Run with the Cheetahs - Your Climb To An Extraordinary Life
Run With The Cheetahs is a how-to guide for living an extraordinary life by facing the truths that hold us back and embracing the choices that move us forward. Each conversation explores the mindset shifts, challenges, and breakthroughs that define real growth. With raw honesty and practical wisdom, author Jerry Freishtat and long time associate, Russell Anderson, help listeners identify the patterns that limit potential and replace them with clarity, courage, and purposeful action. Whether you’re navigating setbacks, chasing new goals, or simply looking to live with greater intention, this show will challenge the way you think and inspire the way you move. Because the life you want isn’t waiting—it’s created, one choice at a time.
Run with the Cheetahs - Your Climb To An Extraordinary Life
Don’t Let Regrets Write Your Story - Run With The Cheetahs EP16 - Pt 2 of Serenity, The Ultimate Destination
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The Things We Don’t Do — Regret; The High Cost of Inaction
What will you regret not doing?
In Part 2 of our conversation on Serenity — The Ultimate Destination, Russell Anderson and Jerry Freishtat explore one of life’s most powerful—and sometimes uncomfortable—subjects: regret.
Often, our deepest regrets aren't the mistakes we made. They're the chances we never took, the dreams we didn't pursue, the conversations we avoided, and the moments when fear convinced us to stand still.
From Jerry's reflections on living with fewer regrets to Russell's “Kiss the Girl” philosophy of taking the chance before the moment passes, this episode is about choosing action over hesitation—and recognizing that it's rarely too late to change direction.
You might fail. You might stumble. You might even need a little “permission to suck” while you're getting started.
But there is one outcome that almost guarantees regret:
Doing nothing.
What have you been putting off?
Who do you need to call?
What dream deserves another look?
What would you attempt if you weren't so worried about getting it right?
Maybe today is the day to stop waiting.
Kiss the girl. Take the chance. Make the call. Start the thing.
Because serenity isn't about reaching the end of life with a perfect record.
It's about getting there knowing you truly lived.
Jerry Freishtat
CEO of Wealth Climber | Serial Entrepreneur | Investor | Advisory for Startup Entrepreneurs | Speaker | Author | Committed to innovation, growth, and making a positive impact on the world.
Russell Anderson
Founder, President ACS Creative; Marketing & Design (30+ years of growing brands; global and local)
Serial Entrepreneur, Forever Student of Business - and Life
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Intro/Outro Music Credit
Big Thanks to Michael Fath for the use of The Emerald Isle
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hva33IEU3SY&list=RDHva33IEU3SY&start_radio=1
The highest courage is to dare yourself in the face of adversity, choosing right over wrong, ethics over convenience, and truth over popularity. These are the choices that will measure your life and your legacy. Travel the path of integrity without looking back, for there is never a wrong time to do the right thing. And that is that last line is the key to everything. I don't care what happened five years ago, 20 years ago, and I don't care how bad it was what happened. I mean, you know, there's some people that have done some really, really bad stuff that turned out to be able to do the right things in the second half of their life and get things turned around. So, you know, there is there is no um that thing I always say, there there is no final defeat.
SPEAKER_01My name is Russell Anderson, and we're going to be joined here in just a few moments with the author of Run with the Cheetahs, Mr. Jerry Freistatt. We've been doing these podcasts since the book was published, and there was uh quite a demand for the additional information for us to build off of the fantastic topics in the book. I highly encourage you to pick the book up, but we're really gonna go deeper in these podcasts. So thank you for joining us. We appreciate it very much. Uh last episode, we talked about serenity, the ultimate destination. And that was uh part one of a part of a two-parter. And today is part two. We're gonna be talking about the biggest obstacle to serenity, which is regret. And uh, we got a lot to say about it, and you know it it turns out there's an awful lot of people out there that carry some regret. And uh we're gonna we're gonna visit it, we're gonna talk about it, we're gonna talk about what you can do with it, and we're certainly gonna talk about the connection of regret to serenity. And in that first episode, we spent a lot of time talking about a lot of people chase degrees, they chase awards, they chase success, they chase money. But uh the ultimate destination is serenity. It's that that feeling at the end, when you've when you've done right, you've done well, you've done it all, you feel good about it. And Jerry spent a lot of time talking about serenity. The very last chapter of the book is on serenity. It's very important. And when we look at serenity, just to give you a very quick recap of last episode, when we talk about serenity, we really like to look at the five life horizons. And those horizons are health, family, financial, professional, and faith. And you don't have to wait till you're in your sixties or your seventies to be thinking about serenity. You can be thinking about serenity when you're in your twenties and your thirties and your forties by looking at those five horizons and trying to make the best choices you can. Now, you know, we don't always make good choices. Sometimes we don't make good choices, but it's never too late to make the right choices. Let's bring Jerry Freistadt in here right now and say hello. Jerry, come on in, my man.
