Lion King and Self-Trust | Jeremy Cameron

0:00 And I remember I was crying in there. I can't do it by myself. And so I went from a very highly paid technology job to I'm crawling under somebody's house, installing a wood stove. When we think about Scar, Scar wanted something big. He wanted something huge. He wanted to be kink. What's the difference between Simba remembering who he was and believing in himself and Scar? doing much the same thing with vastly different purposes and outcomes. If I was to look at the way that Simba shows up and the way that Mufasa showed up, ultimately it's through the lens of love.

0:40 And if I was to look at the way that Scar showed up, it's through the lens of fear, through power and through manipulation. But what got planted in my mind is I can't do it by myself. And anytime a big decision showed up for me, I felt the need. to ask somebody else, to get to the point where I felt paralyzed in making the big decisions. Just get to know yourself. Get curious about who you are right now. Get curious about what you like, what you don't like, and write it down. Hey, this is me. Love it. Take it or leave it.

1:22 Welcome to Yes And Land. where we say yes to the reality of yesterday and today, and we say and to the possibility, growth, and imagination of tomorrow. Welcome, everybody, to another episode of Yes and Land. We are very excited for our guest today. Jeremy Cameron is here with us. He is a coach. He has experience in the tech world for many, many years and has taken some amazing experiences that he's had in life, things that he's learned, and he's spinning that into really helping people step into their own. He's helping people get coached through things where they're a little bit stuck, maybe needing a breakthrough.

2:10 And he's doing some really amazing things in helping people find that something more, that something that they're missing. And so we're really excited where the conversation is going to take us today. Today, we're going to be talking about self -trust, right? Perhaps a little about intuition, trusting your gut, maybe. And we're going to do that through the lens of a wonderful Disney movie that many, many people know, at least my generation, our generation, right? The Lion King. When we were growing up, I mean, Lion King was huge. And that was in the early 90s. It was like peak Disney movie time, right? The golden generation of Disney movies. It'd be really great for us to take a look at that through the lens of Lion King today. So very excited. Welcome, Jeremy. Thank you so much for having me, Ryan.

2:53 I'm so excited to be here. It should be a good time. Absolutely. So let's talk a little bit about your background. Referenced it briefly, but... Let's talk about kind of where you started from. When you finished high school, did you do some college? What did you do to end up getting into the tech world? Absolutely. So I graduated in 1995. I went to a year of college, and I got to college, and the dot -com boom was just starting to take off. And I was realizing, I was like, you know, I love technology, and I was actually teaching technology when I was in high school. And I was like, i can learn i can go pay a whole bunch of money to learn technology or i can have somebody pay me to learn it and so i left college after a year and founded my own company learned a ton from founding that company for sure and then continued to work in tech throughout the dot -com era obviously we know how that all ended um immediately after that i wound up installing wood stoves because that's what happened after the tech bubble burst you had all these very qualified technology professionals taking whatever they could and so i went from a very highly paid technology job to i'm crawling under somebody's house installing a wood stove and From there,

4:24 continued back to the tech field once the economy stabilized. Yeah. Grew and grew and grew a little bit. Stepped in from individual contributor, stepped into leadership roles, began building teams, began leading and managing teams. I was at Live Nation for a bit. And my core... Client was house of blues and so we ended up building the marketing presence for house of blues amazing and then from there stepped into I went from managing three teams of 12 and massive leap to managing 25 teams and over 300 people and Quickly realized in that moment. Yeah in a team of 12 I can bring in my heroic efforts Sure, and my heroic efforts can save the day But when I'm dealing with 25 people working on a multi -hundred million dollar project, my heroic efforts aren't even going to move the needle. And so it moved from I can lead these people directly to I'm going to put people in the best opportunities for them to win. I'm going to hold them accountable, but I'm also going to give them all the support they need to be successful. Because they needed to be the ones that were going to be able to implement it. You couldn't do it all. I couldn't do it all. No one could rely on your efforts.

5:44 physically impossible. Like, unless I figured out the 148 hour day, and even still, why would I want to do that? Yeah, for sure. So take me back then. So I think journeys like this are always interesting. So where did you dig down to trust yourself enough to leave college? and start your own business? Because, I mean, was it naivete? Like we all know that like most businesses that start fail. It's a really, really high percentage of businesses that start fail. Where did you dig down from to have the courage and the trust to do that? So you're absolutely right. It was a gut feeling. It was just a feeling of, I believe in myself. I think I can do this for my experience.

6:32 My definition of failure is, did you learn something? And so it's not a matter of, is your business still running or not? But did you learn something? And so I haven't had a failed business, even though I have several businesses that aren't running anymore. I've learned from each one of them. And so in that business, I learned what it took to run a business. I had no idea before then. And so it was powerful for me. to be able to step in and go, I got this. I can do this. All right. I learned from that. I'm going to go lick my wounds a little bit. I'm going to go work for somebody else. I'm going to go rebuild. I'm going to go start again. And I'm not starting from nothing. I'm starting from the experience I gained the first time. And then go run that business. Learn some more. Go work for somebody else for a while. Did you have somebody though during that time that was mentoring you to do that? Because I think for a lot of people, that's a really hard thing to do. We hear it. Hey, yeah, there's no failures. There are lessons that are learned. We hear that all the time, right? And I believe in that principle. But to actually do it is not that easy, right? Because when you're experiencing that, like you don't start a business.

7:52 wanting for it to go out of business. You don't start a business wanting it to fail or to have that hard lesson. And so when someone's thinking about it for their life, like, was it a mentor? What was it that helped you have that courage to say, even if it goes out of business, I'm going to learn a lesson? So my parents were both entrepreneurs. Okay, that helps. That helps, right? Yes. So my parents owned an auto repair shop for 40 years. And they ran it together and I got to see the good times. I got to see the hard times. And so just being around the entrepreneurial spirit, I just grew up in that. I didn't have a mentor per se, but I was always just of the opinion of I can figure this out. And that's just been my worldview since I started. Out of curiosity, what was your major going to be before you dropped out of school? I was still deciding.

8:47 I was still very much in the decision process. I knew I loved technology. My dad wanted me to go study religious. So we were still having that conversation. was I was curious as to whether or not you were looking at something like engineering, right? When I hear like I knew I was just going to figure it out, that is like very much like an engineer brain, like I'm going to figure this out, right? Like this is a problem. I'm going to break it down. I'm going to see what the parts are and I'm going to go figure this out. And in that kind of mentality, whether or not it's an engineer, that kind of mentality really does, I think, help when it comes to entrepreneurship. Yeah. And some of the most successful engineers i've known engineering brains are also creative and so combine the fact that i love to figure things out with the fact that i'm a musician and as a musician you're starting with an idea yeah and okay what would it take in order to turn this idea into what i'm feeling yeah and so being able to bring the best of both worlds together has been really fun so tell me this too because one of the things that i heard you say is that after kind of the dot -com bubble burst that you went to installing stoves yes so where did you have to go where did you have to find within yourself to say like i'm going to be humble enough just to take this job installing stoves right because i think when i see certain

10:21 people who lose a job or lose an opportunity it's like they'll just stay unemployed always just waiting around for what the perfect next gig is and i i just i just don't like that mentality right right where was it for you they're like i'm just i'm gonna stall stoves right it came down to i need to pay my bills yeah and just having that pragmatic approach and looking at it and going this may not be my dream job but this is the job that's here And I'm going to take it. I'm going to go do my best. I actually wasn't very good at installing stoves, but I did my best. And I did it for as long as I could until the next opportunity opened up for me.

