Coaching, consulting, and the path to entrepreneurship with Chris M King

Today I'm joined by Chris M. King, the self-proclaimed "Executive Witch Doctor."  We swapped stories about building businesses from the ground up (or in our cases, from our car trunks) and dove into the nitty-gritty of what it really takes to succeed. Chris shared some fascinating insights on the psychology and science behind success that had me questioning everything I thought I knew. If you've ever felt like you're faking it in your business or struggling to turn your big dreams into reality, this one is for you.

Can't-miss moments:

• The surprising reason Chris chose to build a business out of his car trunk instead of taking a stable job (and what it means for you and your goals)... 
  
  
• Why "fake it till you make it" might be doing more harm than good (and what Chris and I recommend instead)...
  
  
• Contrarian advice: don't talk about your dreams. Chris reveals unexpected downside of talking about your goals, and how it could be sabotaging your success without you even realizing it...
  
  
• Do you have what Chris calls, "Loose Tooth Syndrome?" He breaks down how and why you might be stuck in a cycle of "wanting" instead of "having"...
  
  
• Chris's personal triangle of success that he claims guarantees he can't fail (and how you can apply it to your own business)...

Chris's bio:

Chris M. King's life is a testament to resilience and transformation. Despite a tumultuous childhood marked by grief, rage, abuse, and addiction, he defied the odds. Overcoming a prolonged academic journey, Chris transitioned from an unfinished undergrad to an NCAA hockey player within just a year of learning to skate. His path included two failed marriages, struggles with mental illness, and a shift from a lucrative career to becoming a poverty-stricken radio personality.

Navigating unconventional career shifts, including marketing a neuroscience institute and a tech role that led to dismissal, Chris faced unemployment. Choosing an audacious path, he built a successful company from his car trunk, making a significant impact on the real estate industry.

Termed a "witch doctor" or "irritated Buddha" Chris is the author of "Renegotiate Your Existence: Unlock Your Impossible Life." Drawing on spiritual psychology and insights from diverse luminaries, he facilitates transformative expeditions for individuals and organizations, pushing them beyond perceived limits to achieve the seemingly impossible.

Resources and links:

• Chris's site
• Chris on Insta
• Chris on YouTube
• Chris on X
• Chris on TikTok

Transcript

Angie Colee: 0:03

Welcome to Permission to Kick Ass, the show that gives you a virtual seat at the bar for the real conversations that happen between entrepreneurs. I'm interviewing all kinds of business owners, from those just a few years into freelancing to CEOs helming nine figure companies. If you've ever worried that everyone else just seems to get it and you're missing something or messing things up, this show is for you. I'm your host, Angie Coley, and let's get to it. Hey and welcome back to Permission to Kick Ass With me today is my new friend, Chris M King. Say hi, so good to see you. Thanks for having me. I'm excited about this one because you signed into the Zoom room as Chris Imking, executive witch doctor.

Chris M. King: 0:46

And now I must I must know more. Well, that's, that's something that a client had said to me, because the work that we do and the way that we do it, it really transcends the regular kind of business and personal coaching and consulting. And so he said you're not a coach. And I said well, what am I? And he said you're some kind of witch doctor, voodoo medicine man thing. And I'm like, all right, that's cool, I'll buy a hat. And I did so.

Angie Colee: 1:12

Oh my God, you actually have a hat.

Chris M. King: 1:14

I have a witch doctor hat, you know. Oh, this is fantastic.

Angie Colee: 1:19

Okay, so for anybody not watching the video, it's a literal top hat with, like a peacock feather oh fantastic.

Chris M. King: 1:25

Right, got the skulls and bones on it and everything, yeah, had to do it.

Angie Colee: 1:28

This makes me so happy. It makes me so happy. Well, how did you get into this line of work? How do you help people?

Chris M. King: 1:36

Well, I got into it. There's a low barrier to entry. Really, that's how that just no, I was really good at it. I'd kind of been doing this all my life in some way shape or form it was. I had this moment in my life where, in the span of about a week, I lost my job, my girlfriend and my apartment, and so I was like destitute here and living out of my car, and my options were go to work for this guy who was offering me a job to become a commercial real estate broker, or be broke and hungry and try and build a company out of the trunk of my car, and so I opted for the latter, and here we are today.

Angie Colee: 2:16

What led you to go for the like? Broke hungry. Build a business out of the trunk of my car. Versus the quote unquote stable option.

