with guest Jeremy Hezlep

Jeremy Hezlep is the Director of Recruiting at Ramsey Solutions in Franklin, TN. He has an extensive background in Leading teams, Sales, and Recruiting. Most importantly he is a husband, a father, a co-founder of a non profit that has given away over $10M, and actively involved in his church.

Learn more about his non profit at conduitmission.org

You can connect with Jeremy on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremyhezlep/

Joe Bukartek empowers people to live intentionally. As host of the podcast, Intentionally Ever After [www.IntentionallyEverAfter.com], Joe is an ultramarathon runner and pickleball enthusiast, living at the beach with his family as part of his own curated intentional lifestyle.

As a board certified Intentional Lifestyle Coach, Joe helps individuals to have lives and careers that are wildly more fulfilling. Ready to curate a life of intention? Connect with Joe on his website [www.joebukartek.com] or LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/joebukartek/.]

Joe also helps emerging adults build lifelong success beyond the nest in his specialized program, Intention to Launch. This results-driven partnership guides participants as they prepare to leave home and discover their ideal lives. Ready to launch? Check out [www.IntentionToLaunch.com]

If you would like to have your own intentional conversation with Joe, either on or off the air, visit https://www.joebukartek.com/contact

Check out more episodes at intentionallyeverafter.com

Transcript

00:00:05:08 - 00:00:25:10
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One of the things that completely changed for me is that whenever I started moving from a reactive state of living into a proactive state of living, where I started being strategic in creating goals and thinking ahead of planning out, what do I want life to look like, instead of just sitting back and waiting for what things would come my way.

00:00:25:19 - 00:00:39:14
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This is intentionally ever after. Join intentional lifestyle coach Joe Brokercheck for a series of personal conversations and coaching sessions with various people about how living with intention shows up for them.

00:00:42:18 - 00:00:58:19
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Greetings everyone. Welcome to another episode of Intentionally Ever After. Today I am very much looking forward to the conversation I'm about to have with the one the only Mr. Jeremy Haslam. Jeremy, welcome.

00:01:00:01 - 00:01:00:17
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Hey, thanks for having me.

00:01:01:09 - 00:01:08:09
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Yeah, man, I'm very happy to have you here. Jeremy Lead Kindly introduce yourself to folks.

00:01:09:06 - 00:01:38:21
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Yeah, absolutely. Jeremy has a little bit live here in Franklin, Tennessee. I've had the privilege of knowing Joe since high school, and unfortunately for us, that means that that's over 20 years ago. And we haven't seen each other in a very, very long time. So we recently connected live here and Tennessee with my wife, Amber. I was married for 18 years, have two kids, and I have a pretty good history and background in sales, recruiting and leadership.

00:01:39:01 - 00:01:40:05
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So that's that's me.

00:01:40:22 - 00:01:47:15
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That's you in a nutshell. And one of your highest achievements is being my friend from high school.

00:01:48:04 - 00:01:49:19
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Yeah, I would think so, for sure. Yeah.

00:01:50:03 - 00:02:09:13
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Okay, good, good. Just to clear that up from the very beginning, Jeremy, I'd like to do something with you that I have Not yet done, but I would like to moving forward, and that is to essentially treat these questions that I've given you in advance, kind of in rapid fire response. And and then we'll talk it through each of you.

00:02:09:13 - 00:02:10:02
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Ready for that?

00:02:11:07 - 00:02:11:20
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Absolutely.

00:02:12:04 - 00:02:16:17
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Okay. All right. Here we go. Jeremy, what does it mean to live intentionally?

00:02:19:05 - 00:02:26:09
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I believe that living intentionally is moving from reactive living to proactive living to solid.

00:02:26:20 - 00:02:32:16
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What is one change in habit that has had an exponential payoff?

00:02:32:19 - 00:02:35:18
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Nightly communication with my wife.

00:02:36:19 - 00:02:40:15
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What have you said no to that has made a significant impact in your life?

00:02:42:01 - 00:02:44:10
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Anything that doesn't put my family first.

00:02:46:00 - 00:02:52:03
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Love it. What area in your life feels just about perfect?

00:02:53:06 - 00:03:00:20
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Nothing's perfect, but my relationship with my wife, Amber, is pretty solid right now.

00:03:00:23 - 00:03:05:23
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Who is someone you admire and what do you admire about them?

00:03:06:02 - 00:03:13:03
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Darren Tyler. He is my pastor, pastor and friend. And he is. He's just a world changer.

00:03:14:19 - 00:03:21:20
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That's. That's awesome. And what do you imagine some people admire about you?

00:03:22:07 - 00:03:24:04
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I'm a really solid problem solver.

00:03:25:03 - 00:03:32:11
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Sleek. And this concludes the inaugural version of Rapid Fire. Thank you for participating. You nailed that one. Nailed it.

00:03:32:23 - 00:03:33:22
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We did it.

00:03:34:12 - 00:03:50:09
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We did. We did a great job. I think we voted on that one. Yeah. All in all. All right. Can we please dig into that very first and baseline question of what does it mean to live intentionally and love the way you very succinctly put that in? We maybe pull it out a.

00:03:50:09 - 00:04:27:00
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Little bit deeper. Absolutely. I think this when you think of intentional living, to me, that hits home in a lot of different ways because I lived a lot of my life, I would consider I didn't realize the how. I wasn't being intentional. And one of the things that completely changed for me is that whenever I started moving from a reactive state of living into a proactive state of living, where I started being strategic in creating goals and thinking ahead of planning out what do I want life to look like, instead of just sitting back and waiting for what things would come my way.

00:04:28:22 - 00:04:52:17
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What's an example of your former self? Who would have been living in a reactive state? Because I don't. You know, we've chatted a little bit to catch up recently and it's not like you've been, you know, twiddling your thumbs and being this now very sluggish, ineffective, unproductive person. Right. So what's an example of a reactive state that you might have previously been in?

