View From The Top
89. Everything is "Figureoutable," Right?
"We can’t control anything… except our attitude–that we are in 100% percent control of.” Can everything truly be figured out? Big A and Wally have their own opinions about whether changing your mindset can change the way you figure out your biggest issues.
Ever considered how persistence and creativity can turn seemingly insurmountable obstacles into opportunities? Big A tells how he transformed a burned-down building into a bustling business space.
Key Takeaways:
- Is everything really "figureoutable"?
- How mindset can help you fix your biggest problems
- Can you really do anything you want to do?
- How to face the issues you don't think you'll ever get out of
We discuss how faith and collective support can turn challenges into growth opportunities, and hear a poignant family moment where faith and prayer led to unexpected financial relief. Join us for an episode brimming with actionable insights, personal stories, and an optimistic outlook designed to help you navigate life's challenges with a solution-oriented approach.
Iron Sharpens Iron Community: https://go.viewfromthetop.com/community
LinkedIn Group: https://www.viewfromthetop.com/group
Local Roundtable Events: https://go.viewfromthetop.com/isiroundtable
Connect with Big A and Wally:
View From The Top Website: https://www.viewfromthetop.com/
The Climb Newsletter: https://www.viewfromthetop.com/climb
Big A’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronwalkerviewfromthetop/
Wally’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinwallenbeck/
"We can’t control anything… except our attitude–that we are in 100% percent control of.” Can everything truly be figured out? Big A and Wally have their own opinions about whether changing your mindset can change the way you figure out your biggest issues.
Ever considered how persistence and creativity can turn seemingly insurmountable obstacles into opportunities? Big A tells how he transformed a burned-down building into a bustling business space.
Key Takeaways:
- Is everything really "figureoutable"?
- How mindset can help you fix your biggest problems
- Can you really do anything you want to do?
- How to face the issues you don't think you'll ever get out of
We discuss how faith and collective support can turn challenges into growth opportunities, and hear a poignant family moment where faith and prayer led to unexpected financial relief. Join us for an episode brimming with actionable insights, personal stories, and an optimistic outlook designed to help you navigate life's challenges with a solution-oriented approach.
Iron Sharpens Iron Community: https://go.viewfromthetop.com/community
LinkedIn Group: https://www.viewfromthetop.com/group
Local Roundtable Events: https://go.viewfromthetop.com/isiroundtable
Connect with Big A and Wally:
View From The Top Website: https://www.viewfromthetop.com/
The Climb Newsletter: https://www.viewfromthetop.com/climb
Big A’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronwalkerviewfromthetop/
Wally’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinwallenbeck/
Hey everybody, welcome back to View From the Top podcast, where we help growth-minded men who desire momentum in their businesses, their families and their finances get through the valleys and up the mountain to their very own view from the top. Hey, have you ever heard anything like everything's figureoutable? I mean, is it really? Have you really ever asked yourself that? Do you think that everything is figureoutable? I mean, is it really? Have you really ever asked yourself that? Do you think that everything is figureoutable? Well, we're going to deep dive into that today with Big A. Big A came up with this great topic for us to talk about today because sometimes in business and in our families, even in our finances right, we got to think there's got to be a way. Maybe there is, and I think today we're going to talk about some things that maybe there isn't a way sometimes. So listen in as we talk about this topic today we deep dive on is everything figureoutable? Let's get big A in the studio. Big A welcome.
Speaker 1:Wally how's it going today you doing good, I'm not going to lie. I did something to my back and I got like this yeah, you know, when I don't exercise and stretch and walk like I should, it takes me about 30 days of not doing that. And I get this, I turn a certain way and oh there it is, there it goes. I'm sitting in the chair, I've got ice and ibuprofen and we've've got a great topic today, so I'm ready to roll yeah we do.
Speaker 2:You know, for those that are watching this on video, some of you might see me for the first time without glasses. 35 years I've been wearing glasses and had cataract surgery and, honestly though, you're not completely in focus, wally, because my right eye hasn't been done until next Tuesday. My left eye was done last Tuesday. I can see you perfectly with my left eye. My right eye doesn't know you exist, but anyway, I'm excited about it. I keep adjusting my glasses and they're not there.
Speaker 1:They're not even there. Yeah, they're not even there. You know, you wear glasses, phantom phone, phantom glasses.
Speaker 2:I know it's like what in the world, but, man, that cataract surgery is the real deal. Five minutes you get a new lens and you walk out with 20-20 vision.
Speaker 1:So pretty cool. I don't love the idea of somebody messing with my eyes. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I guess, if it works Well, they vacuum out your old lens and then they insert a new one and it fills the void and you leave out of there, and the next morning I was able to read. So it's phenomenal, isn't it? I should have paid for that 35 years ago and I would saved all that money on glasses. But I don't think you can have cataract surgery without cataracts, and so that's part of it, man. Hey, I am so excited, man, to see you today.
