Share The Struggle
Share The Struggle
How You Do Anything, Is How You Do Everything 232
Have you ever wondered how the way you approach the smallest tasks reflects your entire life mindset? Let's explore that profound question through the hectic, yet fulfilling lens of balancing holiday preparations, family duties, and career ambitions. On this episode of the Share the Struggle Podcast, we're embracing the chaos of the Christmas season, finding strength in our struggles, and honoring the memories of loved ones we've lost. It's all about turning potential sorrow into a celebration of legacy and love, reminding us that "how you do anything is how you do everything."
Join me as I navigate a whirlwind day that includes crafting Christmas gifts, managing customer accounts, and tackling farm chores—all while juggling family responsibilities and the challenging logistics of a new office building. Imagine a day filled with muddy boots, broken tools, and rushed trips to Home Depot, but ultimately driven by the determination to meet life's demands. The relentless hustle of balancing personal and professional duties, culminating in a late-night recording session, showcases the tenacity required to thrive amidst chaos and exhaustion.
But it's not just about surviving the day; it's about thriving through inspiration and innovation. Reflecting on organization and the Pareto principle, I reveal the delicate act of managing my many commitments, ensuring that the most important aspects of my life receive my best efforts. From taking on unexpected gigs at Skip's Bar and Lounge to advancing the Loud, Proud American brand, I share the journey of embracing change and finding motivation. As we wrap up, gratitude takes center stage, celebrating the connections we've built and the shared journey of the festive season. Let's continue this adventure together!
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Have you ever heard the old saying how you do anything is how you do everything? I heard this quote for the first time last week and it provoked a great deal of thought. The quote raises the idea that how we work and act in our lives are more cohesive than people realize. Anyone can work hard when it's for something that we want or care about. Most of us work less on the things we don't like but have to do. We tend to ignore those areas that we don't want to do. Today, we give thought to the theory that how we work in any of these areas can cause and affect all areas. How you do anything is how you do everything. That and more. On today's episode of Share the Struggle Podcast, let me tell you something. Everybody struggles. The difference is some people choose to go through it and some choose to grow through it. The choice is completely yours. Which one you choose will have a very profound effect on the way you live your life.
Speaker 2:If you find strength in the struggle, then this podcast is for you. You have a relationship that is comfortable with uncomfortable conversations. Uncomfortable conversations challenge you, humble you and they build you. When you sprinkle a little time and distance on it, it all makes sense. Most disagreements they stem from our own insecurities. You are right where you need to be.
Speaker 1:Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh. What it do, what it hot diddly do, episode 232. And I am so excited to be back with you. Oh, it's true, it is damn true. How do you do? How do you do today? You have a good day. Oh, that's so good for you. I'm happy for you. Oh, me, so happy for you. Thank y'all for coming back yet again. I heard y'all heard me. You heard me say it Two, three, two. You know what that means, don't you? That means 232 consecutive weeks of me and you, mm-hmm, we've been doing this for a long time.
Speaker 1:You can find all things podcast related over to wwwsharethefragilepodcastcom, proudly brought to you by the good fine folks over at Loud Proud American. I mean, well, that's me. So that makes sense, doesn't it? How y'all feeling, how you be doing, how's your mentals and your dentals doing?
Speaker 1:On the day that this podcast drops on said winning Wednesday, it is officially one week from Christmas Day. Good Lord and God, almighty, time is flying. That loss of a week between Thanksgiving and Christmas this year, based off of you know where Thanksgiving fell on the calendar. Man, I could use that extra week. I am jamming and cramming so much stuff into my schedule right now and I don't have time to think. I don't have time for nothing. It's been jam city. Okay, it's been a real jam sandwich for me right now, and I want to get to today's subject. But I want to give you a little sneak peek, a little peek beneath the sheets, if you will, as to a day in the life of times of yours truly and just what I've been up to, how busy we've been. And it's promise, I promise you, I'm going to take that Cabela's catalog right now, smack that baby down. Oh, y'all heard it. And I'm going to take my left hand, drop that left hand right on top, and I'm going to take these beady little eyes and I'm going to look up towards the sky and I'm going to preach the absolute truth from this guy. I'm going to connect it. I'm going to give you a little scenario about my life and what I'm doing and I'm going to connect it to that wholesome, beautiful quote that I used to open today's show. Think I can do it. Do you believe me? Do you trust me? Will you bet on me? Huh, about to find out. We're going to find out, okay, we're going to find out if you're betting on me or not.
Speaker 1:So here's the thing. Y'all, we're all under that holiday rush crush, right? Everybody has everything going on for Christmas. We're gearing up and getting ready. Everybody has, you know, family get-togethers and holiday parties and work parties and all those things. Over the weekend we had a couple holiday parties, we had a get-together for Allie's work and all these things going on, which are great. These great festive things, these beautiful little festive things, little festivities. It's so festive, which is fantastic. That's what the season's all about, right. Getting people together, even if they don't want to be together. That's what it's all about right. Forcing people to be together. That's part of the magic of the season, let's be honest. So you have all those things going on, and then you have the Christmas shopping side of things.