00:04:54:10 - 00:05:10:13
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Well, I think the thing is one of the misconceptions can be that you're not achieving things when you are. Well, I was being reactive, but I still was achieving a lot of the things. I still had a lot going on. And I just realized that I was reacting to the environment. Environment around me a lot more than that.

00:05:10:13 - 00:05:37:16
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I was trying to put an impact on it myself. So, for instance, the person we'll get to talking about a little bit later, David Tyler, he came to me years ago with this idea of helping these kids, help feeding these kids in Haiti. And it was one of those things that it was brought to our attention. We had a mutual friend who had just been there and a connection with him just said, Hey, let's do this, let's let's feed these kids.

00:05:37:16 - 00:06:03:06
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And we started a nonprofit organization and we started feeding kids on a daily basis in Haiti. And that just grew and expanded during that time. I wouldn't say that I was living very intentionally. Most of the time. I had a set of standards of who I was. I had a faith. Part of me has always been very, very strong and help guide decision making.

00:06:03:06 - 00:06:23:03
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I knew what was right and wrong in my head. However, my day to day didn't necessarily look very intentional. So you can launch a nonprofit. I could be working a job that I'm enjoying and doing well, and at the same time I could be feeling like and I did in that period of time, like I was just very reactive, like things were coming to me.

00:06:23:09 - 00:06:42:09
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But if it was anything that required me to be thinking proactively ahead, I wasn't doing that. And that all changed when I started adjusting what my mornings looked like. I started adjusting who I hung out with. I started adjusting what I what food I ate in my body, what all of this kind of thing, what kind of exercise looked like.

00:06:42:16 - 00:06:49:00
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And at that moment when those things started happening over a period of time, that's when I started feeling like I was intentionally living.

00:06:50:03 - 00:07:10:10
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So was there a starting moment? Was it from when you first met this person or when you first started talking about this nonprofit? Like, what was was there a moment or seminal moment? Was there a time period of phase when you were starting to click in? Because obviously you had heard that successful people get up and really, you know, we know these truths.

00:07:11:00 - 00:07:17:19
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Right. So what was it that clicked for you or when did it become meaningful and start to motivate you?

00:07:18:19 - 00:07:37:05
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At 12 years ago, my wife and I were invited to go to an event to hear a speaker named Dave Ramsey. And there's a guy it was a guy I'd never heard of before. He had listened to him on the radio and heard some things about money. I knew nothing about him. We were invited. We were given free tickets.

00:07:37:05 - 00:07:54:23
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We sat in the very top row of this arena, and I honestly just didn't want to be there. And over the course of a few hours, I heard him start talking about money in a way that I'd never heard anybody talk about. And it talked about how you can be intentional and what does a budget actually look like.

00:07:54:23 - 00:08:15:14
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And what does it look like. And I didn't realize it, but if I look at it now, he was saying that here's how you and you are intentional with your money. I remember leaving that day totally inspired because I heard this person talking about how you and your spouse could be on the same page with money and but you have to talk about it.

00:08:15:14 - 00:08:33:22
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You have to put a game plan together and here's how to do that. And we went through a curriculum that he had called Financial Peace University and helped us realize that we had some debt in our life. And here's the game plan. Here's how you can help. And it wasn't like a get rich quick scheme. It wasn't like, give me any of your money.

00:08:34:02 - 00:09:03:06
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In fact, actually, he wasn't asking for any of our money. He was just sharing what he had learned. So my wife and I jumped all in on that and we paid off all of our debt in about a eight month period of time was $28,000. And all of a sudden we found ourselves completely debt free. Now, this isn't just a conversation about money, but I realize in that process of being intentional, of, Hey, wait a minute, so we should get together, we should actually talk about our money, We should put a plan together.

00:09:03:14 - 00:09:27:10
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I didn't realize that I was being intentional with my money and intentional in conversations and realized that Amber and I for the first time, started to. We were married for six years at that time, and all of a sudden we started realizing that when we started talking about our money, we started talking more about everything. And we started talking about our goals and we started talking about what do we want life to look like?

00:09:27:10 - 00:09:49:17
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And all of a sudden it started extending to where do we want to live? What do do we didn't have kids at that time. And so we were like, okay, what do we want kids to look like? It just started extending into all of these other areas. And so I really read it that day in that arena is when a whole bunch of life changed for for Amber nine.

00:09:49:20 - 00:10:11:16
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Wow. Yeah, That's so interesting, right? Because we hear things like money isn't everything, right? But money affects or is affected. It's connected to so many things, right, in different parts of our lives. Absolutely right. Sounds like it gave you this new framework to kind of like open a new way to communicate to your wife, it sounds like. Right.

00:10:11:16 - 00:10:12:08
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And yeah, it.

00:10:12:08 - 00:10:30:06
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Was this very basic. It was just a basic thing. It was like, hey, once a month get together and talk about what you want to spend your money on. Put a plan together and and then when you do that, then you can walk through the months and, and part of that he was like, Hey, you know what? Spend money on yourself.

00:10:30:10 - 00:10:48:18
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Give yourself money to have for spending. And what we started noticing was, like when we did that, she'd come home with bags and I'd never like, Well, how much did you spend? Or if I wanted to, went to get something. She didn't care because we had already planned it out. It gave us more freedom because we had talked about it.

00:10:49:17 - 00:11:09:17
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And then that also started a framework of what could regular communication look like because we we would have said at that time, oh yeah, we're great communicators, but we like set times where we would sit and set goals together or talk about our plans or what do we want the future to look like. It would just be like, Hey, this happened in between watching episodes of Friends or After Eat.

00:11:10:05 - 00:11:26:22
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Yeah, Now that's so interesting, right? That's great. So going back in time, what, you already admitted that you probably didn't want to be there at that at that presentation, right? Yeah. What would you have been doing instead on a typical evening or that?

00:11:26:23 - 00:11:49:19
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Honestly, at that time, my wife and I were really we were seeing a lot of movies. Yeah, we would a typical day and I would go to see something regularly. We'd go out to eat a lot. And I mean, we still love to do that as well. So we did go out and see a movie a couple of days ago, but but that would have been it wouldn't have been out searching for something to better ourselves, for sure.

