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Subscribe | Turn On Post Notification | Like | Comment | Share To help this channel grow and to help us bestow on this world even more content, you can make a donation here: https://www.paypal.me/upliftpastcrossroads Watch this podcast on YouTube instead? Click link below: https://youtu.be/xXUYOL694JQ Subscribe and follow my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuv53Xdk-97UcS_gSvsS76A Here on Uplift I will be uploading videos on songs that I love, that touch my heart, that describe my relationship with God, and that I know will touch someone's life and answer any questions they have about God, the Bible or this life. I had someone on Instagram ask me this question, "Man I'm having a terrible time man...I'm having a hard time of just finding pure joy and discovering who I am....Is it because I haven't moved out on my own and found the job for me? It's just so shameful people can like sense it off me that there's something wrong, that I'm thinking a lot, I have a hard time speaking up. I pray and pray and pray but there's gotta be something I'm doing wrong." Thereby, this video is hitting that question again. To watch the video over the question this guy asked me, click the link below: https://youtu.be/wiqhNGXSH_M Please follow Dr. J's social media pages: 1. Facebook, LinkedIn: Sean Christopher Jenkins 2. Instagram, Twitter, Snap: troubledontlast 3. Tumblr: troubledontlast1 --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Subscribe | Turn On Post Notification | Like | Comment | Share To help this channel grow and to help us bestow on this world even more content, you can make a donation here: https://www.paypal.me/upliftpastcrossroads Subscribe to my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuv53Xdk-97UcS_gSvsS76A Check out the video of this podcast instead: https://youtu.be/wiqhNGXSH_M I had someone on Instagram ask me this question: "Man I'm having a terrible time man...I'm having a hard time of just finding pure joy and discovering who I am....Is it because I haven't moved out on my own and found the job for me? It's just so shameful people can like sense it off me that there's something wrong, that I'm thinking a lot, I have a hard time speaking up. I pray and pray and pray but there's gotta be something I'm doing wrong." How would you have answered this questioned? Write down your answer in the comment section. Or are you feeling the same way? Write down how you feel in the comment section and let us all pray for you! Check out this video as to how I answered this question. Please follow Dr. J's social media pages: 1. Facebook, LinkedIn: Sean Christopher Jenkins 2. Instagram, Twitter, Snap: troubledontlast 3. Tumblr: troubledontlast1 --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

These are our confessions... Just when I thought skrey ende skrey ende skrey got one on the way These are our confessions... Man I'm throwed bla bli blu bla bli blu bla bli blu bla bli blu of our confessions -Usher 2004-

Episode Simpin #133. Thurs 9/5/19 Simpin when you can't stop thinking about a person, so you listen to sad music Dawg what's wrong? Man I'm simpin. Facebook Event: https://www.facebook.com/events/2442260712698690/ Previous Episode 132 Long distance relationships Next Episode 134 No Prospects for Punnany (Incels involuntarily celibate) Hosts: Kinte @KinteF https://twitter.com/KinteF https://www.instagram.com/kintefergerson/ Shannon Ford-Jefferson @shanfordjeff82 https://www.instagram.com/poetry_social/ Guests: tba https://twitter.com/marsvenusshow https://www.facebook.com/marsvenuspodcast/ https://www.instagram.com/indyradio/

It was June 23rd, 1989 when Tim Burton's Batman hit theaters in America, starring Jack Nicholson, Michael Keaton, and Kim Basinger. Almost 30 years later, myself and Marcus Robinson come together for the one hundred and third episode of THE WORLD'S GREATEST PODCAST to discuss Batman '89 and its legacy when it comes to those involved... and those that came after. Plenty of hijinks ensue of course as we blatantly steal apex mountain from the Rewatchables, which leads to a deep dive into the career of... Johnny Depp? Aside from that, flowers are given to all those involved in this master class of a superhero film and we even talk a little about its sequels, Joel Schumacher, and our favorite Batmobile! Pair this episode with Episode #68 for ultimate Batmania immersion. This episode was brought to you by sleep deprivation, This Magic Moment, and now Trainwreck, I guess. And Batman '89. Man I'm sleepy. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/hyphen-nation/support

NOTE: We don't share any graphic detials in this episode but this is not an episode to listen to around children. To support this podcast please pick up one of our marriage books at https://shop.marriageaftergod.com In this episode, I share my history with an addiction to pornography and how it affected Jennifer. Jennifer And I both discuss how it made her feel and how it affected every aspect of our marriage but ultimately how the Lord freed me from this sin. Our prayer is that by being open and vulnerable about this sensitive and taboo subject that a light would be shown and that many other men and women would find freedom and healing. READ: [Aaron] Hey we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God, [Jennifer] Helping you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. [Aaron] And today we're gonna share our personal journey with pornography in our marriage. 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. Love. 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. Thank you all for joining us this week on our podcast and we just wanted to invite you to leave us a review. This is just one way to help us get the word out about the Marriage After God podcast and let's other people find us and we really appreciate it, it just encourages our hearts. We love 'em. [Jennifer] So if you could just scroll to the bottom of the podcast app and leave us a review. [Aaron] Yeah a star rating is the easiest way to do it. All you have to do is hit a star, but if you have extra time we'd love a text review as well. [Jennifer] Thank you guys. [Aaron] Hey we wanna thank you for joining us and we also want to invite you if you've been enjoying the podcast to consider supporting our podcast. And the way that you do that is go to shop.marriageaftergod.com and pick up one of our books that we've written. The ones we wanna talk about today is our 31 Prayers for My Husband and 31 Prayers for My Wife bundle. We call it our prayer challenge and we encourage couples to do it. Thousands of couples have already gone through the challenge and they've loved it. They go through it multiple times actually a year so go to shop.marriageaftergod.com, pick up a copy of our 31 Marriage Prayers Challenge and that would support our podcast, thank you. [Jennifer] Okay moving right along, we are gonna jump into our icebreaker question, which is which one of you said I love you first? [Aaron] That's an easy one. [Jennifer] Give them a second to guess. You guys guess. Jennifer. Who is me. I couldn't wait any longer. [Aaron] Did I actually say I love you back? [Jennifer] So what happened was we were, I don't know if we were on a date or just hanging out but I remember I was getting out of your car-- [Aaron] I'm up in front of your house by your red mailbox. [Jennifer] No, actually Aaron has a terrible memory. [Aaron]Oh, it's not right there? -We were-- Where was this at? [Jennifer] It's okay honey. I'm not mad. We were in the church parking lot. Oh, oh. I was getting out of your black Honda, and I was getting into my car. And I got out, and I stood up-- I remember now. [Jennifer] And then I leaned back in, and I said, "Oh, by the way, I love you." 'Cause I was waiting, waiting-- Did I skid away, and the door slammed shut, or? [Jennifer] No, that didn't happen. But you did let a very long pause happen before you said anything, and it made me feel super awkward, and I said, I might have even said, "Okay, I'm gonna go now," or something like that, and then you were like, "I'm just kidding." You start laughing and you're like, "I love you too." Almost as if I had already known, but you never said it. [Aaron] Well, you did already know. [Jennifer] Yeah, I did. But it was-- That's really funny I made you wait. It felt good to have said it, and I'm glad I said it. I don't remember-- Yeah and we say it a lot now. Yeah, I do love you. And I won't make you wait. I'll tell you all day every day. [Jennifer] All day every day? [Aaron]Yeah. Oh good. So Jennifer said I love you first, and then I made her wait a few seconds-- [Jennifer] Super awkward. Super long seconds. And then you laughed, and then you said I love you back. [Aaron] Yeah. All right. So why don't we do a quick quote from a book. Okay. And this book is your book. [Jennifer] Yeah, we chose one from The Unveiled Wife, so it's not a typical quote that we've kind of been sharing with you guys. It's a little bit more personal. Okay this is found in The Unveiled Wife on page 153, and it says, "We were devoted to making ourselves "known to God and known to each other. "I finally felt free from the bondage "that was holding me captive. "I could breathe deeply without fear "of someone finding out who I was "because I had chosen to make myself known." [Aaron] And this was a part of our story where we were divulging to each other our deep dark secrets. Where we were sharing our sins, things we were struggling with. Actually, divulged everything. Talked about everything in our hearts. That was a pretty pivotal moment in our marriage. And that goes into what we're gonna be talking about, that's why we picked the quote because we're gonna be talking about that season of our marriage, we're gonna be talking about a pretty large season actually, of my life, and it has to do with pornography. [Jennifer] Yeah, which I actually, well we both didn't wanna do this episode. [Aaron] We've been putting it off for months. [Jennifer] Because I don't know why, it's just, I think it's one of those topics that's hard to dive into and expose, but like that quote said, I chose to make myself known, in our marriage, you've chose to make yourself known, and I've, I believe that that created a safe place for trust to be built, and I think it's really important for husbands and wives to hear our story and to hear, just to hear how we've exposed our hearts to each other, and hopefully they could do that too. [Aaron] And not only have we exposed it to each other, but we've exposed it to others. We've exposed the things that we've gone through, our dark secrets to other believers and through our platforms, there are ministries of the world. And one of the things that I love about how we are, you use the word expose, I love that word. The Bible tells us to drag that which is in the darkness into the light because that which is in the light becomes light. And that was our sin. The more it was hidden, the easier it was to keep doin' it. And so we've been draggin' it out ever since and keeping it out in public, keeping it out in the light so that it doesn't live in us. So I wanna start off by reading a scripture. And it's in Ephesians five verse three. It says, "But sexual immorality and all impurity "or covetousness must not even be named among you, "as is proper among saints." Paul's telling the Ephesians, you're saints, you're saints of the most high, and sexual morality and impurity and covetousness, they should not even be named among you. Meaning not even a little bit. In other translations it says there shouldn't be a hint of sexual morality. That's insane. Because in our current culture, in our current world, in my own life experience, I had not just a hint of sexual morality in my life, I was drenched in sexual morality. And Ephesians five verse three is very clear and it's, this isn't the only scripture that talks about this, that there shouldn't even be a hint of it among Christians. [Jennifer] Which is so weird because I mean, through our online platforms, we've shared about the topic of pornography before, and people even Christians, have shared their acceptance of it. And I think we're living in a culture, in an age where it's widely accepted even if people aren't talking about it. [Aaron] Yeah, we're desensitized to the grotesqueness of our sin. [Jennifer] Which is another reason why we knew we had to do this episode. We need to be willing to talk about it. [Aaron] Yeah, pretty much every time we've ever posted about pornography and how it's wrong, and shouldn't even be in a marriage, and how, and not that we're coming from perfection, we're coming from, well actually no, we've experienced this, it's wrong, and the Bible says we shouldn't do it, and God hates it. Christians, people claiming to be Christians in our comments will say, "Well, you're wrong actually, it's fine as long as." And then fill in the