Speaker 2:We do have a cool topic. Everything's figureoutable. Some people say, ah, that's just being overzealous in your optimism and I'm like, no, we need to dive into that. But before we do, I do have a question for you, and we normally have a little question we talk about. We call them riff topics, but I get asked all the time from coaching clients and guys in the mastermind. There's always talking about money, right, and they said Big A, what do you recommend that we save? Is there a percentage that we should save of our income? I know Dave Ramsey has all that laid out, but just between me and you as businessmen, like, how do you look at that related to your budget? Is there a percentage that you should save? And should there be a percentage of it in cash that's disposable to you at any time, how do you look at it?
Speaker 1:yeah, well, when I didn't have any money, uh, I didn't no thought about saying it was hard to say but once I started right once I started being able to steward that.
Speaker 1:Um, yeah, I think I started looking toward the future and, uh, you know, first for me was short-term things. Like you, you know, I have children, so I had daughters and still have daughters, but they're all married now but, yeah, weddings and school helping them out there and all that. So those are some shorter-term things that we saved for. And then, obviously, you know, started thinking about longer-term with retirement or freedom funds we talked about that in a recent podcast but cash itself, that's.
Speaker 2:Well, let me be specific now. I'm not talking about saving for college or saving for the wedding. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about cash, specifically just rainy day funds, in case you need to get your hands on the money. Is there an amount of your annual income that you should set aside regardless and just keep building that little nest egg up, like not for expenditures? Just hey, it's there if I need it.
Speaker 1:Yeah um, a percentage of cash, uh, like in the safe kind of cash. Are we talking? No, no, I'm just talking about cash like mattress cash. What are we talking about in the bank, kind of cash Like mattress cash? What are we?
Speaker 2:talking about Accessible cash, like you can put it in a money market, put it under your mattress, I don't care what you do with it, but just it's accessible. It's not something that's, you know, allocated towards an expense that you're saving for. That's not what I mean. Just like raw cash in the bank, cd money market, whatever you want to do with it, like, is there a percentage that you would say, hey, I just need to save this much every single month, every single year?
Speaker 1:I haven't saved like every year cash, but I have a certain amount that I'll keep Right, Not even really a percentage. I mean there is a percentage, obviously, if you broke it down.
Speaker 2:But if you make $100 a month, you're not saying you should save ten dollars a month. Right, yeah, you don't look at it that way.
Speaker 1:No, so there's like a I have like an emergency fund amount right, that's smaller, that I keep like in my safe right and then there's like larger, not emergency fund, but larger like cash reserves at a certain amount, a lot of times, like it's in your checking account or in your savings account.
Speaker 2:You just got it yeah.
Speaker 1:And so we do sinking funds on a lot of things, yeah, and so we build up some cash there. We may spend a bunch at one time. I could buy a new car, save up for that or whatever. So we'll have. We'll have large amounts of cash available If something goes wonky. We can have access to that, sure.
Speaker 2:But I don't have like a but you don't say 5% of my annual income goes into cash.
Speaker 1:Do you? I haven't. Let me tell you where I've struggled with this. I can't believe that you would be that specific about saving a percentage.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I get asked that question and it's like the reason that I've done a terrible job at saving cash and the reason is I get a little bit of cash. I want to invest it. I'm like, well, I can do better than it, sitting in the bank earning a percent and a half or 3% or 5% or whatever it is Like. I can go invest it in something. So I've done a terrible job. But as I've gotten older, it's become much more interesting to me. Yeah, it's like, yeah, robert and I are getting a little bit older and maybe I should have done a better job. So I've kind of upped the ante a little bit for me personally now at this stage in my life and it's much more of an interest now. And I look back Robin and I had this discussion the other day because you know, 45 year career. If I had set aside 5%, 10% for that 45 year career, can you imagine?
Speaker 1:You can't, you can't go back like that man Hindsight's so 20, 20.
Speaker 2:Okay, you know what Crazy I had, uh, if I did those numbers, man, I would.
Speaker 1:I'll be able to sleep at night. I'd be like oh.
Speaker 2:I know, I know, I told Abby, my granddaughter. We had dinner the other night together and I told her that I said, abby, if you and Ben would set aside X percent and I'll tell you what I told her I said 5%, let's just say 5% of cause you guys are going to do good, right you? I mean? They're graduated from college, they've got some good offers, and I said start out your marriage or get married, you know, next month. And I said start out your marriage, just earmark 5% of it. Time you get big age, you'll have so much money you won't know what to do with it, and so I wish somebody had given me that advice as a young person to really build my budget on 90 or 95%.
Speaker 2:And you're talking still just cash like you're talking about saving five percent cash yeah, you're kind of hung up on is it in the safe or in the money market?
Speaker 1:no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You just came back and said five percent. Like, say, I told my granddaughter to save five percent of that of her.
Speaker 2:let's say she makes a hundred grand, put 10 grand or five grand away, 5%. Just put it away and don't. Don't spend it, don't invest it, don't do any just don't invest it. Don't spend it Like in a money market or something it's accessible, she can go cash it in and get it immediately.