Chris M. King: 2:25

Well, the problem with the safe route is that I knew where it was going to end me at some point, right you know, two, three years down the road there I am making good money. I've created a lifestyle that I'm now required to support with this job that I don't love, you know. I mean it's fine but it's not something that lights me up and really kind of sets my soul on fire. And so and I don't do well with bored, I just I'm a high sensation person thanks to my love, my lovingly dysfunctional childhood, but bored is the worst thing I can possibly be, and so I decided I just I couldn't end up in jail again, the proverbial jail of the boring, safe, conventional life. It just wasn't going to work for me.

Angie Colee: 3:12

Yes, oh, I understand that feeling very, very well. I had a job running the marketing team for a very high powered Internet marketer, think like Tony Robbins, but for the business space, and when I left that team we loved each other. Like I was leaving on top of my game and we actually kept consulting for several months. They were trying to lure me back and I just went. I've got to leave for my own sake, for everybody's sake. And when they asked me why, I said something kind of similar. I feel like I've done all I can in this role and if I stay, I'm probably going to slip into coasting mode and that's not going to serve anybody and we're going to wind up hating each other, and that is not the way I want to leave this relationship. Let's leave why we still love each other and then that way we can probably find exciting ways to work together in the future.

Chris M. King: 4:01

Right, it's like a moral imperative in the future.

Angie Colee: 4:09

Right, it's like a moral imperative. Oh, this is fascinating and okay. So you started the business out of the trunk of your car.

Chris M. King: 4:13

What was that process like? It was really interesting. I was doing one of the ride share things, a couple of those to string together enough money, and I was in this professional networking group and so there were a lot of professional service providers. You know, lawyers and accountants and insurance professionals and IT professionals as business coaches, consultants and business managers and all these you know pretty high level people and I was terrified that one of these days I'm going to get you know the call on the app or whatever to pick somebody up and it's going to be somebody in the network, Right, and so, um, so that was a little terrifying, but it's when, when, in my experience, if I'm really on a mission for something that really means something to me, um, I have to be willing to do what is required to make that happen, and if I'm not willing to do what's required, then it's not really a goal, it's a preference, and that's okay.

Chris M. King: 5:11

But I need to know the difference between those things. This was an absolute mission and you know, as my father has said about me, you know when, when Christopher puts the dagger between the teeth and he calls me Christopher, he's the only one on this planet. Please don't go there.

Angie Colee: 5:24

My mom calls me Angela, I get it.

Chris M. King: 5:27

Love dad, but no, but he says, when Christopher puts the dagger between the teeth, it's going to happen. And you know, and I have a history of creating impossible, seemingly impossible realities and and there's a science to it. So once I learned the science to it, I figured well, if I did it for me, I can do it for others.

Angie Colee: 5:46

Oh, I love that man. I've written so many notes. I'm like trying to pick a direction, to go on the fly Pick the rabbit hole, you like, or unhoused story. When I became a copywriter, I had moved in with some good friends in the San Francisco Bay Area, which at the time was the second most or most expensive metro in the US. It's still pretty high up there, but they had to move apartments. I couldn't afford to go with them.

Angie Colee: 6:18

So now I am without housing and my parents lovely, lovely human beings that they are said hey, come back to Texas, we'll take care of you, you can rebuild, you can get your old job at the diner. And something in my soul said nope, nope, nope. I would rather live in my car with my diabetic cat and figure this out, because something in my soul says stay here. I don't know what's next, but stay here. So I did, I trusted that and, man, it was rough, because for those first couple of weeks I'm taking all of my meetings out of Starbucks. I went to a no-tell motel for like 30 bucks a night, which you definitely can't even find anymore, and this place smelled. It was like a 10 by 10 room with a Murphy bed. It smelled like a 10 by 10 room with a Murphy bed.

Angie Colee: 7:04

It smelled like somebody the only cleaning they had done for the last 30 years was walk in, sprinkle some carpet powder and walk out. It was horrible. I managed like two nights there, but like I'm showering there, running to Starbucks, conducting my client meeting, closing business, getting a check, sitting in my car, sobbing Right, that's the path Put on the happy face, make shit happen, go meltdown later.

Angie Colee: 7:29

So I definitely understand what you're talking about, right and like for everybody listening. I'm not saying that everybody needs an unhoused story crying in your car story in order to make it, but I really loved what you said about is this a mission or just a preference? I think that's important to know. What are you willing to do to make this happen?

Chris M. King: 7:55

Well, and you also need to understand what is within your human systems. Tolerances, right, I refer to human beings as human systems, right? These integrated systems mind, body, spirit and different systems have different tolerances. So somebody said you know and I get this question I was asked Chris, why didn't you take the real estate gig and build the coaching practice as like a side hustle? I said because I don't work that way.

