The Confidence Shortcut with Niki Sterner

#15: Jesse Jensen | Pilot, Poet, and Performer | Throw Your Hat Over The Fence

• Niki Sterner • Season 1 • Episode 15

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Big news—Jesse Jensen’s debut book, Throw Your Hat Over The Fence, launches on Amazon this Thursday, August 28th! 

In this week’s episode of The Confidence Shortcut, Jesse shares the life philosophy behind the book—a simple but powerful commitment mechanism that can propel you toward your biggest dreams.

What if the secret to achieving your dreams isn't waiting until you feel confident, but taking action that forces you to move forward? In this illuminating conversation, Jesse reveals how "throwing your hat over the fence" creates a powerful commitment mechanism that propels you toward your goals.

Jesse shares the origins of this philosophy—a piece of wisdom from his grandfather that became the title of his debut book of illustrated poems. By creating situations that demand follow-through, Jesse transformed from a mechanical engineer into a multi-faceted achiever: sales executive, private pilot, patent holder, entrepreneur, comedian, and certified executive leadership coach.

The conversation takes a deeply personal turn when Jesse recounts his catastrophic early attempt at stand-up comedy, opening for a professional comedian with zero preparation. Rather than letting this painful experience define him, he eventually returned to comedy decades later, proving that failure provides invaluable lessons when approached with honesty and reflection.

What makes this episode particularly powerful is Jesse's emphasis on defining success on your own terms. Early in his marriage, he wrote down specific goals that mattered to him personally. Years later, he discovered this list and realized he had accomplished most items—a testament to the power of clear intention and consistent action.

For anyone feeling stuck or uncertain, Jesse offers practical wisdom: write down what truly matters to you, create commitments that force action, take small daily steps regardless of how you feel, and view setbacks as learning opportunities. His approach challenges the common belief that confidence precedes action, suggesting instead that bold moves create confidence.

Ready to throw your own hat over the fence? Listen now, then grab your copy of Jesse’s new book on Amazon August 28th—and share which commitment you’ll make today to move closer to the life you want.

For more information on Jesse's new book of illustrated poems:

https://www.throwthathat.com/

To purchase a copy of the book, Throw Your Hat Over The Fence, The Poems of Jesse Jensen, Illustrated by Jashton Gieser, head over to Amazon on August 28th!

You can find Jesse on Linked In: 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessewjensen/

On TikTok:

https://www.tiktok.com/@throwyourhatoverthefence?lang=en

On Instagram: 

https://www.instagram.com/throwthathat/

To contact Jesse: 

Jesse@throwthathat.com

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Confidence Shortcut, the podcast for ambitious creatives and entrepreneurs who are ready to stop overthinking, take bold action and finally step into the life they've been dreaming about. I'm your host, nikki Sterner mom, actor, comedian and producer. After years of playing small and waiting to feel ready, I went on a courage quest and found a shortcut to confidence. Each week, I'll bring you real stories, simple steps and conversations with experts in mindset, courage and confidence, plus heart-to-hearts with fellow creatives who are turning their dreams into reality. It's time to get unstuck and start showing up. Let's dive in. Welcome to the Confidence Shortcut. I'm your host, nikki Sterner.

Speaker 1:

Today's guest is Jesse Jensen, sales executive by day, poet by pretty much whenever inspiration strikes. During the pandemic, he started writing whimsical, funny poems that turned into his debut book, throw your Hat Over the Fence. He's a private pilot, a volunteer with Tiger Flight Foundation, an inventor, entrepreneur and a certified executive leadership coach. Jesse lives in Atlanta with his wife, heidi and their four kids, who've patiently endured more dinner table poetry readings than most families. Today, we're diving into how Jesse blends humor, creativity, leadership and a love for life into everything he does. I want to welcome to the show Jesse Jensen.

Speaker 2:

Thanks, Nikki. I gotta say it's awesome to be here. We met earlier this year, what at Jeff Justice's comedy class, and I never imagined it would lead to a podcast, but I'm glad that it did.

Speaker 1:

I know I'm so excited. Jesse is one of my favorite people from the classes and he is so funny you guys are going to figure that out right away after listening to this but he's incredibly intelligent, incredibly kind and giving and just a wonderful human being. On top of that, he's very inspiring. He has systems in place to get the stuff done that you want to do, and I'm just so excited for you to share that with people today, jesse. So go ahead and get us started off with. Tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do and what you're passionate about.

Speaker 2:

You asked me to join based on the book that I wrote and it's coming out here August 28th. There it is. It's a little, that's right. It's a fun illustrated poem book called Throw your Hat Over the Fence and I feel like that's where we should probably start the conversation. I remember when we first started talking you're like where'd the title come from? You know, I chose that title.

Speaker 2:

There's a poem in the book called Throw your Hat Over the Fence, but I chose that title because it's a phrase that my grandpa used to say. He used to say, jesse, if you really want to get something done, then throw your hat over the fence, and that forces you to go get it right. He meant go do something that makes you accountable, that creates a forcing function for yourself to go get something done, because a lot of us will sit on the sidelines and not do it. And for most of my life that's how I've lived. I love to commit, I love to throw that hat and use that as a motivator to get going. In fact, I love that. Should I read that poem? You want to hear it. Yes, would you please? I would love that. Should I read that poem you want to hear?

Speaker 1:

it. Yes, would you please?

Speaker 2:

I would love that all right, let's do that okay all right.

Speaker 2:

This is throw your hat over the fence. Throw your hat over the fence. To many around you it won't make sense. Tamp down the voices that hold you down. Push past the negative so often around.

Speaker 2:

Commitment is hard and scary to do. Take that first step and be true to you. Deepen your bones. You know that it's right. Stop the struggle, the internal fight, stop the doubts, the fear and the worry. Take the first step in your life's journey. Take that first step to live out your dream.