Speaker 1:It's not. What point does she convert that into something more long-term, Cause she's going to. That's going to add up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I know, I don't know. I'd worry about that if I had 5% of 45 years, right? Hey, let's get into our topic today.
Speaker 1:Everything is. You know what? This is one of those things I don't know. This is figureoutable. It is because we would just do it very different, right?
Speaker 2:Hey, you know, when I was a kid, wally, my mom would come in my room and we would talk at length. My mom was really good about just having conversations at random about things. And she came in one year. I was young I don't remember how old I was, I was pretty young but she wouldn't allow us to say the word can't and she had this little saying that I thought it was the most ridiculous saying on earth. She would say can't, couldn't do it, but could did it all. And I didn't understand that really. Then All I was mad because I couldn't say can't, because I would say I can't do better than that on my report card, or I can't do better on the yard, or I can't do better cleaning up the house. You know my mom would go yes, you can, because anytime you think you can't, you won't and those that think they can will. And so she said can't, couldn't do it, but could did it all. And it was really embedded in me, it was just ingrained and really I've adopted that kind of as my life mantra as I've become an adult.
Speaker 2:And it's the title to the first chapter in my book, view from the Top, and that leads into this everything is figureoutable. The reason is, it's one of our core values, it's our fifth core value. Everything's figureoutable. Our team knows and while you know, we talk about it, but they say, well, we can't. Yes, we can.
Speaker 2:It may not look exactly like we had prescribed, but there is a way for us to do that and I thought it'd be fun today to kind of break it down just a little bit at the reason. You know we've titled this Mastering, the Art of Problem Solving, and, I think, our disposition towards things, our attitude. I was thinking about it this morning. I had an errand to run and I was on my way out and I was thinking, you know, we're really not in control of anything, like anything could happen except our attitude, that we're in 100% control over the way we perceive things, what we do as a result. So for me, it's that I can if I choose, and if I choose to figure this out, I can. Again, it may not look exactly like I had originally prescribed, but that's the way I look at life, that's the way I look at business. What about you, wally? When you think about that kind of mindset, what comes to your mind?
Speaker 1:I used to think about when we first actually put these core values in place. What, four years ago, the idea of everything is figureoutable. I was a little torn because I was like man, like that, just that just doesn't seem true, right? Because so often you said it earlier, it may not turn out exactly like it's prescribed, and how I thought about that was oh, like, exactly how I think it should be is how it's going to be. And if it's not that, then I didn't really figure it out.
Speaker 2:That's because you're so literal yeah, you are, your personality is that way, right? Mine's not exactly that way, and so you're like no, we said it would go in this order and it would be exactly like this. So therefore, we didn't figure. Yeah, but I've had to learn.
Speaker 1:I've had to learn to relax that and to think differently about what's figureoutable. I know we're going to get into some details on this, but I think it'll be fun that I've had to learn about it. All for myself is that everything's figureoutable and sometimes, like the answers, like you said, different than than what it was going to be. But most of the time the reason that that's perceived as a failure, not figureoutable, is because we don't communicate effectively.
Speaker 2:So I know we're going to talk more about that as we dive into this, but that's been my experience with that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I want to tell a quick story related to this and I could give you dozens, if not hundreds, of stories around this over the course of my career, but I do want to tell a quick story. It'll take a couple of minutes. When I was 28, 29 years old, I had sold my first business and I had gone in business with Herberry in Madison, tennessee, just north of Nashville, about 11 miles just north of Nashville, and we went in partners and we outgrew our current location and I went across the street and there was this burned down antique mall and I went to the guy that owned it Junon Yun was his name. He owned a lot of property in Nashville. He's Korean and he had bought tons and tons of property. And I went to him one day and I said Junon, I said I want to buy that building. He goes Abram, what do you want to buy that building for? It's burned down. And I said I'm going to tear it down, we're going to put a location there. So we agreed to the price. I bought it, we tore it down, we started building a building and I didn't think through it deep enough, because what I discovered was is that we were going to have a huge showroom and the parking wasn't going to be adequate, nor was the storage, and so there was a building next door and the family the HG Hill family here in Nashville, is probably the largest property owner in Davidson County. They do nothing but buy property. They don't sell property. They own the building that was adjacent to it. It's literally zero lot line, so it was literally connected to this building.
Speaker 2:And I called up the Caldwells and I said hey, I want to meet you at this location. He said what do you want to do? I said I want to talk to you about this building. So he came out there and told him who I was, what I'd done, and I said I want to buy this property. He said we don't sell property and I said I'm in a real spot here. I said I really need to buy this property and I'll pay you fair market value for this building. It's about 5,000 square feet. And he said you didn't hear what I said. We've been buying property for 100 years. We don't sell property, we only buy property.
