Ep. 101 - Larry Long Jr. - Relationships For The Win

Ever chased the shiny job only to feel strangely empty once you got it? That’s where our conversation with Larry Long Jr. begins—on the far side of achievement, where the paycheck is large but the purpose is small. Larry, a former college baseball player turned sales leader, speaker, and author of Jolt, walks us through the messy middle: leaving a prestigious consulting role, launching a baseball academy that eventually failed, and discovering how cash flow discipline, radical relationships, and faith could rebuild a life that actually fits.

Larry describes being financially rich yet spiritually broke, the power of prayer and quiet listening, and the moment a severance became confirmation rather than collapse. 

Thanks for listening!

Click here to take the LeaderImpact Assessment and to receive the first chapter of Becoming a Leader of Impact by Braden Douglas.

Remember, impact starts with you!

Transcript

Meet Larry Long Jr.

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Welcome to the Leader Impact Podcast. We are a community of leaders with a network in over 350 cities around the world dedicated to optimizing our personal, professional, and spiritual lives to have impact. This show is where we have a chance to listen and engage with leaders who are living this out. We love talking with leaders, so if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions to make this show even better, please let us know. The best way to stay connected in Canada is through our newsletter at Leaderimpact.ca or on social at Leader Impact. And if you're listening from outside of Canada, check out our website at leaderimpact.com. I'm your host, Lisa Peters, and our guest today is Larry Long Jr. Larry is the founder and CEO of LLJR Enterprises. He's a motivational speaker, MC, sales trainer, and coach focused on motivation, inspiration, and most importantly, transformation. Larry is the host of the weekly live show Midweek Midday Motivational Minute, which has 300 plus episodes and author of the book, Jolt, Get Zapped into Intentionality. Rediscover and believe in your inner greatness. Recognized as a four times top sales influencer by Salesforce, Larry is a sales and revenue acceleration expert and serves as a LinkedIn influencer and sales thought leader. As a former college athlete who played baseball for University of Maryland, GoTerps, Larry is extremely passionate about serving and helping professional leaders take their game to the next level. Welcome to the show, Larry Long Jr.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

Oh my goodness. Lisa, the check is in the mail. What an amazing intro. Happy to be here with you.

SPEAKER_00 1:37

Oh well, you came highly recommended to speak to you, and I can see why. We've had a little bit of a discussion before, um, and my cheeks hurt already. So I I'm thank you. I'm I'm blessed to have you and so great with gratitude. Thank you. Thank you. Um, so you you're a baseball player.

SPEAKER_01 1:53

Uh former. I uh I played baseball growing up, and uh it's funny. It taught me so much. Uh, teamwork and setting goals and overachieving and failure is not final, but uh it's learning the lessons, lessons learned as well as lessons earned, I think they call them.

SPEAKER_00 2:15

So you're a comedian as well.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

I think a wannabe and out-of-work comedian.

From Dream Job To Empty Success

SPEAKER_00 2:20

Yeah, if anyone's watching this on YouTube, he's got prompt props. Yeah. So Larry, I'm excited to jump in and hear more about your journey of how you got to where you are today. And you already talked about this being a baseball player and what you learned from that, but really those pivotal moments that got you where you are today on your journey.

The Baseball Academy And Its Lessons

SPEAKER_01 2:39

Yeah. Uh after college, I worked for a company called Accenture doing IT consulting. And uh it was quote unquote the dream job for most. For me, it was not a dream job. I enjoyed the travel, I enjoyed the people that I worked with, a lot of bright people, but just something in my heart I wasn't fulfilled with the work that I was doing. Some of the clients that I had, America Online, if you remember AOL and Verizon, um, they were big clients, but the work wasn't meaningful. And I pretty much said, Is this what my life is supposed to be? I'm helping these billion-dollar companies make even more billions by eliminating people's jobs. And uh, my heart really spoke to me that no, that's not your purpose on this earth. So I ended up moving from DC, Maryland, Virginia, doing the consulting uh to open up an indoor baseball and softball academy, sewing into the lives of youngsters through the game of baseball and softball, teaching life skills. We called them the fundamentals, capital F-U-N. I don't know if you can tell, but I like to have fun and really honing in on the basics of baseball, softball, but more importantly, life. And that's what's led me. I had a 16-year career after my baseball academy failed, 16-year career in sales, software sales, and um, I was blessed five, a little over five years ago, uh, to step into my own business as a motivational speaker. You mentioned it, CEO, that's chief energy officer. I'm not your traditional CEO, but I'm an MC, I'm an author of a book, a coach, a trainer, just living my best and my blessed life.