SPEAKER_00Hey there, Russell. Looking forward to uh part two of the uh two-part um serenity components there of uh you know getting into uh regret. Um, you know, we generally uh try to keep things real positive and upbeat, and you know, regret is certainly has a little negative connotation to it, but we're gonna we're gonna try to spin this in a way to make sure you don't end up in in that arena.
SPEAKER_01Jerry, I honestly think this is like one of the most positive episodes we've ever done. I mean, I I when I when I have learned and read and and listened to how many people deal with regret and how there are ways to deal with it that are very positive. And uh I think we're gonna have a real positive episode here, to tell you the truth. I'm looking forward to it. So so, Jerry, we've said it already, but you know what? I want you to open it up here. They say that regret, regrets are the single largest obstacle to serenity. Let's talk about it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, um regret, you know, essentially is the ultimate enemy of, yeah, I guess what I call the human soul, right? Okay, not not nothing, nothing will lead to self-pity, hopelessness, despair, guilt, uh, more than you know, a buildup of lifetime of regrets. Um it's the most important thing to avoid as you age. And uh we're gonna get into the details of that, but uh, just gonna give you a quick teaser here. Um, life is a game of you versus you. I mean, clearly, the most successful, fulfilled people who land in a place of serenity, um, they don't regret their failures. They regret indecision caused by fears, being risk-averse, that accumulates, you know, over a lifetime. Warren Buffett said he never regretted the deals that didn't go right, but he regretted the deals he didn't do. Right. Yeah. So so it has a lot to do with your actions, you know, through the years and through the seasons of your life.
SPEAKER_01Well, we're gonna get into this in much more detail here in just a bit, but there's basically two different types of regret. I mean, there's the regret of what you didn't do, which far out shadows the grud of what you did do. And there are ways to look at and talk about each of those. So that that Warren Buffett quote is perfect. It's you know, he regretted what he didn't do more than what he did do that went wrong. Right.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because because i i i if you're if you're if you don't do if you don't pursue anything, you know what you got, which is nothing, right? You're you you you you're gonna miss the fulfillment of you know achievement and glory and all the wonderful things that can come out of you know being a risk. Um, you know, Coach Burt that we had on a couple weeks ago. Sure. Oh, that was great. Yeah, yeah. He he has he has a saying, he goes, he goes, the big don't eat the small, the fast eat the slow. And essentially what that means is regret comes from a lifelong slow acceptance of mediocrity and complacency. Whereas serenity comes from the characteristics of behaving like the cheetah, always on the hunt, always, you know, growing, expanding, you know, at you know, you have to ask yourself, you know, what is next? Right? Uh most people, I find, try to land in a place of success and and just stay there. And that never works. Um it's about a constant evolution and growth. Um, and you know, you just need to ask yourself, you know, if you read the chapter of my book, Welcome to the Jungle, um, you need you got to ask yourself, you know, am I displaying, you know, sheep characteristics or cheetah characteristics? Because that that is the definition of the slow progression of either regret or serenity.
SPEAKER_01Well, you know, I'll tell you, okay, so let's go back to the Warren Buffett quote, and then let's just say it right here. We're gonna get real clear on this. Yeah, regrets come in two major flavors. It's either things you did that you regret, or there's things that you didn't do that you regret. And uh, I mean, those are the two big ones, and uh by far the largest sense of regret people have is things they did not do they wish they had done. Why is it that inaction? Why is it? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the the inability you know to do that. You know, inaction basically, you know, is the death knell to human development. I mean, you're you're going nowhere. You know, what well uh here's another way of saying it well-intended wrong actions are better than no actions. Absolutely because all you're doing is learning something to get you to the next level to do it differently next time. Um, and and your your life's outcomes will be in direct proportion, you know, to the amount of responsibility and and accountability you can endure. Um, you want to you want to every day you know seek to be overcommitted, you know, get busy so you don't have time to feel regrets. You know, a lot of people get in that that that woe was me mode because they're they wallow in their sorrows, right? You know, if if you keep pushing forward, keep going on to the next thing, you know, you essentially get out of that mindset fairly quickly. And you know, all this ties into to my favorite word, like when when things don't go right and you and you did have a setback, whatever else, you just literally got to say next.
