Ever had a moment that made you reassess everything you knew? That's what this episode is all about. I, Dr. Taylor Hartman, am joined by my friend Cat Larson, to recount some of our most transformative experiences; from my recent family trip to Peru, to Cat's discovery of the Color Code. We've met some incredible individuals along our journeys and they've taught us invaluable lessons of resilience, humility, and the importance of education.
Prepare to be captivated as we share tales about paradigm shifts. We'll look at how Cat's terrifying incident involving her partner dramatically altered her perspective on life. We'll delve into the hospitality of the Peruvian people, and discuss how age and life experience can entirely shift your values. Plus, we'll uncover the meaning and distractions in life, drawing from our personal reminiscences on the importance of resilience, education, and connection. Tune in for an episode chock full of insightful reflections and powerful stories that might just inspire you to look at your own life in a whole new light.
Take the Personality and Character Profiles at TaylorHartman.com.
Send questions and comments to Taylor@TaylorHartman.com Or Cathy@TaylorHartman.com with “Podcast” in the subject line.
Ever had a moment that made you reassess everything you knew? That's what this episode is all about. I, Dr. Taylor Hartman, am joined by my friend Cat Larson, to recount some of our most transformative experiences; from my recent family trip to Peru, to Cat's discovery of the Color Code. We've met some incredible individuals along our journeys and they've taught us invaluable lessons of resilience, humility, and the importance of education.
Prepare to be captivated as we share tales about paradigm shifts. We'll look at how Cat's terrifying incident involving her partner dramatically altered her perspective on life. We'll delve into the hospitality of the Peruvian people, and discuss how age and life experience can entirely shift your values. Plus, we'll uncover the meaning and distractions in life, drawing from our personal reminiscences on the importance of resilience, education, and connection. Tune in for an episode chock full of insightful reflections and powerful stories that might just inspire you to look at your own life in a whole new light.
Take the Personality and Character Profiles at TaylorHartman.com.
Send questions and comments to Taylor@TaylorHartman.com Or Cathy@TaylorHartman.com with “Podcast” in the subject line.
Hello listeners. This is Dr Taylor Hartman, with Very Best of Living, and I'm with my good friend Kat Larson. Hello Kat.
Cat Larsen:Hello, are you very, very best living today?
Taylor Hartman:No, I'm actually not feeling great. We had a remarkable experience with 18 of our family kids, grandkids and we spent two weeks in Peru and everything was great. I did get elevation problems. One day I could not open my eyes, it was like horrible on Lake Titicaca, but then everything was great. And then we got home and the day after that I was like I can't get up, I can't get up, and so I've had just a monozuma trots and all sorts of challenges. I'm not back to myself yet, and I think it's kind of the price you pay sometimes when you do an aggressive kind of itinerary and have amazing experiences, but so I'm a little bit under the weather. I apologize for our listeners, but I expect you to carry me, Kat.
Cat Larsen:That's your job. I have the baby backpack and I'm ready to go, and thank you for being here it is. I know it's so important to you and me to talk to our people out there.
Taylor Hartman:So that's awesome. You're right. You're absolutely right. I appreciate that. So what I thought we'd talk about a little bit today are those times when you hear something or read something, meet someone or experience something that changes your paradigm on life, like when you literally can remember back saying that really made a difference to me, like I carried that into my life and other things that you probably didn't even know you dismissed, you dropped them as go. So I was thinking about some of those things with myself. I mean it's interesting. I mean it's when you went to Amsterdam and you could just see how lit up you were with the experience of traveling and being there and seeing it. And it's hard. I have some great friends that are partying on a boat called Fabulous Character. So they texted me and said we were thinking of you because they know I work in character, which is so great, and they're having such a wonderful time in Italy. And that's what they. I just love that about them.
Taylor Hartman:And then our trip we took the family to go see Peru and really see it the way it is. It was amazing to see this culture on many different aspects. So the three different areas are Machu Picchu and Cusco and then Lake Titicaca, where they have the floating islands built on straw, and then to the Amazon jungle and I can't first of all the kids and grandkids. Literally we did it at a very aggressive like we were up at five am to swim with the peak dolphins in the Amazon. We got into Lake Titicaca at like midnight, so we're literally navigating this boat through the reeds and the tall grass to the place we're going to stay with a complete stranger. We don't even know this person and this was the individual that wrote us in advance a year ago and asked if we could front him $1,000 of what we were gonna owe him, because they have no money and no food and school supplies for their kids, so you don't even know of him from Adam. And we did so, which is great. And then we get there and the quality of this family who serve you very, very nice quality meals. They work every single day of their life. You're up an altitude of 13,000 feet, like it's like I'm in 6,500 sunnets, so it's double right and I'm thinking, and they're gracious and kind and engaging and I think about things that happen in your life. One of our guides in the Amazon was adopted by a Belgian PhD biologist researcher and his wife when his parents died and he was eight years old, from the Amazon and he has stayed there and gone on for a PhD which is a very rare app happened and stayed in the Amazon and loves and lives it so remarkably well.