SPEAKER_00 4:18

Yeah. You know, it's funny. I loved when you said um the job you first got was uh most people dreamed of. Um I have been in positions where it's like, how could you not take this job? It's the best job. How could you leave your job? And it's like, yeah, but it's it's not for me. I'm not finding something fulfilling out of this. So I appreciate that because everyone thinks it's the best job. You're doing, you know, you're making the money, you're, but I'm not happy. So what can I do? And um I love that you talked about um the and not that I love that sounds bad, but you know, you talked about the academy and that it failed. And, you know, because we're gonna talk about failures a little later, but um, I think I think you learned a lot. I mean, I'm hoping you'll share more, but um learning from failure, right? We we never fail, we learn, and we take that to the next, you know, thing in our life.

Asking For Help And Getting Unstuck

SPEAKER_01 5:09

So true, so true. And life, when you look at life's journey, uh, I think they call it a journey line, the ups and the downs, the highs and the lows, the twists and the turns. As I've gotten older, I've realized to really enjoy the journey, enjoy the process, enjoy all that happens. I'm gonna be uh vulnerable. Last year, Q2 and Q3 were very tough financially, but they were some of the most fulfilling from a learning about myself, being able to trust in myself, that I can persevere and uh really showed the people in my life that are there to support me, that I don't have to do it alone. Like I've thought that I've had to do it alone to be Superman. I don't need to be Superman. I I can be Superman by asking other people for help. I work with a coach and she said, Larry, healthy people ask for exactly what they want. And at that point, I wasn't healthy. I was afraid to ask because I thought it was a sign of weakness, and I've learned and I've grown and I continue to learn and grow through this journey.

Principle Of Success: Relationships

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Yeah, and I think um when we I we didn't say this out loud, but you have two children, and your children are watching you, right? Like they're watching dad um go through a low time and really um getting through it, and they see that, and and you know, that's our legacy, you know. Our kids are watching us. So uh thank you for sharing that. So before I get into fails, because I'm excited to hear, but I want to talk about your best principle of success. So um, if you have one and tell us a story that illustrates that.

SPEAKER_01 6:45

Yeah, the best principle of success in my life is relationships. And I learned from a sales guru, Steve Neudelberg, down in South Florida. He said, Larry, what I've learned is the difference between contacts, people you know, and contracts, people you do any kind of business with. It's the letter R, and that R is relationships, true, genuine relationships. Because there's a saying that uh people like to work with and refer uh folks that they know, they like, they trust, and they believe in. And I found that throughout my life. There's a saying, help me out, Lisa, it's not what you know, but it's Who you know. Uh in my Steve Harvey Family Feud voice survey says, that's a traditional saying, but I'm not traditional. It's not what you know, and it's not even who you know. What I found is it's who knows you, who likes you, who trusts you, and who believes in you that makes things happen. And the perfect example, as a motivational speaker, the majority of my business comes from word of mouth. Someone heard me, they like me, they might even love me, they trust me, they believe in me, and they tell their friends, oh, you've got to check out Larry Long. He's gonna motivate, he's gonna inspire, he's going to transform your audience, and he does it with a genuine authenticity that actually gets results. Relationships for the win. And we all know this, but what I found is that knowing isn't always doing.

SPEAKER_00 8:16

Yeah. This makes me think of the because we talk about mentorship and sponsorship. And sponsorship is taking that person's name into the room that they're not in. And so that that's you know, like, are they gonna say something good about Larry Long Jr. when they go into that room and go, oh my gosh, you have such a great motivation. He he inspired me, you know. So what are they saying about you? What are they taking into that next room?