SPEAKER_01Right. I like it. I like it a lot. Well, you know, um, ever since we've talked about regret, and we've talked about regret in past sessions of the podcast here, but ever since we have, I've really been paying attention to what all kinds of people say about this. And there's there's a it's a much bigger, it's a much bigger conversation than what I initially thought. I mean, there's a lot of stuff. And uh Daniel Pink, who's one of my favorite guys, he has actually done an exhaustive study on regret, one of the one of the bigger studies of late. And uh one of the things he adds to this conversation about it's either things you do or things you don't do, is he talks about in that things you don't do, one of the biggest areas is loss of connections. You don't keep up with people. Now, you know, when I first heard that, I thought I don't know whether that really applies to me or not, but but boy, the examples of who it does apply to of people who childhood friends that they just lost track of, college friends, school friends. You know, in my case, I've got a bunch of former band members that I can remember back from junior high school going forward. We just, you know, we know we the those those were the boys, you know. I mean, we were we were the band of brothers back in those days, and you you lose track of those guys. So loss of connections is a big one. And uh I'm gonna say it right now. I would encourage anybody that's listening to us today, if you've got one of those situations, whether it's whether it's a family member or whether it's just a friend or someone, an acquaintance in your past, if you've got someone that you've not kept up with, you might be so delighted to reach out. And I suspect the person that you reach out to will be so delighted to hear from you. Take the step, make the move, do what needs to be done, reach out to those people and reconnect. Jerry, do you have anybody that you'd like to reconnect with?
SPEAKER_00Well, yeah, there are people I'd love to reconnect with, but you know, this topic um is is a little bit tricky, okay? And let me explain real quick. You know, people will come and go, you know, with the seasons of your life, right? So the more um the more you engage in cheetah characteristics and growth and and and building yourself up and expanding and everything else, most people are not moving in that direction with you. Okay, so um so a lot of times you have to make the decision that if someone's not essentially your ally in believing in what you're doing and and and um uh happy for your growth, happy for you know that you're doing well and things like that. You know, there's times where you know you just have to leave let that go and and and and you leave that behind. Um and uh you know, on the other side of that, I I always say, you know, go to the reunion, right? Okay, you know, because you know you you may have lost contact with other people who have who've headed in the direction that you went in, and and and you might um you know find that out. You know, I um, you know, when you say about people that you know to uh lost contact with, you know, one of my best experiences um was we had uh I don't know how many years ago this was, it's probably like let me think about 22, 300. Yeah, probably probably like 10, 10, 12 years ago, um, we had our first major University of Maryland golf team reunion. Now, this was all the teams, right? You know, for not just my years, but it was like all the teams, a big reunion. And and you know, about you know, 60 players showed up, and it was unbelievable seeing everybody. But here's the here's here's why I say go to the reunion. The person I saw there, a gentleman named Ron Scales, was my mentor and teacher from the time I was like 14 to 20. And it was just a wonderful feeling and experience for me to be able to, you know, thank him properly, right? Because when you're 14 to 20, you don't see it, the value in what these people have done for you and everything. So and he was just a wonderful guy. So, you know, I you know, as I said, I see it on both sides. There's people you outgrow, and there's people that you know you would love to reconnect with. And um, you know, it's just a mixed bag when it comes to you know lost connections.
SPEAKER_01Jerry, I'm really glad you said all that because yeah, it's not as as as much as we're as much as I was positioning it as something you just gotta do. The reality is is that that old match, those old feelings aren't necessarily gonna still be there. People have moved on, people have moved to different places. It's probably worth a shot, and I love the story of you finally being able to speak to your mentor. Uh my my largest mentor when I was in high school and and college was my trumpet teacher, Mr. Dave Flowers. He played in the National Symphony here in Washington, a monster player, but even a bigger human being that had a lot of impact on me. And and uh I did get to I did get to see him before he passed away, got to get out with him a couple of times, but boy, would I really like to have that experience with him where I could thank him for all that he did for me in those times. That's a great story. I love that. Well, okay, so the largest single category is things that people have not done. And uh, I want to talk about this is a study that comes up all the time. There was a uh there was an Australian palliative care person by the name of Bonnie Ware, and uh she sat with hundreds, if not thousands, of people in the last parts of their lives, and she got to hear them talk about it. And uh number one regret of these people was I'm gonna read the quote. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me. It wasn't about money, career, or missed adventures, it was about identity suppression, the slow daily compromise of who you actually are in exchange for approval, safety, or belonging. Man, is that a tragic? That is just a tragic quote.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, this this all comes down to, you know, we've probably mentioned this word in every podcast we've done is comfort. I mean, you know, and when you when you go to when you're listening to other people's expectations of you, the reason that it's very difficult for you to go down a different path or have a different view or a different vision is because that's uncomfortable. And especially when it's people who love you, people that, you know, you know, are close to you, your parents, you know, great friends, things like that. So um, look, the the enemy by far on this topic is comfort. And um, you know, it it's what I call the easy path. And it's it's always easier to blame something or someone else for your circumstances. Okay, but the path to serenity clearly lies in the personal accountability of yourself, even if you're wrong. Okay, what I mean by that is like even let's just say that you know somebody gave you some advice and you went a different path and you found out later, oh, their advice was correct. You're still better off going with what you believe in your core is the right thing and finding out later. Um, I think I say this in the book, you know, I'd rather be the victim to my own decisions and mistakes than a victim of other people's decisions. And um, so when you when you listen to advice, this is a total totally different topic. We in the book where we talk about, you know, only work with people who have been in the trenches. Um, but the reality of it is is that that's where personal growth happens. Uh the the blame game is the easy way out, but it's the surest way to regret.
SPEAKER_01So, Jerry, why why do so many people not live their life? Well, why do so many people make choices and decisions that are contrary to true north for them, you know, of what they what they of their own dreams, hopes, and desires. Why do so many people go go other ways?
SPEAKER_00Well, it it it comes down to you know self-concept, you know, confidence and and and self-esteem, all of which, by the way, is you know, developed from you know, you know, birth to you know 12 years old, and and and how that how that period of time in your life goes and who you're around and and and and what your parents do and the influences you have, coaches, teachers, other people, you know, can have a huge effect, positively or negatively, on your self-concept, self-esteem, resulting in, you know, big confidence problems. People who have people who have big confidence problems um have a real tough time, you know, making that leap uh or taking those steps into the risk area of getting it done. They they spend their entire time trying to mold things to be in a protective mode, and it just doesn't work if you're looking to live a life of serenity, you know, down the road. Um, you know, a lot of people you know listening to this are, I'm sure, are familiar with Ed Milette. He's one of you know one of the great motivational speakers out there. Um, and he he has he has a saying, he goes, in order to truly love and trust yourself, you need to get to know yourself. And and then, you know, once you know yourself, it's easier to trust in what you can do, what decisions you make, you know, what your visions are. Um, and uh, you know, self-love requires deep personal honesty and acceptance. And with without those components, you're gonna have a real tough time um, you know, getting out of that arena of living what other people's visions and dreams are for you, because when something doesn't go right in that scenario, it's their fault, not yours.
SPEAKER_01Well, you know, you said something there a minute ago, and uh, it just hit me, not that it's a new thought, but it sure did hit me hard, and that is you got to know yourself. You've got to know yourself. Well, you know, I don't think a lot of us, I don't think a lot of people, a lot of us, I don't think a lot of us know ourselves. And I'm just gonna say for I'm gonna I've said this before. We're gonna have to do an entire episode on self-awareness. I mean, we're gonna we're gonna dedicate a couple of hours to self-awareness because it is the critical link in so many things that we talk about. And I don't think people really know how to do it. As a matter of fact, I I made a I made a few notes about what not being true to myself actually means. This is what comes under that umbrella of I haven't been true to myself. You maybe you haven't been true to yourself in career choices. Now, you know, a lot of people, a lot of people go to college because their parents want them to go to college. That again, the example I've used in the past, I know several people who have become attorneys that have just been miserable with that. I mean, they just thought that was the right thing to do, whether it was their parents or pressure from Peers or whatever, but I mean they made a career choice that was not their own and lived to regret it. Live to regret it. So career choices that are often made for parents or spouses or social status. Career choices, number one. Uh relationships that you stayed too long in or fear of being alone. You know, relationships are big, tough, tough. And by the way, I'm sure no relationship expert. I can I'll tell you that right now, but that's a big issue, relationships. Um, opinions never expressed. Now, I guess the internet has kind of fixed that. Yeah, yeah, right. There you go. Oh my goodness.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and and and nobody knows and nobody knows needs to know that you're the one that said it either.
SPEAKER_01Opinions never expressed is one of the uh true signs of not being true to yourself. Wow. Um, now here's one that I I like this one a lot. Talents and passions that have been abandoned. Jerry, I can't tell you how happy I was the day you told me you were gonna write a book. You know, that's that's one of those things you'd had in your head for for years, and you finally said, Russell, I'm writing a book. And I just couldn't. But so many people can't make that step. They can't make that step. They uh they can't they don't they can't start writing their book, they can't learn to sing, or they won't sing, they won't start playing the guitar, they won't paint, you know, take up painting. There are a lot of hobby sorts of things that are passions inside people that they abandon and they shouldn't. And and I've got a little more to say about that in just a little bit. But then the the last one here that I have a note on is values that have quietly been negotiated away. Yeah, you know, we do sometimes we do lose track of uh our values. I mean, we we we give them up, we resign them sometimes, you know. And uh that's not a good thing. And those one, two, three, four, those five areas of not being true to yourself can cost you and and and and leave you with an awful lot of regret. Um social conformity, you know, that's a big deal. Social conformity. The fear of the thing.
