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From Setbacks to Success: The Art of Trusting the Process

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Ever wished you could peek behind the curtain of life and see the real, raw journey of self-reflection and adaptation? Well, here's your backstage pass. We're diving headfirst into the deep end, exploring the transformative experiences that have shaped my personal and professional life. From the college classrooms to the monkey board, and even the journey of founding my own company, we're sharing it all.

What happens when our carefully laid plans don't work out? Can you recall a time when you had to revise your goals and expectations? Join us as we explore the humbling experience of trusting the process rather than the plan. Hear about my own journey, the trials, the triumphs, and the unexpected opportunities that arose when I let go of rigid plans and embraced the process. 

Finally, we're highlighting the significance of support and engagement in personal podcasts. Learn about the gratifying experience that comes with investing your energy into meaningful endeavors. We'll uncover the impact of connections and conversations in shaping our careers and lives. So, if you want to understand how to adjust expectations, trust in the process, and appreciate the power of conversations, this episode is for you. Don't just listen, join the Energy Crüe!

Speaker 1:

And welcome to a new energy crew podcast and your host, jp Warren, and I want to thank you all for tuning in right now. We're kind of doing something new here, something that I'm going to be trying out. That is kind of a new practice for me. I'm not really comfortable with it, but I do think it's gonna. It's gonna help me and it's also potentially help someone out there as well, maybe a few people, and that's kind of the whole goal of this to kind of know whether it's the interviews that we have on this podcast to highlight leaders, strengths, vulnerabilities, weaknesses, passions, kind of where they sit. It kind of correlates to kind of where I'm at right now personally in my life. I am very interested in hearing about people's passions.

Speaker 1:

I think that it's refreshing change to conversations that are happening outside of the normal boring, mundane business corporate conversations that we normally have, and I also think it's important to talk about you know, our vulnerabilities or blind spots that we all face. I know that you know a lot of things. On surface, it can look a certain way. It can you know whether you're scrolling through Instagram, linkedin, whatever social media websites out there. It can certainly feel like like everyone's got their shit together, that everyone's doing great, everyone's not worried about anything, and you know we've all got it figured out, but it's something that you know. I tell my daughter we don't have a figure, we're learning, we're trying to learn. And vulnerabilities to me, I think, is an important part because, again, we're all going through the same struggles, but different struggles. And the third thing is strengths. I think when you're discussing people's strengths is kind of a little hack on on how to improve quickly and something I love, you know, kind of talking to different leaders and kind of understanding a little bit more about their strengths and why they're so good at what they do, and not just in the role but kind of, you know, whether it's dealing with people, whether it's building a business business, whether it's communicating an idea or visualizing an idea, I think it's so fascinating to hear, to learn from, to kind of pick up stuff.

Speaker 1:

So part of my journey is you know that, yes, I'm fascinated with these buckets, but also personally I have been kind of going through some self-reflection, some some discovery through this entire process. When I started my company almost two years ago I think actually in two days it'll be a two-year anniversary of Connection Crew and during that time and I'm honestly still facing situations today and I expect to be facing situations throughout my entire life where I'm kind of mentally processing stuff and dealing with stuff and I was thinking how cool would that be if I got out of my comfort box, if I got out of my shell and I was able to provide some sort of kind of insight on kind of the either situations that I've been faced with and kind of a change in perceptions that have helped me along the way, and it could potentially help you along the way too, if you're kind of finding yourself in the same boat. No, you don't have to have your job or a company started to kind of gain insight and some nugget to knowledge from this. It could be kind of whether, whatever you're faced with in life I try to make it general and I also try to dial in a little bit. But obviously, before we begin, there's another one I need to plug on kind of you know who's sponsoring this, who's bringing this to you? It's Exact Crew. Exact Crew is again is one of my passions is bringing good people together with good people. One of my passions is exchanging knowledge, ideas when it comes to people's passion subjects and how that can benefit not just the community but also people's professional and personal lives. So we're building a community of leaders, of founders, of executives, of successful executives and expiring leaders who want to come together and who want to learn about people's different strengths, people's different passions, kind of the ideas everyone could be a student, everyone could be a teacher. I've learned and I've probably gained more insights, perception, knowledge just through conversations, conversations with friends and people that have been in my shoes before. Then I have any podcast or lunch and learn or whatever else is out there self-help books or anything like that. I think the power of conversations, the power of connection, is going to be what sets us apart and what drives us throughout our careers, not just when there's those little bumps in the road, when it's those oh shit moments that you kind of find yourself isolated, where you do need a network, you do need connection. But also I think it's going to be great to kind of elevate people's knowledge. So I'm excited about that. We have a limited number of spots. We want to learn more Head over to connectioncrewcom, head over to execcrew in the connection crew and just kind of pre-register there because we'll be launching in Q4.

