Finding the Extraordinary in Ordinary Life - Florian Horning : 158

Florian Horning takes us on an exhilarating journey exploring what it means to live an extraordinary life. He shares how reading about inspiring figures propelled him toward adventure and discovery, illustrating the importance of individuality and authenticity in our choices.

Flohjoe is a "Happy Life" coach, founder of "Simplicity of Happiness," and an adventurous, human-centric nomad.

• Discovering the extraordinary in routine life
• Embracing unique experiences
• The transition from recruitment to coaching
• Importance of asking the right questions
• Lessons learned from life in Africa
• Reflections on personal growth and self-acceptance

Flohjoe's episode is a heartfelt invitation to examine your desires and inspirations, empowering you to create a life that reflects your dreams.

Let's enjoy his story!

Florian | Inspire & Empower: simplicity of happiness

Chapters

• 1:30 Meet Florian Horning: The Nomad Coach
• 12:45 From Small Town to Sahara: Flo's Journey
• 28:15 Exploring Authenticity and Societal Expectations
• 43:30 The Meaning of an Extraordinary Life

Transcript

Daniela SM: 0:01

Hi, I'm Daniela. Welcome to my podcast. Because Everyone has a Story, the place to give ordinary people's stories the chance to be shared and preserved. Our stories become the language of connections. Let's enjoy it, connect and relate, because everyone has a story. Welcome. My guest is Florian Horning, or Flo. What a treat it was to have him on the show. He's a nomad coach and the founder of Simplicity of Happiness.

Daniela SM: 0:33

Most of us don't think we're living an extraordinary life. Flo was no exception, but when you hear his story, from a small town in Germany to the vast expanse of the Sahara Desert and all the adventures after that, you will see the trials and triumphs that make his life remarkable. He dives into authenticity and encourages us to break free from societal expectations and instead compare our life to our own journey. Where was I two, five or even 10 years ago? Are we living the extraordinary life we want? And extraordinary means a lot of things for everyone.

Daniela SM: 1:16

As I was preparing for this episode, I received an unexpected news. A dear classmate from our time in Switzerland, mo Mani, passed away suddenly at just around 55. Mo was one of those people who filled the room with humor and kindness, leaving everyone with great memories. An extraordinary life isn't about length. It's about the impact we have on others and the joy we create along the way. And I am certain that, though Mo's life was short, it was extraordinary. So, as we listen to Flo's story, let's take a moment to reflect on our own journey. What does your extraordinary life look like? Let's enjoy Flo's story. So welcome Flo, to the show. Thank you for being here.

Florian Horning: 2:06

Thank you for inviting me.

Daniela SM: 2:07

Yes, I'm super excited that you're here and that you have a story, so why do you want to share your story?

Florian Horning: 2:13

Basically because you asked me to yes when I was younger.

Florian Horning: 2:19

I loved to read and hear stories of people who did something extraordinary. And what does it mean extraordinary? For me, it meant not doing the same as I used to do and everybody else that I know. So I grew up in a small place in Germany, went to school there, graduated there, and I just wanted to see the world, and I did not get inspired by the people around me. I got inspired by people that I read about or heard of. Then I accidentally went on an extraordinary path myself, and I think it's worth sharing, because some might relate and some might get inspired. Sharing because some might relate and some might get inspired. And it's not to be inspired to do as I did, but to be inspired to follow their own calling or their own path.

Daniela SM: 3:13

Beautiful, wonderful. So thank you so much. When is that your story starts? Obviously, when you were younger you were reading stories, but then, when this, your extraordinary life started.

Florian Horning: 3:24

Yeah, that's a good question, because I don't know, it still does not feel extraordinary, it's still just me. I didn't change that much. On the inside it feels the same and there was one day that I decided to go on a multi-week solo hike in Sahara and it was super boring and super hot and the backpack was super heavy and I just felt like a cool kid walking home with a way too heavy backpack and I did not feel extraordinary at all. I had no internet, no cell phone connection. I had a satellite telephone back then and I could give my mom a call to tell her that I'm still alive and I felt like calling home. Like mom, I'm coming home a little bit later. So most of the time I still feel the same. It's still me.