SPEAKER_00I mean, you know, again, it it's a hard, it's a very hard thing to do, but to to take it in all those categories, I mean, especially the relationships one, you know, to take a step back and be honest with yourself and ask yourself, you know, is this what I thought or what I envisioned my life to be? If it's not, then it's time for action, right? It is, it is you, you, you, you, you must make the change because um, you know, I used to be, when I was younger, of course, I I I believed you could kind of fix anything. And I've learned there's just certain things, certain times, certain events, whatever, not everything can be fixed. Not everything can be fixed. And you know what? When you conclude that I've done everything I can, you know, it's just not working, making that decision will be as hard as it is at the moment, because it's gonna hurt, it's painful, but it is going to be probably the greatest. You'll look back and say it was the greatest decision you ever made, because there's a whole world of evolution for you out there, evolution to yourself, that it is is just waiting if you're if you're in any bad situations like that. Is it ever too late? No, I don't think so. I mean, you know, um I said the big transition for me, you know, as it's covered in my book as well, you know, was my divorce when I was 40 years old. Right? I mean, you know, I I essentially have lived two different lives, two different worlds, two different lives. I mean, everything completely changed with that experience. Um, and and man, it was painful, brother. It was painful. But, you know, what came out of it is just, I mean, I can't even begin to tell you um the positives that came out of being able to endure that situation, fight those battles, get through it, and everything in in my life has blossomed ever since. So um, you know, if you're in a tough situation, I mean, by the way, same thing with like you, one of those categories was career, you know. You know, you've been sitting at a desk or something for 10 years, you hate getting up every morning. You don't look, I mean, you got to step out of it. And sometimes you got to step out of it without knowing, this is the hardest part, without knowing what the solution is or what the future is or who that next person is you're gonna meet, or what that next job opportunity is gonna be. But if you know you're in a really bad situation now, the old expression, you got nothing to lose, in my opinion. You know, make the leap, make the change, you will figure it out. This is the United States of America. Anyone can do anything they want.
SPEAKER_01You know, Jerry, I actually read something just last night that was kind of uh that plays right into what you're saying. It has a slightly different twist to it. And it was um, let's use the example you used about you want to leave your job. You've been sitting there for 10 years, you're miserable, you know this isn't where you want to be, but you know, whether it's the security or the comfort or whatever it is, you just you just can't make a move. And the what I read last night was, yeah, instead of just making the decision one day to all right, I'm going in, I'm telling the boss I'm out of here. Right, instead of that being the decision you make, you know, prior to that event, you should choose, I'm leaving. Choose, I'm leaving. And then then here's the key thing. It's not just choose in your head, do something concrete that moves you in that direction. Maybe it's you meet with another friend who's at another company. Maybe you go to lunch, you talk about some possibilities, but choose make the decision, choose, I'm leaving, yeah, and then take some action.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and you know, Russell, you know, and we've all been in that place in some various categories of our lives. And I bet every single person listening can will say, yeah, the second I made that decision, I instantly felt better. Yes, exactly. Instantly had a brighter outlook. I instantly had a dopamine release, right? Because you're leaving behind something that you you have battled with for a long, long time. And, you know, it's it's you're not gonna win every battle. That's the bottom line. You're not gonna win every battle, and sometimes you know, there is a surrender, and that surrender, you know, leads to a new battle, right? That that's it's something that's for a worthy cause.
SPEAKER_01So good. So good. So, Jerry, you know, you know this. I I wrote an essay a couple of uh probably a month and a half or so ago, and uh I want to share uh just a little bit of the highlights with some people today because it's so perfect. And here's the deal: there's a Disney movie called Little Mermaid, and I know you've you've got some grandkids. My grandkids are big now, but let me tell you, when they were growing up, I knew all these movies, okay? Well, there's a there's this movie, The Little Mermaid, and there's a scene in this movie where the charming and handsome Prince Eric is sitting in the rowboat with the gorgeous, beautiful mermaid Ariel on the other side of the rowboat. And I mean, the moon is out, there is love in the air, the fireflies are floating around. I mean, this just could not be a more beautiful setting. And Eric looks at her and she looks at him, and he looks at her, and she looks at him, and just nothing happens until a little crab comes up out of the water, a crab, by the way, named Sebastian, that only Disney can do. And the crab looks at Eric and says, Kiss the girl! Kiss the girl, and you know what? You and I are in that boat. People listening, you're in that boat. Something's on the other side of that boat that you really want to do, and you just can't get yourself to do it. I'm here to tell you, kiss the girl. It's the best advice you can possibly get. You gotta kiss the girl. So, why do we not kiss the girl? And most of the time it's because we're afraid. We're afraid. It's fear, it's fear of judgment, fear of rejection. But here's here's one fear of failure. Jerry, this goes into a whole nother thing. I knew I want to give people listening today, people who have a passion they want to pursue. You took that big chance to write your book. You know, I mean, you you hadn't written any books, you know, you weren't an author, but you had a dream of writing a book and and you've done it, and it things have just exploded. So many people have these things and they just can't move towards them. They fear failure. And I'm gonna tell you right now, I'm giving you permission to suck. You you have my permission to be bad at something. Turns out you have to be bad at something before you can be good at something.