Taylor Hartman:Some of our listeners want a great reference. I give them two great references. Actually, a great place in Cusco to stay, the people on Lake Titicaca that were unbelievable, and then our guide in the Amazon was remarkable. I just can't tell you how rich this experience was. One of my favorite moments Kat was literally lying in my room with my wife listening to all the cousins in this one, like one room that had just hammocks, like 16, 20 hammocks, like just that's all. It was hammocks and they would all lie in their hammocks and talk and just share. I thought, oh, that was so rich for me.
Taylor Hartman:So, unbelievable and things like that happen in your life and people wonder why we travel, why we believe in that right. And it's not that I'm not thrilled to be home, Like I can tell you right now, feeling the way I'm feeling. I am so happy I'm home, yes, To be able to be comfortable, but it reminded me of an activity when I was in college and you had 15 things that you value the most, Like honesty, friendship, a comfortable life, challenging opportunities, whatever, like 15. Number 15 on my list was a comfortable life, Number 15. Today there are moments when I'm like let's move up a little bit. It's not Two, three, Four, Ha ha ha ha. So you realize that with age you do change some of your things. Yes.
Taylor Hartman:Just for the comforts, right. So I was thinking about that, like what's a book you've read or an individual you've met that just changed your paradigm on life.
Cat Larsen:Well, come on, we did not set this up, listeners, he truly did not set this up for this. But, of course, my biggest paradigm shift was when I found the color code. I mean, and that's not even, that's no baloney, that's no baloney. I think mine was an incident. I mean, when I'm when, as you were talking, I was thinking about my. The thing that shifted my paradigm the most is that we had an incident in our family when we lived in Grand Junction, where Paco was in a. I don't want to get in the whole story, but Paco was in front of our house and he was shot by this individual that was came up and you know, I mean it was a big, long story that shifted my paradigm, and really for the better, which sounds so horrendous isn't that funny.
Taylor Hartman:No, I know, I believe you.
Cat Larsen:Well, because I think you a couple of things that have evolved is like it shifted my safety view. We lived on a on a beautiful street in a cul-de-sac in Little Grand Junction, colorado, and some pretty horrendous violence happened on that street. So safety became a thing that's like that's a construct that is not a reality. There's safety is not something you can. I mean, I don't care if you build the biggest yeah right, it's just not, it's not, it's not.
Cat Larsen:You can't buy it, you can't find the place. Sure, there's more safe places than others. But after that happened to me, I'm like, yeah right, you give me the statistics, it doesn't matter.
Taylor Hartman:Right, right, especially when you're one of them right, Right.
Cat Larsen:And then the other thing was is that it is it really is that we don't? We don't talk about it a lot, but we talk about it occasionally in terms of fragility and beauty of life and being able to go. We are here, pucko is here, I mean, and literally by a half an inch. He's here where the bullet entered his body.
Cat Larsen:And the doctor. In fact, the story was is that they went and did the CAT scan, saw where the bullet is and the doctor, you know, wrote him out of prescription and slapped it on his chest and he said go buy a lottery ticket, dude, because you you are lucky you shouldn't be here, you should not be here so incredible.
Cat Larsen:Yeah. So I think that, not that you have to go through that, but I tell you it does bring us back to that day where it's like something gets bigger, bad or something, and you just go yeah, no, we're good.
Taylor Hartman:Yeah, and your appreciation for life. Right that you're still here.
Cat Larsen:Absolutely.
Taylor Hartman:Yeah, I like that. That's a good one. I do think that sometimes the harder things in life have greater blessings, like they do make you appreciate things in a way you would not have even seen and you know had that happened. And that was a joyous kind of outcome of what could have been deadly, literally deadly.
Cat Larsen:Well, yeah, and it was for two of our neighbors, I mean, you know, they were killed that day, and so this wasn't just a, it wasn't just one of those things that was like oh, that was an accident. I mean, this guy was on purpose doing this. So I think when you talk about paradigms and shifts and people and you don't always know it at the time I think that's one beautiful thing about in my age is that you look back and you go.