SPEAKER_01 8:35

So Yeah, he he's he his his energy is, I think, in the words of the great philosopher Aristotle. No, it wasn't Aristotle, it was JJ Walker. His energy is dyno my and he's gonna lift up your audience. You gotta give him a try. So I've I've been truly fortunate with those relationships.

Learning From Failure And Cash Flow

SPEAKER_00 8:54

Yeah, good for you. Um makes me makes me think more of all the relationships I need to build, you know, contacts versus contracts. I love that. Thank you. Um now we jumped into a little bit of failure, but I want to hear more about uh failing because we all know we learn more. Those lows, we learn more. We we learn more. We yeah. So can you share one? Can you share a failing or a failure and what you learned from it?

SPEAKER_01 9:18

Which which one do I pick? I wrote a whole chapter in my book. It's uh strikeouts, they're a part of life because I've struck out on the baseball field. I used to play slow pit softball. I struck out in softball. How does that happen? I've struck out in relationships, in love, in life, uh, in business. Um, my biggest failure, my biggest learning lesson was my baseball academy, which was my baby. It was my baby before I had babies. Being able to teach youngsters the game that I love and the game of life. Uh, unfortunately, we ran out of cash. And what I learned is that if you run out of cash, you run out of business. And uh if you don't know the numbers that matter in business, we knew batting averages, stolen bases, home runs, but we didn't know the income statement, the balance sheet, the statement of cash flows. You're going to go out of business. And we didn't ask for help. And uh what I learned is that that you're if you're drowning silently, no one has the opportunity to help you. And uh it was the hero, it was the ego that uh stood in my way, as well as I call it FUD, not Elmer FUD, but fear, uncertainty, and double doubt. So out of out of that experience, I learned number one, if you're gonna go into business, you you need to know your numbers inside and out. Your accountant, your accounting professional, you need to ask the quote unquote stupid questions, at least for me. What does this mean? What is this all cash flows? What does that mean? Oh, you got more money going out the back door than you have coming in the front door. That's a problem, Larry. You need to make an adjustment and do something, as well as you need to ask folks for help. People want to help you. I work with a coach who said, Larry, how do you feel when someone asks you for help? I light up. I say, Well, I'm honored that Lisa would ask me for help. That's a privilege. She said, Why would you be so selfish to not allow someone else to have that same feeling to help you out? My mind was blown, my perspective was changed. I'm now not selfish. I ask for help genuinely because I know that I need it and other people want to give it.

SPEAKER_00 11:37

When you say that, I think of um women who maybe were trying so hard and it's seen as a weakness. We feel weak. And and I think what you're you're saying the same thing. I I sometimes think we're alone. We we think that we're the only ones, but we're not we're not weak. We're yeah.

Partnerships, Conflict, And Radical Candor

SPEAKER_01 11:56

It it takes strength to ask for help. It's uh and the perspective of I have to do this alone. I I have to have the S on my chest of superwoman. Yeah. Well, having that S on your chest is asking for help because you help everyone else, your family, your friends, your colleagues, your neighbors. You give so much. I'm a big believer that when you give, you've earned the right. I think they call it relationship equity. And sometimes people try to make withdrawals and they haven't made deposits. But I know that your listeners and your viewers are always depositing into other relationships. I know how that goes, yet they very rarely look to withdraw. I'm giving them permission. You got my permission to go ahead and ask for help and to make a withdrawal from those relationship banks that you've built over time.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

Yeah, you you mentioned uh silently drowning. I think a lot of people can um feel that. You used the term we had failed. Who was we in your what did you have a partner? Was this your wife? Like who's we?