00:11:50:06 - 00:12:04:11
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Well, isn't that interesting, though? You get to still do the things you would have always done, and now you've benefited exponentially because, you know, your wife probably, quote unquote, forced you to go to this thing or encourage you strongly. Probably. Yeah.

00:12:04:17 - 00:12:05:23
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She did encourage me strongly.

00:12:06:09 - 00:12:13:19
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I love that. It's great. So on a day to day, what does it look like for you to live with intention?

00:12:13:21 - 00:12:36:03
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You know, this is actually about it. The last two years I started reading more than ever before because I started noticing that the people in my life who I really respect, who are who have done a lot in life, that they're they're very voracious readers. Mm hmm. And I started noticing and I'm like, I'm not like, when is the last time I read something?

00:12:36:03 - 00:12:55:07
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And outside of it, I begin to if there's something in my field or some kind of business book that a bunch of people I was working with, we all decided to read together. So it's not like I wasn't reading it all. Mm hmm. But I just decided to start reading and have that be a regular part of my day.

00:12:55:17 - 00:13:29:16
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A regular part of my week. I have a mixture of things that are leadership books, business books, and and fun. One of my highlights of last year, my my son Micah love this book series called The Green Ember, and they're like warrior rabbits. And and there's all these books. Steve Smith is the author and my wife and him and my daughter, and they all were getting into them and they'd read together during the day or at night, and he's like, Hey, Daddy, we you we read that.

00:13:30:03 - 00:13:44:11
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I mean, I'm sitting here reading like some big business book and thinking like, I'm like, I'll think about reading that. But I read that book and I loved it. And I realized that that is my reading level. True.

00:13:44:11 - 00:13:47:16
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And that's good. That really fueled the.

00:13:48:01 - 00:14:07:06
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Yeah. So we did all we did four of those books and we started listening to the audio books of the other parts of the series on trips. And I think that there's something about that fiction side of things. That is, if you don't have the fiction side along with the nonfiction, then your brain just gets a little stale.

00:14:07:16 - 00:14:19:08
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And I have more creativity after listening to this rabbit named Pickett Save the Day on some things. And I just I felt like it unlocked some creativity for me last year.

00:14:19:12 - 00:14:41:21
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That's cool. And it touches on the themes that have kind of come out in your rapid fire questions about family, you know? Yeah, to the lens of family, what is best for me, my family. I want to get into the next question of one change and habit that has had an exponential payoff. Touch on a little bit already, which is kind of dig a little deeper.

00:14:41:21 - 00:15:07:06
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That's the part of the reading. Mm hmm. Right. That's. That's actually I wrote down three things. I talked about the budgeting. I was kind of brainstorming about what is a big habit outside of this day for fun, you and I. One of things we connected on, we started talking about was pickleball and America's fastest growing sport. Judge. Did you hear that?

00:15:07:06 - 00:15:15:08
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This is total rabbit, Rabbit or squirrel? Really? Did you hear that? More people last year played pickleball than played golf in the US?

00:15:15:21 - 00:15:18:12
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No, no. Interesting.

00:15:18:12 - 00:15:18:23
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I read that.

00:15:18:23 - 00:15:21:22
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I believe it. Given what I what I see around me.

00:15:22:21 - 00:15:57:17
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It's more accessible, more affordable. I'll just have to think it doesn't take 4 hours, all that. But we are changing of habits. That's hard for me because I'm I'm not someone who's at times is always extremely disciplined and I work hard at that. So the habits that I've been doing the reading at night, trying to do that, making sure I go whole periods of time without social media at all, just because I find myself distracted that my my wife, Amber, and I have a really good routine now of just nightly communication.

00:15:58:07 - 00:16:18:13
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We're talking about our days not afraid to talk about feelings. How you how did you feel about that when that happened to you? I started praying together every night, which is a big deal, changed our relationship quite a bit, and then also doing our monthly and budgeting sessions and then weekly check ins has been a big deal for us.

00:16:18:13 - 00:16:31:04
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Yeah. So is there some sort of ceremony around your conversations, your prayers, your your meeting, something maybe with the budget meeting? There's a there's a framework to have some kind of. Okay, it's 8:00. We're going to do this thing now or.

00:16:31:20 - 00:16:32:19
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No, no, it's.

00:16:32:21 - 00:16:33:07
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Basically.

00:16:33:17 - 00:16:52:05
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It's really I mean, I'm definitely the one that wants to go to bed before she does because I get up at 430 to get to pickleball by 530. So she's she's not up then. So I'm the one initiating an ice time where you go to bed. It's not like, oh, here's this time and now we need to. Right.

00:16:52:08 - 00:17:16:19
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You need to tell me your stuff. It just kind of turned into like, Hey, every night there's this check in after we put the kids down. How are you going to have something in your day? The thing that we did that the nightly, nightly prayers was a game changer for us. We both have been actively involved in our faith, in our church, our whole lives, and we just found ourselves wanting and desiring like, what have we prayed together?

00:17:17:07 - 00:17:39:05
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And so before bed we just will pray. And it's just been this really great, like calming moment for us where there's something to pray out loud. Like that's a but it's I felt weird at first even having faith be an element of our entire lives. 41 years it's been a part, but something that just helped kind of bond us up.

00:17:39:06 - 00:18:04:17
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Like there's this theme of wanting to be part of something that's bigger than ourselves. And when you do something like prayer or communicate intentionally talking to your spouse, that's me saying to her, I care about you. I want to hear what you have to say. And I feel like that's what prayer does with us. It's like, Hey, we can have our own plans, but there's something bigger than us that we want to be a part of.

00:18:04:17 - 00:18:10:05
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And to do that on a nightly basis just seems like it would be so rejuvenating.

00:18:10:23 - 00:18:19:02
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Yeah, it is. It's been very unifying for us in a lot of different ways. So we're happy about that.

00:18:19:12 - 00:18:42:10
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Yeah. Yeah. Like so it sounds like you taking the adage of never go to bed angry. Yeah. And you really, like, gotten real specific about this. Not that that was the goal to not go to bed angry, but. Right. You actually made it useful to you and meaningful to you. Can I ask a further detailed question about that?