Daniela SM: 4:20

But you change something, you change the routine or what everybody was doing in your area to make it less ordinary if you don't want to use extra.

Florian Horning: 4:30

Yeah, well, I just wanted to play a bit with that ordinary thing because I was always looking for the extraordinary and I thought that there might be a time or a day when I personally feel extraordinary, and as long as I kept comparing myself to others, and.

Florian Horning: 4:49

I was never looking down when comparing myself. I was always looking up. So I always felt like the underachiever, the not so extraordinary, the boring guy. What is much more important than feeling extraordinary is feeling me, feeling myself, being happy and proud of what I'm doing. And I struggled. I struggled very, very often with that.

Florian Horning: 5:16

So when I was still going to school so in germany, you had to go to school for 13 grades, 13 years, and in the 11th grade you could take a gap year and spend it abroad and out of my entire school I think three or four people did that and I went to the United States and I lived there, next to the Rocky Mountains in Utah, and it was a wonderful time. And well, then I came back and I felt a bit out of place because everybody else was the same and I felt the same, but it did not really match. And from that day on I knew that I just wanted to move on. I wanted to see the world, I wanted to speak other languages. I always underperformed in languages. My German grades were bad, my English grades were worse, my French we don't want to talk about this and I had Latin in school and I completely failed there and I thought I'm just not the language guy. But I found out that I'm not this learning guy as soon as I had to talk, I'm fine. So now I'm not this learning guy. As soon as I had to talk, I'm fine. So now I'm speaking English quite well, I survive in French, I understand some Italian and I'm getting along, because I found out that it's not about technically learning the grammar, it's about the wonders of communication and talking to people. And now I'm all about communication. I work as a coach and I focus on communication, because leadership is the way that we talk to ourselves and then it's the way that we talk to others, whether we motivate them or we put pressure on them.

Florian Horning: 7:00

So that was, I think, like an initial spark, when I knew that I wanted to break out of this rural surrounding that I had over here. And after my graduation I worked in a national park for a year. Then I went to the next city to study there, and then I moved on to Berlin and I stayed in Berlin for quite a while and at some point in Berlin I thought that I achieved everything that I thought I should have. Being a German, you know this you have to go to university, you have to study, you have to find a job, you have to find a nice and decent house, you have to, you have to be married, like all these things around building a house or building a home and building a family. And the more I had of this, the more I get frustrated, because I just read these adventure stories of people traveling around the world in in a van or backpacking or sailing around the world.

Florian Horning: 8:05

That was a time where I felt that I am not me, but that I'm trying to impress others and I'm living somebody else's life my wife back then. We didn't get along. My job situation was really difficult. There was a time of Lehman Brothers. I worked as a headhunter in the international finance industry. Lehman Brothers obviously disappeared from one day to another. Lots of people lost their job. They had plenty of money before and all of a sudden I saw they are still having the same problems. They are just adding some zeros.

Florian Horning: 8:40

At the end I had my penthouse in Berlin.

Florian Horning: 8:43

I had the open chimney, the view over Berlin, the sauna. In the end I had my penthouse in Berlin. I had the open chimney, the view over Berlin, the sauna in the bathroom and all I was thinking of was that I was worrying that I could still finance this. If well, maybe I have another struggle with the income or another bank is going bankrupt. And that's the point when, on the one hand, I transferred to coaching because these people that lost their job that I placed before, they came back to me and asked me for advice, although I was mid-20. And the reason why they asked me was that they said, flo, you were the only person that I talked to over the last five years in the recruiting industry that did not tell me what to do, but who asked me questions and who helped me to move a step further, and I really liked that. And that's when I started the coaching training. And then I had to ask myself the coaching questions and I found out I want to be somewhere completely different.

Daniela SM: 9:47

Flo. How were you different? How do you become different? Why were you different? Why were you asking questions instead of telling people what to do?

Florian Horning: 9:54

Because I did not go to school. I had no idea where. I was interested in everything and nothing. So we could talk about chemistry or we could talk about physics and about biology and about nature, and I love this whole national park stuff. Probably the thing that I would have loved most is either working in a zoo or becoming a ranger somewhere in serengeti in africa. So I just wanted to be with wild animals. I wanted to be be out there. I wanted to be in the bush. I wanted to sleep in the open. I wanted to go on adventure. I studied agriculture with nature protection. I thought it was really interesting, but I had no path where I could go with that.