Speaker 1:

I think, in the absence of not having a guest on the Energy Crew podcast is it's kind of two things First. First off, it's kind of nerve-wracking for me. I kind of like having things planned out. I like kind of having things set where I kind of I know to expect kind of what's down my path, I know to expect what's coming up. But whenever you don't have a guest on the podcast, whenever you're trying to build the podcast up again and you had two guests through circumstances change. It gives me an opportunity to step out of my comfort zone where I'm the one asking questions, I'm the one bringing forth the other conversation to it's me sitting here and having you hear me ramble talk and whether you take something from it. That's great, which I think you will.

Speaker 1:

I think today I'm going to be discussing kind of just what I talked about. I want to take little nuggets of self-reflection and kind of things that I've been dealing with as an entrepreneurial and kind of provide that to you. So today I want to talk about plans and I want to talk about processes and why. That's kind of something that I would constantly remind myself. Again, I thought myself today today it's 12.30, I got a crew club event tonight. I can't wait. It's sold out or at capacity and I find myself in this like life's good. I can't complain, life's good. Brought someone on to kind of delegate the time. Wife is doing great, daughter is doing awesome, friends and family are doing great, things are going good. That's what I'm trying to say. However, I am still met with this certain level of I don't know if anxiety is the right word it's certainly some level of anxiety, but all falls back down to the plans versus processes.

Speaker 1:

I remember when I first started Connection Crew it was kind of a people ask why I started this company or how I jumped out of my own for the first. I want to say 17 or 16 years of my career. I was very comfortable bringing home that W2, I was very comfortable not making commission when I was in sales. I was very comfortable not really kind of getting out of my box to see my market value. I was finally making where I was, or maybe a little bit below, because it was comfortable. I was comfortable knowing that I had a job. I was comfortable knowing that I had that W2. And starting this, starting Connection Crew, you always expect that there's a plan like, yes, I got this plan right here month one. We're going to do this. We need to set this up first and we're going to align this after this is launched and we're going to start the next board and after these processes are in, then we can start the announcement.

Speaker 1:

If I actually focused on that and actually spent a lot of time, energy and effort into that, I could easily talk myself out of pursuing this. I could have easily talked myself just through the kind of the layers of the shit that you got to pile on and the things you have to navigate through. I probably could have easily stopped myself from doing this, from stepping out of my own. It was more of a process that I believed in versus a plan. I didn't have a plan. I still don't have a plan, and what does that mean? I think there's a lot of companies out there that they, before they start, they do need a plan, they do need a look to source this For me. I'm just going to talk about my experiences, only my experiences alone.

Speaker 1:

My original plan was for Connection Crew, was to promote brands, was to bring people together, promote brands and do that utilizing platform, do that utilizing social networking sites, media and all that stuff. That was my plan and I thought that was a good plan. I thought that was a good plan to try out. It was safe, it was very comfortable, I had a good network and I felt like I had a good presence on LinkedIn and other social sites, so I decided to start that. However, if I stuck to that plan, I probably would have shut the doors in two to three months, because what I realized my plan, what my plan was was a glorified social media manager.

Speaker 1:

And yes, I do think social media is extremely interesting. I definitely think there's pros and cons to it. I, however, as much as I rely on social media for my business and as much as I do post and promote and publish, I really don't enjoy being on social media that much. I think it's a vacuum of my time, of my energy and effort. Now, video games different story, but anyway, that's a different tangent. But no, I think I wouldn't enjoy that. And if I stuck to that plan, I would have just been a marketing social media management company. That's not what I wanted. That's not what fueled my passion. My passion was really kind of bringing people together, bs-ing people, finding common, similar traits or hobbies or areas of interest and kind of connecting friends, kind of connecting two friends along the way.

Speaker 1:

So, you know, I started kind of revisiting and rethinking and rethinking and I realized something that if I stick to this plan, I'm going to either burn myself out or I'm going to shut the doors or I'm going to try to find another job, just because I wasn't into it that much. So I decided to shift from a planned base thing, a planned thing which gave me control, gave me the instructions, gave me the direction, gave me kind of control of my fate. Hey, if I stick to this plan, that's my path to get from point A to point B. How that looks, I know how that's going to look, I know what I got to do. That's going to be here, my head's going to be down and I'll be staring at that plan. I'm going to be staring at that path.

