[00:00:07.450] - Chris
Welcome back to the head, Heart and Boots podcast. I'm Chris.
[00:00:10.950] - Brandon
And I'm Brandon. Join us as we wrestle with what it takes to transform ourselves and the businesses we lead.
[00:00:17.670] - Chris
Man, I love this industry
[00:00:21.330] - Chris
folks, we've got kind of a unique show today. This is Chris from flying. So this is a special episode that we actually pulled from our floodlight Friday live streams. And those of you listening that follow Brandon and I on LinkedIn, or follow Floodlight on LinkedIn, you know, about the live streams. It's kind of an industry variety show. We cover everything you can imagine. Podcast episodes that we liked, or podcasts we follow, articles we've read, we talk about field operations, project management, culture, leadership. I think we've even touched on marriage. Well, this particular episode, Brandon and I end up circling around the topic of discipline. It was a great episode, and if you wanted to, I suppose you could go hunt it up on our LinkedIn page. But we just thought, man, this is something we should pull into headheart and boots, and inevitably we'll talk about this again. I mean, those of you who follow Brandon and I, we talk about discipline a lot. But this particular episode, I found myself, as I re listened to it, I found it provoking me, and I was one of the main people in the conversation.
[00:01:18.820] - Chris
Right? Sometimes when we're teaching others, we're ultimately speaking to ourselves. And I found myself reflecting on areas in my life where I've allowed some disciplines to slip and also in some areas where I feel like I could apply more discipline, I'd benefit from creating more discipline in some other areas of my life. And so I hope this episode, similarly, it provokes you. But before we get into it, let's thank our sponsors. And by the way, I have a habit of fast forwarding through ads because I just want to get to the meat of the people I follow, the personalities that I enjoy listening to, whatever. And Brandon and I, I get that. And you totally can do that. Brandon and I really, we're very careful about the sponsors that we choose to work with. And conceivably, if we had a sponsor we started hearing bad things about or we had a bad experience with, they would cease to be a sponsor. We don't do it for the money. And so we really believe in our sponsors and we try to be creative and not too scripted with our ads. But I'm going to talk about Answer Force first.
[00:02:14.430] - Chris
Answerforce.com. Brandon and I met the Answer Force folks at the RAA convention this past spring, and we invited them on our podcast live. We just really hit it off with know she just checked all the boxes in terms of the values that they espouse, the principles behind their answering. Right. Essentially they do remote call reception with a really sophisticated technology back end that's administered through an app interface. It's very easy to turn their service on or off. To forward your phones to the Answerforest platform, there's no contracts. You can flex the service up and down based on maybe a storm scenario or if your main receptionist is out on lunch, right. Can very easily forward the phones to answer force. And I think the most powerful thing about their platform is that their goal is to imitate your call and take process. Their whole objective is to try to mirror or imitate or replicate the exact same experience your customers would get with your full time receptionist, but with answer force's calling agents, regardless of time of day, day of the week, of the year. And I think that's exactly what a call center or remote call service ought to do.
[00:03:29.700] - Chris
We just appreciate how they work, how they handle customer experience and account management. We just have nothing but great things to say. I think you owe yourself a demo. Go check them out. Forward slash floodlight. Also Liftify.com. Gosh, I love these guys. I really do. I think we all have a certain standard of service that we try to provide all of our clients that we want to be known by. Right? And liftify, they're one of us. They're doing things right, care about their clients. We had a couple clients that were kind of struggling to onboard the liftify system and holy cow, the CEO and founder got engaged in the process. And when he was engaged in the process, he realized that there's some nuance to the restoration industry that's different than some of the other home services trades, plumbing H because they're involved in all of those other trades, very successful. I mean, they've been growing like crazy, but they realized that there's some nuance to our industry that required them to augment their process. And so they did. And then they provided new onboarding, new training to help restoration companies implement this slightly modified process.
[00:04:32.740] - Chris
And the results have been fantastic. You guys have heard us talk about Team Gutierrez. They're a big, fast growing Servpro team. Awesome people over on the East Coast. It is incredible what they've done with their Google reviews since they implemented liftify. They've done everything liftify told them to do. They've implemented the full process and adopted the platform completely. And they are absolutely crushing. When we first introduced them to liftify, they had some 560 reviews, which at the time was number one in the serve Pro network and within, I want to say 90 days, they were over 1000. Now granted they're a high volume shop, they're a big, successful team. Your results may vary, but it is certainly worth a demo, especially if you're currently using podium or Bird Eye or some of these other big name, venture backed Silicon Valley Google review platforms. Brandon and I have had experience with those when we've been running companies and got very mediocre, lackluster results, if any. We just struggle to see the value at $400 a month per location or whatever these fancy platforms are liftify better value and better results. And we're seeing that across our client portfolio.
[00:05:43.550] - Chris
So it isn't just us tooting our sponsors horn here. You really owe it to yourself to check out their platform, meet their team. High quality folks with a really high quality product. Last but not least, CNR magazine. We all need good partners in our industry. Michelle and her team at CNR, in my view, I mean, it's not to knock some of the other publications that serve our industry, but I just think Michelle has gone above and beyond to really weave herself into the fabric of the industry. She scoops all the biggest stories. I feel like I've got a really good pulse on the industry because I follow her on LinkedIn. I follow CNR on LinkedIn and I regularly read the publication and I feel like I'm in the know. Oftentimes I will see something in CNR, a press release, a story break on LinkedIn, a live that she'll do, and then later I'll hear it from a person involved. I knew about it before they brought it up in conversation. Right. So I certainly appreciate that. I mean, they are awesome at keeping a pulse on what's happening in the industry. They're connected to kind of the bleeding edge of what our vendors are doing, the products coming into our market, the new technology that's emerging, all that kind of stuff.