Taylor Hartman:That really was life changing Right, you can appreciate that more when you look back. Yeah, you know, I remember even this guy was talking one time about you should walk on our day and he goes. You know, I don't care what you do, just walk an hour a day. And they were just talking about this thing like in a conversation I never even acknowledged. I heard it, but it changed for me the paradigm on exercise. Like it made sense, like he's right, you could only walk an hour a day. How hard is that gonna be? If I'm gonna read anyway or watch TV or whatever, why can't I be walking when I do that? Right, and that just came out of just enough totally random Conversation that I was having with two other people and it was their conversation with each other that I was listening to that. Then that dawned on me and I didn't even comment on it to them.
Taylor Hartman:So if things like that can happen very randomly, I still remember a book I read called the educated heart. I was a very young man and I still remember a couple of the. The concepts in there were they would slip Foreign currency in your pocket of the place you're going, so you'd have money when you got there to spend in that country and they were talking about the educated heart. Does that, or the person that sends you a book, gives them to read, and then you respond to them later on Explaining what it did for you? Well, you appreciate it about it? So they just it's kind of like an extension of care, like it just is beyond, just the normal Right, and yet if it resonates, as when I read those examples for example, it resonated with me oh, that makes sense. That is the educated heart. There's more to it, right?
Cat Larsen:Oh yeah, I'm. I mean, I'm gonna read that, that's I've. I Love when you bring stuff like this, because the a paradigm shift can be as easy as somebody's saying Walk an hour or right, you know something as big as what happened in our life. You know, I mean just, I think that's the. The beauty of a paradigm is that you don't know when or where right I'll be sitting because something must have shifted for you. Did something shift for you in Peru like that changed you?
Taylor Hartman:Yeah, you know, the thing that really really struck me was these oh my gosh, I couldn't get emotional they. I'm gonna take Caesar and Lucy, who were the couple with two children on Lake Titicaca. They work every day in the pandemic. The president of Lake Titicaca organization that people live there Denied anyone the opportunity to leave the islands and go to town of Puno or for anyone from Puno to come out to the islands. Mm-hmm. So for two years they were cut off and there's no tourist trade, which is the major way of making money.
Taylor Hartman:Mm-hmm and Yet they're humble, genuine-ness, they're taking care of others at their own expense. Mm-hmm, they work hard, work ethic. It was something about seeing these people. This man said to me Caesar, my wife and I got an elementary education. That's what we could afford because it's free, but I want more than anything for my kids to go to the university.
Taylor Hartman:The same thing was said by the guide in the Amazon. He said I would love for my children to be educated, not the one that had the Belgian parents that adopted him, but others that took us for a very, very poor, slummy area of town. He said I would love for my kids to go to the university and I had just taken that for granted. I mean, granted, I went and I did the work and it was hard. I mean, I get that, but I had the opportunity to go. It wasn't like I was. It was a major ordeal for me to be able to do that. So when I see people that don't take education seriously, really don't step up to what they're given, it really reiterated for me my belief in education, my belief in growing and learning and becoming, because we have so abundantly in America and many people here don't take it, they don't want it, they pass on it.
Cat Larsen:Gosh, and that's all they want for their kids. That's all they want.
Taylor Hartman:That's all they want. Yep, oh my, and they would do whatever it took.
Cat Larsen:And this is what they do for a living, taylor. They have tourists like you, vacationers like you, and that's what they do.
Taylor Hartman:Correct. That's what they do, yeah. And then when they don't by the way, that two years that the COVID was there, all they do is fish and hunt for duck eggs to live off of. That's all they do. That's all they have.
Cat Larsen:Oh my gosh.
Taylor Hartman:And yet people don't want to leave. The area they love. They love their family is so tight and so connected and when they get of age that they would marry. They start traveling to the different islands, the boat people and meet people that they could connect with, or in the Amazon, they have soccer on Sunday and that's where the tribes come from all around to play against each other Really and they get to know the girls and boys there.
Cat Larsen:And that's how they decide.
Taylor Hartman:And they want to marry.
Cat Larsen:Did you go to a soccer? Did you go there on Sunday?
Taylor Hartman:We weren't there on Sunday, we played soccer with them. We got out there and of course, they beat us Four or two.
Cat Larsen:Was it 18 Hartmans against four of them and they beat you? No, it was like that.