Florian Horning: 10:38

I always thought that I have to become rich and famous at some point so that I can. Once I achieved all of that, being someone in this world, I could just tell everybody to screw it and move on and live my life, and people will allow me to do that because I deserved it. I didn't overperform when I went to university. I needed some money, so I worked as a researcher. Obviously, I already loved communication and I had no idea what I was doing, and my boss back then took me on some client conversations. I think it was even a client pitch.

Florian Horning: 11:19

That person talked to me all the time and I had no idea what I was doing there so I couldn't pitch. I couldn't tell what we were doing. All I could do is ask them questions how they want us to perform, and that's what made the sell. So they offered me a consultant contract and all of a sudden I was a headhunter, got paid very well, basically lived in a suit, was flying to Frankfurt twice a week from Berlin. Basically lived in a suit, was flying to Frankfurt twice a week from Berlin, making a lot of money, meeting all these people, and I had no idea what I was doing. So all I could do is talk to them about their wife, their house, their dreams, what they want to achieve with the job, why they think they could fit there, and so they made the cell themselves and this worked out quite well wow and so it was completely, completely by accident, and that is what makes a good coach, in my opinion.

Florian Horning: 12:14

It's not somebody who's telling you what you have to do, but who's asking questions that you have never answered before, and somebody who's sticking with the questions.

Daniela SM: 12:23

As a friend were you always. A person who asked questions Feels very emotional intelligence.

Florian Horning: 12:29

No, I think I was being a child. I was a pain in the butt because I never shut up and I kept asking why, why, why, but, why is this, but, why is this, but why is this? So I never let people off the hook and if somebody told me, yeah, because that's the way we do it, yeah, but why are we doing it like this? So I was very pushy. Pushy on that, wanted to find answers. So I always wanted to find it out, I wanted to figure it out and I thought one. I thought one day I'll be grown up and smart and wise, and that's the time when I can explain the world to other people and I can tell you how it is done. I thought that in order to be well educated or intelligent, I need to be the one with the answers. And so I used to cover up my own insecurities with telling you a lot and giving you a lot of answers and being a bit of a, or maybe a lot of a, smartass At the same time. Every time I met somebody that I admired, I was asking a lot of questions because I knew to that person. I don't have to prove anything, I just wanted to know and find out how they are doing that, don't have to prove anything. I just wanted to know and find out how they are doing that, and I think that is something that I was able to transform when I, when I went into that headhunting business that I I knew that I can't tell them how their job is done, so I transferred to that yeah, curious child asking the questions.

Florian Horning: 14:04

When I I transformed to coaching, though, I thought I have to do all the coaching training so that, because people now are paying me money to achieve something in their life, so I thought that I have to tell them how they get there. I have to tell them the strategy, I have to tell them what's the next step, and you can only coach people who are way behind on the experience level, because you can tell them oh, I have been in that situation before and this worked out and this did not, so it's very limited. So you always have to look down for the, for the coaching, and I think coaching is not about this. This is advisory, and I thought that good coaching is advisory telling people what, what to do and so I did that out of curiosity when I was a child. I did that out of curiosity when I was a child.

Florian Horning: 14:57

I did that out of lack of knowledge when I was a headhunter and then I had to relearn that, being a coach, that it is much more helpful if I ask intelligent questions, because the more complicated a matter is, the more difficult it is to ask a really challenging question, and what I had to learn most is shut up After you ask the question. Shut up, and exactly the opposite than today. You are doing that. You just ask a question, you let me talk, question, you let me talk, and in a coaching situation, very often that is the most like healing and where you can achieve the biggest step forward. So let somebody talk until there's nothing more to say and then you ask them okay, how do we move on now?

Daniela SM: 15:53

but it's hard to find the good questions.

Florian Horning: 15:56

What is hard about finding the good questions?

Florian Horning: 15:58

If you're uninterested and if you don't understand the matter.

Florian Horning: 16:02

It's really difficult to stick with the person, on the one hand, understand what you're talking about and then being able to step back to not get confused with the content, but to see the greater context.