Speaker 1:I am an old school old soul when it comes to Christmas. My mom raised me on Christmas and giving gifts and making memories and trying to do things special. If you are a loyal listener and you've been listening to this show for years now I can honestly say years now when I say that right, 232 freaking episodes. It's unbelievable. So if you've been listening, you know how important Christmas is to me and my family, and one of the reasons for that is that we've lost a lot of close loved ones, pillars in this family, some of the closest people to me in this family. I've lost them around the holidays. So a lot of people would think that means that it's a time of year to run and hide and feel sorry for yourself and weep and cry about the past. But that's not the case. For me, it's about making the memory last and honoring them and their legacy this time of year. So I always want to bring them out in the holidays. I want to involve them in the holidays and their memory and their legacy in the holidays, and that's part of the reason why we strive so hard to make Christmas special and I've got a multitude of episodes on making Christmas special and that holiday hangover let down that I used to get that. I usually get that I'm trying to work through. There's some great information on Christmas and on the holidays and the power of the season and previous episodes, but that's not where we're headed today. I'm just painting a picture for y'all so we can pave the road to let you know I'm gearing up and getting ready for Christmas.
Speaker 1:So I'm working on trying to think up and create sentimental gifts and things that are heartfelt and special for the people that I care about. So, doing these things, you dedicate a bunch of time to it, and this is kind of the way my mom raised me. I'm the type of person that I like to go out, buy things, find things, make things, create things and then wrap all of those things, deliver those things. You know what I'm saying. I want to be a part of it. I'm always shooting for making a memory. So keep that in the back of your mind. That's how I take on Christmas. I'm always trying to do my best to make the best for anybody and everybody that I know and love this time of year. Right, that's just kind of how I look at things. So I always have that going on in the back of my mind. I'm a new dad, I'm a first time dad, so you're trying to experience all those things which you know. She's not going to remember all those things, but you want to capture those things.
Speaker 1:So I'm factoring all of that in and I'm also trying to capitalize on as much business as I can possibly capture before Christmas, because in my industry things tend to dry up after Christmas. I mean, think about it, everybody spends money on retail. They go crazy before the holiday, buying gifts and racking up credit card debt. And as soon as you know the holidays are over, people kind of pull back on their spending. They start paying for, you know, heating, fuel and all those things and they're trying to recover from the debt they created during the holidays traveling, expense, gifts, credit cards, the whole nine. So we tend to slow down during that time. One of the reasons why I'm looking towards possibly traveling during that time to make some money for the business. But that's all on a side note.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to capture what's right in front of me. Part of doing that is trying to do live sales, trying to get out in front of my existing customer base, but also tapping into, like the how do I say this? The, like the business side of my, of my customer base, and what I say by what I mean by that is is like the custom orders for small businesses. So right now I'm trying to maximize that opportunity. I have some small businesses that I'm getting caught up on that. I'm working with some things. I'm trying to maximize that opportunity. I have some small businesses that I'm getting caught up on that I'm working with some things I'm trying to fulfill. So they have those for Christmas. I have some family and friends coming to me trying to make their business logos and ideas come to life in time for Christmas, so it's important for me to be a part of that for them but also support my family at the same time. So you're delegating those things family at the same time. So you're delegating those things.
Speaker 1:I recently just gained a new customer thanks to a referral from the Pet and Gills, which is going to be a pretty big wholesale or custom account I would say a business account for me. That is really going to help going into the holidays. So I'm trying to wrap all those things up. Now here's the thing there's a bunch of deadlines that go into those things, right? So you factor in a family member trying to take an existing logo and make it into something special and surprise their loved one and their family members, and I'm trying to wrap that up for them. I have another close friend that is trying to develop a business logo for a significant other and they want to surprise them on Christmas and I'm working through taking their vision and making it a reality, also while reaching out to different customers and pushing out products that I have. I just mentioned the Pet and Gills to you from Freedom Designs.
Speaker 1:I'm currently working on some hats for them their first time getting hats for me and this new customer account that I'm working on. Their first initial order with me is about 130 pieces. So I have to get all those done and that's a complete logo design, redesign, overhaul. So I'm doing all these things and I have these deadlines. I have to order my graphics at a certain date or they won't be here on time. So for me that date was yesterday. So I'm working all these different logos, sending them out, waiting for approval, getting changes back, you know, mixing everything up, and then I'm against the gun. I'm reaching out to everybody saying, hey, man, I need an answer now if we want to make this happen for Christmas. So I'm trying to get things done by five o'clock in the afternoon on Monday. I'm not getting them done until nine, 10 o'clock at night, and then, in order to make things work, I'm paying for an expedited shipping charge. They wouldn't have had to occur if I had literally just had everybody get back to me in a timely fashion. But we're all stressed, we're all going through things right. So you're working on that and then today I'm trying to get my apparel order in which I needed to be in by noontime today to have everything here in time to make all the products. So I'm going back and forth with a multitude of people trying to figure out what sizes they need, what stylings they need. When you're talking about hundreds of items you're trying to navigate, you have one chance at ordering those correctly. I'm dealing with that. So that's bringing you into my day today. So let's get into today.
