Marc Kirshbaum: Being and Doing, Connected Leadership, and the 11 Primal Spaces

In this episode of the Coherent Business Podcast, host Aram DiGennaro sits down with Marc Kirshbaum, board member, leader, and author of the upcoming book 11 Primal Spaces. Drawing on two decades of writing and a deeply personal reckoning with what it means to be human, Marc explores the forces pulling us away from our own nature — and what it takes to stand upright again.

Marc shares how the pandemic, the rise of AI, and a culture of polarization inspired him to crystallize his life's work into a single urgent question: are we devolving from what evolution made us capable of? This lived observation became the foundation of 11 Primal Spaces, where he weaves evolutionary biology, philosophy, and personal reflection into a framework for reconnecting with what makes us distinctly, irreducibly human.

The conversation challenges the common assumption that "being" and "doing" are opposites, reframing them instead as two expressions of the same purposeful life. Marc and Aram explore the difference between a to-do list and a to-be list — and why the most effective leaders know as clearly what they'll say no to as what they'll say yes to. From wake-up mantras to life maps drawn in crayon, Marc offers quietly radical tools for leaders ready to rediscover who they are before deciding what to do next.

From individual awareness practices to organizational identity, Marc offers practical anchors for leaders willing to slow down long enough to find their center — and to build everything else from there.

Resources:

Marc Kirshbaum's Website: https://primalspaces.com/ — 11 Primal Spaces — Available for pre-order now, publishing August 4th.

Coherent Business Project Website: https://coherentbusinessproject.com/ — For leaders, thinkers, and builders who believe business can be more than just efficient — it can be whole, human, and meaningful.

Marc's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marckirshbaum/

Aram's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aram-digennaro/

Key Topics: Human evolution and leadership, the 11 primal spaces, being vs. doing, to-be lists, pandemic and AI's effect on connection, polarization and listening, personal purpose, organizational identity, legacy, and the philosophy of standing upright.

Key Takeaways:

• We Are Devolving From Our Own Humanity: Technology, polarization, and disconnection aren't just cultural trends — they're pulling us away from the evolutionary qualities that made us human in the first place.
• Being and Doing Are Not Opposites: Purposeful action flows from self-awareness. Who you want to be determines which things on your to-do list actually matter.
• The To-Be List Is as Essential as the To-Do List: At the end of each day, the question isn't only what did you accomplish — it's whether you were the person you intended to be.
• Quiet Is the Medium of Thinking: In an age of constant stimulation, even five seconds of stillness is a practice worth building. Start small; the muscle grows.
• Organizations Must Know Who They Are: Clarity of identity is what allows teams to make fast, accurate decisions — especially about what to say no to.
• Legacy Lives in Small Moments: The grandchild's article that credits one relationship, the crayon life map drawn 20 years ago — impact rarely announces itself. It accumulates quietly, in moments of genuine presence.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Looking people in the whites of the eyes in person, going in and doing a community service project together as a business team, having fun, being creative, getting to know each other. Those things are hugely important. And getting together in person to make that happen and to strengthen the bonds, I completely agree, is absolutely critical.

SPEAKER_01 0:24

Morning, everybody. Today's guest is Mark Hirschbaum. Mark is an advisor, board member, and leader helping innovators and organizations reconnect to what makes us human, delivering sustainable transformation and growth. He's also the author of the upcoming book, 11 Primal Spaces. Mark, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

Thanks so much, Aaron. It's great to be with you.

SPEAKER_01 0:42

So in your book, you have this concept of standing upright. And it comes with a sense that in some way we have evolved to stand upright, but you're concerned that maybe we're devolving or missing some of our potential. Can you explain what that's about and what led you to this concern or conclusion?

SPEAKER_00 1:01

Sure, absolutely. It's more than just a concern, it's an actual observation of what truly is transpiring. And you nailed it at the beginning, the idea that we've evolved to be able to stand upright. And that came with a lot of amazing qualities, both through physiology and sociology. And those are what I define as the 11 primal spaces. And I was inspired to write this in part because what I was realizing and was the original concept for the book was standing upright, that we were all of a sudden now starting to slouch back over. And part of that was being caused by watching what was happening during the pandemic, how we were losing human connection during that time, and obviously the evolution of technology. When I started, it was really about no longer working side by side with people, no longer communicating live with people, but using devices. And just in a matter of two and a half years since starting writing the book, you enter the phase of AI evolution. And that's taking us even farther away from human connection because now you don't even need a person on the other side of your device, let alone obviously a person on the other side of a conversation like this. So that was the first element. And the second was we stopped speaking with each other. We stopped listening, right? We've become more of a black and white concept culture. You're with me, you're against me. The louder I shout, the more right I am. And so that ability to lose connection by not listening, by not asking questions, by not engaging and by not focusing on that which we have in common with others, as opposed to those things that divide us was the second inspiration. You know, and the third was watching what happened, quite frankly, on a very personal level after October 7th, 2023, and the war that erupted in Israel and in the Middle East, and just seeing the absolute darkness that arose in our country and around the world stemming from that. And that all led to my inspiration to write, to take 20 years of prior writings and coalesce them into the book that became the 11 Primal Spaces.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

Well, that seems like a really significant conclusion. You know, this idea that we are made, we evolved to be human, and that's a unique thing, and that in some sense we are slipping in that. And the things that you named, technology, conflict, polarization, those are certainly signs that I think a lot of people can resonate with that we might be moving away from something really important. I did want to ask about the framing of primal spaces, because if you're talking evolution, we're moving maybe away from being primate-like or primal, but at the same time, we're asking these questions of, well, what does it mean to be human? And you're saying on some level, we have to answer with primal responses, with primal opportunities. So is that a mixed metaphor or is there a very intentional linking of these two dimensions?

SPEAKER_00 3:54

Yeah, it's mixed, I'm sure. Primal really isn't going back to our animal-like instinct, but it's going back to primal, meaning more original, more evolutionary. The last thing I want is for us to forget the evolution of our neocortex, the evolution of our periodal lobe, the evolution of our amygdala, our temporal parietal junction, all of these things that actually are part of our evolution that have made us human. And so I think catching what you said, Aram, in very particular intentional words. You said it, we are human beings. We don't call ourselves human doings, right? We are human beings. And so getting in touch with who we are as individuals and the translation to that as leaders and next level leaders, what's it going to take to bring that human connection back together? What's it going to take for people to feel engaged and to take ownership and pride in what they're doing in their work or part of their organization? That's what I feel people are hungry for. People aren't sure where to find it. And the pace is moving so fast that I want us to come back to that.

SPEAKER_01 5:01

One of the things that I've noticed is a lot of people making comments like the world is going crazy, or you know, there's a sense that whether you're on the left or the right or at the top or the bottom of the organization, that change is accelerating, that the paradigms that gave structure to our world no longer hold or no longer have the same import and connection that they did. And that is raising the question of what is a human and what are humans for? Is that what you're trying to answer? Or is it more that you're trying to answer the question of how do we become more human?

SPEAKER_00 5:32

How do we awaken what made us human in the first place? Right. There is the evolution and the abilities that we have that are uniquely human, that have moved us to the top of the food chain. I mean, how many predators do we even have anymore that could threaten us that have a heart? The reality is the things that can threaten us, they aren't animal anymore, right? They're the things that you're describing, the things we're talking about that are causing us to lose our connection to each other. And yes, it's moving fast. And yes, you can think of it in the context of, you know, the whole world is. Well, I can't do anything about the whole world per se as a concept. What I'm trying to do is to give people that quiet space to think, to reflect. It's not intended to be a prescriptive book, it's intended to be a thoughtful book. Pause for a moment, think about what makes you who you are, how you want to uniquely live and exist in this world. You know, I think of the Oscar Wilde quote along the lines of be yourself because everyone else has already taken. So, what does that mean to be yourself as an individual, as someone in your personal life, and as a leader and working with others?

SPEAKER_01 6:45

Yeah, I really hear you leaning into this being mode as opposed to the doing mode. And that's something that resonates with me. I think it resonates with a lot of the leaders that I work with. At the same time, it is a bit counter-cultural, or there is a stream in our culture that is counter to that. And there are people who are saying very loudly, stop reflecting so much, stop ruminating, just go out and do things. That's how you move forward. And there's some truth to that as well. But it seems like you're staking your claim pretty much on the opposite of you need to spend time with the prime things, the primal things that make you who you are, and then everything else springs from that. Am I reading you right?

