#174 - The Ironman Executive Steven Pivnik's Life

Ever found yourself at the crossroads between comfort and the call of the wild unknown? That's where guest Steven Pivnik stands, a man who transformed the very fabric of his life from the disciplined focus of a successful entrepreneur to the heart-pounding exhilaration of an endurance athlete. This episode is your chance to absorb the raw, riveting tales of Steven's life, a journey marked by the steadfast values of an immigrant family, and how they fueled his rise from an employee to a titan of industry.

Strap in for a deep exploration of the trials and triumphs that come with scaling a business, the nuances of partnership akin to marriage, and the wisdom gained from strategic delegation and mentorship. Steven's narrative isn't just about professional milestones—it's an intimate look at integrating the rigor of Ironman challenges and the Zen of long-distance marathons into a lifestyle that reshapes priorities, enriches relationships, and carves out a legacy of perseverance.

Finally, we're climbing to breathtaking heights with Steven's larger-than-life adventures in extreme sports and mountaineering, where each peak conquered is more than just a physical triumph—it's a testament to the power of visualization and daring to dream big. From the shores of open-water ultra-triathlons to the daunting aspirations of climbing Mount Everest, this episode promises to leave you inspired, pondering what mountains you'll conquer in your own life, spurred on by the relentless pursuit of growth, learning, and the sweet adrenaline rush of achieving the impossible.

How to Reach Steven:
Website: https://stevenpivnik.com/
Link for Steven's Book Built to Finish: https://a.co/d/5QOYcaM 

To Reach Jordan:

Email: Jordan@Edwards.Consulting

Youtube:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9ejFXH1_BjdnxG4J8u93Zw

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jordan.edwards.7503

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jordanfedwards/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordanedwards5/

Hope you find value in this. If so please provide a 5-star and drop a review.

Complimentary Edwards Consulting Session: https://calendly.com/jordan-555/intro-call

Transcript

Speaker 1: 1:00

Hey, what's going on, guys? I got a special guest here today. We have Steven Pivnik. He's closed multimillion dollar leasing deals with IBM and Microsoft. He's also ran the Ironman World Championship and Ultra Marathons. He's submitted expeditions and he's best known for going the distance. So, steven, I'm so glad we're here in. Your New York apartment is all good to have here. How did you become built? To finish, how did this start for you?

Speaker 2: 1:33

Yeah, interesting. How did I became built to finish overnight? I think my life evolved to be one that finishes epic things yeah, it's a side-run by an Ironman business. I got bitten by the entrepreneurial bug, which I inherited from my parents, yeah, and the business started to succeed. And then later on in life, I started to do other cool things, like triathlons, and I got into mountaineering and I experimented with Ultra Marathons. So they all built on each other and each one of them. I just enjoyed finishing and then starting the next one.

Speaker 1: 2:10

Yeah, absolutely, because you find so many people get so laser focused and they can't and shunt the next activity. So you mentioned about your parents. Yeah, how did your parents impact you and help you along that?

Speaker 2: 2:23

journey. My parents were a huge help. I mean, they were incredibly inspirational. We immigrated to this country when I was three years old. Wow, we left the former Soviet Union due to anti-Semitism. Yeah, it got pretty bad. I can't imagine how bad it must have been for them to actually uproot an entire family yeah, so it got bad. So it was. They really motivated me a lot because they did an incredibly hard thing, yeah, and I watched them grind it out as immigrants in a brand new country, in this strange land, and they did whatever it took, you know, put it on the table to put a roof over our house and it was just incredibly inspirational and motivational to watch.

Speaker 1: 3:03

So I think that's where I get a lot of my rich from Absolutely, because, when you think about it, the five people we spend the most time around impact us drastically. So, with that being your parents, and immigration, and seeing them building their own businesses and their own lives in short, that's very motivating as a child. And what would you say? Those major values that you saw from them and learned from?

Speaker 2: 3:29

them. I mean I also have to include my grandparents. I didn't include my grandparents because we were a family unit. I mean I definitely learned love. It was a very loving family. I learned how to trust. A work ethic was a huge value that I picked up because there was no such thing as sick days, right, yeah, they worked from sunrise to sunset, literally.

Speaker 2: 3:51

Yeah, Six days a week sometimes seven days a week, no sick days, and they did whatever it took. So I thanked them for a lot of things, but the biggest one, I think, is just work ethic. Yeah, I just work a lot, which is what I did.

Speaker 1: 4:06

Yeah, absolutely, because I mean, I even saw it when we were scheduling this podcast. I was like, hey, I'll come to your office early and you're like what time's early?

Speaker 2: 4:14

And I'm like oh, 9.30,.

Speaker 1: 4:15

You know, because sometimes you talk to some people and they're like but 11, some people are like you're like Jordan, we need like early is early.

Speaker 2: 4:23

You want to be not early. 6.30 is early, 9.30 is not early.

Speaker 1: 4:27

Yeah, so I knew you had it in you. So when you started your business journey, how did that begin? Because I know it had a couple of variations over the 20 years. Yeah, so when I got into my, when I started my computer career.

Speaker 2: 4:40

I first worked for other companies and did that for several years, and then I just noticed that I could probably be doing a better job if I worked for myself. One of my last jobs before going into business for myself was for a consulting company where I was a contractor.

Speaker 2: 4:54

Yeah, they were basically a placement agency. They got contracts with large companies and they found the necessary skill sets to staff jobs. So I was staffed on a program job and then I noticed that I'm just using round numbers they were charging a customer $100 per hour and paying me $60 per hour, making the $40 margin and adding no value whatsoever. And granted, they found the customer and they got the project. Great, give them credit for that. But months and months went on and they didn't do any project management. They didn't do any customer relationship management.

Speaker 2: 5:28

I never saw my employer. Yeah, my customer never saw my employer. I'm like you know what? If I cut out the middleman here and start up a company and go directly to these end customers they provide the same level of service or I can provide much more added value services.

Speaker 1: 5:44

I can be doing better for myself, which is exactly what I did so when you were going through that process, because I know nowadays a lot of people are doing side hustles and kind of maneuvering their way in to finally make that leap. Did you just cut the cord and then go, or are you a contract lined up? How do you think about that transition? Actually, I cut the cord.

Speaker 2: 6:02

I mean, fortunately I was younger, I didn't have kids yet, had a tiny apartment. The expenses weren't huge at that point, so it was a calculated risk, so it was all in. I don't think the side hustle wasn't invented yet.

Speaker 1: 6:23

So when you're going first days in, how are you feeling at this? You quit your job. Now we're sitting here and we're like I need to figure out a way to get paid. How do you think about that?

Speaker 2: 6:34

Yeah, it was a little bit scary. I mean, there was also two failed attempts prior to the one that I just described. There was a couple of versions that weren't as organized, I should say, and were a little bit more visionless in terms of just throwing spaghetti up against the wall. Those felt a lot scarier because there was less of a plan. Ok, so I think the third time, which hits really successfully, went better and smoother because of the lessons learned with the first two.