[00:06:52.050] - Chris
So if you're not following CNR, you need to. And by the way, if you listen to this podcast and you're like Brandon and I, you're a service provider, like serving the restoration industry, I think CNR is a fantastic platform, the platform to advertise in. I think ever since we started advertising and promoting Headheart and Boots podcast, for example, our numbers have exploded this past year since we began advertising with. We've really been relying on our advertising in CNR and just posting stuff to our socials and we've watched our downloads, our audience grow tremendously over this past year, and we would credit a lot of that to the exposure we've gotten with CNR. So if you're an advertiser, you really should reach out to Michelle and the team and talk about their advertising options. We just renewed, by the way, for this next year, our advertising plan with her and the team. So we're committed, we're believers. We think you definitely should be following them, building a connection with Michelle. HeRe we go. Let's drop in. Let's talk about. Hey. Hey. All right. Welcome to the Floodlight Friday Livestream.
[00:07:53.470] - Brandon
Wow. You said that.
[00:07:54.310] - Chris
Well, I know I just got to wake Brandon up. He's on a little bit of a Friday morning slump.
[00:07:58.960] - Brandon
I'm struggling. You can see my face. I look dog tired.
[00:08:02.430] - Chris
So today I might have actually just pooped the bed with the title with the description I put on Friday's livestream with discipline for leaders, everybody's like, oh, my God, it's Friday. It's the last thing I want to talk about is discipline. I just want to get my bourbon on tonight. Around the fire, circle in the back.
[00:08:24.980] - Brandon
Are we hitting the wad before we go home?
[00:08:27.620] - Chris
I was expecting. You should probably clarify that for non crossfitter types. Yeah, we have a workout to do before we hit the weekend. Brandon thought he was going to dodge that one. So we're going to talk about discipline. And I have a quote that I love and I come back to. In fact, I want to get something on my wall that says this, but Epictetus is a famous stoic, and I've gotten into stoicism over the last few years. Not like, seriously, but Ryan Holiday has been a big figure. Many of you have read his books. The Daily Stoic is kind of like a daily journal. He's got a really, really good stuff.
[00:09:08.050] - Brandon
Every book he's written, pretty much like, keep on the quick draw shelf.
[00:09:13.480] - Chris
Yeah, it's just really good stuff. And he works, know, NFL teams and corporations to sort of teach them these stoic thoughts. Well, one of the stoic thoughts that I really latched onto recently relative to discipline is Epictetus says he asked this question, how long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself? How long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself? And I just feel like that touches every single aspect of our life. It's like, okay, how long am I going to wait before I get serious about my marriage? How long am I going to wait before I get serious about my personal fitness? And it ties in many of you have heard, like, if you listen to our podcasts and stuff, like, I've been thinking, I'm 43 years old. I'm in this, like, midlife deal. We talked with this, with Rico about this. I think a lot of us, and I don't think it necessarily starts when you're 40s. We have some young entrepreneurs we work with that are starting to think along these lines. They're starting to think about their life and how much time is left.
[00:10:29.210] - Chris
What am I capable of? I think is a question I've been asking myself a lot. It's not so much what do I have to do? It's what could I do?
[00:10:41.790] - Brandon
What could I do? It's interesting because I think part of the struggle with discipline is that it's a powerful force, but I feel like I often personally approach it from a, I need to, I ought to. It becomes more guilt and shame versus motivation.
[00:10:57.670] - Chris
Yeah.
[00:10:58.230] - Brandon
And I think one of the things I'm learning partially by watching you is just the way that we're using language, spinning the things I say out loud regarding that thing. So instead of moving from the could, I need to, I ought to, I got to be better. It moves more into what can I do? What am I capable of, what's possible? And that just. I don't know. It could be total bullshit, but it just makes me feel better when I think about this subject. Well, it seems more motivated.
[00:11:31.130] - Chris
It feels so real to me. And I think that's why it's like, discipline breeds more discipline. Here's one way that's been showing up for me is in my parenting, my fathering of my two boys. I messed a lot of things up with my first born, and it's like we don't get that time back. No, it's like, my daughter and I have talked about this. She experienced a version of me for the first ten years of her life that my boys really didn't. They were each three years behind each other, and so they have a different experience of me, and I can't change that. But what I can do is I can change the way that I'm interacting with my boys. And here's one thing. This has just been profound. We know this. People have told us this. The books say this, other things is that as a parent, nothing matters as much as what you do, what you say. Our kids could give a shit about what we say. Isn't that true?
[00:12:28.140] - Brandon
Well, most of the time, they're not hearing it. It's like us, right? It's like when we get into a conversation and you're caught in your head. You're just constantly thinking about, what am I going to say next? How am I processing what this person just said to me? You end up most of the time if you're not very intentional about how you're listening. Most of the time, we're not even catching most of the message. And I think ultimately our kids just live in that space. It's not even like a conscious. Like, my parents don't know anything. I think more often than not they're just barely hearing what we're saying because they're so stuck in their own head, they're so self consumption.
[00:13:07.710] - Chris
They're just trying to figure out, and I think it's all subconscious. They're just trying to figure out what is real, what works, what is real, what. I've noticed this about my kids and there's no pride in this. It's fascinating to me. So I've been on this fitness journey for pretty seriously for the last five years or so. And what I've noticed is I do a fair amount at home. I work out at a gym brand and I now are going to the same gym. And I do like 90% of my workouts at the gym. But I also have kettlebells out of my back deck and I have some gymnastics rings on my back deck. And I built a chin up bar in our backyard and I'll still at home, I'll go bang out a set of pull ups or whatever. My boys in particular will see me working out. And I've never had a conversation with boys of like, hey guys, let's start working out together every day. You guys should work it. No, I really haven't. But they've seen me and it's interesting. My 15 year old boy started training in the backyard. He'll start doing workouts.