Florian Horning: 16:22

Confused with the content, but to see the greater context, you have to stay in the moment, understand what they're talking about and, at the same time, being able to push that away so that you can have this meta position and ask a question that they don't expect. So it's not the logical next step, but sometimes to move left or right or ask a completely different question, and there I. It's a combination of, on the one hand, curiosity in my case training and then a gut feeling. So the moment that I stop telling my own story, I can completely immerse in yours and I get a feeling how you feel and very often I feel that there's something missing that I don't understand. And if I go for that, very often that's the point where you don't have an answer and that's the moment where you pause and it's drawing you out of your own story and then rethinking what you really want to do it seems all like magic.

Florian Horning: 17:20

Yes, that is when the magic happens. One thing is life and the other thing is this or the one story is life happening and the other story is the one that we tell ourselves about our life. So one is living in the moment. The other one is looking back and telling us a story about our own life. That story can change because we see everything out of our own point of view and if we are able to shift the perspective. I mean, a house can be very beautiful from the front and very crappy from the back. Another house looks crappy from the front and has the most beautiful backyard. The way that you see that property only depends on your perspective, and what I do as a good coach is I help you to change that perspective. It's still the same house. That feels like magic because it's a tiny moment and within one moment you change the perspective and the whole world looks different.

Daniela SM: 18:27

But also you are a very human-centric person, right? I would say that that's why you enjoy being coach and helping and asking questions and helping and asking questions.

Florian Horning: 18:37

Yeah, I viewed myself as a very analytic person, a very logical person, somebody looking for and searching for answers, somebody dividing the world in right and wrong and good and bad. I had to come to situations where I thought that I did everything right and I failed with that and all of a sudden, I had to rethink what I did after traveling to the Sahara. That was 2013 that I went on a four-week solo Sahara trip that I just mentioned, with the satellite telephone. Before that, I was afraid on my own and I was afraid in the dark and I had to sleep on my own, completely alone, under the open sky in the desert. And after that, a lot of other things completely changed and I was much more easy with it. I went more with the flow and I lost the fear of a lot of unknown because I thought, okay, I will figure it out one way or another. And that's the time that I started traveling.

Florian Horning: 19:44

I lived on the road with my girlfriend back then. We traveled all the way through Europe again to the Sahara Desert and back after what's moved, to the mountains in Switzerland. Then she showed me her second home because she was very attached to Tanzania. Then I started to build a lodge at the beach in Zanzibar. So I had this tropical beach and the dolphins every day and doing these tours on the water and living this tropical African life. I had the lodge for almost four years. I full-time lived in Zanzibar for one year.

Florian Horning: 20:23

Then I met this world of betrayal and corruption and I lost my lodge through. We could make two podcasts just about losing that lodge. A lot of corruption, people just coming up with a random story, reporting you to the police, the police arresting you for whatever reason, and then you can prove everything and they say, yeah, that's true, you can prove everything, but maybe all of your proof is fake. And then they say but it's an official government stamp. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but you know our government. You can get every stamp you want if you pay them the right money.

Florian Horning: 21:00

And that's how I lost the Lodge. Then I went back to Switzerland, then bought a boat. I traveled for a year in a tiny wooden boat on the Mediterranean. Then I opened a safari company at Kilimanjaro and had a house at Kilimanjaro and I did my Serengeti tours that I dreamed of when I was younger, bought a piece of the national park in southern Tanzania, and then I met corruption and betrayal again and I lost again everything. And then I moved full-time on a boat and now I'm living on a sailing yard on the Mediterranean.

Daniela SM: 21:31

Yeah, I can imagine that these things can happen. Only because I grew up in Venezuela, so I know how corruption it doesn't surprise me. Actually. It's terrible that happened to you.

Florian Horning: 21:41

Yes.

Daniela SM: 21:42

What I'm missing here is that so you were helping people because you lost your job as a recruiter and people were coming to you and then you became a coach. And then from becoming a coach is then, when you started to travel to the Sahara.