Speaker 1:

Very soon did I realize that that was the wrong, I guess, mindset to take. That was the wrong view, view of stance to take, I guess, because I started noticing a little kind of blurbs of opportunities pop up and I thought that was really neat. I saw little blurbs of these different opportunities. Hey, you know, let's do this. Hey, can you do this, let's do something like that. They were very against my initial plan. However, I was intrigued by it. I decided so.

Speaker 1:

This plan guiding thing would, I feel like if I did stick to a plan even today. If I did stick to a plan, don't get me wrong, I probably do need some sort of a plan, I probably do need some sort of goals and again, that's gonna be another episode but if I did stick to a plan, it would definitely kind of not allow me to peak my head up and change the direction of the company. Because here's the deal when I first started Connection Crew, this was a survival moment. This was I don't have enough money in my bank account to the end of the month. I gotta do something. So I think, kind of backing up and realizing there was a process that's probably more important than a plan, especially the first year, the first two years maybe, of a company. So what I did?

Speaker 1:

Instead of sticking to that, I shifted back and I thought about the process, what am I trying to do? Okay, well, I'm not really sure what I'm trying to do. I don't have an elevator pitch for it and I think it's kind of funny. People say ask me what does Connection Crew do? I think if I had a plan, it'd be a lot easier to communicate what Connection Crew does, but we don't.

Speaker 1:

So I had to look at the process. The process that I needed to kind of look at is hey look, if I do this every day, if I strive towards this direction every day, however, that looks like I'm not gonna be walking, I'm not gonna be crawling, I'm not gonna be not every day, I'm gonna be skipping. Not every day I'm gonna be jumping, running, sinking, swimming. But as long as the process to get from here to over there, as long as the process is there, I'm gonna get to there. And what does there look like? It's gonna be completely different than that planned point B that I had in my mind when I first started my company. So what does that mean? To trust the process, not the plan? Well, I think that whenever you do trust, I gotta find a place for this water bottom. I wish I could plug it more, kind of, put it in the screen, get my logo on it.

Speaker 1:

But here's the deal, just like kind of when I started, I remember it starting my career off at okay, well, first off, let's start off back to my college days. I grew up in Connecticut. I was born in Houston, grew up in Connecticut. I really had no plan to go to college. Well, not sure I did have a plan to go to college. I didn't take it serious. I only applied to like two or three schools. I got accepted to provisional summer school at A&M. I had no idea what to expect from that. Not only that, I had no idea what to expect when I joined the core cadets at TechSignM. So again, that's a process. Okay, well, look, it's a good school. I'm gonna do the work as much as I can and try to enjoy the experience as much as I can. Okay, so I worked the process, got through graduated and marketing. And again, let's get into my professional career. So this isn't kind of a boring run through, but even my professional career.

Speaker 1:

I got my master's in France. So I graduated at A&M Marketing, went to France, got a master's. My plan was to stay over there, to get a job, to be some liaison between US and European countries, live in Europe, burn heaters, drink wine all day, eat a lot of carbs and call it a day, and I really dig that lifestyle. I still do. But again, that was my plan. However, life kind of presented itself, kind of gotten its way, and I realized that that plan was probably only as good as the external environment allowed it and we all know that there's a lot of things in our control and there's a lot of things outside of our control. So got back to the States, couldn't find work. Finally found work at Noble Drilling after six months.

Speaker 1:

I knew nothing about the energy industry, nothing about only gas space. I figured you just kind of put your car, put the nozzle in your car, you fill up on gas. I was clueless when it came down. So clueless I went to a different company to interview a different noble, to interview for my noble drilling job. It was noble energy anyway. So again I mean, looking at this, like I graduated in marketing I wanted to do some sort of marketing, branding and all that stuff. But hey, my plan was to do that. But my plan was also to make a living, to not be living with my parents when I was 24, 25 years old. So I had to trust the process of getting into the workforce.

Speaker 1:

So I remember I started off at Noble and again I started off at it's an HR attempt. My first real job was HSC, a coordinator, then supervisor and then, long story short, it was my five years and I remember sitting. I remember I was standing there on the monkey boards. I was five years into my journey at Noble drilling. Unbelievable journey, unbelievable people, unbelievable experience can't say anything negative towards that. Still friends, a lot of people that day and think very fondly of those times. But I remember standing there, I was on the top of the monkey boards in the Derrick and it was my five year anniversary. And never did I think that in my five years of graduating, of getting a master's, of doing HSC, would I be pulling pie back in the Derrick on my fifth year anniversary.

