now, I rarely can go see a movie because there's something in it. I'm like okay, well. And you know what? I'm not like missing out on anything. [Jennifer] It continues to build that trust between us because I see you make those choices and I go, I have a good man. [Aaron] And I'm not just making them for you. Like I've intentionally-- [Jennifer] But it impacts me and it impacts our relationship and I appreciate that. You know, when you say that you used to put yourself in these positions or situations, I think that a lot of us do that hoping that we be fulfilled. You know, that our flesh would be fulfilled. And it makes me think of in the Garden of Eden where Adam and Eve were tempted and the serpent's going, basically he's saying it's not that big of a deal. [Aaron] Yeah, like you really think you're gonna die if you even touch it? Which is not what God said. [Jennifer] I know, but it basically boils this thing that they weren't supposed to be doing to it's not really that big of a deal and I think so many people do that in their lives. They say it's really not that big of a deal. [Aaron] Well, and then he even says that Eve saw that it was good for looking at and good for eating. And like we do that. We're like well, it's art. And this is entertainment. It's good for my spirit 'cause I need to relax and it gets me excited and enjoyment. Or we had Christians comment on our posts in the past saying well, it's good as long as we do it together and as long as it heightens our sexual experience and it makes us closer. That's good. That's exactly what Eve saw from sin in the Garden of Eden. She looked at the fruit that God said not to touch. Actually said don't eat of it. Satan said did he really say not to touch it? He lied to her. And she's like. She saw that it was good to the sight and good for eating. And that's what we do. We're like well, yeah, but I know that that's probably not the best thing for me but look, it looks good. It's gonna taste good. And then in the end, it's gonna kill us. And I don't think that's worth it. At the end of the day, my prayer is that my children would never have to deal with this sin. They'll never have to deal with this struggle. That doesn't mean they're not gonna be tempted. It doesn't mean the world's not gonna try as hard as it can to grab their hearts. But it is not going to be because I have it in the house. [Jennifer] Yeah, and I think that important to note here is that we're setting an example through our actions and behavior as parents. I think that it's vital and necessary for us to be warring and battle through prayer for ourselves, for each other, our spouses, and our children, and even our children's future spouses. [Aaron] Oh yeah. [Jennifer] We need to be on guard in this way. We need to know that this is a growing problem, that it's affecting our children. [Aaron] It's cancer in the church. [Jennifer] Well, in the world. Like it's everywhere. [Aaron] Yeah, but we can't expect people who aren't regenerated by the Holy Spirit, that people who don't follow Christ to change in this area. They need salvation first. But you listening to this, you believer, you person who says you're a Christ follower, this is a serious, serious issue that we need to submit before the Lord and confess, and repent of, and walk away from, and never touch again. [Jennifer] And you can't sit there and say well, my addiction is to fill in the blank. It's too hard. It's too difficult. [Aaron] You don't understand. I've done this for too long. [Jennifer] But if you claim to be a Christian, you have the spirit living inside of you, empowering you to walk the way. He has not just called you but created you to walk. [Aaron] And so my wife, you struggled with this. [Jennifer] I did. [Aaron] I struggled with this. And thank God for God's patience with us. But we have been shown that he has already given us everything that pertains to life and Godliness. Second Peter 1:3 says that. And you listening, you have that same spirit, same spirit that raised Christ from the dead. He's living in you and he's empowering you to walk in freedom. And the Bible tells us that even when temptation, whatever temptation comes, first of all, it's not uncommon to man. It's like every temptation's common. It's not unique to you. But secondly, it says that Christ will make a way of escape so that you can escape that temptation every single time. [Jennifer] So before we close out 'cause I feel like we're coming to the end here of this episode, I do want to point out something that I wanted to mention earlier and that is that one of the biggest reasons why I didn't expose my sin to you for a while was because I didn't want it to minimize your sin. I thought-- [Aaron] You don't want me to say, so, we're the same so stop judging me. [Jennifer] Yes, exactly. I thought that had I said that we did struggle with the same thing, that I wouldn't be allowed to express such deep emotions over your failures because of mine. And that kept me isolated, and I was deceived, and I believed that it was better to hide from you than to tell you the truth. [Aaron] So it was a false authority that you would come to me and. Where when Jesus says don't have a plank eye, like, the reason we take the plank out of our eye so that we can see clearly in our brothers. So you walking in purity, you would have been able to see clearly in my life, not just emotionally, but actually spiritually. Like hey, like that time when you came to me. [Jennifer] Which I was pure then so maybe that's why I saw it then. [Aaron] And vice versa. You know, when we walk in holiness, when we walk in righteousness, we can without being a hypocrite go to our brothers and sisters and say hey, you've got to change this area of your life. And them say like wow, if you can do it, I can do it. So I think that's a good point to highlight is that we don't want to be plank eye Christians. We want to walk in holiness so that we can see clearly in our brother's and sister's eyes for their sake and not just because we want to be a holier art thou, you know, and be above and look down. That's not why. We want to walk in holiness ourselves because we love God. And then we want to walk in holiness so that we can walk with our brothers who are not walking in holiness and encourage them to walk in holiness. That's a good point, babe. So I feel like that was a lot and good and you did really well. [Jennifer] I'm still sitting here afraid. I don't know. It's so hard to talk about this issue but I want to be open and honest so that if another wife is listening right now, I hope that if she's struggling with any sort of pornography and lust, impure thoughts, that she would have the courage to be transparent with her spouse and talk about these things. [Aaron] Confess these things. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] Yeah. And confess with the purpose of repentance so that you both can walk in holiness. [Jennifer] And be reconciled to each other and to God. [Aaron] Yeah, so that we can fulfill the mission he has for us in life. To be lights in this world. To proclaim the gospel to the lost. Yeah. So we thank you for joining us this week. We thank you for listening to our testimonies and our prayer is that you and your spouse would have the same testimony. It's the only testimony that we get. It's from Jesus Christ. It's what he's done in us and through us. And he's the healer. He's the provider. He's our rock. And so before we close out, I'd love to invite you to pray with us. [Jennifer] Dear Lord, we pray first and foremost that husbands and wives would give you their hearts, that they would obey all that you command in your word and that they would love you with all of their hearts. We pray that if any of them are addicted or struggling with pornography, that they would choose to stop today. Holy Spirit, please remind us daily of your desire for us to live holy and pure lives. We pray we would not live in hiding, but rather may we be transparent with others, confessing our sin and repenting of it so that it will not have a stronghold in our lives. Give us stamina to pray for protection against the enemy and against our flesh. Remind us everyday to pray for ourselves, pray for our spouses, pray for our children, and pray for our children's future spouses. May we be men and women who choose to walk faithfully with you. In Jesus' name. Amen. [Aaron] Amen. Thanks for joining us this week and we look forward to having you next week. See you next time. Did you enjoy today's show? Find many more encouraging stories and resources at marriageaftergod.com and let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage.