The Blue Cup Podcast
At The Blue Cup Podcast, we believe success can be defined in a thousand different ways. From artist to entrepreneur's, business owners to real estate investors. We aim to tell all of those stories. Hosted by Russ Scheider.
The Blue Cup Podcast
I Quit a High-Paying Corporate Job to Find My Passion Again
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In this episode of the Blue Cup podcast, host Russ Scheider welcomes his long-time friend David Kellam, a hotel developer, to discuss their enduring friendship and the lessons learned over the years. The conversation delves into themes of ego and empathy, with David sharing his journey from corporate life to pursuing his own entrepreneurial dreams. He reflects on the challenges of leaving a stable job, the importance of building equity for oneself, and the emotional support he received from his 'emergency contact' during this transition. The discussion also touches on personal growth, the struggles of being unstoppable, and the balance between empathy and assertiveness in leadership roles.
As the episode unfolds, David shares his experiences with weight loss, emotional eating, and the impact of his learning disability on his life. He emphasizes the importance of focusing on strengths rather than weaknesses and the value of relationships in both personal and professional contexts. The episode concludes with light-hearted anecdotes from their past, showcasing the deep bond between the two friends and the wisdom they've gained through their life experiences.
Takeaways
Ego and empathy are crucial in personal and professional relationships.
Life is a marathon, not a sprint; take it one step at a time.
Emotional eating can be a coping mechanism; awareness is key.
Building equity for oneself is more fulfilling than working for someone else's success.
It's important to focus on strengths rather than fixating on weaknesses.
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Human human nature is when we hear the word change, that means what am I losing? If you help your customers get out of life what they need, you don't have to worry about yourself. It'll be taken care of. And he said, friends will trunk price. I think that'll help some people.
SPEAKER_02There was an old microphone that tried it out for himself. His name is Russ. He mount the mic. And now he's got a podcast show.
SPEAKER_00Welcome to the Blue Cup Podcast. And this is a special day for me as host. Make sure that you like and follow us. And especially on YouTube and click that bell. The man on the camera here is one of the best friends anybody could ever have. And I'm going to tell you why. And throughout this podcast, and we're going to talk about a lot of other things. But the the principle that I learned from Tony Robbins as a salesperson, as a great salesperson, is a blend of ego and empathy. And I think that applies. David's not really a salesperson. You you have a different role, and we'll get into that. But the ego and empathy with you, because I've known you so well for so long, is the ego part. And ego does not mean that that you're cocky, but it means when I would come visit you and I would park my truck, blocking your truck in the driveway and say, hey, let's go to dinner. You're like, I'll drive. Well it's my truck. You're like, you're a terrible driver. I'll drive. It's like, all right, here are the keys. Instantly since we were 18 until, you know, we're 40 years later. So that's what I mean by ego ego is the confidence, knowing who you are and what's right for you. And then the empathy runs deep and wide. And I'll share some stories later on, but just the empathy. When I was having a real struggle, I lived in Charleston and you and Charlotte, and you just showed up at my house and you were just there for me. And we'll talk about a lot of that as we go through. David Kellum and I have been friends for 37 years, 38 years, something like that. I know it's painful when we have young Ryan behind the camera. It it is painful to admit. But David is a hotel developer, and that definitely qualifies you for this podcast. David has more investments than he realized based on a recent conversation that we have and enormous equity in some things. So that's that's part of what we talk about. And then we just want to talk about life and how to live it, as REM said.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So thank you for being on. Absolutely. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_03I'm excited and nervous at the same time. Oh, don't be nervous, dude. It's just a conversation. No, no, I'm not nervous about that. I'm just nervous about the questions you're gonna ask me. You know, you know wait till not You probably should be.
SPEAKER_00That's fair. So tell us about the hotel development business, first of all, and what you're doing. And tell us about the the lifestyle change and the position change that you made in the past year.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So long story, and and and you let me know how how deep and far back to go, but uh I find myself in the hotel industry, hospitality industry uh with uh hotels and resorts, uh most recently with Windham Hotels and Resorts. And through a series of acquisitions, um uh companies that they acquired, I became uh a member of their uh corporate team and leading their architecture design and construction team. Uh and life at the top is good. And I've always wanted to do my own thing, but didn't have the guts to do it. And I was happy suckling the corporate teeth. And uh it's a really nice thing to do. I had weekends free, surely worked plenty of hours or more uh during the week, and weekends, but but life was good. Um and but I just had an itch that I've always wanted to try my own thing. You you have on many occasions as as we've talked over the years, encouraged me to do that. Scared to death to do that. And I think the longer not I think, I know, uh the longer one is in the corporate world and it doesn't have to be corporate, the longer that you are getting a paycheck every two weeks direct depositing to your checking account, the harder it is to do your own thing. I have a son that is starting out in his career, and uh I would love for him to start out as an entrepreneur and a business more than owning and trying to work his way up in a company. Only because in a company I'm building someone else's um portfolio. I am building equity for the stockholders. Uh and they paid me to do that. So I don't want to say that's a negative thing. But if I choose to do my own business, then I'm building equity for myself and my family, of which I didn't do outside of a paycheck. Um a lot of changes in my life. Let me know how much you want to go into that in the last really 18 months. Oh, we're gonna get into that too. Yeah. But there were changes in the corporate leadership at my company, like being a direct boss. I went to work for a new person. And really, very honestly, I had lost the passion for my job. And it really wasn't fair to the company or the shareholders that I stood on the bench.
SPEAKER_00I love that point. Y'all are listening to this, right? To what David just said. But what'd you do differently? One day. Go ahead. I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_03What what did I do differently uh to create value or what did it what did I do to change?
SPEAKER_00What change did you make to get out of that situation?
SPEAKER_03So one day I had a uh a bad day um and uh was sharing that with uh with with my emergency contact.
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_03And um she said, Well, why don't you quit? And I go, Well, first of all, I don't have a job. And second of all, I don't have a job, and third of all, I don't have a job. And she goes, I got you. And and and with no hesitation, with no concern, with no anxiety, she says, I got you. Yes. And we can talk more about her and and and her influence in the world. Oh, we will, yeah. But that was probably four or five o'clock in the afternoon and at 10 30, I emailed my resignation.