Florian Horning: 21:56

Every day I'm aiming to become a better coach than yesterday. However you call it, coaching, mentorship, leadership can spiral you up and it is very difficult if you have to grow on your own. And it's super helpful if you have somebody lending you a hand, inspiring you, asking you the tough questions, questions being with you when it is difficult. That is like spark in my in my eyes when I think about that. I have the chance to motivate somebody to follow their, their own dreams. So I am personally trying to be every day to become a better coach than I was yesterday. So whenever I have the chance to learn anything about coaching, I go for that. So I'm doing my own coachings and my own coaching trainings every now and then. Sometimes I'm learning new techniques and when you learn them, you have to practice them on yourself. So becoming a better coach forced me to ask the tough questions myself. And that's when I realized I don't want to do that. I don't want to be a coach with an own office in the same city, waking up in the morning, making my coffee, driving an hour to my coaching office, spending the day in the computer, in front of the computer to fill my calendar, and then having back-to-back coachings.

Florian Horning: 23:21

I wanted to live a life that I dream of In my life. I love it when I'm outside, when I'm climbing mountains, when I'm crossing deserts, when I'm living on my boat. Normally, I do my coaching sessions on my boat, even my mastermind sessions. I have 10 people in the call and I'm sitting somewhere on the boat. Normally, I do my coaching sessions on my boat, even my mastermind sessions. I have 10 people in the call and I'm sitting somewhere on the boat.

Florian Horning: 23:44

It's, it's, it's. It's not a fake background. That's my life, because I wanted to create this and this is coming with a lot of downsides. It's very difficult at times because you're super dependent on the weather, and still, that's the choice that I made. This is, this is the life that I that I love when, in my 20s and in my early 30s, I was not brave enough to go for that choice, because I thought you have to have a real job, you need to have a house, you need to have a family, you need to have a proper income, you need to have a house, you need to have a family, you need to have a proper income. You need to have these savings Because when you're traveling so much you can't work or I can't work 60 hours a week. That I used to, because all that travel has to come from somewhere and they're driving a boat and repairing the boat and maintaining everything. It's time consuming as well.

Daniela SM: 24:41

Mm-hmm. Yeah, wonderful. Now I'm curious and I don't want to ask about money but how do you manage to buy this bungalow in Africa and the other one? You've saved a lot when you were working as a recruiter as much as I earn.

Florian Horning: 24:58

I started very slow. I just invested $1,000 here, $1,000 there. That wasn't a big deal, and I took it out of my coaching money and I thought it's a fun project. And then I realized, oh, this is something that I really really really dreamed of. And then I moved there All of a sudden. I had almost no fixed cost because living there is super cheap.

Florian Horning: 25:28

I kept working as a coach. I had a big client at that time. That was the oldest business school in the world. It's called ESCP Europe. I was in charge of their international alumni career coaching-wise.

Florian Horning: 25:43

I had to do that on the phone anyway. I could do that from Zanzibar, same time zone, super easy. So I did, like this, spent a lot, do that on the phone anyway. I could do that from Zanzibar, same time zone, super easy. So I did, like this, spend a lot of time on the phone and in between I managed everything there, kept an eye on where they spent the money, if they're really building this, if they're really showing up. I did the whole management of the of the lodge at some point.

Florian Horning: 26:03

It's tricky at times, and so at one time the cook left, and so what did I do? We had clients there, we had people who wanted to have dinner, so I did my coaching during the day and then I hung up the phone and I went to the kitchen and I cooked for everybody. So that's what you have to do when you're an entrepreneur, and if you want something to be successful, you have to put your own heart and your own uh, like, uh, sweat and tears into that. So that's how I built it up. It's just bit by bit, by bit by bit, and when it was up and running, when I lost it and uh, so now it's uh, probably, uh, it's still it's a tiny project. So right now it's probably worth like a quarter of a million, half a million, something half a million, something like that, not from the money that we put in there, but from the reputation that it received.

Daniela SM: 26:54

And so now it's owned by the government, or who took it.

Florian Horning: 26:56

No, no, no. I had a partner, I had a business partner there and the business partner wanted to have it for himself.

Daniela SM: 27:02

Oh, okay.