11:06 Yeah. You know, I do think that there is real value in that and just doing something sometimes because you need to. And I remember during law school, between my first and second year of law school, There wasn't a lot of internships available at that time. This was back in 2007, where the economy is really starting to go downwards, right? It was not trending in the right direction. So I didn't have a gig. I had an old missionary companion that lived here in Utah. I went to law school in Baylor. So I came back here to Utah for the summer. And he and I... uh his i think it was his uncle owned a flooring company and he and i delivered flooring all summer yeah and we would pack the flooring on our shoulders and i would have to like wear extra padding because i just wasn't used to manual labor but we did it we did it day after day and it was just what we needed to do because i needed to have some income in the summer but but i just i always think there's two like you said there's lessons in the things that you do right What it taught me is just showing up, right? Showing up and just doing your best. Like sometimes it's going to hurt. Sometimes it's going to be hard. Sometimes you're going to end up with those calluses from the things that you're doing literally or figuratively, but just keep showing up and keep doing it. What do you think the lessons are that you learned from your experience doing the stoves that helped you as an entrepreneur? So I think one of the lessons that I learned is show up. and do your best so one of my favorite books is the four

12:36 agreements the four agreements yes okay who's that by don miguel ruiz okay we're gonna put that link in the show notes and it's a very quick read it's a very simple read i recommend it for all my clients and i actually just had one of my clients who's in her 60s come back to me and go i read the book i realized what a game changer this is she's like i've been living my life totally blaming other people. And she's like, I'm ready to take control of my life. And I was like, yes, good. You go girl. Yeah. And what was so fun. So the four agreements always do your best, be impeccable with your word, never make assumptions.

13:22 And, um, Oh shoot. What's the fourth one? I always, I always remember three out of four. Yeah. Um, So there's four of them. Always do your best. Be impeccable with your word. Never make assumptions. Don't take anything personally. And I read that book in 2013. I've been working on mastering those principles since then. I'm still not there, but I've come a long way. And so if I was to tie that in, always do my best. As an entrepreneur, we're always doing our best. There's days where I show up and I'm just ready to go. I am so excited.

14:06 I'm lit up. I am passionate about it. And there's days where I show up and it's like, oh, boy, let's go. I got this. I think I think I know. Let's go. And some days my 60 percent, if I give 60 percent out of 60, that's my best. Sure. Some days. If I show up and I give, I was actually talking to a client of mine. He's a former, he's a former officer in the army, commanded 40 ,000 people in multiple tours. And he was having a conversation with Lloyd Austin, who was one of, he was the secretary, one of the secretaries at the time. I think he was secretary of the army. Lloyd Austin came in and he's like, I want you guys to give 110 % every day. And he looks at Lloyd Austin, who's the secretary of the army at the time. And he goes, sir, I would love to do that for you, but I can't. He's like, I will give you 110 % today and I will give you 90 % tomorrow because that's what I have. And so he's, he's looks at him and then. Lloyd Austin's aide pulls him aside and just rips him a new one.

15:27 And then Lloyd Austin comes up to him afterwards and says, I hear you. You're absolutely right. Thank you for saying that. And so there's days where we give 110 % and we need to realize, hey, I got 90 % today to give. If I try to push beyond that, I'm abandoning myself. I'm depleting myself. It's not sustainable. And so it's being present with where am I at today? How can I show up fully as my best self today? Hey, one more thing before we move on. There's a show I've gotten really into lately called The Wisdom of Walt. And I don't usually do this, but it's earned it. If our show is your kind of thing, I'll bet you'll enjoy that one too. So go give it a listen. So I have a question with that because this is something that I always think about when these types of things come up. because i agree with that right i agree with the principle that like we're not going to always have our maximum to give every single day and and by the same token i think there's also times though where we can fall into the trap of using that as an excuse to not do our best that day so if we have 60 that day we then use that as an excuse to give 30. so we don't actually give a hundred percent of what we do have to give how do you coach people to recognize what they actually have to give, and then to give the full amount that they have to give rather than use it as an excuse to give virtually nothing. Absolutely. So the first step is check in with yourself. Where am I at today?

17:00 Be present. So where am I at right now? And be honest about it. So for me, the first step is check in. The second step is be in integrity with yourself. And integrity is a fascinating word for me. I've done a word study on it. So integrity comes from the word integer. Integer means whole. And so if I have 60%, the whole amount for me to give is 60%. If I'm giving less than that, I'm not an integrity. And so integrity is when my actions, my words, my energy align.

17:41 I have a friend who took a concept that I had. and simplified it even more which is and we talked about it yesterday on our podcast which is words actions over words energy over both and when all three are aligned i'm in integrity and when i'm in integrity when who i am is an integrity then what i do matches who i am it was fun because we actually filmed an episode yesterday called who are you when no one's watching and in those moments nobody might be watching but it matters to you because you're building that state of i trust myself i'm gonna show up for myself i'm showing up because this matters to me i'm showing up because this is who i am and i'm showing up because i want my life and i want everything in my life to reflect who i am right now yeah yeah i love it So I love where we're going with this. Let's bring in the movie lens. Yeah. Let's bring in some Lion King, okay? So when I was thinking through kind of this overall topic and the way that I kind of saw some things with The Lion King, one of the things I wanted to ask you about was when we look at kind of the arc of The Lion King. um one of the things i think we see at the beginning that i think is just

19:13 a really interesting something interesting i think we all experience to some degree when we're young and maybe naive which is when simba sings i just can't wait to be king right because like okay he he doesn't know much about life he doesn't really know much about what it means to be a king but he still has that sense of wonder and a belief that like yeah I'm going to be king. Can't wait. Can't wait for this. I'm so excited for this thing to happen. And so, you know, where does that suddenly get lost for us? Why do we lose that sense of wonder and possibility of what we could do and we stop trusting ourselves?

19:55 Yeah. And you think about so many kids, say they're three, four, five, six years old. They dream. have imagination they make believe that was one of the reasons i got into improv comedy is i was like oh my gosh i loved that phase of my life i'm gonna go do that again as an adult and in those moments we're born with that desire to dream that desire for anything to be possible so simba singing i just can't wait to be king is no different than johnny being like i can't wait to be an astronaut or i don't know what your thing was but like i had so many different things from an astronaut to a cowboy to working with my dad you name it i probably dreamed it but then what happens is we start getting around people and we start getting into schools or friend groups and we start hearing what's acceptable what's expected what our obligations are and we start choosing to fit in instead of belonging and when i fit in it's like taking that square peg and trying to put it into the round hole hey you might be a square peg that like that might be your authentic self but all we have is this round hole so you're gonna have to shrink

21:27 yourself in order to fit in this hole that's what normalization is yeah and how often do people whether it's covertly or overtly here the way you're showing up right now is not acceptable it's not good enough you're too much You need to tone it down. Hey, stop acting out. Hey, stop crying. Hey, you're being ridiculous. And we wind up by doing that, teaching people that it's not safe to be who they truly are. And so people start putting on masks and they start figuring out what would be acceptable. What parts of me are acceptable and what parts do I need to hide?