SPEAKER_00Wow. So that was the turning point, is I've got you. It's gonna be okay. And sometimes we all need to hear, I mean, that's empathy in its purest form is it's gonna be okay. Yeah. From your emergency contact.
SPEAKER_03From my emergency contact. Yeah. So I you know, just really quick, I I really don't like uh in personal relationships the title of partner. It's uh too businessy to me. Girlfriend and boyfriend is too high school. And so I struggled with the title of of which to call her. Uh I recently went in for some surgery and was filling out the form, and it said, Who is your emergency contact? And I love that. And I said to her, Hey, by the way, I've got your title, and she said, What is that? And I said, You're my emergency contact. And she says, Well, you know, that pretty much sums it up.
SPEAKER_00And uh I love that. So tell me about your new career, and then we're gonna go talk about backstory and all that.
SPEAKER_03Sure. Twenty-six to thirty years ago, who's counting again. I was in the hospitality industry on the engineering, uh, design and construction side, and uh hired a company to perform some hotel reflooring. Just just we were swapping out guest room carpet. Okay. I happened to be one of the first customers for this company, uh headquartered in Atlanta. And, you know, 26 to 30 years later, uh I've probably done over 300, 400 hotel renovation projects with this company. You know, his kids, I know his kids, we saw our families grow up together, and and he, much like you, Russ, is a is a mentor or a mentor on live life and business. I'd been sharing with him my loss of passion for my job and what what can I do to, you know, ignite that flame again and get excited. And he said, Why don't you just come to work for me? Um and I was like, Well, uh, you know, and uh he said, I'll teach you the business from our style, I'll give you a salary, I'll all bet a lot less than what you're making. And um I'm tired myself, and so maybe in the future this business becomes yours. Uh and and we put together uh uh an agreement. And so the day that I had a bad day, so that plan was to happen uh in the summer of twenty twenty-six. I had a bad day in September of twenty-five, and I called him up and I said, Hey, by the way, I'm leaving today, and uh I know you and I aren't gonna start anything until next summer, but I just want to let you know I'm available and you know, I'll figure out what I'm gonna do from now until next June. And uh he said, Welcome to the family. I can't wait for you to start. I love it. So that was again a very soft landing for me. Yeah. I told him, he called me, I don't know, in the weeks that I was winding down my job and and starting with them. And it he goes, How are you feeling? And I said, nervous. And uh that is not what you say to an entrepreneur, I've learned. And I won't use the language that he did, but he he basically said, What the hell? You can use any language you need. He said, He's what did he say? He said, What the hell are you thinking? That pisses me off. And I go, What are you talking about? He said, I moved here from Lebanon with no money in my pocket, and I started a business by myself. Now that's what you need to be nerfed, nervous and worried about. He said, I'm gonna pay you money, I'm gonna give you benefits, you're gonna have in you're gonna have vacation. Like, what the hell are you nervous about? I was like, Nothing.
SPEAKER_00I'm not worried about anything. Humans don't like change. We just we don't like change. I mean, we we're afraid of it. Um, even if it's a good, really good change. It's like, I don't know, I don't know. It's pretty comfortable sitting in this mud puddle and you're trying to show me a warm bath.
SPEAKER_03That's it, that's that's it. I do an exercise with any and every team that I speak to. Yeah, and I have them pair up. Uh uh and I say, okay, the person on the left change something about the person on the right. Okay. They change something. Then the person on the right changed something about the person on the left. Okay. So they take the watch off, they take a pen off, they take the jacket off, the glasses off, whatever, right? And hands down, I've done this hundreds of times with many, many, many people. And every time, that's the only instruction I give. And every time we then go through the room, what did you change about your partner? Well, I took their glasses off, or I took their pen, or I took their wedding ring, or I took right. And so it proves that change means what am I losing? No one ever adds a watch, no one ever adds a jacket, no one ever takes their necklace off and pins it to the next person. See, that's change too. Oh wow. So yeah, the human nature is when we hear the word change, that means what am I losing? And I don't like it. So I hear you.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, y'all keep listening or watching because that is gold, and I've never heard that before. And I'm can I steal that for a mastermind? Absolutely. Oh my God. I've got goosebumps. That's gonna be so good for a mastermind to to notice. God, I never thought about that. That that you always assume you're losing something unchange. And that's all the instruction you say is I'm gonna I want you to change something about your partner.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. Huh. Cool. I love it. Automatically do it. And if you find someone in and when you do this, if you find someone that adds, that's a that's a special person right there. Yeah, I would think that was. Did you see some of those? I may have had three people in a hundred times that I did it. Three people. And usually, you know, you'll have a group size of you know 20 to 50 people, you know.
SPEAKER_00Um it's very rare. Well, without doing that exercise, I just went through some people in my life who were like, here, let me let me give you this thing, let me add this good thing to you. And it you're right, it's very few people. Um, and we could all learn to be better at that. So that's the empathy, the empathy, that's pure empathy, is let me change something about you by adding something to you. Love it. And I'm so glad your emergency contact is behind you, and that that your boss is will call you out on your bullshit. Can I tell another funny story? Just yes, please.
SPEAKER_03So go ahead Weeks, if not Yeah, it was weeks after I had sent in the resignation. Okay. And I was filling out, I said I had had some surgery, so I had to fill out some the contact in front of the emergency, right? Well, part of that was uh that I had to fill out my salary. Well, I didn't even know what I made, right? So I had to go look and I was like, damn, like I hadn't looked at it in a while, and I was like, oh, it's pretty good. And uh so I'm telling her this story, and she says, first of all, she's severely disappointed that I did not know exactly how much money I made. Right. And I had to go through the barrage of questions of why don't you know this? And I said, Well, you know, you have direct deposit and you have auto pay, and things are paid, and my savings account grows, and so I just really, you know, I'm good. And uh this, you know, which is terribly, kids, do not do that. Make sure you know how much money you make. Anyway, so she said, she says, Well, well, how much was it? She goes, No, no, no, no, no, I said I said, No, you're my emergency contract. I don't mind. You know, she goes, What? She goes, You made how much she said, and you quit your job?