blank. And I'm like blown away. But we shouldn't be surprised by that 'cause the world's being, the world's gonna be deceived. So our heart today is to expose our story, and I hope my, our prayer we just prayed before this is that you listening, if this is your story, would begin to walk in freedom today. So that it, that sexual morality and impurity and covetousness might not even be named in your marriage. That there would be no hint of it. And so let's start, we're gonna start with my experience, and there's a bunch of questions I'm gonna answer and, but before we go to some of the questions I'm gonna answer about my experience with pornography and where it came from and how I walked in it and my story behind that, I just wanna read a letter I wrote to pornography in 2014. And it's on my blog, and it says this. "Dear pornography, "We have known each other since I was a child "and I feel as though I can tell you things "that I can never tell anyone else. "You know all my secrets and all my fantasies, "and you have been by my side "in the good times and in the bad. "You spent time with me when I was lonely or bored, "and you comforted me when I was angry or hurt. "It feels like you have always been there for me, "but I need to get a few things off my chest. "You promised me that after I got married, "I wouldn't need you anymore. "You made me believe that what we had was just a fling. "I realize now that you never loved me. "I am finally seeing your endgame. "You have stolen a piece of me like a master thief. "You wanted everything from me, not just my eyes, "but also my mind, heart, soul and strength. "You have promised a world to me that doesn't exist. "You have threatened my marriage and my children. "You have hurt my friends and family, "you have destroyed the lives of girls, boys, men and women "all over the world and used me to help. "All the while assuring me that no one would get hurt. "Our relationship has been nothing but lies. "You are not, nor have you ever been my friend. "You are the reason I have lived "with so much shame and embarrassment. "You are the reason my wife has been so hurt. "You have warped my perception of women in the world. "I needed to write you this letter "to let you know that it's over. "I would tell you in person, "but that would give you too much satisfaction. "I have found a true friend, his name is Jesus." I wrote this letter a long time ago and posted it. It resonated with a ton of people. It got 4,000 shares. And it was just me verbalizing out loud the relationship I had with pornography, so that I made it real. I was like oh, I don't wanna pretend like, oh, I'm just struggling and this that, like I actually verbalized what it was that I, how I related to it. [Jennifer] It actually makes me really sad just hearing you read it out loud, 'cause it makes it even more so feel like such an intimate thing, such an intimate relationship that you had with this thing, and I just, I, makes me heartbroken over the many people who are doing it, who are addicted to it, who have this kind of relationship with it. [Aaron] And it's true it's a lie. And it, in reality, it destroys us, it leads to death, and it destroys the people that, were, are being consumed by it, in the images. And it, do we care about those people? Do we care about ourselves, do we care about our families? And we need to consider those things. So I'm gonna be getting into some information about kind of where it started with me, and if you have questions as we go, Jennifer, you can ask me. How old was I when I was exposed first to pornography? I actually don't know. I feel like maybe seven, eight years old. I can't, I don't have a very good memory of my younger years. But I do remember one of the first experiences I had with it was I was walking home from school and I found a, it was like a playing card on the ground with a nude woman on it, and I remember keeping it. And I remember that being my first experience with it. I don't remember how I got connected on the internet with it, I don't remember how I've seen it on TV, but I've been exposed to pornography for many, many, many years. And not just exposed to it, but I've exposed myself to it and craved it, and sought after it since a very young age. And it went with me, I literally thought when I was younger that all I need to do is get married and it would fix my lustful cravings. 'Cause it, what they did was they, being exposed so young and right at that, puberty, when I'm already gonna be naturally more hormonal, and more testosterone, and all those things that come with puberty, I, it was heightened, extremely from a young age. And it just continued on until even, into marriage. [Jennifer] I actually remember before we got married, we did talk about that aspect of feeling like, 'cause you admitted to me that you struggled, pornography, and I also wrote it off as like well doesn't every guy do that? That was my perspective of it. And we both believed that it would be like a non-issue when we got married, that it would just go away. [Aaron] Right, so while we were dating, you had no red flags about it. [Jennifer] I mean, I hated it then and it hurt me then, but I figured marriage would be the solution. [Aaron] Well what you said was that you thought, well, I guess every guy struggles with that, and we'll just, when we get married we'll walk together and we'll figure it out, and it'll be fixed. And I actually believed that too, but I was so entrenched in it that I couldn't imagine men not struggling with it, and I think there was two reasons I did that. One, pretty much everything I heard from other believers, and pastors, and mentors was like, well yeah, everyone struggles with that and there's that book, Every Man's Battle, like we, that's the thing we've heard about this, so I just believed literally every man struggled with it and it was normal. Yeah, it was wrong, and we shouldn't do it, and I felt shameful, and I should be better at it, but I wasn't actually ever told by anyone that I didn't have to do it, that I wasn't slave to it, that as a believer I could walk in freedom from it, and that it was gonna destroy me. I don't remember hearing that ever. I remember how it made me feel. [Jennifer] How did it make you feel? [Aaron] Well,it made me feel gross. I hated that I couldn't stop it, probably like any addict. Like why do I keep doing this? Why can't I stop? I feel like I have no control. But then at the same time, I wanted it, I enjoyed it, I loved it, I couldn't say that out loud. When I would talk about it, it was always like, "I hate this, I don't wanna do this anymore." But internally, I really did love it, even though I didn't recognize that back then. And I can't remember ever having a real conversation about sexual purity. I remember being told I shouldn't have sex before marriage, I remember being talked about it a little bit, but I don't remember purity discussion. I remember being caught a few times with pornography and having a short discussion of how it's not good and we shouldn't do that, but I couldn't, I don't remember having these serious discussions of this can't happen. It is going to destroy you. You need to stop. I don't remember that. And it maybe did happen, but I don't remember it being, it wasn't memorable for me. It wasn't something that changed my direction from anyone, my parents, from pastors-- Youth pastors, yeah. [Aaron] Friends. In reality, even when I would try and, ways I would try and deal with it was just abstinence. Like, well I'm just gonna try and go, oh, I went a month. And I didn't mess up, was my term. I would have accountability partners. That's what we all do. But all my accountability partners also struggled with pornography and weren't changing. So all we would do was come together and commiserate and say, "Well, God's good, grace of God." Those kinds of things, but no one ever changed, no one ever had authority in my life to say like, "Hey, I'm walking in purity, you should too." I didn't, I actually didn't know anyone. I've never met someone back then that walked in purity, that didn't struggle with pornography, which gave me a very small world view actually. 'Cause I thought, I literally thought everyone struggled with it. And I'm sure there's people listening right now thinking like, "Well doesn't everyone?" No, everyone doesn't struggle with it. Many do, but it's a lie from Satan to believe that it's just the thing that everyone's gonna struggle with. [Jennifer] Well if we believe that everybody struggles with it, it just makes it more normal and then, like it's just-- Yeah, why change? [Jennifer] It's another justification for it, yeah. [Aaron] I would confess to God all the time, and just remember that God loves me, and remind myself. I would read scripture that would make me actually feel more shameful because I'd be like, "Wait a minute, why don't, why doesn't my life "line up with what the Bible says?" Like shouldn't it? Shouldn't, when I read this, oh, that's what a believer is. I would have to in round about ways work around what the Bible says to be who I was, as a quote unquote, Christian. Which is wrong, 'cause we're supposed to align our lives with what the Bible says not with how we feel, and then try and make the Bible fit into that, which is what I had to do because it, my life didn't line up with it at all. [Jennifer] So then we got married, and it didn't stop. [Aaron] No, it actually, I feel like at times, it got worse. [Jennifer] Well just to catch people up on our story, the first four years of our marriage, actually it's kind of humorous now that I think about it with your addiction, our biggest struggle was-- Sex. Sex. And-- Yeah, I remember telling God like, "God, just give me a wife, "I just wanna be able to have sex with my wife, "and I'll stop doing this." And then,gettin' married, and it's literally-- [Jennifer] The hardest thing possible. [Aaron] The thing that we can't do. [Jennifer] So I experienced excruciating pain every time we tried, and so for four years, our marriage just got tougher and tougher as far as our relationship because of this issue. And because we weren't coming together and being, experiencing that part of our relationship, you dove even further into-- I-- Pornography. [Aaron] Definitely used it as a excuse and a justification. 'Cause I thought to myself, like well I can't even have the one person I should be able to have, so, I got this over here. And it was wrong, completely wrong. But looking back, God absolutely used our struggle with sex to show the depravity in my own heart, and yours-- I was gonna say both of us. About lust, pornography, and these things-- [Jennifer] I'm like a lot of that is sin. Sexual, yeah lots of things. But He's, He was definitely saying like, "I don't want any of this." And He was willing to discipline us, and I believe that's what it was. I believe that that season of our life was discipline because He's like, "You're My children." And He says, "I discipline those who I love, "and I love you." And I, He was done with us walking our own way, and walking in that sort of sin, and, now I can't say like, we walked free from it, and then boom, we were healed. It was much more complex than that. But looking back, I know that's what God was doing in us. [Jennifer] So are you saying that we struggled with sexual intimacy because you struggled with pornography? [Aaron] I believe so, I believe that God was disciplining us, He was disciplining me. I told Him, the one thing I wanted was a wife I can have sex with, and He's like, "That's not gonna fix it." And it, and He, and I should be able to walk in freedom with Him, regardless if my marriage is perfect. I, it's not a justification, having a broken marriage, having a broken sex life, having these things that I think give me permission to break His heart, and His laws, and walk opposite of how He's called me to walk, when my greatest relationship should be with Him, which is what I've always said I have, like no, everything is about God, and I love God. And He's like, "Well," as Jesus says, "if you love Me, you'll keep My commands. "If you love Me," In 1 John, He says, "Those who practice righteousness "are righteous." And I wasn't practicing righteousness, I was, I had no integrity. When I was alone, I knew what I was gonna do, and you knew too. [Jennifer] I didn't trust you. [Aaron] No, I didn't trust myself. [Jennifer] I'd just go back to that point though, I wanna talk about trust, but I wanna go back to you saying that our, let's call it a drought, 'cause that's what it was, it was a sexual drought, and our marriage was correlated with this addiction to pornography, 'cause as much as I see that, I also know that it was layered because He used that time for so many other things, to reveal a lot to us. And I don't want that, I don't want them listening just to go, oh, that's kinda strange, but a cool little revelation, there was a lot more that-- [Aaron] Well