22:16 And lots of shame happens with that hiding. And so people wind up being very small versions of themselves instead of dreaming. And so the work that I get to do is helping people remember who they are. And it's not finding themselves. It's remembering who they've always been. It's allowing them to come home to them. It's allowing them to find. That three four five six seven year old who's fearless who loved to dream who loved to show up big who had imagination Imagination so we're talking about Disney movies think about the word imagination the first part of its image if I can see it I can imagine it and How cool is it to be able to play in a world where we get to imagine? And what if we came back to that as adults? How fun would that be? Yeah, for sure.

23:20 I mean, it can really unlock a lot of things. What do you think the role was that Mufasa played in helping to set the stage for Simba, for who he is? And by the same token, when we look at our young people, how can we play that same role for our young people like Mufasa did? So the first thing. i think mufasa did is he created safety so he he saw there's that scene where he's looking over the whole thing and he's just looking out for the whole tribe like he's not helicoptering them but he's just looking out and he and you just get the feeling of oh mufasa's got this whatever happens mufasa's got this So the very first thing he did is he created safety for the whole tribe. The next thing he did is he was a role model. And so Simba got to see what a king was in real time because Mufasa was a great king. And with children, there's so many times where we're teaching them by what we do way more than what we say. They're watching in the moments when we don't think they're watching.

24:39 I was over at a friend's house the other day and they have two girls, six and three. Oh, fun ages. And I noticed they were about to get into a little tiff over, oh, you're in my bubble. And so I turned it into this game. I was like, well, watch this. Now I'm in your bubble. And we turned it from. sister fight incoming to this game where now all of a sudden they're working together to try to deal with me and it went from the sister fight to everybody's just laughing and having a great time and sometimes in those moments it's just oh we can do something i didn't even have to say anything i didn't have to be like hey girls knock it off right was just like what would shift the energy right here yeah and so just looking at mufasa like you look at his presence he comes in he is strong he is grounded he is sure he is confident and so simba's learning that that's what it looks like to be king yeah what's interesting too you use that example because what we also have in the movie is when simba who's told not to go to the elephant graveyard, still does, of course, because that's what kids do. And Mufasa has to go and save them. And Mufasa

26:12 does need to reset the boundary. Like he does need to tell him, like, I told you, you can't go there. You can't do it. You put yourself at risk. You put Nala at risk, right? And then what does he do? He shows him love and they wrestle around in the grass, right? They start goofing off, right? Because... he has to he has to reprove him right he's got he's got to set the standard of what it really is hey you did do something wrong like we have to acknowledge you did something wrong but then he brings it back he he helps him remember who he is he shows him love and then they have they turn that into fun in a bonding moment which it can be i think maybe sometimes his parents would get a little bit too serious or like It's just all punishment, right? And sometimes it is just like, okay, so we've got to disrupt it a little bit. Let's just like get to the bubble, right? Let's make this thing a fun thing. And so that kids can experience that, okay, there are boundaries, but there's also fun in life that we can have. We don't have to be serious all the time. Yeah. Yeah. I love the example that you had. That was brilliant that you did that. Yeah. And I would even draw a distinction between boundaries and agreements. Yeah. And so for me, boundaries are. The spot where I can fully show up as myself. Boundaries are for me, by me. Agreements are what I set with somebody else. And so if I was to look at the relationship between Mufasa and Simba, I might even call that an agreement. Hey, you violated our agreement.

27:40 Our agreement was you don't go to the elephant grove. We're going to foot stomp this. We're going to make sure that you understand what our agreements are. Because this is our agreement together. And I think about boundaries as like borders for the nation. And I think about agreement like treaties. Like the United States and Canada, they have a treaty. Hey, we'll protect each other if either one of us needs to. We're going to protect each other. And so I would draw that distinction between boundaries and agreements. Well, and I think it's a helpful one because... what we'll hear in in child psychology a lot is that when you can get the buy -in for from the child for whatever the rule is by agreement right then when they have violated that agreement then you don't get the same degree of back talk because it's hey we had this agreement we agreed this was the rule now you've violated that rule or that agreement and here's the natural consequence that we already agreed would happen if you violated it right And it's not always the easiest thing to do, right? My wife and I try doing it with our kids. And sometimes it's a little bit harder than just saying it. However, when we've done it effectively, it really does work. And it leads to a whole lot less backtalk, which is a whole lot less like fighting an argument and a much more peaceful home for sure. So I love the reframe there. And I appreciate where you're coming from with it being agreements, because I think that's

29:11 exactly right. And the cool thing about agreements. is you're teaching them to trust themselves from a young age. So you're part of this. So guess what? You now have skin in the game. It's not just because I told you to. It's because we agreed to this. And so in those moments, being able to say, hey, this is our agreement. How would you like to show up based on our agreement? What would it look like you mentioned earlier? You love to ask questions. So what if you asked your kids the question of, OK, here's our agreement. How do you want to show up at this moment so that you can honor our agreement? Then they get to decide. Then they're building self -trust.

29:56 And how powerful is our world when we have kids who love themselves and can trust themselves and feel safe within themselves? Yeah, it's a really helpful. reframe to give our kids and i think i think that's part of what we saw from vasa and it's part of one of the lessons we can learn and then what we see is is exactly the opposite of that with some subsequent things that happen to simba right um and you know we all know the story right scar ultimately uh is able to kill mufasa yes his whole plan to kill mufasa and does and then blames it on simba right and and then and then he tells simba it's a quote from the movie um this is just moments after uh mufasa's death and scars planting these seeds of self -blame and grief but the king is dead and if it weren't for you he'd still be alive and so scar reframes it in the worst way for simba and now simba's got this trauma of his dad dying. And now he's got an adult who's telling him it's his fault. Right. And so in what ways do we do that in our lives where trauma pulls us away from the wonderment and the possibility we have from that, you know, three, four, five, six year old brain. And then also what role does other people do other people play in in keeping us from that and getting us in the wrong mindset?

31:28 Absolutely. And sometimes it's as insidious as what Scar did. Yeah. Oh, totally. Right. And sometimes it's not. Sometimes it's a well -meaning person who's just trying to help. But sometimes it is manipulation or gaslighting. Pick your psychological abuse terminology. Seen both. And sometimes it's somebody is just living their own experience and they project it onto you. And so in those moments where we have the choice of, do I trust myself or do I trust you? And in those moments where it's like, I'm not sure, I'm feeling confused. I don't know the answer.

32:16 I need to go outside myself. And there's a difference between asking for perspective and checking in with you. Hey. I just got this information. How does this feel for me? How does this feel in my gut? Does this align with who I am at my core? Yes or no? I've quoted one of my favorite philosophers, Bruce Lee. He says, take what is useful, discard what is not, add what is uniquely your own. And for me, that means listen, be aware, be curious about perspectives. Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater. Take the part that's useful.

33:00 But also, don't just take everything. Nobody gets a lifetime pass to decide for me what my truth is. And your truth might be different than mine, and that's totally okay. Because what if the world was big enough for both of us to have our own lived experience and for us to both be able to show up and live our own path in a way that felt authentic to both of us? Like, what a great world to live in. And then as those traumas show up, there's times where those traumas hold us back from actually being who we are. There's times I remember in my own life, I was three years old. I'm standing on a stool trying to brush my teeth. And I was still a tall kid back then. I am six foot five, so I'm a tall guy.