[00:14:14.620] - Chris
And it's funny, man, this kid is like every mirror he sees, his sleeves have to come up or his shirt has to come off so he can check himself out in the mirror. It's really freaking hilarious. But then my twelve year old boy is following suit. He's seen his older brother work out and now, I'm not kidding you, my twelve year old, I mean, he is so disciplined and driven. He works out. He has a workout schedule, he told me, and I have never once programmed anything for him. I've never once said, you should work out three or four times a week. He's like figured out his own schedule. He has rest days because he's just hearing. He sees and hears what I do, and then he's moving off of that, and I'm just so fascinated by that, and it's so motivational to me. Just the power of discipline and how it affects people around us. And, of course, the parallels for leadership are massive. I think those of you out there that lack discipline and, you know, you lack discipline, and you bring that to your work, but you're still winning. I think sometimes that's the biggest deception, right?
[00:15:23.940] - Chris
You've got all the things. Your company's growing, your top line's crazy. Maybe you're very profitable. All the things. That's the biggest deception, right? Is, well, it must be working. Who needs discipline? You know what I mean? Why stop eating the pizzas and having the three bourbons at night when clearly I'm killing it? And the big question to me is, yeah, but what if I got more disciplined? What would my results be? Would I have less turnover in my business? Would I have a better relationship with my spouse? Would I be having more sex? Would I be healthier? Would I look better in my clothes? Would my employees? Would I have a better, more leadership depth within my team? Would I be more profitable? Maybe I'm at 22% EBITDA. Could I be at 25 if I dialed in some of these disciplines and my team modeled after my lead? You know what I mean?
[00:16:21.610] - Brandon
Yeah.
[00:16:23.610] - Chris
What if it's like, there's untapped energy for all of us in the realm of discipline? Dude, you and I watched you turn me on to that Cam Haynes thing.
[00:16:36.080] - Brandon
Yeah.
[00:16:36.930] - Chris
Can you talk about turned? So Cameron Haynes, a world renowned archer friend of Joe Rogan's. Like, did you want to describe him?
[00:16:47.600] - Brandon
Yeah. His circle. So Cameron Haynes keep hammering collective. That's his podcast platform. And Then he's the equivalent of an elite level sports. He's an athlete specifically, though, in the archery community. Now, personally, I just have sporadic exchanges with the archery community. I'm not a hardcore.
[00:17:11.520] - Chris
Neither one of us are regular hunters or whatever.
[00:17:13.820] - Brandon
But what got him so I think infamous was his commitment to discipline. He falls in kind of those weirder categories with, like, a goggins and stuff where they're doing a lot of pretty extreme, just very extreme. Like, he's an ultra marathon runner, and then on top of that, he's done, like, the equivalent of 200 miles ultra marathon. So I don't even know what they call that. Like, Deca Ultra something. I don't know. But the point is, he did. Most of this came from him personally, establishing a routine to prepare him for the extremes of the bow hunting that he would go into. And so part of what his story is based on is in order to get the biggest, craziest, most unique animals, and we don't need to go into the conservation stuff. There's that whole thing. Some people freak out when they hear it. But anyways, the point is that he himself set a standard of training for himself personally. This was before. He's not sponsored, he's nothing. He just knows in order for me to be successful in this thing I'm passionate about, it is going to require me to reshape my body's commitment to the standard.
[00:18:21.070] - Chris
To get the most out of it.
[00:18:22.510] - Brandon
To get the most out of it, yeah. And he has just turned that into an influence. He's a mammoth influencer. But the coolest thing about it is he's from Eugene, Oregon. He's actually a smaller town than that, but he's right here from our own backyard. And he released a movie not long ago called we were once Wolves. And it's a really touching story about a live hunt that they do. This is for grizzly in Alaska, like Apex apex predators. And when we talk about the boars that he's going after, the big male bears, these are the old grizzled bears that need to be removed from so that the younger blood can come in and begin being the mating male. But monsters, predators. And anyways, the story is about him going back to Alaska multiple years after his very close friend has passed away. He fell off a mountain and he's back there with a really close group of friends and guides. And they're on a big grizzly hunt. And it is not an easy thing that they do in their bond with each other. I mean, they're stuck in crazy weather, exposed to the environment, and then they go in and do something extremely dangerous with one another.
[00:19:39.480] - Brandon
And in an environment that sometimes things get out of your control and they just. Anyways, we were once wolves. Or once we were wolves. It's Cam Haynes. He's just a specimen of a person in terms of mental discipline. He's got this show that he also does, and it's called run, lift, shoot. And what he does is he brings in athletes and big brand managers and all these different folks that come in and they meet with him right here in our hometown. And they go out and they lift, run and shoot. And so sometimes he's teaching people to shoot bows for the very first time. But they go and grind gears, man. They do really hard shit together. So he literally flies his guests in from out of state. And they basically spend two days getting their ass crushed by Cameron.
[00:20:28.870] - Chris
Except the time that he had David Goggins as a guest. And those two badasses, they provoked each other. I remember seeing that. I remember he put up for those weightlifters out there workout folks. I want to say that Goggins and he did, like, 25 reps of 225 pounds on the bench, which is very phenomenal. I mean, it's like elite level NFL combine kind of performance. Anyway, you and I were so both of us really inspired by that. And there was a moment at the beginning of the show, too. And it's maybe not directly related to discipline the way we normally think of it, but he was just talking about his love for the wilderness and hunting in that, especially in going after, say, grizzlies in those environments. They're rucking 30 miles in to the Denali. Right. There is no backup plan. Granted, they have guns and pistols and stuff like that, but they're on their own. He's going to that place of I either do or I don't. I either successfully engage that grizzly or there is the real potential that Grizzly is going to dispatch me. And there's a very pure place in that.
[00:22:02.840] - Chris
And I think very few of us spend much, if any, time in that headspace of clarity. You know what I mean?