Speaker 2:So he left and so I called him back about a week later and I said Mr Caldwell. I said Kevin, you meet back out there. He goes, are we not coming? And I said would you please come and just hear me out? So he came again and we stood out there in front of the location and I said listen, there's got to be a way that we can figure this out. He goes I don't know how we're going to figure it out because we don't sell property and we argued for about 30 minutes and I'm a pretty good sales car and when he got back to the car he started to get in.
Speaker 2:He goes, mr Walker, and I said yes, and he said we do do 1031 exchanges. And I said done. I didn't even know what it was. I didn't even know what a 1031 exchange was when I was 27, 28 years old. And he goes there's a property that we're looking at on Dickerson Road and he said it's comparable in value. He said you go look at it and if you want to buy that, we'll do a 1031 exchange. And so here's my point we did the deal Went and bought the property. I exchanged it. We then turned that into storage and had adequate parking. So we ended up with about a 10,000 square foot building. But here's my point into storage and had adequate parking. So we ended up with about a 10,000 square foot building. But here's my point.
Speaker 2:It would have been easy to just give up. He said we don't sell property and if you look at the data, it would support 100 years of buying property and never selling. It would have been very easy to go. You know what? There's no way they're going to sell. That, I think it's persistence. I think there are ways creatively to work things out, and that's just one of many, many ways. I just think there's a way to do most everything that you want to do. Maybe you get creative, maybe you do a 1031 exchange. I think there's an element of persistence. There's an element of being an encourager, figuring out what's good for both parties. So I think it's how you approach it. So all these things play into what we're going to talk about today in regards to everything is figureoutable. For me, it's just a lot more enjoyable to live life with that disposition and attitude, rather than it's not going to work out. That just seems like a defeatist mindset to me, and so that's one of the reasons that's our core value is because everything is figure out.
Speaker 1:It is easy, though, like I mean the example that you just gave. I'm sure guys are listening to this. You know I'm listening and I'm just going. Man, I'm not sure I would have had that kind of resolve right To like somebody told me, no, that you know I'd be like okay, like that's especially being a lot younger, and so I know there are guys listening right now that are, you know, bumping up against a decision or a situation that's in front of them and they're just like I don't know how I'm going to figure this out.
Speaker 2:I think it goes back again being ingrained by my mom can't, couldn't do it, but could did it all. And it's having that. I will accomplish this, I will do this, I will figure this out. It is so much easier, but isn't it worth it? Isn't the reward so worth the end result when you push through and you get that accomplishment and you make it happen?
Speaker 2:Another quick story it's similar in nature is that when I went into the business I was in, the other people that was in that industry ostracized me for about five or six years, wouldn't have anything to do with me, and later they made me president of their association. Because you just continue to work with them and show them hey, I'm for you, I'm not against you. And I think that all of us need to adopt a level of that mindset in order to accomplish the things that we want to do. Same with being average. You know that mindset is like well, okay, they said no, so I'm going to go on. That's kind of an average mindset. And again, to my mom's credit, she would say average, you're just as close to the bottom as you are the top and you're above average and you can do things above average, yeah, and so what I'm saying to those that are listening today? I don't know your circumstances.
Speaker 2:I don't know your situation, many of these things seem impossible. You know, I talked about several months ago, my daughter was up against a life-threatening disease and they gave her a few months to live and it's like okay, so game on. We got to figure this out and we weren't able to do it at the place we were at here in Vanderbilt in Nashville, but there was another place that we did figure it out and today she's thriving Excuse me, that sounded hoarse, my throat's a little hoarse. She's thriving, I think it came out. And so, yeah, I mean, what if we had given up? Okay, she's got a few months to live, and we're like, oh, I'm sorry, you know, it's like no, we're not going to do that, and I think that we can adopt a certain mindset as we go forward. But listen, there's a number of things that I want to talk about. I did a little research just to see what most people were challenged with the most, and the first one that I came up with was financial management. It's the top of all of our lists, no question about it.
Speaker 2:You get into cash flow situations making wise investments and I'm going to be honest with you, I struggle with this. I was on a call for 30 minutes today about an investment that I've got. That's gone a little bit south and we're trying to work through it and it's tough. It's like, okay, do I keep it's a piece of real estate, do I keep it? Do I lower the rent? You know it's making these wise decisions related to finances and right now no option looks real promising. And so I'm like, okay, we got to figure this out, and that's what I told the realtor today. I'm like this is not optimum, but this is what I think I'd like to do, and so we've got to figure it out. We can't just be defeated. But what about for you, wally? How much of cash flow making wise investments? How much of your time do you spend on those kind of decisions as well?
Speaker 1:No, those are tough. Young families, guys listening, that got young kids and you're trying to get a business started, or you got one going and you know you're, you're profitable, but it just never seems like enough. You know, those are, those are hard, it's hard to figure that out. It's hard. You know my I'm not picking on my wife, sonia, but any shape or form, I think she'd be okay with me saying this but um, cause I was, I was, I'm still immature sometimes. But um, I've been immature in my life as well and there was a time when she was more, she was more immature than she is today. Right, I mean, it's not. You know what I'm saying. She's mature today, but there was a time when, when the lack of maturity and and I growing young, growing a business like it, was hard because she knew we had a business, she knew we had revenue coming in, but the revenue coming in didn't match what I put into our personal accounts and it was just lack of understanding on her own or lack of my ability to know how to communicate effectively.