Speaker 1: 7:03

Yes, so and why do you think we? The funny thing is, I was thinking about this In schools we're told don't fail. Yeah, it's like, fail as much as you possibly can to learn.

Speaker 2: 7:18

There's so many people out there that will say it's exactly that. If you're not failing, you're not learning, and failure is you. Don't have to look upon it as a negative, just look upon it as a learning experience, which every single failure is. It wasn't for all the failures that I had in my company Put it in the groan at the level that I eventually grew into. Don't be afraid to fail?

Speaker 1: 7:40

Yeah, absolutely. And that's the reason I'm talking about the problem, because you have to take these lessons and these leaves and these calculated risks yeah, otherwise you're never going to move the needle 100%.

Speaker 2: 7:52

There's actually a chapter We'll talk about the book later. It's called DNF. Did Not Finish. Yeah, that's the most dreaded three initials in any research vocabulary. That means you didn't get to the finish line. Yeah, and some people relate that to failure. Yeah, and I'm a firm believer that if you did not finish, that doesn't mean you failed. That just means you did not finish. Yeah, learn from it, dust yourself off and start again. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 8:18

And I think the biggest fears come from. It's funny because they came out with the two biggest fears, and it's fear of rejection and fear of failure, which is not surprising because rejection you have to go there, you have to go try to get clients, you're talking to the different businesses, and then fear of failure is like what if I can't perform? What if I can't do this? What if this doesn't work? And we always have these questions about ourselves, but we have to push through this.

Speaker 2: 8:41

Oh, yeah, yeah, 100%. I mean, there's an old sales edit right, Every single note is that much closer to a yes. Yeah, I mean I used to die off of dollars. Anybody, any real entrepreneur, probably die off of dollars and get cold calls or cold emails in their career. And, yeah, you have to accept these notes.

Speaker 1: 8:59

Yeah, there's definitely there's a yes there. It could be 100 notes away.

Speaker 2: 9:04

It could be a thousand notes away, but there's just so many stories of that being true.

Speaker 1: 9:09

Yeah, absolutely. And the funny thing is, when you started looking around and you found your quote, unquote, tribe, or your people or your companies that you work with, you started to realize you're like whoa, that person chose me over, like 27 nodes that person, Emily. You started helping these companies and these people and you're like you start getting more conviction and confidence in what you're doing.

Speaker 2: 9:30

Yeah, the confidence is huge and like the best time to go out and get another customer is right after you've landed one.

Speaker 1: 9:36

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 9:36

Right. So most people think, okay, I just find another customer. I think I need to get to work on that customer.

Speaker 1: 9:41

I need to satisfy their requirements.

Speaker 2: 9:43

Yes, that's true, but at the same time, go and get your very next one, because your confidence is at an all time high and that's going to show in your effort in getting the next one. So the term always be closing I have different variations of it, but always be closing the new business.

Speaker 1: 10:01

Yeah, no, no, no, absolutely, absolutely, because we can start thinking about it. The other thing I really enjoyed is, as you get more customers now, your risk is diversified across all these different areas, so you're not centralized on oh my God, if I lose this one customer we're out of business.

Speaker 2: 10:20

Customer concentration is a bad thing If you're ever going to get a credit line with a bank, if you ever go through any sort of due diligence for acquisition or new partnership. People looking at your books hate customer concentration. Yeah, and that's the whole risk. And it's so, so true. I mean you can think you have the best relationship in the world with these one or two customers. There could be factors completely outside your control that would derail that relationship and dry up your revenue stream. So customer concentration is a bad thing, a major risk.

Speaker 1: 10:54

So, as you're going into this, you're looking at it, because the thing I found really interesting about your story is that you go from being the consultant to now stepping back a little bit and you got a bunch of employees, you're different hiring, and then you also had that software project that allowed you to create from there, which was a calculated risk. So how did you think about that when you started as the paid for money and then the transition?

Speaker 2: 11:22

Yeah, that was a really interesting transition, so we got hired as consultants to build a custom project for a company. In this case it was a conversion tool. A customer wanted to go from one email platform to another and they needed to convert all this data. So at the time it was a super boring project. We were doing cooler things, but being consultants and entrepreneurs.

Speaker 2: 11:44

We weren't going to say no to business. So we wrote this product and then all of a sudden we found out that other companies need a similar product, like holy cow. That's called the software business. Instead of having to do this from scratch, we could just sell them a license to what we just built. And we did that and that's when kind of our store-off-court business emerged from and we started doing that more and more and more and launched an entire software division.

Speaker 1: 12:14

So how often do you see this occur? Because I know your consulting business is, because I realize it. Sometimes we put in all this work and all this effort and we think that a loss and we think maybe there's nothing to gain from it. But we do gain these skills, like you said right there. Like that software example was a brilliant example of like I thought we were just doing one project but it ended up becoming a whole new business line. And this happened so much in life where we're like I think I'm working on something but I don't really know. So how often were you guys kind of exploring different risks and different options inside of your business that are like maybe this is a thing, maybe it's not a thing, because I doubt the software was the only one.

Speaker 2: 12:53

Yeah, you know what I think in hindsight? We should have done it more. Yeah, because we continue to do a lot of custom projects. So let me correct you. A lot of software is built out of custom projects. Customers hire a company to do something for them that's super, super unique. Then all of a sudden, they realize that there's more opportunity for what we just built. A lot of software is born like our example.

Speaker 2: 13:18

In my case, I don't think we did that enough. Oh really, because there could have been so much more opportunity to do additional things and create a lot on other software products. We kind of became a victim of our own success. There was so much need for that software that we created that we just sold a lot of it and we modified it, we customized it for various customers and we just became snowballed. Had we continued to replicate that model that got us there to begin with, I think we could have done even more.

Speaker 1: 13:49

Wow, and that's important to hear from someone. That's such a successful exit because it's making us realize that there's so many iterations that occur. Yeah, that can cause us to always improve. So how did you get this mindset of constantly iterating and leveling up? You're typing in all the info, you're doing all the stuff. Now we're getting into sales. We're doing sales dynamics. Now we're getting into ownership dynamics. There's so many different hats to wear. How did you grow yourself from a few people to 200 plus employees?

Speaker 2: 14:29

It was definitely an evolution. It didn't happen overnight. Hindsight is always a fantastic tool, but growth could have happened a lot smoother and a lot quicker had we been more experienced. But we were young. We were young entrepreneurs doing this for the first time. One of my favorite sayings is anytime you do something for the first time without export guidance, your results are going to be suboptimal. Could we have grown faster or smarter? Absolutely, but to answer your question, we just evolved. As business continued to grow, we started hiring more staff. As we hired more staff, we realized that the owners, myself, we can't be coding all day, every day. We need to start doing more managerial things and then continue to add layers beneath us. And then we realized that we can't be doing sales all day long. We need to hire a sales force. We hired a sales person, we hired a second sales person and then we continued to scale and that same methodology was executed across every single department and started growing and expanding.