[00:22:11.130] - Brandon
Oh, I do. It's funny, too. And one of the most moving parts about watching that movie, it's about an hour, is at the end, one of his really close friends, Kip. Oh, I'm brain farting his last name. Anyways, he's the ex co founder of Under Armor. Under Armor was Cam's first company corporate sponsor that came in behind him. And really they built something together. So that was when Under Armor got into the hunting space. But that's right. Anyways, one of the things that they talked about was this gentleman. Kip's been friends with Cam for 20 years, 20 plus years. He's like, there's this weird calm about Cam in a moment like that. Because I won't give away the end of the film because it's worth watching regardless if you like hunting or not. But anyways, there's this moment that something pretty scary happens. And in the midst of it, he just references Cam's calmness. And he's like, he's ready to go. He's ready to die. And he's like, clearly the other dude, Kip. He's like, clearly, I've got some work to do. And what he's referencing is. And part of Cam's message. You can hear it with some of the ways he titles things, like Keep hammering collective, right.
[00:23:24.130] - Brandon
If any of you watch Eric's podcast, the Blue Collar Boys, you'll see behind Eric in his office. He's got the note that says, no one cares work. Know a lot of that stems from Cam. Anyways, I think what it really told me and how it relates to this discipline idea is that Cam made a personal commitment to ensure that every moment he's getting the most out of and what that means is, and I can't speak directly to all these things, but just relationship, what he does for his business, his hUnting, his passion for his friend group, not just a passion for them, but a passion in creating a tribe of brothers who challenge each other to operate at a very high level. There's something interesting about the fact that from an internal peace perspective, very confident and ready to go when the time calls. And I can't say that. I can't say that about myself personally, that I consistently live in a place where I am mentally very comfortable with who I am. And I couldn't say with confidence that, you know what if today's the day, I know I got all the juice out of the tank like, I gave it hell, and I'm proud of what I've done.
[00:24:39.690] - Brandon
I'm falling forward. But to be honest, to tell myself with that level of conviction, it's not true for me yet. And I think what I'm learning is the only way I'm going to experience some element of that or at minimum be on a journey that will get me closest to that goal as possible, is I've got to figure out more ways to implement discipline. And again, I think what we struggle is we look at this as everything's a no. It's a denial. And I think it's less about being in no and a denial, and I think it's more about establishing a goal you're chasing and the discipline comes in. The motivation of getting that thing or having that experience versus a running away from what I got to stop. I can't. I don't want to do right. Even with working out. It was interesting is I get off and off on the wagon a lot. It's so easy for me to be unmotivated until I start doing it. When I get in and start, it's different. But, man, I fucking struggle to get in and do it. And one of the things like you and I have been talking about is let's put something hard on the horizon once a quarter.
[00:25:52.530] - Brandon
And the idea is that now we will have this thing that's out there that when I try preparing for, we're preparing for, and it's just a calling. So instead of me running from, I don't want to be feel guilty, I don't want to blah, blah, blah, no, I want to go because that could help me achieve our goal and me look better when I'm competing against our group at that challenge.
[00:26:15.440] - Chris
Right. Okay. So there's another angle that comes up for me about that, of the preparation is not only being ready to die, like, sort of I've squeezed all the juice out of the orange, or I'm squeezing all the juice out of the orange. So I'm ready at any given moment for this to be it. I think also, too, part of what he may be saying is that I've done the work to, regardless of what situation I find myself in, I can be fully present and bring whatever I need to bring to that moment.
[00:26:49.090] - Brandon
He used the term I'm as ready as I can be.
[00:26:53.160] - Chris
Yes.
[00:26:53.620] - Brandon
Meaning there's zero question of whether or not he could have trained one more day. He could have gone one more mile. He's confident that he literally did everything he could to be ready for that moment. And if there's not a direct business application, I can't even imagine what there is. Right. I think you and I, even the other day, we were talking about how.
[00:27:17.970] - Chris
Much the success of the team has.
[00:27:22.660] - Brandon
Been often not in our control. Like, it's just timing, a certain relationship, a certain opportunity. But the one thing that we say pretty consistently with conviction is we are getting better and better at doing everything in our power to be ready so that when we, in quotes, get lucky, we fucking hammer that thing out of the park. And that's the part I think is giving me more confidence, not just as a business leader or as an entrepreneur, but just in my own, in general, is the more often I can tell somebody with conviction that, you know what, we did the best we could to be prepared for this opportunity. Even if it doesn't hammer out of the park, I'm going to still feel good, because I just literally gave it everything I could. You know what I mean?
[00:28:12.110] - Chris
Yeah. Another aspect of this readiness, I was listening this morning. I've been spending more time on YouTube lately for some reason. No.
[00:28:24.780] - Brandon
Okay.
[00:28:25.280] - Chris
Like, in the mornings, I try to find something positive or know as I'm making my coffee in the morning and my eggs, my five eggs and my is. So I landed on JordaN Peterson this morning, and his wife I can't remember her name, but his wife is interviewing him on stage as part of one of his speaking engagements, and she asked him the question, Jordan, how do you become more articulate? Because if anybody listens to. Got some. We got some engagement here. Yeah, I'll come back to that, Alex. So, first of all, will bro Goggins. Yeah. He's an alien. There's no doubt about that.
[00:29:06.530] - Brandon
Literally.
[00:29:09.310] - Chris
Alex. Speaking of setting quarterly goals, what do you guys think about smart goals?
[00:29:14.930] - Brandon
Yes, we can circle on those.
[00:29:17.000] - Chris
Yes, we think they definitely tie into discipline. Watley. This is why I always have a run, expedition, or hunt in mind when I'm training. Yeah, right on that Cameron Haynes thing, I have to be preparing for something less ethereal than good. Yeah, no, that's good. Okay, let's come back to that smart goals thing. I like that, though, dude. So with Peterson. This is great, by the way. Let me just find it so you guys can search for it while I knock over my coffee. We just had a near party. It's called you can search. What's going on here.