Speaker 1:That was a real problem and it took us a long time to figure that out and I tried a lot of years on my own ineffectively. Once we got some help that we were able to work through that. But that took a while to figure out. I didn't know if I was going to. It was a point of frustration Like every week. It felt like probably not, but man, it sure felt like that. So yeah, I've had those moments and they're real. You figured it out. I did figure it out. It took some time, took some help.
Speaker 2:Right, took some energy. Right, that's right, right. You know another thing, even today with us, one of the things is the challenge is marketing, customer acquisition. A lot of you are small business owners that we're listening to A lot of noise out there today. It's like everybody's promoting advertising.
Speaker 2:I talked with one of my clients yesterday and he said man, I've never seen so many ads for the space that I'm in and I've never seen it so hard. And people have only got a certain amount of disposable income to invest in some of these projects. And you got to fight for it. It's hard, like what do we do? And so we strategize for an hour. It's like, well, hey, what got you here is not going to get you there, so we got to do some things differently. We've got to approach it differently. We got to try some things that you may not want to do in light of the circumstances that we're in right now.
Speaker 2:He was very, very discouraged when we got on the call and he was very energized and encouraged when we got off the call because some of these things he hadn't thought about. He was like man, I can see exactly what you're talking about. It's like, yes, we're going to figure this out. He was motivated when we got off, also because I encouraged him. Right, he's discouraged and one of my jobs is to encourage him. Like we're going to figure this thing out, but let's try this for two weeks. If that doesn't work, we'll pivot and we'll try something else, but we're not going to give up. We're not going to quit. Marketing is something that's been a challenge for 10 years for us figuring out exactly the things to do Podcast interviews, facebook ads, google. You know we do email sequences, like what are the things? So what are some of those challenges, wally, that you feel that some of these people may be up against from a marketing and a customer acquisition?
Speaker 1:Well, I think you answered the questions. You said all the things that I would say as far as effective marketing strategies and things like that. We're talking about marketing specifically today, so I don't want to dive into all the little nuances of what like what we need to try with marketing.
Speaker 2:That's just some of the things that people are trying to figure out.
Speaker 1:It's legitimate, Like it's a real thing. Marketing is a it can be a big challenge in business and, like you said, we are. We're in that struggle right now and marketing is like getting your best message in front of the people that you can help.
Speaker 2:Right At the end of the day, that's you know what. It never quits either. The algorithms change, the messaging changes, like it's not one and done. I wish we could just figure it out and set it and go, and that's impossible, yeah.
Speaker 1:Business is hard dude.
Speaker 2:Business is hard, right it is for all of us it is we're having to figure it about the marketing side of things.
Speaker 1:It ties right into one of the areas that I think is, you know, tough to master, that's hard to figure out often is people you know from who you hire to whether it's employees or whether it's you know, 1099 contractors or third party. You know agencies or you know that that can be really difficult and we've we've had some of those struggles in marketing and other businesses that I've had. It's it's been a struggle Like you're like, oh man, we really need, like this, this role filled. Or maybe I that was when I got smarter, when I wasn't very smart I'd be like, oh, we need this person. You know, I've seen Johnny and he's really good at this, so I'm going to hire him. And so I hired Johnny to do a thing, versus figuring out the thing and then hiring Johnny but that's a conversation for another day.
Speaker 2:It's hard, you feel like, with well, it's really part of this conversation, Wally, because you can't figure it out properly until you put it in the right sequential order. So you had a problem figuring out that challenge because you were doing it in reverse order.
Speaker 1:So it being figureoutable is getting it in the right order working the problem out, like you were talking really right, not giving up how many. Often it's like you just get frustrated. You know, I don't know if if you or the guys listening today are like I'm just tired of having the same conversation with that team member, you know, for three weeks in a row and you've got to make some decisions about that person in your business. Maybe they're the right person and you're not the effective leader you think you are. Maybe you're not communicating effectively.
Speaker 1:I had a I was doing some coaching a little while ago. I love to help kind of those second in commands, like those COOs, director of operations. A lot of times they're the forgotten heroes of the businesses. They're doing a lot of work in the background. The CEO, the founder, gets a lot of, gets a lot of FaceTime and airtime, if you will, and they're the ones that have invested a lot and driven it all. Don't get me wrong, it's not what I'm saying, but those, those second in commands, need help as well. So I've been able to help a number of those folks and I enjoy that.
Speaker 1:But in that process I was talking to the CEO and the and the or the visionary and the integrator, if you want to talk about it, go EOS route.