of course, like God is infinite, and He orchestrated a lot of things in our life, for many purposes, to put us on this journey with this ministry, to make us, our unity and our oneness stronger, to use us in the lives of others, like lots of things to teach us things. [Jennifer] To teach us things, yeah. [Aaron] But it tells us that the, in the Bible that that our Father in Heaven disciplines His children. And if He didn't discipline us, we'd be illegitimate children. But because we're His children, He disciplines us. I just wanted to highlight that to show that we, in going through those things, that what our heart should be is to recognize what God's doing and that He loves us, and that He cares for us. It's that quota, He loves us the way we are, but loves us too much to leave us there, and so He changes us. And He draws us to Himself, and He makes us more like His son, Jesus. [Jennifer] He definitely used that time to do that in our life. [Aaron] Yeah. What for you, Jennifer, 'cause I brought this into my marriage, and I didn't know if you struggled with anything at the time, early in the marriage, but what did my addiction to pornography, how did it make you feel? How did you deal with it? What were some of the highlights, or lowlights, I should say-- [Jennifer] Yeah, I'm like, there were no highlights. [Aaron] From our, from that's part of our story? [Jennifer] Knowing that you struggled with this was painful, and I felt betrayed, as your wife. And there was a lot of deep hurt, a lot of pain, but what's interesting is also wrapped up in a lot of insecurity, and I felt like it was pointed back at me, as if I wasn't good enough for you. And so on top of the pain of betrayal and mistrust, there was also this layer of, "I'm not good enough for you and it's my fault." [Aaron] Right, like you're causing me to like, well, if I was prettier, or if could give him this-- [Jennifer] Or if my-- Part of my body. Yeah, if my body actually worked-- Yeah. [Jennifer] And we were experiencing an awesome sex life, maybe he wouldn't, maybe marriage would have fixed it. So then I felt at fault for it, and that was really painful. And so anytime that you confessed to me, or that the truth was exposed, I felt just as at fault for it. [Aaron] Yeah, and I remember you would say those sorts of things and I would try and like comfort you, and be like, "No, no, no, not at all, not at all." But what's unfortunate is I was only comforting you back then and trying to help you back then for the sake of my own shame. Like I didn't like that I made you feel that way, I didn't like that you responded that way, but instead of changing, I just tried to help you cope with it. Which is wrong of me, I wasn't a very good spiritual leader back then. [Jennifer] Well we didn't know back then, where I feel like spiritually, we were so immature that we didn't know how to navigate this right. [Aaron] We didn't have much close fellowship back then. We've talked about that in past episodes. Which would have helped us see it sooner probably, if we had people closer to us, knowing us. Not just people but spiritually mature people. People who would challenge this area of our life. But again, we have to expose it and we have to tell people how we're struggling if we want that kind of correction. Yeah, and we kind of-- Which most people don't. [Aaron] Kept it to ourselves. [Jennifer] So I also remember anytime that you would say, "Hey we have to talk," my heart would drop, 'cause I'd be waiting for the bomb, the truth bomb of like, "I have to confess again." And I hated that feeling, and my heart also ached with anxiety every time I left you at home alone because I just knew. [Aaron] You knew it was gonna come when you got back, yeah. [Jennifer] And when I did come home, and you told me you messed up, like you said you would say, it just affirmed my distrust in you. [Aaron] Were you ever surprised? No. Yeah, 'cause you knew I was gonna, which is such an unfortunate thing to make my wife only know that about me. That I'm not a trustworthy person, that I have no integrity, and she's gonna feel small, and insignificant because of something I'm choosing to do. And I think the reason, no I don't think, the reason we are getting real with this stuff, is because these are the things that aren't said to us. And so we can easily minimize what we're doing. I minimized it a lot with you. I would just be like, "Well it was only for a little bit here, "I, it was, like, it was nothing, it was not a big deal." And like, all I ever tried to do when I was apologizing to you was minimize the shame and the guilt that I saw in your face. And I deeply regret that part of our marriage, and the things that I walked in, that I didn't believe the truth that I've seen and read in the Bible that I thought that was for other people, not myself. I believed I was still trapped by it, even though I was a believer. I believed that I was still trapped in my sin. I believed that it had power over me that it didn't actually have. And I let it into our marriage. And in the Bible it tells us to keep the marriage very pure, and I didn't. And so I thank God that He showed me these things and He was patient with me because half the time, you feel like, "Man I'm surprised God just didn't strike me down." 'Cause like He's sovereign, He's a good God, but He's a just God, and man I justly deserved not what I've been given. The patience, and the reconciliation, and a wife who remained with me when you probably had a good reason and a good right to leave me, for breaking our vows so many times. Because the next truth we wanna make everyone listening realize is that pornography's not just, like oh, this little sin that I did over here, and like it's not a big deal, it's not attached to anything. The Bible tells us clear that sexual sin is special. It does something different to us because it's against our own bodies, and especially in marriage when you and your wife are one. [Jennifer] I was gonna say, it's against your oneness. [Aaron] It's against your body. It's against my wife, and this is the truth bomb, pornography is adultery. It's adultery. I was a cheater on my wife. I broke her trust time and time again. I broke faithfulness with her, and that's the reality, and if anyone's, that's listening right now is walking in this and is telling themselves, "Well, it's only every once in awhile. "It's not that big of a deal. "I can stop anytime." Whatever we, words we use, we are committing adultery on our spouse, and we are not practicing righteousness, and we are not walking in light as He is in the light. And those are truths that we need to say out loud, and we need to recognize them for what they are. [Jennifer] I just wanna be honest, this episode has been so hard for me, and I just feel like I, there's things that I wanna share, and then I get this lump in my throat, and my eyes start watering. We've had to stop three times just to pause so I can breathe. But pornography hurts. Pornography kills, and it kills oneness, and unity in marriage, it kills trust, it kills love, it kills-- [Aaron] Faith. [Jennifer] Faith, and-- [Aaron] It severs our relationship with the Father. [Jennifer] Yeah, it severs our relationship between husband and wife. Like our relationship was crumbling because of this. And I just, I feel so emotional I think, even sitting here listening again to our story because I know we're not the only ones who have been hurt by the pain of pornography. There are so many husbands and wives, maybe them listening right now, have walked this, or experiencing it, or maybe just last night, they had that hard conversation where they're in tears over it because they want it gone so badly, and it just keeps coming, and keeps coming, and keeps coming and it's gonna keep coming-- Or if they're about to have the conversation-- The enemy-- Today. The enemy hates marriage. The enemy hates what we're doing, and it's going to keep coming because he knows that it will destroy what we have. [Aaron] And I wanna, your words are powerful, but I wanna remind us that our words are powerful. And you keep saying "Pornography, it's coming, it's coming," as if it's something coming at us, and this is one of the lies I believed, that pornography was something happening to me. And when something happens to us, it's out of our control. Pornography was not happening to me. Yes, the same issue kept coming up and we had to keep dealing with it, but, and I'm not correcting you, Jennifer, but I want the people listening to not take anything we say and say, "See? "There it is, it's coming at me." [Jennifer] No, and when I said it's coming, I mean the enemy is dangling that temptation in front of us because he knows our flesh is weak. And we have to be willing to stand strong against it. [Aaron] And so if we think it's something happening to us, we'll never walk strong. It's something I believed. I believed it was a outward force that I had no control over. But it is not. 'Cause if that was the case, then no one's free. And the things that the Bible tells us are lies. Our encouragement to those listening is to believe the truth. Proclaim the truth, so confession, which is saying what's going on. Saying what you're doing. What you are choosing to do, which is the key. Not coming like, "Oh, it happened again. "Oh, I messed up again. "Oh, "I slipped and fell into this thing again now." Confessing that you chose again to cheat on your spouse, that you chose again to walk in unfaithfulness with your God. That's true confession. And then repentance is to turn the other way. I am no longer gonna choose to walk in that. Because if it's something that we accidentally fall into, if it's something that happens to us, then there is no need to repent because you don't know if you're gonna slip. You're walking on this journey, and you're just gonna fall into the pit by accident, and that's just your destiny. But that's actually not true because that goes against everything Jesus came to do on the cross. He came to set us free from the bonds of sin and death. And the same power that raised Jesus from the dead is the same power that will bring life to our mortal bodies. That's what the Bible tells us. And in a little bit, we're gonna get through more scripture just so you listening can hear the truth about this. And I wanna bring up something, you said, Jennifer, that pornography hurts us, and it destroys us, and I wanna highlight one more truth, it was something that I never realized until I started walking in purity. And God was revealing to me who I was, and the things I was doing, is that pornography doesn't just hurt us, the ones consuming the pornography. We are literally condoning and cheering on, and paying for things that we would never condone, or cheer on, or pay for a Christian to do. And a lot of these men, women, whoever's in these videos or photos, many of them are forced into it. And even the ones that choose it, were literally saying, "Yeah, keep doin' that. "Keep doin' that." We're choosing to hold hands with someone to Hell, by the thing we are consuming. And if Christians would realize that, if I would have realized that earlier, would I have stopped? Maybe. If I woulda realized like, man, I'm actually like, partaking, participating in someone's journey, to a journey away from God. And it's easy for us to think like, well they're just things, it's just a video. Well no, those are people in those videos. Real people that are made in God's image. And I just hope that this is hitting home with those listening, I hope that people are hearing our hearts of concern and love, and are also being, having their eyes opened, and their hearts opened, and that true Godly repentance would come from this. [Jennifer] So I remember there was two pivotal moments in our marriage, that stand out to me. I think you'll know what I'm talking about, but they are pivotal because they helped you change in this area. And so I wanna share 'em so that those listening can be inspired by it and hopefully it, this, hopefully this moment right here becomes a pivotal moment for them. [Aaron] Amen, yeah. [Jennifer] So I remember it was just after we had Elliot, he was just a little baby, and I was sitting in a rocking chair midday, trying to rock him. And you were sitting at the desk in our bedroom, and you started telling me and confessing how you had-- -Again. [Jennifer] Messed up again. And normally, I mean, list an emotion, and I've expressed it. Tears, uncontrollably, like just all of it. Sadness-- All rightfully so, 'cause of what I've done to you. [Jennifer] But this time, I just sat pretty much gripping Elliot's little body, and patting his back, and my heart was just so burdened for you. And I remember-- It was actually your first time thinking about me in that way, because of what I was going through. [Jennifer] Yeah, yeah, like if tables were turned, yeah, putting myself in your shoes, but I just, I questioned you on your