SPEAKER_00It everything. I mean, go back to you know, I again I always use the example of a little baby learning to walk. The baby gets up and tries a 10,000 times before they take that first step, right? It is the same thing for every one of these issues. And by the way, on that story you just told about kiss the girl, so let's go down the different scenarios here real quick. Let's say you decided not to kiss the girl, that decision will carry regret for you your entire life, right? Let's say you kiss the girl, but it doesn't go well, right? Okay, that is making a decision that didn't go right, and you just learned something, right? You will not regret that a year or two years from now, right? And let's go to the third path, you kiss the girl, and it turns out to be a 50-year marriage with five wonderful kids, and everything is amazing, right? Okay, so if you look at those three options, only one ends up in the regret category, and that's the inaction. So I I am just a big fan of you know actions, make those decisions. Um, and you know, sometimes, like in business in the business world, sometimes you can look pretty stupid doing something, you know, by taking that action. But again, you're not going to regret that. You're gonna learn something from it. So the next time you're in a better position to handle whatever that circumstance might be. Inaction is just um the thing that it's a it's like a slow accumulation of inactions that lead to that place of regret that once you're like my age, you you you really, really almost can't recover from it. It's really, really tough. So again, for you younger people out there, 20s, 30s, 40s that are listening, you know, what whatever it is that that is that you know, dream in the back of your head or something that you need, need or want, or whatever, you know, just just go. You know, I'm not saying don't use common sense, of course, you know, be reasonable, but you know, you you gotta try, you gotta go for it.
SPEAKER_01You gotta kiss the girl.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right. You know, there's another circumstance that I should just comment on here, too. You know, your inability to stand alone in the face of adversity is another category of this. You know, a lot of times there's something, there's an issue, or you know, you could be at some community meeting and everybody's looking at something one way and you feel very strongly the other way. You know, again, your your ability to stand alone by your ethics, morals, and integrity in the face of adversity, I mean, that is probably the one thing that will lift you up further than anything else. I don't care if all night the hundred people in the room, if all 99 disagree with you, if you stand by your position and you know it's the right position, you're a winner.
SPEAKER_01Because you know, compared to uh compare when I talk about uh learning how to sing or painting, standing up in a community meeting and being the one out of a hundred that has a different or a dissenting view, you you you need uh you need some strength to do that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, tough stuff. Tough stuff.
SPEAKER_01Wow. So this uh this uh inability to kiss the girl is really the antithesis of the cheetah. I mean, the the the cheetah runs its own hunt. That's right. Cheetahs know their game, they run their own hunt, you know.
SPEAKER_00The cheetah decided before he got in the boot he's kissing the girl.
SPEAKER_01That's right.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_01I love it. That's great, fantastic. Well, you know, one of the things that we want to talk about here is that we've spent uh we've spent some time talking about regret, but the the link between regret and serenity is a really important link. You know, so you know, so we have to talk about, and maybe let's talk about this a little bit. If you have regrets, if you have regrets, what can you do with them, Jerry? Do do we have do I don't know if we have that written down here or what our answer is. I know I have I have a I have a thought or two on that, but do you have anything that you can want to say about, you know, if you if you're living with some regret, what can you do with it?
SPEAKER_00Well, first of all, you need to be aware of it, that it's it's a certain emotion that you know is is embedded in in in implanted in your you know, brainwaves, whatever, you know, that have an influence on you. And um, so so just the initial awareness, you know, is a cr critical component to you know the growth factor of recognition that I've got these these regrets and and and here's what happened. Um and what I like to do with them, and um, you know, and by the way, everybody has them. You know, I don't want anybody out there thinking, oh my god, this guy lives a perfect life. No such thing, no such thing. Um, I like to do what I call compartmentalize my mistakes um or misjudgments or whatever I might do. Um, and I you know, I kind of say to myself, I put it uh just to visualize it's here's a box, it's in the box, and it's it's it's not coming back out of the box, it's staying in there. And then I'm gonna use it, you go, as a launching pad, okay, to try to improve the next time I'm faced with a decision or a situation like that that I potentially could regret. Um, you know, a lot of people, and when I say a lot of people, you know, again, it's most people, they get obsessed with their with their regrets and setbacks and things that happen. And when you get obsessed and you think about them negatively all the time, all you're doing is just reinforcing it. And you're just you're just making it something that you're gonna wake up the next day and you're gonna wake up the next week, and you're gonna wake up the next year, and it's gonna be part of your thought process. You have to figure out a way, and as I said, I do it by this compartmentalizing thing, where you just don't become a victim to your setbacks or your poor decisions, you know. Um, and and you're gonna make poor decisions. I mean, it's just that you know, in throughout your lifetime, you're making tens of thousands of a lot of times real important decisions. There's no way anybody's getting them all right. No way. It is just impossible. So when the one when you when you get it wrong, you know, put it where it belongs, and and let's move on to the next thing. Um I and and the other the other part of that is I think the most compelling fact about people that reach serenity is that they just have the ability to just keep going. Right? They don't get to a point where they have this big setback, and then they fall into a comfort zone because they're afraid to do it again. People who reach serenity are always striving for more, always have an optimistic outlook, always anticipate the best down the road, and um, and then in their short-term executions, some win, some don't, but the long-term view is the ones that didn't work, they're gone, can't do anything about the past. What we want to do is have a vision that is sustainable for the next positive thing that's coming up in your life. And you don't always know what that is, by the way, which gets back to the of the five horizons, the faith, the faith thing, right? Like, you know, I I I wake up every single day. I mean, it doesn't matter how bad something is, I mean, uh maybe an investment went wrong, or who who knows what could happen. But I what overrides that is a deep-seated faith that I'm doing enough of the right things, I'm a good enough person, you know, that eventually this is gonna head down the right direction. And and you you must must embrace that faith component to to execute, you know, getting rid of the regrets and down the path to serenity.