Speaker 1: 15:38

It's incredible because there's so many times where people are, sometimes they're forced into roles and then sometimes they're building themselves into roles and it can be very challenging because you don't know the skill sets ahead. What do you think would have made a major difference, in regard to looking back hindsight, to have exponential more success? Would it be bringing in speakers, consultants, these different people to help?

Speaker 2: 16:02

you. I wish I would have been open to better guidance early on. Being a cocky entrepreneur, I built this thing. I know it all. Let's continue to forge ahead. Later on in my career I realized the benefit of advisors, how much quicker they can help move the needle. So had I been open to that earlier, the road would have been smoother, faster, greater, etc. But better late than never. I eventually brought on some fantastic advisors and had this great exit?

Speaker 1: 16:37

Yeah, absolutely, which is awesome. And when you started, was it just you or did you have other partners?

Speaker 2: 16:43

Actually I started with Suckal of the Partners. I introduced this opportunity to several others that were in a similar boat that I was in and we all started a company together. But that's a whole. Another separate, bolo Wax. I have a friend in Texas. His favorite city is partners are for loving and dancing, not for business.

Speaker 1: 17:05

No, I asked that because I know there's so hard to pull off the partner. I don't realize you're married.

Speaker 2: 17:13

It's a complete marriage. I've had great relationships. Some of the relationships with the partnerships ended up in court. Others were really amicable. I'm still friends with some of the partners that I had in the business, but it can work.

Speaker 1: 17:29

That's a whole separate podcast.

Speaker 2: 17:32

Absolutely absolutely. Partnerships can work. Mine work Sketchy.

Speaker 1: 17:38

Absolutely. I just know because there's just so many. The whole point is that, like, if you marry someone, you date them for a little bit, then you get engaged and then you marry in business. Hey, you want to start a business and it's like that's too quick. You don't know each other, you don't know the dynamics and we always want to rush into those things. So it is better to just think about that area.

Speaker 2: 18:00

Yeah, there are books written on how to give out equity, when to give out equity, on how to form partnerships, how to come up with yourself, how to come up with your separation agreements? Yeah, these things are just so necessary, and versus just jumping in Absolutely, absolutely so.

Speaker 1: 18:15

Then, at 40, there's a major turning point. You start to get into fitness and focus on these different areas and these challenges. Were you thinking about challenges at that point? Obviously, you're on business challenges, but fitness challenges were those relevant at that moment.

Speaker 2: 18:31

Yeah, I think there was a confluence of a whole bunch of different things. I mean, the business was going well, we were firing on whole similars and I think I was ready for another challenge, something, something, something you know. So that was way heavily on me. Another thing that was way started the way you have really on me, was recognizing how much bad genes I have in me. Going back to my parents and grandparents, you know, god bless them. They had it all high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, strokes you name it, so I figured and half of the stuff is like hereditary, so it's in here somewhere.

Speaker 2: 19:03

So I figured you know what, if and when I get it, I better be in the best shape possible so that I can fight it, because I don't want to go through the pain that I experienced. You know that going through and there are eventual death. So, again coincidences and then somebody at work does a triathlon and I find out about this and I'm like wait a second. A triathlon is this unique Olympic event that only you know chiseled athletes participating. How does a mere mortal do a triathlon? And I found out that a mere mortal, anybody, can go to a website and there's dozens of them just sign up for a triathlon and race. So like that's it, I'm going to turn 40 in the best shape in my life. I'm going to train for a triathlon. It was a short one and that's exactly what I did. So one week after 2040, I crossed the finish line at my first triathlon and I was hooked.

Speaker 2: 20:00

I'm like that's it. I'm staying on this bandwagon for a long time.

Speaker 1: 20:04

That's awesome, yeah, because they realized that physical fitness, mental health, business, religion, family they're all interrelated and we like to think of ourselves as I'm a runner or I'm a businessman or I'm a this, but you can have so many different roles and that's kind of the thing I really want to help people with is not pigeonholing themselves in I'm just an accountant or I'm just a bit like we're all so much more than that, yeah, 100%.

Speaker 2: 20:36

I mean I could agree more. The reason I think I like endurance sports as much as I did because they actually fueled my entrepreneurial journey. I found so many similarities Planning, perseverance, execution, pivots, setbacks, stamina All of that is required in the business world. All of that is required in the endurance sports world. Guess what? All of that is required in relationships, in family. So there's just so many similarities. I want to get good at perseverance. You could persevere a triathlon. You could persevere a downfall or downturn in your business. You could persevere maybe some. You know a rough road in relationships, so it's so intertwined.

Speaker 1: 21:19

Yeah, absolutely. So. It's really building those values right, those proper values that are going to allow you. Because even for myself, when I started Edwards Consulting, it was that same year I go I'm running a marathon Because I sat there and I go 26.2 miles. That's insane, let me do this. So I started training and this was before. I feel like there's so many running clubs now. I feel like there's so many people who are like rah, rah.

Speaker 1: 21:45

I was like this was a few years back and I literally trained with no one. I did it myself, bought a mask because I was doing it in Lake Tahoe. I'm training in Tampa. Okay, so that oxygen deprivation mask, yeah, so I'm running around like Bain on the space called Bayshore at like five in the morning. I think people thought I was a lunatic but I like needed to wear it. And then I went to the race and I ran the Lake Tahoe one, literally. Only my parents came Like no one. I didn't even have like a support, like it was just like you'll just do it, because it's like this is what I wanted to do. It's not like hey, join the club, and now the club's doing it. It's like just do your thing. Like cause you start to realize it, and I think you probably realize as well that it's not about everybody else.

Speaker 2: 22:33

It's about the journey that you're on with yourself that allows you to show off the best for other people, absolutely, and I love the journey as much as people think like I love to do these things because of the actual race itself.

Speaker 1: 22:43

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 22:44

Don't get me wrong. The race is fantastic, but the journey is just as much fun and it's just as rewarding as the actual race. So you know all the training, you know the saving shape, the eating right yeah, so sizing, but you know getting in the sleep, you know all of that lead up to the race is just as fun and important as the race itself.

Speaker 1: 23:03

Yeah, and because I realized when I read that marathon I was like Did I really just run like multiple hundreds of miles for a 26 mile?

Speaker 2: 23:14

ride Like you, just start to think about it.

Speaker 1: 23:16

You're like wait, every Thursday morning I would wake up and run 17, 18, 19, 20 mile, like you're doing these races, yeah, and you start to realize that you're like this. Just it changed your entire lifestyle. Yeah, you probably run a four in a mile. Yeah, in preparation for that one. Exactly. So you start to do this and you're like wait, is this really about the run, or is it about me changing my whole life and changing the way I view things? Yep, so for you was it a real pivot, for you?

Speaker 2: 23:46

I mean it was a huge pivot because I just I've never had so much athleticism in my curriculum.