Speaker 2:

Do not let a fence slow down your steam. The challenge is real, the obstacle high. By throwing that hat and letting it fly, you're forcing your hand to figure it out. The path is now clear and you have no doubt, for you now must go to the other side, retrieve your hat and feel the pride, unless it's a hat that you don't care to own. Maybe this works better if you throw your cell phone. So that was one of the first poems I wrote and became the title of the book and also a little bit of what we're going to talk about today. I'm hoping that I can share with your listeners a couple of tips and tricks on how to throw their hat right, to create a forcing function to overcome obstacles and do those things that they know they want to do or that is in line with their dreams, but they just haven't done it, for whatever reason, to go, start living the life that they want to live.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think that's great. A lot of people have that fence blocking them?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and so how do we?

Speaker 1:

get over that fence.

Speaker 2:

Yeah and force yourself to go do it. And yeah, a little background on me. I asked about a little bit about myself. I am married. I've got four awesome kids, ages 21 to 27. So just starting to become empty nesters 27. So just starting to become empty nesters.

Speaker 1:

Time to party now, Jesse.

Speaker 2:

That's right. Professionally, I'm a mechanical engineer that kind of moved into sales. I got my MBA from the University of Michigan and then realized that salespeople look like they had more fun than engineers. So I moved into the sales side and I've been doing that now for over 25 years. I've worked for Gateway, ibm, intel where I'm at today and I've covered some of the largest companies in the world. I've sold Shell Oil, exxon Mobil and my current customer is AT&T. So a lot of big customers.

Speaker 2:

But I think my professional career is like one side of me. But I think what I'm really proud of is that I've lived a life that's been purposeful in pursuing the things that I defined as successful and things that I wanted to go do. I think a lot of people don't take the time or really spend the time thinking about what is it that success really means to me? What you know, what do I really want to do with this life that we've got on this planet? And and so for me and I think I told you about this, nikki, the other day, I was this was probably about five, six, seven years ago I was cleaning out an old suitcase that I had, actually a briefcase. You remember the old briefcase days with the handle on top. I was cleaning that out and I found a piece of paper that I wrote down a bunch of stuff real early in our marriage that I said I wanted to go do Like. These were the things that I defined as success. And here I found it 25 years later, which was cool, and I wanted to share some of the things that I'd written down. One of them was be a good husband right, and I wanted to be a good dad. I look back and I'm like I've been married 30 years this November. We still pretty much like each other most times and I've got four awesome kids and they're all contributing members of society at different, varying degrees right, but I'm proud of all four of them. They're all awesome little human beings, and so I feel like that was a little check mark.

Speaker 2:

Obtain a Patent was actually one of my one on there, which I did. I think it was 2012, 2013,. Somewhere in there, I got a patent for a headband holder. That also also led to another one, which was start a company. My wife and I started a company in 2011 called Heidi's house. That is still going to this day, where we sell the headband holders, mostly on on Amazon.

Speaker 2:

I had on there that I wanted to try standup again, and I'll walk you through that later. Cause that later, because I think that's how you and I met and the way that this whole thing got connected, so that's a fun little story, the roundabout way of how that worked. I also had to start flying again, so that's a real passion of mine. You highlighted that in the intro. I got my pilot's license when I was 16. And then I ran out of both time and money. I went off to college and it just got super expensive, and so my goal was to eventually start flying again and then own an airplane, and so I made that dream a reality in 2020, be a successful sales executive. I've ticked that one off the list. And then there's there was one that I had not done yet, and that was publish a book, and hopefully in a few days I get to check that one off the list and actually publish it.

Speaker 2:

But I think there are a couple of lessons that, as I was thinking about this and talking to you, that I thought would be takeaways, right as I reflect back, and the first one is write down what you really want, right? Get it in black and white and be specific. I think a lot of people just don't take the time right, just start running after whatever shiny object or whatever other people think that they should be doing, or what they think other people think they should be doing, which is probably more accurate a lot of times but really take the time to sit down and say what's important to me, what matters to my life, and when I look back, what do I want to be able to point to that says, hey, this, I feel like I lived a life that was on my terms, and so define what success is for you and don't let others change that for you, but you can change it yourself. Right, I've certainly changed some of the things that matter to me, and we'll talk about that later. Right, what I'm passionate about today is a lot different than before, but then the next thing is throw that hat right. Make a commitment, a promise, an obligation that forces you to start going down that path. Right, if this is something you really want.

Speaker 2:

A lot of times for our own lives, we're like, yeah, I really want this, but I've got this other thing I got to do first, or I got this that I want to do, or I've got these obligations or I've got kids or whatever. But start making those moves that put you in a position to be successful on the things that you said you want to do. And if you don't do them, then really assess is it that important to you? Or, if it is, start knocking out the blockers and then do something every day that moves the needle towards your goal, no matter how small, right, but do something every day. If this is a real goal, start doing stuff every day that moves that needle forward. And it doesn't really matter how you feel, right, you're going to. There's going to be days that you get up and you're like I don't feel like doing it today and push past that and just do it. Do the things that you know you need to do and, at the end of the day, this was another grandpa-ism. Is that a thing, grandpa-ism?

Speaker 1:

I guess it is yeah that's right.

Speaker 2:

He said just at the end of the day, you need to look in the mirror. And he was a sales guy, right, and so he was teaching me how to go sell. And he said, every day, if you're working out of your house which I've done now for the better part of almost 30 years, he said you've got to get up every morning and be able to look in the mirror and say I'm doing the things that are moving forward on moving a sale, moving whatever it is, and I think it applies to so many more things than just sales. But sales is a great analogy for that, right, Because if you get up in the morning and you end up drinking a coffee and then go and mowing your grass and you do a bunch of stuff that isn't related to moving sales, down the road, one day turns into two days, turns into a week, turns into a month, and all of a sudden you're wondering why things aren't moving. And then the salesperson that gets up every day and can honestly look in the mirror and say you know what I did do that call today. I did make those prospecting things, I did do the things that I need to do to move the ball forward.