00:18:43:08 - 00:19:01:10
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So step by step, do you start with your prayer loud? Does she go second? Is there how do you how do you run these things? Yeah, interesting. It's probably organic and it's very smooth. But for someone who maybe wants to try this, you know, whether they commit to one every night or just try doing it once.

00:19:01:10 - 00:19:25:13
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But yeah, how you doing that? And I want to say that like there are times that if she has it, she's out with her friends. Somebody is watching a movie going to bed like we're not weird about. It was like, All right, now everybody stop what we're doing or anything like that. It's just it's just kind of sometimes it is us together, talking through some big things of life, and we just want to just toss it up in a prayer.

00:19:25:23 - 00:19:46:23
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But sometimes it's just a a posture thankfulness where one of us typically just one of us just say a quick prayer and it's like, Hey, this was a really cool day. We got to do this amazing things and just want to be thankful and grateful for that and don't take it for granted. We realize with our kids in the spotlight, even though we've been married 18 years, our kids are.

00:19:46:23 - 00:20:20:16
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But Mike is about to be nine and Lilly is six and a half. We waited about my wife did music professionally and taught all over the world. So there were some period of time where we we didn't have kids. And so we realized that right now we're in those days that some would call the good old days, but we recognize that there is a point in life where we look back and realize this is that spot where our kids want to cuddle, where our kids want time with us, where they say, Daddy, not dad, where on a walk with my son.

00:20:21:00 - 00:20:43:01
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He held my hand the other day. Yeah. And I was like, you know, this isn't forever. That happens. And so we are really trying to pause in these moments and just be grateful and thankful that we're here. And so I think that's what that is. That's, that's more of what this is right now. This is it's a prayer time that's trying to like the Santa Clause.

00:20:43:05 - 00:20:51:05
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What do you give me this really give me this, that. This is more of a posture of us saying we're thankful and grateful. We'd like to be led that kind of thing.

00:20:51:21 - 00:21:09:02
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That's great. I'm also hearing a theme, but this is how you want to engage with one another as a family, right? This is how you connect with one. Another is how you speak with one another to one another, how you help strengthen one another. I would suggest from my perspective, an opinion Here comes.

00:21:09:02 - 00:21:10:14
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That's all right.

00:21:11:19 - 00:21:33:02
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There are the good old days if you want them to be right. I think. I think I mean, I am very interested in your wife being a professional, world renowned singer, and those would likely were the good old days then as well, I imagine. And I know I heard indirectly that you jump into the band when necessary, when called upon.

00:21:33:02 - 00:21:55:20
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Right. And like, that sounds cool. That sounds like definitely like that is the good old days, right? And at some point when your kids start calling you dad and you know, you go hang out in a in a different venue, maybe no more hand-holding, but guess what? That's going to be the good old days, I think, because of the way that you guys choose to engage with one another.

00:21:55:20 - 00:22:00:15
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Now, I imagine that's going to carry you on moving forward. If I not bold.

00:22:01:03 - 00:22:23:02
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No, no. I think I think you're totally right. And that is the game plan for life is to have have that be I have part of being in your forties and having a six and a half year old is that I get to be this mixture of a lot of my friends of teenagers or one of my best friends is actually he just became a grandpa and we're a year and a half age difference.

00:22:23:02 - 00:22:47:18
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They got married real young, had a honeymoon baby, and then their oldest guy got married. And the reason I talk about it as the good old days is there is the seems to be, in my experience, something about the as the kids get older as they leave the house, all these things that there's this yearning back here, looking back to that time where things were simple but I'm very well aware of you start kids start driving.

00:22:47:18 - 00:23:08:16
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When there's complexity come in, there's levels of intensity that have that I'm really looking forward to. Like I love I look forward to when my kid can beat me in a big game of basketball in our driveway. And because I know that's coming, you know, there's those kind of things that I know and anticipate. And then I also think that I'll look back to that.

00:23:08:23 - 00:23:16:11
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Last night I carried my little my daughter up to bed. She just asked where you carry me up to that. And that is something special that I know is not here forever.

00:23:17:06 - 00:23:35:06
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Yeah, Yeah. Jeremy, if you recall, back when we first were in each other's lives, I was a runner in high school, and I wasn't the best, but I was not terrible. Well, my 12 year old is now a faster runner than I am already, and it happened a lot sooner than I thought it would.

00:23:36:04 - 00:23:38:07
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That's both awesome and disappointing.

00:23:38:12 - 00:24:04:09
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It is. Yeah. Those are exactly the things. Those are the things. So anytime there's a5k in town and I get both of those emotions, Michael is going to beat me. But, but it's exciting. That's impressive. Pace It is impressive. Well, that's also true. I mean, he is he's a fast little guy as well. But again, these to me are the good old days as well.

00:24:04:09 - 00:24:11:22
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All right. What have you said no to that has made a significant impact in your life.

00:24:11:22 - 00:24:42:12
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So I was really thinking of I wanted to come with this one example. Yeah. And I really struggled with it. But but I will say, well, you know what? I'll give you one example. There's a golf league at my office that I really would love to be a part of. But one of the things that I have said in my life is that I want to set up my life so that where I put my kids to bed pretty much every night, like I want to be there at bedtime.

00:24:43:00 - 00:25:04:16
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And part of that was because my dad was very intentional with that. He I remember him even through high school, sitting on my bed asking me about my day at the end. And then I think back about those conversations, and I think that's why he and I still have such a great relationship still to this day. And so I just have this idea that I want as often as possible to do that.

00:25:04:21 - 00:25:26:07
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And I've had a lot of opportunities in my life. I lead a team in my office and actively involved in my church, but I'm an elder at our church, so involved a lot of strategy planning and we've been asked to be on a bunch of different boards in the past and we'll have to look at the time commitments and things like that.

