Resilience: "This Too Shall Pass" and "What Does This Make Possible?"

At 13 years old, Bethany Hamilton faced a life changing moment when a shark attack left her with one arm. But just one month later, she was back on her surfboard. Determined to conquer the waves through sheer willpower and unwavering resilience, Bethany adapted her technique and soared to new heights, even winning a national title. Her incredible journey of overcoming physical and mental challenges is a powerful testament to the human spirit. Today, her story continues to inspire millions, proving that with determination, no obstacle is too great. I'm Joe. My tough pal over there is Kurt, and we are dudes in progress. Hello, Kurt.

Hey, Joe.

What's going on, man?

Hey. Just, uh, doing the thing all week.

Yeah? Doing the what? The work Wednesday night thing?

Yeah. Hump week. Hump day?

Yeah. What is hump week? I wonder what hump week is. That'd be the. I'd be the day right between your last vacation and your next vacation. That would be that week between your last vacation and your next vacation. We need to figure that out one day. I just got back from vacation, dude.

I know.

Spent. Spent a week in d Fusky island with the family. If you've been listening to the show a while, I'm sure I've mentioned this before. Every year, I take my family on a week long vacation to someplace special. Typically, it's a beach of some sort. This is our second year on Dufusky island, and my agreement with my family is I take care of the residents, I take care of the place, and maybe one or two special things, they find a way to get there. And this year, we had my three daughters, my two son in laws, my three grandkids and me and my wife. And that. That flexes out a little bit. I mean, sometimes my in laws are with us, and I'm waiting for a time that the whole family can't quite make it. And that'll be okay, right? But every year, I'll. Every year I want to do something like this because memories are better than stuff, dude. And it's these kind of vacations. And we did a whole episode on vacations, a few episodes back, and this. These times are important to me. So that's. That's where I'm coming off of. So I'm feeling refreshed and rejuvenated, new focus and ready to take a nap.

I was really jealous of you, Joe, and a couple other people. Of course. I do a podcast about vacations, listen to other one vacations and interviewing people. I was getting really frustrated, but I'll. I'll bring that up in my win for the week. I'll get into more detail on that, but congratulations. That's a great thing. We're going to do that next year to Wildwood. We haven't done that trip in a long time. My wife is already laying the ground, and I try to get my parents down hopefully, too, and my kids. So I'm. I'm excited to do something very similar. What, you just got back from next. Next year, next summer?

Yeah. My. My resource for the week is a very interesting resource that has to do with vacation. And if you're not taking advantage of this resource, wherever you are in this world, wherever you are in this world, you can take advantage of this resource. And if you're nothing, you're. You're shorting yourself a very important thing. So we'll talk about that. But today I want to talk about resilience, Kurt. You know, this Bethany Hamilton. I know her story. First of all, she's a person of faith. Her faith is very important to her. And her story hit nationwide, worldwide. When she was this young, up and coming surfer, she got attacked by a shark. I mean, this wasn't just a nudge from a shark. The shark bit her left arm off.

Yeah.

Off.

I know. It's one of my biggest fears of my life.

Just one month later, dude, she was back on a surfboard doing her thing, and she had to adjust. She had to make some real changes in the way that she surfed. She eventually won a national title.

It's. It's an incredible story. The movie is out there, too. I've seen the movie. I don't remember where.

Soul surfer.

Yeah, soul surfer.

Yeah, yeah, I.

Very good.

It's an amazing story of resilience and overcoming obstacles, and I really want to talk about that today, Kurt, and because it's important to understand that we're going to face obstacles, we're going to face tough times, and we're going to face moments that we think are the. Or the end of the world. We have to realize, how do we put that in perspective? How do we get over those things? Other than yourself, Kurt, because I know you are a very resilient person, but other than yourself, who is the most resilient person?

You know, I got to go back to my dad. I'm a pretty big fan of him. And resilience isn't interesting. There's probably a lot of different ways you can define it. I've talked about laying in my bed early in the morning before the sun even comes up. And here in that truck outside my window, starting up and him going to work. I think he gave me that work ethic and resilience. Part of resilience is doing the same thing over and over and over again, even though you might not really even like it. But he was one of those people, and he always had a project. He still does to this day. I couldn't believe when he said, joe to me, he's 85 years old, and he told me he cut down a tree in his backyard that had fallen over from his neighbors. And I didn't even argue with him. I just, like, this is never going to stop, right? That was. I mean, the projects. He built cars for my sister and I. He bought a 72 mustang for dollar 50 and restored it. It wasn't running and needed a lot of bodywork. 302. 302 engine. I wish I had right now.

Wow.