33:54 the faucet handles. And I remember I was crying in there. I can't do it by myself. And my parents came in and they turned it into a song. Oh, I can't do it by myself. Sniff, sniff. And they didn't mean anything by it. Like they were just trying to get me to calm down. But what got planted in my mind is I can't do it by myself. And rather than saying, Hey, we got you. We're going to help you. You're okay. Your feelings are valid. You can feel this. You're safe to feel this. I totally understand why you're feeling this. You're good. All of a sudden, the subconscious programming went in. And by the way, I've heard the stat that says 95 % of our lived experience by the time we're 35 is subconscious. And so in those moments, All of a sudden, I had this subconscious programming running in the background of, I can't do this by myself. And any time a big decision showed up for me, I felt the need to ask somebody else to get help. To the point where I felt paralyzed in making the big decisions.

35:11 And it wasn't until I cleared that for my own life. Now I can. Now I can show up confidently. Now I can both ask for help. but also trust myself yeah it's interesting how you know for everybody different things that might be said to them play a role in in what our subconscious brain decides to take and what it doesn't you know as we as we look again at simba's journey right so after scar says that to him and and makes him feel the blame for it and he leaves he then encounters a couple of other creatures that have a very different philosophy, right? But, you know, as I was looking at it, maybe they have some trauma of their own because old Timon says something very interesting when Simba's kind of telling him what he experienced. And Timon says, when the world turns its back on you, you turn your back on the world, right? And it's like, okay, well. That's, you know, that's Timon's lived experience and that's his perspective because he's obviously been through some stuff, but now he's telling Simba the same thing. And what does Simba end up doing? I mean, that's what he does for whatever stretch of time it is from when he, you know, from when Mufasa dies till he's, you know, when we're past adolescence and starting to come into his own, presumably years, right?

36:34 That he's got this where he has. accepted the blame from scar that he shouldn't have he didn't need to carry that weight and he did now he's accepted this philosophy of hakuna matata right world turn their back on me i'm gonna turn the back on this world and that's the world he's living in and that's what he allows to do so these outside voices are what's controlling him and what he's doing rather than going back to what he knew, going back to what Mufasa taught him, going back to who he really was. And that stands in the way of him becoming who he was for a really long time. And I mean, we obviously, we do that at times. We let ourselves be held back by what other people say or just by the trauma, right? Just experiencing the trauma because something like a death is a big deal. It can really affect us. Have you ever had things like that, that you experienced a big trial or a big trauma or any clients that have that? you had to find a way to work through and work past so that you could go back to self -trust and self -belief and becoming who you who you're meant to be yeah so i'll go back to the client i mentioned earlier he's given me full permission to share his story so i'm not violating any confidentiality here he served in the military and he had a lot of trauma and when we first started coaching He was like, there's things I've never told anybody.

37:55 He's like, I've seen things that I can't tell anybody. And we ended up working through, and they were capital T traumas, you know, loss of life, serious injuries, roadside bombs going off, having a round come right up into the seat of the helicopter that he was flying in. And had they not have put in, an additional bulletproof material that morning he wouldn't be here so he had capital t trauma to work through a lot of my clients do and it's so fun to watch them be able to see it get down to the root of it and find okay i can let this go i don't have to keep holding on to this i don't have to keep replaying this in every area of my life because so many people the trauma creates the fear of what if this happens again and so like in my own example what if i can't do it by myself played out in so many areas of my life and as we release that trauma all of a sudden we're now open for all these new possibilities and what you said earlier about So many times we'll hear something.

39:25 It's like, okay, cool. I'm going to go learn from this. I'm going to go learn from this guy. I'm all in on this. And I'm super passionate about this. And then we move on to the next thing. It's like, all right, cool. I've just learned this new thing. I'm all in on this. And then we start noticing, oh, this seems to contradict this. What if... instead of this or this what if it was this and this or maybe it's a little bit of this and a little bit of this so if we were to take a little bit of the strength and the courage and the groundedness that um scar showed or not scar but mufasa showed and we were to take the Hakuna Matata. It means no worries for the rest of your days. That's carefree. That's enjoying life. So what if we could have it all?

40:22 That was one of the very first things I told Grace, who was an earlier guest on your podcast. What if you could have it all? And so what if it's not a this or this? What if it's a this and this? But it's not complete massive swing over here and then complete massive swing over here. What if it was just, I am finding balance with what aligns for me in this moment. I'm taking what feels aligned from what Timon and Mahumba are saying. It means no worries. It doesn't mean that I have to hook into his trauma around the world. I'm going to turn my back on the world. But it means, hey, we're going to go have fun. We're going to sing along the way. And let's go enjoy it. Before we jump back in, can I ask you a quick favor? If you're enjoying the journey so far, will you like, rate, and subscribe to our show? It helps us reach more people like you. We can design and create and build the most wonderful place in the world, but it takes people to make the dream a reality. That's such a good perspective. It's a yes and for me, right? Like, yes, what Mufasa taught is correct, right? Who you are is he was meant to be the king. And you can also live in the moment. You can also shed off worries and be present where you are, right?

41:45 Be present in what you're doing. I was just watching a golf tournament over the weekend. World number one golfer, Scotty Scheffler, right? He wins the tournament this weekend. He's had a really consistent season, all season. Hasn't won a lot of tournaments. In fact, he's only won two. He had one of his most consistent seasons. The reporter afterwards asked him, like, if you had any advice for kids that wanted to one day be where you are, what's the advice that you would give them? And he said, be where your feet are. When I'm at practice, like I'm at practice, I'm not thinking about hanging out with the guys. I'm not thinking about being at home and missing my kids and my wife, right? I'm also not thinking about the round. I'm thinking about I'm practicing and being there. When I'm playing a tournament, I'm there. And when I'm home, I'm home. And I'm not thinking about practice. I'm not thinking about the tournament I'm going to play in next. I love the idea of what you're talking about with the Kuna Matata thing. That is good. Like, let's take that thing. Let's have no worries in the moment. Be present in the moment where you are.

42:43 And you can also still remember who you are and step into your power and do those things. Like, both things can simultaneously be true. Yes. Yes. And when I look at them, it's like if I'm seeing a situation where it's this or this. It's usually if I take a step back and see the bigger picture, it's like, oh, these are two parts of the whole. Yes, there's absolute value to being safe, to being grounded, to having purpose, to having passion, to knowing what you want in your life, to designing your life, to creating a life that lets you up. And yes, there's absolute.