00:25:26:07 - 00:25:49:07
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And I have to say, all right, I've gladly consulted widely, be around. I have a meeting this afternoon with the guy who asked that, and I said no, but here's the here's my time frame that I have. And if you can make that work, then I may help consult as you looking to grow. And because one of the things that I have found is that in my life I do have certain skills.

00:25:49:07 - 00:26:10:19
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Now, I was talking to somebody yesterday about that where, you know, I'd say the first something when I was 25 years old, it might have been right. But for some reason that came across as arrogance. Now you have 20 years of experience in industry or leading teams and things like that. You can say the same thing in your forties and all of a sudden it's looked at totally different wisdom.

00:26:10:21 - 00:26:34:14
.
Now it's wisdom. It's like the gray hairs that are coming in the beard. And I realized I did the same thing when I was. It meant something different when I talked to somebody who was just starting business, to somebody who might be my mentor, who's 60 some years old and has done a lot. So I really am intentional when I allow myself to have fun, of course.

00:26:35:00 - 00:26:55:08
.
So I love going into predator games here and that's a really great thing to do here in Nashville. The fan base is really great and I have a buddy with season tickets and I go as often as I can, so I do those fun things. You don't hear me say it. I'm just like sitting around, you know, actively involved in pickleball community, all these different things.

00:26:55:08 - 00:27:15:19
.
But if somebody is like, Hey, will you come to do this thing on a Tuesday night? And I look and realize I have another event that that week, or if I've been spending some time or a bunch of time away from the family, I will say no, right? And I won't feel guilty about it. I heard somebody say once that you're going to always disappoint someone.

00:27:15:19 - 00:27:17:21
.
You just get to choose who you disappoint.

00:27:17:21 - 00:27:21:05
.
Oh, yeah, Yeah. That's fair. I think that's a fair point.

00:27:21:18 - 00:27:26:08
.
So I'm just choosing I'm not going to disappoint my family or I'm not going to disappoint my wife.

00:27:27:01 - 00:27:51:05
.
Yeah, no, that's great. That seems very clear. Very simple. Straightforward. Is there something on the horizon or currently that you think that there's a no that you haven't yet developed that you think is probably coming down the pipe that would benefit you?

00:27:51:05 - 00:27:55:22
.
I can't think of anything right.

00:27:55:22 - 00:28:05:19
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What would your wife say? Would your wife have the insider perspective to say, you know, you need to stop or because our loved ones usually figured these things out a little before we do.

00:28:07:08 - 00:28:27:05
.
Yeah. So believe it or not, we've been talking about that quite a bit. We not too long ago looked at all the aspects of aspects of life and we figured out, Oh, actually, yes, yes, there is one. I just thought, I just thought of one. It's one that we already did say no to, but we're kind of right in the middle of it.

00:28:28:04 - 00:28:48:23
.
So I mentioned before that my wife did music professionally for a long time and pre kids. I've done music my whole life. I've been involved. You knew me as a drummer back in the day in school, you know, a lot of guitar. So because that you get a lot of different opportunities. This past year I was a part of my company.

00:28:48:23 - 00:29:13:12
.
There's this big battle of the bands and we have over a thousand people here and we're in Nashville. So that level of musicality is just through the roof. And so we put this this big event and a lot of people played professionally, a lot of people toured all around the we just have this big battle. And the band I was in actually won last year and it was a lot of a lot of time and energy and it was fun and it was a blast.

00:29:13:12 - 00:29:27:16
.
And I already said, I'm not doing that again this year. Yeah, I was like, That was kind of a one time thing. Well, I've done it a bunch. And now I'm like, You know what? I'll let some other people do this. I'll be happy to just go out on top.

00:29:28:06 - 00:29:49:18
.
That sounds great. Sounds like you got to experience the highest of highs in that lane. And you can say no, right? It's a thing that you got to do and got to experience at the highest level in that way. Yep, That's great. That's great because what it does is if you were to say yes again, you feel like it would take away from some of the other priorities you've identified is that.

00:29:50:03 - 00:30:07:20
.
Yeah, it took a lot of time. Actually. It's funny because over over my shoulder here are a couple of posters from the years. Like the one up top is Thunder Sisters and the Debt Free Screams. And I guess I should have tossed out there that I eventually did start working for for Dave Ramsey 11 and a half years ago.

00:30:08:00 - 00:30:10:18
.
Yes, Yes. Full circle. There it is.

00:30:11:03 - 00:30:22:15
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Yeah. And then the best part about it is see, that one is that it's called the New hip. That was because our drummer had an accident and had to have a hip replacement. So our band was the new hip and that's true.

00:30:24:00 - 00:30:30:01
.
That's right. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. I can see the X-ray right now. You see it like us? Yeah, that's great.

00:30:30:23 - 00:30:38:12
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So I think that there's a lot of those kind of things in life that you start to look at and be like, What? Could I do this? Yes. Should I do this?

00:30:39:15 - 00:31:00:09
.
Yeah, we like to look at that kind of stuff is what version of it makes sense for me now, right? It's like, how do I still get to experience that really cool, that connection, that community, that creativity, the fun in a way that makes sense for this phase or this this next upcoming thing. I don't like to have to give up things anymore.

00:31:00:11 - 00:31:24:17
.
You know, I may be totally that box that I used to check for me. I gave up playing basketball. I played a ton of pick up basketball and post back surgery. It was my life consistency. Like she's like, you have a 100% success rate. When you go out or injury rate, you have a 100% injury rate. When you go play, you're always bruised and let's just figure out a new thing for you.

00:31:24:17 - 00:31:30:20
.
So I don't play basketball, but I do. Other thing I play pickleball is a thing that.

00:31:31:05 - 00:31:54:16
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That was one of the reasons it's so funny. I had a bruise on my arm for about three months from playing basketball. We caught a dad balls three on three in the morning. Yeah, this guy elbowed me and I would twist my ankles and I just was always feeling it in my Apple Watch would one day told me that I my heart rate got up to 190 and I was like, I don't think this is good.

00:31:54:17 - 00:32:03:09
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I went out and played pickleball and my average heart rate was around 140. So Max was like 155 and I dripping sweat and I'm like, Oh, okay, yeah.