faithfulness to me. Because on the outside, we were Christians moving forward in our marriage and at this point, we actually had already been reconciled and determined to stay together. And you messed up again, and I questioned you on your faithfulness and I reminded you what scripture says about it being adultery, and I know you have already mentioned that today, but I remember just reminding you in this, in that moment that you were committing adultery against me. And I questioned how you would want our future to go, I questioned how you would want our son's future to go. [Aaron] I remember all this. You asked me if I actually feared God. You asked me if I actually loved God. You were challenging me at the core of what I was doing. Not just this one event, oh, I forgive you for the event, you told me like, you need to realize what you are doing Aaron. And I remember it was like, shocking. It was like oh my gosh. This is different first of all, 'cause usually I'm like looking forward to you, not looking forward to it, but I'm expecting an outburst, a reprimand-- A reprimand, yeah. [Aaron] "What, you did it again? "Don't you know how this makes me feel?" But you went from, you actually loved me, selflessly, 'cause even though you were totally hurt, you instead told me the truth in love. You said, "Aaron, you are committing adultery." And I think that was actually the first time I, we recognized that's what I was doing. I'm laughing 'cause I'm embarrassed. That was a pivotal moment, and that began actually, over the next few years, me walking in-- [Jennifer] The start of the true change. [Aaron] Like it, I did still have-- [Jennifer] A weakness. [Aaron] I still fell back into it, I don't wanna say fell back in it, I still chose it, but it was, it became much less, and much less, and then what the next event that happened was the straw that broke the camel's back. Like the, the like it was the thing like, so you opened my eyes to like, "Man, I have to change. "This is not okay what I'm doing." And then this next moment, I'm sitting in my car with our pastor and mentor, and he's, and we just had dinner and we were hangin' out, and he said, "Aaron, are you walkin' in purity?" And I said, "Well, no, recently I did this." 'Cause I wanna be honest, that I'm tryin' to walk in repentance and openness and light. And he says, "Well Aaron," he's like, "nothing's gonna change "until you believe the truth." He's like, "You need to believe the truth." And I said, "Well, what do you mean?" Because the way I talked was, oh, it happened to me again, I fell into, I stumbled into, oh, woe is me, like as if something was happening to me, so, 'cause I was still not thinking clearly about this even though you challenged me correctly. I still wasn't thinking clearly. And he said, "You are not a slave "to your addiction to pornography. "Pornography is not something that has control over you." Which I didn't believe when he was saying it, 'cause I believed it controlled me. And then he said, "And also, Aaron, "you need to admit and confess that you love your sin." He said, "You need to say it because you do." And I said, "I don't love it." And he's like, "Well, your actions are proving different. "You say with your mouth that you don't, "and then you say with your actions that you do." And it went right into my heart. And it was the first time in my life that I was able to say with my mouth out loud, that I actually loved pornography. And what that meant was is I actually was able to fully confess, 'cause before I was confessing about the fruit of my sin, not confessing the sin that I loved my lust. [Jennifer] Which if people are wondering, my response is I hate hearing it, I hate knowing it, I hate, I hate all of that, but I think it's necessary in order to overcome-- [Aaron] Well, a true confession is necessary, I had to be able to admit the truth, 'cause I was walking in lies. And the lies were keeping me in the darkness, and the lies were keeping me trapped, when the trap was my lies, it was, there was no trap. There was no chains, 'cause God broke those chains on the cross. And he's like, "You need to recognize that, "that that is the truth. "You have not stopped sinning because you love your sin." And so I, once he said it out loud and once I said it out loud, I realized, wait a minute, I don't want to love my sin. And so I confessed, "Lord, forgive me for my love of my sin, "and change me." And that was the last time. I think there was one other little time after that, that was, and I'm not trying to minimize, significantly different kind of sinning, but in the same area. And I confessed that out loud to Matt, and to you, and that was it. And it's been how many years now? [Jennifer] Five. [Aaron] Five. But those are the pivotal conversations, was you telling me the truth in love, and then another brother telling me the truth in love. Not, "Aw, sorry, yeah we all, we're all gonna struggle. "Let's just get back up, "and let's just try harder next time." But that's not, that is not what God's asking us to do. He's not asking us to try harder, He's asking us to walk in the truth. And the truth is, let's read some of these verses. The truth is, Galatians 5:1, "For freedom Christ has set us free; "stand firm therefore, "and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery." And that's what I was doing, I kept submitting to a yoke of slavery that didn't exist. I was allowing a yoke to be put on me that didn't need to be there. So I'm free. That's what Christ came for, freedom. Would you read Romans 6:6? [Jennifer] "We know that our old self "was crucified with Him in order that the body of sin "might be brought to nothing, "so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin." [Aaron] Oh, so it's not that I have to try harder, I am not enslaved to sin. So I need to walk in the actual truth-- [Jennifer] Which is 2 Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. "The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." [Aaron] So am I walking in this old self while pretending to be a new self? [Jennifer] Talk about a marriage fixing things. [Aaron] Yeah, and the marriage doesn't fix it, Christ has already fixed it. [Jennifer] No, the marriage of Christ, the being one. Oh, yeah, we're being one with the body of Christ, we're His bride, and it says that He's gonna come back to a pure white, and without blemish bride. That's who, that's what I'm a part of, that's who I am. That's who you are listening. [Jennifer] Yeah, how dare Him come back to a bride that's been-- [Aaron]Dancing in the mud, with her dress. [Jennifer] Sad. [Aaron] So those listening, your old self has been crucified. It's been crucified. Christ set us free on the cross. Ephesians 4:17 through 24, "Now this I say and testify in the Lord, "that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, "in the futility of their minds. "They are darkened in their understanding, "and alienated from the life of God "because of the ignorance that is in them," that was my life, I was walking as, He's telling Christians to not walk as Gentiles were, I was walking that way in my ignorance. "Alienated from the life of God "because of the ignorance that is in them, "due to their hardness of hearts. "They have become callous "and have given themselves up to sensuality, "greedy to practice every kind of impurity. "But this is not the way you learned Christ, "assuming that you have heard about him "and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, "to put off your old self," Aaron, put off your old self. "Which belongs to your former manner of life "and is corrupt through deceitful desires," I, that's crazy that it uses the word deceitful desires. They trick us, they're desires that are deceitful. "And to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, "and to put on the new self, "created after the likeness of God "in true righteousness and holiness." So my trying harder is actually just putting on the new self. Christ's likeness. 1 John 2:1, "My little children, "I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. "But if anyone does sin, "we have an advocate with the Father, "Jesus Christ the righteous." What's awesome about that is when we're walking in righteousness, and we stumble because we've chosen to, or we haven't, we weren't walking in the, we weren't walking in the Spirit, but we were walking in the flesh, we have an advocate. But the things that we're reading right now have been written so that we won't sin. So that we will actually walk in the truth. 1 John 2:28 and 29, "And now, little children, "abide in him, so that when he appears "we may have confidence and not shrink from him "in shame at his coming. "If you know that he is righteous, "you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness "has been born of him." I love that it says practice first of all, 'cause that that means is that we are not yet righteous, but we are becoming righteous. And as we practice it, we get better at it. So am I practicing my sinful desires and getting better at those things, or am I practicing righteousness and getting worse at my sinful desires? And that was, that's my life now, is I'm getting worse at my sinful desires and I'm actually getting better at avoiding temptation, and knowing what temptation is, and being strong under the temptation, and fleeing from the temptation, and talking about the temptation. And now encouraging others to do the same. [Jennifer] So actually I was gonna mention that, how you walk in authority now and challenge other believers, and I can be confident that you're gonna walk our children through these things, that you can teach them, and I don't know, I just, I love that you have this authority that you can say, "I've overcome this, you can too." [Aaron] Which is amazing, because when we see other people overcome something, it makes it that much more believable that we can. And so you're listening to this, and if you're thinking, "Man, I can't do that." Stop believing the lies, you have been set free by Christ. You have the power of the Holy Spirit in you. You've been given everything that pertains to life and Godliness, just like I have. I'm not special, I haven't been giving, given something that you haven't been given, Jennifer hasn't been given something that you haven't been given. We have Christ in us. We have, we could put on the new self, created after the likeness of God. [Jennifer] Something that we mention in our book coming out, Marriage After God, is that Jesus didn't come back to kind of save you, He came back to save you. [Aaron] He came back to fully save us, today, when Jesus teaches the disciples how to pray, He says, "Thy will be done on Earth, "as it is in Heaven." Which is cool because we can actually have His will on Earth, in our life. Now we haven't, our bodies are still gonna decay and we're gonna still see death, and these bodies are gonna fall apart because they're not yet redeemed. But you know what is fully redeemed? Our spirit. And He's renewing us day by day, and He's giving us a new mind, and new spirit, and He's, and through His word, and through walking in community, and through being, walking in light and truth, we can actually walk the way God has enabled us to walk. It tells us in Malachi, that He will write His laws on our hearts, on tablets of flesh. They're no longer on stones that can be broken, they're on hearts of flesh. His laws are written on our hearts, and not only has He showed us in our hearts how we can, how we should walk, but He's empowered us to do so through the power of His son and His spirit. I don't know, I hope that was vulnerable enough, and again, our prayer is that those listening, you, would not be freed from this addiction, and this struggle with sin, and pornography, but that you would recognize that you are free, and that you do not have to choose to be submitted to it. You don't have to choose it. You can choose actually to walk away, you could choose actually to turn the computer off, you can choose actually to put your phone down, you can choose to run away as fast as you can. We can choose that, and we are empowered to do so through the Holy Spirit. [Jennifer] So if this episode encourages them to go have a conversation, and there's confession and reconciliation, do you wanna share some things that we've learned over time that could help them? [Aaron] Yeah, I will say on my part, or for those that are going to do the confessing, and we talked about confession in one of our episodes, and they should go back and listen to that actually, don't minimize, meaning, well, it was just this, it wasn't as big as deal you think, it was only for a moment. Just say I did this. And then the second thing I would always try and do that I shouldn't do, was I tried to control your reaction. Please don't be mad, I know that I was wrong, please don't be sad, please don't be frustrated-- Or why are you crying. [Aaron] Or why are you crying. And