SPEAKER_01So I've got another term also, and I'll I'm gonna use two of my I I have to really dig to look for regrets, to tell you the truth. I mean, and because and here's one of the reasons why. So many people who see failure as regret, you know, I I don't see failure as regret. We've talked about this a million times. Where I have failed in my life, I I have typically found the beauty in that and been able to catapult from that. So so I don't look back and regret failure. I but I do have I had I do have two regrets that I again I had to I had to really search for okay, what what do I regret? And I want to share these two, not not the specifics, but the first one is there was a period in my life where I caused my parents a great deal of anxiety and embarrassment. Now, don't get me wrong, my parents loved me, okay. My parents loved me crazy love, okay. And and we had a great relationship, and eventually things eventually things were all cleared up and done. But I mean, there was there was a couple years where I just really caused them tremendous anxiety, and uh, and I regret that. I regret that. But here's the here's how I look at it at the time I was doing what I felt was right. I I I wasn't making an ugly choice to be ugly, I was doing what I felt was right, and so I'm gonna introduce a term here. We we do all have to have some self-compassion. We have to have some self-compassion for things we've done, who we are, decisions we made that maybe weren't the right decision. We need to have enough self-compassion to be able to look back and say, look, I didn't mean to do that. I wish they were here today for me to apologize to them, you know, for but self-compassion. So even though it is a regret, they love me. We're past it. Okay. The second one was in my first successful business, which is when you and I met when I was in the cowboy boot business, there came a point in that business where I brought in a partner. Uh it was two or three years in. I brought in a partner for some financial strength. And um up to that point, I had one key employee that would literally walk through walls for me. I mean, this is a guy, this is a great guy, hardworking guy, good brainstorming. This it was a great relationship, just fantastic. And um there came a time when this new partner of mine told me I needed to fire this guy. And um I you know, I was like, what? What are you talking about? You know, and it it turned out to be it was a jealousy thing. It was a jealousy thing. This new partner who wanted to be the main man could not handle could not handle the relationship I have. And let me tell you, I can still remember to this day fire firing this guy. I can still Remember it. And he and I both knew what the story. I mean, he looked at me like, really, okay, I get it. I get it. And damn it. Really, to this day, that pisses me off, you know? Yeah. But I'll tell you what, I did it. I knew it was wrong when I did it. But I was honoring this new evolving relationship. And so I'm gonna have some self-compassion on, okay, I understand why I did it. I I still don't like it, but I did it. And I'm not sure.
SPEAKER_00Let me ask you this question from that. Over the next 40 years, how many people did you help because of that experience? Right? Like, you know, you you that that lesson probably taught you more about you know integrity, character, how your internal moral core was, and and it was a huge positive impact for the future. Unfortunately, your guy was the victim of that. Yeah. Okay. But again, if you focus on just the negative of what happened in that event, but let's look at all the positives in the future that came from that experience. This is what people have a tough time doing. You know, when you make a big mistake and you might hurt some people. I mean, especially in business. Oh my gosh. And over all the years in business, you just even even through unintended consequences, you know, people are affected by negatively, sometimes severely negatively. And uh, but it doesn't mean that you didn't have you know the right, you know, intent inside. And, you know, and you were you were my guess is you were probably younger than this partner you brought in, and you you felt influenced by him, and you said, hey, well, there must be something you know he knows, I don't know. You know, that's what happens. That's what happens. But then you learned, yeah, you you also learned, you know, to trust yourself. You know, one of the uh, you know, uh I get one of the lessons to everything that you just said and what and what our last segment was just all about was is that you know you can't go back and recreate yesterday, but you can start today to create a new tomorrow. Yes. And and again, and you had mentioned about um, you know for almost like a forgiveness type thing, right? Okay, and you know, and you do need to have some compassion for yourself and forgive yourself for that event that happened and the effect that happened on that gentleman. Um, hopefully he went on to bigger and better things. Um, but you know, uh, and and we talked about this before, go ahead and forgive yourself, but don't forget.