SPEAKER_00 7:20

I'll say yes and no. So I don't make the distinction in a binary way between be versus doing. I see doing as an offshoot of being. How do you first define it's chapter one, awareness? Who am I? Right? It's identifying who you want to be and then choosing and focusing your time and energy on the things you do that are consistent with who you want to be. So I don't get caught in that be versus doing optionality, but a consistency of it. And I have one other thought for you on that, which is we are so caught up in a lot of ways, especially as leaders and the achievers, right? We get so focused on our to-do list. What are we gonna do today? What am I gonna get done? You know, I have at least three or four to-do lists at any given time. There's probably an index card in my back pocket, there's another post-it on my desk, and then my notes on my phone, and then an app that I use, right? So I got all of these to-do lists, and I probably am not unique in that, and I can tell from your reaction. However, and this is the challenge I put in the book, which is how do you not just have to-do lists that you check at the end of the day and see how much you accomplished, but what's your to-be list? At the end of the day, ask yourself, in addition to what did I do, was I the person that I wanted to be today? And if you can check that off at the end of each day and maybe start your day with what I call your wake-up prayer, the person you want to be for that day, that's one box to check and score 100. And then you can look at your to-do list and say, okay, I got six out of 10 of my things done today. And they'll still be there tomorrow. But the opportunity to be today are all of the interactions and the impacts that you make on yourself and others in every moment.

SPEAKER_01 9:10

Yeah. Yeah, I love that. I love that. So you're kind of refusing to set up this duality between being and doing. Like most things, instead of weighing in on you should be more this or you should be more that is you should be both. And the life comes for the interporosity, the connection between them. So is your being fully linked to your doing and vice versa? That's what we're going for.

SPEAKER_00 9:29

Totally, totally. So thanks for catching that.

SPEAKER_01 9:31

Yeah, I like that. So these spaces that you talk about, are these old things or are they new things?

SPEAKER_00 9:39

They are existing things. They are what have made us human. So I answer that by saying they're old things that we need to make new. They are the things that we are forgetting that are what make us as individuals the humans that we are. They are what make communities work, what allow us to live together. And then thirdly, they are the things that bring us to new heights. And I can extrapolate on that a little bit. And it's very intentional, the order of the book, right? It's in three sections. It starts with the spaces that are personal, it then goes to the spaces that are shared. And then the third part are the spaces that are transcendent. So, firstly, we must focus on ourselves, and those are three spaces. Secondly, there are four spaces that involve others. And then lastly, only if and only if you have one and two do you create the opportunity for the third for transcendence.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

Okay. Can you say a little bit more about that sequencing? That's a pretty bold claim about how personal transformation or development works. Say more about why you feel they have to progress in that order.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

Sure. If you join an organization, if you take a job within a company and you're trying to find your place in that business, you're in that second set of spaces, right? It's community because community isn't just where you live, right? It's every different organization or business to which you are a part. But if you try to be part of that organization without firstly understanding who you are, you're going to be flailing, maybe. You're going to be trying to define yourself through others or being something that someone else wants you to be or you think they want you to be. And in particular situations, for example, you know, when I've led businesses and organizations and we're dealing with a question on the table, and we make a decision, and someone comes to me later on when something doesn't work out, and they say, I knew that was going to happen, right? Well, why didn't you say something? You have a duty and an obligation to say something. And the aspect of the community part, well, first of all, it's being comfortable and confident enough to speak up. And then it's secondly, when you get to those shared spaces of knowing how to do it in the right setting and in a respectful way, right? And so I'm off on a little bit of a tangent with an example, but I'll take you back to specifically if you go to those middle sections, the shared ones, four, five, six, and seven, the first thing that has to be established is law. There needs to be a common understanding of we do this, we don't do this, we stand for this, we don't stand for this, right? And from the law, you can then create a community. Because if you think you're just going to start a community, but there's no common framework and laws for it, you can't really have a lasting community. So you've got the law and then you've got the community. From there, you build trust. When you start working together, you take actions and you do things that build trust. You don't need trust if you're just by yourself. So you have trust from community, and the community is based in the law. Then the fourth one in those shared spaces is conflict. How are you going to deal with conflict? How is an organization become better and stronger and more trusting by addressing conflict? And what are the methods that you in your organization as a leader espouse to allow conflict to successfully happen? And so conflict can only be dealt with as that fourth component in the middle there, because you have trust in a community based in law. So I hope that gives you a little flavor as of the deep methodology that went went through my head.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

Okay. So the four just remind me, it's law, community, trust, and conflict. And conflict. Law, community, trust, and conflict. Okay. So yeah, that makes sense. Let me see if I can recast it in some of the words I would use. To have community, to have a shared space, you have to have common unity. There has to be a relationship between unity, oneness, and multiplicity, each individual or even the individual impulses of the individual, right? So the law creates a center or creates a framework by which we relate. And then out of the connection between those two, we develop trust and conflict also emerges. And really, those two have to exist together. You can't have trust without conflict, and you can't have effective conflict without trust. But I think a lot of people would be surprised to see conflict in there as something that is a necessary component. How would you defend that choice?