00:32:04:10 - 00:32:07:00
.
Yeah. Much better alternative, more sustainable, right?

00:32:07:22 - 00:32:26:18
.
Yeah. Joe, you said something that I wanted to keep on for a second, which is you said one of the things that I really connect with, even that's to say back to that battle of the Bands thing. I like to think with the information I have right now, I make a decision. So I'm not saying that I'll never be in a band again.

00:32:27:01 - 00:32:43:22
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I'm saying that with the information I have right now, my best decision is to not do that this year. If we get to a different spot is that the information that I have, then it makes sense. I want to do it. I need an outlet. Then I'll make that decision and I won't have to feel guilty about it.

00:32:44:14 - 00:32:50:07
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And how freeing is that not to have to make a final decision on anything? Frankly.

00:32:51:09 - 00:32:51:23
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It's a big deal.

00:32:53:06 - 00:33:16:02
.
I love that. Yeah, I love that. I also embrace that idea as well. It's very freeing, right? It reduces the stakes in a lot of instances of like, oh, I'm no longer am I someone who does this thing. Like, I'm not for now and maybe for the foreseeable future, I may not ever be, but I don't have to decide that right now based on the recognition that I currently have.

00:33:17:01 - 00:33:17:09
.
Thank you.

00:33:17:11 - 00:33:40:14
.
I think that takes an element of human humility to be able to do that. You and I were talking about a drink that I found out had some artificial things that I really just didn't want and and I had some left of it. And I had and I had this new information and I was in this limbo of like but I like this thing like, I know this hurts could potentially hurt my body.

00:33:41:01 - 00:33:58:14
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Yeah. And I threw it away because I was like, I now have new information. And if I am not willing to walk away, then I'm not humble enough. And that starts to question my intelligence. And then this just thinking about addiction and all of that, I'm not willing to give it up. Then I probably wasn't going after it for the right reason.

00:33:59:00 - 00:34:07:21
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Yeah, I mean, very simply stated. But it was it was a challenge for you. It was a struggle for you to actually end up doing it. Sounds like.

00:34:07:21 - 00:34:10:06
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Oh, for sure. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

00:34:12:00 - 00:34:24:23
.
Real quick, just a quick one liner. I think anyone listening to this would appreciate hearing the name of your wife's former group so they can do a Google search and go down that rabbit hole.

00:34:26:00 - 00:34:47:16
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Yeah, sure. She was in the band for life. It was her and her two sisters and they ended up getting signed to Hollywood Records and did a lot with Disney. So back in the day when it was like the Miley Cyrus Hannah Montana tours and the Jonas Brothers and Cheetah Girls and all of that to life was right with the vets.

00:34:47:20 - 00:35:10:17
.
She played guitar and and so I, I was their drummer for five years. And so before all of the big arena tours and so I would just do things every month. So I played drums off and on. Got the opportunity to play percussion, opening up for the Jonas Brothers in Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, and then some of their Europe tours and things like that.

00:35:10:17 - 00:35:36:03
.
I played guitar, electric guitar for it, so we had a lot of fun and they had a good 16, 17 year run and it was time for them to just be sisters. It was right after that was when we started having kids and it just was perfect time for them to to be done. And they actually had been starting to have some fun doing some things and teasing maybe to write a couple of songs in the future.

00:35:36:12 - 00:35:52:18
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Do we go keep the theme up of You Never know, you know, No. Five or no answer on anything, right? Got new information, new phases. I love it. Thank you. That's thanks for sharing that. So we could spend the rest time talking about that. But I refuse. I refuse you.

00:35:52:18 - 00:35:53:05
.
Sounds good.

00:35:53:16 - 00:35:57:20
.
What are your in your life? Feels just about perfect.

00:35:59:23 - 00:36:11:07
.
And I struggle to answer that one. But I've been thinking about that for days because I really hate in my head thinking of anything as perfect. Yeah.

00:36:12:00 - 00:36:20:01
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Many people do. By the way, I know it's a triggering word, which is why I use it. I also throw it in quotes. But tell me, tell me about your struggles here a little bit.

00:36:20:01 - 00:36:42:09
.
Yeah. I mean, I tossed out that that would be a little quick. I said my relationship with Amber and I want to be clear, we're not perfect even a little bit. But if if you're talking to some of my close friends or you're talking to our family, we have been very intentional and we've been together for a long time.

00:36:42:19 - 00:37:14:12
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We've been together for 22 years, married for 18. We've kind of grown up together. We've learned a lot. And that is John is very close. And so we've had a lot of bumps along the way like everybody has, and we just keep trying to draw closer and closer together. So that's why if I have to say one area of my life, this is perfect, it's not like but I will say that's the closest right now.

00:37:14:22 - 00:37:22:20
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Yeah, that's fair. Is does it have is it associated with the idea of it being the most developed part of your life?

00:37:23:09 - 00:37:41:06
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That's probably a better way of saying that. Yeah, I think that's a great, great description. It's been the most most attention, most intentionality, most hardship, the most probably stretching in every way. Yeah. So that's, that's why I would say that.

00:37:41:17 - 00:37:50:13
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Yeah, right on. Not that you ask me, but that my answer was the same. But the the most perfect part of my life is your relationship with your wife.

00:37:51:14 - 00:37:51:22
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Best.

00:37:52:07 - 00:37:57:06
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Yeah. Yeah. It was something you admire and what you admire about them.

00:37:57:21 - 00:38:23:21
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Yeah. Darren Tyler, man, he is. What? What a cool guy. I met him. Here's how we met. 19 years ago. We moved to Nashville, and I mentioned before, faith has always been an element of our life. And I had been in college actively involved in the Bible studies or campus group, anything that got connected and moved to Nashville and had had none of that.

00:38:24:22 - 00:38:46:23
.
And there was this guy that we heard about named Darren Tyler, who's in the music industry. He managed a bunch of bands and he was just the kind of this rock and roll manager guy who led a Bible study for young adults on Wednesday, Wednesday nights. You're like, Let's check it out. We go there and just connecting with this guy.