Speaker 1:This morning I get up at 5 am, I get ready, I bring my mom to work. When I come home from work I head to the office because it's still dark out and I start working on a Christmas gift and some customer accounts. I'm working on those. I see the sun start to peel through. I go out and do barn chores, so I'm shoveling horse poop and feeding the pig and getting the horse out. Then I go over and I unload a massive load of lumber. I have a truck full of 1 by 12 by eight foot sheets. So I take, you know, 90 of those off the truck and a bunch of one by sixes and I load all those up and I stack those up and then I go inside and the wife's getting ready to leave for work and little baby girl is still sleeping. So I start wrapping Christmas presents. She wakes, I get her all up, get a bottle going, feed her, start working with her, get her comfortable, go back to wrapping some stuff.
Speaker 1:I'm going back and forth, bottle wrapping, moving things around, get her to fall asleep and then I get to my computer. I'm working on the computer trying to finalize these orders. I'd get to my computer. I'm working on the computer trying to finalize these orders. I'm going back and forth. It kind of feels like you're working on the stock market, right? It's like in the stock exchange. You're waiting for that bell to ring and you're just, you're moving and shaking, trying to finagle everything and to get things done on time. So I'm going through all those motions Now to gain a little more insight into things for you as I'm recording this.
Speaker 1:I'm recording this on Tuesday and on Wednesday, winning Wednesday, when this episode drops, we are going to be receiving the new Loud, proud American office storefront storage location, our new building, a shiny new building that we've invested in, our 12 by 26 office depot I guess I can't call it that. There's already an office depot. It's on its way tomorrow. So I have to get some things done today to get ready for that building to be dropped. So part of that is moving some things around. Getting back to that pad that, if you've been listening to, over the past couple of weeks it was frozen and now it's been raining for two days, so it is a mud pit. Okay, that's a little irony for you, am I right? So, um, before my mom gets out of work, I'm doing all these orders for the, you know, getting things ready for customers, placing those things. I get the baby ready. We head to the bank, get some cash because I got to go get another load of lumber my friend Doug called the batten boards and some other two by fours I ordered are done. So I head out, go to the bank, get some cash, go over, get another load of lumber, head into town, get my mom out of work shop for dinner and then head over to Home Depot because I'm looking for some 18-inch round cement slabs for the barn. And I get there and they're sold out. So I buy some actual cement blocking instead.
Speaker 1:I come home, get the baby to my mom's house and I go out to the pad and I start working, getting ready for the building. I'm sinking in this fresh new gravel like four or five inches into the ground. It is just a mud bath. I'm trying to line everything up to level things off. I break two count them two measuring tapes. I'm throwing things all around. The sun's going down. I've given myself 30 minutes for a four-hour job. Right, that just sounds logical. So I'm going through all this and then I realize this isn't going to work. These bricks are sinking out of sight. I have to get these cement blocks. I look and there's some available at the Home Depot in Portland, which is, let's say, 25, 30 minutes away. Right, it's Tuesday, folks. I haven't recorded the podcast, just want to put this all in perspective.
Speaker 1:Now sun's down, it's dark out, I still haven't done the barn chores. I'm outside up to my nipples, my schnipples in mud, so I unload another load of lumber, I go over, take care of the barn chores, I change my clothes, jump in the truck and head to Home Depot in Portland. And while I'm there, you know the old fiasco of going to a Home Depot and needing somebody to secure a forklift to get your order. So they get these six blocks for me about. I don't know what is it like? 600, 800 pounds worth of cement Load that into the truck, drive home, get home, cook dinner for the family, sit down on the couch for 10 minutes with the wife.
Speaker 1:And here I am now downstairs recording the podcast. I am getting started at 9 pm in the evening, when this episode of the podcast needs to be done, booked and cooked tonight so y'all can consume it first thing in the morning. This is a screenshot into my day. Okay, I'm gonna be doing this, recording this, editing this, posting this for the next couple of hours. I'm going to try to get some sleep. Then I'm going to get back out there first thing in the morning, because now I have to pick up the blocks that I put down and then place the new cement blocks that I have, and my building should be here by 10 in the morning.
Speaker 1:So this is what's going on. This is me in my life. You have the deadlines of the business and all these orders and things I'm trying to get done for Christmas. You have a building on its way tomorrow that I need to have the ground ready for. I'm being daddy freaking daddy pants McDattle cakes okay, instead of McGriddle cakes, I'm McDaddy cakes over here Doing all those things, taking care of the family stuff All this stuff is just kind of swirling and whirling at the same time, right, I feel so unorganized yet again and I'm realizing my life continues to be unorganized. If you guys have been listening over the past few weeks, you know that part of the reason for getting this building is to get organized so that I can get my life back, I can get my garage back, I can do all these things and you're going to increase productivity when you're not overwhelmed and overcome with all of these things. So this is all the reasons for what I'm about to do. You take all this, all these emotions this is just a screenshot into my one day, my one day, and in the meantime of all this, I try not to be an asshole, right? You try to just be upbeat and as positive as possible, and I'm going to.
Speaker 1:While I'm saying this, I'm going to apologize to some friends out there that try to reach me, that try to get in touch with me. There's a few of you. Jared, I know I need to meet up with you so our girls can hang out and I can pick up the whatever the baby wrap thing is for the car seat that the, the wives, have talked about. Matt, I know you called me today and texted me today and I just didn't get a chance to get back. The list goes on and on about the people that have reached out that I just haven't been able to return phone calls, toby so many people I'm thinking about and I'm feeling bad right now as I'm saying this, but I'm just trying to handle and tackle what is right in front of me. I need to get these things done. I'm not trying to ignore anyone. Full frontal disclosure here. Folks, I apologize. I am doing the best I can, but I feel like I'm in the swirl. I'm in the tornado, I'm in the eye of the storm as things are just spinning around me and I'm trying to finagle and figure out what the hell life is all about. Now, for those of you that bet against me on connecting the little dots between the opening of the show and the story about my day and what's going on in the life and times of this guy right here, here it goes you lose. I'm connecting the dots. You ready. You better be.
Speaker 1:How you do anything is how you do everything. Last week, I was either watching the news. Okay, or I was watching sports, one or the other. Which one was it? It was the news or it was sports. I think it was the news and I actually think this was Pete Hegseth that actually made this quote. So either Pete said this amazing quote or I'm giving him credit for this quote, but I'm pretty sure I was watching an interview with him and Pete's actually Donald Trump's nominee for United States Secretary of Defense, and I'm almost certain it was him that said this, and he said that he lives his life by the motto of how you do anything is how you do everything. If it wasn't him, then it was some baseball player going into the Hall of Fame. I swear, that's how my mind works. That's how I spend my time.
Speaker 1:Okay, but the quote was how you do anything is how you do everything, and I instantly took to my phone, I went to the notes section and I typed out that quote. Now, the the nice thing would have been if I wrote down at the same exact time who it was. That freaking said it. Okay, that would have been a smart thing to do, but that's not how it went. Okay, I just wrote down the quote.
Speaker 1:But as I put that quote down. It sat with me and I spent some time thinking about it and then, over the course of a week, as I find myself in certain situations, I think about that quote and I think about those times when maybe I'm being a little lax on things. I think about those times when you know you're putting something off, right? Maybe I had to watch my baby girl all day and then something comes up and you start working on something and you let something else slip and the next thing you know it's there for you to pick up the next day and all things, good or bad, can have a snowball effect, right? That's like that ball of positive momentum that you get rolling uphill. That ball of positive momentum. You just feel like it starts building up steam and you start. If you keep pushing that ball, that ball of positive momentum, up the hill, eventually it's going to get to the top and it's just going to start rolling and things are going to happen. Things are going to happen to you and for you, and all because of you. You're going to just make things happen. The same thing can happen when you let things slide, when you have that snowball, that runaway snowball coming downhill at you, that you're just letting things pile up Bills, laundry, to-do list, work, whatever it is right. You start letting these things pile up and they just start rolling downhill. Those things happen, both positive and negative. Right, we can all agree on those things. How you do anything is how you do everything.
Speaker 1:This quote raises the idea that how we work and act in our lives is far more cohesive than we tend to realize. Anyone can work hard when it is something that we care about. I can work extremely hard and be extremely dedicated to spending time with my little baby girl and trying to make those memories. Or I can find that super easy, fun, rewarding, positive task when it comes to my daily business that I'd rather sit down and focus on for countless hours a day versus having to stand there and endlessly press and focus on for countless hours a day versus having to stand there and endlessly press t-shirts for 15 hours. Like, we can focus on those good things, right, we can focus on those things that we, that we enjoy.
Speaker 1:Most of us work a heck of a lot less on the things that we don't like, but we have to do. We all have those tasks at work or in life that we know this needs to be done, like it's one of those things on the to-do list that we tend to skip over but we'll get to it. But when we get to it we're just not going to enjoy it, we're not going to put a lot of effort into it, we're just going to get it done because we know it needs to be done. We tend to ignore those areas because we just don't want to do them. But if you really truly give thought to the theory that how we work in any of these areas can cause and affect all areas, because how we do anything is how we do everything, as I'm sitting here today and I'm thinking about the whirlwind of a day that I've just had, and I start thinking about what I'm going to talk about on tonight's podcast, I flipped over to my phone, checked my notes section and there was that quote staring me right in the face how we do anything is how we do everything.