And a lot of. Yeah. Extra jobs. Used to cut down. Cut trees with my uncle. I think the resilience is all that hard work. I think I'll leave you with this one, because I think my uncle Jim always says this to me about describing my dad. How many people do you know that when they were bringing sewers up your road, which was a thing at the time, the city was running the sewer line up through the road, and it was your responsibility to connect to it. He dug the. He dug the trench by hand from through the driveway, through the concrete. I remember him cutting the concrete in our. In our garage and running the pipe and connecting it. I can remember it being a real cold night, too. And he was in that hole, connecting it himself. Himself.

Wow.

I mean. Or the other story tells, my uncle will say, hey, he called up my uncle Jim and said, hey, do you have. He was looking for some kind of part because he was changing the rims on some tires. And my uncle's like, just bring it down to tosies, which is the tire guy they'll do it for free from. You know, he was just like. He was just a self doer.

Toughest nails can go through anything, huh?

Oh, yeah. He came home one time from cutting trees, and he had this scar. Well, he had this bandage. He looked like he just. He was like, from the revolutionary war with a bandage wrapped around his head. One of the limbs came down, hit him in the head. My uncle said, I can't believe it didn't knock him out. He's like. He just shook it off like a bull and, you know, went back to work the next day. I mean, I could tell you story after story after story about him, but that's my. That's my dad, I would say. I think that generation, too, is just, there's so many resilience from, I think, his generation, you know, when it comes.

To resilience, I kind of live my life from two phrases. And I like these phrases a lot. They really help me reframe tough times. They're not end all, be all complete solutions to life's problems. But they do help me be resilient because they help me with mindset. And that's what resilience is about, just being able to push through life circumstances. And let me know if you've heard these two phrases, and we're going to dig deeper into these two phrases and talk about them. And if you have a phrase that helps you through Kurt, let me know and we'll talk about those as well. And I don't want to necessarily sloganeer my way through life, but these foundational phrases, these mindset phrases really help me, and I hope they help you as the audience as well. The first phrase is this too shall pass. This too shall pass. And we're going to talk about that phrase. You can, and you understand what it means just by the words this too shall pass. And the other one is one that I really love. And I learned this from the late Dan Miller, who recently passed away from pancreatic cancer. A legend in the online marketing world, a legit, a legend among entrepreneurs. Just a really amazing man. And he would ask himself, what does this make possible? What does this make possible? So this, too, shall pass. And what does this make possible? And I'd like to use these two phrases, these two slogans, these two mindsets as the foundation for today's discussion. Is that fair enough?

Yeah, absolutely. Those are great. Well, you asked me a question, and I think I've definitely heard you say for sure. What does this make possible? I can remember you saying that one. This to shall pass sounds like a biblical reference. Is it?

It feels like it, but it's not in the Bible. There are philosophically, it's in the Bible. Right. Giving it to God, allowing God to do his thing with your life, that kind of stuff. But this to shall pay us certainly does sound like a biblical term, but it's not. It's right up there with. God never puts anything on any, on someone that they can't handle. That's not, that's not necessarily in the Bible. And God helps those who helps themselves. That's not in the Bible. Oh, okay. Yeah. People, people always, those three things are biblical references that aren't necessarily, that are not biblical references.

Yeah. You recognize them, those phrases, for sure?

Absolutely. Absolutely. I love this, too shall pay us. It's really a. It's a simple yet profound reminder that the tough times we're going through are temporary. Kurt, no matter how difficult a situation might be, it's going to change. It's going to change for us. This. This phrase. I guess a phrase. Phrase is a good word. It does. Has it. Have it have its roots in ancient wisdom? And it's been used throughout millennium to provide comfort and perspective during hard times. I think about Abraham Lincoln, and he used this mindset. He faced immense personal and political challenges throughout his whole life. We've talked about Abraham Lincoln a couple times. He struggled with depression. He lost loved ones, led the country through a civil war, found a way, creative ways to end slavery. But he struggled. He struggled with life, with mental challenges, with depression, with physical challenges, although he was a big, tough guy. And he struggled with relationship challenges with him and his wife. And he held onto this belief, this, too, shall pass, which really helped him endure and ultimately succeed as arguably one of the greatest presidents ever. And his resilience reminds us that even the darkest times are temporary and can lead to growth and change. Resilience. To me, Kurt, it's not about avoiding hardships. It's about. It's about making your way through these tough times and navigating through them with the understanding that they won't last forever. Challenging times reminds us that this, too, shall pass. That's the mindset we have to have. This too shall pass. And that phrase, just by itself, can provide the strength we need to keep moving forward. Preston. Yeah.

I think that becomes more real for you when you've come up against something they're really challenging, and you've overcome it, and then you have that life experience. So that when something like that, even if it's very specific to that, I'm thinking of two big things, like a relationship that ends.

Mm hmm.

I think of that first girlfriend I had. I thought that was the end of the world.

Right.

I didn't have this phrase, this, too, will pass. I was. I was shaken pretty hard by that, but the next one wasn't hard at all.

I'll speak for myself here, Kurt, and this is me reading my mail out loud a little bit, which we tend to do on this show. And I've talked about this before. I have a tendency to catastrophize. I have a tendency to kind of think, okay, this is going to be the worst thing ever. And I don't spend a lot of time there. But that mindset clicks in when I'm facing a real adversity, and I have to move beyond that. And there are three kind of strategies, I guess you would call them three strategies that we can use to help us understand that this, too, shall pass. And you just brought up one of them. It's reflect on our past challenges. Think about previous difficulties that we've overcome. The first one's always the worst, right? That first relationship, that first breakup, that first job loss. However, you lost the job the first time you crash your car, you know, the first time you get in trouble, the first time you disappoint somebody that you really respect. Remembering how we managed to get through these tough times can give us the confidence that we can handle our current struggles. That's why I think kind of journaling is an important thing, and reflection helps us see that we've faced and conquered challenges in the past, and we can do it again. So I like what you said there, Kurt, about understanding and reflecting on what has happened in the past and knowing that we can get through it again and understanding these past challenges that we've had.

You know, I remember interviewing with a. I'll call him a headhunter. This is the best description I can have. I kind of had the job already. I had to do go through the process, working through this job agency, and I met with this guy, I remember, at a Marriott hotel close to where I worked. And I was a little nervous making this job move, and I had some specific reasons why I was nervous about it. He said something to me that was really profound and really stuck with me. And I'm telling you this now because I remember it, that he said, well, have you ever had. And this is technically a challenge that you never really were able to overcome or at least work around it. I said, I sat there and thought about it for a while, but you know what? Now I can't think of anything.

Yeah.

I was like, wow, what a. I just, like, sat back, and that really made an impact on me, especially going into that job that I ended up taking.

You know, if you don't take risks in life, Kurt, you're not going to face challenges. My pastor, and I've probably said this a couple times, he said, safe doesn't make good stories, and safe doesn't make good lessons, either. Right. If you've never had a situation where you had to sit back and say, this, too shall pass, then I really question how much somebody's living for.

Sure. Yeah.

Just, you know, but we're going to face it. Listen, we're going to face it. And resilience is important. And understanding that this, too, shall pass is foundational for me, and it's foundational for many people. But in that you got to maintain perspective, too. You got to keep a long term view. You got to recognize that these setbacks are just a part of life, and they'll lead to personal growth, and they'll lead to new opportunities. But by maintaining perspective, we can see beyond that immediate struggle, that immediate difficulty, and understand that better times are ahead, even if we have to fantasize about it and make it up. If we. If we may not even believe it, that better times are ahead. But if we put that in our mind and we. And we roll through our mind that this, too, shall pass, and we maintain that long term perspective, that mindset can help you, can help us be resilient, stay resilient, and focus on the bigger picture.

Reminds me of when the company I was working for. We knew they were letting us all go. I remember being in a room with a bunch of it people. This was a tough time, too, when the economy was bad, and we also had all this outsourcing going on, and people were really nervous. Some people had a different perspective. We had one guy who got a golden parachute and retired. He was so happy. Then there was me with young kids wondering what in the world is going to. I was really concerned about the future. Luckily, the manager we had was keeping this perspective. Not only this will pass, because he definitely felt that way. He really encourages that everyone's going to land on their feet and looking back on it. We all did. And like you said, I mean, I ended up at the place where I am right now, which ended up being a good place to be. And so. Yeah, you don't see that, though. When you're in the middle of the.

Storm, you don't have. You have to be intentional about it. Right. And thinking about this stuff in advance before you're in this struggle, before you're in the challenge, before resilience has to. Before you have to flex that resilience muscle, it's important to understand that these tough times will come. And with the mindset of this, too shall pass, we can better handle the situation that we're in, because we don't. We're not stuck now. We can be forward. We can be forward. Look, looking and forward. Forward planning. I think it's important to learn from the struggle as well, don't you, Kurt?

Oh, yeah, absolutely. Like I said, I think if you've been through a similar experience that second time around. So much easier.

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, if you've already overcome something before and, and you're up against it before, it's like night and day. I mean, you might not even stress about it at all to some degree.

If you can understand that every challenge comes with a lesson. And instead of just enduring tough times and pushing through it, if you actively seek out that lesson and reflect on what this experience is teaching you about yourself, about your strengths, about where you might need to improve the aspects of life you might take for granted and not be as grateful for. By learning from the struggle or understanding that you're going to learn from the struggle, you really do transfer, transform this adversity into a super powerful tool for personal development and resilience.