00:38:47:04 - 00:39:17:08
.
He had no ego and he wasn't he wasn't out to prove anything. He just had this passion for teaching the Bible. And we connected with him and that was 19 years ago still. And through to the last 19 years, we've been through a lot. But one of the things that we did together was we launched a nonprofit organization called Conduit Mission, and when we started feeding kids in Haiti, we started building wells in Africa.

00:39:17:08 - 00:39:37:06
.
We started working with drug and alcohol rehabilitation center called Place of Hope in Columbia, Tennessee. We started doing these different things. He was the guy that he would find out about a need. He would find out about something that was going on in the area and he would do something about it. And I'd be like, All right, let's go.

00:39:37:12 - 00:40:00:17
.
Let's do this together. So eventually we started a nonprofit. He was president as vice president and we just started feeding kids. And then the Haiti earthquake happened and we were actually already in Haiti and in Jacmel, we were already doing a lot of work. We had already been there like I've been there to Haiti to oversee. And we were seeing what was going on and working with people there.

00:40:01:09 - 00:40:27:07
.
And so all of a sudden we started having hundreds, thousands of dollars flowing through us of feeding kids and building schools. And that's been something that we've continued along the way. He decided to stop being the artist manager and he decided to be a pastor. And so together we helped launch a church in that area. And it's a church that eventually the nonprofit merged into the church.

00:40:27:07 - 00:41:02:02
.
We're now everything that we've done has just exploded. We have given away over $10 million. We've now freed a lot of people don't know that there's parts of the world right now that slavery is bigger than ever. The European trade that whole time. And there's more slaves right now in the world than ever before. And so we found an area where we could help these brick kilns, where families would take on a debt for a medical debt, maybe for their grandpa, for their dad, and they work and making bricks their whole life.

00:41:02:02 - 00:41:28:06
.
And so we found a way to start freeing these families and paying off the debts of these families. And so we've now freed a few hundred families and we have plans for thousands more already. But Darren, Darren's a guy that there's a lot of people who hear problems like this, that there's a lot the world is full of, a lot of problem spotters and very few problems.

00:41:28:09 - 00:41:42:04
.
Problem solvers. He is for sure a problem solver. And being able to see him leading a team in Israel right now. And so I just really look up to he's a great guy.

00:41:43:07 - 00:41:52:20
.
Yeah, that sounds like a very powerful force to have in your life for such a long time, too. It sounds like a lot of time and energy went into that relationship as well over the years. I mean, decades plus now.

00:41:53:10 - 00:42:13:07
.
Yeah, absolutely. It's actually stronger, stronger than ever because of that. And I think that's also because he is such a humble, intentional guy. I can't think of anything in his life that's like that's not intentional, especially with what he does with his career, with his calling and he's been able to impact with millions and millions of people.

00:42:13:20 - 00:42:30:06
.
Yeah, no big deal right now. It's just changing at scale. It's incredible. That's great. All right. So a slacker like you, what do you imagine some people admire about you?

00:42:30:06 - 00:42:54:00
.
I think it was said if I'm listing like on a resume or if I'm applying for a job, I'm pretty high up there. Deductive reasoning skills, problem solver, because that's something I love to do. I love to get in the weeds on things. I love to to solve a complex problem. But I'd say that part of that is there's a steadiness and consistency that I work very hard to be.

00:42:55:03 - 00:43:18:02
.
My my personality is very, very even keeled. If you've ever heard of something like the Enneagram is something that's pretty popular these days and the peacemaking challenges the any gram nine wing eight. So there's like this peacemaking side where I love to bring peace to something, but that doesn't mean I avoid conflict or just means I try to create peace.

00:43:18:02 - 00:43:33:11
.
And I think that's what carries into problem solving is I look at a problem as something that I can try to solve to bring peace, to bring clarity, bring some type of insight to.

00:43:33:11 - 00:43:38:18
.
Yeah, that makes sense. Give me an example. On a very surface level.

00:43:38:18 - 00:44:04:14
.
Yeah. So first eight years of career wise, I was always in sales and leading sales and then four years ago, i was asked by our head of h.r. How would you consider taking on recruiting for the company? And so i did that. Now I've been doing recruiting. But one of the things that comes with that is a lot of interaction with teams, with leaders who are thinking about how do I process through?

00:44:04:20 - 00:44:22:16
.
I have this person, is this the right person for for the job? So one of my roles is people will bring these complex. I have this role that I need to fill. We have this person. How do I know if this fit together? It's a regular part of my world as well. I get to break it down and say, Oh, let's talk about this.

00:44:22:22 - 00:44:32:20
.
And by the end we can always come up with whether or not we feel like this is the person for it. So I love solving and being a part of anything people related just in general.

00:44:33:23 - 00:44:54:03
.
Yeah, I hear it. I hear it. That's cool. What other thoughts or ideas would you like to share? This is your platform now for the next several moments. What what would you like to share with folks in the name of intentionality?

00:44:54:03 - 00:45:26:13
.
One of the things that I've been thinking about since you and I started talking and I listened to some of the podcast and started thinking about potentially ever which some point I'd love to know from you how you came to be. Why, why this, why this platform? Why don't here? But the thing that kept jumping out to me about living intentionally and my self decisions I've made others around me who I can say look and see that their lives are like, I want to be similar to them.

00:45:26:13 - 00:45:50:12
.
I want to try to do things like them is I've noticed that in our world today there's an obsession with ourself and there's a lot of self healing thing. There's a lot of I can dive into my story, I can dive, why am I this way? I can uncover and people naturally go and are drawn to things that make them look inward.

00:45:50:22 - 00:46:21:17
.
Hmm. An observation that I've had is that I feel the best. I interact the best when I am putting others, when I'm thinking about others, when I care about other people, when I care about somebody else's story and and when I try, I work on myself to make sure that I'm the best version of myself, that I'm taking care of myself, that I'm taking care of my mind and my body and my spirit, all those types of things.