Speaker 2:

It's amazing that eventually those are the people that people look at and say, gosh, why is he successful? Why did that drop into his lap? Why did and it's like it didn't drop into the lap, right, it was all these little things built up over time did exactly what we need to do, Whatever that works in sales but also works in life right, it works in weight loss, it works in all the different areas right, If you get up every day and do the things you know you're supposed to do and we're really good, Nikki, at lying to do to move this thing forward. And if not, that's okay, Do better tomorrow and you'll find that over time, those incremental steps actually make a huge difference.

Speaker 2:

And then, finally, don't be discouraged by failure. Learn from it. I think there's a lot of times and we talk about one of one of my biggest failures, right that ultimately led us together was a harsh one, right? But you, but I learned from it, and it took me a long time to learn the lesson, and maybe I can shortcut that. This is a short, a confident shortcut, so maybe we can shortcut that.

Speaker 1:

Tell me that.

Speaker 2:

I don't have to go through all the pain. There is a quote that brings to mind, right, bill Gates and you and I talked about this the other day right, most people overestimate what they can do in a year, but underestimate what they can do in 10 years. And, yeah, a lot of people just think I'm going to get all this done, and then, when they don't get it done, they're super discouraged and they're frustrated, and sometimes it's just the wrong time horizon, right?

Speaker 1:

So write it down. Do one small thing every day toward the goal and then learn from failure.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, that's a good summary of what I said a lot longer. Yeah, yeah, that's a good summary of what I said a lot longer. So I think. So one of the things that we talked about was people that lie to themselves or aren't honest about themselves, and there was a fun poem that you and I read called time. I was going to get that one out. You want to hear that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, please yes.

Speaker 2:

So this one is relatable for a lot of us. I still struggle with this every now and then, but I'm getting. I try to get better all the time. Actually, it's not called time, it's called late. Look at me, I don't even know my own poem. All right, we all have that friend who is constantly late. They're never on time. It's a character trait. There was traffic flat tires. They're not inept. The alarm failed again and they overslept. If you find you're late to every event, making up stories to explain where time went, then perhaps you're a friend who needs a new clock to leave extra early or to start to take stock. Your word is important, so be there on time. The excuses are cheap and not worth a dime. You have to be true to the promise you've made. Show up and be present and don't be delayed. I just looked down and my watch must have died. I'm late to meet friends, my battery's fried this is ironic and I have to go. We were meeting for lunch. I guess I'll eat crow.

Speaker 1:

Oh my gosh, Jesse, this is something I struggle with. I don't know if it's because I have too much on my plate. I don't know how to. I want to do it all, Like you said, write it all down. I have so many things that I want to do and I guess I need to prioritize better, but I just I try to do it all and it's like I get behind, a little bit behind, a little behind, I'm like, but I still have to do it all. Like how do you do that?

Speaker 2:

You're like a doctor's office, right Morning and by the evening it's oh my gosh. You got a bunch of people waiting in the lobby.

Speaker 1:

Yes, yes, that's exactly right, oh yes.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I don't know. I do think, I do think I do think there is a level of commitment around time. That's hard to do, but it's. It is important, right, Because if you've got, if you are meeting somebody and this is I used to really be bad at this, right, and I've gotten better I still struggle at times.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, okay, but look people, if you say you're going to be somewhere, if you're going to meet somebody for breakfast, if you're going to do something, and then they end up sitting there waiting 15, 20 minutes, right, you're not valuing their time. Right, you're valuing your own time, but you're not valuing their time. And I think, when you start looking at it, as you know, that everybody that you're interacting with is a valuable person, right, a valuable person has their times valuable, all the things about them are valuable, and you treat that in that type of a way, right, that says, hey, yeah, I don't want to be disrespectful to their time, I want to be respectful of their time. And I know, like my one daughter really struggles with this and I and then you hear her make up excuses the traffic was bad, and I'm like, look, the traffic in Atlanta is always bad, right, so just leave 15 minutes earlier, you plan for the worst case scenario instead of the best case scenario, and she always plans for if I leave, I got three minutes to spare. And then you have a hiccup, have a hiccup, problems, right, and so there is a.

Speaker 2:

There is an element of just changing the way you think about it and then changing the way that you engage with the world, kind of recognizing that, like today, my wife had to go down to get her global entry card right. We're going to Italy in a couple of weeks and we wanted to have global entry and she had to do an interview and those interviews are scheduled in increments online and you can't be late. If you're late, they skip over you. And then you got problems, especially when we're leaving in a few months, a few weeks. And I just said we're going to leave and we're going to get there half hour early and my daughter was going with us, the one that's always late and she's just. This is crazy. But when we were driving there, she's like this is cool because there's no stress. She's normally. I've got all this internal stress as I go. Do it. It takes all the stress out.

Speaker 2:

So, anyway, that's my that's where that poem came from though, Because late is one of those things that I think all of us at one time or another struggle with, but not everybody, though. I get my my one daughter's fiancee guy's early to everything and he's he gets offended when people are late, and at some level that's rightfully so, yeah absolutely I it when people are late and at some level it's rightfully so.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely I. It's something that I really I don't know why I do that. I it's like a relationship with time. I think that I have more of it than I do, and then I end up like struggling with it. But you're right, and then you're like heart is pounding on the way there because you don't want to be late, because you don't want to let somebody down, and it's like ridiculous, versus if you just stopped what you were doing, put it aside 30 minutes earlier and then just picked it up, if you got there early, you could work on it. Then I know there's different, a different way to do this that makes more sense. I just have to. I don't know, do I just have to write it down as one of my goals and acknowledge?