SPEAKER_00And I go, yeah. And she said, Why? I said, You told me to. I was gonna say, rewind to remember? Yes, yes, yes. So we laugh about that. Yeah, I love it because you and I had a conversation on your back deck over some stogies and lousy guitar playing a few years ago. And I said, What are your plans for your retirement? And you said, I'll just work till I die. And do you remember what I said? I I I don't. I said, That's a terrible plan.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yes, yes, yes.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. To work until you die. I mean, you deserve better than that. So I'm happy so happy that you now have this ownership role. Well, not yet, but that's plan. Well, but it's it's it's I have a plan, let's put it that way. Right. And it's it's in the near future. I mean, it's within a year or two, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Well, and he's as soon as I feel comfortable, he's ready.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah, I remember you saying that, that he he's ready to be out. So that's fantastic. So we'll talk about, and I want to talk about there's something in the investment community that Robert Kiyosaki teaches that uh your personal residence is not an asset. I agree and disagree with that because in your case, and I I won't say your numbers if if you want to say them, you can, but you bought a house a long time ago. It's a really great house. I've spent many weekends there, and it's worth quadruple, and you owe very little on it. So there's an equity piece there that you can now invest at our advanced age. You can you have that equity piece to invest. That was a good investment for you. I I love this career change. All right, now we want to talk about the night that we met. Jeez.
SPEAKER_03Yes, I remember it very well. Extremely well. And you were driving that night, and see that's where it all went wrong.
SPEAKER_00That's where it all went wrong. I was driving, you were in the passenger seat, and Kevin was in the passenger. I was in the back seat. Oh, you were in the back seat. Okay, you were in the back seat, and Kevin was in the passenger seat. Kevin was in the passenger seat.
SPEAKER_03So I do guys were bunnies, and I was, you know, I was the odd man out.
SPEAKER_00You were the third wheel.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I was like, I had just met you that night.
SPEAKER_00So we were we were headed for some sort of mischief, and I had a 1975.
SPEAKER_03Be honest, be honest. We were we were under the age of 21, and we were headed to the D the Teen Dance Club. That's true.
SPEAKER_00We're under well, that's why I said some sort, because I didn't remember the specific mischief that we were going for. So we're going to the underage dance club where we could get on.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Eli's Troubles Away Dance Club. Something like that. No, that's the name. I remember the name. So I have a 1974 Diesel Pugio.
SPEAKER_03That's why I said I was being fumigated in the backseat. But anyway, go.
SPEAKER_00That is accurate. With an exhaust leak, was my next the blue weight exhaust or like blue exhaust everywhere that we went, but it had a sunroof. So I'd the nice night I had the sunroof open. So we're going to the teen dance club where we can actually get in. And you said, pull over, pull over in this gas station, and you bought a a sleeve of powdered donuts and a bottle of strawberry milk. And probably a burrito. I remember it well. And so we're headed down the road and you finish your snacks and throw them out through the sunroof. The garbage through the sunroof. Yeah. It's like, and I slammed on the brakes, pulled over, act up, and said, Pick that shit up. And you were like, why? Said, pick that shit up. We're not doing that. And you you went and picked it up and threw it in the floorboard of the car. And you're sitting there thinking, this guy's an asshole. Absolutely. And I'm sitting there thinking, this guy's an asshole. We were. And and within days we were best friends. Yeah. But but that was our first night together, as we both were like, this guy's an asshole. Why am I hanging out with this guy? And then the next part of the story.
SPEAKER_03What's that? It wasn't because of your cool car.
SPEAKER_00No, that car, that car would move. It would it would it would roll. That's all you can say for it. It was a four-speed jury rig to start and jury rig to stop because the ignition box had gone out, but it was diesel, so you couldn't kill it. Couldn't. It's probably still running. It could kill you, but you couldn't kill it. As you say, in the backseat, you're like, I'm getting a little dizzy back here from all the fumes. I'll put a window down. New York sitting in that thing, too, in the backseat. Well, that's right. We drove that thing from Virginia to New York. And we also drove it from Virginia to Fort Myers, Florida. Yeah. Yeah. Why on earth did we drive my car? That thing was horrible. It got good mileage, but it was horrible. So tell the story of at my wedding, the speech that you gave at my wedding. Or I can tell it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you should tell it because I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Okay, I'll tell it. Because so I just talked about the night we met a year and a half, two years later, I'm getting married. You're my best man. And so it's your job to give a toast and a speech. And you told that story of the trash out the window and you know, backing up. And you said you told the truth, which was you were then an environmental studies major at my Montreal University College. Yeah. Several years later. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, just from litterbug to environmentalist in two years. Yeah. So I've always thought that was an ironic story. That is. It is. So tell us about your family.
SPEAKER_03So grew up in a beautiful part of our country, the Shenandoah Valley. Yes. It was great. I say that I grew up uh with three dairy farms that surrounded my house. These were old order Mennonite people, which means horse and buggy, no electricity. And I grew up, they were my friends. Their parents were like my adopted parents. And I would get home from school and I'd be on one of these farms. And what a great way to to grow up. Yes. And uh for my fifth birth my fifth, hold on, I was in fifth grade. I don't know how old you are in fifth grade, but uh what, ten years old.