[00:29:54.750] - Brandon
Have a quote while you're looking that up.
[00:29:56.960] - Chris
This is how you become more articulate. Okay, I'll drop it in the comments. It is a fantastic video about the importance of being articulate as a leader. And I've always been a talker. I mean, it's how I came up in this world, was talking. And so technically, I think we all a sale coming up in sales and owning business. It's always been my thing is public speaking, and I enjoy this kind of stuff. And as I'm listening to him, I'm like, I still have a really long way to go, first of all, to ever be anything like Jordan Peterson, who's, like, super smart and articulate. But there's something in it for all of us, I think, in this video. So this is how you become more articulate by Jordan Peterson. But he's just talking about, how could you not want to become more know as a leader? The way we speak and the way we explain things has a direct impact on effectiveness, our influence. Yeah.
[00:31:02.680] - Brandon
And effectiveness of the team, of the message, of the whatever.
[00:31:06.280] - Chris
And I think we all know somebody, and in some cases, we are this person that, again, we're deceived by our own know. Occasionally. Brandon and I, in general, I think blue collar industries have an unearned rap that we're somehow more simple. We are as an industry. We're just not as smart and sophisticated. And I think it's bullshit. I think some aren't. And some people don't give a rip about these other skills and things like that. But I think it's just the deception of success. We achieve a level of success, and we think that that means, like, it's good enough or whatever. But I think you listen to Jordan Peterson, you're like, God, I have a whole nother level I could move to if I was a little bit more deliberate about my communication and I invested in myself to become more articulate, to be more clear in the conversations I'm having with my people at my all company meetings, in my vision, casting with the team, the better I get at explaining where we're going and how we're going to get there. Yeah, maybe I'm a $10 million company now, but maybe I should be 20 million if I just got my shit together and I got a little more focused and disciplined in some of these skills and habits.
[00:32:32.610] - Chris
Anyway, I got fired up when I was listening to that. Oh, my God. I fancy myself a fairly good speaker and communicator, but I feel like I could double my competency if I really put some effort and energy into it. In fact, I think I probably rest on my laurels a little bit. Just my own natural talent. I think a lot of us do that. It's like, wait, what if. What if I actually discipline myself more? My son. Okay, so my son, I don't know if it's because of. I haven't been modeling this for him, but my son's been starting to take cold showers, and I know he is.
[00:33:05.210] - Brandon
YouTube's modeling that for him right now.
[00:33:07.740] - Chris
Yeah, all the cold plunging and all that stuff. Right? So my son's been doing cold, and I know it. He's not just talking about it. In fact, he doesn't talk about it much at all. But when I go to take a shower in the evening, after I come out of the sauna, which I've been trying to do more often, I should take a cold shower. It'd be beneficial. But anyway, when I go to get in the shower, it's turned all the way cold because he takes a shower before he goes to bed. And I'm like, well, he's doing this thing almost every time I've been in the sauna, the last four or five times I come in, it's turned to cold. And I have a moment. I love this. I have a moment where I think I should do a cold shower, and.
[00:33:49.430] - Brandon
Then you crank that heat up, and.
[00:33:51.240] - Chris
Then I turn it to hot, and I'm like, no, I just want to be cozy.
[00:33:54.770] - Brandon
I know.
[00:33:55.150] - Chris
I just want to be comfortable. I just suffered in the sauna, and it's like, what is suffering? Yeah. Was it hard? Was it hot? Yeah. I'm sweating my ass off. It's not really suffering. It's something I'm choosing. Like, I know I get the heat shock proteins. I'm developing resiliency in me. I'm doing all the good things, and yet the moment I get out of it, I just want to be comfortable. It's like I just give me comfort. I can't do the. But I thought to myself as I was standing there, and I still didn't do the cold shower, but I just thought to myself, why is it my son can do that at 15, and I can come up with every excuse of why I don't need to or I'm not going to right now? I thought about that last night, and I'm thinking about it now, and I'm like, you know, what is that? What's that? Holdback. Anywho, what else you got?
[00:34:47.760] - Brandon
I don't know if this is perspective or not, but it's just something that I think I'm personally kind of trying to try. I guess when I look at my life in terms of business, relationships, leadership, competency, all the things, there's a bajillion things that I feel like I've got the opportunity to make gains in. Well, there is no category. I don't feel.
[00:35:11.460] - Chris
Gillian, by the way, is an order of magnitude larger than bajillion.
[00:35:14.410] - Brandon
Yes.
[00:35:14.970] - Chris
Different things.
[00:35:15.580] - Brandon
We've moved from Bajillion to Bajillions. But every avenue of my life, I have the opportunity to increase its effectiveness and gain skill sets and Competency. So it's overwhelming. I think that part of the reason we hesitate to take stock of how we're doing is that then it's like, you see it. You can't unsee it, Right. So I think one of the things that I've been kind of wrestling with is that is there something that when I focus on it or when I give it effort or discipline, what's the return for that engagement? And so one of the things that I'm just finding myself moving back to more and more often is just starting with the physical element. And here's why. Because I'm not a fitness guru, I'm not 10% body fat, or I'm just a normal dude with Dad BoD.
[00:36:14.270] - Chris
You do got biCeps, though, BRo.
[00:36:15.770] - Brandon
Well, we're trying. We're trying. And we buy the T shirts the Right way. But I think one of the things I'm realizing is that there's two critical elements that come out of physical fitness that then I'm able to, as I become more consistent, to leverage into developing some other disciplines and or making progress in other areas of my life. And here's why. I think that part of the reason that we struggle to be motivated to do hard things is because our mind isn't ready. It's just not ready for it. Because our Mind is Constantly telling us to get back to neutral, back to comfort, back to it's okay. And one of the things I realize with physical fitness is that it's a very tangible black and white way for me to intentionally put myself in a scenario without it being taking three days to fly there and you got to stay and buy all this Gear. I just need to go into the gym and commit to forcing myself to finish some reps, finish a pull up count or whatever. But every time I do that, I'm Building muscle Memory for my brain to do better at being Uncomfortable for a prolonged period of Time to get what I want.