43:27 Power in being fully present, in being playful, in enjoying your life, in taking those moments, stopping at the side of the road and at the taco stand that just looks amazing instead of driving by it. Yeah. Those moments where you look back and nobody's going to say, man, I remember that random Wednesday at 11 p .m. when I had that meeting. everybody's going to remember oh my gosh i remember that time with dad and we went to the water slide park and it was the most fun day yeah yeah i love that that's fantastic uh let me ask you um let me ask you let me get a hot take from you yeah okay because i was thinking about this this morning when i was getting ready i had on the soundtrack for lion king right yeah like i love i love disney music and i was kind of getting prepped and one of the great songs i mean The soundtrack for Lion King is the classic, like, no -skips soundtrack. Like, every song is good. And one of the best villain songs out there is Be Prepared by Scar. Okay, so let me ask you about this. Because as I started thinking about it, I think it's a really interesting thing for us to look at. When we think about Scar, Scar knew what he wanted. Scar wanted something big. He wanted something huge. He wanted to be king. Scar... believed in it so much that he enlisted the help of the people around him. And he went about to make it happen. He trusted his

44:59 gut, so to speak, on what he was going to do. And yet it was for great evil. So contrast that for me. You know, when we're thinking about the idea of trusting your gut, trusting your intuition, believing in yourself, what's the difference between Simba remembering who he was and believing in himself and Scar? doing much the same thing with vastly different purposes and outcomes. And I'm going to tell you a funny story about The Lion King that actually leads into this. So when The Lion King came out, I was, I think I was either a junior or senior in high school. I was driving at the time. And my brother wanted The Lion King soundtrack. He was, I think he was 12 or 13 at the time. And so he was like, hey, Jeremy. He's like, I'll tell you what. he's like i will take over your chore of mowing the lawn if you go buy me the lion king soundtrack and me in my villain arc i wasn't like hey you know that's a bad deal for you i immediately went and grabbed my keys i hauled it to the local store i probably broke every speed law to get there before he changed his mind and i came back and like here you go Now you have this chore.

46:21 And so my dad, like a week later, he's like, hey, Jer, I need you to go mow the lawn. And I was like, no, you don't. This is my brother's job now. He's like, what do you mean? And I said, we made a deal. And my dad's like, that's a terrible deal. And I was like, it wasn't a terrible deal for me. And so in that moment, like, yeah, I was looking out for number one. And yeah, there's times where there's... We're we step into something and we're just looking out for number one. Yeah. And we're just looking out for, hey, what's going to advance me? And we're not thinking about the cost. We're not thinking about the bigger picture.

47:01 How does it impact other people? How does it impact our world? How does it what's going to be the knock on effect for what we're doing? We're so focused on the eye and not focused on the we. gets so focused on the me. So the W gets flipped upside down and it's now a me. And in those moments, a lot of times people are, a lot of times people want control because they need certainty. And underneath that needing certainty is the need to feel safe. And so if we were to go to a lot of those times with Scar, like, I'll bet you he didn't feel safe. Yeah. He didn't feel safe. He didn't feel wanted. Yeah. He didn't feel loved. Yeah. Yeah. It's totally true. Yeah.

47:49 I could have done some really good work with Scar. Right. He'd have been a great candidate for your coaching stuff because he could have used it, right? Totally. And instead of, I mean, because obviously he was skilled. Yeah. Obviously he knew how to inspire people to follow him and yet did it for great evil. um and you know it's a great it's a great point that you bring up it's it's what what is the focus of of what the purpose is is it focused purely on selfish things or is it focused on you know how we can Benefit everybody. Benefit those around us. Certainly ourselves as well, right? We're not going to completely forget about ourselves. But that's all he thought about. How can he have that sense of importance and that sense of being loved and admired and he was going to do anything necessary to do it. Whereas Simba was not focused on that at all. Yeah. Right. Simba, by contrast, is focused on, okay, I've got to remember who I am and what's the purpose of being the king. It's not so that...

48:52 I can be loved and admired. No, it's so I can effectuate great good for others. It's so I can take my right place in the circle of life, right? That's what Mufasa talks about, his place in the circle of life. And the circle of life is to benefit everybody, right? All of the creatures that were there, him taking his place was to benefit all of them. And I think the movie does a really nice job too of showing... You know, when Scar takes over, suddenly the circle of life is disrupted. Suddenly it's like, there is no food and everything's dark, right? Of course, it would never really happen in real life if the wrong lion took charge. But like, it's such a great visual representation of what that selfishness does versus care for everybody and for what the circle of life means. Absolutely. And one of my favorite definitions of love is what is for the highest good of all concerned. And that includes me, by the way. And so if I was to look at the way that Simba shows up and the way that Mufasa showed up, ultimately, it's through the lens of love. And if I was to look at the way that Scar showed up, it's through the lens of fear, through power and through manipulation. And so you have that contrast of, is it love or is it fear? Because a lot of times, if we just keep asking the question, and why is that? And why is that? And why is that? We'll get to either

50:24 love or fear at the end of that chain of why questions. Because what I've experienced is love or fear, fear or love. And the more we can release fear, the more capacity we have to show up in love. That's a great point. I love that. You know, one of the things that I came across in kind of preparing today was a quote by Adam Grant. Love Adam Grant. He's one of my favorites. He was on Andrew Huberman's podcast and they were talking a little bit about authenticity, right? And trusting yourself. And, you know, what...

51:06 what he talks about um he said that the the real test isn't does this feel authentic right now but is this consistent with my principles and here's the exact quote he says i think what we want to ask is is what i'm about to do or say consistent with my principle right and what what role do you think knowing what your principles are what role does that play into trusting yourself and and finding your authentic self so i had a very similar version of that thought come to me last week and the way it came to me was you are on your path if you're doing aligns with your being and for me when i know who i am and i'm clear on who i am and i'm in alignment with who i am right now everything i do one step at a time comes from alignment with that. If I'm trying to be something I'm not, if I'm trying to fit an avatar of a mask I've created, all of a sudden that gets really confusing. Okay, which mask did I wear with you? Okay, which mask did I wear with you? Okay, which mask did I wear with you? Trying to just juggle all that mental gymnastics is exhausting. where authenticity is who I am is just who I am. And the integrity

52:37 of it is I continue to show up as me in every situation, whether it's in public, whether it's on social media, whether it's in a group setting, whether it's in a community setting, whether it's one -on -one. Hey, this is me. Love it. Take it or leave it. How do you, though, find for you who you are keeping in mind, like, this idea of principles and values? Because we all have that little voice inside our head that at times tells us to do something we shouldn't do, right? That wants us to, you know, say the main thing or take advantage or take more than we're entitled to, right? And I think, again, sometimes what people will use as an excuse is that idea of like, oh, I'm just being my authentic self.

53:33 That's why I'm going to be a jerk. I'm just being honest, right? I'm just giving you the hard truth and I'm just being honest. And really, it's just brashness and harshness and being rude. Like, where is that difference, though, for people? Totally. And I love that. And another variation of that is, oh, I'm just keeping it real. Yes. Oh, I hear that way too often. You go and keep it real. uh -huh and so for me the distinction actually came in understanding the difference between for love and from love okay tell me more yeah so for love and as i mentioned earlier i'm a musician and i could see the times in my life where i would show up and i'd perform for love i'd want that cute girl in the audience to notice me i'd want my buddies in the band to think i was killing it i'd want the people who were there.

54:27 And so it's all external. It's all about them perceiving me. And then I thought about the times I performed From Love. And I was like, this is from my heart. I just love this music. I'm just vibing with this music. And if anybody else gets it or not, cool. This is for me, from me. And if you like it, awesome. If not, Cool. We're good. And then I got to take a look at everything I've created because I'm a creator as well. And so it was like, where did I create for love versus from love? And so what I ended up doing is I ended up taking a piece of paper, drawing a line down the middle for love on the left from love on the right. And the challenge to myself was Jeremy, anything you've created for love, go recreate it from love. And so. To your point about values, my values tend to be very stable.

55:29 My values don't change very often. They can sometimes, but my values tend to be my values. My values are a North Star for me. So I get really clear on what my values are. And then from those values, it can be a check -in. Does this feel aligned with my values? Or... Is my ego stepping in? Am I starting to do something that feels out of integrity with me just for a short term win, short term fix, a short term dopamine hit? Yeah. Those short term things, from my perspective, always wind up with long term consequences. When you took stock of things for love or from love, I mean, did you ever find that that sometimes you felt like something you did was both? Yeah.