so I, when I started walking in purity, I purposed that if I was gonna confess to you, I was just going to tell you what I did, when I did it, and then I was gonna be quiet. [Jennifer] And so on my part, I mean, as the person receiving the confession, something that I've learned is, well the first thing is, God created us with a lot of different range of emotions, but He created us with emotions. And so the first thing is acknowledging that you feel, and the second one is you're still called to have self-control in those feelings. And-- And you're allowed to have the feelings. And you're allowed to have those feelings, so you may cry, you may get angry, you may get all of the things, but you still are required to have self-control in them, and that doesn't mean that you just shut it off and you don't express those emotions, it just means that you don't sin in your emotions. And so I just wanted to share that as the counterpart to what you-- [Aaron] And on the person receiving the confession, the other spouse, your job is to not just love your spouse, but to speak truth in love. Like you did that day. You very calmly and lovingly said, "You are walking a very dangerous line. "You are committing adultery, "and you are harming our marriage, "and what you're doing will destroy us. "And you must change." [Jennifer] And then the biggest thing after all of that, is reconciliation. It should always be for the purpose of reconciliation and we hope that it's for reconciliation in your guy's marriages. [Aaron] And reconciliation can happen even though trust is still broken. Because the reconciliation is knowing that hey, we are still one, but we are going to work on this trust thing. Because you have hurt me and we're gonna walk it out together, and I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna avoid being healed, but it's going to take time and that's gotta be okay. Because it's not like a switch that gets flipped. There's been unfaithfulness, there's been brokenness, there's been sin, and there's consequences to that sin. But as a team, you walk towards healing and restoration, on both parties, and you do that by prayer, you do that by fasting, you do that by walking faithfully-- [Jennifer] And abiding in the word of God. [Aaron] And abiding in the word of God, and you also do that in community. You don't do it alone. If you're a brother dealing with this, you find other brothers that are gonna say, "Dude, stop it." That have authority in your life because they walk in purity also. If you're the wife, you find girls that are gonna be like, "You can't do this. "You need to walk in purity." And the goal is oneness, unity, healing, righteousness, holiness for the purpose that we always go back to is that God has a job for our marriages. He's got a ministry for us to do, and we will not be able to do it if we're stuck in sin. [Jennifer] Yeah, we need to be pure, and we need to present His bride, pure. [Aaron] And that's what we get to do, we get to purify ourselves, we get to practice righteousness, and we get to chase after God every day, and I just pray that this brings freedom today. I pray that hundreds, thousands of couples today would find not just healing, but realize the freedom that they have. And that they would be the ones that people look at and say, "I didn't know you could walk in freedom like that." And then they'll say, "Actually, this is what the Bible says." And they'll be able to help other Christians walk that way as well. [Jennifer] What an incredible ripple effect for the body of Christ. Oh yeah. [Jennifer] Well thank you guys so much for joining us on this episode. It was, it was vulnerable, and I appreciate you sharing, Aaron. And I can see that there's probably gonna be a lot of questions, probably come up from this. Probably. [Jennifer] And we might have to do another episode, but that's okay. But we do wanna invite you guys to pray with us, and close out the episode with this prayer from Aaron. [Aaron] Dear Lord, thank You for Your loving patience and kindness towards us. Thank You for Your mercy and forgiveness. Lord, I pray as Christian men and women we would practice walking in righteousness. I pray we would pursue purity, as You are pure. I pray that as Christian men and women who proclaim You to be Lord in our life, that we would not walk in this sin anymore. Change us, transform us, and cut out any dead flesh and wicked way that is in us. Help us to fear You and love You. Help us to see the truth about pornography, that it is destructive, sinful, immoral, and that it is adultery. Your word tells us that there should not even be a hint of sexual morality named among us as Christians. Help us to live with integrity, help us to be transparent and honest in marriage, help us to choose reconciliation over isolation in marriage. We are Your saints, and I pray we would walk in a manner worthy of Your call in our lives. In Jesus name, Amen. Thanks for joining us this week, and we look forward to what the Lord's gonna do in your life. And the testimonies that are gonna come from the truth that people heard today. [Jennifer] We'll see ya next week. [Aaron] 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.

Pokemon Blue Nuzlocke 36: MOLTRES. (Season -05 episode -16). Man I'm putting these things out so fast I don't have time to do fun descriptions and stuff, sorry readers... Music in this ep was Here Comes a Chicken by The Wiggles and Six Ways to Sunday by The Drones.

Rob:           All right well, welcome to our Becoming Your Best podcast listeners wherever you are in the world today. I have a person that we're gonna talk with today who I consider to be one of the most amazing people I've ever met and you'll quickly realize that and as you start to listen to some of his stories and hear some of the background and a little bit about Randy. But let me introduce Randy because, I don't say that lightly when I say he's one of the the most respected people I know and not just by me but might many many other people who I know, that says a lot about Randy. He started out as a student body president at Ricks and while he was there I said, “You know Randy, is there anything you haven't done?” Because he's done all these things and he looked at his phone and he showed me this picture of him riding a bull while he was in college. Not only was he study body president, he did some bull riding while he was there, which immediately my respect level went through the roof for him when I saw that. He went on to the Harvard OPM Program. He starred and sold several businesses very successfully. He has six children, a beautiful wife who's amazing in her own right. One of the things that stands out to me most about Randy, amongst all his success’ and all the people he knows, he's probably the most connected person I've ever met. The thing that really stands out the most about Randy is his impeccable character and honestly, he genuinely cares about other people and helping them succeed and that's one of the reasons I believe Randy has been so successful himself is because he wants to see other succeed and he comes across very genuine people realize that he's very sincere in what he does. So without further ado, one the most successful people I know and down to earth, just loving, kind people; Randy Garn!   Randy:       Well, thank you Rob! I really really appreciate you saying those kind words and I feel the same about you and what you and your dad have built with BYB and the whole leadership thing is so critical in everybody in all facets of our lives and so I'm learning to be a great student of yours.     Rob:           Yeah, well that goes both ways! It’s always hard too, when someone introduces you and says all these amazing things, it’s like what do you say after that? But Randy really is amazing! Do you think, Randy, if you wouldn't mind just giving them a brief background on you that I didn't cover? You know, where you're from, a little bit about you, anything that you think would be valuable for someone to know?   Randy:       Yeah, I think it is important to know where we've come from and you know, I grew up in a really small town called Sugar City, Idaho. You know, when I left I think there's 1150 people there after I left. And I mean it was just an amazing place and I'll get back to that. Why I think our roots and the way we are raised, and the way we're raising our children are so critical for the people that we become, and especially with character and integrity and in leadership. And so I grew up and and my dad was a high school football coach for 29  years. He's going into medicine and then you know he had these four boys and he's like, “Man I'm gonna buy a ranch and I'm gonna be a football coach. I'm gonna teach my kids how to work.” So I mean he sacrificed on what he could have done but he wouldn't give it up to the world and so you know, I grew up in a really fun environment. It's so funny when I meet a lot of leaders, they’re like, “You know my parents abused me,” or you know, “I was in some serious trauma,” or other things happen and that makes people great. You know when they can overcome those things, but I was actually fortunate enough to be led by a really,  really good man that told me that I could do anything I wanted in life and actually mentored me and stuck with me the whole time. And so, somebody that I love and admire and he's still alive today and I respect him and he still gives me a quote every night and how he help build me up every night and so that was some of my roots was growing up in that type of environment.   Rob:           Did I hear you right to say that you either rode a tractor or a truck or something and he would always be playing these tapes of some these greats?   Randy:       Yeah. In fact, we had about, you know it was about a twenty minute ride out to our ranch where we you know we raise cattle and horses. And so, we had about 300 head of cattle and we had 50 horses at one time so I mean it wasn't a huge ranch but it was a ton of fun and we would listen to Denis Waitley and Jim Rohn and Zig Ziglar and The Strangest Secret from Nightingale and that’s some of the things that I’d listen to and then he'd mentor me. We're out there fixing fences and all that and he’d talk about it. You know, we grew up in kind of a family to where we are God fearing and we literally would say family prayers at night and then put it in and everybody in, ready? Break! Go Garns! And so it was just fun. It was a good time, so yeah we listened to a lot of the classics and you and I did a call with Denis a couple of days ago and he's a great man, but that's some of the things I grew up on.   Rob:           Yeah, and the irony is all these very people who you grew up listening to now, you become very close friends to them. In many cases ,helping mentor them as it goes both directions and ironic how you know that fate aligned that way. Speaking of this, interestingly, we were just with the group today and was talking about estate planning and one of the things was mentioned was often times we think about estate planning as it's just financial. You know, here's what happens to your finances. This particular person leading the discussion was saying, you know what? It's so much more that! It's a legacy that you're leaving. It's a legacy of character. It's a legacy of what you're teaching your children and in so many ways it sounds like you're such a product of what your parents created for you in the environment.   Randy:       Yeah, I would totally agree with that in a lot of ways. And so I mean now I've got a family of my own, married probably one of the most awesome women on earth and I've got an amazing life. In a lot of times I do I talk a lot about kind of the home court advantage. You know I had a CEO reach out to me the other day and he's like, “Man I've got two kids and you know things are rough at home. How do you balance everything? How do you grow a business and keep things right personally and stay fit and do all these things? I can't keep it up!” And he's like, “Randy, you're probably single and being able to do all these things!” I was like, actually I'm not! I have an amazing wife. I've got six kids. I’ve got two sets of twins. I run multiple companies and we’re growing things like crazy! He about lost it! He's like, “How in the world do you balance all that?” You know, I said, well first off you got to have make sure you get everything right both personally and professionally because for me, there's no distinction. And I know a lot of people try to put things in silo but for me, Rob, there's no distinction between who you are at business and who you are home and who you are church or who you are personally and professionally. It's you’re one person and so the way that you show up in one place is the way that you really show up everywhere.   