Chris M. King: 8:14

My system needs a certain amount of heat to mobilize. Like you know, this company is like cooking a meal, and if I'm going to cook the meal, I need the oven at the right temperature to make that happen. And if I'm going to cook the meal, I need the oven at the right temperature to make that happen. And if I had some cushy thing that I was doing or if I was hustling somewhere else, there just wasn't going to be enough heat to cook this meal and generate it. Now, other people they would take the regular gig and then build this on the side, because the idea of living out of their car and not knowing if they're going to eat tomorrow is too stressful, it's outside their systems. Tolerances, and so, yes, there is what is required to make this happen and what is within my tolerances, so you got to marry those two things. What? What can I do? That needs to be done, and how do I balance this all out?

Angie Colee: 8:57

I love that because I think my biggest frustration with a lot of business coaching out there has been this tendency to go toward one size fits all, and I have definitely been in those programs where they're like Angie, just do it this way, just trust the process. I can see around this corner, you just need to do it my way. And to a certain extent I go, yes, cool If this is outside my realm of experience. At some point I need to trust the mentors that I have chosen to guide me and try stuff out. But even if I've tried stuff out to the best of my ability, I've given it my all, not just half-assing it right and it doesn't make any sense to me. Well then I got to trust my own gut and my own system and my own intuition and create something for me. Does that make?

Chris M. King: 9:38

sense, right, yeah, well, and you need to know the difference between coaches and consultants. Right, consultants have answers, coaches have questions, and so when? And that's really you know the very simple way to put it but the I think we sort of look at this get a mentor thing as almost the way we might tell young women back in the day, like you need to find Prince Charming. It's like this kind of rescue thing, it's like this is not going to save you. No, a mentor is sort of like brewing your own coffee. There are some basic guidelines, but really ultimately do what you like and what your intuition, especially if you're building your thing. Nobody has done your thing through you ever before, so you do have a magic in there. And that's where coaching comes in. Consulting is great when you need answers. Coaching is when you need to access what you don't know. You actually know.

Angie Colee: 10:34

Yes, oh, I love that distinction because, like, we all have been studying we. If you've been in entrepreneurship for any amount of time, even if you're brand new at this, you've probably been reading books, listening to podcasts, trying to get familiar, so you don't feel like you're floundering, just trying shit right, there's a lot of noise out there.

Chris M. King: 10:53

There's a ton of noise out there.

Angie Colee: 10:55

How do you understand what you really want, what makes the most sense to you? And only my favorite part of it is people kind of pushing you towards certain business models, right. And there's you know kind of an economic wisdom in there, right? Don't reinvent the wheel. And also nobody invented like Apple computers because they were trying to follow what people did before. You know what I mean.

Chris M. King: 11:18

True, Right, Are you trying to do something that's never been done before? Are you doing your own thing, Like, like there's no one answer for this? You know, I mean like I'll use consultants. You know I joke about this. I'm a classic entrepreneur. I have no business running my own business. You know, that's just what do I need. I need to file a what Like? I got lawyers, got whatever, Like. There are definitely places where this is number one nothing that I have any kind of acumen in and number two, I don't care, I'm, I'm, I'm more of a CEO and much less of a president. Right? My operations person, Ashley, she's almost the president. Really, the CEO is is the visionary and in charge of the direction. The president is in charge of the day-to-day make it happen, and so I have no business, you know, being in charge of the day to day.

Angie Colee: 12:05

Most of us feel like that on a daily basis. What have I even built?

Chris M. King: 12:09

here. I mean, I have yet to meet the successful entrepreneur that says, oh yeah, I knew exactly what I was doing the whole time. Like no, every one of them that I talk to is like I had no idea what I was doing.

Angie Colee: 12:17

I need an adult. I need an adultier adult, somebody who can tell me what I'm doing right and wrong. But that's been like the biggest mindfuck of this entire journey. It's like there's not really any right or wrong, there's what's working and what's not working, and you kind of have to figure that out by trial and error.

Chris M. King: 12:33

Yeah, yeah, that's exactly it.

Angie Colee: 12:36

Okay, all right. So you don't do well with board, so you built this business out of the trunk of the car, right? What was that process like? Like I know I told you getting a check and crying in the in the behind the steering wheel there, but like, did you have one client that kind of pulled you out of it? Was it like fits and starts? I'm curious.

Chris M. King: 13:00

This, this, this business runs on magic, um, and so it's really kind of interesting, I? Um. So the first, there were a few things that had to happen. Number one um, if in order to be a good messenger, you have to live the message. And my first what I would call quote unquote real client was this guy that was. He was at an international wealth management organization. He was making more money by the minute than I was going to see in a month.