Florian Horning: 27:16

And so these ups and downs because of major things that happen. Well, you lost several times your positions. Have you decision whether you will let that determine the rest of your life or make the choice to learn something out of that? The money that I that I personally put in there probably probably 20 to 30 000 dollars money wise, had I visited a hotel, school or university and paid for tuition and everything, it's probably had spent more and had less knowledge. So I try to put it like this and say, okay, everything that cost me money is basically a lesson that I bought and that I received. And now it's up on me whether I let that determine the rest of my life in a good or in a bad way.

Daniela SM: 28:11

I like that, that if you have gone to hotel school, you have spent the same for sure. Or more my husband and I, we went to Switzerland for hotel school. It would have been more than that, yes.

Florian Horning: 28:23

And maybe you know some things better than me, but I had to figure everything out while doing it because I wasn't prepared for that. And while managing it, I learned the construction because I understood what they were doing. And then I started to question that. And then at some point, okay, let me do that myself. Point, okay, let me do that myself. And when I came back to switzerland, after we lost that I, we had the chance to rent a house in a skiing resort very, very cheap, but it was, it was run down, was very broken. Because I had the experience from zanzibar, I thought, okay, let's meet, let me do it myself. And I I was completely changing construction and everything myself. I just, african style, built the construction to hold up the roof and then I changed the, the walls and everything still holding up, and it's looking super nice.

Florian Horning: 29:15

After having done that, I had the chance to renovate an old sailboat and everybody that I knew told me I'm completely crazy, that boat will never swim again. Just figured it out and then I sailed with it through the Mediterranean for three years. Had I not done Zanzibar and the house in the mountains, I would have not dared to do that, probably had bought a much more expensive boat, and by now I know if you buy a much more expensive boat it might hold for a year or two, but when things start to break and they will always break on a boat it's much more expensive. And then you either have to have somebody do the job for you, which is even more expensive, or you learn it the hard way. So I started with that, worked myself up and by now I'm very confident with most of the repairs on a wooden boat and on an epoxy boat as well, so I'm not so dependent. I could give the job away to somebody else and I would be able to understand whether they're doing a good job or not, which can save you a lot of money. Or I could even do that myself, and I love that.

Florian Horning: 30:24

To build something with your own hands and I need that. In contrary to my coaching, I love talking to people, but at some point I need to build something myself, because if we have a good conversation, after you hang up you start changing your job or your relationship or your life, and things change for you. For me, everything is the same At some point. That is exhausting for me. If I'm dependent, for my own well-being on your success. Then I'm very dependent again and by having my own projects that are in my own hands and that I can realize and that I can build up, and that if I can live in that project or sail with that project, it's very satisfying. And then I'm getting very detached from your success and that is again making me a better coach. If I'm not dependent on you being successful, I can go back and I can stay critical and I can be the even better coach for you.

Daniela SM: 31:24

Wow, I love everything you say. First of all, I want to go back to say that you found a cheap house in Switzerland. That's amazing. I didn't think anything was cheap in Switzerland.

Florian Horning: 31:34

Yeah, yeah. And we had an agreement with the landlord. We got rent free for a couple of years for doing the renovation and that was price-wise. That was fine for us doing the renovation, and that was price wise. That was that was fine for us. But then he offered it for sale to us and he went bananas because, oh, everything's looking fine. I was like, yeah, well, it was me who saved the house. In the end we went separate ways because he wanted to sell it. That is a house in germany in that condition that I found that was like 50,000, if at all, and he wanted to have 350,000.

Daniela SM: 32:10

Talking of the Swiss, oh, wow, you know, I understand you like talking to people, though I'm introvert and like I need to recharge on my own. But I feel like I need to have little projects, little things that you built, not just ticking boxes, because that's what I do at work. For example, when I created the podcast, everything I did it myself and I had no idea and I feel so proud, like I feel like proudest thing. Well, there's another one too. When I was in Switzerland in the school we had, the yearbooks were black and white, because this is in the nineties. I was like we are going to have color, we're going to put a lot of pictures, and I had a vision, the whole vision, from the first page to everything. Some teachers were like oh no, you don't have any experience. And some of them believe in me and you know, the owner of the school was this is the best book ever and this is like, oh my God. I feel like I did such an amazing thing Because it was using your hands, using your brain, getting ideas.