Speaker 2:

yeah, I think. I think acknowledging is the first step in fixing right. If you really want to fix it, you got to acknowledge that there's a problem and then just go attack it and start incremental, like we talked about. Grab your next meeting and just the other thing to do is push everything back 15 minutes and then just pretend like it starts.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah.

Speaker 2:

Not like it starts earlier, but, I think, changing the perspective. A lot of people look at the perspective as oh, the world's not cooperating with me, this traffic hit, or oh, yeah, I think about because and that's what changed it for me, right, it was like, oh, do I really want, do I really not value their time? I do. The fact that they are willing to meet with me for breakfast or do whatever, right, it means that they're taking the time. I want to be respectful of that. And that switch in my brain, I think, started really making a difference.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I remember my husband when we owned our first company back in Boise a long time ago it was like 20 years ago he made the switch from rushing to be like nope, I'm done with that. I'm not going to stress myself out over being on time. I will always be early from now on, and he is. He's always early now. He just made the switch, so I know that it's possible, Need to do it.

Speaker 2:

You haven't done it yet.

Speaker 1:

I haven't done it yet. I haven't done it.

Speaker 2:

Yet You'll get there, you'll get there, I will. I will Soon, can you tell?

Speaker 1:

me, jesse. Did you have a low point in your journey where something happened and you made a change, a shift in the way you were thinking about things? What happened in your life?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, can I tell you a story?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I'd love it.

Speaker 2:

Tell you a story that got me there. So while I was in college I started my first venture juggling. I was juggling for birthday parties and I was. I could juggle fire, knives, rings, pins, all that kind of stuff. I had a unicycle, right I was halfway to a clown. But I was juggling a park with a friend of mine and this lady walked by and she asked me if I did shows and I said and at the time I'd done a few birthday parties and everything else but I had this thing in my head that eventually I'd love to do bigger shows. And so I'd actually made up business cards and I had them on me and so I looked very professional, right, jesse Jensen juggling, it was like three J's inside of three little.

Speaker 2:

So I handed her one of my cards. I said, absolutely, I do shows. And she goes oh awesome, I'm a teacher and I'd like to see if we could maybe hire you to come into our it was like an elementary, middle school, combo type school and come in and do our assembly. So they had these big assemblies and they would, they wanted to bring somebody in. And so she says do you do that? And I'm like, absolutely, now, I had no, nothing. I'd done a couple of birthday parties for kids, right, I knew I'd interact with kids and I know how to have fun. But I she's like it would be about an hour. I'm like, okay, and she goes, let me talk to the principal, I'll give you a call. And she's like how much do you charge? I'm like $500 to do to come to your school, plus expenses. And she was like, okay. So she calls me a couple of days later and she said talk to the principal and we'd like to hire you. And so talk about throwing your hat right Now I'm fully committed. I've got a gig scheduled.

Speaker 2:

It wasn't for about a month and a half, but I had no real show and so I had to come up with an entire show and I had a lot of things right. I had juggling things. I could juggle balls, knives, rings, fire, all this other stuff right. But I didn't have a show and so I started trying to figure out what I was going to do and I ultimately came up with gas, goals, attitude, and stick-to-itiveness goes and makes you be successful. If you put that in the tank, you can go and be successful. And that was the whole show and I built the whole thing around. That Ended up going fantastically.

Speaker 2:

I ended up doing a bunch of shows for a bunch of different schools, which led to me doing our talent show in the college. I was a fairly small school General Motors Institute is where I went to college in Flint Michigan and so we had this talent show and so I juggled, I put a bunch of the stuff together. I didn't use gas or anything, the goals, attitudes I just did a short little bit to some music and ended up winning first place in the talent show, which led to a lady coming up to me after the show saying, hey, we've got a professional comedian coming to Flint Michigan named Jonathan Solomon. Now this guy had been on the Tonight Show, he was doing the circuit right, he'd performed with all the big names and everything. Back in the day he was coming through Flint and he needed an opening act and she wondered if I'd be his opening act and I said sure.

Speaker 2:

I said, can I do stand-up, or what do you want me to do? She goes you can do whatever you want, but you got 20 minutes. In my infinite wisdom, I'm going to do 20 minutes of standup. I'm not going to use any of these crutches of juggling or anything like that. And so you're laughing, nikki, because 20 minutes of standup is an eternity, especially if you've never done it right, and I'd never done anything related to standup. I just watched it and I loved it and I thought it was something that I wanted to maybe go do.

Speaker 2:

So the day rolls around and I'd been working on jokes, I'd tried it out with a couple of my friends and I was trying to get 20 minutes worth of material pulled together and which is super hard, right. And so, anyway, I get there the day of. There's about 200 people this is a big event, right? So I got 400 eyeballs looking at me it's just me a stool and a microphone. I have a black and white picture somewhere that night that a friend of mine took. He was like a photographer. He took the picture and I've got it somewhere.

Speaker 1:

You have to find that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it was before I bombed, so I was still smiling at that point. So, anyway, I get up and I start going right and nothing is landing. I've just got 400 blank stares, just 400 blank eyeballs, just staring back at me, just looking at me, and I was probably 14 minutes in before I got my first chuckle. And then I got a couple more jokes and they laughed and I. The other thing is, if they're not laughing, right, you go through your material super quick. So I had, and I had about a half hour of material that I'd written, but it was so bad. It was so bad and it wasn't in the form of like we've learned how to do this now and how to structure stuff, and I didn't have any of that, I was just totally winging it up there and but I did hit on a couple of jokes towards the end, got some laughter, and then Jonathan got up and and he killed it. He just did a great job, he was super funny and I still remember I remember it probably because it was so traumatic, right, but I remember the room itself had this border up all the way around it and I remember Jonathan's first joke was he got up and he said I feel like I'm sitting in my grandmother's bathroom and that border looked just like a grandmother's bathroom and everybody laughed because it was so accurate. So anyway, we got done. I sat down with him. Everybody left and it was just me and Jonathan and he said so how long have you been doing stand-up? I'm like 20 minutes. And he's like you were really good, you should keep it up. And at the time I couldn't even hear the feedback. All I heard in my own brain was this was the worst experience of my life Standing up there for 20 minutes with nobody laughing, thinking I think comedy is probably more personal than almost any other type of art form, because you wrote it and you performed it, and when you wrote it you thought it was funny, otherwise you wouldn't perform it.