Rob:           Ooh, we could stop the podcast right now. If we all just live that, what a huge impact it would have on the world. Randy, actually segways into a thought I had and that was you know one of the things that is amazing about you, is the relationships you have with so many people. And so you had a chance in your life in these different associations to meet some of the most incredible people and influencers on earth. So, from all these people you've met and you just describe some of it right there, if you had a narrow down to a few things what sets apart those who you most admire and respect and why?   Randy:       I thought about this a lot you know and I thought about this over a great deal. I actually wrote a book called, “Prosper.” We hit The New York Times in 2011 and I wrote the book with the with a close friend of mine. We started another company that we sold in 2014. But for me, it's those people that are balancing money and happiness and sustainability. And to be able to do that, that's where prosperity really comes in for me. But to be able to do that, you have to have some real deep character and there's a few people in my life that I really truly respect. You know, I just was on the phone with Brandon Steiner from Steiner sports and Harvey McKay - I'm on his advisory board. He's written 13 books, “Swim with the Sharks,” and you know, “How to use your head to get your foot in the door,” and many others. But for me, it's people that have really lived the law of reciprocity and that you know, Brandon always says, “Do as much as you can for as many people as you can for as often as you can without asking for anything in return. And watch what life does to you and for you.” And so, I watch them and I watch how successful they are but also successful is more than just monetarily. It's like it’s rich in relationships and rich in being able to do business development and rich in being able to call anybody at any time and have access instead of you know trying to pay your way into things. You have access to the things you'd never have access into because you're such a giver.  That’s one characteristic that I know the people that I really admire and love.   Rob:           Yeah it's interesting you say that because, really, we live in a world where it's almost counter to our culture. At least from my perspective, there's so much in the world of what's in it for me and how do we grow and I and we and us and what you described is so powerful and I just think, you know, our listeners don't know this but you have this ranch up in Wyoming, this beautiful ranch in a valley called Star Valley and you bring people there often go fishing and take some time in the outdoors and you had a couple of people who  from the outside would be considered very successful recently and I remember you show me the pictures of the dad catching a fish with his son and taking that time and so many things come from that. Not only was that a relationship that you had with him, where just purely giving of your time not only giving but creating a rich experience. It’s not even just a lunch or dinner, you're out there fishing side by side and secondarily there's this dad fishing with his son for what looked like one of the first times in his life and the rich experience that they were having together and his son will never forget that and so I think you're one of the epitomes of what you just described.   Randy:       Well, I mean that we were doing that for them and they become even deeper friends right? There's another principle that I live, one is the law of reciprocity but the other big one, Rob, that's really been effective for me is called the experience economy. Joesph Pine wrote a book called “The Experience Economy” and that's why we have you know the Trout Ranch. We've got other properties and then I do, I take a lot of people up too. Got some great friends up at Sundance and Chad Lindebaugh and the guys that run Rocky Mountain Outfitters or we go horseback riding or fly fishing or zip lining and you go have an experience with somebody and a lot of times you'll spend the whole day together and maybe talk business about twenty minutes. When they kind of come out for the whole day and we have a deal done. And so a lot of times people get so stuck in to, you know, “We will meet you at the hotel,” or wherever. I love to get out and do stuff with these guys that never experienced the things that we can offer. So I'm really big on the book by Joseph Pine called  “The Experience Economy,” to generate deep meaningful, relationships but also drive tremendous value and move business forward in a big way naturally.   Rob:           Yeah that's awesome. I mean there's another terminology: transactional versus transformational. I mean, lunches are great, dinners are great but what you're talking about is the spirit of good, better, best. Taking something that's good and making it way way better because it's so rich, it's so deep and so real. I mean you're out in the outdoors and so much amazing things that can happen from that. So building on that what you just described there, and maybe now zeroing in on you not so much on others, but from your own life experiences ,what are two or three of your biggest lessons learned through life? I mean you've seen so much now. What are one, two or three of those lessons learned that you feel could we have a real impact in the lives of our listeners and what tips would you share from your own experience?   Randy:       From my own ,experience, I think some of the biggest things are ,you know you don't need to please everyone. And I think early on in my career, you know the most valuable asset that any of us have is time - is our time. And so I have a formula for whether I’ll do business with others or not and it's a formula that I actually learned from it another gentleman that does partner with this up at the top of the trout ranch. It's called you're the P. over your E. squared. Take look at fractional equations get your P. over your E. squared that means that your principles are higher than your ego or economic interests, always. I always look at somebody and I say, at the end of the day is as their principles other principals higher than their ego or their economic interest in something and will they stick to that more so because I have done business and I've done things with individuals where, man,  it looks on paper like it's going to be a fantastic, amazing, awesome opportunity and we’re going to crush it and we're all gonna be billionaires and you know being able to give back and do all the stuff but the end of the day you know that something's just not right and I've actually got some pretty good Spidey senses for that, where you just know that there's just something that's just not right and I went forward with that is like I haven't quite figured that out you know when I was younger but now I have. If it just doesn't chemistry, doesn't fit right or like something just doesn't feel like, “Oh heck yeah. We’re gonna crush this, we're gonna do this!” if you leave a meeting and you feel like I just I don't know if I am in. It doesn't mean that they're always unintegrous or whatever it may be, but it's always been where their ego or their economic interest don't align with mine, it has not ended up being a good thing.   Rob:           That right there just to pause, I know you have one or two more to say, but that is a huge, huge deal. You know it's interesting as we put together the book you know as you well know Become Your Best and ironically used the word principles -  The 12 principles of highly successful leaders. And in doing so interviewing hundreds of people and you try to look for these patterns of success and what sets apart great leaders and high performing teams from everyone else. And so you see that there's this pattern that emerges there's where the 12 principles come from. At the same time it was really interesting because another pattern emerged and it was at the very same principle but when they were violated. And one of the things you see over and over in CEOs and leaders that at least was from my experience and perspective was their downfall was their ego.   Randy:       Totally.   Rob:           And when ego became so big that it got in the way the progress of the company or got in the way of the finances so they couldn’t  wrong or they couldn't take input - the ego, was in many cases, their downfall. And we have several coaching clients right now and part of the reason I know this is, “Hey I've got a nice present or so and so and their egos got so big, how do I handle this?” Because it’s kind of killing our business. So just to reinforce it, what a great thought that is so P over E squared, is that right?   Randy:       P over E squared - so your ego and economic gain, but you're right, I mean there's been, in fact we just met with another amazing, amazing man and he said the best CEOs in the world are those that have humility. Isn't that interesting? They have humility and they follow their principles. Because you can do anything, I mean you can have success for a short period of time but if your ego and your economic interest and you get too greedy, it's gonna get in the way and it's going to stop you from growing and the best CEOs both have humility and also give credit where credit's due. I mean, there's different forms of ways you can pay people. One of the best ways that I know how to pay people is to give them credit.   Rob:           Yeah, make them the hero. Yeah, that's really good. Any other thoughts on that lessons learned from your past experiences? I mean that's a fabulous one right there.   Randy:       Yeah, I think the other big one for me is something that again my dad, he is just an amazing man and I can't wait for you to meet him but one of the things; I was leaving for college and he told me one thing and I wrote it down. I’ll never forget in this state is like my first day going up from college. I just got back from living in the Philippines for two years and literally had like four days until I start college and he said, “Randy, I want you to know one thing is that if you don't have your own goals then someone else will use you for theirs.”   Rob:           Wow. Yeah that's powerful.   Randy:       So, you think about that whether you're a CEO or you know working for somebody or whatever that is but again you know if you don't have your own goals then someone else will use you for theirs. So I work closely with a lot of very high powered people in on some advisory boards and we work on strategy. If you do not have your own personal strategic plan and if you don't write down those principles like you guys talk about like leadership, like when I went to your live event, it was awesome! Because you were really pushing people to write down and to really manifest what they wanted to accomplish and so that was like one of the biggest key advices that had ever been given to me is, you know, “Randy if you don't have your own goals someone else will use you for theirs.” And I know you guys do a lot of that with what you do and even this year, BYB Daily Journal that I'm using and everything else it's so critical, to set those goals and know exactly what you're doing -every single day, every single week, every single month and execute well.   Rob:           Yeah, because the whole point is to lead a life by design rather than live a life by default.   Randy:       Exactly.   Rob:           And you know the research, backing up what you just said, is that a person is 90% more likely to accomplish something when they have a clearly written goal. Yet on the other side of the scale, on average only 10% of people have clearly written goals and so getting very intentional and focused. But I love that quote, I wrote it down. I'm gonna use that again in the future because it’s so spot on. “If you don't have your own goals someone else will use you for theirs.”   Randy:       Exactly right.   Rob:           That's a good one. I like that. You know, we're sitting here talking Randy and so many people listen to this podcast because their businesses in a leadership position or you know they want to be a better employee, yet many people also have these families at home, they’re in a relationship with someone else and a lot of what you're saying now goes right back into the home, doesn't it?   Randy:       Well, it does. I mean that's why I said it. It really does. You think about your family, to think about your most valuable asset. To me, it’s my children.  