Chris M. King: 13:27

Right, and there I am sitting across from his big desk telling him how, of course, I can help you and your team and, and you know, really kick ass. And all the while, I've got this beat car outside with a side view mirror that's held on by duct tape, windshield wipers that were strapped on there, with zip ties at a broken tail light, like you know. All I can think is dear God, I hope this guy doesn't walk me out to the car, right. But the thing was that there was a deep knowing, like I knew I was good at this and I knew I could do this and I knew I could crush it for him, and he hired me and I did, to the point where now, 10 years later, he actually called me about four months ago one of my feedback on something, and so so there was that and the and the phone call from him came in when I was walking into I don't remember what.

Chris M. King: 14:19

I was walking into a store for something. I had $3 in my pocket and this homeless person approached me and asked me for money. And my first thought was are you kidding me? Right now I'm broke as shit, I know. But and she was telling me this whole story that was clearly bullshit. Right, I can read that kind of thing.

Chris M. King: 14:38

But what happened was in that moment I realized the reason I'm not giving her money is because I'm in contraction and scarcity mindset. It wasn't because she was full of shit and I knew it. So in that moment I was like, all right, give her a dollar. And of course, she asked me for more, you know, and it was like what I was sort of communicating I'm going to be a little woo here. I was like communicating to the universe. It was like when I was sort of communicating I'm going to be a little woo here. I was like communicating to the universe, I'm going to let go of my scarcity mindset and gave her a buck. And then she asked me for more, as if the universe itself was saying are you sure? So I gave her $3, and now I got no cash in my pocket.

Angie Colee: 15:16

And about a half hour later the phone rang and that guy hired me. Isn't it so weird how the universe kind of tests your faith like that.

Chris M. King: 15:22

It absolutely will.

Angie Colee: 15:23

It's like I'm not necessarily talking about faith in a religious sense, but I'm talking like faith in yourself, faith in your direction, that inner knowing that you mentioned, which I think is so great. Something similar actually happened to me when I made that decision to live out of my car the day that I lost the apartment. Literally, I am handing the keys to the leasing agent, we are just completing the walkthrough and I got the call with the offer for my first part-time copywriting job and that was the thing that saved me. I only had to live out of my car for a couple of weeks and try to get those clients to pay the bills in between, when I got my first paycheck in that moment. So, but it was, it was minutes. I mean minutes. I'm handing the keys over, and I just couldn't help but think after the fact that if I had been in that moment on the road back to Texas because I was scared, I wouldn't have been able to take that job. That's just like.

Angie Colee: 16:16

Oh, one important question, super important, highly important. Did you ever wind up picking up one of your networking buddies?

Chris M. King: 16:25

Fortunately I did not, that never happened.

Angie Colee: 16:32

Oh man, that's so crazy. I did tell a bunch of them about it later.

Chris M. King: 16:36

I mean, I've been very, you know, open and shameless about my history at this point.

Angie Colee: 16:40

Yeah Well, and that's part of the impetus behind the show too is I hid a lot of this. I remember one of my first big business conferences. I actually wrote an Indiegogo campaign to fund my way there and I was so ashamed of that. I wasn't successful enough to afford it on my own without doing this campaign, and I like let me be clear, I wrote haikus for people for five bucks and I I sang on stage with my band for 20 bucks. If like everything I could possibly do in this campaign to raise money. And when I got there, I'm just like posturing yeah, look at me, I made it, I'm here, I'm fantastic. I'm just here posturing. Yeah, look at me, I made it, I'm here, I'm fantastic, I'm just here to soak up some knowledge.

Angie Colee: 17:22

I remember following one of the speakers that I thought was really cool to the bar that night, getting to the bar before they did, asking the bartender can you make me a tall water in an actual glass with a twist of lime please? I got a fiver with your name on it. No, I don't need any booze. I can't afford any booze. That's what I want. Like. I remember like that pressure to maintain the image and not show that basically I had no idea what I was doing, was very, very strong in my early days.

Chris M. King: 17:52

Yeah, the the thing in my experience and I see this with clients today, you know, and I'll tell them, the thing that you're ashamed of right now is going to be the catapult later, like it's going to be a huge asset to you Right. So if you can change your relationship to this, like you know, I had the same thing. I had to push through the imposter syndrome stuff because, like I said, that first client's like I'm going to help this guy yes, I am. Yep, it wasn't a fake it until you make it thing. And you know, fake it till you make it doesn't really work for me, cause I just it sets off my like affirmation, affirmation, same thing kind of sets off my internal bullshit detector, you know. But when there's a, when there's an embodied knowing, that's when it happens, that's when I'm, you know, adjusted my own frequency to match the frequency of the thing I want. And it's going to happen, it's just going to happen.