Speaker 1:My day today was a whirlwind. It was a tornado, it was a shit shoot. My day equals my life. My day equals my life. My whole life right now feels like the Groundhog Day version of today Chasing deadlines, moving money around, standing in mud, slugging things around, trying to spend time, provide time, do things for my family, everything right. My little screenshot that I gave you today is every day when I gave you a scenario about my day.
Speaker 1:How many of you, driving, working, at the gym, casually listening, heard my day and got a little bit of anxiety? How many of you, how many of my loyal, loving, beautiful listeners out there, heard my day and got a little bit of anxiety? How many of you, how many of my loyal, loving, beautiful listeners out there, heard my day today and got a little bit of anxiety? Just put your hand up, raise your hand there. I just want to kind of count the room. I want to gauge the room. Didn't think I could see you, did you? You did not think I can see you. Well, I can't, but I can feel you and I'm going to just jump out on a limb here and say that a lot of folks live and operate in the chaos that I do. But I guarantee there's a bunch of you that are saying, bro, when I heard your day today, I got anxiety for you. When are you going to relax? When are you going to unplug? You're going to crash.
Speaker 1:For those of you, that got a little taste of anxiety, a little touch of curiosity about what goes on in my world. How do you feel, knowing that today is every day? Today is every day for me because every single day of the week I do something for the business. Every single day of the week, I do something for the family. Every single day of the week, I do something for the family. Every single day of the week, I do something for something, for something, for someone, for some, who, for somehow, for some way, every day. And the thing is, as I'm trying to spin as many plates as possible, as I'm trying to balance as many things as possible, a lot of those plates fall as possible. As I'm trying to balance as many things as possible, a lot of those plates fall and a lot of things come crashing down and you lose sight of a lot of things and you can only keep this rate of speed up for so long before everything comes crashing down.
Speaker 1:So today, as I'm sitting here and I read this quote and it's right there for me, thankfully I put it back in my notes section it's hitting me and I'm realizing I need to change how I do everything, because how unorganized and behind the eight ball I am and all of those things begins to impact everything. Some things are completely out of my control. If you've been listening, you know I got two loads of gravel. One of them wasn't enough. Second one froze solid. Not much you can do about that. You make the best of it, get it all done. Then, when the ground freezes and you get three days of rain, it is what it is. It's going to turn to mud. There's not much else you can do, right? But the point is, if I was more organized and maybe I did that a month ago or two months ago I would have been able to adjust for the climate. I would have been able to adjust for those things.
Speaker 1:But then, because I'm falling behind on those things, it translates into other things. Right? Because just think about that snowball effect there. If I'm out there doing those things at late hours and spending all day doing that, then I'm not in my office capitalizing more on the opportunity that's in front of me right now with the holidays, right, I'm not able to maybe do the gift building and shopping and wrapping ahead of time. So instead I go ahead and just try to capitalize and maximize all the time I have now and do those things. Every single time my daughter takes a nap.
Speaker 1:If you think about it, how I do, one thing caused and affected every other thing. Me being behind the deadline on my slab for my building can translate into me being behind the deadline on my products for my customers. I'm following their timeline, but some of the requests came in two weeks ago and I didn't have the ability or the time to get to those requests for another week or two weeks, so it affects that. Right, I'm chasing all these things. My building should have been here last week, so I'm chasing all those things for last week. That puts me behind on what should have been done last week for these customers.
Speaker 1:You understand what I'm saying. I'm painting kind of a muddy picture here. No pun intended, but the point is how you do anything is how you do everything. So when anything in your life becomes chaos, you create the opportunity for everything in your life to become chaos, and you're not trying to create chaos. I'm not Captain Chaos over here. I just have a high-functioning ability to handle chaos, but I don't want to live my life in chaos. That's a lot of chaos.
Speaker 2:Captain Chaos.
Speaker 1:I don't know. I just felt the need to say that. Man, it's crazy. And as I think about that quote and I think about my day and I think about my life and I start realizing how overwhelmed I've become when I stop and sit in it, when I sit in my emotions and my feelings and I realize what I've created for myself. And and it's all with the best of intentions You're running as hard and fast as you possibly can towards your goals all layers and levels of your goals, right, and you're outgrowing things and you're trying new things and you're building new things and you're taking chances on things, but when you're doing it in every single aspect of your life, it can become overwhelming.
Speaker 1:I'm encouraged by these things Don't read this wrong America. I'm excited about these things, but I'm realizing I need to regulate and change how I do things. And this is the time of year when we do those type of things. Like, if you've been listening for the past four years that we've been out here creating you realize that we talk at the new year the opportunity about making a new you with new goals and new opportunities, and and we have all these great episodes about forecasting goals and challenging yourselves and writing out objectives and all these things. And one of those things that just keeps beating me between the freaking blinkers for the past few years is getting organized. And I'm just not organized. And the problem is that when I'm not organized and things start spinning as fast as they are, that's when chaos ensues, Because if you have a level of organization to fall back on, then at least you don't lose sight of all the things that you forecast and all the things that you planned out. I feel right now like I'm capturing and maximizing all the things possible. But when it slows down, I will realize. It'll reveal to me which plate I dropped. It'll show itself to me in which area of my life lapsed, which things I didn't get done. It'll reveal itself to me. But right now I'm going so hard and fast that I feel like I'm on top of everything. But someday, someway, something will come up and show me you messed up, you left something on the table, you dropped the ball, you made a mistake, because I'm going way too fast.