[00:37:39.090] - Brandon
And then the other thing though is that I really struggle with Energy. Like I'm just Constantly giving to relationships, the business, the whatever. And so sometimes mental disciplines around, let's say, some kind of business competency because I don't have the energy. I'm very unmotivated to really creatively think about this element or this skill set or this tool set. But I can drag my ass into a gym and once I get there, once I take a few stretches, do what I'm going to do, I'm going to gut through that workout. And I think what I'm just realizing right now, and this is just for me personally, is if that's my discipline right now, there's a million things I could work on, but I'm getting energy back and it's building the foundation for me to leverage into other elements or areas of my life. And so right now I'm just trying to give my attention to developing one area of discipline. But the return for me is ten X. There's going to be other things. I already see areas of my life that I'm able to take advantage of. Here's another thing I think I'll shut up, is the context of discipline is really important.
[00:39:01.950] - Brandon
And again, for physical fitness. For me, this is an easy way for me to have context for my own perspective. When I go into a gym, it's hard not to get caught up in what other people doing. But at the end of the day. It's a personal record. It's not a fucking record against anybody else. If you can't do a working set with 225, that's your deal, baby. There's nobody else in that room that's going to get you there, right? So I don't know. I don't know where I was going with that, other than it's just like, well, here it is. So when I'm in that gym environment, you and I had a set a weight that you and I were wrestling with. You fucking got it, by the way, which hammered down.
[00:39:45.850] - Chris
But that was our spot.
[00:39:47.750] - Brandon
But if you looked at all the other benches in that room, they weren't close to the weight that you and I were flexing on. And it's easy for me to get into that place. Well, yes, he told you. But the opportunity is that person that's got a single plate on each side, that's their personal record. They're pushing their own personal limit. I'm motivated by that, not the fact that I have two plates.
[00:40:11.370] - Chris
Yeah.
[00:40:11.840] - Brandon
Right. I think slipping into that space of the correct context for you, we're always trying to do better than what our latest best was. Don't fucking worry about what everyone else around you is doing, because you don't know their story. You don't know the context. It has nothing to do with your life. Am I making gains from my own barometer? In the context of how I feel and look and operate today and if tomorrow I get a little bit better because of discipline, in my context, you are winning. It doesn't matter what it looks like against somebody else's.
[00:40:50.810] - Chris
It's funny. That's one aspect of discipline. This reminds me of talk where Chris talked about how you need to step back and give yourself that emotional. Bro, that's. That's discipline. Absolutely right. We talked about that in the heart of the matter episode of just that experience I had with Jack of, wow. Part of me starting to feel really pissed off. Like, just the act of noticing, that's a discipline of just taking a pause break in your anger or in your negative emotion and just the scene. That discipline, right. Allows us to make a different change in the moment. I mean, that is so true and applicable, I think, about in the gym. It's interesting, dude. One, I don't have a concept of what I look like or I perform like to other people. I just don't have a context for it. But when I'm in the gym, I think probably very few people realize this, even you. Like, when we were working out yesterday. No one else in the gym has a context for how hard I'm working to stay in. Yeah, like, but I think you have more of a context now, the gym that Brandon and I go to, it's a crossfit style gym.
[00:42:05.360] - Chris
It's not a crossfit gym. It's a functional fitness gym.
[00:42:07.810] - Brandon
Fucking hard.
[00:42:09.030] - Chris
It's like you get in for an hour in the first 15 minutes, you're doing movement and stretches and warm ups, and you're kind of like, the first time I went, I'm like, oh, well, this is a bit soft. I'm in here for an hour. But we were spending 15 minutes stretching and all this stuff. And really, the actual working time is probably closer to 35 minutes at our workouts. And you just think, well, how hard could it Be? Kind of thing. Every single workout I go to, and I'm not exaggerating, I have to make multiple choices to complete the reps that were assigned to me and or the sets. And then there's this thing they have at the end called the finisher, which the very definition of that makes me want to quit when I don't feel like it. Like, well, I did the main strength, the add on. I did the main strength workout. I don't have time for the finisher today, or I don't have it in me. I have all these little decision points in this workout that no one else is aware of where I could totally just f all and just leave and nobody cares.
[00:43:09.930] - Chris
It's like if I leave, they just assume I have a doctor's appointment or whatever. I got to go pick up my kid from soccer game. I could just leave, but I have all these decision points where I am telling myself I got what it takes. Do the last gosh damn rep. Yeah.
[00:43:25.080] - Brandon
One more time.
[00:43:27.400] - Chris
I think I've told this story before, but I remember one time when I first started working out at this gym. It was four years ago, and I'm new to this, and it's overwhelming every single workout. And I get to the end and we're doing v ups and AB exercise, and there was 15 in the finisher. Three sets of 15. First of all, I can't even do a v up. It's like a leg stretch. I can't even do it. It's like a freaking gymnastics move. I can't do it. But I'm doing tuck ups, a modified version of it, and I'm in my first set of 15, and I am blasted. We've already done a bunch of other things, and I'm laying there, and I'm the last person. I might have been the last person yesterday. I think I was on the carries. Anyways, I'm often the last person in the gym doing the workout because I'm slower or whatever, mainly because I'm battling in my head to do the next set. But anyways, I'm doing the v ups, I'm doing the tuck ups because I can't do v ups. I do my first set of 15, and I collapse.