Speaker 1:

And to me that kind of, that kind of did two things number one. It kind of gave me. It kind of humbled me. It humbled me to the point where it's like who is I to kind of be out here when I was, you know, 29 years old, bitching a moanin that I was missing on my friend's birthday? You know El Tiempo or missing, you know this, you know whatever turtle racing at Little Woodrow's, wherever that was, who was I to bitch about that, when you know some of these cats out there on the rig work? They've been doing that for 40 years, that's all they knew. And Uh, here I was, you know, five years into.

Speaker 1:

So kind of gave me a sense of, you know, being a lot more humble, kind of just appreciative of that About all of our journeys, all of our paths, that they're very different, we're all strive for the similar thing it's comfort, is to your family, it's what, whatever that is. And it kind of kind of took me back, so that that part of the process to my journey to where I'm at today, I Still remember it so vividly because it was such an impactful part of the process because I realized this was not my plan at all, this couldn't be the furthest thing closest to my plan that I originally had five years ago and, and to me that was kind of a, that was an aha aha moment, that was a self-reflection moment where it's like, just because this wasn't part of my initial plan, I could never imagine, if I'd suck to my plan, the opportunities and the experiences that I had now Would have never presented themselves. So again, trust in the process. The process is to just, I guess, just do a good job and hopefully I want to get into marketing at some point for Noble John. That's that's why I fell into that. You know, mekondo happened, a deep water horizon happening. I pulled back on shore and again the the trust in the plan versus process I whenever Saudi, you know I never thought I'd go there, but again, I trust the pros anyway. But let's get back to. Let's get back to kind of more recent times so we don't need to, kind you, go through my LinkedIn and find all this. But uh, no, literally, I think I think whenever you do trust the process for me now is this it's it kind of it pulls me back away from the plan though the weeds, you know, all that stuff of the daily tasks.

Speaker 1:

The process for me currently is you need to, what I need, I need to tell myself, I need to, I need to do several things every day to walk in the right direction, to get to, to have that process carry me to my, to wherever my goal may be. And what does that process look like now? As there's some days I wake up with a plan oh, I gotta do x, y and z today I need to do that and, lord behold, we're on the same boat. We know that life doesn't always go as planned and you never. You never get around to x, y, z, and what does that do? That just creates more anxiety for me. That just that that creates more, I guess. Uh, frustrations, anxieties, I beat myself up and Whatever I.

Speaker 1:

So when that happens, I take a step back and I say, okay, well, what's the plan? What? What is the process today? What is the process that you need to do? Well, the process is kind of simple. The the process number one is to continue to bring people together, and if I do something in that regard every day, whether it's through content, whether it's a podcast, whether there's a crew club event, a kids crew event, a building exact crew, whatever, that is whatever. If I'm doing something in that fills one of those buckets of bringing people together, that's part of the process to build something greater. After every crew event, it only gets better. I think you know what exact crew is gonna be from initially in my mind, what it is now, where it's gonna be in a month, three months, five months. It's gonna be ten times better. But again, I'm trusting that process. If I stick to a plan, it's gonna stay at this level. There's gonna be a ceiling on it. So I'm trusting the process for it to grow.

Speaker 1:

Another thing I want to do I want to continue to Provide value to people, whether that's conversations that I have with people, whether it's these, these you know, I do these minute like tidbits of you know, mental Mindset improvement areas, kind of. That's the base of what we're doing here today. If I can do something like that, if I can kind of connect someone to another person, then maybe looking for the right role or the right person for that role or whatever that looks like, that's something. So if I can check off one, two, three of those processes that get me towards whatever that goal is throughout that day, it kind of lets me stop not be so Horsesha myself, it lets me not be so so judgmental on myself and kind of cuts that negative self-talk. But again, that is something that I've had to learn. I've had to learn that Trusting the process over the plan it's more realistic for me, it's more fulfilling for me.