Speaker 1:If I turn the clocks back for me to maybe I don't know five, six years ago, I was becoming an owner of a Harley Davidson dealership and I was traveling every three, four months out to Denver to this management academy that I was going to, and Sam Dantzler is the guy that actually owned the academy and he had this saying that he used to use, and it came from some Greek poet or military leader. Don't you guys love how I can narrow down quotes to one to three people? The quote that Sam used to love to say is we do not rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training. It was a motto and a mantra that I brought back to the dealership and that I used to use with all of our management team, all of our leadership team, and we tried to instill that in all of our employees, all the family that work for us. We do not rise to the level of our expectations, but we fall to the level of our training. When you can cause and affect employees by training them, by educating them, you pour into them all that you can possibly do right. You try to give them all the information, all the knowledge, all the confidence, all the hopes, dreams, ability and aspirations you possibly can. That's the truth, Because those employees that you don't pour your effort to, they're not going to rise to your expectation. They're going to fall to the level of training. So if you're not training them, then that's what you're going to get. They're not going to reach the expectation that you falsely have for them. They are going to fall to the lack of training that you have provided them. So when I take his quote and I mold it into today, we do not rise to the level of our expectations. We fall to the level of our training.
Speaker 1:As I'm thinking about what's going on in my life, I'm not rising to the expectations that I have for myself. I'm not rising to the goals, hopes, dreams and aspirations I have for myself. I'm falling to the level of training and to me, I'm also falling to the level of organization. I can change that quote a little bit and say that I'm not rising to the level of my expectations, hopes and dreams, but I'm falling to the level of my organization. I am unorganized and I am undisciplined and that has truly been something that has affected everything. How you do anything is how you do everything. If I don't organize, if I am not being organized, I'm falling to the level of my organization and it is affecting everything. Right now I am floundering, I am not being organized. I'm falling to the level of my organization and it is affecting everything. Right now. I am floundering. I am swimming, Just keep swimming, Just keep swimming.
Speaker 1:I don't know if that was Dora or that missing little fish. Nemo, Is that right? Nemo, Is that right? Why is it that every single thing I give to you folks today, I can only narrow it down to two people? Oh my God, I don't understand. Is it Frank Sinatra or Hulk Hogan? I'm confused. Wow, I don't know what's wrong with me. This is a screenshot to my life. This is what's messed up in my world, you know what? Here's another layer of the onion. Guess what I did, Guess what old Saint Nick did. I said yes to a DJ gig on Friday night that'll keep me out of the house till one in the morning because I have time.
Speaker 1:Right, I have time. All kidding aside, it's a great opportunity. Skip's Bar and Lounge out in Buxton, buxtonian, maine, reached out to me. I've DJed there a couple of times for private events and such, and they asked me to take a shot at being a regular for them, a rotational DJ. They've never had really a DJ at all, but they've seen it work at a saloon so they want to try it there.
Speaker 1:So Friday, christmas freaking weekend, I will be DJing at Skips from nine to midnight, so I'll be getting home at one in the morning because I have plenty of time. Plenty of time, so much so that I have this event happening in a few days and I haven't even made a freaking flyer. I am literally announcing it to the world for the first time right here. It's one more layer of me being unorganized. I'm saying yes to anything and everything that will provide for my family, but it only can take so much of me. Does that make sense If I can spread myself out so thin if I'm making this sandwich and I only have so much of me? Does that make sense If I can spread myself out so thin if I'm making this sandwich and I only have so much jelly. Well, the middle of the sandwich might have a lot of beautiful, luscious, fabulous strawberry jelly, but as you get out towards the border, as you get out towards the crust, it might be running a little bit light. Maybe there's no butter, maybe there's only a little speckle of jelly, maybe it's a strawberry seed out there. You understand, I can only spread that jelly. Oh, so far. I mean, if you think about it, when you go to a little breakfast place, the little jelly packets they give you are almost so small anyways. So imagine me as your little free cup of jelly.
Speaker 1:Okay, and you have a nice big slab of texas toast and you're trying to take that little cup, that insufficient amount of jelly, and you're trying to get 100% coverage. You want the electoral map of coverage all the way across that said piece of Texas toast. Okay, you want coverage greater than Verizon on that toast, but you only have itsy-bitsy little jelly. You don't have the opportunity of combining three jellies. No, I'm one jelly, you heard. You're trying to get me from the center to all four corners of your toast. You want a nice even layer, but guess what? That ain't easy unless that whole layer of jelly is very, very thin. You understand Nothing about all sun over here is thin, except for my patience and my time, you understand. Wow, lord.