SPEAKER_01Seven or eight.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, seven or eight, yeah. Uh I got a motorcycle. Both my dad and my my brother, older brother were big motorcycle people, and so for my fifth grade birthday, uh I got a motorcycle. And so then every day after school, I was I'd go and get on my motorcycle and would be gone until you know 6 30 at night for dinner, riding on the in the fields and just I mean, I w it was great. It was wonderful. I have a learning uh disability, a severe learning disability. And so uh when I graduated high school, I was gonna get a job uh at work. I was not going to college, that was not an option. I hated school, school hated me, it was not a good mix. And I started selling motorcycles. Well, first of all, actually, I worked for a Nissan Subaru dealership in the auto in the mechanics uh part, learning to be a mechanic, and I had a sister that would come and see. Me every week, take me to lunch, and tell me that I needed to put a plan together, as Russ says, for my life. And then I sold motorcycles at a motorcycle dealership, and it was great times. I uh would sell motorcycles and go race motocross on the weekends, and life was good. During this time, I uh actually interviewed with a big company and they offered me a job for a nice sales job. And I want to correct Russ. Russ said that I'm not in the sales industry. I believe that everyone is. Everyone is in the sales uh industry. Whether you're a nurse, a doctor, uh a lawyer, you have to sell yourself. So I think we all are salespeople. But anyway, I I grew up in a sales family and have the ability to talk to others. And so they they made me an offer and I was gonna accept it. I came back from Washington, D.C. where the the interview was, and actually had dinner with Russ, his sister, his mom and dad. And his dad asked me, What did you do today? And I said, I went for an interview with this company and told him about the job and the offer, and it's a wonderful offer. And he said to me, he said, Well, David, if they offer you jobs now, they will offer you jobs after you get a an education. You need to go get your education in. When Russ's dad speaks, it's like one of those things that you must listen, right? Yeah. And so I all of a sudden found myself in college. And uh yes, and studying environmental science. And so anyway, we were talking family.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I graduated family.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh so during college I I fell in love with my college sweetheart who uh was from Charlotte. And uh after after college, we we made an agreement between the two of us that we would not get married until we both had graduated school. We then were married after school, and I was married to her for 25 years and have two wonderful children. Uh 26 and a son that's 24. Uh my son actually lives uh close to Russ in Charleston. When he when I helped him move down there, I said, Son, you never you'll never live back here. And he said, Why? And I said, Because you're moving to Charleston, right? You can fall in love with that place. And he has. Uh, and then my daughter lives uh close in Charlotte.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And uh I adore your children. I don't I don't know Grace very well, but I know Harry pretty well. And Harry worked for me for close to a year as my part-time admin assistant. And he's he's just such a solid person, he's smart, he's willing. He actually two weeks ago helped me run an open house because I had two open houses, and I can't I can't be in two places at the same time. And so he was the first person I thought, and I said, God, I hope he says yes. And he was like, sure. And he shows up in a white shirt and khaki pants. Um, I tried to give him a notepad and a pen. He held up a notepad and a pen. Like I said, because you've never done an open house before. He said, But you texted me and said, I need to get people's information. And I was like, All right, here's here's the the door code. I'm gonna go to the other house. And we had a great day. It was good to see him. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And I I am definitely blessed. I have two amazing children that I give my ex-wife 100% credit. She did a great job uh had being there.
SPEAKER_00Uh, not 100%. You get you get some credit too, but absolutely. So let's talk about the learning disability because I remember I don't know if you remember this, um, but Billy Shank owned the Honda dealership, right? Yes. And I lived right behind you, you and I lived right behind the dealership in an apartment as roommates. Yeah. And you said, Come on, Billy will pay all hands on deck to do inventory because you had like a million motorcycle parts, and they have a SQU, SKU number, and then quantity. And we started on it, and you struggled so much getting the numbers right. And Billy eventually said, David's a great salesman, but he said, You just go home and we'll do the inventory. And I'd I'd like for I'm gonna talk about it for four seconds, and I want you to talk about it. I think it's so key that we play to our strengths and don't try to fix everything that's wrong with us because there are certain things that are wrong with me that I cannot fix. So I overcome that by just going hard on my strengths. And I had a mentor who taught me that and go more than four seconds. So an example is when you get your kid's report card and it's A, A, A, A, B, C, D, what do most parents focus on? It's like D, why is this a D? And it's important to know if it's a D because they didn't work hard, or if it's a D because that's a subject that they're just not never going to be good at. And so, whatever the A's are, in later life, my mentor taught me, he said, not that you don't need to get better at the D's, but don't focus on that. Focus on getting great at the A's. And I feel like you've done that. And do give me your perspective because you've lived it, and I'm just saying it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I I I my elementary school years were just absolutely brutal. I hated it, I didn't do well, and thus I hated it. I didn't enjoy it at all. Right. It was brutal. And uh by the sixth grade, my mom says, you know, something is just not because she would help me with homework, right?
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_03So they got me into uh educational consultant uh and uh he evaluated me and and said that I had a a reading issue called dyslexia, where I see things backwards or I skip lines when I'm reading. And so I would go to school and then I had homework with this reading this this uh educational consultant for like two years where I had to read books and record myself and then go back and listen to myself reading them and follow with a finger so that I don't know. I I think he was, I don't know if it was I've thought about that a lot. Like, what was the purpose of that? I think it was like, okay, see, David, you skip lines, okay. Well, that's great, wonderful. But what I learned from that was unfortunately, David, you are going to have to work harder than anyone else, and you're gonna have to work four times harder than anyone else, and still not gonna get good grades. Like that's it. And so from sixth grade on in my education, my parents said, I don't care what you get as long as you work hard.
SPEAKER_00And uh, I love I love that. I love your mom and dad, by the way. And they rest they rest in peace, but absolutely they were they were amazing people, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um, so yeah, a lot of really good, good stories from that. My favorite is in seventh grade, and this was my science teacher, by the way. So remember what my college degree was. Yeah. My science teacher was not a nice person, and she did not understand my dilemma and did not accept it. It was that David doesn't take notes and David doesn't pay attention, and that's why he had grades. And she actually told my mom in a parent teacher conference that your son is not a smart person, and that wow, he will never, ever, ever graduate high school. He'll never make it.
SPEAKER_00Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_03And my mom never told me that, or at the time didn't tell me that. And when I graduated high school, my mom sent that teacher an invitation to my graduation. So that's a mom for you, right? And when I graduated college, she also got an invitation for that too. Man, we're both gonna cry. It's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_01Gotta stop.