Speaker 2:

Then you got up and you performed it and there's like nobody to blame except you or not, that you blame. But there is a part of you that like you throw yourself out there. This is you, right. And then nobody thinks you are funny. It hurts at a deeper level than most things, right? If you're an actor, you can blame it on a crappy script or a bad director or bad camera angle. Comedy is uniquely personal and so that one really set me back right.

Speaker 2:

The whole throw your hat thing was like that didn't work so good and I think one of the lessons I took away from that is make sure you do your homework right. Misplaced confidence is also a bad thing. Right Now I think the thing that I didn't do misplaced confidence can be okay if you learn from it right. At the time I didn't learn from it. I was just like this was terrible. I don't want to ever do this again and it's funny. Then I found that piece of paper saying that I wanted to try stand-up again and I had not done anything with it for decades.

Speaker 2:

But I did watch the movie Comedian. I don't know if you've ever seen that movie. Have you ever seen the movie comedian? It's got Jerry Seinfeld. It was. You know. Jerry Seinfeld had this, the show Seinfeld. Have you heard of that show Seinfeld? Yeah, seinfeld, yeah, I mean, yeah, I've heard of Seinfeld.

Speaker 2:

When he got done with that TV show he went back into standup comedy and he did a documentary called Comedian and it followed him around and anybody that's done comedy should go watch that movie because it's fascinating and I think it was. For me it was a real wake-up call on. So Jerry Seinfeld right, done this, he'd been a comedian for years went and did this super successful TV show and then he went back into comedy. He always wrote all his stuff on the yellow notepad and he was in these comedy clubs in New York City bombing, trying new jokes, having things that didn't fly, forgetting his lines, pulling out his paper, looking at it, trying different things and watching the process of him hey, I know this joke's funny, but it's not landing the way I think it should and tweaking it and playing with it and getting it to the point where it's super funny and then that would go into his next hour-long act. And watching that whole process is what that documentary was and I remember and it had other comedians in it that he was performing with and stuff that were on the documentary, and I remember for me it was like a real wake-up call of wow. I was so arrogant and misinformed and not doing my homework on what it means to do comedy and what it takes to be good at comedy. And watching Jerry Seinfeld be willing to go and fail and be willing to try new things and be willing to, and even with people knowing who he is not having a joke. You thought everything he said is funny. It's because he works really hard to make sure that everything he says is funny, and so that, for me, was a real inspiration.

Speaker 2:

So I actually looked up Jonathan Solomon and found out that he was teaching comedy in Santa Monica College in California and I sent him a note and I said man, you probably don't remember me, but I remember you like it was yesterday, because it was so impactful in my life for all the wrong reasons. And I told him I would love to grab a coffee the next time I'm out in LA. I was going to LA all the time at the time because I was covering Warner Media. At&t had just bought Warner Media, so I was flying out there quite frequently. I remember he sent me back the super short note just saying I charge a $350 an hour. So I'm like kind of curt, what the heck was that? And then maybe two months later I got a note out of the blue from him and he and it just said hey, jesse, this is Jonathan.

Speaker 2:

I had some problems with my email. I was responding to people. I'm not sure if I ever replied to you or if my reply was appropriate. But I just read that your email again and saw that you said you'd come out here frequently. Let's grab a coffee. He said I'd love to, and then the pandemic hit and all travel was kind of shut down. And then he reached back out to me. We ended up talking on the phone. I shared with him the whole, that whole night. He's by my side man.

Speaker 2:

I did so many shows I don't remember it, but he goes. That sounds accurate and he goes because of the pandemic. I'm gonna do an online course, he said you should think about taking it. So I did this course for 10 weeks or whatever it was. It was very much like Jeff Justice's class, actually, and it jumped me back into comedy a little bit right. So I ended up taking the class and then I graduated and, just like us, I I had to do a performance and at the time we were finally out of the mask. It was in 2022. So this was probably around 2021, 2022.

Speaker 2:

I finally did the class and the graduation was at the Hollywood Improv on Melrose Avenue in LA and it was supposed to be at the comedy store and then something happened with scheduling and so we ended up at the Hollywood Improv, which was also very cool, and happened with scheduling, and so we ended up at the Hollywood Improv, which was also very cool, and I performed a seven minute set in front of a sold-out crowd.

Speaker 2:

So that was jumped back into it and it was cool. Then I came back to Atlanta and I performed a couple times at the Laughing Skull and a few other places and then went dormant again for a little while until I took the class with Jeff Justice and did a few more, and now I probably do have about 20 minutes of relatively funny stuff that I could do in a pickle. But that was a low point that really turned. Just a couple of lessons that came out of that. I think misplaced confidence is painful, but with honest reflection we can provide some big learnings, and so use those failures as a chance to learn and be better.

Speaker 1:

Yeah I wanted to mention. It reminds me of something that a lot of us go through, which I call the try cry by loop. When you go to you have this like confidence, this initial confidence of I want to try this thing. So you go and you try it and it goes terribly because you're new and every time you try something new it's probably not going to be the best. And then you start comparing yourself to like these other people that you're seeing, like the Jerry Seinfelds out there in comedy and the big names, and you're like, oh my gosh, I'm so terrible and you cry about it, you're so upset, and then you say goodbye to it for a long time, right, like, ah, I never want to feel that again, ever. I just don't want to feel that way again.