Yeah, I think you get ideas in your head that might not be true, but to you they are. Again, I've used this example of, hey, I'm an expert in this particular area. I don't know that I could really make it. How do I transform into something different? How do I move into something else? How long is it going to take me to get to where I am right now? And ive talked about how ive been able to do that over the years. So now I know I was wrong before. I have the ability to do some of the things that I thought were going to be tough. And thats a great lesson, to have evidence of overcoming things, Nate.

And if you do have evidence for overcoming things and you are able to put yourself into a mindset of what can I learn here? What can I learn about myself? What are my strengths? What are my weaknesses? What are my areas for improvement? If you can put yourself into that mindset as you're understanding that this too shall pass, it allows you to ask yourself the question, what does this make possible? And I love this question. When I'm going through struggles, one other question that I kind of dip in there, too is, what happens if this is the greatest thing that's ever happened to me? It's the same question, but what does this make possible? Or what happens if this is the greatest thing that's ever happened to me? When I think about this simple phrase, what does this make possible? I'm really encouraged to look at challenges and setbacks in this new perspective, focusing not necessarily on the obstacle itself, but on the opportunities it presents. Instead of dwelling on what's going wrong, we can ask, what are the new possibilities that might open up as a result of this struggle? I think about Thomas Edison, Thomas Edison. In 1914, his laboratory burned down, destroying years of his valuable work. But you know what the funny thing about Thomas Edison is? He had a way of. He had a way of turning. Of turning his mindset. And when he saw this, this burned down laboratory with all of his years of valuable work, he didn't see it as a disaster. In fact, he's quoted famously for saying, thank goodness all of our mistakes were burned up. Now we can start fresh again. Wow. That's amazing to me. And how that mindset can allow him to rebuild and continue inventing and continue innovating. His ability to see this opportunity, Kurt, in adversity, is such a powerful example of just asking, what does this make possible?

I love that story. I didn't know that. Course, he's an incredible inventor of so many things. It's not surprising. This was his mindset. I mean, I'll go back to Walt Disney, and this is not that he had an invert. He had lots of adversity, too. But I'm thinking of the amazing accomplishment of building Disneyland. But, my gosh, they made so many mistakes. They had promoted it so high on television. The whole world was coming to Disneyland that first day it opened, and there were so many things that didn't work. They. They went, ladies shoes were sinking into the asphalt heels. Things just were broke down. They didn't have enough food. All these problems, and they just didn't have enough land, either. But when he dreamed up of Disney World, what was going through his mind was, what could we do bigger? What can we do better? Because we had learned from so many mistakes that we made at Disneyland or opportunities we didn't have because of the land, that constraints that they had. But in Disney world in Florida, they had all the land they could possibly ever need to last for generations. So it wasn't just an adversity thing, but the fact that they. You always build on those mistakes. You know, you look at someone's career, and that's been really successful. It's always one challenge after another that just keeps growing, and you take on tougher challenges that you overcome. You build something even bigger.

You build that resilience muscle because you've been through it, because you've changed your mindset. You've pushed through.

Let's take on another bigger challenge. Right?

Absolutely. You know, in the same way that we said before, that resilience isn't about avoiding hardships. Resilience isn't about just bouncing back. It's about bouncing forward. Kurt, if we just shift our focus to potential opportunities, we can turn these setbacks into, I don't know, stepping stones for growth and innovation and learning and exploring opportunities. I love that. Resilience isn't about bouncing back, it's about bouncing forward. And when I think about what does this make possible, three things come to mind. Reframe the situation. Embrace growth. And I want to save the next one for itself, by itself, asking ourselves, what does this make possible? Reframes that challenge. It reframes that challenge from an obstacle into an opportunity. And the question can help us shift from the mindset of loss to one of gain to one of profit. However you want to look at profit. And by viewing obstacles as potential opportunities, we open up ourselves to a whole world of creative solutions and new paths and new ideas and new ways to think and do things.

I think it's fascinating how you can look at the same situation from different perspectives and they be completely opposite of each other. Or two different people can be looking at the same challenge and have two different perspectives, really bouncing forward in one, you know, staying and being.

Staying. Stuck.

Yeah, staying. Stuck. It's.

Yeah, it's fascinating.

Stuck. We can. We have that capability to do similarly.

To learning from our struggles that we talked about before is embracing growth. If we use these setbacks as a learning experience and reflect on what the situation is, has taught us, or is teaching us, and how it can contribute to our personal or professional development. By embracing growth, you transform obstacles into opportunities for improvement and advancement. Each challenge becomes a stepping stone for greater achievements and personal growth. But you have to embrace it. You have to embrace growth. You have to allow yourself to see this situation by asking yourself, what does this make possible? How can I grow? How can I learn and grow and be a better person for this?