Speaker 1:

I think plans they're so rigid. I think plans they did. It's an extension of trying to have control and that's something I'm currently faced right now the level of control that I'm trying to relinquish, but also the anxiety that fills that board when I relinquish control. But again, I think this is all part of of the process and what I'm doing today is part of the process. The process is hopefully I can provide some sort of insight where it does kind of reframe someone's mindset out there or kind of what you're dealing with and you know, I think you know and I think I will always Go trust a process and the reason is because, building, following this process, it has opened up or it has highlighted so many random opportunities on my path that I would never seen if my head was down. It has allowed me to evolve the business model, the business, the people at the events. It has allowed me to evolve my podcast, the content I'm creating, the stories I'm writing. I'm going to do these little short stories about sci-fi and the future, what would happen with poor energy policy and what that looks like, the children's book Energy for Everyone. Allowing myself to trust the process, I guess what it does. It kind of puts your goals in a bigger pot. It allows your goals to be in a bigger pot for, I guess it to flourish more, to get to that next level. I think it's easy to get frustrated, it's easy to have a lot of anxiety if you're trusting the plan. I think, okay, how about this? To wrap this up, because I feel like I'm going to get in the rambling mode To wrap this up, I would say I would ask you out there, what is the process for you to get to where you're at today, to where you want to be?

Speaker 1:

What does that process look like? Whether that's whether you're going to get a six pack of abs, or whether you're trying to get that promotion, or whether you're trying to improve your relationship with your husband or wife, what does that process look like? There's a couple of things to do to go with that. First off, what would that process be? If that process is you getting in the gym, getting a six pack or something like that? What is that process? That's probably you scheduling time right. Be a little more planning your time to go to the gym to allocate you some free time to go to the gym, which is not free time anymore because that's your time now. The process would be probably not doing as many cheat meals as you do, probably allocating a couple of days for cheat meals. Obviously, I'm not a nutrition expert and I do not have a six pack. I'm just kind of using this as a kind of a base on pretty much whatever. What else does that process look like? That process probably involves a couple of times where you can't make it to the gym or you do have an extra cheat meal. What does that process? Does that mean just kind of give up, just say I tried it, I'm off, my process is all screwed, my plan is all off. It's more comfortable for me to fall back and the pizza Monday through Fridays or it's not. That process might also have you say, okay, look, a little mess up time. Hey, look, I kind of messed up, I let myself down, but that's okay, I'm going to get back on track today. I'm going to get back on track tomorrow and I'm going to follow the process of getting that six pack.

Speaker 1:

For me, starting a new company, the plan was to survive. What does that process look like? The process was connection crew. What's funny is, if I stuck to that plan, I would only be operating connection crew. What's kind of funny. Connection crew really isn't the thing that I've been focused on. I've been focused on crew club. I've been focused on kids crew. I've been focused on exec crew. Again, the process of bringing people together, the process of elevating people's networks, the process of elevating people's knowledge, whether it's kids to professionals, that has really kind of I'm trusting that. I'm trusting that process. So, yeah, I think it's important.

Speaker 1:

So, whatever goal you have, whether it's a small or big goal, think about what that process looks like and think about and obviously we're all human, think about I'm messing up, think about stumbling, think about falling and what the process is. If you kind of getting back up, getting back on track, getting back on your, I guess your process path, I think it I think hopefully reduces your anxiety or stress towards getting that goal accomplished or getting that plan done, and I really think it kind of creates, it facilitates, a more Genuine environment to have something kind of more impactful, more More compound, more something more beautiful built. I think. I think allowing that process of opportunities present themselves, of trying stuff out, of bending, of evolving, of adapting, a list of let's try this was a problem of our plan. We should be venturing in that area. Well, okay, let's try it. I mean, this might be A great source of revenue. This might be very impactful. This week we could be the first movers in this market. So again, my challenge for y'all out there is to kind of back away from your plan and kind of look at the process more. I think the process will more healthier is probably will lead in yield better results.

Speaker 1:

So I want to thank you for tuning in on this energy crew of podcast. Again, it's this. I know we mainly talk about Energy sources for electricity, for vehicles, for everyday lives, but this is energy for our personal lives. So this, what are you putting in energy in? Are you putting your energy in your plan or you put your energy in your process and I think you start shifting your mindset and your lenses with that. It can lead to improve it.

Speaker 1:

So, thank y'all. If you enjoy this, please Shoot me a note. We need a little words of encouragement because I do want to start doing these more. Obviously, this might not be the most impactful one as the first one coming out of the gate, but again, I'm trusting the process. It's going to prove. So I want to thank y'all out there for a for tuning in and I hope everyone has a great, great, great week. If you enjoy this, please share this with someone, like, put on instagram or wherever, so we can kind of spread the word of Of connecting. You know when, when I have interviews connecting leaders, passions, challenges and strengths, but also whenever I do these personal podcasts on kind of where you putting your energy and that's kind of party energy crew. So thank y'all and I guess we'll see you soon.