Speaker 1:

So it's like this loop of trying something new, being bad, because we're always bad, we fail. We have to fail forward, like you were saying, learning from it. But it's a mindset shift. It's really being in the victim mindset of oh, I'm just not good at it, versus being in the growth mindset of I'm not good at it yet, but if I work at it and I put in the time and the effort and study it and tweak it, learn something, apply it, get feedback and tweak, do it again, do it over and over again. Then you can be good. You can be good at anything you want to do, if you are able to realize that I'm going to be bad, it's going to be messy, and then I just keep going.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I think, recognizing that I think a lot of times we don't think through what's the worst case scenario, right, we think it's the end of the world and most of the time it's not that big of a deal. Most people don't even care about us nearly as much as we think they do, right?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, they don't.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I look back and that night Jonathan didn't remember it and I doubt any of those 200 people that were in that room remember anything about that night. Even though it was huge for me, it was a big nothing and blip in time for most people. So If you time for most people.

Speaker 1:

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Speaker 2:

The other little bonus kind of lesson I learned from that is relationships are everything in this world Build them, grow them, cherish them. Just being able to reach out to Jonathan and now I still have that relationship with him and it's just fun. It's cool to go back after so many years and have that little connection and the connection you and I made, all the connections that we have through these crazy life. Yeah, that's the fun part of life.

Speaker 1:

I think you're really good at that, Jesse. The relationship aspect of it. That's something you're really good at, that, Jesse. The relationship aspect of it, that's something you're good at throwing your hat over the fence with is we had class together and there was, I don't know 15, 16 of us, but not everybody reaches us back out and not everybody reconnects. And you did that with Jonathan, you did that with me. You're really good at cultivating relationships. I wonder why that is.

Speaker 2:

That might be the sales guy in me.

Speaker 1:

Maybe, yeah, why that is? That might be the sales guy in me. Maybe, yeah.

Speaker 2:

You're not afraid to do that, you're not afraid to follow up. Yeah, at the end of the day, sales is about helping solve people's problems, and people think a real sales is you're. At the end of the day, if you're doing sales the right way, people should feel like you're a partner and you're helping them do something that really matters, right? I think a lot of times you feel like you think of a time when you bought something, nikki, that you're just like oh, I really needed that. It solved a real problem for me and you were just happy to hand over your money. Right, that's how sales should be. It shouldn't be like I feel like I got scammed, I feel like somebody tricked me. I feel true, sales is really about relationships and caring that the other person really needs, wants and has a use for what you're trying to sell them, and I think that's how I've approached sales my whole life and how I approach relationships. I think, at the end of the day, you can't do these jobs long-term if people feel like you used them and you didn't really care about what they're trying to do. Yeah, so even this podcast, right, my goal for this is really to try to make it successful for you right Help contribute to your audience and help drive that.

Speaker 2:

And I think that maybe shifts to that next thing. As I look at my passions and goals and things I've learned along the way, I think it's changed for me right. Like in the early on it was success at work, it was certain things, and as I've gotten older now I've started to make this switch towards helping, coaching, mentoring others right and inspiring kind of that next generation. And that's been a fun switch to happen over the last few years, right as I, I think, just gotten older. I think all of us realized several people that poured into me when I was younger made me who I am today. I had some sales guys that I worked for that. They've all passed on now but the mark they left for me was I'll never forget it. It made me who I am today and I want to do that for other people. So that's also part of the shift and passion that I have today.

Speaker 1:

What does that look like in your life right now, Jesse? How are you mentoring and helping people?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, there's a couple different areas. One of them is through aviation, so we talked a little bit about flying right and probably about eight years ago my daughter was doing this fun run for cancer research on children's brain tumors, and it originated in Rome, georgia, at the airport. So I had to get her there. At five in the morning she was able to drive, but I didn't want her driving up there that early. I don't know why they call them fun runs when they start at five in the morning. Nothing fun about that for me. And so I was getting her there and then I went to actually go play a round of golf. So I got done with the round of golf, came back and she was cleaning everything up. That had been a really successful day. A bunch of people showed up. They raised a bunch of money.

Speaker 2:

This was her senior project in high school and when I got back, there were these four little airplanes sitting out on the tarmac and my daughter and they were all painted like tigers and if you go to tigerflightorg I think you can see what they look like. But there were four little two seat airplanes and she's, what is that I'm like? I have no idea. And she's, what is that? I'm like I have no idea. So I started chatting with one of the guys over the fence and, before you knew it, they invited us around and my daughter and I were flying in those planes that less than 20 minutes later. And then they found out that I was a pilot that hadn't flown for several years and they're like we'd love to get you back into it. And I ended up joining Tiger Flight and started flying.

Speaker 2:

And one of the missions of Tiger Flight is to really inspire that next generation of youth and get them excited. And we really focus a lot on underprivileged kids, kids that kind of don't feel like they got much hope, don't feel like this is something they could do. And you get them up in an airplane and it doesn't happen to every kid and doesn't even happen to every other kid, but you do find one in five, one in 10 that just ignites something inside of them that nothing else can do, like aviation. Right, if you really love flying, like that's. I started flying when I was like, I think, six or seven, at a promotion at our airport that you could fly for a penny a pound and my dad took me out there and I went flying and that ignited something in me and I someday I want to fly, and that led me to get my pilot's license at 16 years old and I wanted to give that back. And so you get these kids up there and you get that one kid that's oh, this is unbelievable, and they may not even become a pilot right, but it ignites, like this vision of themselves that didn't exist before.