Do you ever have something you worked really hard on and then end up throwing it all away? That can be a really frustrating thing. This is a small example, but I worked on something. It was something I was pretty proud of, and it was part of a larger project. And my manager recently told me, you know, I hate to tell you this, but we're going to do this in a different way now. Some people could get really upset about that, and that could be a real. I mean, for me, it's not, I always, in the work that I do, I'm always learning something. And in that particular project, I learned something. And I even said to him directly, I said, you know, we still could use this pattern on something else when it comes up because we've proved it works. If we wanted to use it for something else. We certainly can. So, yeah, it's definitely a different perspective because you can get really defensive on somebody telling you, hey, we're not going to use that.

Well, I'm going through that right now, Kurt, in a way, I've spent the past year developing sales strategies, selling processes and ways of looking at selling in my business that are unique. And I've spent the past year building these processes and I'm about to scrap half of them and rebuild for a new vision and rebuild for a new strategy. Now many of these strategies worked very well over the past year, but many of them did not. And our markets have changed and our, and our, our corporate mindset has changed. And so I'm about to scrap half of what I did over the past year and start anew. So it's, it's painful, man. I have some ego invested in this stuff, dude, and, and I like it and I liked what we were doing and I liked the results we were getting and I liked the, but that's a one year view or a two year view. When I look at the ten year view, we have to make some changes.

You know, in software development they talk about agile development and part of that philosophy is fail fast. Especially when you're in a competitive environment, fail fast so you could get to the, get to what's going to be the thing that works.

So when this next strategy is near and dear to my heart, and I think you'll appreciate it as well, we have some discussion over the law of attraction and that idea, and this isn't necessarily that, but it's similar. If you're going to embrace the mindset of what does this make possible, you have to be open to what the universe or God or your higher power has in store for you next. You have to be open to that. Sometimes life's challenges are a way of steering us towards a path we've never considered. We have to stay open current. We have to stay open minded and receptive to the possibilities that are ready to come our way. If we just leave ourselves open, leave ourselves a little liberally minded and understand that the universe might have something amazing for something we would have never considered, and trust that there may be a greater plan at work, whatever that plan, greater plan is from God, your higher power, whatever you might want to call it. My christian faith is very important to me, and I know it's important to you as well Kurtzen and thats where I latch onto. And I can certainly weve done some early episodes about the validity of our christian faith but we wont go into that now. But you got to be open to what the universe or what God has for you next. This openness can lead to unexpected and incredibly rewarding opportunities.

I think this is something I was reading, I've read this before and just recently was, it came across my path again is don't get hung up on the hows. How are we going to make this work? Because that will lock you up. But this openness to it, eventually the hows are going to come to you. I don't know where they're going to come, but if you just keep pushing forward, doing what you can with what you got, the hows are going to show up in unexpected ways. And as long as you have that big reason why you want to do something, the hows are going to happen. But a lot of times we get really frustrated and as Joe will say, locked up, thinking about how we're going to get something accomplished, and that is not the best way forward.

I agree. I agree. We have to be open. We have to be open to resolutions, pathways, ideas that we would, that we would have never thought of. We can call it the muse, right? We can call it God, we can call it the universe. We can call it whatever we want to call it. We have to be open to these challenges, steering us towards a brand new path and to be ready to engage that new path and take that path wherever it takes us.

You can describe it in a lot of, you know. Yes. You can describe it in, in a faith base, you can describe it in a universal way or a scientific way, like the reticular. What's that called?

Activator.

Either activator. Activator, yeah, that thing that you focus on. Why is it those things appear to you when you're focused on them, and if you're not focused on them, you don't see them at all. It's a scientific fact. So, yeah, it's, it's, it's, I think, I think it's fascinating, but it's so true. And you and I have talked about situations in our lives. When you're thinking about something and maybe someone, you think they say something and it just, you know, something clicks. Like, oh, that's, that's something I haven't tried yet. Let me, let me go in that direction. And, and, wow, look at that. Where did that come from?

Mm hmm.

How did that.

Magical, right? Yeah, it was, it's almost an, it's almost an entity in and of itself that has shown up in your life.

Yeah.

And you're in your finally recognizing resilience itself is built one day at a time, Kurt. And by seeing beyond the immediate difficulty and recognizing the potential for new beginnings, for understanding and learning and growth, by holding on to the belief that this, too, shall pass, you're not going to be stuck in that forever. You're not going to be in this situation forever. You can navigate all these life's challenges, all these struggles with greater strength and optimism. And I'm surprised we didn't bring up the idea of optimism, but I think optimism is threaded throughout the. Woven throughout this discussion. And when we ask ourselves, what does this make possible? To transform challenges into opportunities and really move forward with a sense of purpose. Every storm runs out of rain, right? You ever been driving through a storm and you're thinking, man, this thing's lasting forever? And what's on the other side of that storm? Usually sunshine, maybe a lot of traffic, but you're still out of the storm. But every storm runs out of rain, Kurt.