SPEAKER_01 13:10

I had a business partner in my baseball academy, and that was another lesson that I learned with regards to relationships, the power of communication. And uh, when you're in business, it really is similar to a marriage. And uh it takes work, it takes communication, it takes intentionality to make it work, and if both sides aren't committed, ooh, it's gonna create some challenges. But uh, like I said, I learned my lesson. I'm actually in the process now of building a new offering with a partner, and we are putting it all on the line. We want to protect our friendship first, no matter what happens with the business. And we're committed to making sure that happens because when you start talking about money and you start talking about feelings and families, it can get a little bit dicey. They say never do business with friends and family. Well, we're we're gonna go ahead and make this thing work.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

And would you find this person you're working with is very diverse from you? Like when I think of do they have a completely different mindset? Do they challenge you? Are you guys just both on the same page all the time?

SPEAKER_01 14:20

No, we we are definitely, we complement each other, which is a a great thing. And it also creates some some friction, some conflict, and that's where the communication of uh making sure that we're open, we're honest. I think they call it radical candor. Making sure that we're being, we're we're not bottling anything up because that's where resentment happens. But we're in the spirit of making this work, we're gonna express exactly how we feel, when we feel it, and we're both gonna have respect uh at the center of everything that we do.

Faith, Calling, And Listening

SPEAKER_00 14:55

Yeah, we uh we all at times when you feel that um the the connection is not happening, we all need to step back. Okay, wait a minute, what part did I just play in this? You know, because we we think they didn't understand me. Well, just step back for a minute. Uh, how did we communicate? So, yeah, keeping those lines open. Uh thank you for sharing that. That was a great uh reminder. Um, and and the story of well, your stories are good. Strike out. I love that because we all strike out, just using the baseball analogy. Um, so getting into leader impact, what we are about um is we want to grow personally, professionally, and spiritually to have impact. So I'm wondering if you'd be willing to share an example, uh, how you promote the spiritual to make a practical difference in your life.

SPEAKER_01 15:38

Yeah, so I I speak from example, and when I was stuck, I wrote a book called Jolt, uh, get zapped into intentionality, rediscover, and believe in your inner greatness. I almost called it unstuck because I was living in corporate America, life was good, but it wasn't. I was rich financially, I was doing well, but I was so broke spiritually. Uh, my life just didn't have the meaning that I was put on this earth for a reason, and I realized it. And uh I was at a crossroads. Stay comfortable in my comfort zone and do the right thing or do the right thing. And my mom, as wise as she is, she said, Larry, little Larry, I won't, I'll always be her little Larry. She said, You need to pray and pray harder and then do something that you rarely do. You need to shh be quiet and listen. When you listen, you now have the opportunity to learn. You now have the opportunity to get the direction, at least for me. And it was loud and clear. On March 26, 2021, my position was eliminated in corporate America. Essentially, I was fired. I got a severance, and uh there couldn't have been any any clearer sign of what I was meant to do. And I wanted to be a professional speaker, I just didn't believe that that was possible. Not for me. Yeah, I know people do it, but that's that's not my journey. Well, yes, it is, Larry. And I'm setting everything up. I had my first paid engagement March 17th of 2020, at the start of the pandemic. And I know you're like, hold up. Yeah, that was St. Patrick's Day, and I'm not even Irish. So that prepared me for March 26th of 2021, when my position was eliminated, that this is my plan for you, Larry. It's your opportunity to step into it. Don't let me down. And I come from a family of service, a heart of service. And for me, this is an opportunity to really serve the world with my gifts. I've I've been practicing for 47 plus years, talking and serving and speaking, and now it's my profession. It's what I get to do each and every day to serve others with my words, with my feelings, my emotions. So I've just been hashtag too blessed to be stressed. It hasn't been all sunshine, rainbows, and unicorns, but I can tell you it has been so fulfilling. And to be able to have my family along for the journey, um, it has been just amazing.

Fear, Persistence, And Three Feet From Gold

SPEAKER_00 18:24

Yeah. You mentioned um you mentioned one point financially well off, and then you got let go, versus I think last year uh Q2 and three were bad. When you think of how you felt financially good, you got fired, Q2 and Q bad, no money. Um, like can do you remember turning to God and going, okay, like and is it the same? Because those feelings are very different, right? Like one financial financial, you know, it really is, and we have to believe that God can provide, and and that's it's it's a struggle.