Taylor Hartman:In fact, there were no real boys. They were like young 10-year-olds, but they were only girls.
Cat Larsen:Yeah.
Taylor Hartman:And they were unbelievable. Like I played goalie for just a moment, that's when they won the final goal.
Cat Larsen:Well, there was your biggest paradigm shift Exactly.
Taylor Hartman:Oh, you're right, you're so right, but it is amazing how talented and committed they are and just how appreciative they are of daily life.
Taylor Hartman:It did make me think about people that struggle with depression and things that don't give them meaning in American life, and I'm thinking about these people that really have nothing to look forward to but the next day, and yet they are motivated, and yet they get up every day and go do their routine things, make their jewelry, find some way to find meaning in their life, and I think I wanted our listeners to think about what are they doing that brings meaning to their life? What are they doing that gives them a sense of purpose? Because it's almost like harder here than there, because there's so many distractions here, there's so many opportunities to get led down a path that you don't really benefit you and before you know it, you wasted gaming. You wasted hours, literally hours, gaming, and you missed the opportunity of what else you could have been doing with that, whereas down there, what they do is life affirming. It's like they have to do it to live. So it seems much more focused to me.
Cat Larsen:So when you talk about that, I think it's true. It is a seductive thing to think about. Oh, I'm in the eighth grade and I'm going to be in high school and I'm going to graduate. Oh, I can't wait until I graduate, or I can't wait until I get out of college. Then you look to marriage, and then you look to kids, and then you look to a trip. Instead of what you're saying is there, they have to be. There isn't really any big thing they're looking forward to.
Taylor Hartman:Right, correct, right. They're just doing life every day. So really their connections to each other and doing things you need to do to live is all they focus on. So I was interested to see that dynamic, wow, and I think it may have gave me an appreciation for how we have to be very resilient with all the opportunities we have to be distracted you got to really think about. Is that where I want to spend my time and my energy? Is that where I want to give my thoughts? You remember from Dr Prankles' man search for meaning, the paradigm shift that he offered, which was they can control everything about me except my mind.
Taylor Hartman:They cannot take that and those who gave their mind over to the Nazis died. They could not sustain their own health then, but those who said I still own my mind, they've survived. Many of them survived in what were just untenable situation. So what about that with our listeners? I like to think about that like it's like. Do you own your mind? Does it own you? Are you able to control and manage it in a way that it actually gives you meaning in your life? Or are you being managed by it, like the addictions and the, the distractions of the world? Are they taking away from central purpose and meaning in your life?
Cat Larsen:That's the question I would have and there's so much Distraction when you think about so, so, so give me an example in your life. What distraction do you fight against?
Taylor Hartman:I think I fight against Entertainment. I want to think about it by Rome fell and it seems like a lot of things that happened. There are some immoralities as well that we're going on there and and just unhealthy political things, but they just got a more and more interesting being entertained and I looked at my own life and and I like to be entertained and Sometimes that becomes too much of a desire. Instead of doing things that are enriching and meaningful and not sitting back and letting the world happen to you, I would say can you give me an example of that?
Cat Larsen:like Entertainment, like, like what, like watching a movie or going somewhere, or it'd be like watching a movie versus reading for me.
Taylor Hartman:When I read, all my facilities are engaged and I'm learning and developing and it's more work than watching entertainment, for example.
Cat Larsen:New works your brain. More is what you're saying works my brain.
Taylor Hartman:More gives me more meaning and purpose, and I'm not opposed to sporting events and Movies and no, I'm not opposed to any of that. What I was realizing in my life is that is not what is most fulfilling for me. What's most fulfilling for me are that should be like a reward or a treat, not a focus, like going to an irregular basis. That's all I'm really thinking about. Are those elements which are just entertaining entertaining, but they're very, they're very flat and superficial. They lack the depth. That, I think, is more important.
Cat Larsen:Well, that's a great point. I mean that that really is something to to think about, is like that entertainment piece I don't know if I've thought about that in terms of what brings down a society and when do you know? We have enough information, now that we have all the information, and it seems like.
Taylor Hartman:Seems like it's seductive you know it is seductive.
Cat Larsen:That's a good word, yeah.
Taylor Hartman:I think it is seductive and it is easy. But frankly, it's easy to walk into something entertaining. I'll pay you entertainment that that does happen a lot in our society. I am not opposed to entertainment Please don't get me wrong but when it becomes the focus, Then I feel like that takes away the remaining of life.