Speaker 1:I talked to both of them while I were in this, in this, uh, this coaching situation, and, uh, a couple of times, the CEO, the founder visionary, he said to me man, it sounds like, sounds like maybe I'm the problem in this, in this particular case, for this particular thing, and and so maybe you're the person leading the charge right now, but you're not the effective leader or not thinking about it the way you should, or maybe that person needs to be changed, maybe that that role does not fit, um, you know who, who you need in that role. That person doesn't fit that role, uh, anymore, and that those are tough. Man, it's like how do we figure that out? They have families. You know, like we're a family business. I'm in the sense that, like you know, everybody's family and we're going this together and everybody's on board and and they're working their heart out. You're just like I don't, I don't know how to figure that one out.
Speaker 2:Right? Well, you know what's tough and it's hard for me and not as hard for you, and even easier for people younger than us. The culture changes, hmm, and if we don't change our strategies and our tactics and our retention methods, we're going to lose people, because what's important to some of the up-and-coming folks today is not what was important 30, 40 years ago. It's true, and so I think the reason there's a lot of things that it's difficult to figure out as far as HR and talent management is because we're not adopting the new culture, we're not looking at the new strategies, we're not on the cutting edge. You know, we're stuck in our head, we're the old school and I don't ever want to be guilty of being that guy as I get older.
Speaker 2:I don't want to be that guy. I want to learn. I always want to be a student and I want to adopt the new culture mindset in regards to okay, what is important to you, like money, is not as important oftentimes as time off. They want more personal time and it's like see, that's contrary to the way I used to think when I was young. I was like dude, I work around the clock. If I can make more money, put me down as long you know like I'm here, but now it's like no, I'm going to put these boundaries up and I'm not saying they don't have it right. That's probably more right than the way I looked at it, quite honestly. But what I'm saying is is evaluate yourself, do a self-evaluation when you're looking at problems and don't always portray that it's on the other person. It could be the lens that you're looking through.
Speaker 1:I want to speak to the younger generations real quick An observation I have because we both have, obviously, children. They're younger and so Sonia and I served in ministry with college and career age for a number of years and I think for you and I there was some pursuit of either status or things right, like got to get the nice house, and that's part of status and things. And I don't mean that necessarily in a bad, uh, a bad stewardship way or pursuit of earthly things and materialism. That's not what I'm talking about. Like, there's just a fundamental like status was important and things were important. Um, now it's more about experiences. I think, like the experience of work, the, the, the time off, experiences right. It's really interesting to watch and I think in a lot of ways that they have it right. I really do. I agree.
Speaker 2:You know what we're going to need to do. I've got a buddy of mine, chris Tuff, the Millennial Whisperer. We need to bring him on one day be a co-host and we'll talk more about those things and he's an expert at it. I mean he travels and speaks, written a book. Chris would be a great co-host on one of these to talk about the millennial mindset and what they're in pursuit of. There's other things that we could talk about. We won't go on and on, but there's all kind of time management. Are you delegating things properly? A real challenge for me over the course of my career, because I wanted to do it. I didn't think anybody could do it as good as me. I ended up the bottleneck, so how do you figure that out?
Speaker 1:Yeah, how do you figure it out?
Speaker 2:Right, you got to say hey yeah, I can do this or I can do that, so it's yeah. Then there's all kinds of regulations that we have to navigate today, a lot of government and legal and accounting compliance. There's just so many things that we have to try to figure out. But those are just a few of the highlights. But I wanted to reserve a little bit of time for talking about the way we approach our mindset. And for me and Wally, you're the same. We're Christ followers, we're believers, and so I want to start out kind of with that in mind. For me, it's all about mindset, but it starts with a spiritual awareness, and a lot of our audience are believers. Some of our audience is not believers, and there again, we're not condemning anyone.
Speaker 2:This is our podcast, so we're just telling you the way we view things, and I think that, as a believer, we really have a different lens by which we see challenges, and honestly, I kind of like it that way, because I don't feel alone, right, I feel like there's a higher power and I'm looking at it through the lens of being obedient to the way I feel God is leading me to do things, and oftentimes I'll look at challenges as even a means of protection, like, maybe it's not the right path, that I should be going down and maybe there's other opportunities. And when I think of it that way, it almost sounds like a cop-out that you're like, well, you couldn't figure it out, so you say God didn't want me to do it. And that's the way some people perceive that it's like, well, you couldn't do it, so you're just using your faith as a crutch. That you couldn't figure it out, so you're going to switch gears. For me it's about prayer, mindset, spiritual awareness, being obedient.
Speaker 2:There's things that we can count on, and for me you and I both, and many that are listening out there a lot of it is Scripture, and when we're reading Scripture, god's Word is truth for us, and so we go to God's word. And I only want to give a couple, but there's many, many, there's hundreds. But there's a couple of contextual verses that I really look at to help me through difficult times. One of them is Proverbs 3, trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not on your own understanding and all your ways, but submit to him and he will make your path straight. Well, for me, that gives me a lot of comfort and peace, knowing that I have an abiding trust in him and he's directing and leading as I go.