SPEAKER_03So uh so anyway, yeah. And and and the crazy thing about it is I really didn't know, I didn't notice that anything was different. Yeah. Until really college. And it wasn't related to to studying or school. It was driving down the road, and I still to this day, uh, I will drive down the road and I will see a billboard or I will see a street sign, uh, you know, a highway sign or whatever. And the first thing I do is guess what it says. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I look at it again and I was like, what? That's not it. And then I'll look at it again and I'll look at it again, and I'll it'll take me four times to look at a sign before I know what it says. And that's when I started to realize, whoa, this like that's weird, right? Again, there's nothing I can do about it. But yeah, and and so because of my learning disability, I have had to work harder than anyone else. And I have had bad grades, and I've never been the uh the you know, the magna coom anything. Right. And uh an employee tell me once, he said, he said, wow, he said, you know, your your personality's really gotten you a lot of places in this world, hadn't it? And I was like, Yeah, yeah, it has. And then later that evening, I was like, wait a minute. I don't I don't know that that he meant that for good. Actually, I I don't I think he was burning me down there. Like, what's up with that? And it definitely was a slam, but reality is he was absolutely right to it that that my personality has gotten me a lot of what I have accomplished, and I'm okay with that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, okay. I think I think your personality takes you 80% of the way, and then your persistence takes you, you know, the rest of the way. And the fact what you said uh is you work harder. And it just taught you that, and that's just like a muscle for you that you're gonna work harder. I have another friend and mentor who's very dyslectic and has made millions and millions of dollars and helped a lot of people by understanding I'm not gonna write a book. I mean, you're not gonna sit down and write a book, you're not gonna, but you can communicate with people and you can motivate people and you can bring people together. And like the exercise we talked about just a little while ago, that's phenomenal to have that ego and empathy where you have enough ego to say, okay, we're doing this, and you have enough empathy to say, now, do you see what that means? And I think that I wanted that to be the theme of this episode. I hope that y'all that are listening to this will stay with us because we're gonna we're gonna get into some other good stuff. But I mean that was that was awesome that you can you can share that, and I think that'll help some people.
SPEAKER_03I have learned in my 56 years that I am who I am, and yes I either need to be proud or or not proud. And I have not been proud a lot of my life, and yeah, there's no reason why I should not be.
SPEAKER_00No, there isn't. You've been very successful just because you have a great personality and you work your ass off. That'll work. You don't have to you don't have to be a great reader and you can overcome dyslexia, but you you can't cure it, and that's something that I just heard you accept that. Like you can't cure it, but you can overcome it without curing it.
SPEAKER_03Well, you can deal with it. Yeah. You deal with it, right? You accept it really is ultimately what it is. You accept it and then you work around it. If you're a a a veteran or whatever and you lose a limb, you don't have a choice. You learn to accept that and you move on with your life without that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you just learn to be left-handed. That's it. There you go.
SPEAKER_01Exactly. Right.
SPEAKER_00You lose your right arm, you don't have a choice but to be left-handed. Exactly. So let's talk about some fun stuff outside of work. Like boating, you you live in the community around Lake Wiley, South Carolina.
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_00And we have spent many happy afternoons on the boat. Absolutely. And you've come to Charleston. What's me up? I said anything with water, sign me up. And um reminds me of when we were I'm gonna say kids, you and I went to different schools together, right? Right. We went to different high schools together. Yeah. Went to different colleges together. But your your parents had that cabin on Smith Mountain Lake, and we had, I mean, they they had jet skis and a ski boat, and we um would sit out there and fish with corn off the dock in the middle of the night and catch catfish. And so your love for water makes perfect sense. Yeah. And I and I share it. Of course, living in Charleston, the love for water is inherent. So fishing, boating, you have a pretty sweet motorcycle now, and you always have. Yes. And you've always warned me not to get one because I'll kill myself and probably somebody else in the process. So absolutely. Ryan is nodding. Young Ryan is behind the camera nodding about this.
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_00Knows you already. Right, right, exactly. I am not the driver. I I drive myself when I have to. Yeah, yes. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Well, my uh yeah, I talked about my mom. I'll talk about my dad, just uh about talk about the lake. Uh say my dad taught me two things. Well, he taught me a lot more than two things, but uh but he taught me to work hard and to play hard. And uh we we definitely we definitely played hard on the weekends. Uh so my parents would say uh the more bruises you have on your body when you leave our lake house means the better time you had. So uh it was uh I love that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and and they they taught us to be fearless. I mean, jump off the not just the top dock, but the handrail of the dock. And your mom would be like, Can you do a backflip? Yeah, I'm 20 feet off the water. What do you want? And she's like, You can do it, try a backflip, and so she said start down okay, yeah, they were a lot of fun. Yes, and your dad was an absolute force of nature, yes, um, and and hilarious.
SPEAKER_03Best best snap person I've ever ever known, and a little bit of wisdom that I will share from him to your listeners. Yes, please. And that is, he said, David, he said, friends want to do business with friends. He said, friends will trump price, friends will trump delivery, friends will trump quality, friends will trump, you know, the slow boat from China, friends will trump all of that. And he said, Do you know what I'm trying to teach you? And I said, No. He said, Go make friends. And uh, you know, he was a relationship guy and he taught me relationships. Yes. He said, if you help your customers get out of life what they need, you don't have to worry about yourself. It'll be taken care of. And and those are the principles that really have put me where I am personally in life as well as professionally. And that guy uh called me out on my personality, but really it was about my ability to create relationships with people and ones in which when they need something, they think, I'll call David, right? Yeah. Plug in your industry. It doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Right, right. Yeah, I think that's that's incredibly true. And another way to express it is the way to get you what you want out of life is to give other people as much of what they want as you can. Absolutely. And that's that's what friends do. And and back to the beginning, the ego and empathy thing. I mean, you and I have each been there for each other in some pretty rough times. Sure. Absolutely. And I know you do that for a lot of people, and I do my best to connect people with what they need. Yeah. And that that's friendship. Yeah. To love it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah. That and that really is what ghouls me um as a person. Uh and uh I uh have been recently uh staying a professional, uh, and I call her my counselor. Uh I am not, I don't need a therapist, okay? I need a counselor.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_03Her sign may say therapy, but or therapist, but I call her a counselor. Uh that's a joke. Um uh but anyway, in seeing my counselor the last time we were together, she says, David, you know, I think out of all the people that I know or have ever met, you have the most empathy for others that I've ever seen in anyone. And I proudly smiled and said, Oh, thank you. And she said, It must be exhausting. And you know, when truth hits you in the face, maybe it'll punch you in the nose, right? And I said, You know, it is exhausting, right? And but that's who I am, right? Yeah, you can't change that. Right. I think that she's working with how how to be empathetic, but yet not let it exhaust you. She's teaching you about boundaries? Yeah, you know, uh, she said something about that word, and I said, you know, I don't I don't really know what that is. I know if I knew what that is, I would not know how to keep said boundary. Right. So I would go past the boundaries of X miles an hour. Yeah. Maybe she might be teaching that.