[00:44:22.840] - Chris
My stomach's cramping. I know we're closing in so much for 40 minutes, right? You're like, well, let's just do 30, 40 minutes. I'm laying there in the middle of the floor. My shirt is soaked in sweat. Everyone else is leaving. I could have just gotten up after the first set and say, hey, good enough, because it might have been right. But there was something inside me, and I knew it was a part of me that I wanted more of, where I'm like, no, I'm going to do the next one. Yeah. And I got to the last set, and I did, like, eight reps, and I had to do one rep, and then I had to do one rep, and then I do one rep. And this sounds weird to say this out loud. It always feels embarrassing to me for some reason, which is probably just a weakness of mine, but I felt like I wanted to cry at the end of that 15th rep. And I don't just mean cry. I think all of us can relate to this, but there was this primal letting down that happened in me that I just wanted to bawl my eyes out and scream and yell and cry.
[00:45:33.300] - Chris
It was the weirdest thing. Maybe some people can relate to this when you've just exerted yourself or you've like, I don't know exactly what happened in that moment, but I managed to restrain myself. So I didn't look like a weirdo idiot in front of. In the middle of this CrossFit gym. But I managed to hold myself together, and I got in the car, and it was just this weird primal. I just bawled for, like, four or five minutes sitting in my car. It must have been the most ridiculous looking thing for anybody who happened to catch this. But, you know, at the end of it, you know what it was, though? I had this overwhelming sense of personal pride in myself.
[00:46:10.500] - Brandon
Yeah, there you go.
[00:46:11.430] - Chris
That had nothing to do with other people affirming me. It might have been, to be perfectly honest, the very first time in my life, and this would have been at age 39 years old. It may have been, I don't know, the very first time inside me, I was proud of myself. And you're like, Nordike, so freaking dumb. You did freaking 45 sit ups. Okay? But it was bigger than that for me. It was obviously a lot bigger than that for me, because there was this moment, and I think we all have these opportunities, and I've sat In this more and more, is when no one else is watching. And the only affirmation you're going to get is you doing the thing that you knew you could do but you didn't want to. There is something special. There's something really special that happens in that moment.
[00:47:04.260] - Brandon
I have a quote for you that marries up with what you just said. I'm not sure who this is, but it says, self respect is the fruit of discipline. The sense of dignity grows when the ability to say no to oneself.
[00:47:20.680] - Chris
Oh, yeah.
[00:47:21.570] - Brandon
So it's like. I think what you're saying there, right, is that you had this immense moment of real self confidence.
[00:47:31.380] - Chris
I can do what I need to do.
[00:47:32.900] - Brandon
Not the bolstering. Come in, take ownership of a room, own your environment, control people's perspective on you. None of that bullshit. You had legit self developed self confidence and self esteem.
[00:47:48.880] - Chris
Esteem.
[00:47:50.790] - Brandon
That was the fruit.
[00:47:52.090] - Chris
I met myself in that moment.
[00:47:53.740] - Brandon
That's right. No one could take that from you. It wasn't a contextual thing. It wasn't because you just happened to be trying something longer than somebody. It was totally internal integration. And I think that that's probably the opportunity in discipline is. It's not even the thing that you achieve when you're able to really dial in discipline in a category, whatever the thing is. But it's more what yourself is believing about yourself. And I think we just under.
[00:48:24.920] - Chris
No one can.
[00:48:26.150] - Brandon
No one. That's the thing. It's like the most broken thing inside of us, that it doesn't matter how much you're consuming from your environment. It won't fill it. It is the whole saying, you can't outgive a taker, right? When we have those people on our team that just consume instead of giving back. Your self esteem is that thing. It will consume every accolade, every add a boy, every add a girl, every reward. It will consume all of that and give you nothing long lasting in return. But discipline does. Every time I do something, regardless if someone's watching and I achieve, go one more, do one more thing, do it one element better for me, it's for me, it builds confidence in me. That makes me more resistant to the external environment. And that's what allows us to continue to win.
[00:49:27.930] - Chris
It's what James clear talks about in atomic habits. It's reaffirming. I am the type of person that makes these kinds of choices. I am the kind of person that is capable of doing X, y, or Z. I am the kind of person that, when I'm faced with a challenge, I can confront it with confidence. I'm the kind of person that's capable in these kind of situations. And, man, it is so true, dude, that is nothing that other people can give you.
[00:49:58.500] - Brandon
No, it's not. And that's the identity you can build on.
[00:50:01.300] - Chris
Yeah.
[00:50:01.680] - Brandon
That is the universal identity for yourself that you can build on. Because it doesn't matter what job title you have if you're entrepreneur. Not entrepreneur right now. If you're a brother in law, you're not a brother in law. You're a husband or a wife or you're not. All of that comes and goes with our current life systems place, current relationships, current environment. But your identity attached to what yourself knows you're capable of achieving. That's a totally different game.
[00:50:31.770] - Chris
Okay, so, dude, I'm fired up. I'm like, if nobody watched this, if none of you watched this, this was all for me, folks. I think Brandon and I might have gotten the most out of this. I don't, you know, can I be me? That was Watley. Okay. You guys improved in your ability. What did you say? Wow. Right on, dude. Thank you. Thank you. That feels really good, man, especially coming from. Yeah, yeah. I saw your burnt hair thing, by the way. That was so rad. Watley. I love that. And I love just what's. That's so much fun. Okay, Alex, smart goals. Can I be honest? Alex, smart goals. Specific, measurable, realistic, attainable, time based. Did I get it right?
[00:51:25.310] - Brandon
Yeah, I think so.
[00:51:25.950] - Chris
I think so.
[00:51:26.410] - Brandon
Close enough.
[00:51:27.770] - Chris
So, yes, that is valuable. That's valuable. Yeah. I don't know. Is there anything.
[00:51:38.270] - Brandon
What?