56:20 Because as you're saying that, again, I love the principle of it. And as I sit there and think about it, though, I'm like, boy, sometimes I really feel like I'm doing it both. Because look, it feels good to have somebody appreciate what you're doing, right? Yeah. It feels good when we've done a podcast episode that I really felt passionate about and somebody that I'm out amongst the community and they're like, hey, I listened to the episode. It was really great. It feels good. You're like, okay, yeah, like, all right. Yeah. and so then you're like okay am i doing it for the praise or am i doing it because i love what what that is that i'm doing and i think that for me a lot of things in life i kind of see like man it's kind of like this battle when things i'm doing like yeah well i want to receive the love but i do want to do it from my heart and like what what do you do with that tension that exists there yeah so i for me like i remember a time a couple years ago i wrote a song for a friend for their birthday. Cheesy song, like totally cheesy song. Like a lot of songs tend to be, but it was from my heart. And like that part was straight up from love. The for love part was we had a big birthday party for her.

57:37 And I had my friends play the song for everybody at the birthday party. You know, there's probably like 40 people there. And that part of me was my ego wanting my other friends to see, oh, my gosh, look at this amazing gift Jeremy just made for his friend. And so it was both in that situation. And what I've noticed is it's OK to want to enjoy when somebody appreciates what you do. I love it when somebody says, hey, Jeremy, you said something that changed my life. I love it when my clients come up to me and say. oh my gosh, that session we just had, like I've been showing up differently since then. That's not my why though. My why is I love seeing people step into their power. And so you can do the exact same thing, but from a different why. And so if I get that adulation, if I get that acknowledgement, if I get that recognition. awesome. It feels good. I'm going to look at them and say, thank you so much. I receive that with gratitude, but it's not why I'm doing it. Yeah. You're not, you're not just searching for that. You're not just searching for the love and praise. That's not the only thing that's motivating you. You've got the pure motivations and you accept the love as it comes. Absolutely. Absolutely. If I'm so abundant, why wouldn't love come into my life?

59:05 Yeah. and that's a great point yeah abundance is more than just money abundance is opportunities it's love it's relationships it's friendships it's connections yeah when you show uh love and kindness to people as a regular practice of what you do inevitably it will come back to you yes yes yes and i was actually sitting with that over the weekend And if you've been religious, the religious people will teach that as give and it will be given. And if you think about the golden rule, show the way you want other people to treat you. If you think about the tradition of karma, what you put out into the world comes back to you. And so every major tradition has a version of this. And I love what you're talking about here. And I believe it's true. If we show up as our most authentic selves and we show up in ways that are authentic to ourselves, inevitably more comes back to us than we put out there.

1:00:21 Like if you think about a farmer, they go out into a field and they plant seeds. But then you think about the harvest that it comes back with. Like for each seed that they planted, let's say they were planting corn. One seed equals an entire stock of corn with all these ears on it. So that one seed multiplied itself. Yeah. So inevitably. When we show up as our authentic selves and we give big and we love big it. comes back to us more than we could have ever anticipated in more creative ways than we could have anticipated and that just requires us to be aligned with ourselves and trusting ourselves every day yeah i love that so at the end of the episode we're going to get to your three actual takeaways yeah but before we get to our this or that or our rapid fire yeah any other final thoughts about this idea of um trusting yourself trusting your gut and especially as it relates to lion king absolutely so if we think about the end of the lion king so it's the showdown between scar and simba and simba he has to trust himself like major gut check time it's all on the line he has burned the boats there's no plan b he's bet it all on himself for this moment And that doesn't

1:01:53 mean we have to live life without a contingency plan. In fact, sometimes not having a contingency plan is a failure mode. But in this moment, Simba said, I'm going all in on me. I'm doing it for the best of our whole tribe. Scar isn't the right one to lead. Scar killed my father. I've wanted to be king my whole life. It's my time. and i'm going to step in and i'm going to lead and i'm going to do this from a place of self -trust and so um like i think about the m m song um palms are sweaty uh oh yeah mom's spaghetti lose yourself in the music the moment you never let go you get one shot this opportunity only comes once in a lifetime Like I can imagine that being Simba's walk -up song as he's getting ready to go fight Scar. And in that moment, he's just gut -checking himself. And he's believing in himself. I can do this. And it's all on the line.

1:03:02 And in that moment, he's stepping into massive self -trust. Because there's no other option in that moment. If he had one ounce of fear. He might hesitate, and who knows what happens in that moment. But he's stepping out there in total belief of who he is, in total alignment with who he is, and just allowing himself to show up as his authentic self in the moment. And to your point earlier, he did it from love, not for love. Yeah. He had to love his pride. Not his internal pride, the pride, right? His group of people, he had to love all of the animals that were there, part of the circle of life, more than in that moment than he valued his own life. He had to put it all on the line. And it was from love that he was willing to make that sacrifice for everybody else. It's such a good framing of that for me that I hadn't thought about before. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Freaking love it. Not everywhere can be the happiest place on earth. And at RCG Law Group, my job outside of our podcast, we get that. Life throws curveballs, legal stuff, family stuff, the things you didn't see coming. That's what we're here for. If you're dealing with something and don't know where to turn, give RCG a call. Okay. So let's go to some fun segments, and then we're going to circle back to your three actual takeaways. Can't wait to get those. Let's do it. Okay, here's our this or that. Now, it's just whichever one you think.

1:04:34 If I think your opinion is controversial, I will call you out on it, right? We can have fun with it, okay? First one, Timon or Pumbaa? Timon. Timon. Okay, tell me more. Just a fun... fun little character throughout the movie like yeah he's just so much fun like he's so loyal and he's so snarky exactly exactly like everybody needs a timon in your life totally do oh i love i love timon okay hakuna matata or circle of life hakuna matata yeah it's a fun song right i mean i love both of them yeah but no worries for the rest of your days yeah yeah uh simba as a cub Or as king? Ooh, both. Okay, I'm going to make you choose one. I'm going to make you choose one. I accept that it's both. I accept that because it's part of who he is. But if you had to say one or the other, what would it be?

1:05:31 I would say Simba is king. Yeah. Because Simba is king actually embodies Simba is the cup. And he's brought that innocence, that joy, that play. Into who he is. And then he's also brought the wisdom in. Yeah. He's had to remember who he was. Right. Remember that time with that wonderment. Okay. Stargazing or sunrise. Stargazing. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I do love a good sunrise. And I remember getting up at Croatia at four in the morning to go catch some amazing photos of those. That said. That was also four in the morning and stargazing, like being out laying under the stars, especially in a black light community where you can see it when you're out away and you can just see. It's just one of my favorite things ever. Yeah, we I was on a on a trip this summer with some young men in my neighborhood, including my two boys. And we were on the Green River. and it is there is no artificial light anywhere around and i just remember looking up at night and you can just see so many stars there's just this sense of wonder that you get yeah when you look and see all of the stars out it is pretty cool yeah i like that answer um journaling or talking it out they're both great tools For me,

1:07:09 it's talking it out. For me, I love sitting down with somebody I trust, talking it through, getting their perspective, sharing mine and co -creating that process together. Yeah. Yeah. I'm a bit of an external processor and I start to evolve and develop what my thoughts are when I can talk it out loud with somebody. Yeah. I find that to be very helpful. Solo hike. Or road trip with a friend? Road trip with a friend. Okay. Are you a solo hike guy? I can be. Okay. I'm definitely not, like at all. Yeah. They introduced two new love languages last year. So instead of the five love languages, it's now seven. Oh, I didn't know this. Yeah. The two new ones they introduced were emotional safety and shared experiences.