Speaker 1: 23:52

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 23:53

I mean it was work, work, work, work, work. I mean there's a ton of family and a lot of friendships. I mean we're huge into friendships and we're blessed and wealthy beyond belief with friends and family and wanting to enjoy each other's time. But it was just it was either work or family, work, family, work, family, work, family. And then I started now I'm into triathlon, now I've got a point for this. That's a lot of swimming, biking and running time and as the distances got longer, I needed to it just cut into stuff. It mainly cut into social media and television.

Speaker 1: 24:32

And that's what I realized is because when you do it you have deeper relationships. So, like the time you spend on the couch watching TV from eight to 10 PM, when you could just go to bed at 8 PM and then wake up at 4 AM to go swimming, running, whatever, you start to realize that those times are very low value, if that makes sense 100% Super low value.

Speaker 2: 24:55

And, by the way, netflix works on the treadmill. You can watch YouTube videos while you're on a station every bike. You can listen to podcasts while you're swimming. There's a million of them on the water headphones that are available, so you don't get that fix. You can get all of that while exercising and doing something that's incredibly healthy for you, so it's definitely possible if you want to.

Speaker 1: 25:18

No, absolutely, I didn't even think about that because you're still doing the same activity, because if you run for three hours, that's a long run. But I've never even thought about like oh, you can just watch Netflix, you can just do your thing, because usually I'm listening. I'm like, if I'm going to go motivation, I'm doing motivational stuff, not like oh, let me knock out three episodes of my show.

Speaker 2: 25:39

No, I mean there are some times that I love nothing more than just to be outdoors on the bike for five hours at a time. I love those types of rides, but most of the time I mean I'm just going through audio books like there's no tomorrow.

Speaker 1: 25:51

It doesn't five hours a ride it is half an hour to a book yeah, it's a long time. And that's the other thing that you start to realize is that you can get more information, you can be more intentional with your life because you're learning things and you're taking it in a different dynamic than like right now. We're sitting, sitting's, cool, but when you're active it's like whoa, now you're really engaged and you're learning differently 100%, and I think the mind actually takes in more information when your body is pumping at greater.

Speaker 1: 26:21

BPMs? No, absolutely, Because you're more alive. That's something Tony Brown would do. He's like do your thing, Do your thing. And it's like you do your stance, and it's like people are like oh, it's kind of crazy, but when you're just sitting there, sitting there, you're like I can't even show up if I wanted to.

Speaker 2: 26:37

Yeah, exactly. One of my most favorite features of the Apple Watch is it reminds me to stand up If I have like over an hour and a half or I forget what the actual limit is, but if you're sitting there for too long, it's a time to stand.

Speaker 2: 26:49

Yeah, it's the single most favorite feature of this watch Time to stand Because it keeps you active, it keeps you motivated. Yeah, because you just get so into like whatever it is you're doing, you forget to just rotate the blood a little bit. Yeah, and just like a three minute walk around the apartment, you're back right back to it.

Speaker 1: 27:04

Yeah, and you'll show up better for these different areas. Yeah, so for you it's not about the fitness, it's not about that, but it's about the journey that you're on. So what's allowed you to? Really? Did you make friends in these different areas, or how did you think about that? Because you said friends and families are very important as well?

Speaker 2: 27:24

Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean you definitely, no matter what you're doing, like I think you normally gravitate towards like minded individuals, of course. So if you pick up a hobby, like you said earlier, there weren't as many running clubs back then, but there are a ton now, so I do a lot of triathlons. There's a million triathlon clubs. I've got a group that I've trained with New Jersey. I've got a group that I've trained here in Manhattan.

Speaker 2: 27:46

I've got a group that I can go train with in Brooklyn, in fact, if I wanted to. There's lots of people everywhere and when you travel there's a million and one Facebook groups that say, hey, I'm going to be in Tucson, I'm going to be in Tucson tomorrow. If I want to go for 20 mile run tomorrow, guarantee you I could find five people to go, because that's how many people are in this specific country. But anything you do in life, you just gravitate towards like minded individuals and it's a lot easier to do things when you're doing it things with people that are similar. Some of my friends do what I do, others don't. We go way together. They'll go golf. They'll go golfing. They'll drop me off like 10 miles from where we're staying and while they're golfing I'm running back to where we're staying I would come back at the same time.

Speaker 1: 28:33

No, that's fantastic, because I've always had like similar experiences where it's like I want to do my activity and you just figure out a way to make it happen 100%.

Speaker 2: 28:43

You always make it, you always figure it out Like we want to weigh in vacation ones and everybody wants to go hot air ballooning. I'm like, how long is that going to be? That's going to be like a five or six hour excursion, like early in the morning. I'm like, great, Drop me off at the bike shop. I'm like I'm going to go run the bike. I'm going to go for 100 mile run. I'm stuck. 100 mile ride. You're going to go hot air ballooning, have breakfast and we'll meet for lunch and we're working out perfectly.

Speaker 1: 29:06

Yeah, and the other thing that I wanted to run a cash there is Steven just said on vacation. Yes, because that, and this is something like I just came from a vacation as well. But you start have to realize that vacation does not mean that we change our habits. Like right, vacation means maintain your similar lifestyle, just in a different location.

Speaker 2: 29:26

Not that doesn't mean you have to work the whole time.

Speaker 1: 29:28

It means you can enjoy things, but like, don't just go off the deep end and be like I don't work because I'm on vacation or I don't work out because I'm on it.

Speaker 2: 29:36

Yeah, I mean, don't get me wrong I love laying on the beach for a couple of hours doing nothing, just like the next guy, but I do get a little bit. You know antsy, yeah, after a while I'm like wait a second. I haven't run in two days. I got to get a run in or I got to get a swim in. My body is now free to have to want to do some physical activity?

Speaker 1: 29:54

Yeah, because the challenge is you keep doing it and most people don't realize it, but those, if we don't do that, then we, because the more we do something, we build it as a habit and we get more reps and we get more excited about it. And now it's a winning formula and it's not just hey, I'm just going on a walk, but it's like no, I'm going on a walk.

Speaker 2: 30:12

I'm excited about this walk.

Speaker 1: 30:14

I'm excited about working out and running because we build these habits. So for you, you mentioned earlier that you have a wealth of friends. I find that a lot of people's circles actually get smaller. How did you broaden your circle and expand these different friend groups? Because the thing is for adults like, a lot of the time you're like, oh, like, yeah, you know what I mean and they hang out with their family.

Speaker 2: 30:37

Yeah, 100%. I mean I get my wife full credit for our expansion of our circle of friends because she manages a social calendar and we do. We go out of our way to make sure we show up for birthdays, for anniversaries, for kids parties or older kids parties. Even older kids have parties my daughter's 25. Big party coming up. So she makes sure that we go out of our way and I'm happy to look at it.

Speaker 2: 31:06

Because we just have a ton. Unfortunately, it just makes the morning, the morning work out that much harder, but it's worth it.

Speaker 1: 31:13

Yeah, no, absolutely, because you start to realize that showing up for someone is so small and minor, like it might be a flight, it might be a whatever, but it, like it, really moves the needle for that person.