SPEAKER_00 14:14

How do you grow? How do you continue to evolve unless you're willing to address challenges, address conflict, address problems? Conflict could be so simple as we're not hitting our product milestones for development. We're not hitting our revenue goals. We're having trouble with employee retention. I mean, there's a perfect example. If you're not willing to find out and get to the root of what your challenges are as to why you can't retain employees or why you can't retain customers, then don't be surprised that you're living the definition of insanity of doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. I stand by conflict as incredibly important. And I talk in the book about an example that I saw it when my daughter was at Montessori school in preschool. You know, Montessori uses this thing called the peace rose. And I'm watching three and four-year-olds take this rose with the teacher only as an observer, really. And the child holds the rose and speaks their feelings in their mind. The other one listens. And when the first one's done, they give the rose to the other person. And they get to speak and share their feelings and their experiences. If three-year-olds, if three-year-olds can listen and address conflict, we too can do the same thing. And like you said, it's based in the foundation of trust, a common understanding of wanting to be part of a community and being based in law. But all of this are the middle section. You said it before about knowing who you are. You know, you got to solve who I am to be part of the community. Those are the first three spaces, understanding who you are.

SPEAKER_01 15:49

Okay. So law, community, trust, and conflict. Are you buying it?

SPEAKER_00 15:53

Are you buying it?

SPEAKER_01 15:54

Creating, yeah. I mean, you're creating a recipe or you're creating a framework for how any community comes together and continues to refine and improve itself. And that's also necessary for any community. And it's also necessary for the individual engagement with any community is that there is that constant movement forward.

SPEAKER_00 16:11

That's why I call it next level leaders, because I think all of the evolution that's going on around technology, social issues, et cetera, are pulling us away from that. And yet I believe there is a strong hunger amongst individuals to want to go back to that, to want to be a part of that. So, how will a next level leader create those environments and lead in a way that creates stronger foundations, growth, meaning, and purpose?

SPEAKER_01 16:37

Well, and people need that. I think increasingly people want that. You mentioned COVID as one of the catalysts for the breakdown of community. Then there's also technology. There's also the way that some companies are run under high competitive pressure and community breaks down. So all of these factors come together to make it really difficult to create real community. And if you can come up with that, then you have a massive competitive advantage.

SPEAKER_00 17:04

Totally agree. And some of it, you know, there's no going back, right? Globalization, there are going to be satellite offices. There's going to be a distributed workforce. There are huge benefits of that. You can go hire the most talented engineers anywhere in the world and connect them into your organization, whether you set up a physical office or not. That's amazing. And how are you going to use technology so that there can be human connection? So, for example, even having a Zoom meeting, great. You create some sense of two-dimensional connection for 30 or 60 minutes. But there's technology out there too for virtual offices where people can come to work in a shared space virtually. You can have an avatar sitting there that represents you in an office in a shared workspace. You can move around, you can turn on your microphone, you can message people, you can get together impromptu, you can invite customers into your office, right? So there are lots of ways to leverage technology that maintains that very, very important human connection.

SPEAKER_01 18:05

It sounds like you're a little more optimistic about this than I am. I do see that yes, there's connection that you and I are on opposite sides of the country and we're having this conversation. Whoever's going to listen to it or watch it is also in a different room. At the same time, I feel like one of the things that is broken down is our face-to-face abilities and habits and those spaces of being bodies in a room, I think are becoming more important, not less, as the impact of technology rises. Do you address that, that trade-off?

SPEAKER_00 18:32

Yeah, again, I don't see it as an or, kind of like it's not being versus doing, and it's not, you know, virtualslash remote versus in person. How do we make that an and? Right. And so I completely agree with you that looking people in the whites of the eyes in person, going in and doing a community service project together as a business team, having fun, being creative, getting to know each other. Those things are hugely important. And getting together in person to make that happen and to strengthen the bonds, I completely agree is absolutely critical.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

Well said. And good job bringing that back into the both and rather than allowing it to be one or the other. So let's move on to the transcendent spaces. And I'm curious what kind of reactions you get, because this is kind of a taboo topic in modern life, or one that is frequently marginalized, either with eye rolls or anxious laughter, or maybe you should go to the crystal shop or talk to your priest. How do you approach this? And how do you make it sort of fresh and accessible for the people that you deal with in 2026?