SPEAKER_01 19:01

So I yeah, um there's a saying that you can't have faith and fear at the same time, and I've tested it, I've tried, and uh what I realized is you can't, and as a believer, I've had faith. Uh, there's a book, my my coach shared this book with me. It's called Three Feet from Gold, and it's a great reminder of so often people give up when they're this close. You're three feet from the gold, and I've committed that I will not give up. You can't stop a person that just will not quit, and I will not quit to make this happen. Now, I've had to make some adjustments, I've had to check my ego at the door, and I've had to get some lessons learned and lessons earned through this hard noggin. I'm I'm hard-headed, but uh for me, just that trust in the Lord, for me, uh I know that he's going to bring me through. He's he's brought me through every situation that I've been through, and uh Lord knows I've been through some situations.

SPEAKER_00 20:10

Uh I want to talk to you about listening to God. So you talked about in 2020 you had your first uh keynote, and then you know, there was a year after then you got fired in 2021. So there was a year. Can you think of moments was God did God ever drip on you like, look, I gave you this speaking engagement, you should start listening to me? And then finally, did you get fired and go, okay, I'm listening? But did you see, were there any times God talked between that year going, I'm telling you, you could do this?

SPEAKER_01 20:40

There were plenty of them, but at least I hate to say it, I was too busy talking and trying to figure it out on my own to listen. And it's by design, God doesn't make any mistakes. There's a reason why, for the most part, we've been blessed with two ears and one mouth. Think about it. We are supposed to listen two times more than we're supposed to talk. But like I said, I'm hard-headed. Yeah, I'm a rules breaker. And uh, my wife, it was actually my wife in December of 2019. She said, Hey, baby, you tell everyone else to follow their passion and pursue their dream. Look in the mirror. You're you're faking the funk. You you put on this smile for a mile for external, but I see you when you come through the door and you are not happy. What are you going to do about it?

unknown 21:31

Yeah.

Priorities, Eight Buckets, And Presence

SPEAKER_01 21:32

I said, uh-oh. And uh my mom, with her advice to pray and pray harder and to listen, that year of 2020, in the pandemic, I was stacked up with virtual remote Zoom engagements where I was getting paid. I was being set up in a good way. God was showing me that there is a way so that when March 26th of 2021 hit, I was ready. It wasn't like I was starting from ground. I had already built the foundation so that I was prepared for that next stage. Now, I can tell you there's been a lot of lessons from that time. And sometimes you have to laugh to stop from crying. But what I've learned is it's not, it's not me alone. If I do it all alone, I will fail. If I pray and I listen and I follow God's plan for my life, I'm going to be great. It's going in the end. It doesn't mean that immediately, short term, everything's going to be awesome. That's not, but I realize in the long run, God's plan for me is uh it's the perfect plan. So trusting in that is tough, uh, but life is tough. Choose your tough. Which tough do you want? You want the tough where you do it all alone? Superman, super woman, or do you want to trust and believe and follow God's plan for you? I I choose the latter.

SPEAKER_00 23:00

Yeah. I have to ask you about um regret. Where do you put regret? Where do you place regret? Um, I have learned long ago, I I don't want to have any, I can't change that, I can do better. But I I just listening to you, I'm like, you you we take what we learn and we move forward because that's faith. So I would love to hear what you think.