Speaker 2: 31:25

Oh, it's humongous when people show up for me and I hate having like it's funny, like we love going to parties or other people's events. I personally my family likes it for themselves. I hate my own parties, but if and when I do do something and people show up, I'm so beyond grateful for that. So I'm sure that's how they feel when we show up to their occasions.

Speaker 1: 31:47

Absolutely 100%. And I say this because it's not very hard, like a lot of the time, to get invited places. Then we go. That's impossible. Like my fiance's brother invited us to Puerto Rico last year and we're not like like we're close with him and we're close with the other family members but we don't know all his friends who are coming and my fiance's, like I don't know man. And I'm like no, he invited us for showing up, like, because it's just, it's just the right thing to do, it is.

Speaker 2: 32:18

And karma's a powerful thing. You show up for somebody, the universe will pay you back in multiple ways. Not only would that person show back up for you, other things will happen positively for you.

Speaker 1: 32:29

I believe in it. No, absolutely 100%. So I just wanted to leave that lesson, because there's so many of us who are like I don't make new friends, I only have my 20 year friends. And it's like no, we're constantly making new friends, we're constantly exposing Like me and Steven are just meeting right now.

Speaker 2: 32:45

It's definitely possible to make new friends. You just have to want to. But you put that desire out into the universe and put yourself into the right circumstances. You can't just sit on a couch. That's not good, it's not going to work, but it is possible for sure.

Speaker 1: 33:00

No, absolutely, because there's so many groups, there's so many ideas, there's so many different things. And so, steven, for you was it kind of eye-opening and realizing how many people are Iron Man-ing, how many people are doing Ultras, because you go through your life all the time, and they're like, oh, like everyone's at the bar, like everyone's working, because you start to realize like, whatever you see, you think is the truth 100%.

Speaker 2: 33:23

I mean, I've learned that it's a large and growing community. When I started Iron man back in I think 2011 was my first race there was maybe one, two races someplace on the weekends. Now there's three to four races someplace in the world every single weekend. Two thousand to twenty-five hundred competitors Every single race. So that's about anywhere from six to ten thousand people a weekend that are doing an Iron man someplace in the world.

Speaker 2: 33:54

Wow, and the same thing with Ultramarathon. You stroke the Ultramarathon and you think you're the only one crazy enough to want to run a hundred miles. And you look around, there's a hundred other people. Okay, it's not like Iron man, it's not a thousand, but there's at least a hundred to a hundred and fifty other people that are about to run a hundred miles with you. So and you instantly make friends. The second that gun goes off and you start running, you're best friends with everybody around you Because everybody has a similar mindset. Absolutely, especially the late hours, like when you're hurting and like twenty miles left to go and it's dark outside, it's cold and you're just jogging along with a couple of others. Instant, lifelong friendships are made?

Speaker 1: 34:35

No, absolutely, and people don't realize it, because the real way to connect with people is going through a difficult thing, and that's why, like if you have a club, like they try to have a high barrier entry, or if you have a college fraternity, these people would try to make it difficult, like they do these different things, or like even a football team. They're like challenging two days, whatever it is. They try to do these challenging things to mold relationships, and that's essentially what you guys did in an unforced environment. You know what?

Speaker 2: 35:05

that's actually a great way to look at it. I mean, I don't think they did that on purpose, but the circumstances put us all into that environment, right? No, so we are the ones that are at the back of the pack, for whatever reason. It's not a bad thing. We're still signing up for the race and we're still competing, but the back of the packers also are hurting the most and therefore are bonding the most. And the amount of gratitude I can't tell you the amount of braces that I finished where I was either thanking somebody up one side down the other or vice versa, for getting me through the last five miles, or I'm getting somebody else through the last five miles because there's just such a deep human need for connection at that point.

Speaker 1: 35:48

No, absolutely, Absolutely. I remember I did a. It was August 2021. It was a, and then we're going to kind of transition into your other thing. It was a. I hiked Machu Picchu, the anchor trail, four days and I was the only one in shape. It was me and the door guy.

Speaker 2: 36:06

My buddy.

Speaker 1: 36:07

They're like die Everybody's hurting, yeah they're like Jordan, this is insane. I'm like just hike and they're like my legs don't work, like they're not working, and it was just a funny experience. But once we completed it, we're like we saw Machu Picchu and it's like one of the wonders of the world and you see this whole thing and you're like which of four days to see this thing? Not like because a lot of people just get there and they see if I boss, and it's like you took the boss and they're like ah, it's a couple of hours.

Speaker 2: 36:35

It's a whole lot of different satisfaction.

Speaker 1: 36:36

Oh, my God.

Speaker 2: 36:37

You think it's a physical exertion? Yes, absolutely. That endorphin hit. I mean I just kind of want to just buy this and do your story. I'm getting chills because I've been to some of the circumstances where after days of effort you're rewarded and that is such a drug Like once you get that, like I did that again.

Speaker 1: 36:58

So were you. How would? We haven't talked about it yet, but the summoning you actually got a new mound that you're, yeah, a little one.

Speaker 2: 37:09

So with my business we did a lot of work with Microsoft in Seattle, outside Seattle, so I had a ton of trips out there and many trips required meetings on both Fridays and Mondays and instead of having to fly back all the way across the country to New York to fly back on Monday morning I would just stay for the weekend.

Speaker 2: 37:26

On one of those many weekend stays, I went to explore Mount Rainier, which is gorgeous, incredible, and I hiked it for a few hours and I started doing some research and I found out about a course that they gave on how to get to the top of Mount Rainier. Oh, it's really simple. Anybody can sign up. Again, it's not just a big Olympic event you go to. My favorite guiding company on that mountain is called RMI Guides and you sign up for like this four day thing.

Speaker 1: 37:54

It's two days of training and two days of climbing.

Speaker 2: 37:57

It's basically. It's not really climbing, it's hiking. It's super, super advanced hiking. You have grandfathers on, you have a harness on, you're tied to each other. There's pro-vosses that you can follow and but they get you to the top. Whether they're dependent, because it's really- variable.

Speaker 2: 38:13

It's crazy alpine conditions. And I got to the top. It was 14,000 feet, oh, wow. And I said, oh my god, this is the most incredible experience in the world, because of just this sense of accomplishment once you get to the top. But going back to my earlier point, the journey was just as much fun.

Speaker 2: 38:31

The two days of training, going up to the mountain, going up these various passes, the views, the scenery, the camaraderie that was built up, the other climbers. I'm like that's it. I'm going to take mountain climbing. I have to go higher now, so fast forward, and then I can fill in more. I'm going to Everest next year. Yeah, incredible. So I did a couple of other large, large mountains and I've got all the necessary training in. I've got all the necessary experience in. I'm not going to be one of these inexperienced guys that dies on the mountain, because those are the horror stories you hear. Somebody just pops out a ton of cash. Oh, is it really? Yeah, if you have enough money, you can find a guiding company that will take you. And then, because you're so forceful, they won't have enough authority over you to tell you to stop because you don't have enough experience.