Cat Larsen:You're making that. I think it was Victor Frankl. Tell me if I'm right he's. I think he is the person I'm pretty sure that he said between Stimulus and response there's this space that you have to make a choice, and I think we get so stimulated at least I know my personality gets so stimulated that I just go into you know, for example, like what feels good is what you're talking about, and just click, click, click. Instead of stop. I'm going turn that off, pick up the book.
Taylor Hartman:Go for the walk do the things right.
Cat Larsen:And I think that that growth and in freedom Lies in that space right, like being able to say is this growing me? I love that question Is this growing me?
Taylor Hartman:Yeah, I like that and that, and that's really true what you're saying. I think about couples that I have always said just do me a favor and take a half an hour, go for a walk or sit on the deck outside and just Talk. I don't care how you do it, but give me a half an hour a day. I Mean those that do it always swear by it. There's not one person who has said I'm sorry, we did it, but those who don't do it are far greater, far greater.
Taylor Hartman:The number of people who don't act on Something like that, like that, is this growing me? They don't do that. They take the easier path and they excuse it. Well, the kids they have homework, we have things going on Be pushed to have a half an hour today. They find reasons to make it not happen and I think what's sad about that is they don't grow, whereas those who literally take that advice and just do it, all of a sudden they're feeling better and better and better about their relationship and they're thinking about the space and you're talking about. In that space. There is a decision that has to happen.
Taylor Hartman:Mm-hmm and I think what you're talking about, which is a selectiveness of the easy path. I Think people don't realize that they're making a choice. Even though it seems so, I'm not really choosing. It Feels good, so I'm gonna do it. You are choosing. That's again why I think it's so important to have good people in your life, or reading things or seeing people, or somehow Offering a change in how you see life, because you get stuck in your own paradigm, you're probably not gonna see those things or recognize opportunities that other people bring to you or think you can ask me a question what are the tools to become aware of your own paradigm, I mean as a professional therapist and doctor?
Cat Larsen:how do you, how do you go, kathy, you know, do these things to help you see your paradigm? Is there something? Is there anything?
Taylor Hartman:Oh yeah, I'm well I. My first question is always are you happy? Like are you? Are you feeling fulfilled and happy in your life? That's the first question I start with. Right, uh-huh, I really want to know are they actually doing things that make them happy? And Typically, people can give me an honest answer.
Taylor Hartman:Most often, people can say you know, I'm not as happy as I used to be, or actually I'm very happy in life. Here's why. So if they are happy or they're not happy, then we move forward with that with okay. So how often have you reflected on who you're running with and what you're doing in your life? How often have you done that recently? And they'll often say I don't and I'll say okay, I want you to do me a favor and just spend time this week, spending five minutes when you wake up in the morning and reflecting on People in your life and things you want to commit to. I want you just to take five minutes and think about what you'd like to be add to your life so you don't have right now. And then the next thing is I Want them to actually do something different than they've been doing. Just try something different than they've been doing.
Taylor Hartman:So they don't do something different, they will stay in the same paradigm and until you can do something different and, by the way, I've done this myself and sometimes what I do different I don't like it doesn't work for me. That's fine. Don't feel bad about that. Just know you're checking things out. You want to get to know what's good for you, but the fact that you're doing it gives you insight that you would not have had and you know what, you know my brain does to me.
Cat Larsen:You know that 1.3 ounces I have left, that I use my brain is is it messes with me and it's like that's not that big of a thing. Yeah, my Instagram, you know so. I'm just that's not that big of a thing right, come on, you're not. And then here's something that was amazing, as my daughter showed me how she's like. She puts this thing on my phone the last time she was here about how long you're on something on your phone.
Taylor Hartman:Yeah, oh my god, it blows your mind, doesn't it?
Cat Larsen:Oh, I turned off. I turned it off. I didn't turn off the thing that showed me. I turned off the Instagram thing because it's like come on.
Taylor Hartman:You wouldn't know that, though, like you said, you always dismiss it. You do, cuz I'm way. I don't want to look at it like when you're trying to lose weight and they say counting calories. No one wants to count the calories, but once you do, you realize are you kidding me and I wonder I'm having problems right? So the reality is, I think, holding yourself more accountable. Yes, chance for change. Yes, yes, all right, we got a clip for today. Oh, it's great, I was always being with you, cat you too.
Cat Larsen:I'm gonna go for a walk.
Taylor Hartman:We love our listeners, don't we? So much and we'll be back with you next week. Talk to you soon Bye now, love you.