Speaker 2:

I flew an airplane and we always let the kids fly for a little bit and stuff. And I flew an airplane, I can do anything I can, and so it's a lot of fun. And so that's one way that I think today that I really have a lot of passion around doing that for kids. And I will say if any of your listeners have a kid in their life that they'd love to get up in an airplane, have them, reach out to me. If you're in the Atlanta area, we'll get them up there. Right, we do it as part of EAA 709. So the Experimental Aircraft Association has a whole program around it that we plug into and I can take them up in my airplane. We can do it in the Tiger Flight airplane, whatever.

Speaker 1:

They're both a lot of fun, I'm going to get in touch with you, Jesse.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's jesse at throwthathatcom. It's probably the easiest way, right.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

That's just Jesse at. Throw that hatcom. J E S S E. That's correct. Yep, jesse, I'm also on LinkedIn. I think you can find me on LinkedIn. You'll see a bunch of tiger flight airplanes behind me. So then you know you have the right, jesse.

Speaker 1:

Oh cool, that's your like profile picture.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, the profile picture has some tiger, flight planes, flight planes. The other thing that I've started doing a lot more is leveraging. So I went back to school but it's actually two years ago this summer to Georgetown University in Washington DC and took executive leadership coaching class that lasted about six months and I'm a certified executive leadership coach. And I think, nikki, you and I were talking what is coaching versus all these other things? Right, and I think coaching really feels to some people a lot like therapy, but it's quite a bit different. If you think about therapy, it takes a person and tries to look backwards and figure out why are you the way you are, what went wrong in your life or what childhood trauma caused this, or why am I always late? Maybe I had something in my past? Coaching doesn't care right. Coaching doesn't care why you're the way you are. Coaching looks forward and says you are this way and you want to. If you want to change that, how do we change it? What do we go do and what? And it's really a coach is really a good verbal mirror for reflection on somebody that gives them the space to figure out what they really want and how to go get it and can really lead to some pretty deep insights, which is different than I've done.

Speaker 2:

A lot of mentorship, if you think about mentorship, is more about trying to teach somebody something that you know how to do, almost in sales. I do a lot of mentorship in sales. I've been there, done that. Let me show you how. That, how I do it right, or what worked in the past or what things might work for you. And then the other thing that I do a little bit of is consulting, right, like around small businesses, and since I've started a business, I'll probably do a little bit free consulting with you. Or even around books right, I've wrote a book now. I went through process.

Speaker 2:

Consulting is really about providing solutions to a person or a company, right, hey, you're trying to get this done, here's some solutions, here's some ideas, here's some things. A mentor so really, at the end of the day, consultants are hired to provide solutions. Mentors provide guidance based on experience that they've had before, and then coaches help individuals discover their own path forward. And I think, if you kind of look at those three types of things, I like to help people in those three vectors, right, depending on what they're trying to accomplish. And that's been a fun little thing.

Speaker 2:

Intel has a whole coaching program and a mentorship program. I'm part of both of those and I've mentored and coached a number of leaders at our company as part of that. So that's. I'm pretty passionate about those things today. Right, I'm still passionate about sales. I still love my career and my job and the things that I'm doing with AT&T. But I think pouring into that next generation and those people that are trying to make themselves better and grow, trying to help them do that, is a part of what I'm passionate about.

Speaker 1:

So if you're wanting to grow in something, reach out, find a mentor, find a coach, find someone who can help you on the path, someone who's done what you want to do. Yeah, and that a part of that is being brave enough to ask.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's very true. I had a couple of University of Michigan kids reach out to me a couple of years ago and they were trying to start a new company and wanted some advice on sales. And I took them out to breakfast and we still have breakfast now, probably once every six months or so, and they're killing it there. They started a company called bird dog and they're doing an outstanding job and I can't take any credit. All I can do is sit back almost like a proud dad and say, yeah, these guys are killing it and at some point I gave them a little bit of advice and that was it. And they did all the hard work and they've got the ideas and they're super ambitious. But I love doing that kind of stuff and I remember when they reached out, they actually reached out and used the wrong name, and so I told them the first key of sales to use the correct name when you reach out to a new prospect oh no.

Speaker 1:

All right, we are going to move into the third part of the conversation, and that is the confidence quickfire round.

Speaker 2:

Bring it on. Bring it on.

Speaker 1:

Okay, the first question is Jesse, how do you define confidence?

Speaker 2:

I really thought about this actually quite a bit, because I knew this one was coming, and I think it's like a self-assurance about your own talent and abilities and worth, right, like confidence really comes from the self-assurance of recognizing, hey, I've got talents and abilities and I've got worth. But I also recognizing that failure is an opportunity to learn and grow, right, that in that confidence, you may have some setbacks, right, but those are real opportunities to learn and grow.

Speaker 1:

Second question is what's one bold move you made before you felt ready?

Speaker 2:

Almost every job I've ever taken. When I jump into the next job, the next thing that I'm going to go do, I always feel like I'm not ready and there's a lot of excitement, nervousness that goes into that. But each of those new jobs those new, it's a lot of times they require to move across the country. They were very disruptive to the family and I never felt like we were fully ready and it always worked out.

Speaker 1:

It makes me think of something I watched an interview about how a lot of like high level actors will feel that when they take on a role and they know that it's the right role because they don't feel like they can do it or they feel like it's outside of their comfort zone, they don't feel ready for it. So they're like I'm definitely doing that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I feel it's pitting my stomach. It feels like that's probably a good thing.