Speaker 2: 39:27

Those are the guys that die, so I'm not planning on dying, and if my guiding company says, for whatever reason we're going back, we're going back. My number one goal is to come back, not to summit. A summit will be great, though.

Speaker 1: 39:42

Yeah, no, absolutely. Because I started to hear about there's different people, who it's in Nepal, right, yeah, and there's a Netflix thing on the guy who did the seven, seven something, yeah, no. And you start to realize it and you're like this is not a hey, we're just doing this other thing. It's a very challenging task.

Speaker 2: 40:03

It's incredibly challenging. I mean, I've been to other mountains. You're literally, it's the most exertion I've ever been through in my life on some of these days, Because A you're in a really really harsh environment.

Speaker 2: 40:16

It's like minus 20 to minus 40 degrees outside. Oh, wow, you're climbing up this mountain. There's less. The higher you go, the less oxygen there is in the air. Yes, the best way I could prove the point is a simple hike. You're walking slightly uphill in a normal environment at sea level. You walk, you walk, you breathe, you walk, you breathe, you breathe while you're walking. And that type of environment not just that Everest, even lower than Everest you take a step, you have to take two breaths. Really, you take a step, you got to take two breaths. Oh, wow, you exert yourself any more than that and you will think there's just not enough oxygen in the air. Wow, and that's on Everest. It's five breaths, it's one step. Five breaths. Wow, one step, five breaths.

Speaker 1: 41:01

That's why it takes you. That's why you feel more. That's why you feel more. Yeah, it's good to step, because I've heard about people going. It's like two, three months.

Speaker 2: 41:08

It just you can't move any faster Because there isn't enough oxygen in the air to move any faster. And then you got to acclimate the body, right, yeah, you have to stay, you have to live a base camp for a while to acclimatize, build up red blood cells. And then it's kind of like in the EKG chart, like you have to go up a little, let your body acclimatize, you know, come back down halfway, let your body acclimatize, go back a little bit further. So you kind of you go up the mountain this way.

Speaker 1: 41:34

How long you plan on doing this. For how long do you think it will take? You don't know.

Speaker 2: 41:39

These trips typically take anywhere from a month to two and a half months. Wow, yeah, there's a whole bunch of different factors that go with it. I'm planning on being there for maybe 35 days. Wow, that's incredible, hoping for a summit, but I will. My number one plan, like I said, is to come back alive. Yeah, that'll summit. It'll be a big one. Whatever, I don't want to talk about it. We're going to do, we're going to summit.

Speaker 1: 42:04

Now, have you used this for travel, because I know you like travel as well. Like, one of the things I've always found is like, for example, like when I did that Lake Tahoe run, I ended up doing Napa Valley, san Francisco, like, so I did the exploration, but it was led by the excursion Because I was like, if you, if you like, there's different types of trips. There's education trips a lot of people will be vacation, sit on a beach, drink whatever but then there's also a fitness trip where I view it as like, you do some endurance activity and then you go and explore the area afterwards for two days.

Speaker 2: 42:38

Yeah, so I've done, I've done, I think, 17 full distance Ironman right now. And many of those trips we turn into little family vacations Because, like I said, ironman has races all around the world right now. Yeah, you're pretty much in a faradar data country, really. You can find an Ironman race and then I just, you know, love to make a mini vacation out of it, either leading up to the race or right after the race. Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 43:01

Sometimes both yeah Because you need to, yeah Because otherwise it's, it's not just a journey yet again. The other journey Because otherwise I mean and I've done the other thing as well I've done.

Speaker 2: 43:13

I've done races where the only reason I'm in that city is for the race yeah, and those are tedious. Right, you fly in, you check in, go to sleep, race, you're camping out. Get on the plane, go home yeah, we just just for a second, and there's nothing wrong with that because some, some races I just I needed to get some races done to build up my qualification for the championship. But the ones where we made a trip out of and stayed extra days or, if not, a week, those, those were the best.

Speaker 1: 43:42

Yeah, because it's just so much more meaningful.

Speaker 2: 43:44

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 43:45

And so, after all of these journeys, I know you wrote your book Built to Finish. And what was even the starting point on that? What caused you to even think about that?

Speaker 2: 43:55

It's interesting, so I sold my company, which was, you know, a big finishing event in the entrepreneurial world. I was on on track to get to the Iron man World Championship, which is a big finish for the, for the Iron man community. Yeah, and so I did. I did the my business. Finish, yeah, I'm getting towards my big, my big goal of the Iron man World Championship. And finish, yeah, and I said, you know what? I want to modernize my journey? Yeah, and I want to inspire others to set big goals and to go after this. So I said, you know what? There's no better way than to to write a book.

Speaker 1: 44:28

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 44:28

So if a college dropout and couch potato can build and sell a big company and compete in the Iron man World. Championship. There's no reason why others, you know, can set big goals and go after them, absolutely, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 44:43

And how did you break through the limiting beliefs, cause there's so many of us that can sit there and just be like? That's not for me. I don't think that's possible. I don't know how do you break through these limiting beliefs, cause there's so much of so many of us that are sitting there.

Speaker 2: 44:58

You just have to start. I mean, it's it's really. It's really that easy. You just start and you figure it out. Somebody that used to work for me used to say, hey, an okay plan executed today is 10 times better than a perfect plan executed next month. So, no, don't wait for that perfect plan. If I I didn't have a perfect plan when I set out to, to, to. Even even though company number one and two failed, I still didn't have a perfect plan. I had a lot of lessons learned, yeah, but there was no perfect plan for company three. Yeah, it was just an idea and a concept and a lot of willpower to get it done.

Speaker 1: 45:32

Well, I mean just relating to this podcast that we're having today. It's literally we spoke a week and a half ago and we're like, oh, we're both going to be in New York at the same time. You're flying out tomorrow. I literally got back yesterday and I'm like can we get a camera guy? Can we do this, can we make this happen? And it's like we're just I came in here and I'm like, steven, we're going to figure it out, we're going to make it happen, cause the thing is that when you put yourself out there and you put these opportunities out there to make things happen, it's there's a beautiful serendipity of I don't even know what's going to come.

Speaker 2: 46:09

Yeah, and then the universal lines and the right things happen. You'll make mistakes. You know there's going to be a ton of setbacks there's going to. You're going to need to pivot, but as long as you have like your line on that North Star and on that goal and one of the things that I talked about in the book, which I love, it's one of my favorite chapters. Oh, thanks the the finish, available on Amazon and never where books are sold. We're going to put it in the show legs. One of my favorite chapters in the book is called envisioning the finish. I'm a huge fan of visualization and envision things and manifestation.

Speaker 1: 46:47

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 46:49

Quick story when I had my company, all of our customers were in Manhattan primarily, so there was also saying as zoom right, so sales calls, you actually had to go knock on doors and meet with people face to face for a sales call.