Angie Colee: 18:44

I love that. I've had to train myself on that, to look for evidence, because I think the way that I grew up whether it's a product of the local culture that I lived in or whatever, but I grew up with this idea of you have to prove yourself, and I think more I had to prove it to myself because I was always discounting everything I had done and then comparing myself to everybody around me as like not good enough. Look at that person I'm clearly not good enough. Look at that business I'm clearly not good enough. So I literally now have I'm looking at it in a file behind our Zoom window something, a file that I call the kick-ass confidence booster, and that is where I have a screenshot of every win I've ever got in marketing, every unsolicited compliment I've gotten feedback from the podcast. I keep all of that there just to help me bolster that inner faith that knowing that I can figure this out. Look at all these wins I've got. Look at this long track record. I totally agree with you on the fake it till you make it.

Angie Colee: 19:42

I cannot stand that bullshit. Just be honest about where you're at, because somebody is going to meet you where you're at, and don't do it from a one of my mentors called it a sell from your heels, kind of like. Well, I mean, I'm new to this and I could probably help. Like there's a big difference between that. Well, I'm just starting my copywriting business and I've done some emails for these people over here. What I think I could do for you is this and I'd be willing to charge a reduced rate in exchange for a testimonial and some feedback right, there's a totally different energy going into. I know I could figure this out over here versus I'm new. Will you approve me?

Chris M. King: 20:14

Right, yeah, that that it's. It's all energy and frequencies and and it's important to match the frequency that you are where you are with the with the frequency of the thing you want. I mean, that's how you're going to bring it to you a lot faster and the universe doesn't really, in my experience, um, kind of let us off the hook, right, because if it's sort of like, oh well, when I make, when I make half a million dollars, and I'll feel better about myself, or then I will be validated, then that will prove to me that I'm good enough, it's like no, the universe isn't going to let you off the hook that way. You got to know you're good enough first, without any data points, and that is how you're going to you know. It's like you know you're not going to you're, you're not going to feel better about yourself when you make half a million dollars, like when you, when you do this, then it happens, right, most people go backwards.

Angie Colee: 21:03

Oh, I absolutely agree. There's a. I wrote about it in my book. It was like there's no crossing the finish line into happy. And I don't mean, don't celebrate your accomplishments. And if you hit a big goal New York times bestseller, spoke on my first stage in front of 10,000 people those are absolutely goals that should be celebrated. And then don't rest on your laurels, because that goes away after a while and you're on to the next thing. One of my mentors talked about that too. He was like I finally hit a million dollars and I had like a little party and then I went yeah well, shit, now what. I've been working toward this so hard for so long. I don't even know what to do with myself. And that's what it's like Set the bar, cross it, set a new bar. On and on we go.

Chris M. King: 21:50

Yeah, once you normalize the thing you have. I mean I know I sound a little woo in my speech sometimes, but we bring a science-backed approach and so there are more centers in the brain, there are more pleasure centers in the brain for wanting than there is for getting or having, and so we very quickly normalize. Once we get it, it's kind of there's. It's almost not as exciting, it's like I'm working so hard and I want it so bad, and then you get it and you're like, ah, okay, what just happened, right.

Chris M. King: 22:19

Right. So humans aren't. We're not designed to be happy. I mean, we're not. We're actually not supposed to be happy. We are as humans. We are supposed to experience happiness quickly, normalize it and then strive for more. That's what keeps us advancing.

Angie Colee: 22:34

I love that. I love that. I'm curious. Can you tell me more about like the wanting? If it's proprietary, no is always an acceptable answer, but I'm curious. I want to know more about that. Like wanting center of the brain.

Chris M. King: 22:45

Well, I, there's I, and I think I think Joe Dispenza talks about this, dr Dispenza, you know, but we get so much juice out of being in that wanting and there's there's what I call the loose tooth syndrome, like, and when we're kids you get a loose tooth and you flick it with your tongue because it kind of hurts but it kind of feels good in a weird way, right? Yeah, dr Carolyn Elliott wrote a book called Existential Kink and she talks about this. Like when you don't have the thing you say you want, there's a part of you that is super getting off on not having it and just own that Right, and so, and there is, there is something so exquisite in the wanting and the pining and the the that just desperation, right, and it does tend to fall flat when we get the thing, and so that's, that's just how humans are wired.