1:08:04 So I thought I was quality time. but shared experiences it hits even closer to home for me and so road trip with a friend is right up my shared experience alley totally yeah it makes total sense okay this next one i think i know now basically we talked about but i'm gonna go ahead and ask anyways Karaoke or trivia night? Ooh, karaoke. Yeah. Cause you're a singer. Cause you can sing. Like I am not a singer at all. Even though like karaoke can be fun. I'm a terrible singer. Nobody wants to listen to me sing. I've had some fun nights doing karaoke. I'll bet. What's your go -to karaoke song? Bohemian Rhapsody. Oh, heck yeah. Amazing. Oh, what a great karaoke song too. Or Baby Got Back. I mean, yeah, you are definitely a kid that grew up in the 90s. There's no doubt that that's one of your go -tos. I'm a I want it that way guy. Nice. I love that. Backstreet Boys.

1:08:57 I can go there anytime. My brother and I are not singers. And yet I can still like a core memory. He and I, we're in our 20s and we went and did karaoke and he and I sang it together. And then a couple of our friends joined midway through the song. That's a core memory, right? Yeah. We're terrible. We can't sing it well at all. And yet we've had an absolute blast doing it. Yeah. Tell me why. Exactly. Exactly. Window seat or aisle seat? Ooh, aisle seat. Because I'm a tall guy. Yeah, you are. When they're not pushing the carts through, I might sneak my legs out just to stretch them out every once in a while. And if I need to go to the bathroom, I don't want to have to climb over two people.

1:09:37 Man, we are perfectly aligned there. It is the same thing. I'm not quite as tall as you are, but definitely a tall guy. I don't want to be sneaking past somebody or bumping into them every time I got to go to the bathroom. And look, I'm in my mid -40s. It means I got to go to the bathroom a lot. So you can pretty much guarantee I'm going to go during a flight unless it's to Vegas or something. And so, yeah, I'm an aisle guy all the way there. Okay, last this or that. Text or call? Ooh. depends on who it is whoever you want yeah um i love a good call with somebody i love being it because 93 of communication is non -verbal so much of communication is lost in text it's so convenient because it's asynchronous yeah but there's something great about a live conversation with somebody else sure have you ever tried a voice memo. Do you like those? Yes.

1:10:34 I know some people love them because you do get a little bit more flavor in it. It's still not the back and forth that you get in a conversation, right? But it's a little bit more context and flavor than just a text. Yeah. I've tried it. I still am not like a convert to voice memos, but I can definitely understand the value in those. Yeah. It's a hybrid between a text and a call or the next step up to something like Marco Polo. Oh, yeah. People love some Marco Polo. Yeah. Because then you get to see the facial expression too. Yeah. For sure. Okay. You ready for a rapid fire? Let's do it. Okay. Just whatever comes to mind. Yeah. Okay. Favorite Disney movie. The Lion King. Okay. That's a good answer, right? A lot of times that's what it ends up being is it's the movie we just talked about. Favorite Disney song? Ooh. I'll say Hakuna Matata. Okay.

1:11:23 That's a great answer. I've gotten that answer before. Yeah. People love that song. I do too. It's a wonderful song. Favorite Disney princess? Princess Jasmine. Jasmine. You see, you are a 90s guy. Yeah, Aladdin was so good. Yeah, it was. I remember that. I loved Jasmine, too, growing up. Oh, man, Jasmine. Favorite Disney hero? I would say Aladdin. Okay, Aladdin. He's a good hero, for sure. Now, we haven't talked about it. Have you ever been to Disneyland or Disney World? Yes. Which one? I've been to both. Okay. I used to live in California. And I used to have season passes to Disneyland. We should talk more about Disneyland. Okay. But I'm going to kick back to a quick this or that then. Yep. Disneyland or Disney World? Disney World. Disney World.

1:12:09 Okay. Now within Disney World, let's go Animal Kingdom or Epcot? Animal Kingdom. Okay. And now what about Hollywood Studios or Magic Kingdom? Magic Kingdom. Okay. Then let's, I guess let's siphon it down. Magic Kingdom or Animal Kingdom? Magic Kingdom. Okay. So Magic Kingdom is your thing. You love Magic Kingdom. Yeah. Okay. So now this will pop us to our rapid fire. Favorite ride at Disneyland or Disney World? The Indiana Jones ride. Really? Yeah. Okay. Classic ride. I mean, when that came out, do you remember when that came out? Oh, yeah. Were you living in California at the time? Yeah. Oh, man. It was unbelievable, right? Like everything about the ride was great.

1:12:49 The queue was amazing. No experience of it. I mean, the little video they did, like right before you get on, right? So fun, like explaining, don't look in the eye. Oh, it's a great ride. And now they're doing an Indiana Jones update to what was the dinosaur ride, right? is it animal kingdom i think that's where it is animal kingdom you heard this no i haven't yeah so d23 they made a big announcement that uh harrison ford's gonna gonna lend his voice to the redesign because they they use the same style of ride to create the dinosaur ride if you ever went on it at animal kingdom i always thought it was kind of lame there's that's probably controversial a lot of people love that ride sorry for those of you that do i having been on indiana jones i was always like ah kind of it's fine but they're going to do a full update with harrison ford indiana jones for that ride i can't wait for it cool yeah you you'll love it yeah yeah and if they wanted to go um co -op with universal studios make it indiana jones meets jurassic park wouldn't that be cool that'd be amazing um okay place you'd most like to visit ooh um southeast asia australia and new zealand okay oh those would be fun times have you ever watched bluey you don't have kids so you might not have i have never watched bluey okay Bluey, Australia is Bluey. And they did a big thing at D23 because they're going to do a Bluey movie now. And they had the mom and dad do some interviews that were

1:14:20 there. And it's so funny to hear, to see them talk because they sound exactly like their characters on Bluey. It was amazing. But they're Australian and they've got great accents. Dream podcast guest. Ooh, great question. I would say podcast guest. I would say. I would say it would be so fun to have Oprah on. Oprah? Yeah. Oh, yeah, it would. It'd be amazing. Oprah would be an incredible guy. Okay, we're going to put that out there in the universe for you. Yeah. Oprah on your podcast. We're putting it out there, okay? We're going to find a way to make this happen. Favorite book? My favorite book is The Four Agreements. I mentioned it earlier. That's your favorite? Uh -huh. Okay, well, we're definitely going to make sure that's in the show notes for sure. Animal you'd want as your spirit guide?

1:15:07 Ooh, I would say a lion. Okay. Yeah. That makes sense. Yeah. They're big. They're strong. They're powerful. They're brave. They're leaders. Yeah. I mean, if mine was a lion, it would have to also have the voice of James Earl Jones. Just got me through with that deep, booming voice. Oh, I love his voice. Could you imagine if he got to narrate your life? Oh, it'd be amazing. I'll throw in also potentially the singing from... Alton Fitzgerald White. So he's his book right here. We had him on the podcast. He played Mufasa on Broadway more than 4 ,000 times. Wow. He's got a great deep voice, like just speaking voice.