[00:51:38.610] - Chris
Does that speak to you?
[00:51:39.540] - Brandon
Well, I think Watley even said this, right in Watley's post. He just basically said, yeah, I got to have a hunting trip, or this thing that I'm working towards. I can't just be thinking I want to maximize my life before I die. Totally get it. And I think at a global level, that's what smart goals really are. It's taking this thing that's thought or concept and breaking it down into these more concrete elements so that whatever effort you give to, that you can actually accurately measure and identify. Did I succeed or did I not succeed? So I think the value for smart goals, big picture, if you think about just leadership behavior in general, right. Is anytime I walk out of a meeting or a conversation with somebody, if we have not concretely articulated what you will be doing, when is it due and what does success look like? We really haven't done anything. We're all going to walk back to our businesses.
[00:52:38.360] - Chris
We're just winging it.
[00:52:39.190] - Brandon
Yeah, we'll get consumed by the tyranny of the urgent and the outcome of that is going to be less than probably desired most of the time, statistically. But as soon as I say to that individual, this is the action or we agree, this is the action that will be taken. This is when it's going to be done and this is what I'm going to do to follow up with you. We get results that align with our goal. So I think, Alex, that was a really wordy way to say smart goals are probably the only kind of goals if we're going to actually do something concrete to get a result. 100%. Yeah, they make complete sense.
[00:53:16.560] - Chris
And Alex Hansen. Okay. I haven't checked your Facebook or your LinkedIn profile, but Alex Hansen, Hanson Insurance Group are now Hub International. Right. One of my insurance buddies. Okay. Anyway, thank you for dropping in. I hope to meet you in person at some point. I've been mostly connected to your bro Trent, assuming you're the same Alex Hansen. I'll have to double check that. Anyway, thank you, everybody for watching today. I hope this FFL was as motivating and inspirational and provocative as it was for me and Brandon. I feel like, I feel lit up, ready. I got things I want to think about and I want to double down and I want to be better.
[00:53:57.870] - Brandon
I want to be better and surround ourselves, I think, with more people that are kind of in that space.
[00:54:02.780] - Chris
Yeah. So if you are, please comment. Like if this fires you up, please join the tribe. I don't know. I don't know where I want to go with that. I just feel.
[00:54:13.780] - Brandon
Well, here's an example, guys. It's the whole one plus one equals ten. Right? There's bonds and relationships that we can build that make us better in very measurable, intangible ways. Here's yesterday. So Chris and I go into the gym. I didn't know this, but the gym has been working on weight, personal records, so they're doing strength right now. And Bench was part of it. And I won't give our number away because the big lifters will make fun of us. But we went in and I was a little bit more full of gusto, and so I stacked the plates on, and because Chris doesn't want to let me down or look weaker than I am, he stepped up to the plate and crushed it. So he set himself a personal record. Just because almost I was the catalyst, I forced him to do it. And I think that that was a perfect example. Man, when your tribes dialed in and you guys want the same kinds of things, there's something powerful that begins to happen when you have a running mate like that, where it's just like, you know what? If you were left to your own, it probably wouldn't have hit that number.
[00:55:17.660] - Brandon
But because you were almost forced to, you did. And then you walked out of there like, fuck. Yeah.
[00:55:23.980] - Chris
It was pretty know. It reminds me, I was watching a YouTube short with Jay Cutler, who's a famous bodybuilder power lifter, and he was doing some kind of clinic with a bunch of people. And, of course, videotaping the whole thing. Right? Videotaping. Isn't that funny? Yeah, we do that recording the whole deal. But he told the guy. He sort of brashly told the guy. He's like, hey, I want you to do 20 plus. Retina was 225.
[00:55:48.620] - Brandon
Oh, yeah.
[00:55:49.010] - Chris
And this guy was a young buck. He's like 19 or something. And he stepped up and, man, but you could tell the look on his face. He's like, really? What? Yeah, I Can't do that. And he's like, get the fuck on the bench. The dude did it and banged out, like 21 reps of 225, which, again, is like NFL combine type of stuff. Right? It's just bonkers. But it was funny because I saw that, like, two days before you came.
[00:56:18.200] - Brandon
You're like, I just got to do six.
[00:56:19.950] - Chris
Yeah. Anyhow, I believe this with all my heart now is that we are capable of more than we realize, period, in every single area of life. We're capable of being better husbands, we're capable of being wives, and we're capable of being better parents. Now, there was a thing I posted on my Facebook page the previous day that I felt like is a good way for us to end this talk or whatever this is or live is. I can't remember if it was Seneca or some more modern day person said, look, you were under. No, I think it was Alan Watts. You are under no obligation to be the same person you were five minutes ago. Wow. All of us can choose who we want to be, and I find that incredibly inspirational. So we'll leave you guys on that. Thank you for the floodlight Friday livestream, for being here, for participating Watley will Tigert, Alex Hansen, thanks for having. You guys made our day. Stephanie, oh, my gosh, we missed something. Stephanie, what'd you say? Deep insights on setting goals and steps to reach them for yourself without comparing yourself. Yeah, we're all better than yesterday, right?
[00:57:41.170] - Chris
That's what we're all trying to do. Okay, next time we're going to be on site in the Pack Northwest working with the client that Friday morning doing a thing with them. Won't be on next week, but the following. We'll see you back. Drop your comments here, share it with your friends, family and children, and we'll see you next. Well, maybe we had some f bombs in here. Maybe don't share it with your children. You choose. All right. See you later. Bye.
[00:58:11.050] - Brandon
All right, everybody. He thanks for joining us for another episode of Head, Heart and Boots.
[00:58:15.520] - Chris
And if you're enjoying the show but you love this episode, please hit follow. For commonly known as subscribe, write us a review or share this episode with a friend. Share it on LinkedIn, share it via text, whatever. It all helps. Thanks for listening.
