Ep #052 with Guest, Author David R. Edwards

Join Reyshan Parker as he hangs out with guest, David R. Edwards, who served in healthcare for 35 years before his epiphany.  After 2 years of research and writing he published “New You! Who Knew?” The principles and tools in the book put you in the captain’s chair of your life.  He doesn’t just plop you there and say, “swim”, however. Principle by principle the 10 chapters guide you on a path that is of your own making. The book is only a guide. By the end you will have the basic tools, based on enduring principles, needed to be more effective, self-directed, resilient, connected, hopeful, and balanced. 

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Transcript

0:23

Welcome back to another episode of Be on the Service Industry podcast. I am Sean Parker and you haven't yet. Please go watch my television series Beyond the Tech Worker. In addition now streaming on Amazon Prime and to Tube TV, I hang out with some fantastic chef owners, find out about their lives, the history of the restaurants. And of course, they cook up and let us try some of the best dishes they have to offer. Also, go follow us on Tastemade, because, you know, sometimes I do love stuff. And anyway, I have a fantastic guest today. He is an MD who has had an epiphany recently on how to improve people's lives through their own personal self-improvement. I believe there's ten steps to that, but he has a fantastic new book out called New You. Who Knew? Ladies and gentlemen. Gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, David Edwards and even the animals out there, everybody is welcome. This is a no judgment zone. Come on. Come on. So it's nice to be here. See, you've been a doctor for over 35 years. Or you worked in the health care industry for over 35 years. Now, I need to clarify. I'm not a physician. You're not physician? No. My mother then my great uncle used to call me Doc when I was a little boy. He was not a sign of things to come, but my initials D.R. Sometimes that's confusing, but I'm not a doctor. I have a master's degree in health care administration. So I went on the the back end stuff from the health care, finance and health care operations and most recently as a CEO of a health center. All the fun stuff. Yeah, well, I enjoyed it. I mean, my career has been very non sequitur kind of a thing. You know, I, I started off, I was going to college, you know, I worked in various things, you know, as a bookkeeper or something to earn money to go to school and finally landed a job. So this takes me a little bit, but I was making$3 an hour and I saw an ad because we used to find our jobs in the newspaper. If anybody remembers what those are and it's on the newspaper because I needed to make more money, I couldn't afford tuition. The next quarter, I was getting kind of desperate and and I saw a job paid $7 an hour. I mean, like the current federal minimum wage tells you how to date that is. But was it also 315 or was it was it was it $3 to 75? Yeah, my first job was $3. So was it. Yeah, yeah. Like my very first job. But I was like 12 or something. Oh yeah. Like when I was 23 years old or so I, I, again, I think my whole career has been a little different. So I joined the church and I served a mission for my church when I was 19. And so 19 to 21, I was in France trying to teach people the gospel of Jesus Christ. And it was a marvelous experience. But when I got home, so I was 21 and that's when I started school. So I was a little older than some of the kids, still a kid. But when you got to world travel a little so that's yeah. Oh it was amazing. That's a leg up. Yeah. Yeah. And I know it's funny because I was dirt poor over there and I lived on $200 a month and yeah, I ate out one time too. Can you imagine that? Two years in France at one time. Where did you eat? I heard that I made myself. That was cheap. Sometimes that can appease them in Baghdad. Did you at least get a baguette? Yeah. We get a bag out. We love it. You know, they're made every morning fresh. And, you know, so the one the one that you did go out, what what what did you treat yourself to? Were to what's called a crab outing, which is a crab crab restaurant. So it's like you'd have like an appetizer of crabs and then the main course would have, you know, some meat and mushrooms and stuff, and then you'd have a desert crab. So it was all crazy. I know. It was wonderful. I mean, and I ate at people's homes a lot, which frankly is maybe even better because, you know, these are just cooking, as you know, and France is amazing. And so, you know, even the home cooks don't mess it up I mean, the home cooks are amazing. And, you know, I was still this was in the late seventies, early eighties. And at that time, McDonald's had, you know, like a handful of restaurants in France, in the big cities, mostly for tourists. So you want mediocre food in France? Well, there's a McDonald's for you, so. But it's consistent, right? That's their thing. It's consistent. So royal with cheese. Yeah. And but I mean, we would people would invite us into their homes and they would feed us and and boy, I had. And it depended on what region you're in, right. Because there's different regions will have their own wine, their own cheese, their own cuisine. And so depending on where I was, you know, we had and the simplest things like and I can't remember what she called this, but like we were in central France, up in the mountains and a woman made this is like a soup, but it is all kinds of different vegetables from salt and pepper, very simple spices and