SPEAKER_01Jerry, what you how you started that out is exactly what we want people to do with their regret. People think regret is all about the past, right? But actually, regret, when used properly, is about the future. In other words, if if you if I don't like being that guy that did not stand up for a good employee, then I'm not gonna be that guy going forward.
SPEAKER_00That's correct.
SPEAKER_01Okay, you know, and if if you didn't spend enough time with your kids when they were growing up, okay, well, that tells you about not forget about who you were. Now let's talk about who you want to be going forward.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So regret is really people look at it in the past, but let's take that regret and become somebody different in the future. Let's use it to catapult forward into things.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and and other people, by the way, they don't remember you for your failures, they remember your successes. Right. So, you know, if if like when you that failure that you feel, other people don't see it nearly as bad as you do.
SPEAKER_01Right. Oh, I'm sure that's the case. Absolutely. Uh, and you know, here's another note I made, which is great is I think it's so valid, and it's a good thing for people to know. There is a time horizon problem here, too, on regrets. You know, things that look like a mistake at when you're 35 don't necessarily look like a mistake when you're 55. That's right. That's right. You know what I mean? Life is long enough for us to have some changing perspective on things.
SPEAKER_00Yep, absolutely.
SPEAKER_01Wow. So, Jerry, if a if a listener is sitting out there right now and they're thinking about some of the regrets, there's something they've been carrying, you know, what's the single most important thing you think that someone should do with the regret?
SPEAKER_00I think that the best thing you can do is build a reputation for yourself. Like not a reputation other people, you know, are are looking at you and he, oh, he's the greatest at this, he's the best at this. But what reputation can you build for yourself? How does it make you feel? I always say write a contract with yourself and don't break it. Right? If you're a consultant and you signed a contract to go do a project with somebody, you know, hopefully you're the type of person that's gonna go out and you're gonna execute that contract. You're gonna follow every word in it, and and you, you're, and both parties are gonna be rewarded for it. Well, it's the same thing with with yourself. You know, write write yourself a contract, make some commitments to yourself. Um, it's probably the most important thing you can do. Um, you know, I I wrote something um uh you know a few years back, and I just I just want to read this to give you like an overview of of the attack, I guess, that you want to want to go into this. Is and it goes like this the highest courage is to dare yourself in the face of adversity, choosing right over wrong, ethics over convenience, and truth over popularity. These are the choices that will measure your life and your legacy. Travel the path of integrity without looking back, for there is never a wrong time to do the right thing. And that is that last line is the key to everything. I don't care what happened five years ago, 20 years ago, and I don't care how bad it was what happened. I mean, you know, there's some people that have done some really, really bad stuff that turned out to be able to do the right things in the second half of their life and get things turned around. So um, you know, there is there is no um that that thing I always say, there there is no final defeat, right?
SPEAKER_01You know, Jerry, that that's very, very strong. I think we need, I think you need to read that one more time. And I let me frame it. We have talked for almost an hour about regret. Yeah. It's uh regret is an ugly thing for a lot of people, and we're trying to show people that it doesn't have to be that ugly, that uh that you know there's a new day tomorrow, and that we can use regret to shape how we go forward. I think you need to read that statement one more time. Sure. That really is the bottom line on what we're talking about today. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um the highest courage is to dare yourself in the face of adversity, choosing right over wrong, ethics over convenience, and truth over popularity. These are the choices that will measure your life and your legacy. Travel the path of integrity without looking back, for there is never a wrong time to do the right thing.
SPEAKER_01I love it. That's fantastic. And kiss the girl. Kiss the girl. Gotta get out there and kiss the girl, people. There you go.
SPEAKER_00Yep.
SPEAKER_01Jerry, you have any last thoughts for us?
SPEAKER_00Yep, I'm gonna give you one last thing because uh this just applies exactly to this years ago. I I was uh, you know, and most of you know I'm a big Tim Grover fan. Uh wrote the book uh Relentless from Winning. He was the uh um athletic trainer for you know uh Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, uh, you know, super, super successful guy. And and uh his books are just fantastic. But I was at an event where he was speaking, and he and here's what he says he goes, if you think the price of success is high, wait until you get the bill for regret. Wow. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Jerry, let me thank you so much for today. And by the way, ladies and gentlemen, if you don't, if you don't already have this book, you should get it. I promise you it's a good one. You there's not a page you can turn to in this book that doesn't have some little gym piece of wisdom for you, you'll enjoy it. And Jerry is available for speaking engagements. He's done uh a good bit of speaking here in the Washington, D.C. metro area. He's had some invitations for out of town as well. If you would like to bring Jerry and his cheetah story to your organization or business, uh let us know. Just drop us a note in the comments uh of one of the videos or the podcast. But uh you won't regret it. He's a good man. Jerry, I want to thank you for joining us again today. Love these sessions. Can't wait till the next one.
SPEAKER_00Yep, appreciate it. Have a great day.
SPEAKER_01All right, talk to you. Goodbye now.