Hopefully not a down charge.

Gonna need to call your dad to get it out of the way. But it's true. Every storm eventually runs out of rain. Every hardship has its end. Every setback can be a setup for something greater. We say this at the end of the show, but I'll say it right now, we got to keep moving forward and exploring the possibilities and knowing that brighter days are ahead. That's how we build resilience one day at a time. Facing our challenges, not that they're not serious, not that they're not painful, but facing them with the two mindsets, this, too, shall pass. And what does this make possible?

Yeah. When you first hear the word resilience, to me, it's got a negative tone to it, and it really shouldn't. It's such a great life skill. I'm so glad you brought this up as a topic. I think anyone will tell you, look at any successful person, it's not their talent, necessarily, although talent is a good thing to have. But you're going to find, and we've talked about this so many times, it's that person that just isn't going to give up. They've. They've got a reason why, and they've. They're. They're going like, hell bent for election. It's going. They're just going to make it happen.

Yeah.

It's that resilient person that is ends up being really successful. You think they're lucky, but you know for a fact they've crawled over and climbed over so many challenges to get there.

Yeah, they've got scars. They're bloodied still. They've got bandages there. They've been through the battle, and I want to go through the battle, and I've been through the battle. I've been through many battles, and I know you have to, Kurt, and I want to continue to go through the battle. Battles are good. Struggle is good. Find a way to be resilient and build your resilience, and we'll be better for it.

Yeah. Those things you're going to be most proud of are going to be the ones that you really had to work hard through. I love this topic, Joe. It's really interesting how I was reading a book that I'll be bringing up in my probably next episode. I'll be looking at some things. Resilience was threaded in through many of the things that I was reading recently. So it was really interesting you came up with this topic. I love this topic. Good job. Great way of presenting it to for everyone.

I appreciate it, man. How about your win for the week?

I booked a Disney world vacation for the end of August.

Of course you did.

Don't say that, because I had nothing planned. And I think I mentioned to you I was a little jealous that you were at the beach and you had already. You went to Portugal, and I had lots of friends going and talking about vacations. We had a big all employee meeting, and at the end, our chief executive officer said, hey, you know, it's summer, everyone take some time off and refresh and recharge and have fun at the beach and all this stuff. And I'm just. Joe, I was low. I was down. I was feeling a little low. And I know my wife and I were in the car doing some grocery shopping, and she said something to me that kind of set me off, too, because I was already feeling grounded about this, like I was trying to. I've been trying to get her to make a decision on something we could do. I was a vacation between now and the end of the year. I wasn't really looking to do the end of August, but she sensed that I was upset about that for. And then a couple days later, she said, hey, you know anyone who's going to Disney World, you know, and suggesting, or she's, you know, what are the dates? I'll go. I'm gonna go check out the flights for you, and if you want to go, I'm gonna stay home. We got things going on at home. I'm gonna take care of them. But if you want to go, tell me your dates, and I'll start looking at some prices. And that's how it started.

So you're going by yourself. Well, we also not necessarily by yourself, because you. At any given moment, you have listenership, you have your community, somebody in your communities. At Disney.

Yeah. That was the conversation. You know, do you know anyone who's going, you know, we call it a geek meet. Now, I knew my friend Samantha's birthday trip was end of August. I knew there were a few people getting together for that. So that was the dates I gave her. She's. And I think Samantha mentioned to me when we had an online meeting recently, a friend of ours, Dan, when they were talking about that trip, kind of perked his ears up, thinking he might go. So I called him, sent him a text message, and within a few hours, he said, I'm in. So we booked a room. He always books with my wife anyway. And we split the rooms, took it off, took care of it within a couple days. And him and I are sharing a room down at pop century. And we're going to be there with a bunch of other people. So it's going to be a. It's gonna be hot. So we're gonna have to find ways to beat the heat. We're probably doing a lot of lounges. I said to him, very cool. I'm really excited. Yeah. So it's like two weeks, and I'll be in Disney World.

All right, man. Can't wait for a full report.

That was my win. What was your win for the week?