cheese soup, pressure cooker each and and then she would strain it and it was like a broth almost morning. But just the flavor of it was spectacular. And she had her own garden, you know, and everybody buys food fresh every morning. There's none of this. Well, and today is probably different But back in those days, you know, there was no Costco. So people would go to the, you know, the a Costco in France. Now I'm going to have to handle that. There is I mean, they had a place called Carrefour, and it's kind of like in the western U.S. I'm not sure where you're at Russian, but I'm in Georgia. Georgia. Georgia. Yeah. Well, here that's called Fred Meyer. And I think they have the same idea. My daughter and son in law live in Utah. They have a place called Smiths. And it's kind of like you got the grocery store and auto part and you can buy clothes and like a Wal Mart kind of an idea like back in the day, Woolworth back in the day. Right. And so they had a place in the seventies called Car for all the in the big cities. So like in Bordeaux, I was in Bordeaux for a while and there was a car for there. But none, none of the smaller towns had anything like that. So typical for a normal person was you would buy groceries fresh in the morning and you would prepare what you're going to eat that day. Right. And the next day, repeat, you do it as you would buy everything, fresh bread, your meat, your cheese, your whatever. You're going to have your parsnips and your. Exactly. Things on back home to make breakfast. Exactly. We had one time a guy made us this Thanksgiving Thanksgiving in the United States. And so he kind of liked American culture and he had a little bit more money than a lot of people. So he invited us over for Thanksgiving dinner. Which they celebrate in France, right? Exactly. But, you know, there was no Internet back then But he was able to find, you know, they make a turkey at Thanksgiving and they do stuff. And so we had stuffing with truffles. And it was off the charts spectacular. This guy had this Swedish wood fired oven that was, you know, like several thousand dollar oven back in those days. And and he you know, I mean, it was just marvelous. I mean, and you you get the interaction with individual who are just human beings, right? And we're breaking bread together. And it was really a joyful experience. Nice. Have you been back to France since? Since your one time. You know, you need two things to do, that kind of stuff normally, right? You need to have the time and you need the money. And sometimes we had the money at no time. Sometimes we had time, but not like today. That would be the case right now. And so but we went back, my wife and I, around our 20th anniversary. Oh, nice. And I had been working for a health care business for about 11 years. And it basically dissolved and got absorbed into a big hospital and some doctors groups and things. It's a long story, but I, I had time and I had a little bit of money And so we went back to France and had a joyful, wonderful visit. It out more than once. This time we email more than once. That's very true. Yeah, very, very. I mean, just the food is amazing, so it's fun. Anyways, so I, I, I've done a number of things I like. I worked in Africa for a while, so there is very different again, I was in Nigeria commissioning a hospital with an international group. So we had people from America, people from England, from different places around the world who would come help. This guy was a chief, seriously, a tribal chief who had been a very successful businessman in food. Actually, some of it he was he was the match king of Africa. He made more matches in Africa than anybody else. Match anyways, right. Fire match, a striker matches. Right And the match mogul of Africa. All right. Still very necessary over there. Yeah, the 2005 when I was there, but probably still is. It was a marvelous project that we were able to work on. I have worked with the elderly. I worked in tribal health in Alaska. So a consortium of tribal governments who pulled together their health care resources and authorities and created this nonprofit that served all of southeast Alaska, mostly native populations. But in some communities it was the only health care. So we served everybody. So that's okay. I'm super interested in that. What? So the tribal communities they normally don't have well, I mean, would they be able to subscribe to, I guess, regular, regular insurance programs as they can? But so there's a certain level of health care services that are provided by the United States government for families, for for tribes. Yeah. And so, like, there's this thing called the Indian Health Service. And traditionally the Indian Health Service is a part of our commitment to say, hey, we sold everything from you. So in return I'll give you a reservation land and and health care, you know, kind of minimal level of health care shopping. I mean, you know, I mean, it's a little cynical, but not true, completely untrue. And so that's really enough, right? So so they wanted to form their own basically health care system with their own personal insurance company or like. And so we're like this network. And some tribes have done they've done this thing. And I don't want to get into all the technical stuff. You know, there's federal law that guides these things. But a lot of tribes, you know, over the years basically said, we don't want your lousy health care from the Indian Health Service. And not that they don't do some great things because a lot of people still do use a lot of tribes. But some said, you