SPEAKER_00I hope so, because I have seen you, if we can be real, I've seen you honestly hurt yourself with your empathy to other people because you will put people so far ahead of yourself. I'm like, God damn it, dude. Don't you see what's happening here? Yeah. And you were like, Well, kind of, but I can't I can't help it. Yeah. And I said, Well, I need you to help it because you're my boy, you're my brother. Like my parents call you their third son on a regular basis. So you know, we want to see you take care of yourself. And so the, you know, it's a everybody's heard the corny analogy when the the oxygen mask drops in the airplane, put your oxygen mask on first and then look around, see who can help, and not be like, oh god, who who can I help? Right. You can't help anybody if you don't have oxygen. Can't really you're right. I've always I've always loved that analogy for excess empathy.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. But it's incredible that I agree, I see that, but it's it's yeah, it's hard not to to take care of others for it's your nature.
SPEAKER_00It's your nature, absolutely. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I don't yeah. Uh I don't feel good unless I do that. And right, right. That's that's that's a good thing and a bad thing.
SPEAKER_00Double-edged. Yeah. Well, and you a lot of your success is because of what you just talked about, Harry, your dad teaching you about being a good friend and making that connection. And then people want to do business with you or want to hang out with you on the weekend. I mean, if you're a good friend, it it gets you a long way. Yeah. You know, talk about something on the notes that Ryan took that you and I have really not talked about, letting go of aggression.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I uh so I I said that I was married for uh 25 years and and I find myself single now. And uh that's a whole nother story, but um of which I'm wide open for. Uh that's the other thing, is is uh I am who I am and and so I I don't shy away from any questions. But I'm in phase two of my life. Right. There's phase one and phase two, and I don't know how many phases there will be, but I'm in phase two. And uh phase two, Dave, is more calm, less aggressive, 100% forgiving. And maybe, Russ, maybe it is my age, right? Maybe it is that, and I do believe that that does change over time. Although I do know young people that are very compassionate and less aggressive. So, so maybe not. But for me, maybe it is that, and the reason I say that is because I was about to say life's way too short to worry about the little shit. And I I feel like the things that I would have gotten angry or aggressive or obsessive about were little shit. It really you can just you can just brush brush them off. Yeah, yeah. Uh again, another great uh lesson uh that I was taught, I was an executive again with a hotel company, not not the last one. And I got so upset in a meeting. I mean, I was just I was so upset. And a colleague, older gentleman, two-term Vietnam helicopter pilot, uh man that had lived life, right, called me into his office after that meeting. And he said, Man, he said, David, he said, you gotta learn to let things roll off your back like a duck's back. And I go, like, what? He goes, Yeah. I go, what like what are you talking about? And uh he said, What what does water do when you be when it's on the back of the duck? And I said, Well, it just rolls off. He said, Yeah, that's what you gotta let. And there are there are not a lot of things that you get that passionate about, right? You can call it passion uh and uh that upset about um that you don't just let it roll off your back. So uh I think about that too.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. It's a lot of wisdom around us if we'll shut that shut up and listen. Absolutely. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So yeah. Learn to learn learn from others' mistakes because you can't live long enough to make them all yourself.
SPEAKER_00Right. I like that. That's a good quote. Ryan's gonna tag that. That's a gold nugget right there. That that one, we're gonna pull that out. What else? There was something I was gonna ask you. I'm just gonna look at my notes because it blew it blew right out of my head. I love this. Struggles of being unstoppable. What does that mean?
SPEAKER_03What it means to me is Again, being unstoppable? Like, how can that be positive, right? Being compassionate or having empathy? Why can that that's wonderful, right? Right. When it's taken to the nth degree, when unstoppable means that that's all you focus on. It's bad, right? A stoop before God and a few witnesses instead, you know, in sickness and health till death do us part. That's pretty unstoppable, right? And I couldn't I couldn't make it work, but I tried like hell, right? Yeah, I remember and hurt myself trying to make it work, right? And probably hurt not probably and hurt many, many other people because I was gonna be unstoppable. That was not divorce was not an option. Failure was not an option. I just need to work harder. And sometimes, sometimes working hard is doesn't fix it, right? And and I'm a fixer, right? By nature. I'm a pleaser and I'm a fixer. Oh my god. You're a mechanic. I mean you're a fixer. Right. Two things that you think again, wonderful things, a pleaser and a fixer. Well sometimes you well, a lot of times you can't please or fix everyone or any situation. And wisdom is knowing when you can't and and and having having the strength to say, I can't fix it. I can't I can't make you happy.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I mean, there's a a prayer saying from my history, which is God grant me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change. God grant me. And that's huge. Just just just that sentence right there is absolutely epic. Yeah, just abbreviated. It's the strength to change the things I can, the and the wisdom to know the difference.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. That's tough. Because I'm like you. I mean, and I don't know if it's it's the era in which we were raised or the community in which we were raised, but aggression was celebrated.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I mean, I was never taught, and you can ask my kids, I was never taught about a life plan. I remember my very first job, I was working for an engineering firm, and I had a a client that was about my same age, and I picked him up for a business trip at his house, and he and his wife had finished their home and built it themselves. And I said, Man, this is wonderful. And he said, Yeah, yeah, yeah. He said, I hate it that our cars have to sit out in the driveway, but we're gonna add a detached garage, you know, in the future. And uh he was an architect, and I said, Well, why don't you do that now? And he goes, Well, you know, it's it's not in our life plan yet. It's we have it scheduled. I said, Life plan, what's that? Yeah. I I said it just like, what's that? And he said, Well, you know, your plan where you schedule out your in your budget and timing and timelines and work and career and you just go on all, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, oh, you meant that, right? I got home at night. I said to my what's a life plan, she used what are you talking about, right? I made money to pay bills. That's what I did. That was my plan. And I thought that was what you're supposed to do. I have no life plan. My brother says, plan the work and work the plan. And so my kids hear that all the time. What's the plan? I don't care what the plan is, I don't care what it is. Let's have a plan. Let's know what it is.