I actually literally plan time to spend time with them or planning out you know our whole entire year; when we're doing vacations and all that. When I was younger, we didn’t plan our vacations and then somebody else put something on there like, “I'm sorry honey, we really can't go to San Diego,” or “We can’t go to Hawaii this month of August, because I actually have an event I'm speaking at or doing.” But now, we do have to plan those things out or you will miss baseball games, you will miss opportunities for your your family and family things and so, why do we work so hard? Literally, for me, it’s because so I can actually give my family that things that they need so I don't want to miss that time especially the prime of their life. And so, I don't want to be one of those guys you know like Cat Stevens, “A cat's in the cradle,” where I didn't spend time with my most valuable assets so I think it does spill over to home and again that's part of my whole thing on home court advantage. You got to plan those things out or else other people use your time for other things.   Rob:           I’m so in agreement on that, absolutely! And, everything you're talking about, not only planning and being intentional with our children and with our spouse. I just met someone at a conference, Randy, last week and the two people walked up and, it's not a credit to me or you. It's the principle. That's what you're talking about. And they just said this short hour just changed my life and they say, “Well, you know I haven't been on a date with my spouse in over a year.” It is just because life - it's so easy for life to come in and take over if we're not being intentional planning and doing the things you're talking about. Because, in our society, unlike in some others around the world, wow it's so fast paced here and so we’re not intentional we run the risk of something else taking over our lives and suddenly we look back and say, “Wait a second, where’d time go and our kids around the house and our relationships? You know, what happened?” So I love that! If you want, Randy, since we’re about twenty minutes or so. I can't believe it goes by that fast and I got to tell our listeners, something cool about Randy, that we don't know, we're in the very early stages but I just had this thought, it'd be fun to go to the Everest base camp store talking about experiential and this experience economy, and so we got on the phone and I asked for Randy, “Hey Randy, how would you like to go? And would this be some you might be interested in?” And we want to keep this to a small group and Randy was like, “Man I had this is as a dream of mine forever!” You know, I was thinking maybe it might be fun to take my will be, at the time my 18 old son with us now and we talk about these experiences and we're in the early stages of planning and just before the podcast we’re thinking, you know, maybe 2019/2020, the thought is if we don't plan it now, what's the odds it's something like that's ever going to happen?   Randy:       It's so true, Rob and just think about that both! It will help us to get in shape to do that – that’s some serious, serious hiking but just think of the experience that we have that the group that will go will do something that we’ll never forget, right? And so you're exactly right but we're planning that after two 2019 or 2020 and you have to do that because time flies! Time flies so fast that if you're not staying on top of stuff you will you'll miss out on living the intentional life is what I call it.   Rob:           Hopefully my mother in law is not listening in this podcast because she doesn't know that yet. So as we get ready wrap up, maybe one more thing if you don't mind Randy. I haven’t really asked you this yet. What's an experience in your life that really ,if you look back say maybe that experience or one of the experiences that was one of the most influential experiences on you, help shape you and who you’ve become today? Would you mind sharing that?   Randy:       Yeah, I mean, one that just comes to my mind that I'll share with you. As you know, back in our company we started  company back in 1999 and you know, it just exploded and back after two and a half years of being business and really profitable and growing and we had some people that came in and said, “Hey, we'll give you all this money and you know we'll take you IPO and we'll do a reverse merger and you know we ended up doing the deal and it took us 3.5 or over 3 years to unwind it and it'll cost millions of dollars to be able to do so and so that was one of my most valuable experiences because we said you know what these guys are really super smart you know they're in their forties, they're amazing, they've done business stuff but come to find out that it was really not what it was all out to be. I remember my business partner looking at me and he said, “You know what, if we're waiting for all the smart people to show up, we're actually here.” And we’re literally just looking at each other and so I think one of the biggest things is that I've learned in my life is to have confidence in myself, in that, if somebody else can do it, I can do it. So you can't fear those things and it's just like what's the difference between a $4,000,000 company a $40,000,000 company and a $400,000,000 dollar company - that really is really good people and strategy but it's a really good leader. Leadership is everything and so I stopped looking at other people to be my leaders and I started looking inward and started to build my own leadership qualities and traits and that's been a big focus of mine I’d really say for the last 18 years or so. But it all stemmed from that experience.   Rob:           How was that when you're going through it at the time?   Randy:       Oh bro, it was the worst ever. It was dark days, you know. It was it was really, really hard because we had all our employees that were also rooting and fighting for an understanding but it was a lot of prayers and in a lot of good things but we ended up you know really, really exploding after that as well, so I mean it's those things that build character and put hair on your chest when you go through tough experiences so it was good. Rob:           It is. You know it's interesting that's what you shared and I think a lot of our listeners know that my dad went through a similar experiences and it took him seven years. I remember him going down to the office with him. You know, speaking of being intentional, bringing everything back together. I remember running around the building -  it's a dark building but I'm down there in his office with him until like 9pm. He’d work these 15 hour days - trying to get out of a similar dark period and from that experience, that was kind of a refiners fire for him to really shape him to who he became later on in life and they're certain principles as a result of that and standards that we live by now as a company, for example, we will not operate with debt. I know that's not the case in every industry and companies there’s, you know, different thoughts on that but that's one of our things that we will do. He will never get in that position again. It's one of my personal mottos - the same principle. So it's amazing what can come from those refiner prior experiences. Boy, they're tough when you're in the middle of them aren't they?   Randy:       Yeah, and I learned too, you can't go sometimes in life you can't go around things or over things. Sometimes you just have to go right through them, you know?   Rob:           That's why you got the nickname. What they call you as a full back in high school?  The little ball of hate?   Randy:       Yeah, the little ball of hate. Back in the day. It’s a ton of fun!   Rob:           Randy, thank you so much for being on this podcast. I mean you're such an incredible friend, mentor, example and I think all of our listeners - I'm extremely confident they felt not only sincerity, but who you are and why you’ve had the influence on people that you've had and who you've become. So if you wouldn't mind, if there's any way they can either contact you or any details that you share about how they can learn more about you? If someone wanted to reach out in some form or fashion – is that something you could share with them?   Randy:       Yeah you know what, this is gonna be awesome because one of the software technology companies that we have is a marketing communications technology and it allows you to get really good at personal relationships and following up. It’s a company called Skipio and so the best way to get a hold of me as I'm really on my V. I. P. line and if you will just text me the words S K I P I O at 801 332 9909 and I'll be able to be able to follow up with you and you'll get a reply from me on some of the cool things that we're working with on the how to be a really, really amazing communicator and how to be really good on follow up. So again it's Skipio, just text key words Skipio to 801 332 9909  and you'll get a text right back from me with all my contact info.   Rob:           Awesome, so text Skipio – S-K-I-P-I-O to 801 332 9909 is that right?   Randy:       That's correct.   Rob:           And Randy will respond to you and we use Skipio. This is a great service if you're in any type of business where the customer experience is important which should be just about all businesses. You can also go to skipio.com and see what they do is a business a little bit more. Very, very cool what they do and Randy will respond so that's very generous of you to offer that out there for them Randy. Any parting thoughts?   Randy:       You know the last parting thought that I have is that I hope that all the listeners are you know utilizing Becoming Your Best tools. Honestly Rob, you came in and you spoke our company about what was it three months ago?   Rob:           Yeah that in there. Somewhere in there.   Randy:       And it has been it's been amazing, both for myself but other people keep referencing it in our office so all of the listeners I'd say you know the most important thing to do is to continue to work on yourself and continue to become the best individual, the best human, the best person that you can, and that way you can really reach out to others in a big way. And so I'm just that’s the one thing but I'm trying to do a lot better is to be the best you know leader that I can be and change as many lives but I possibly can before I go to the other side. And, so the other thing is one last thing - relating back to that story, is that a lot of people think you know in today's society it's like you know well I should deserve that or I should you know that's something that I deserve. I should deserve to be the CEO or I should deserve to have lots of money. I will tell you, that you really don't get what you deserve in life. You get what you work hard for and what you negotiate. So those are the two things – the two principles I live by: you don't get what you deserve in life you get what you fight, scratch, beg and plead for and negotiate. That's what you end up getting in life so that's part of my last leadership tip for everyone.   Rob:           Well, that is so true and I certainly echo and feel the exact same as you do so. Randy you're amazing! Thanks so much for being on the podcast. I know this is a huge deal for our listeners. It impacts me and it will certainly impact them so thank you for being here and everyone remember that one person can make a difference and it's just like Randy said it's you and I asking what can we do to make a difference so wishing you a great day and wonderful week where you're at in the world. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