know, we think we could do this better. So it's kind of like if you're a kid, right, and you had parents and your parents fed you and they closed you and they put a roof over your head. This is kind of the relationship, the federal government and the tribes. Who, you know, on reservations and whatnot. And so what some tribes said was, you know, we're kind of grown up now, and I think we can do a better job. So you just give us the amount of money you would have spent providing these things. And rather than you doing this for me, I think I can serve my people better and they are successful, create jobs, all that stuff. If you just give us the money and let us, you know, kind of do it our own way. And I agreed. And they yeah. And so they set up a process where people could do what's called compacting. And and again, there's specific regulations that kind of guide this process. But so in Alaska, which is quite different from the rest of the U.S., because there were no reservations, actually, I think there was one reservation in all of Alaska. And in the 1970s, you might recall, we discovered this thing called oil up there. Hmm. And all of a sudden, a lot of this oil would be potentially on tribal lands. And the state senator at the time said, we're going to figure out what we're going to do so we're not in this legal morass for the rest of our existence. And so they very rapidly went through this process of recognizing tribes in Alaska and paying them for the mineral rights. Well, and basically they did a number of different things. So they set up and they said, we're going to set you up with corporations. We're going to give you grants of land, we're going to give you some cash, and we're going to allow this compacting process. So there's a number of pieces that kind of fell together. But basically it was we're going to set you up with this kind of bolus that should allow you to be self-governing, to be successful, and to kind of do things the way you want to do them. You know, we're not going to tell you how to do it. You do that on your own and they like this. And they said in return you give up all of the oil rights. Oh, there's the catcher there. There was I knew there was a shoe that was going to drop at some point. Well, exactly right. It's like the government's being real nice right now. Let's go home. Well, the whole idea was to not have legal battles and ongoing disputes. It's like, well, this is coming up. We know it's a deal, so we're going to deal with it and we're going to try to create something that everybody feels like. That's cool. Take the oil. Yeah. Well, no, well, and, and and so they have well anyways. And it's it's just a lot of different things. And so in Alaska, what you find is that there are tribes that are federally recognized and they compact with the government. So for some of these services, so they get the money and they get to do their own thing. But as well they have these businesses and many of them have become large, successful international businesses and they invest things like, you know, Alaska is really if we look at it, it's like a third world country There's not a lot there. There's not a lot there. I mean, there's a lot there. There's a lot of land and a lot of mountains and a lot of fish, you know, some oil. You know, it's it's, you know, big things are extraction industries, fishing and tourism. And so, you know, that's what third world country is. And so and it's a long ways from any population centers. Right. I mean, that's a long ways. I mean, you got to ship. Everything will be Hawaii. Yeah. Well, yeah, yeah. So transportation is a challenge and and all those kinds of things. So, but, and it worked. I think generally it's worked very well for the tribes and most of the tribes, you know, they're well managed. They have the successful businesses and they've invested in things, like I said, all over the world. They have lumber businesses, they have extraction businesses, industries, you know, of the land that they have. And so they so maybe sometimes they run the companies that do the drilling, but not actually the oil itself It can be. Yeah, it just isn't. Yeah. Which what do you think was worth more the health care or the oil itself? Yeah, well, anymore I don't know about oil someday. And they know this, right? In Alaska the state government you know unusual is that seems you know is are pretty brilliant and they said oil at some point runs out . You know we don't know when you we have gases but you know at some point this will run out So what they've done is they take the money they get from oil, the state, you know, from oil revenue. And they. Set a portion of it aside, and they basically created like an endowment and they draw on this endowment to balance their budget because they figure that someday when the oil dries up, we want to have a big blow to Saudi Arabia and other oil rich countries have done, unfortunately not Nigeria. So all the other story was working over there. But for Nigeria, that's for another day. Yeah, Norway, you know, those kinds of countries, they've got these huge reserves of cash and, you know, they invested and it's kind of got a life of its own because they know at some point these resources will run dry. And then, you know, we've got to have something to live on because we're used to a standar of living that you couldn't sustain by which here, you know, normally. And so Alaska was smart in that way. And and they also wanted to benefit all the people, right? So that would be the permanent fund. And so against this kind of endowment that's set