Well, my win is very similar and obvious. I just got back from a family vacation to defusky island out that. Out there outside of Hilton head. And it's a really neat place because you can. You can only get there through a ferry. And there's. I probably saw ten regular motor vehicles on the whole island the week I was there. And they were all maintenance vehicles, plumbers and builders and a fire truck and stuff like that. Right. All that kind of stuff. And spent six days. Yeah, I would say five, six days, because you got your check in day and you got your checkout day, which don't really count, but spent, let's call it six days on this beautiful island, peaceful island, great, great beaches. You have to have a golf cart while you're there. So we got four golf carts and one for each kind of family group. So we could all kind of go off on our own when we wanted to go off on our own or go all together. And it's funny, there are lots. There's lots of people on this island. And it's funny how often we accidentally ran into each other. We're going to the local winery, and. Well, there's my daughter and son in law. We head over to the beach, and there's my other daughter and son in law and two grandkids, and there's my. And we drive down the road and we pass up my daughter and my youngest grandson. And it's just. It's so funny how that happened. And just had a blast. Had a really good time. We'll. We'll try to do this every year as a family, and we try to do it every year, but this is my win for the week. Grandpa's the best, dude. How about your resource? You know, there's something interesting that I'd like for us to explore sometime. It's the idea of grounding. There's some. There's some really neat research out there about standing barefoot on the ground for an extended period of time with your feet touching the ground and what that does for your body, for healing, for your mental. For your mentality. And I think there's something to this. I don't know a lot about it, but I've heard a lot about it. And I'd like to. I'd like for us to explore this one day on the. On the lemon water. A nice. A neat little hack to build on top of that is they make those lemon squeezers, those. And they're pretty cheap. Five, $6 that you cut the lemon in half and you put the. You put it in its little pocket and you squeeze the handle and it just pours the juice right out of there. I remember my grandma's old lemon squeezer where it was basically a ridged mound, and she'd sit there and squeeze the lemon or squeeze the orange and it would drip into the pan. But this is. This is real quick. You put the lemon into the. You put the half the lemon into the little pocket there and squeeze it together and instant juice.

I like that idea. I was thinking when I read this, would I get one? You don't get a little plastic lemon thing that had lemon juice in it.

Yeah.

Is that the same thing as getting a real lemon, like you're saying?

I think a real lemon is the way to go, man.

I do, too.

I think a real lemon is the way to go. The reason I know about this is I used to do this and. And it worked so good, I stopped.

I thought so.

It was part of my morning routine.

Doctor Justin. I thought so. Did you ever was this the reason you did it, to increase your metabolism, Evan?

Yeah. I think the combination of the morning routine, everything in combination was. Was great. But I do remember that this really gave me kind of a boost of energy. And again, like most things, it works so well. You stop. Right. My resource is an interesting resource, Kurt. I. And I just real. I realized this in Portugal, and it really settled in on this vacation, and you're ready. This resource is something that everybody can take advantage of as long as the day is right, but everybody can take advantage of it, and it's no more. You probably have to travel no more than a few minutes from your house to take advantage of this, but you might have to travel some. My resource is a sunrise. Now, that might sound like a strange resource, but when I talk about. When I thought about that Portugal saying back a few episodes ago, when I went to Portugal, when the english translation says that a sunrise is for everyone, a sunrise is for everyone, that is just such a neat way to. Once a month, once a week, whatever it might take, find a place to watch the sunrise. You may have. You might have to watch it sunrise over. Watch the sunrise over some buildings or over a hill. There might be some electrical wires there, but just take it in. Know that that day, that sunrise, is for you. And no matter how. How poor you are, how rich you are, what your lot in life is, that sunrise represents a new day for you. And I really invite you to take a moment and experience it. Just let it happen. A couple things that I do when I. When I go watch the sunrise on vacation, Kurt, is I'll always take my camera with me, either my phone or a regular camera. And I want to just capture that perfect sunrise. The last couple of days, I stopped doing that. I put my phone down, didn't take my. Didn't take my camera out, and I just watched the sunrise. And thank God for a brand new day, a brand new opportunity. And what a great resource I found that to be for inspiration and peace and motivation. I'm going to make it a point not just to do this on vacation. I'm going to make it a point to maybe a couple times a month, get up early in the morning, find the best place here in Cincinnati to watch the sunrise, drive to that sunrise and just experience it and enjoy it.

I love this. And I. I don't think there's a better place than the Atlantic Ocean. Another reason why I was jealous, you were sending me pictures of sunrises when you're. When you were there, like that Wildwood beach, which looks a lot similar to where you were. And there is nothing like on a nice clear day or even when there's a little bit of clouds, you get the color of that sunrise. But with the ocean there, the breeze, and really not very many people there for the sunrise for you, do you really come across a lot of people? There's a lot of peaceful, usually, usually.

A few minutes after. The secret to the sunrise is just go on the Internet, look up sunrises in Cincinnati or sunrises. And what time does the sunrise in Torrington, Connecticut? That'll tell you. Right. And you show up a half an hour before the sunrise. That's where 45 minutes to a half an hour before that sunrise time, that's when you're going to see the color. That's when you're going to see the beauty, the reflection in the clouds and that orange glow or that deep. I saw a couple deep purple glows as it's bouncing off the clouds or bouncing off the mist, whatever it is. And if you do it, if you just do it, make it a point to go see a sunrise. No matter where you are, you don't have to wait till you're at the beach or in the mountains. Just find where you can watch a sunrise and watch the sunrise.