00:46:22:17 - 00:46:54:02
.
But when I only make it about me, then I get stuck. But when I'm very intentional about seeing the world that I'm in and interacting like I'm just one of the pieces of the story that's going on, then I instantly my worldview opens up and I realize that that's when I find opportunities to help those around me who are unfortunate or don't have I don't have money, I don't have the opportunity.

00:46:54:11 - 00:47:25:13
.
When I went to Haiti and saw I remember an image that I'll never forget for my whole life because I saw a thousand people lined up in a row selling the same fruit, knowing full well no one's going to buy this fruit. And and when I saw I've been able to travel and do some different missions work. And I remember being in Brazil and we visited the garbage dumps and I saw people rooting for food because that's what they through to live that day.

00:47:25:22 - 00:47:49:04
.
Yeah, I've seen these different things that have opened up my worldview to say, What can I do to impact this work and how can I use a platform, How can I interact? What the decisions that I can make today to help others. And when I did that, I started seeing that I'm blessing other people. And in the meantime I felt like I'm growing as well.

00:47:49:04 - 00:48:05:11
.
So when I talk about Darren Tyler, when I think of this list of people in my life who like I want to be like or who are world changers, they aren't just obsessed with themselves. They are very outward focused of helping other people.

00:48:05:20 - 00:48:30:06
.
Yeah, or I throw this idea out, wonder if it connects or how it might get the idea that we're all about self-fulfillment. Okay. And for some people, that's. Look at me, look at me, I'm great and you know me. Make sure I get what I want. But for others, their fulfillment comes from helping others. What do you think of that idea?

00:48:30:06 - 00:48:36:23
.
Is that that connects at all. But it's also self-fulfillment.

00:48:36:23 - 00:48:57:11
.
There's definitely a difference. You can tell somebody you can spend 5 minutes with someone and you can realize if their whole goal is self-fulfillment. It's whatever you spend any time on. A lot of the social media platforms right now, you see a lot of me, they look at me, look at me in this, Here's my good angle, here's my here's the best.

00:48:57:11 - 00:49:29:08
.
You get the best of all of these things. And you may have ever met somebody in real life and you're like, you don't even look the same world. And and that's that's where this I feel like that's obsession of self in some people like I said there's this it's almost like a self less there's the outside going to help somebody else but there can be there's a balance with that as well because one of the things that Darren talks about quite often was the first few years of launching his nonprofits.

00:49:29:20 - 00:49:51:14
.
He didn't realize it, but it was for a lot of selfish reasons. It was a lot of his growing up in poverty. And and he had a counselor really challenge him and say, Hey, what would it be like to not have to do this for your own fulfillment, but just because you wanted to help somebody else? And it felt like it was just mind blowing for him?

00:49:51:14 - 00:50:15:01
.
Yeah, I think that's that's kind of what my wondering was that was that in that area is can there be self-fulfillment as a driver? Is it selfish to has that can that exists as an idea like you get your fulfillment from helping others? Is that acceptable without it being selfish?

00:50:15:01 - 00:50:28:14
.
Probably, but it's probably limited as well. Like it's limiting. It probably has a limit of how much you'll actually get fulfilled by it.

00:50:28:14 - 00:50:49:09
.
I think I need to noodle on that one for a little bit and it's part of my job too, is to push back and, you know, when someone makes statements to kind of see where that line is, I'm very curious because I'm very much about fulfillment. Very much. Right. It's not where it is, obviously, but fulfillment is very closely tied to that.

00:50:50:01 - 00:50:53:08
.
Would you say that you are fulfilled in life?

00:50:54:16 - 00:50:58:13
.
Yeah, absolutely. I don't feel like I'm done.

00:50:59:15 - 00:51:00:23
.
Sure. Thank goodness.

00:51:01:17 - 00:51:22:08
.
Yeah. I don't feel like I have a fulfillment. Like I've accomplished all the things I knew I'm here to do. But I sleep very well and I go to work every day enjoying what I do. I don't when when I hear people talking about how it's Monday and I know I get up on Monday, I get to go do this thing, that's a big deal.

00:51:22:08 - 00:51:42:06
.
And I know I don't take that for granted because I know that not everybody can be at that spot and there are seasons. I have not always been there. There's been times where it's like, this is this is exhausting or this is hard work. But I think that's why there's definitely a theme. You don't know me and you're just hearing me for the first time.

00:51:42:06 - 00:52:06:07
.
There's an element of faith that has probably been through this entire thing. And and I understand that not everybody comes from that perspective. And I'm not naive to that. But I will say that for me, one of the things that's always been very fulfilling or it's allowed me to be fulfilled is to feel like I'm a part of something that's bigger than myself, that I'm not making all the roles that what I'm not here on this earth just because I was here.

00:52:06:14 - 00:52:24:05
.
I feel like there's a bigger story happening and I feel blessed to just be a part of it. So there's this fulfillment of knowing what I'm doing in my day is contributing in the best way that I can and challenging myself when I'm not. But also, no, I don't feel the pressure that I have to be the one to solve everything.

00:52:24:19 - 00:52:39:15
.
I'm not the one that feels that that pressure, that anxiety that I have to solve all of the world's problems that was never mind to solve. So I feel like that to me, that helps me feel fulfilled.

00:52:40:05 - 00:53:05:21
.
That's great. Well, sir, at the risk of ending very abruptly and to be conscious of your time and and I so appreciate the consideration you've given to this conversation and these questions and and also to make sure that we still have stuff to talk about. I'm going to end it right here. Thank you so much for showing up and sharing your insights, your stories, your experiences.

00:53:05:21 - 00:53:07:12
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And thanks for having us.

00:53:07:17 - 00:53:13:00
.
Here's to absolutely. Here's to the next phase of the Joe and Jeremy Show. How about that?

00:53:13:18 - 00:53:14:06
.
Sounds good.

00:53:15:11 - 00:53:38:15
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This has been intentionally ever after, hosted by intentional lifestyle coach Joe Booker. If you would like to have your own intentional conversation with Joe on or off the air, visit intentionally ever after dot com. Thanks for listening.