SPEAKER_00Because once we know what it is, then then we can go. When I had side story, I had the pleasure of working for your brother for 10 months when I was 22 years old. And he is it's a little more ego than empathy, but he has the empathy, yeah, and he loves he loves to teach like that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I learned I learned so much working for him. He was my direct report within the company. Yes. And learned so much from him, and he's such a Kellum. Yeah. He's like your dad, he's like you. And Harry's a little different. Harry's a little little more cerebral. Yes. Your son, your son, Harry. But he has the empathy. Yeah. A lot. Well, he and he he thinks a little differently. A lot. So we're not don't need to get sidetracked on that.
SPEAKER_03But this is I'll tell you funny about my brother recently that I don't think you know. I'll make it quick, Ryan. Sorry. So my father passed away in 2024, 91 years old. What a wonderful life. And I said, I'll do the eulogy, right? And uh I cry at the drop of a hat. And I was like, There's absolutely no way that I'm gonna be able to do this, but I think I'm for it. And my brother said, keep it short. I'm like, no. He said, short and sweet, short and sweet. And I go, absolutely not. He goes, David, I mean short and sweet. And I said, Greg, if you want to do it, I'll be happy to let you do it. He said, No, I'm not doing it. I said, All right then. It will not be short and sweet. His life deserves to have stories told. So anyway, short and sweet.
SPEAKER_00Well, when I worked for him, it was the same time, and this has how old we were. I had a pager, no cell phones, and I covered Virginia, Southern Virginia and West Virginia. So I'm driving through West Virginia and my pager is going off over and over. And it's your brother sending me 911, 911. And I'm thinking, God damn it, it's going to take me 45 minutes to get to a payphone. He called the office nine 911. That's I couldn't communicate back until I got to a payphone and put quarters in it and called the office. He's like, Where were you? I said, in the in the hills of West Virginia, driving to my appointment. He said, Well, we set appointments for you in Richmond tomorrow. And the technology then is like, all right, let me get my my notebook and read it off to me on the phone. And then I'd get out my paper map and drive over the mountains of Richmond. Yeah. But he would he would send me the office number and say, you know, call the office. And then if it if if 10 minutes went by, it became a 911 emergency.
SPEAKER_03Keep it short. Keep it short. So back to the original thing that you were talking about, aggression. That that's what we were brought up with. And it's not aggression as an anger, it was get shit done.
SPEAKER_00That shit done. Get shit done. Yeah, we have a whole community, and I'll bring you into the community that it's hashtag GST. And I'll send messages to friends and business associates mostly with the hashtag G GSD. Let's just get it done. That's it. That's it. So um another another example of your empathy and your love for people is that you were basically the officiant at my daughter's funeral or day of remembrance or whatever we called it. And because I couldn't do it, there's no way. No way. No way. Impossible. And I didn't even have to ask you offered. Like, let me do this for you. And that was um that was a tough day. But it was it was beautiful to have you there and you handled it remarkably well. And with respect to everybody in the room, you know, kept everything on track. And you know, I I really appreciate you being there for me. And that's just a a really personal example of who you are. And I've I've been in your house when you're on a work call, and I can hear how you deal with contractors and employees and your superiors, and like, well, how do we do that? What's the best way to approach? And you'll you'll ask questions and say, okay, okay, well, what about this? And sometimes give a command, like, nope, we're not doing that. We do this. And I think you're that's why you've been an executive and done so well at managing people, is is you can listen, but then you're gonna say, no, that doesn't make sense. Let's do it this way. Um, and I think that makes a powerful leader, and that's that that's why I wanted this this episode to be focused on the ego balance with the empathy, because I know it's a struggle for you. Yeah. And it's a struggle for a lot of people. And sometimes this is a struggle, too much ego, and sometimes this is a struggle, too much empathy. And getting that balance right can be difficult for all of us humans.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So I congratulate you for working on it, and we're never gonna quite get there. Sure. Talk about weight loss, man. You've lost a bunch of weight this year.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So uh I've struggled with weight all my life. I used to say I participated in four sports in high school, each in back to back. So all year I was running and gunning and uh could eat uh my beloved uh food of pizza uh all and as much as I wanted, or strawberry milk and uh burritos from 7-Eleven, a pocket and white, powdered dum nuts, so if I ever do anything really, really bad and I'm on death row, uh, that's what I'll be asking for for uh the last week. But uh I I I uh I went to I went to college and I tr uh I walked on our our soccer team until the first week of class and I knew that there was no way that I could do anything other than college to survive, right? And so I uh I stopped any sports focused on school, but continued to eat and uh and got very large, but uh a battle all my life, all my life. And I've probably lost several people in uh years and I've always you know always gained that back. Um I right prior to COVID got divorced prior to COVID, I went to the local CrossFit gym and handed them my wallet and I said, I want you to beat uh my demons out of me, and they said gladly. And I did great. I lost a lot of weight, I was in the best health that I'd ever been. Uh it was my 50th birthday party, Russ was there. Oh yeah. And then COVID happened and that and that the gym, the world shut down, right? But that gym shut down, and I remember saying to myself, I will never go back there because I knew the pain that it took me to get to that place, right? Yeah. And I wasn't I wasn't willing to go back through that. And so again, I gained all of that weight back. Most recently, I had made a decision to start back into the CrossFit. I was absolutely petrified. Uh I was 55 years old, 54, 55, and uh I thought, man, I'm gonna have a heart attack. Uh, and I'm around all these young punks, and I'm trying to hurt myself. And I was just scared to death to do it. And I I just finally just said I'm gonna do it. Uh I started to do that, and uh you know, that just made me feel good. I don't know that I was losing much weight. I met my emergency contact, so that changed my life. And I know that that I haven't lost my weight for her, but it surely is nice