aside and then the investments do well. If you live in Alaska, you're, you know, a resident, every year you get a check. But yeah, really, you get a check out of this endowment and And this guy, huh? Yeah. Yeah. And so it's just, you know, very unique environment. But I wanted to work with tribal groups, frankly, and health care, because what they do is they look at all the elements of their life from a cultural lens, including health care. So unlike a lot of medicine, you know, Western medicine, the typical medicine in Georgia or in Washington State where I live, tells in your shots and your pills and your. Yeah, exactly. And and so they look at it as a part of a whole it's a part of their spiritual life. It's part of their physical live, their mental life, their cultural life. Right. And so we tried to look at health care from the perspectiv of a whole person, and I really wanted to kind of experience that firsthand. So we had a hospital, we had medical care, dental care, physical therapy, eyeglasses, the whole shebang with a sweat lodge, because that was a part of, you know, health in that Native American or Alaska Native culture. I mean, we have saunas, we have sauna now. Well, there you go. And if you are from Sweden, that would be a part of your cultural health experience. And so cold places, I feel like, oh exactly, exactly. For in sweats. Right. So these were all marvelous experiences. It wasn't like this, you know, career where I work for a little place and then a bigger place and then a bigger place. And finally tried to be in charge of the biggest place, which is a typical career trajectory kind of a thing. I wanted to have different experiences with different kind of populations and people in different positions. But I would say overall, through most of my career, I have worked with people who have maybe a few more barriers than average, maybe lower income, maybe cultural barriers, maybe economic barriers, etc., etc., and trying to be of service. And the last ten years I was CEO at community health centers. And the whole idea there is that you would you come into the health center are a whole person. And particularly this last organization I worked with we had a amazing group of people and it was a privilege for me to be there. And they really had honed in on this idea that you rayshard are the captain of the care team. So when you come to our health center, there might be a physician or a nurse practitioner, a dentist or a hygienist, nurse, community health worker or a health coach We might have a Zumba class for you. We might have a living well, with chronic conditions class, we might have all of these different things, right. Services, if you will, that you could take advantage of. But what was fundamentally essential is that you. Are there any of you? You are in charge of you? Exactly. Not us. We're not going to have you come in and kind of poke and prod you a little bit and then say, oh, do this. And if you do what I tell you to do, you're a good patient. And then we pat you on the head and send you on your way. That's right. That's the typical kind of model and especially these days where the stressors and the kind of the economic world since unfortunately, health care has become all about economics, it seems, in the U.S.. In the U.S.. Yes. That, you know, the only 5 minutes and then you're lucky if you actually get to see the doctor, maybe. Yeah, exactly. And so it's it's very different. So this model was very different and it was by design, it was on purpose because we felt this was going to be more effective. Oh, totally. In fact, over time, you know, our quality became the best quality in the region. We eliminated any disparities in health outcomes between our minority and majority populations of patient by ourselves, empowering them to help themselves. Exactly. Exactly. And so we got ourselves in an organization that struggled financially. I don't do everything well, but one of the things I do pretty well is to kind of figure out, you know, how do we make a living here? And so how can we do better at that with still retain the reality of the fact that we're all human beings, we're not machines. And so how do we make a living as human beings in a way that, you know, pursues our mission and is integrity to our values and allows everyone the opportunity to visit the center ? Yeah. And and frankly, in the process of this, people wanted to come to us. Right? We had a big waiting list of people who wanted to come see u and engage with us around their health care journey. And so we got in a position where we had some money. Finally, we had good reputation, we had a great quality, we had great staff and we needed to build a new building. I had moved as a CEO into a closet and I moved out of my closet so I could put three dentists in my closet. And it was a big closet, but still. And what do you do, work in the hallway? Well, we actually rented a little space outside the health center itself because there just wasn't room. And so we kind of filled it as far as it could get. And and we got in a position where we actually then tried, you know, all the things lined up and we started designing a new health center that would be twice as big. And instead of being built and designed around the traditional model where you are a bit or a part of a person, right, which is the traditional model, the dentist is on that side of town, the doctors in that side of town, the therapist is in the middle someplace. You're way over there. Right. But this we had everything that were up together, including a place to do a Zumba