One of my favorite things on vacation was walking the beaches. And when the sun was rising, another close second, we probably both agreed it might be second place is the sunset. There was a place in Cape May, New Jersey, which is the very tip bottom of New Jersey. They had sunset beach, and it was common for people to go down there. There'd be a lot of cars lining up early. They always had a flag ceremony there, too. And speaking of my dad, they'd have a veteran there and they would do a salute and honor. A veteran every, every evening. And something about the beach, too. The sun burns off the clouds, you know, like the sun. I was telling you, hey, it's a little cloudy. Don't worry. The sun's going to burn off all that cloud. But the sunset beach in Cape May, New Jersey, there's a resource for you that's, you know, it's the day ending, which is not as maybe uplifting as the day starting, but it's still gorgeous. You get some really good colors from that.

The important thing is you don't have to wait to go to a beach. Don't wait to go to the, you don't have to wait to go to the mountains or the lake or anything like that. Just wherever you are in the city, find out a good place to watch the sunrise again. It might be. You might have to watch it over some buildings. You might have to watch it over some hills. There might be some telephone wires there, some electrical wires, but still, soak it in and know that this sunrise is for you. You got a brand new day ahead of you, brother. Take advantage of it. So there's my resource. Let's wrap up with our quotes.

No matter how much falls on us, we keep plowing ahead. That's the only way to keep the roads clear, friend. Greg Kincaid.

I like that.

Pretty straightforward.

And it reminds me of your dad in a way, right?

He did a lot of plowing of snow, too, that's for sure. Clearing the way.

We got to keep plowing ahead, right. And you know what we do when we plow ahead? We make the path better for somebody else, for sure. Right. We make the path easier for someone else. That's the only way that we can keep that road clear. Whatever that road is, that metaphoric road.

I'll tell you, it's not metaphoric. In New England in the winter. Everybody's got a plow here.

I like that. I like that. Greg Kincaid. I do. You know, I have a, I have a playlist, Kurt, that I always play when we're driving for vacation. I love the driver drive for vacation. And this playlist is called happy music, and it has lots of songs that are just upbeat and happy. I mean, the song. The song happy by Pharrell is on there. Don't worry. Be happy by Bobby McFerrin is on there, as well as several other tunes that are just kind of upbeat and joyful. But one of those songs is called Three Little Birds by Bob marley.

I have the same playlist, dude.

I love that song.

Yeah.

It. It is about as a happy, feel good, optimistic song. You can, you can hear. I love it.

I love Bob Marley. Many of his songs are like that.

Yeah. Yeah. Just a great soul. And he has this quote that really hits home with me. You never know how strong you are until being strong is your only choice.

Yeah. You got no option.

That's awesome, man.

Yeah. He got shot during political upheaval in Jamaica.

Yeah.

On stage, I believe. I really want to see the movie that's out recently. It's. It's really in a place where you got to pay for it. I can't. As soon as you don't have to pay for it, I'm going to watch it on some kind of streaming channel. But I love Bob Marley. I love this quote by him. Yeah. He's such a great spirit, for sure. But, yeah, I think, boy, talking about tough times, I'd love to hear his story, because growing up in Kingston, Jamaica, you don't, you don't have much option.

He certainly, he certainly had resilience, didn't he?

Oh, I'm sure in so many ways. That's why I really want to see that movie. And hopefully they'll, they'll, they'll show you a lot of that. But to have that positive outlook with all of the struggles living in dirt poor Jamaica and the violence and political upheaval, it's. It's a great story. It's great music that transcended so many international cultures. I love Bob Marley. He's one of my top. You know, if I think of. I told you I got this chance to see Neil Young recently, and there's a couple of artists that just are huge for me. Bob Marley's one of them. Jerry Garcia, similar.

John just celebrated. I mean, you know, they just. It was his birthday just last week, I think.

Yeah, yeah. I get a lot of emails, you know, them selling stuff.

Sure.

His birthday.

Well, let's wrap up right there. Our website is dudesinprogress.com dot. Dudesinprogress.com, and our email address is dudesinprogress.com dot. If you want to reach out to us about the show, talk about the show, maybe give us a few ideas on what you want to hear on the show, we're open to that. If you want to investigate or explore our coaching services, we are certainly open to talking with you about that. Dudes in progress.com. and remember, as we are being resilient, as we are pushing through, we don't have to be perfect. We just have to make progress. We have to go one day, one step at a time, and overcome these obstacles. Because progress is better than perfection. We got to keep moving forward.

Dude, I love this reminder, resilience. So important. Joe. I will do my best. Keep this in mind as we go forward this coming week.

Talk to you soon, buddy.