to have someone that you look forward to working hard for, right? Yeah, so I'm not just working hard for me, I'm working hard for her as well because she's smoking hot. And uh uh yeah, so I would say in the last uh 18 months, my doctor says congratulations, I've lost an eighth grader, but I've lost 90 pounds. Um uh you know, I feel great. Uh I feel wonderful. But but but for me for for me, food was and you know, everybody that knows me says duh. But uh food for me was uh my I was an emotional eater. It was it was my connection, right? Don't uh I remember I could take you to exactly to the place that I learned this. I was driving uh a rental car through Manhattan and at two o'clock, two o'clock in the afternoon, and was on the phone with my wife, ex-wife now, in a hated argument, right? And I got I hung up the phone and I go, I've got to get something to eat. Well, I had just been at lunch, like and I said to myself, Oh my gosh, you're an emotional eater, right? And so food to me has been my comfort. And you know, when people talk about comfort food, it really is. It is it is absolutely comfort food. And so not only have I been on a uh an exercise uh program, but my emergency contact has taught me not only what it's what you put in your mouth, but how much you put in your mouth and when you put it in your mouth, and there's so much education behind that, and then she's a wonderful talker, right? So, you know, when stuff tastes good, that makes it easy too, right? Right, to to eat good stuff, right? So yeah, so uh what a lot of change in the last eighteen uh months I I uh I f found someone and fallen in love and I had promised myself I would never do that again. Ever, ever. Would never take a risk to be vulnerable with my heart. Um have lost an eighth grader in weight and I quit a really good job. Right. Yeah, a lot of things. And so I'm working on myself. I want to be a better David. Well, phase two is it's all about being better, and I want to learn and grow and be a better person, not only for me, but for others as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Well, I hope you'll still be as fun as you are. So absolutely, absolutely, gotta have fun. Yeah, I love it, absolutely love it. So we had John Fischell on. T-Bone. Oh, I forgot about that nickname. Good god he has a lot of nicknames.
SPEAKER_03Yes, well, I'm the only one that calls him T-Bone, and I don't know why. I just think Johnny T-Bone Fischell sounds good.
SPEAKER_00Call himself White Fire now or something weird like that. So of course he does. Um, so the story I told the story about us you flying me out to Fort Wayne, Indiana to surprise him on stage. So we need to tell a college story, and I want to pick the Mount Metro bike ride as a college story. So you went to college in Montreat Anderson in North Carolina. Beautiful, beautiful campus there, like black bears walking around. French Broad River runs right through the campus. And I was living here in South Carolina at the time, and you called me and said, pack up your mountain bike and come up here. We're doing a ride. And I was sing you, we were young and single, and I was like, I'm there. So you had arranged a van to take us to the top of the mountain, so we only had to ride down. We didn't have to ride up, and we rode down Mount Mitchell, highest point on the east coast.
SPEAKER_03East of the Mississippi Peak.
SPEAKER_00Highest peak east of the Mississippi. So there were what, five of us, six of us? Yeah, I don't remember. Yeah, it sounds about right. It was you and I, and then three or four of your friends. And so we get the van ride to the top, we're riding down, and I had been working like 80 hours a week, no social life. I so much needed that relief. So I was hyper and I'm leading, I'm leading the descent, even though I have no idea what I'm doing. And so, you know, I wiped out three times on slippery rocks so that you could the four of you behind me could see where the white belts were, scraping elbows, and I didn't care because I was having so much fun. So we get to the end of the run. We get to the end of the run. So we're we're we're on where it's not like technical, and you can go pretty fast. So it's relatively smooth, like single track. And I rode into a swarm of bees, and so the beat, I can feel them, but I'm going fast. So luckily they're hitting my face and chest and shoulders and bouncing off, except for one particular bee. And that little fucker hit my upper lip and went up my nose and stung me in the nose, inside my nose. The best day of my life. So I I skid over to the side and I'm snuffing this bee out of my nose, and it's swelling immediately. And you and the other guy stopped and was like, what's wrong? What's wrong? I was like, I'm me, a me with my mose. Oh my gosh, it was so much fun. So we went we're like blood now. Right, we went out looking for girls that night, and the side of my face is swollen like this.
SPEAKER_03But you know, those the mountain girls kind of like a guy with a big big nose like that, you know? And I'm still talking like this the whole night because my nose is swollen. Yeah, yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, good times. Good times. We we have too many stories like that, but I I wanted to share that one because it's relatively sanitary.
SPEAKER_03Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00Anything else you want to share?
SPEAKER_03I don't think so. I think, you know, I I am uh a student these days. I am not in a position where I am confident in my skills and abilities. I am started over, and I'm not an entrepreneur, and so uh I think I have more to learn than share. Uh I one thing that I think about a lot that my dad taught me, and it applies to so many things in our lives, but uh for me in my life, and and maybe this will will help someone else, my dad would say an inch is a cinch, but a mile takes a while. And so that that gives you that grace that you you you don't have to accomplish it today or this week or this month or this year. Life is you know, life is the marathon, it's not a sprint.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's great. And I think growing up where we did, there were a ton of those little mountain expressions like that. But it's I mean, it's value.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Definite value. So thanks for sharing that. Thank you so much for being here. You know I love you with all my heart. You're a brother. And we will talk again soon. This has been the Blue Cup Podcast. We thank you so much, David Kellum, for being here today. It's been sensational. Thank you to everybody who listens or watches us. You can find us on social media such as Instagram, Twitter, X, or whatever it's called now, YouTube for short, and then some various websites, like our good faith websites that Ryan will share below. The most important thing you can do for us as listeners is comment. Did you love it? Did you hate it? Are we right? Are we wrong? Start a discussion and let let's all grow together and help each other. So that's a wrap.