Speaker 1:I apologize for that rant. I don't know where that came from and I don't know what Jelly did to me to get so just the brunt of my anger. I apologize to all the breakfast items that have been outcasted on my podcast here today, but I was trying to paint a picture for the people. Okay, a nice breakfast picture. Apparently.
Speaker 1:When I'm spreading myself oh so thin, then nobody is getting the best of me, and the tough thing about those things is, eventually, the people that you care about most the opportunities in your life that you need to maximize on most they don't get the best version of you. People that you care about most, the opportunities in your life that you need to maximize on most, they don't get the best version of you. So for me, I'm falling back to my highest level of organization. And that one thing that quote-unquote anything is affecting everything.
Speaker 1:The great news is it's not a lack of effort. A quote that I used to love to say. This one, I can actually tell you where it came from Ray Lewis, hall of Fame linebacker, baltimore Ravens. Effort is between you and you. Only you know how much effort you're putting in. Only you. You look in the mirror. You get that mirror of accountability. You understand, you realize effort is between you and you. You can justify and tell anybody how hard you're working, but you, and only you, know the truth. What I'm dealing with, what I'm growing through, is not a lack of effort. Effort is there. Okay, effort is all there. The problem is I'm going with a spray and pray method where I'm just trying to apply myself and just put myself in every single possible area that I can to provide for my family. Unfortunately, I'm realizing this has to change and by slowing myself down, reorganizing and reprioritizing myself, I think I will equip myself for a bigger, better 2025. I think that I'm going to create up more opportunities for myself, and I know it's a necessity for myself, because I came to the realization today I no longer want to live this way.
Speaker 1:The screenshot of my day is every day I don't rest. I don't have these down days. There's going to be days where I don't get anything done because my mind is smoked. I'm trying to do things, but my wheels are just spinning. You're just sitting there in bleach doing burnouts. You're just spinning, just keep spinning, just keep spinning. That one I just made up. But the truth is, sometimes you will spin your wheels so much that you don't have anything left to give and you might have the best of intentions on a certain freaking day Maybe it's a Sunday. I got all these things I'm going to do today, but unfortunately you're so smoked you're mentally just drained that as much as you try and apply yourself to things, you fail and you fail and you fail and you bomb and you fail. That happens because you're not giving yourself rest, you're not giving yourself a break. There's no opportunity to unplug. You are spread to thin that you need to unplug.
Speaker 1:You are spread too thin. Man, at no time in my life will you look at me and say that boy over there, he too thin. Oh the irony. Well, as we try to put a little precious little bow, a little Christmas ribbon, on this week's episode, seeing as how we're in the gift-giving holiday season of our lives, these are the days of our lives. Like sands through the hourglass. These are the days of our lives. I only say that because I was born and raised having to suffer through watching soap operas with my mother and, ironically, my baby girl. When my mom, when me ma is watching my baby girl, me ma gets home from work, she puts on the old soap opera. So I've heard multiple times in the past month. Like sand to the hourglass, these are the days of our lives. So little Paisley is being raised the same way her daddy was.
Speaker 1:I don't know why that came up or why that was important. What so freaking ever? But the point that I'm trying to make here is it's the gift giving season, america, and while we're giving gifts, I'm thankful for that quote today because that quote was an absolute gift. I knew the moment that I heard it that I had to type it and put it in my phone. I spent time thinking about it, but it left me and it came back. And today it found me and put me on track.
Speaker 1:Sometimes, these quotes, these inspirations, these little motivations, this food for thought, these messages, they come to us and for us for a reason. If you open yourself up to them, you write them down, you let them in, you think about them, they'll come back again and they will land on you when you need them to land on you. And today, as I'm accomplishing all these things, and it's approaching 10 o'clock at night and I'm still recording a podcast and I've been up since five and I've been on a whirlwind and I'm getting things done. Baby, oh baby, I'm getting things done. Yes, I'm getting things done. The old American dream dusty roads, getting things done, but the problem is I'm spinning, I'm in the swirl. That's another sales analogy. Man, we're digging into the old sales analogy.
Speaker 1:When I go back to all those sales trainings, they used to always say as a manager, you never want to be in the swirl and sales sucks, it's shitty. So we always use shit analogies. I came up in the business being told if you're going to be a manager, you never want to live in the swirl. You want to be sitting on the seat. You want to be on the edge of the toilet looking into the drain, watching the swirl. That's a shitty analogy, I know, but it's one that I grew up on. You never want to be in the swirl, you want to be outside looking in. If you're a manager and you're on the seat, you're on the edge of the bowl, the edge of the toilet, the big throne, the porcelain crown, and you're looking down and everybody, all your people, your family, your leadership, your peeps, the ones that you trust, the ones that you value, the ones that you appreciate they're the ones running. They're the ones in the swirl, running and gunning, getting things done, pleasing and overachieving. They're in the swirl. If you slip down. If you slip and slide your way down into that swirl, then you start spinning and you know what Things spin out of control. You can't help. The ones you care about. That are in the swirl, unless you're sitting outside the bowl. I know that's annoying and ridiculous, but it's an analogy that was given to me, that was painted for me in my years of sales, and it's one that rings true to me because we can all think about a toilet and make it make sense. Am I right To wrap up my sales analogies?