SPEAKER_01 23:22

I I try to intentionally live my life with no regrets. Yeah, and I haven't always been that way because fear, at least for me, can get you stuck. For me, fear has has frozen me in places where I wanted something, but I was so afraid of failure. Oftentimes for me, I'm a perfectionist. Well, up until now, I've been a perfectionist, but I realized it's never going to be perfect. And having those folks in my life that support me and encourage me and cheer me on, you got this, Larry. And in 2022, when I was writing my book, uh I learned a great lesson. My coach said, Larry, you're so optimistic, positive, uplifting with everyone else. But when we start talking about you and your book, you're so negative. You're a negative Nancy, a negative Nellie, a negative Ned. Why is that? And we unpacked it, and it uh it came to the fact that it wasn't serving me. It might have served me before and probably not, but I thought that it did. Uh what's serving me for my vision, for my goals, to support my family, is uh for me to encourage myself. And uh that wasn't my natural tendency. My natural tendency was to beat myself up. But what I realized with intention is Larry, uplift yourself, encourage yourself, trust in yourself, and you don't have to do it alone. You're going to be okay. So go for it. A good friend of mine, Melissa Murray Bailey, she used to be the chief revenue officer of a company called Hoot Suite, their social media platform. She had a saying. I spoke at their sales kickoff in 2023. She had a saying called Giat. I said, is that the long-lost cousin of the fiat? She said, Larry, you're crazy. I said, I know. Some things never change. She said, no, Giat, give it a try. That was her motto for her team. Well, I'm thinking about Giat. Well, I want to Giat. So for anyone out there that's noodling, that's doodling, whether it's starting a business, whether it's asking for the raise, whether it's making that big, hairy, audacious goal, GIOT. Give it a try. You got this.

SPEAKER_00 25:38

Love it. Oh, that was a great conversation. Thank you for just extending that conversation on how you do that and praise, place your spiritual, and not even place, live it, live it out every day. Um, at Leader Impact, we are about leaders having a lasting impact. So obviously, this is just every day. What are we doing? So, as you consider, as you continue to move through your journey of life, what do you want your faith legacy to be when you leave this world?

Joy, Impact, And Borrowed Belief

SPEAKER_01 26:02

Yeah, I want everyone that I touch to realize that uh I didn't do it alone, and that for me, the spirituality, for me, my faith comes number one. Uh, and I encourage people to think about their priorities. For me, I've got eight buckets: faith, spirituality, family, friends. The only one that I'm really, really good at fun, finances, fitness, philanthropy. And I know there's spelling B champion saying that doesn't start with an F. I spell phonetically and frenetically, sue me. And then career is that eight buckets. And I ask people to think about when you stack rank your eight buckets and priorities, what are they? And then how do you grade yourself on each of those buckets with intentionality? And then for your top three buckets, what can you do? What action can you take to enhance your number? I thought that I was an eight when it came to family. My coach said, Why don't you ask your wife Maria and your two kids, Trey and Lucia? Trey said, Daddy, you're a nine. He knows who pays his allowance. Lucia, my daughter, she said, Daddy, you're a five. I said, Oh my goodness. Oh, yeah, staking the heart. I said, Why so high? She said, Well, you take me to gymnastics every Monday. I do. She said, When I look up, because the parents sit on the second floor. She said, When I look up, Daddy, you're looking down at your phone. So now I've got that's my daughter giving me the encouraging eye to be present, to be at where your feet are at. So that's my encouragement for folks is to be intentional. Sometimes you have to slow down to speed up and to enhance and really live in your big vision. We're we're put on this earth to do great things, to make great impacts. And my hope is that the impact that I make on everyone I touch, my family, my friends, is uh someone who did it the right way, who did it with sincere care, who didn't do it alone, and just uh yeah, I'm hopeful that I pass that along.

SPEAKER_00 28:13

Yeah, um, I I I I think many parents have been caught looking down and not living in the moment of you know, the daughter's just looking up at the sun, you know, is looking up like hi, and and you're looking down. That's a heartbreak. And so so to hear it from your daughter, I'm sure that was a heartbreaking moment to go, uh, I can do I can do better.

SPEAKER_01 28:36

It was it was that opportunity that was knocking on my door to make a change and to be better so that I don't regret it. Because time flies. We know this, but sometimes knowing isn't doing. So I've committed to doing so that I don't have any regrets when I'm sitting on my deathbed saying, I wish I had lived in the moment of my daughter growing up, of my son growing up, and really been there because you don't get those moments back again.

SPEAKER_00 29:02

Yeah. And I would say that you can start now. Don't, don't look back because you can't change that. But you know what? Put the phone down now. Be intentional now. Yeah. Because I mean, my daughter's gonna be turning 23, and uh it's it just got better. And I know that at times I was always working and I, you know, I had my own company. I was busy, busy, you know, and I I forgot about them.