Speaker 2:And it just makes it much more digestible right and does give you a sense of hope. I know that verse is very familiar to you as well. Any comments on it?
Speaker 1:No man, I, like you wrote. I'm going to read the next one you got down here. I love it, it's good. Philippians 4 talks about do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation be prayerful, with petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, you even read that, I feel my heart rate go down, I don't feel as anxious and there again, it gives me that peace that surpasses all of our understanding. It's like, well, okay. So yeah, we're not here today to preach a sermon or a Sunday school lesson or anything, but it is a very, very big part of why I feel like everything is figureoutable. Jeremiah 29 said For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. I don't know about you, man. That's very encouraging. That's good news. Yeah, yeah, that is good news, right, when you read that.
Speaker 2:But how do you practically take that and create a better mindset? And so I think, once you figure out the spiritual awareness and you're like, oh, you can overlay that into other areas of your life, including the mindset that you're choosing to use during each and every situation. So attempting to adopt a positive mindset and a growth mindset, I think is the first step. It's like you got to make a choice Like how do you want to receive this Right? It's like you got to make a choice Like how do you want to receive this Right. It's like well, I don't want to receive that, that's not what I've chose. But because I'm dealing with that, I'm going to make the best out of it. And I can go over case in point for decades and tell you hands, I was dealt that I really wished I wasn't dealt. But I can look back and see how God used all those in my life for the better and you know, with relationship challenges, automobile accidents, loss of businesses, health challenges, I can look back and go, man, I grew as a direct result of that.
Speaker 2:I talked to a buddy of mine yesterday and he's going through a really difficult time and I said you know honestly, you won't do that again. Like you'll make better choices going forward. Like it's an education. He goes yeah, it sucks really bad and it costs a lot, but you're right, it made me a better businessman as a result of it. He could have been ticked off and he could have, you know, been a victim. He could have done all those things, but he owned it. He said I made a bad choice. It is what it is and you're right, it's going to make me a better a better businessman.
Speaker 1:What about you, wally? What are some other practical steps? Yeah, so I had a we've talked about it before on the podcast just kind of the journeys we've been on, and so, after selling the business that I did in 2019, it's been a crazy journey over the years through that and I found myself about 18 months after that I was just in a funk and you know, I believe it was spiritual warfare, but I was in a funk and someone pointed out to me, like man, when's the last time you know talking about scripture, how faithful are you being at reading the word which I think provides the most? What do I want to say, like the greatest impact right on your attitude, and because it's our, the way we're perceiving life, and God has a different view right of how life is to be perceived, and looking through his lens puts us in a different mindset and at the same time, he's created other people in the world in his image that create pretty cool things, and one of those things are is information and knowledge that they share. And so I really hadn't been doing much with any self-improvement or paying attention to.
Speaker 1:You know, it's kind of just on my own. I had had my, my eyesight groups and it was doing great there. I just had that, like that edge was off. And one of the guys said to me he's like hey, when's the last time you, like you know, dove into a book to to kind of to help you think about some things you weren't thinking about before? I was like man, it has been a while, and so I jumped into that and sure enough, man, it didn't take long. Yeah, and so that I think that continuous learning there can be a time when you need to take a break, but you know that continuous learning and kind of skills development, um, you know, I've been strumming more on the guitar lately than I have in the past, and so those things are all helpful, uh, with our mindset, our attitudes, um, just how we approach, approach life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's so much that you can do out there. You know online now there's so many TED Talks and podcasts and encouraging YouTubes and you know there's great blogs that you can read. People can't say I don't have access to the content it's out there.
Speaker 1:Is blogging still a thing?
Speaker 2:Sure they do. Oh yeah, man, it's a big thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a big thing it is. It's just changed, but it's not what it used to be. It is.
Speaker 2:No, it's not. But now there's the video vlogging that people have. It's become very popular. But you know, the last thing I think, from a practical application standpoint and some of this you can get into kind of some weird stuff and that's not what I'm talking about but I think, just practicing positive affirmations, that there's nothing that does the soul better than to have a positive affirmations. There's nothing that does the soul better than to have a positive affirmation and sometimes that's from others.
Speaker 2:You and I were doing a podcast the other day and you publicly affirmed me about a situation. It really encouraged me. It was like, wow, we should do that more. And we made it a practice. And it's the culture in ISI that we do affirmations at our live event and have people stand up and take a microphone and walk over to the guy that's really impacted them this year and say, hey, I just want to tell you, if you hadn't have done that, my life would have been different. And because you encourage me, now I've stepped up and I've done this challenge, or I've done this thing, or I'm a better husband or a better businessman. I'm coming home now and being with my kids as a result of your challenging me and I just want to tell you thank you. And they hug each other and just really affirm See, here's the thing, wally, we all are desirous of the affirmation and we rarely got it as children. You know a lot of people had absentee dads and they were out working. And I'm not going to throw dads under the bus, but the truth is is we need those affirmations, we need people to affirm us, and a lot of people act out as a result of just getting that notoriety, just getting acknowledged, and I know a lot of kids misbehave just because they want attention. And so, as adults, we need to affirm our children, our grandchildren, our spouses, our partners. We just need to make a conscious effort at doing that.