Speaker 1:

Third question how do you quiet your inner critic or how do you face your inner critic?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, boy, that's a good one, because I think we are all our harshest critics, aren't we? We just we're so hard on ourselves. For me, I like to be as prepared as I can do my homework, do the time and the prep. I think I told you at one point, if I get up on stage and I fail because I wasn't ready, the feeling I have is a lot different than being fully ready and going up and delivering exactly what I anticipated, of delivering and then not going. That's a different feeling, because now I'm like okay, I was prepared, I did my homework. I didn't land, so I got to go fix it, but it wasn't because I got up there and rambled on or I wasn't ready. I wasn't prepared Because I always feel like if you're not prepared, especially in a comedy act or something like that, then you're wasting people's time, you're maybe not giving it your all, you're not doing what you need to do on the back end of prep.

Speaker 2:

So I feel like if I've prepped and I've done and I feel like I'm ready, then the chips will fall where they may.

Speaker 2:

I gave it my best and if it didn't work out, then that's a different feeling than failing because I didn't, I wasn't ready. And then I think we talked about this a little bit before zoom out and realize none of this really matters as much as we think we're all in this big spinning ball for just a short amount of time at the end of the day, and if you look at the worst case scenario, most of the time it's really not that bad, right, it's not as bad as we make it out to be in our heads. Most people will give you some grace and I don't think usually the consequences are nearly as bad as we make them up to be in our head. And then I would say the last part is throw that hat right, just commit. I think getting that hat over the fence it helps quiet that inner critic because now it's okay. The inner critic can keep you from actually making action, doing anything right, and once you throw that hat, now you gotta go figure it out.

Speaker 1:

And the fourth question is what's one habit that's helped you build real confidence?

Speaker 2:

I think we talked about this a little bit too right, Take those steps every day that help you move the needle right. You don't have to do everything today. You know, a lot of times you feel like, oh my gosh, I gotta do these hundred things today, but you gotta do something every day, and then you'll look back and be like holy smokes, look how far I came and always be learning and growing. Those are the things I would say, that that habit of always moving and learning and growing.

Speaker 1:

The fifth final question favorite book or resource that changed how you think?

Speaker 2:

This feels like a loaded question. Right, I'm trying to launch a book, but no, but seriously. I think there's a book called who Moved my Cheese? I don't know, have you?

Speaker 1:

ever heard of that one, never, never.

Speaker 2:

No, it's a super simple book, a super easy read. It's not very thick I don't have probably not even 100 pages if I had to guess and it really gives you profound advice on how to handle and embrace change. I think a lot of things that scare people is change related right, I'm going to and embrace change. I think a lot of things that scare people is change-related right, I'm going to change my job. I'm going to try this new thing. I'm going to change. My kids are going off to college. My life's going to change Something, and what you realize as you get older is change is inevitable.

Speaker 2:

Right, things are always going to change and there's these seasons in life that change, and this book who Moved my Cheese and there's these seasons in life that change and this book who Moved my Cheese is a story about two mice. I think it's like Scurry and Scat, or I can't remember their names Scurry and somebody and it's a lesson that we can all take away on how to embrace change rather than fight it and try to hang on to stuff that is changing and is never going to be the same again. And that's, I think, a human trait, right, we all get comfortable and we don't want to change and we don't want the next thing right. And my daughter just went back to college on Tuesday and she was crying like crazy because she's this is my last year and everything's going to get different.

Speaker 2:

And that's the reality of life, isn't it? Things just time marches on, and that book who Moved my Cheese, I think gives you a good perspective on how to embrace it and thrive during change, rather than fear it and shrink away.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you're constantly changing and growing, or you hope to be changing and growing right Every level.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, wow, so much wisdom in there, jesse, and I'm so excited for this book to come out. What date does this come out?

Speaker 2:

So it comes out on August 28th. It'll be available in hardcover and softcover on amazoncom. Go throw that at, there you go.

Speaker 1:

Pictures.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so as a backgrounder, this was illustrated by a college friend of mine. His son became a professional illustrator as a career, wow. And I reached out to him and actually hired him to illustrate every poem in the book. So every poem is illustrated by a guy named Jashton Geezer. And then there are a couple little pictures in there that my daughter also drew, that I threw in there. So if you go to, I got to look at which page it is. It's just a second the Royal Flush on page 26. She drew the toilet with the crown. So that was actually. She did that artistry. So Jaston drew the guard on the right, but she drew the little toilet.

Speaker 1:

So that's cool and the whole book has this public.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, that was it. It's been a lot of fun to to put that thing together and it's been a lot of fun to. It was fun to write the poems. It was fun to put it together and that'll be fun to kind of share it with the world.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's so cool. That's amazing. Congratulations on putting your book together. That stick to it-ness that you have for completing things is just incredible.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, nikki. I appreciate that, and thank you for the opportunity to talk to you. This has been a lot of fun.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you're a lot of fun. How can people follow you? Find you find out more work with you.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so again, I'm LinkedIn. I'm terrible on social media. I do have a TikTok. I don't even know what it's called. I think it's called Throw that Hat.

Speaker 1:

We'll put a show notes.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I haven't put anything on that forever. I'm terrible. And then I might have an Instagram. I think I do. It's probably called Throw that Hat as well, but LinkedIn I'm active on LinkedIn because of my professional life and then just j Jesse at throw that hatcom is probably an easy way just to reach out to me if you got a question or want to connect somehow. Yeah, flip me a note.

Speaker 1:

All right, fantastic. Thank you so much, Jesse, for being on today.

Speaker 2:

Thanks, Nikki. It's been a lot of fun Appreciate it.

Speaker 1:

Thanks so much for listening to the Confident Shortcut. I hope today's episode woke something up in you, reminding you that your dream matters and you can start now. If this sparked something, share it with a friend who needs it too. And don't forget to follow me on Instagram at Nikki Sterner and join our Facebook community at the Confidence Shortcut. Ready to take the next step? Check out my free guide, the Confidence Kickstart, linked in the show notes. Keep showing up, keep taking action and remember the shortcut to confidence is courage.