Angie Colee: 23:39

I can see that Like there is a certain majesty in, or majesty magic, in being in a group with people and just talking about those big dreams, even when part of you is like I don't know if I could do that, but like this is the big goal I have, this is the vision, this is what's going to happen. Can't you just taste it? Have you actually started toward that? No, okay.

Chris M. King: 24:00

Well, and that's a dangerous thing, right and um, you know, people used to say talk about your goals or whatever, because that makes you accountable to them. But the science is polar opposite to that, as diametric. Um, yeah, because what happens is that the brain doesn't know the difference between fantasy and reality. It only knows what you're telling it. So the more you talk about your goals, the more your brain is kind of well getting off on the talking about. You're literally getting dopamine hits. Okay, that's, you know.

Chris M. King: 24:25

Dopamine is a is a chemical in the brain. It hits the pleasure centers. It's uh, if it were a street drug, it would be cocaine. Okay, so you talk about your goals and you get so excited about talking about. You get all your dopamine hits from that instead of getting your dopamine hits from getting it done. And so you know what I say. You know, quite simply, is that the talkers rarely do and the doers rarely talk, because they're getting all their dopamine and their juice from getting it done, not talking about what they're going to do. Yes, and this is why they say just keep your mouth shut, like when you're on a mission keep your mouth shut.

Angie Colee: 24:59

Oh man.

Chris M. King: 25:05

But how does that work for those of us that are verbal processors and need to talk out our shit? I think if you can do it with some level of neutrality, if it's data points, if it's strategy, if it's okay, here's what I need to do. This is okay, like, if it's process oriented, I think you're fine. But if you're getting all excited about it, you're teetering on a dangerous edge because you're losing kind of the juice that's going to launch you into making that happen.

Angie Colee: 25:27

Yes, okay, that's a really good distinction and I think for me puts into clarity why so many people I've worked with have had this struggle to actually get into action. They're so excited by the idea of it and the planning for it that, like they don't even actually need to go do the thing and they're scared to do the thing. They'd rather just stay in the fantasy.

Chris M. King: 25:47

Yeah, it's because the fantasy is great, right, and I see this a lot in kind of my woo friends, because they will, they'll get all excited about this. I'm going to do this and I'm going to do that. I'm going to build a retreat center, I'm going to do a wellness center and all these things, and and I watched them get all excited about talking about it. But when they sit down to actually do something, they realize that this is a massive undertaking and whatever, and they they're like, this doesn't feel good. The actual doing this I, I'm scared, I have imposter syndrome. I don't even know if I can do it. This isn't fun, it doesn't feel good. I'm going to go back to talking about it because that feels good, right? Because humans, most humans, in my experience, they don't seek happiness, they seek pleasure, and that's not the same thing.

Angie Colee: 26:29

That is an excellent distinction. I really love that. I had an interesting encounter with that with a high-level marketer that I know. I remember talking to him about planning his launch and it was a big, risky new thing, like he was moving into uncharted territory, pitching a new angle as to why this marketing thing he was teaching was going to be the next new thing. Right, and he commented offhand one night like I just really hope I don't lose the house. Like I feel like I'm putting the mortgage in danger and like the company's going to go under. And I panicked Like that was my first time I'm running the team.

Angie Colee: 27:05

I'm going to him going oh my gosh, like now I feel a whole lot of pressure. Is there something in the marketing that's not working, that's triggering you? And he goes. I'm sorry. I should have warned you that I have dark humor. The mortgage is paid off and the business has plenty of reserves. But there's never been a time that I go into a launch like this that I feel like I'm okay, I know what I'm talking about and that helped me kind of recalibrates how I think through these things. I don't feel okay, I feel scared. I'm going to do the thing anyway because this feels good.

Chris M. King: 27:33

Right, well, and fear is a good thing. Actually, we say you know, people tend to shy away from the experiences that they don't like, but fear is necessary when we're really going after something. People will say oh yeah, I'm going to follow our fearless leader. And I say I will never follow a fearless leader. That person is going to get a sunk because fear is a focusing mechanism. There's a chemical in the brain called norepinephrine. Sometimes we call it noradrenaline, but it's the focusing chemical. It makes you pay attention to fewer things, kind of lowers the cognitive load. Right, if you will, um, and when you're, when you have a certain amount of fear, it's designed so that you're paying attention right now. If you have too much fear, it's going to be paralyzing, but um, but the right amount of fear is necessary when you're going after something.

Angie Colee: 28:21

Oh, I absolutely agree. All right, cool, abrupt segue.

Chris M. King: 28:25

Let's see if you can follow my line of thinking.