Speaker 2:When I started thinking about this entire episode, I was like why does it matter anyway? Like what are some of the benefits from having this positive kind of attitude or disposition? And I'll just be honest with you and I'm going to tell you some of you are not going to like this, but some of your family and friends, they don't want to be around you. You're just a dark hole. You're just like. You're negative, you're pessimistic, everything's fallen, you're a victim. You've got this mindset that nothing's ever going to happen.
Speaker 2:Good for you, and people are avoiding you, and I don't mean that to be mean or rude or harsh, but I think everyone listening to this episode right now needs to ask themselves do people want to be around me? Am I presenting, am I bringing light to the conversation? Am I energetic? Am I bringing positive affirmation? Is my disposition good around my grandkids, my kids? Am I trying to use this? Everything is figureoutable in every situation, for my spouse, for my children, because if you're going the other way, I promise you people are avoiding you. So I think one of the reasons is that we want to have a better relationship with our family and friends. And so I think no, I don't think. I'm convinced that positivity breeds opportunity. Yeah, I'm with you on that. There's no question about it. When you're upbeat and you're positive, you're around people. They want to be around, they want to talk to you, and opportunity comes as a result of that. What do you think, wally? What are other additional benefits? Right?
Speaker 1:but it doesn't mean that you know, these are definitely benefits. I think you know we have better, we can get better relationships and we have better connections, and you know I Relationships and we have better connections and I'm sure with an attitude we hopefully have increased success. But there's still that problem. That's there, right. So does the attitude. We say everything is figureoutable. Does having this attitude, this mindset that things are good, that God's in control, that trying to be happy, Does that mean that the problem solves itself? It'd be easy to say that.
Speaker 2:No, I don't believe in the prosperity gospel. That's not what I'm teaching here at all. I just think that when we have everything is figureoutable mindset, we're positive. We're looking for ways we're in touch with our spirituality. Our mindset is looking for positive affirmations. We're looking. Our opportunity for success is going to be far greater than the victim mindset. The sky's falling, we can't figure it out. Anyway, we're negative. All I'm saying is is it's going to give you. You know, I don't think there's a way to quantify this episode in being a hundred percent. If you adopt this, everything in your life is going to be. You know, come up roses.
Speaker 1:That's not what I'm saying, but like you said at the beginning, like your mom said, if you think you can't, you're right.
Speaker 2:You won't, yeah, and so that's the whole point of this episode. Not for someone to email me and give me a specific situation that they didn't figure out. That's not the point. The point is that there's much more figureoutable, with a positive mindset, going at it in a way that you're not the victim, you're not negative, you're being more positive, we can figure this out. So that's really in, in essence, what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Imagine what it would be like. I've been guilty of this more than I should. I probably should count, but I think back and go. Imagine if those challenges and problems I came up against, that I was like I don't know what to do, like I can't Imagine if I had engaged other people. First of all, right, the people I trusted to help me out, my wise counselors around me, my spouse, you know, for me it's my mastermind group. But imagine if I had done that.
Speaker 1:And secondly, imagine if I had communicated that to the people of the decision affected, just just the communication alone, the value of that I think about my family and think about the times when we yeah, I remember being down in the mouth about some cashflow issues we were having in our family when our girls were young, and we want to do this thing and we couldn't do it. And Sonia took the reins and she's like, hey, let's, let's get down in the living room and pray about this as a family and thing. And we couldn't do it. And Sonia took the reins and she's like, hey, let's, let's get down in the living room and pray about this as a family. And and it wasn't. Two weeks later God made provision for that and yeah, it was cool. It was like one of those Keystone moments, like in your we all talk about that.
Speaker 2:Still Isn't that exciting, right, yeah, it was crazy. You know, what helped you figured it out is she went about it with the correct order, or spiritual awareness perspective governed the remainder of the conversation and it was resolved. Listen, I'm really excited today. Thank you guys for being here. Listen, when you view problems as opportunities for growth and learning rather than as obstacles, it just helps you have that mindset that I'm referring to Understanding that challenges are a natural part of the journey and that overcoming them can lead to personal and professional development.
Speaker 2:Listen today instead of dwelling on the problem itself, shift your focus to potential solutions. Think about it like what does this make possible? As my good friend Dan Miller used to say, I want you to acknowledge the issue, but concentrate your energy on finding ways to resolve it. Listen, try to keep a positive outlook, believing that every problem has a solution. You can even adopt my mindset if you want. Can't, couldn't do it and could did it all, and I promise you if you'll attempt this, maybe just around the corner, you too can have a view from the top.