SPEAKER_00 19:39

We've all had sublime moments in our lives. For me, they have ranged personally to my older daughter's wedding was a if you if you think of the sublime as this higher connection, right? This uplifting. That was an amazing moment that was created for me with others. If I was the only one at my daughter's wedding, clearly impossible, unless we're back to virtual technology. You know, that sublime doesn't happen. And again, I'm tying all three components together. If I don't know who I am, and if I'm not part of that community, that opportunity for the sublime moment does not exist, right? So I'll give you another example: flash concerts. Have you ever seen videos on YouTube or been part of a flash concert? All of a sudden, you could be a Harley Davidson store in Los Angeles, you could be in front of a church in Florence, Italy, and all of a sudden a live concert breaks out with Beethoven's ninth symphony, Ode to Joy. And if you've watched those videos, or even yourself, you listen to Ode to Joy in this last movement. And I don't know how it doesn't raise you up. You know, there's a reason that baseball players have their walk-up music, right? It takes them to a whole nother level. And so I think that being able to feel and experience these sublime moments are examples of pure joy and they extend people's ability to realize what is possible beyond what they might have thought. And those feelings can appear in your life in totally different ways. Your team might hit a sales goal and everyone gets to go on the president's trip to somewhere, right? And you're at that ceremony and you guys are experiencing that together as an accomplishment. That feeling that you have, by the way, very similar to the feeling I had at my daughter's wedding or that my daughter had one of her first times performing on stage, those feelings we can bottle up, Aram. We can bottle them and remember what they felt like so that we can recognize them when they happen again in our lives in another setting, because that is a sign to us that we're experiencing true joy.

SPEAKER_01 21:45

I want to double click on the reaction to the flash mob because I've observed myself reacting emotionally when I see this happen. And I've asked the question why? It's clearly was planned. It did not happen spontaneously, but there's something really powerful about Having this come together as though from nothing. And there's this shared experience that people are having. They're there for a shared purpose. Why do we react to those the way that we do?

SPEAKER_00 22:10

I believe that it is there are synapses, there is a connection. Maybe this is future research to dive deeper into more about the sublime. It's a feeling, right? And what we try to do as human beings, because it's the only way we know how, is we have to give words to our feelings. Feelings weren't meant to have words. They are feelings, but to communicate, we apply words to them. So maybe a thought there as you get me thinking about this is pause for a moment in silence and feel the feeling and don't feel the need to translate it into words, which could actually be limiting.

SPEAKER_01 22:45

And part of what you're trying to get us to do, it sounds like, is to recognize these moments of joy, these moments of sublimity, if that's a word. Yep. And then really give them more airtime. So you're talking about bottling them up, but it's also sort of a way of attending so that they have a bigger presence in our life. Is that what you're going for?

SPEAKER_00 23:06

That they can occur more often. They can occur more often. They can occur more often, right? Because think of the opposite, those moments that we have that make us feel down and dejected and feel small, right? The idea is how do you feel big? How do you feel important and relevant, valued and appreciated? And it's as much what you might do and the way you might feel as it is how leaders make you feel. And how do you get into those environments where you can maximize the opportunity for those things to happen?

SPEAKER_01 23:34

Yeah. I mean, I think you're onto something there. I'm just trying to think of like how to conceptualize it. What are your transcendence spaces?

SPEAKER_00 23:40

Yeah, sure. The transcendent spaces are empathy, creativity, death, and the sublime.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

Love it. Love it.

SPEAKER_00 23:47

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

Well, that's the part of the book that I'm going to skip to when I get a copy.

SPEAKER_00 23:52

Awesome. Well, that will soon be possible. Not knowing when this podcast will drop, but it will be available from my website and also Amazon, BN.com, retail, et cetera, for pre-order with a publication date of August 4th. It is going live a week from today's recording. So that would be on May 13th. My website is markkirschbaum.com, but you can also get there from primalspaces.com.

SPEAKER_01 24:17

Great. Yeah, and we'll make sure we put the links there. But I don't want to let you go just yet because we skipped over the personal section. And I actually did that on purpose. I think that personal development, personal transformation is one of the hard things about the hard things. Because each human is kind of a microcosm of everything. Sometimes we have to go out into the world, into all of the big ideas before we bring it back. And even then, it's hard to know. How do people change? How do people become more human?