Angie Colee: 28:31

I'm going to do the smooth, okay, yes, no, this is ADHD brain in full effect. We talked about where you started. Where are you going?

Chris M. King: 28:36

That's a fantastic question for where we are right now on the map. Some interesting things happened and we had a very rough I had a very rough month of May.

Angie Colee: 28:49

You're not the only one I had one and I know several people who did.

Chris M. King: 28:53

Yeah, there was a lot going on and a lot of people in my field had kind of a similar thing. My oldest friend, who I've known since we were 13 years old, he died that month and it really created quite a pause, an unexpected pause, like it affected me much, much more deeply than I would have forecasted and since then it's kind of in the dance of two steps forward, one step back. We are at, one step back. I went hang on a second and I, like I put, I brought everything to a grinding hold for this organization, you know, and also my my previous operations manager left, my new one came on board, my father kind of got into his crazy a little bit, so I and I'm the one of the family that speaks dad, so that falls to me I got shingles during the process. I mean, there was just stuff happening Right, so so it was like okay and and I was very feeling, very disconnected and and this is really important to me again, being the high sensation person can't being bored I was so disconnected from the big picture mission and what we're really doing here and I really needed to refocus because there's this triangle that needs to happen for me, that guarantees my success and that is when I connect my devotion to something right and this is very kind of.

Chris M. King: 30:21

For me, this is very feminine in its orientation, right. It's that thing that you fall on your knees and just are in complete reverence of and devotion to. If I marry that to my commitment, which is, for me, very masculine, it's very heady. You know, I'm choosing this, I'm doing this, this is happening, right. So when I marry my commitment to my devotion and I attach that to a vision, I don't know how to fail. And so it was like where's? Okay, my commitment is there, but where's my devotion and what's the vision?

Chris M. King: 30:53

And so so it's been an interesting sort of um recalibration for this organization. We had just got the new, uh, the, the new rebrand is has been done, the website changed, like everything's changed, and so now I feel like, okay, now we're cooking with gas here and I'm I'm excited about where we're going. So, yeah, we're in a bend reality, making seemingly impossible. Things happen for a lot of organizations and individuals, cause I like that. I don't like being told no. Things happen for a lot of organizations and individuals because I like that. I don't like being told no, I don't like being told what can't be done.

Angie Colee: 31:26

I am exactly the same way and it's so funny, like how I grew up with so much fear. I actually wrote about this at a retreat last week Like we're recording this in June, this is going to air in July, but I wrote about like it's so funny how some of the most fearless looking people among me around me have a whole lot of fear but they just have decided to do the damn thing anyway. And man, I loved that. It was out in the backwoods of Kentucky. It was disconnected and I feel like everybody should have a sabbatical option to just like. I know that the economy isn't set up that way and a lot of jobs and there's a lot of people struggling right now, but if I had my druthers, I would lift everybody up to the level where they could regularly take that time off and just recalibrate, like you said.

Chris M. King: 32:13

Yeah, you can advocate for all the reasons. You can't do it, you know. But there's a quote and I wish I could remember the source. But you know, if you advocate for your limitations, you get to keep them. Wow, I'm just going to like let that hang there for a second Because, like I said, don't tell me what can't be done. I have a lifetime filled with shit that there was. I had no business being able to pull off and I did every single one of them. You know, I mean I live in Southern California, like in LA on the West side. I mean this is a town where people pay $24 for avocado toast. Don't tell me that your crazy idea can't happen, because ain't nothing crazier than that. We do it every day.

Angie Colee: 32:55

Yeah, oh gosh. It reminds me of my one of my in-house jobs. I was working on a signage package and one of the sign guys comes over and stands behind me in my cube and he sees me at my standing desk staring at the blinking cursor of doom on my blank page and he just says wait, is that how the signs get Like? You actually have to write it in a Word document. And I was like, yeah, it comes from my brain. I make this real from what you asked me to do. And it just like that story popped into my head when you said like these things that I create. That's what I love about entrepreneurship you have an idea and you bring it out of the ether, wherever the hell that idea comes from, into reality. Isn't that magic?

Chris M. King: 33:40

Well, and that's exactly why this organization exists. Like I'm not in service to people, like people think it's so great You're, so you know you help people. I'm like I'm not really into people all that much. To be honest with you, I love persons but people I agree. But the way I see it is, there's something in the universe whatever call it, your soul, like that wants to be experienced through you, as you and you, as your persona, your ego, construct, are in its way.