Florian Horning: 33:12

And your hands, using your brain, getting ideas, and the same with the podcast. I feel like sometimes those achievements, for me, are so much more valuable. Most of the times that I'm coaching, I'm coaching around, so the thing that I'm most interested in is if a person has the feeling that they want to be where they are not. So if they have the feeling that they are not where they want to be, then something obviously is missing. And to find out what is missing and how you get there Because if you want to get somewhere, you have to know where you want to go, and most people just know what they don't want Because there are so many choices and to find something that you really want to work towards, that, I think, is super. That is super interesting. It's the same inside the company.

Florian Horning: 33:53

If you give somebody a raise or a title, something that you receive one time, and then you take it for granted. If you're unsatisfied, this will not satisfy. If you're completely happy with your job and I give this to you as recognition it will land, and you will not satisfy. If you're completely happy with your job and I give this to you as recognition it will land and you will own it from the moment that you receive the raise or that you receive the title and you think, yeah, I own this, I worked for this in my past and now I own this. And if I do a super good job, now I want to have the next raise or the next title. Do a super good job, now I want to have the next race or the next title. Most people don't work to maintain their income or maintain their title. They think they deserve that. If you want them to overachieve, that needs to be the next step.

Daniela SM: 34:39

The other thing, too, is that people are usually not paid enough in all levels, so they do want to raise so that they can pay bills.

Florian Horning: 34:46

Yeah, and we talked about the motivation. If you think that you already deserve more, then giving you the raise is something which will not create a lasting new motivation. The best case would be that people think that, okay, now I receive what I deserve, but it's not a problem of motivation. So it's much more interesting to talk to people about where do you want to go, how do you want to achieve that, so that they have the feeling that with each day they come to work and they achieve something, they are getting one step closer to where they want to be. So that is the creating my success in my job myself. It's not the job offering me a race once or a new title and then I have it and then I don't know how to go from there. But if you work on a plan and people have the idea they can create the title or the race themselves, then they have a motivation to work towards.

Daniela SM: 35:41

Okay, and so, floor, thinking about all these stories that you have told me, I feel like you are living an extraordinary, unconventional life. You seem to be happy and, on top of that, you seem to be giving a lot to the world with your coaching style and your building stuff and creating. Do you agree? Are you happy? Do you think you do have the extraordinary life?

Florian Horning: 36:05

Being happy is the most simple and the most complicated thing in life. Happiness is not a place to go to. It's a place to come from. You won't reach anything in the external world and when you reach that place that title, that reward, that income that will make you happy Happiness is something that comes from within. If you choose to be happy, then you can bring that happiness into the world, and I have met people being super poor and people super rich, and both being super unhappy or being super happy. Happiness is a choice. I know that.

Florian Horning: 36:51

Sometimes I feel that, but often I still slip into my old patterns and I'm unsatisfied and I'm not happy with that. I have to remind myself to be grateful and thankful for who I am. And as soon as I compare myself and I think, oh, I should, I ought to, you have to. What do other people think about this? Did you really make the best out of your life? Then I'm getting nervous and frustrated, and I'm not.

Florian Horning: 37:23

What helps is if I think back five years or ten years. Think about all the stories and all the experience that I have accumulated in between. If somebody had told me that ten years ago, I would not believe that I'm able to do that, and now I just take it for granted. So I think it makes sense if you compare yourself every once in a while with yourself yesterday and yourself a year ago and yourself 10 years ago, because right now I'm always where I am right now and I always have the goals lying ahead of me and they always seem like a very steep learning curve. And when I look back from where I am right now, I take that for granted. But taking yourself back in time and say, okay, imagine 10 years ago that you were the one doing this and this and this and achieving this and that, and that's the moment where I think, yeah, I like me, I like myself.

Daniela SM: 38:22

All right, keep comparing yourself with yourself.

Florian Horning: 38:25

All right, keep comparing yourself with yourself Only person who's living your life is you. The only person having your thoughts and your dreams and your feelings and your capabilities and your obstacles in life is you. Everybody else and this is something really interesting Even if you talk to the richest people, they have their fears and they have their struggles. They are just adding zeros at the end. It's just a bit bigger, but everybody is facing problems that they think that they don't know how to handle, wherever they are in life. So if you are looking, if you're just comparing my wealth to somebody else's wealth, or my coaching reach to somebody else's, or my coaching experience to somebody else's, I can always find somebody who, if it looks from my perspective, looks like I'm a nobody. They are not living my life and I'm not living their life living their life, and they have the same internal struggles that I do, because they know all the other stuff that is going through their head and through their life. My life is about managing my life, so compare yourself to yourself, thank you.