class and to lear how to cook food that's healthy and delicious and etc., etc.. And so we pulled it all together. We were designing this thing and we actually started the construction process as we kind of wrapped up the details and I had this first epiphany, it was basically, you know, we're trying to fix what's wrong with health care in America in a way that's human oriented, you know, patient centered, respects the staff as human beings and is sustainable. Right. It's affordable and effective. Much, much more effective, hopefully. Can you open one of those in Savannah? Because we need that. Yeah, you do, don't we? Where is this? Where is this? This was in Oregon or Oregon, right? Hood River and The Dalles kind of central north central Oregon Oregon patients. Yeah. And we were thinking place it is very for I felt very privileged to be a part of the things that were going on. I was on the board of a medicaid reform, health care reform kind of effort called Cisco's coordinated care organizations. And those are whole nother stories. But anyways, so we started to build the building and I had this epiphany. I realized unless we can do something to help the individual patient to be more effective in fulfilling this role as the captain of security, because when they go home, they still need to. Exactly. Exactly. And after working for over 30 years in health care, I was a little embarrassed. But I am not that prideful, so or prideful so I started asking the question. I had this great multidisciplinary team of folks to engage with and I started asking, Well, what are the skills? You know, what? What would help them be the captain of the care team And as we had these discussions, I realized the second epiphany was that it's about change, like how do we manage and take a leadership role in the changes that are happening in our lives so that we're not only coping with external change, right? So like early in my career, the idea of getting on a computer and talking to yo and Georgia with video was, you know, sci fi, literally. And I mean, this is what's going to happen, especially, you know, for not very much money. And so today, this is reality. This is the norm, right? We've got to keep up with these kinds of changes that are going on around us. But more importantly for our discussion is this capacity to be the captain of my own change process, right? How can I not be the victim of change, not be the pawn? You know, like Pinocchio's pulling my strings. How am I the captain of my own change process? Because that's really the joy and success in life is as we make changes that are self-directed and that are focused on our values, our purpose, our goals. Right. How can we do that in a way that's balanced, that recognizes our humanity? So we're not beating ourselves up all the time, maintains our self esteem and emotions forward in that way. And so it was about change. And I was studying change models. And then you came you came up with like a ten step kind of program in the book, right? Well, exactly. So that was and that was kind of the next step. So I got myself fired from that job. No, good job. I know. I know that was a good visit, but I didn't steal any money or anything like that. Like we had a disagreement with the board and I had lost that argument. And so I had some time. You know, it's one of those situations where I had some time on my hands. I said this, I just had this deep kind of in my soul feeling this is really important, right? So I put all these change models up and I realized that the core of the very foundation of every model is his idea of personal motivation. So then I ask, Well, what? You know, motivation for me as a employer, as a leader of an organization, was how do I get employees to do what I want them to do? And that's what every business in the country is thinking about. When you talk about motivation, how do I get Rayshard to show up on time to work? I do. I have to be nice to the to the customers, you know, etc., etc.. I feel it makes sense. Oh yeah. I feel like that's the day. That's not always the priority for the majority of companies, at least at least on the on the like field level, on the associate level. Right. But maybe in, in the executive offices it's more like that, right. Yeah. But yeah, but when it comes from the executives to the underlings, I don't know that they really think through what keeps employees. I don't I don't think right everywhere from everythin from the uniforms that people have to wear to to the time scheduling that they have to to like having managers who are empowering managers as opposed to just authority managers. Right. Right. And I don't know. I mean, companies definitely need someone to come in and tell them how to care about the people under them for this. So true. Well, and and that's a whole nother discussion that I've had You know, some podcasts have different focus, right? An some of the more business ones. I talk about this mechanical metaphor that pervades business and society. And frankly, in my lifetime, my career has been allowed to run amuck and created all kinds of serious human natural dysfunction. I think that's another discussion. But but anyways, I would totally agree with you. We spent a couple hours here. David Yeah, exactly. So then, but what I was thinking about was how do I generate motivation and direction for my own life? And as I studied. As you noted, I decided I like invent these things. So these things have been around since the dawn of time, right? Since human beings have been around. And so what I found, though, was that there are