Chris M. King: 34:16

I'm in service to the thing that's trying to come through our clients. I'm not really in service to the client, I'm in service to the thing that's trying to come through them. Now, this benefits the client in immeasurable ways. They get to live the life of their dreams, they get to own the businesses of their dreams, they get to accomplish incredible things. But I don't really do it for them. I do it because the thing itself is true. The way I see it, whether it's a company or a team within a company or an individual, whatever they're trying to do, is like this incredible piece of sheet music that's never been played before in the history of humankind, and that organization or team or individual is the perfect instrument to play that music. My job is to make sure that instrument's in tune so that it can actually happen.

Angie Colee: 35:01

Oh, that's awesome. And how do you? How do you do that? Like? I love these metaphors and now I'm trying to figure out how that actually happens.

Chris M. King: 35:09

And again, if that's secret sauce, you don't have to share, but it's um, I mean it's a function of getting your psychology, your physiology and your energy all working for you instead of against you. Um, so it like like I'm going to physiologically change the way somebody's brain is operating. We're going to change their belief system on what they think is actual, real, what they think is real and possible. You know, I'll go into an organization they want to grow their business or something like that. I tell them do not bring me your market trends, your sales history, your KPIs or all that. I don't want to see that shit because it's completely going to fuck up what I think is possible because of the Bannister principle.

Chris M. King: 35:48

You know Roger Bannister was. You know, in the early to mid 1900s the world was obsessed with the idea of watching a human being run a mile in under four minutes. Nobody had ever done it before and people tried it for decades. And finally, may of 1954, this guy, roger Bannister, runs a sub four minute mile and after decades of people trying to make this happen, his record lasted 46 days because the moment he crossed the line, collective consciousness changed. We believe now, we believed it was true. And once you believe it, you can see it. They say, seeing is that's bullshit. Believing is seeing you will create the reality of your understanding.

Chris M. King: 36:27

I love that, and so if I can change your understanding of reality, I will bend your universe.

Angie Colee: 36:33

And isn't that what we do in having these businesses and serving the people and creating these big visions Change reality. That gives me goosebumps.

Chris M. King: 36:45

I have a client right now and she's been good enough to even talk about it on our podcast and um. But we started working with her because she wanted, you know, business performance improvement kind of stuff. But fast forward. She was married to a clinical narcissist for like 26 years. We got her divorced. We got the house in the divorce. We got the house refinanced. We got her off of her anti-anxiety and anti-depression medication. She dropped 45 pounds. She moved 13 times through this process. We more than doubled her business. This took slightly over a year. I think it was 14 months.

Chris M. King: 37:21

She's a different person living in a different reality and it took over a year, I think it was 14 months. She's a different person living in a different reality, and it took us a year.

Angie Colee: 37:28

Oh man, does it start with that vision or does it start with the steps?

Chris M. King: 37:34

It starts with disrupting the unconscious cycles that are running in your brain, unconscious cycles that are running in your brain. Um, that's and that's of psychology, of neurophysiology. I'm going to create what I like to call hiccups in your brain patterns and it's in those hiccups where the consciousness comes in, or like alternate ideas and whatever, and I'll use any number of modalities. You know, I mean I, we have a huge warehouse of tools, so to speak, but I can change one word in a sentence and produce a different experience in your feeling state and even sitting here having this conversation, I can create a different experience by changing one word in a sentence and that's going to create hiccups in your patterns.

Angie Colee: 38:17

Oh, I love that. Well, like I said, I have 5 million more questions I want to ask, but I'm going to keep this one. That feels like such a great way to wrap this up. Please tell us more where we can learn about working with you, about your listeners.

Chris M. King: 38:34

It's chrismkingcom forward slash permission to kick ass.

Angie Colee: 38:48

Awesome. I'll make sure that there's a clickable link in the show notes. I have a feeling I'm going to get so much love from this episode. I will make sure to forward you every single one, oh, thank you.

Chris M. King: 39:00

Getting me to talk is easy. Getting me to shut up is the challenge, you know. That's because I love this stuff. I give away a lot of work because I can't shut up. It's just too much fun.

Angie Colee: 39:10

I am absolutely the same way. That's probably why we vibe so well. Thank you so much again. I really enjoyed this.

Chris M. King: 39:17

My pleasure. Thank you for having me.

Angie Colee: 39:24

I appreciate you. That's all for now. If you want to keep that kick-ass energy high, please take a minute to share this episode with someone that might need a high-octane dose of you Can Do it. Don't forget to rate, review and subscribe to the Permission to Kick-Ass podcast on Apple Podcasts, spotify and wherever you stream your podcasts. I'm your host, angie Coley, and I'm here rooting for you. Thanks for listening and let's go kick some ass.