Daniela SM: 39:41

And so what is up for you in the future?

Florian Horning: 39:42

Any plans, or you say you're always having steep goals on the one hand, I'm just adding a a new mastermind, together with my, with my girlfriend. She's a quite a famous sailing vlogger. Personally thinks she's one of the like top 10 solo sailing women worldwide. She's very well known for solo sailing and now we're sailing together, so let's see how that is going to change. And we have the idea that we want to help other young, especially women, who want to leave their nine to five job behind. They don't know how, so we are creating a mastermind coaching program for them.

Florian Horning: 40:24

I think that we can add so much value because we like men, men and women, different backgrounds, different income streams, different set of experiences, different backgrounds, and I have no idea how to fill that up and how to make that successful.

Florian Horning: 40:41

So that is like like one big goal ahead of mine. Uh, business wise and personally, we wanted to sail to west africa, which is very uncommon to sail there, so from europe to the canary islands, to cape verde and then to to gambia. Uh, some family issues, so my father just died two weeks ago and that, like I had to change everything around and focus on people and not on goals, and now it's getting a bit late in the year and I don't know if we are making it this year or if we're making it at all. And I'm thinking about this because we already promised to film a whole season for her channel in West Africa and now we don't know if we go there. So it's a difficult and very long way to sail. So these are two things that are very currently on my plate. No idea how to get there.

Daniela SM: 41:39

And what about pirates? Are you not afraid of pirates around that area?

Florian Horning: 41:43

I'm more afraid of the orcas in the Strait of Gibraltar. Around that area, I'm more afraid of the orcas in the Strait of Gibraltar If you go further down, to Liberia, ghana, towards Nigeria, there are a couple of pirate attacks. And then on the other side of Africa, on Somalia, there are pirate attacks, but from Morocco, mauritania, senegal, all the way to Guinea-Bissau there are no.

Daniela SM: 42:06

Okay, and why do you want to go there? Why that goal?

Florian Horning: 42:10

I still love Africa. It is very raw, very joyful, especially because it's so hot. It's much closer to nature. So in the north, you have to take care for the winter, you have to have a house, you have to have the warm clothes, you have to take care for the winter, you have to have a house, you have to have the warm clothes, you have to be inside, and in Africa so much of the life is outside and is on the streets. I still love African culture, as long as I don't do business. Spending the winter there when it is cold in Europe is super interesting.

Florian Horning: 42:44

This area is supposed to be one of the most beautiful sailing destinies in the world, but it's very difficult to get back from there and it has no sailing infrastructure. So all the people who want to go on vacation, they go to the Met, because there you can go from one harbor to the other. There you have to be. You need to have an offshore boat, you have to be able to live on the boat, make your own water, have enough storage for the food and to be able to live. Quite simple, because you can't go to any supermarket. You can't buy groceries like you do here. You just buy the raw vegetables and the raw fish if you want to have some. I like that because it's removing a lot of the artificial nonsense in typical European life.

Daniela SM: 43:27

In general, even in North America.

Florian Horning: 43:29

Or in Northern yeah.

Daniela SM: 43:30

All right. So, flo, thank you so much for sharing your story and thank you so much for making this happen. I know how busy you were. You're such a charismatic guy that since I met you, you treated me like a friend and so casual. I love it. So thank you very much. I enjoyed the conversation.

Florian Horning: 43:47

Yeah, me too. Thank you for having me.

Daniela SM: 43:50

Thank you. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. I am Daniela and you are listening to, because Everyone has a Story. Please take five seconds right now and think of somebody in your life that may enjoy what you just heard, or someone that has a story to be shared and preserved. When you think of that person, shoot them a text with the link of this podcast. This will allow the ordinary magic to go further. Join me next time for another story conversation. Thank you for listening. Hasta pronto.