Speaker 1:Another one they always talked about. That Sam Dantzler used to say say is think about back in the old days of the circus and these oddity acts when they would take like these sticks and they would put plates on them and they would get him spinning. You know what I'm talking about. When you'd have like a stick going or your finger going and you just start spinning plates. You see these circuses, these circus acts where you know a guy's got a plate spinning on one hand, then he adds another legger and another plate. He's got one spinning. On the other hand, he might have one on his foot and his right hand's got four plates on it and you're spinning and you move over here and you spin more plates. And you're spinning over here and you're running around trying to keep all these plates spinning. Eventually gravity takes over and you can't keep all those plates spinning. One plate drops and you go over to catch that plate and the next one drops.
Speaker 1:Think about that analogy. If all these things in your life are spinning, you can't keep all of those spinning. They will crash. And when you try to pick up the pieces of that crash, everything behind you will crash. Pick up the pieces of that crash. Everything behind you will crash. How you do anything is how you do everything. Today I realized I need to make major changes to how I do some of the things in my life and if I do, then I think I will have a major impact on all of the things in my life.
Speaker 1:The Pareto principle that we always talk about, the 80-20 rule that some of the biggest things in your life, the biggest goals, hopes and dreams in your life, can be impacted by 20% of the things in your life. If you're in sales and you look at all these big grossing dollars, like the gross sales in your business and your field of choice, you can realize that 80% of your profits, 80% of your gross sales, can come from 20% of your customer base. 80% of your goals can be achieved with the top 20% of your goals. If we don't put the same level of importance and the same level of effort on all things in our life, we can lose track and sight of the major things in our life. This quote today inspired me today, it challenged me today and it's going to motivate me to change every day moving forward. Motivate me to change every day moving forward.
Speaker 1:I know it's going to be big, drastic changes, but tomorrow I'm going to take a step in that direction. Tomorrow I take a step in that direction when I get, for the first time, our new building, a major achievement, a milestone moment for the Loud, proud American brand, something that's not going to happen overnight. Even when that building gets here, I'm going to have to get hard at work at it to do things. I'm going to have to get out there selling things to be able to afford the things to finish that one thing. But I do know, if I focus hard enough and I put enough effort into those areas, that I will achieve those. This episode today, these lessons from today, are going to change how I look at 2025. And I hope the message from today can inspire me to make major changes in 2025.
Speaker 1:And I truly hope that today's message is one that lands on you, that inspires you, that challenges you to ask yourself that inspires you, that challenges you to ask yourself how am I doing anything? And the way that I'm handling these things is beginning to affect everything. I ask you to today give some thought to the theory that how we work in any of these areas can cause and affect all areas. How you do anything is how you do everything. All effort, all the time. Remember that we do not rise to the level of our expectations, but we fall to the level of our training.
Speaker 1:If you found anything helpful today, informative today, I ask of you to share the show today. It would mean so much to me if you share this show with someone you love and someone you care about. I am hell bent to grow this show. I am dedicated to growing this show, to continuing our spiritual journey that we're on, to continue to build the positive tribe with a positive vibe that we keep on spreading. So if you enjoyed today's show, hit, subscribe, grow the tribe, leave a review, say how do you do find all things podcast related at wwwsharethetrugglepodcastcom. Look for some exciting things coming in the future here and in the immediate future.
Speaker 1:If you want to come out and have a great time, come on over and see me at Skips in Buxton. I'll tell you what my regular attendance at said bar depends on my overall attendance on Friday night. Does that make sense? The more y'all that show up, the better chances are that I'll continue to go back. That's just how this bar business works. Hope to see some of y'all there this weekend.
Speaker 1:If not, I love you and I appreciate you, and the next time you hear from me it'll be Christmas. Ho, ho, ho, ho. Thank you for supporting my American dream. Now go wash your filthy hands. Filthy animal, something like that. Love y'all. That's it and that's all. Biggie Smalls.
Speaker 1:If you're a loud, proud American and you find yourself just wanting more, find me on YouTube and Facebook at Loud, proud American. Put a face page, as my mama calls it. If you're a fan of the Graham Cracker, want to find me on Instagram, where all the kids are tickety-talking on the TikTok. You can find me on both of those at loud, underscore, proud, underscore American. A big old thank you to the boys from the Gut Truckers for the background beats and the theme song to this year's podcast. If you are enjoying what you're hearing, you can track down the Gut Truckers on Facebook. Just search Gut Truckers. Give them, motherfuckers, a like too. Make it bleed, I hate to say I told you so. Feel the pain. Make it bleed, I hate to say. I told you so. I truly thank you for supporting my American dream. Now go wash your fucking hands, you filthy savage.