My name is Steve Larsen and welcome to Secret MLM Hacks Radio. What's up guys. Hey, I am very excited for this episode actually, very pumped about it. Let's pass a little bit here, been a little bit busy, as normal, and had a lot of late nights and a lot of just working my guts out. I mean, come on, that's really what it's been. I'm very, very excited, though. Please understand as I say this, I'm not bragging or trying to beat my chest or say, "Look how good I am." I'm just excited. This is me helping everyone know and realize that this whole process works, all of it. All the stuff that we're doing, we're going through, it doesn't just work for me, it's working for other people as well, for recruiting for your MLMs. I just barely passed 140 people asking to join my down line, asking me, people I don't know. That's incredible guys. The first time I ever did this game, I was running around like crazy. I recruited 13 people and they didn't do anything. It was hard for me to get them to do anything. With this whole process, what's cool is I can go through and pretty much literally interview people. If they're not a good fit I say, "No." I see what their process is to promote the down line and promote our products and promote the things. You guys know, I don't ever tell you the name of the MLM I'm in. I'm trying to that on purpose so that everyone can let their guard down and not feel like this a pitch fest on this podcast. It's not the purpose of this podcast. Anyway, so it's been a whole lot of fun though. As I've been looking through, though, the process that I've having people go through I'm changing it. This is what I've been seeing, and I'd thought I'd just kind of drop this out to you guys. You guys know that I build sales funnels on the internet. That's what I do. That's what I'm known for. I've done it for a lot of big people and done it for myself. This whole MLM game and the funnel thing, it works so well that I left my job eventually. It's been coming up on two months here for me being solo, which has been fun. There's certainly some nerve wracking aspects to that every once in a while, but it's been fun though. I've been focusing like crazy on this whole application process. When somebody comes in and they apply to join my down line, they go through a little bit of an application process. There's an actual application. They fill it out, and what I've been doing in the past is at the end of the application process I say, "Okay, thanks. Give us a call here, we'll reach out." What I do then is I go, have them walk through some pages afterwards where they get to watch my presentations as if I was going to do a presentation in your home or you came to a home party or whatever it was. I took that and it's on the internet. It's literally like a webinar basically. I built pretty much a webinar that does that process for me. What's been cool is that it works. It works quite well. What's been rough, though, is going from one funnel, application process, the application funnel, and then pushing them again to another funnel where they go through basically a webinar. What I've been figuring out, what I've been learning, is in the past we'll be doing things like sending an email. Emails, I hate email. Emails sucks. Email drives me crazy. First of all, I hardly ever read my emails. Why do I expect my people to? You know what I mean? Facebook's the place where I go. Facebook's the place to be for me. I go in and I can communicate with my team through Facebook and our Facebook group, our closed groups, things like that. Emails are rough, so I try and after someone applies I'll be like, "Hey, go check out this presentation. If this seems like it's a good thing that you want, let's actually chat, or if you even know the questions you can just join right there." If they've made it that far through the application process, like I know that typically they're the kind of individual that I want to work with, that they'd be interested in the kinds of things that we do because I give them the very process that they just walked through so now they have a thing to go blow their down line up with. Does that make sense? That's part of the beauty of the thing that I've built is I have actual lead in tools, lead in processes, actual training and actual members area for my team. When they come in they go through that training and now they have a plan. That's part of the sexiness of what I've done. What I've been learning, what I've been realizing, is that in the past I've been having people go through the application process and then I do something to get them to the next thing, which is to watch the live presentation. It doesn't work very well. It's not that it doesn't work, meaning I am relying on things like email, which has terrible deliverability and I don't read. I'm relying on maybe a text message or just got the wrong phone number or maybe someone put the wrong digit in there. You know what I mean? It's been rough because there's all these people that have asked to join my down line, but sometimes because of just the way zeros and ones get crossed and stuff and technology will hiccup and things like that, I won't be able to go talk with all of them. I want to talk with all of them. This is what I've been doing. This is what I want to help you get. Anyway, there's a whole purpose of this episode, by the way, is all I'm trying to do is I'm trying to help you see that what I've been focusing on this last little bit is shrinking the length of the funnel. I'm trying to make the whole funnel, the entire psychology, still happen, but in a shorter duration so they're not going through all these pages. They're not waiting for this email to come to them. They're not waiting for this. They're not waiting for all that stuff. Instead, what's happening to them is it's the very same thing that they came for, apply to join Steve Larsen's down line, can get accomplished during the same mental session. The first page they go through, they say, "Yes, I want to apply." The second page is actually do the application. What I've changed is that on the third page I actually put the presentation so now they're going to another funnel. I'm not sending them to another spot. I'm not sending them to another place. I'm not send- ... They're not going on the third page right after they submit the application they can watch the presentation. If they know they're a good fit they're like, "Fine." They can go in and they can join right then, right there. This is a change and just barely made last night. It's been cool already. I've got a few messages from people, people giving feedback. It's far better for me to do it that way than to go send them through another four web pages while they register to watch the webinar, they register to watch my live presentation, then there's a confirmation page and they wait for it to start, then they actually watch it. Instead I just shrunk and condensed the entire funnel, and it's been working way better. What's cool about that is about half the people come through, they're like, "Look Steve. Man I'm ready to join you man. You got a system, you got a plan, your people work it. It is working." I just asked to speak at my MLM's event, which is at 2,500 people, which is exciting, and teach a lot of the things that I talk about here on the podcast. This stuff works guys. People come to me like, "Hey, this is awesome." They're like, "Look, just dude, just let me join right now. Just let me join right now." They'll click and they can go join right then right off that third page. Or there's a second group that they're like, "Hey, this is still good but I just have a question or two." They can click and they can choose a time in my calendar through calendly.com, and they can choose a time on my calendar and reserve a time in my schedule and I'll jump on a call with them and chat and whatever last few questions they have, just for 10-15 minutes. They're already watched the presentation by that point. They've already watched the ... Anyways, I've been shrinking the length of the funnel and I've been making it smaller. Anyway, that's all I'm trying to say. There's a guy, the reason I'm saying this is there was a guy I was learning from once that he was saying that, he said, "Every time you add a product to your SKU, every time you add a new SKU, every time you add a new product to your whatever you offer, you 12 X your back end complexity." Let me say that again, every time you add a new product to your product line you 12 X the amount of complexity on the back end, whether that's through support or how do you sell it or let's learn a new script. Is that interesting? Number one, the reason I like MLM is because I don't have to worry about the product that much. The corporate's the one that's shipping them out. Corporate's the one that's doing this customer service. I don't have to worry, so that's nice. It may not be pure 12 X, but I'm thinking from a funnel standpoint that that's also probably a little bit true, that if I'm trying to have this one outcome happen, if I add any extra pages, it's probably not 12 X, but there's some level of complexity that gets thrown in there, when I could've just got it done in, A, a short amount of time, but B, it may it more simple. Think through. There's a whole process, the whole reason I'm trying to bring this up guys is that I want you to look at the processes that you make people go through in order to buy from you. There's a percentage of people who just want to buy from you right then. You don't want to listen your thing. They're like, "You know what? My hands are dry. I just want your little lotion thing anyway." What I'm trying to do is I'm trying to adapt to what the market has been telling me, which like, "Hey Steven, we love the fact that you have us apply. We love the fact that you vet out to the individuals that are joining through some kind of process. We love that, but oh my gosh, sometimes it's a little intense and there's this huge percentage of us who just want to freaking join your team because we see you're on this path." They're the exact same way for you guys. Start looking through the process. Start looking through. Number one, you guys know that I love automation and I like to automate as much as I can. I'm not trying to take the human out of this business at all. The human element has not been removed from my MLM at all, but there is very much room for me to look and see, okay, now at least the process is there how do I make it better so that it caters to the individuals who are just like, "Look Steven, I just want to join you." Start doing that though and start looking through your process. Are there extra hoops? Start looking at the different pl- ... Are there rough patches on the road that you're making people run through that are like totally unnecessary? You know what I mean? There really may not actually be helping at all. Anyway, that's what I'm doing right now. I'm in the middle of testing out that process. I'm like 99% sure it's going to be better. I've already been seeing the responses from it a little bit and it's better. It's definitely better. It's been more realistic to how you and I would communicate in general. These automation pieces are literally just supposed to automate how you and I would normally communicate. They're not supposed to make us feel weird. They're not supposed to add extra processes or complexities to life. They're supposed to simplify things. I was looking at it and I was realizing like, "That might be a little bit too complex to send them from an application process up to a webinar process. Let's just mash the two together. Let's shrink the length of the funnel." So far it's been great. Anyways guys, thanks so much. Appreciate it. We just screamed past 15,000 downloads, which is awesome. Appreciate the listens and thanks so much for being in the community. I truly believe that the kind of things that we are talking about and I'm trying to teach here has the power to change the MLM industry. Let me bold enough to say that that's my goal. That's what I'm trying to do, so there's a lot of cool things coming down the pipeline and I've really, really enjoyed just getting a chance to share the journey with you guys as I do this. Anyway, if you've not had a chance to go check out secretmlmhacks.com. That's the program that I kind of teach that it works for any MLM. If you've not had a chance, go do so. If you're like, "Hey Steven, I just want to see what kind of stuff you have in general," and you're like, "Ah, I don't know yet. Steven, I'm not falling in love with you enough yet," then go to secretmlmhacksradio.com. You can download some pretty cool stuff for me helping you train your team on duplication strategies. Anyway, thanks so much guys. I'll talk to you later, bye. Hey, thanks for listening. Please remember to subscribe and leave feedback for me. If you have a question you want answered live on the show go to secretmlmhacksradio.com to submit your question and download your free MLM masters pack.

In this week's tantalizing episode of Techdown, our hosts pick apart Apple's "Let Us Loop You In" media event. If you want to hear to nerds geek out over iPhone SEs, 9.7" iPad Pros, software updates (of the point variety), and (god help us) new watch bands, then there's no better place for you to be. This kind of episode is our bread and butter. And also our jam. Man I'm hungry. I need to stop writing these posts right before dinner. Live stream of the festivities iPhone SE iPad Pro Options Totally a real acronym

Well I finally did it, at almost 100 episodes in. I finally conquered my fears and did a two man show with Matt, who is now a pro at it since he's done two now! Matt and I were watching the Blackhawks game and talking about his and Mikey Poo's episode, and how I never could get the guts to do one. So he said "Let's do one!". Jess is now in Florida, and was out with her friends. But she does call in at the beginning from a bar to fill us in. We talk about our moving horrors. Man I'm glad that's all done with.....for now! Somehow we talk about how smart octopuses are. Matt plays a video of the Russian guy going on a virtual roller coaster on that Oculus Rift thingy. It's pretty funny watching this guy totally freak out. We talk some space talk. Matt has me play this creepy as band. Who must obviously be devil worshipers. Which really ends up weirding me out. And we try and figure out why that is given my thoughts on all that spiritual stuff. And we have an actual commercial now, which you will hear. It actually ended up being a fun show despite my fear. And it must have been, because we just planned on doing a 30 minute short show!