Speaker 2: 47:01

I would literally at the threshold of a building, I would close my eyes and I would say to myself I'm going to next time.

Speaker 2: 47:08

I I propose these doors, this is going to be a customer line and I just envision filling the company name they're going to be a customer of my company and I go do my sales call and that's what they became accustomed and it worked. So I did that, but I still do that. If I have, if I'm having an important meeting, I stop at the door and I envision the outcome of the meeting. So a couple of other examples when I wanted to sell my company, I kind of launched that goal almost around the same time that I'd want to go competing in the Ironman World Championship. I wrote myself a check for a very large amount of money and I printed out a poster of Kona, the Ironman World Championship, and I put them next to my computer I think you're sure it was like the word and I had no choice but to see that in my peripheral vision all day, every day or years so, and I basically envisioned that actual event happening.

Speaker 1: 48:03

Yeah, both.

Speaker 2: 48:04

Of those have been happening and it took years because those both are like big, big, big, you know, b-hags, big areas, goals. They both happened.

Speaker 1: 48:13

This is incredible. Yeah, the thing about this and I've realized this too is that we need to just have the thought. It doesn't have to be anything else, we just have to have the thought. Like I asked myself how do you travel for six weeks straight? Because I was like how is that even possible? This Friday I'm flying to London and me and my fiance are going to travel around Europe for six weeks and we're going to like work and we're going to do other stuff, but at the same time, like you just said, if you don't put it out there, then, like I was trying to explain to my family, they're like impossible, impossible, impossible. But to them they're like oh no, you work for you go on vacation for a week and then you go home and like you work more and then you go another weekend and they're like how was it even bought?

Speaker 2: 49:01

I'm like well, someone does it and, it's true, the travel 100% of the time, like a lot of people do it, yeah, and you probably don't have everything figured out and no, it doesn't know we only have yeah, we only have the first place folks for like a week and a half, so there's literally five weeks that are on books.

Speaker 2: 49:17

It's funny, I'm not. I think I won't rub it off on my wife because she's to be still is very organized, yeah. But more and more I'm hearing oh, we're just gonna wing it, yes, we're just gonna.

Speaker 1: 49:27

The best part about leaning it and like. There's other people I've had on this podcast. We've been to like 90 different countries and what they ended up saying is Jordan, just gotta put yourself there, and then you don't know the serendipity of like what's to come. So one might invite you to an incredible place where, like you might have to stay a couple extra days, but you might have to travel somewhere you didn't expect, right, exactly in control of everything, and that's the beauty of it.

Speaker 2: 49:52

The biggest. The biggest thing was that these big hope, big goals is you need. You need to firmly believe in your mind that it's possible. Yes, there's any doubt in your mind that it's not gonna be accomplished. Yes, what you're not gonna come for today. So you may not know how, yeah, but you need to firmly believe that, even though it's a stretch, yeah, you're good, you're going with what kind of shit?

Speaker 1: 50:13

No, absolutely, absolutely, 100%. And with these big goals. Do you set big goals in all areas of your life? Or how do you think about that? Cuz, obviously there's business, the fitness yeah, I mean, because I know you, family is very important, I know friends are very important, I know religions important. How do you think about these other areas?

Speaker 2: 50:33

Yeah, I mean, I don't think it's any specific goal on the friendship side, because we're just, you know, living. You know living that life, that's just that's a, that's an object that's in motion, that's online, that's, it's a living being, you know, same with family. That's living, you know. I, yes, do I want certain things from my children, 100% that I baby to set those goals. I can't manifest, you know, a specific thing happening for them. I can steer them the right direction.

Speaker 1: 50:57

Do you think setting the example Is been helpful?

Speaker 2: 51:01

for them 100%. I mean I, both my daughters have completed track lines. My younger one has done the New York City marathon Wow two times. She's done a half iron man Wow.

Speaker 1: 51:11

So you know one is more, and so yes, so, yes, so in that example, and you're showing them what's possible in the business world is definitely, you know, helping motivate them.

Speaker 2: 51:22

I just lost my train of thought for a second. Oh, big goals, I'm trying. So I had this big old, the business goal of selling the company and competing in the unmarried world championship. So I'm trying to reproduce that. Yeah, so I want to get to the top of Everest and I want to take my book on tour. Yeah, speak on large stages to tell the story and to motivate large crowds I love, right. So that's my business goal. Yeah, and in this, while doing that, you know, pick up a customer to, because I'm loving just providing advisory services.

Speaker 2: 51:53

Yeah to other entrepreneurs that were in my boat that are finally open to be getting advice yeah, how to grow their company quicker and how to realize a much more valuable exit. So I'm hoping to you know, achieve those business goals with the next physical beat of Everest.

Speaker 1: 52:10

Yeah, and here's the thing, people, I want to bring this to you guys what is your big goal? Because if you don't have a big goal, then, like, it's never gonna happen. Steven's putting it out there. He's like these are my goals, anyone can help me, help me. If they can't, oh good, yeah. But like, but if we don't, if you don't know your goals and you can't share those goals with people, then we're never in the place of Accomplishing what we want to.

Speaker 2: 52:35

Yeah, I think a lot of people are afraid to share their goals because they're gonna be shot down. People say, instead of you saying it, oh, that's not for me, I'm not good enough, I'm not smart enough. Other people say what are you talking about? No, you're never gonna get the average. You can get the average with this. You can. Anybody that wants to can. It may be a super long journey, but it's possible. But yeah, a you have to break it down right. Yet you have to break down big goals into smaller goals and you have to schedule them like. I'll just use my example if I don't have a race on my calendar, I mean I don't. It's a bit. It's very hard. Even though I have incredibly better hobbies and habits, I'm sorry of staying healthy, eating right and training. I need to have a race on my calendar Right, so I need to have an event saying I'm gonna be at Ironman X or marathon Y on this date. Therefore, my body knows that I need to be training and to be eating right etc.

Speaker 1: 53:29

I can actually relate to that because the last marathon I ran was the 2021 one, so it's been over two years and it was funny. I was hanging out with my brother I ran the marathon with and he was like oh, do you want to do this 10 mile run like in May? And I'm like, dude, I'm gonna like flying here. I can't like the timing doesn't work. He's like, oh okay, oh good, oh good. He's like I just want to get back in the race. Because the thing is, he's like do you run anymore? And I was thinking about it. I'm like well, I run like a six mile run, like maybe like once or twice a week that will loop in Tampa, but that's not sure. You like that is not trading, and the point of having something to look forward to is super powerful.

Speaker 2: 54:11

Yep, I know 100%, and it's so motivating. And again, it, just your mind is the most, it's the strongest muscle in your body. So when you, when you have something to look forward to, the mind, just you know, makes you do the right things you know towards that goal and you pick those decisions and you.

Speaker 1: 54:30

So how do you think about choosing goals? Because I know there's probably audience in saying that, oh, it's easy for it like. But how do you even think about these goals? Like, when? When is it like? Because I know there's a point of I'm making a decision and we're doing this and we're taking action today, and then there's I'm toying this could be cool. Oh, you know what?