1:15:50 And then when he sings, it's like, oh my goodness. He can sing the phone book and I would love it. So if he could be my animal guide with that voice, that'd be amazing too. Favorite food? Favorite food is steak. Steak. Where's your favorite place to go for it? My grill. Oh, your own grill? My own grill. I was like, my grill? Is that a place I don't know? No, your own home grill. Okay, well, where do you buy the steak from? The local butcher. Okay, so you go to like an official butcher to get it because you got to get the best. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, my favorite. I did this for myself last year on my birthday. I went and got a cut of A5 Wagyu and did it on my grill. Oh, my. And how do you cook it? Two minutes on each side. So you're like rare? Or is that medium rare? That's literally the cook for that steak.

1:16:40 Okay. Like I bought it. How hot, what temperature is it to do two minutes on each side? It got to like 135, which is right where I wanted it. Okay. Oh, the grill was 500. Okay, 500. That's what I was going for. The steak was. So I bought it and they looked at me because it's not a cheap cut. No. And they're like, do you know how to cook this? I love that. It's like, absolutely. And they're like, are you sure? And I said, I got this. Two minutes on each side, 500 degrees. It's fine. And it was amazing. It was so tender that you didn't even need a knife. It sounds amazing. I'm going to have to find out the butcher you went to because steak is definitely my favorite. I love it. I love it. Part of why I like Ruth's Chris because they do steaks really well. But yeah, they don't have Wagyu. All right. Favorite city. Favorite city. I would say Split, Croatia.

1:17:33 Really? Uh -huh. Okay. Tell me more. It was beautiful there. It's right on the Mediterranean Sea. The food is incredible because it's right next to Italy. So you're getting that flavor palette. Yeah. It's really inexpensive. The people are so nice. We stayed in a Roman castle while we were there. Okay, you might be convincing me I need to visit. I always thought, like, I don't know why people go to Croatia. I might be convinced. That was the place I went for my 4 a .m. sunrise photos, overlooking the bay. So you get the sun just peeking up over the bay. And I showed the pictures to the people in our group, and they were like, these are incredible. Can we get some?

1:18:17 And I'm like, sure. It's like, come with me tomorrow. They're like, what time? I said, 4 a .m. They're like, never mind. We're good. They're like, send me yours. That's too funny. Okay. How about this one? This one might not be a rapid fire because it might take more explanation, but we're going to ask it anyways. How are you saying yes and in your life right now? I say yes and in my life when something's a full yes for me, I say yes. And then I add on my own part to it. And so yes, and comes from improv comedy. It sure does. And so, hey, I'm going to take what you're offering and now I'm going to add my piece. And so that's, I'm showing up as me. I'm taking what you're adding and we're world building together. We're co -creating. And so I strive to do that in my friendships, my relationships, in my communities.

1:19:14 just creating that world of yes and phenomenal phenomenal um and then last rapid fire question again this one might not be so rapid but what is the question i should have asked you that i didn't i would say what did it take to remember how to love yourself okay so that is the question um so I grew up and lived the whole expected life. So lived in church, grew up in church, went to youth group, started playing in the church band, met my wife, got married young. We were married for 10 years. I thought that what I was supposed to do was lose my identity so that we could create a new one together. Come to find out. They call that codependence. That's exactly the word that came to my mind when you said that.

1:20:17 I was like, oh, yeah, it's codependency. I didn't know it at the time. But started there. When the marriage ended, I had to go figure out who I was again, starting from nothing. So I had to rebuild from the ground up. And so I had learned how to be really, really hard on myself. I spent a whole year just learning who I was and then started learning as much as I possibly could about leadership, about values, about who do I want to be. And then realized I was still really hard on myself because I would set goals for myself and it was pass -fail. So if it was pass...

1:21:05 give myself about two minutes to celebrate and then i'm on to the next goal if it's fail i'm gonna beat myself up for that i'm gonna be really hard on myself and what i realized is i can still achieve the exact same thing in my life but i can do it from a place of loving myself and compassion because if people can only love me to the extent i love myself and people will show up for me the way that I treat myself, because it's all a mirror. And like last year, I decided I was going to lose some weight. And in the past, I had always done it by being really restrictive and really hard on myself. I knew how to get the results. But I decided I was going to lose some weight. And in about six months, I lost 50 pounds. And I did it from a place of self -love, self -care. And I did it in a way that was sustainable for me. And so I could feel the difference. I was like, oh, I'm finally embodying that level of self -love that I've been working on for years. Yeah. Amazing. What a great answer.

1:22:15 Yeah. Great question. As well. Glad you asked it. So as we kind of wrap up, what are your three actionable takeaways? So for self -trust, the first thing I would do. is I would say, get to know yourself. Who are you right now? And ways you can do it is journaling. You can do it by reflection. You can do it prayer or meditation. Just get to know yourself. Get curious about who you are right now. Get curious about what you like, what you don't like, and write it down. Okay, love that. So get curious and write it down? The second step is... as you know your own voice learn how to take in feedback as somebody else's perspective and their truth rather than the truth capital t each person has their own perspective yeah and so what we said earlier take what's useful discard what's not so anything i've said on this podcast take what's useful discard what's not this is my perspective yeah and check in with yourself this is the third part check in with yourself does this feel true for me right now and then how do i want to implement what i've heard that resonates with me that lands

1:23:47 with me that feels good in my gut how do i want to implement that in my life pick one to three things that say i know i can do this today that feels achievable i'm not picking the hundred year plan i'm not even picking the five -year plan pick something that you can do today or tomorrow just notice one or two or three things and it could be as simple as hey i'm going to write down one thing i love about myself i'm going to notice where i might pause on a decision and just make one and it could be a low stakes decision i i used to go on these drives where it was i would just ask myself left or right and the point of the drive was to learn how to trust myself and so i would just go on these drives and i was just when i got to a crossroads right or left it didn't matter what the answer was but most of the time i wound up somewhere really cool yeah wound up at a park wound up in a field wound up at a taco truck sure in fact i had a friend do one i mentioned it to her a couple weeks ago and she's like chair I did your intuitive drive and I'm at a taco stand. And I'm like, well, you did it right. If it ends in a taco stand, you did it right. I'm a big taco fan as well. But I would definitely be there like, yes, tacos. And today's Tuesday. So what a perfect day to be talking about tacos. Oh, yeah, it is. Taco Tuesday. Yeah. So the recording today is a Tuesday. So when people listen to

1:25:17 this on a Thursday, just. that next Tuesday, go find yourself at a taco stand. We are giving you permission to trust yourself and go get tacos. That's right. It's always a good answer. Appreciate you so much. Thank you so much for the conversation today, for your willingness to share your story, be vulnerable with us, help to explore things, be curious, asking questions. I think there's so much that people can learn from the Lion King, from the things that you had to share with your coaching experience and how we can learn to trust ourselves. how we can learn to find a bit more happiness by doing that, finding the love for ourselves, and then we can show up better for other people as we do that. So thank you so much. Of course. Thank you for having me, Ryan. You got it. It's a pleasure. As you leave this conversation, remember that yes, the past can hurt and you can either run from it or you can learn from it. So here's to learning and finding joy in the journey. See you real soon.