SPEAKER_01 29:26

So you're your priority. What are your priorities? And for me, you know, I'm I'm one of my bit biggest and best accomplishments. I took my whole family to a speakers convention in Scottsdale last year. I'm taking them to an engagement in Portugal. So the international with my family involved, it is just uh it's a blessing. Like I said, I pinch myself every day, Lisa, just not too hard because I don't want to wake up from this dream that I'm living. And if if I can do it, anyone can do it.

SPEAKER_00 29:57

Yeah, takes takes intentionality.

unknown 29:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:00

So my final question is for you is what brings you the greatest joy?

SPEAKER_01 30:06

It's really seeing the smiles and the impact on people that I have, especially those that are closest to me. My son, my daughter, my wife, my family, uh, as well as those that I have the opportunity to touch outside of my family, and just to share my joy, to share my gifts uh with them. And my gift is that I see so many gifts in other people. I see greatness in each and every person, sometimes when they don't even see greatness in themselves. I do have to give a shout out. My mentor, Dr. Willie Jolly, he shared this message in 2023. It was June of 2023. I'll never forget it. He shared this in a group of speakers, but the message was really for me. He said, sometimes we have to lean on the faith and belief that someone else has in us until ours kicks in. And I needed to hear that word from him uh because I know that for me, my God has faith in me. I'm more than a conqueror. And sometimes I need to lean on that. Oftentimes, I need to lean on that to jumpstart my internal belief that yes, I can be great. I will be great. Let's get it in, let's get it done. Show up and show out, Larry. So that's my encouragement. Someone needs to hear that. Yeah, lean on, lean on who you need to lean on until yours kicks in.

SPEAKER_00 31:34

Um it's tough. It can be tough. And I think that's probably the one of the greatest reasons I love Leader Impact is we are marketplace leaders who get together every week. Uh, and maybe some groups don't, but my group does online, and we encourage each other and we share because leadership is lonely. And if you don't have on some someone to talk to, you you need to find someone. So if it's a coach or if it's a group of, you know, like Leader Impact, and I'll share later how to join, but um I am thankful for that because it it's just impacted me my whole life. And I've been involved for gosh, I think 12, 13 years in this group, which I've never been in something so long. Like so surrounding ourselves, and and you know, I think we realize you talked about um smiling and making an impact on people. You don't realize who you're going to make an impact on today, Larry. You know, you've impacted me. And so, you know, I think when I look at you and I think when you look at a baby and you smile, I bet that baby lights up because they just love smiles. And they're like, I don't know. Like, I look at you and I want to smile. So thank you for joining us today. It has been a pleasure.

SPEAKER_01 32:38

Thank you. I appreciate it.

How To Connect And Closing CTAs

SPEAKER_00 32:40

So if anybody wants to engage with you and find you and go, I want to hear more about Larry Long Jr., what's what's one of the best places, or do you have a couple?

SPEAKER_01 32:48

Yeah, uh, best place, they call me LinkedIn Larry. So please connect with me on LinkedIn, Larry Long Jr. Uh you can also find me. Uh I'm gonna tell my story on my website, LarryLongjunior.com. That's LarryLongJR.com. Please connect. I'd love the opportunity to serve, to support, to help you along your journey. I appreciate you so much, Lisa.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

Thank you, Larry. It has been a pleasure. All right. Take care.

SPEAKER_01 33:18

Bye.

SPEAKER_00 33:18

All right. I want to thank everyone for joining us. If you're part of Leader Impact, you can always discuss or share this podcast with your group. And if you're not yet part of Leader Impact and would like to find out more and grow your leadership, find our podcast page on our website at leaderimpact.ca. You can also check out groups available in Canada at Leaderimpact.ca, or if you're listening from anywhere else in the world, check out leaderimpact.com. Or get in touch with me at info at leaderimpact.ca and we will connect you. And if you like this podcast, please leave us a comment, give us a rating or review. This will help other global leaders find our podcast. Thank you for engaging with us. And remember, impact starts with you.