Speaker 2: 54:51

I'm talking about.

Speaker 1: 54:51

Yeah, I mean it's got.

Speaker 2: 54:52

It's got to be something that you get to out of your comfort zone.

Speaker 2: 54:55

I think you know a lot of people and don't know, even realize you know, some of the benefits of goals that they may not be interested in right now. So people won't say you know what, I have no interest whatsoever and ever running a marathon, no, it's not, not of interest to me. I'm like okay, you know what, if that sounds you know too too huge, you know how? About a half marathon? And even though you may not be a runner, but I would, you would be pleasantly surprised on the things you find out about yourself on your journey towards a half marathon. Yes, the amount of arteries you know that that path is going to open up Are unknown to you right now, but I guarantee you that there will be some. So If a marathon is too big, or ever says too big or not, right here, or do I have marathon and see where that journey takes you, I think you'll be very pleasantly surprised.

Speaker 1: 55:44

Absolutely, and also your mindset expands To what is possible. Because the reason I was running the marathon in the beginning was because I Was like, well, if I can do this, I can do anything 100%. And it's that confidence builders yourself, because it's all under control. Like, obviously, building a business is in your control but, like you know, knock a lot of doors and you can't make the customer say, yeah, like right, so it's just you have to get more people. But when it's just your body, it's like there's no one to blame here.

Speaker 2: 56:16

Like the oceans not too wavy, the the roads not too rocky Right there, and if you if the knees are a big issue, then there's always biking and swimming, and if you scare the water, then there's biking. That there's a million one activities, yeah, and even in the business world.

Speaker 2: 56:32

I mean, there's a lot of people that you know want to have a bigger business or want to start a business. There's so many others that are already in that business and they'd be willing to share advice. I mean I have found that a lot of folks are just very, very generous with their time and their advice and I mean I benefited tremendously from advisors both paid at bond paid because people just want to share, right. I love the saying a candle doesn't lose its light by lighting another right? So, as people the candles that are already on lit will gladly share. So if you want to do something in XYZ industry, go find somebody on LinkedIn that's already doing it and ask them to buy them a cup of coffee and just pick their brain on how they got started.

Speaker 1: 57:19

A hundred percent. I mean, this is literally the reason I do these podcasts is to get around people to hear what they have to share, because it's fascinating, like I've had people come on that did Leadville. Have you heard about Leadville? I think that's brutal. You did five times.

Speaker 2: 57:33

I'm like you're a sicko. I love endurance sports. I have no invention of everything. Leadville, that's crazy.

Speaker 1: 57:40

I mean for me to say it's crazy, but that's what I'm saying. Like this guy did it five times. I was like you're a maniac. Like, but what made you be a maniac? I mean you start to understand people and get different perspectives. So I would never be afraid to even ask someone of hey, like Stephen was saying, can you help me with this? Like, how did this work? How did you do this? Because there's so many of us that just stay in our small circle and you're never going to learn new things from your little circle. You got to get out of your circle, you got to get out of your bubble and you have to expand and see new things, because otherwise you never have those new experiences which I think are the most powerful thing.

Speaker 2: 58:19

Jeff, how much 100% life begins at the edge of it. Learning begins at the edge of your comfort zone.

Speaker 1: 58:26

So one I know we're wanting now. But for some final questions, like as a college dropout, how do you think about learning, because it can be very difficult. I was trying to explain this to a few people, that the definition we have for learning is in relation to school. Most of the people school learning not true Learning. We learn constantly. But how did you change your associations to certain words and allow you to develop your own journey.

Speaker 2: 58:53

Yeah, I was definitely of the civil mindset of like you're nobody in this world unless you have a degree.

Speaker 2: 58:59

So I dropped out of school. I learned how to program professionally. I got a programming job. Guess what I did as soon as I got my first job went right back to school because in my mind, I needed that degree. That only lasted for two semesters because my career started taking off and I didn't have time for school and I totally forgot. But I never stopped learning and I became smarter and smarter as years went on. I think there's so many different ways to learn. I love Elon Musk's comment about you don't need a college degree anymore. You can learn every skillset you need for a job.

Speaker 1: 59:33

You can learn on YouTube, that is 100% valid.

Speaker 2: 59:36

What YouTube will teach you is the discipline of showing up to a certain program for an extended amount of time. So when you see somebody with a degree, they're not necessarily the smartest person in the world, but at least they've shown that they have the discipline to do something. They have it, they have the good habits and discipline and to meet certain requirements that whatever institution had of them. So that's something that YouTube will never reach, which is why a lot of people what they like to see on resume is that a kid did dance with 10 years straight, or they did football for six years straight. They consistently repeated a certain activity of getting bored without getting bored.

Speaker 1: 1:00:16

So that means.

Speaker 2: 1:00:17

OK, if I hire that person, they'll be here for three or four years without hopefully getting bored, so that unfortunately nothing will replace. But as far as learning those, there's just myriad of options out there just to gain knowledge.

Speaker 1: 1:00:30

Yeah, no. And then the other thing is obviously you've done a lot of things. How do you focus on constantly expanding your horizons? Because I understand you're around a lot of people. I can't imagine that you're the only one who's like I'm not in there, iron man, today. Like you got other friends and I get that there's groups and stuff like that, but how do you stay motivated to go that first thing, like you know what I mean, that's a big like yeah, it's going back to where other people are Like when you got to the end of the Papamacho picture and you're like, oh my god, I mean that feeling.

Speaker 2: 1:01:01

once you have that feeling, which is incredible, then very next thing you want to do is you just want that again. I mean, you want that dopamine pay to get and you can just do the same thing again, which is why I've done so many Iron man. Just that it ended up itself was fine, but what can I do? That's a little bit longer. What can I do? That's even harder. I did a race last weekend which makes Iron man seem like an easy race. It was a three day triathlon. Oh my god. The first day was a 6.2 mile swim followed by a 90 mile bike.

Speaker 1: 1:01:34

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:01:35

Day two was a 170 mile bike and day three was a 52 mile run. Oh my god, why? Because it's there and, to put into perspective, go back to count 44 people showed up for this race, not the 2,500 that show up for Iron man. I could imagine which is iron is hard, but just to put things in perspective. So again, once you accomplish something and you get that rush of insensible accomplishment, you just want to level up and you want to do it at the next level.

Speaker 1: 1:02:06

Absolutely, absolutely so, stephen, where can people learn more about you? Where can they hear about the book? Obviously, it's on Amazon. We're going to put it in the show notes, yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:02:17

So the book is on. Amazon. It's called Built to Finish. You can also find more about me and follow my blog on my website, stephenpipenickcom. That's Stephen with a B, p, I, v and IK. I love to blog about my various adventures, so this race that I just completed called the Ultraman. There's a huge blog post about that, and I won't stop doing crazy things, so I'm happy to share that information with you on my blog.

Speaker 1: 1:02:45

Absolutely, and I will throw all of that in the show notes.