ten principles in three kind of broad areas, and the areas are our values as a foundation. So getting away from a mechanical metaphor, seek, think about like a tree, a beautiful fruit tree, that what's your favorite fruit? Apples. Apples, wonderful apples. So these are the best Honeycrisp apples you could ever imagine, right? And so you got to start with the strong roots. Right. They've got to go deep and wide. They've got to bring in all that moisture and nutrition, you know, from the soil. That's really the foundation of every tree that wants to produce that wonderful fruit And then you got to have a trunk, right? That trunk has to both be strong and flexible. And then you've got branches, right? These are kind of the foundations. You need all of those things before you can have leaves and fruit. Without those, you know, foundations, you never get the stuff that you really want. And so what I discovered was these are foundations that apply to all domains of our life. These foundations apply whether you've got a master's degree or a Ph.D. or no degree, never graduated from high school. Does it make any difference? Does it matter what your race is, what your gender is, what your background is, what you've done in the past, but you've screwed up on or done well? None of those things matters. It doesn't matter because these are universal to the human condition. So you and I and all those listening are watching, right? We're human beings. These apply to you. And so that was beautiful to me. So it's not just the health care journey, right? Being the captain of my health care team or my health care journey, talking the captain of my own life, not a part of what everybody else wants to do and not that they are all evil or want ill for me. Right? But it's just that we should be in charge of our own lives. And so it starts with this kind of sick of you. Are miracles happen? Well, good things will happen and good things. I was very careful in the book because I wrote it for people on the front lines. You know, the people have got to show up and go to work and work a shift I took a job for six months at the Home Depot, and just because I haven't worked on the front lines in so long, so I was a plumbing associate and I opened at 5 a.m. some days and then the next day they would have me close until 11 p.m. and it was, you know, that kind of monkey business. But I learned to work in there and just be the front line guy who just does what he's told to do. Because I kind of had that experience and. Right. This was some integrity, too. What is life like, you know, in that kind of a situation, which is where life is, frankly for tens of millions of people in the United States alone. Yep And so I wanted to have some integrity to that. And as I wrote, you know, and continue to research and think and ponder these things, it just became more beautiful and more profound to me. So the first step is always to create this foundation that' roots of our values. And the second kind of theme is how do I get more effective at controlling my life? Some of my friends who are Christians, they say, I've given my life to Jesus, and I go, But you don't have any control over your life. So what do you really have you given him? You know, I mean, it's just, you know, you've got to have something to offer. And if you can't have a modicum of control over your life, you're not going to have anything to offer and you're not going to be successful. I don't care what it is you're doing or where you're at And so that's kind of the second foundation. And the third one is what's about self-esteem and maintaining our self-esteem in a human way, using principles of self compassion. And what you've got with these three thematic areas and then the ten principles that kind of split up between those three areas, is you have this foundation that honors you as an imperfect, flawed human being who is doing your best and getting a little bit better every night. Every day. But every week, you know, every month. Right. You just need a little don't be too hard on yourself about it. Well, you can't you just care because it doesn't serve you well. And that's what the science tells us is, you know, when you beat up on yourself, you actually take your capacity to deal with the problem that. You're struggling with and it decreases that, whereas when you have compassion, self kindness, you increase your capacity to deal with that very problem. So do you want to kick yourself in the butt or do you want to give yourself a hand? It's a choice, right? It's choices. Every second of every moment of every day. Your thoughts are making choices. Right. And it's so true. And one of the hardest one of the hardest things for people to do is just to control their thoughts, their emotions. Right? Exactly. It's you know, it takes a meditating. Right. But it's totally possible if you don't want to feel that way You feel that way. Feel that way and feel it fully. And then let it go and decide how you want to feel next. Right. Exactly. You literally have the power to do so. You do And this isn't rocket science writing again. So my book is not written as the master course for people you know, with a psychology degree who are, you know, developing their perfect life or something This is for everyday people. And so I never just say, you have to do this. I present a principle, usually a very simple and a few pages to give you kind of a basic understanding of it. And then I present some what I call skill sets or tools if you will, that give you some perspective that I felt would be useful for a person on