SPEAKER_00 24:46

Yeah. So I'm going to take you back again to the, you know, the and concept of this. It's who we are today might not be the same person we were yesterday or tomorrow, or not going to be. We've had experiences in our lives that change us. At the same time, we can take the time to think about perhaps what we think our purpose is, right? I just posted something from Byeong Chul Han, a philosopher who said the medium of thinking is quiet, right? So how do we allow ourselves in this time of technology and constant, you know, swiping to just be present with ourselves and be comfortable with that? And I'm not saying you should meditate for an hour and do nothing, you know, go on a retreat for a week and don't speak. We have evolved into this super doing, super active mode that maybe it starts with, you know, for three minutes, I'm not going to be on my phone. For 30 seconds, I'm going to be quiet with myself. Maybe it's five seconds. Acknowledge that you did it, right? If I were to go to the gym and say I'm going to bench press 200 pounds and I can't do it, maybe I'm not going to go to the gym the next day, right? But if I go in and say I'm going to start with a lighter weight and I'm just going to do it, I'm going to do one. You've accomplished something. No one can take that away from you. I created what I defined as my purpose. Kind of funny because we don't really know our purpose, but we might as well live one. And as the saying goes, I'm not in a hurry to find out from my maker what my purpose was. I'd rather live it as much as I can here. But I created this purpose, Aram about 18, 20 years ago, and it really hasn't changed, which is remarkable. Yeah. To create, inspire, and be a part of special moments for myself and others. That's my awareness. So coming back to the conversation about the to-be list rather than the to-do list, that's part of my wake up mantra. The first thing I say is thanks that I woke up today with my body and my soul and my conscience together to live another day, right? And then the second is my purpose to create, inspire, and be a part of special moments for myself and others. And then I can determine at the end of the day, did I do that more, more and less, less?

SPEAKER_01 26:58

Well, and that kind of awareness is itself a kind of quiet because when you know what the center is, what the one thing is, then it helps to turn down the volume on all the other things that are then by definition partly noise.

SPEAKER_00 27:13

Yeah, and it helps you make choices in life, right? Because we're we're faced with so many options and so many things we could be doing with the grounding of your awareness, then you can make choices. You know, in business, it's equally important to know what you're gonna say no to as it is what you're gonna say yes to. And I believe the only way an organization can make those decisions quickly, efficiently, and accurately is if the organization knows who they are.

SPEAKER_01 27:38

Yeah. So is this the book you wanted to write? How did it or didn't it bring together being and doing for you?

SPEAKER_00 27:45

It's the most purposeful thing I've done in more than 20 years, Aaron. I said I want to live a long life. And I hope that that length is a side effect of health. And yet, and I've never said this before in my life until this point. In addition to the legacy I believe we leave through if you have children, right? That's the biggest legacy of what we leave on this earth and what comes from there. But this, this is a legacy now for me. I did it. And it's not because I'm chasing something else, what's gonna come from it. Sure, there are different stages of goals associated with this, but the most important was to be purposeful for me and to have an impact. You know, I say what I think my purpose is. For all I know, there's gonna be some article, assuming there are such things as articles in the future, that is written about a grandchild of mine who discovers something and changes the world. And in that article is one sentence, my grandfather was a big influence on my life. That one little moment, that one little relationship could be my whole impact on the world. But it comes back to the question about the book was this concept of standing upright first that evolved into something bigger. And in fact, in terms of uh being purposeful, the same time I wrote my purpose pretty much for the first time, with crayons, I wrote out on a big piece of paper a life map and I put on there the things that mattered to me. And I look back at it just in the last year. On that piece of paper, Aram was a desk, kind of this sturdy wood desk, and two quote bubbles coming from the desk. One was a light bulb and one was a book. So something tells me this has been in my subliminal consciousness for probably about 20 years.

SPEAKER_01 29:22

Well, I'm excited to see what you've come up with and looking forward to picking this up as soon as it comes out. And I hope that we meet again. Really, this conversation should be happening over beers somewhere. So if we're ever on the same side of the country, I hope we can meet in person.

SPEAKER_00 29:39

I would love that. And after you've had the chance to read it and you come up with more questions, I would welcome a follow on conversation, whether we choose to invite others into it or it's just us having a beer.

SPEAKER_01 29:48

Yeah. Well, thank you very much. It's been great to talk to you, Mark.

SPEAKER_00 29:52

Thanks, Aaron. I really appreciate it, and all the best to you.