the front lines is just living their life and trying to do their best and get a little bit better. Among those skill sets, I never say do these. One, two, three, four, five, and you'll be a good reader, you know, and then go on your way. I say you're your own boss. Here, here's some ideas, some skills. Does one of them resonate with you? Mm hmm. Then focus on that. Set a goal around it, and then you go back to the goal chapter in the planning chapter. The goal chapter, and you say, okay, how do I do that? And then you work on one thing at a time, and and if you do that, you'll find and not all. I mean, one of the most common questions I get is new you. Who new is how long does it take for me to be know the where is the new year? How far in the future do I have to wait? Why do I have to do to push ups every day for a year to become a new me? And so it's like, you know what? You can become a new you in the moment and it could take a year. It's not a thing with a timeline. The idea is that you will never stop being the captain of your own life, so you relish the journey more than the end. And it's really just learning, right? It's just it's just learning. We're just learning how to deal We're learning new tricks to deal, right? We're learning about ourselves and how. Oh, geez, I wish I would just put this in an organized fashio in my own mind 20 years ago, you know? Exactly. And that's I love that. Thank you for that. Because that's really all that the book does is it kind of puts these things in an organized fashion and it presents these principles that are, I think, pretty straightforward when you look at things you find inherently true, right? As you read, I'm sure you just like, Oh, yeah, I knew that. But I never just put it in that way. Exactly. Exactly. So the book is about principles. And then there are tips, tricks and techniques. The three TS, I call them, because that's most of what we find, right? It's all about life hacks or, you know, this kind of down, you know, work life hacks without substance of principles behind it. What people find is the life is hard, right? It's all about what I bolted on to get my goal, to get that through. You know, we all want that fruit. It's the prize at the end of the rainbow kind of thing. But instead, if we focus on the journey in alignment with the principles of human success, if we do that, we will take care of itself. Exactly. And we will have more fruit. I never, ever once promised to become a millionaire or a rich man or any of that kind of stuff, because that is ridiculous. But I really like you, David. Yeah, you're a good man. Anyway, so that's. That's what the book is about it. And I guess and I hate to be I'm not a salesman. I, when I was 18, my first job was selling cocoa knives. I sold cocoa, but I did for about a month. For about a month, I guess I didn't I don't think I made any money, but I did get a fantastic set of knives, sort of like 165 bucks. Well, exactly. I got the same. So realizing or what? Here's a plug for cocoa, since I didn't make them any money either. I still have those knives today and they're great knives. Oh, I have one left. I only have one left. I have. I have the the like the the baker's one. Oh, yeah. That's the spatula. One with a knife on the inside. That's the last one I have left. And it's great for everything. Yeah, that's so funny. Yeah, it's a small world. Mm hmm. But anyway, as you know, I sold Cartier knives, and I realized that this helps me. But I will just ask people in the spirit of if I have an apple creation and you have an apple , and we were to exchange apples. How many apples do each of us have? We still have an apples. Are we still each have one apple? Don't. Mm hmm. Yes, we do. But if I have an idea and you have an idea and we exchange ideas, how many ideas do we each have to reach out to, don't we ? Yeah. So in the spirit of a gift, if you buy the book and read the book you will receive, I promise you, you will find something in there that you'll go, Wow. I think I can apply that my life and my life will be better off. And if there's one thing. It's worth the price of the work and, you know, 100 fold. Well, you know, and that's the beauty you just sold me. Yeah. Oh. Did you hear that? Yeah. Is there, like, a lightning storm? That was thunder and the electricity went out all around me. Oh, my gosh. Luckily, we're all on battery power over here, so. Yeah, well, that's like a sign from heaven, I think. And my dog's freaking out. She's that. She does not, like, scared. It's okay, baby girl. It's okay. It's okay. Oh, man. David, this has been this has been super entertaining and enlightening and informative. And I really appreciate you being here and thank you for writing that book. I'm going to get my hands on one. Where where can anyone else go to get your book? So if you go to my website, it's simply my name w w w dot David R Edwards dot com and it talks a little bit more about the backstory of the book you know, some of the reviews and things, and then you can click on it and it'll take you to Amazon and it's in the audio book. So I just published the audio book in June and it's on paperback and e-book fantastic. So I'm looking forward to taking a look and being inspired again. New You Who Knew by David Edwards. Go check it out. David, thank you so much again for being here. And we'll have to hang out again because I feel like we have a lot more to talk about. This should be awesome. Well, cheers and have a wonderful rest of your day. And ladies and gentlemen, go get this book. You're watching a television series. Just.