The Importance of a Tribe, How a Man Shows Up, and Confronting Toxic Employees ｜ ASK ME ANYTHING
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 5 minutes
Words per Minute
186.33333
Summary
In this episode, we discuss the importance of a solid plan for the new year and how to stay on track with your goals and dreams. We also discuss the benefits of a strong support network and how important it is to have a framework.
Transcript
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You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest, embrace your fears, and boldly chart
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your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time.
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You are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who
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you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,
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you can call yourself a man. Kip, what's up, man? Great to see you on Monday morning. Always
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getting the week off started, right? Yes. Yes, sir. And we got a couple of questions from,
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well, a handful of questions from the Foundry and also from Facebook. And some of these are
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pretty good. There's a theme, end of year, visions, what does 2024 look like? So we'll get to them.
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I'm sure it's on a lot of guys' minds. So hopefully these are beneficial questions as well as our
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responses. No guarantees. Yeah, right. I hope that, I mean, the biggest thing is that we implement,
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because it seems to me, and I do this too, I'm guilty of it just like anybody else, is that we
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get all hyped up at the end of the year, beginning of 2024. And then we gradually slip into old patterns
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and old habits. And then we do the same thing next year. And then you hear phrases like,
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2023 was my warmup and 2024 is my year. And it's every single year. And I've been there too,
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so I get it. I would just hope that guys actually take the advice that either we share,
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or they pick up somewhere else in a book or from one of our guests and actually implement it not
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for the year, but as a lifelong strategy. And I think that's the key. If you decide to go into
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something and you decide that this is going to be a lifetime commitment, not, hey, I'm going to try
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this and see how it works, then you're going to be more likely to produce the results. If it comes
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from a credible source and it's proven to be a tool or a tactic or strategy that actually works.
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And one thing I will say that's helped, and I know I'm biased as I talk about this,
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but I need to bring this up. One thing that has helped thousands and thousands of men turn some
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of these tactics and strategies into long-term solutions to what they're trying to accomplish
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in life is having two things. It's having a brotherhood and it's having a framework.
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So if you have the tools and the systems, but you don't have a brotherhood to back you up,
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to support you along the way, or give you the kick in the pants when you need it,
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you might deviate. If you have a brotherhood, but you don't have any framework, well,
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you're just throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks. So that's where the iron council comes
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in. You're going to have the framework because we have all of these tools and resources,
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conversations, accountability, monthly topics, assignments, challenges, conversations,
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guest experts. I mean, you name it. And then you have a brotherhood of guys who are actually working
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and have a vested interest in you achieving and succeeding. So it is open right now and it'll be open
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through the first week of January. We extended the open enrollment period just a little bit longer
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because I know there's going to be some stragglers that are like, okay, now that it's 2024, it's
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January 1st. Now I can start. We'll help you guys out too. So check it out. Order of man.com
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slash iron council. So important, man, that tribe that we put ourselves around. In fact, this was my
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journal entry this morning as, as I was doing my morning routine on how critical it is to have a
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tribe around you that, that to be frank, helps you when you're struggling, gives you the courage when
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you don't have courage that speaks truth into you when you might be questioning things. And not only is
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that valuable, but for a lot of people to be frank, some of their tribes are negative. So instead of
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getting that encouragement, instead of getting someone speaking truth and like calling you up, it's
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someone that's pulling you down, that's suggesting mediocrity. And it's the complete opposite. And this
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idea that we can, you know, and, and don't get me wrong. Like I, I like it. I like the thought of, Hey, I
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shouldn't need those things. Right. And I need to have self-discipline or whatever, but life happens. And
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sometimes we don't have the courage. We don't have the knowledge. We don't have the motivation and it
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matters who we surround ourselves by. And a lot of us have to be frank, mediocre people around us
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that, that probably talk into us in a more negative way than, than a positive one. Yeah. It's crazy.
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You said something I found interesting. You said, I don't like that. It's, or what did you say? I
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don't like that. It's this way that we need to be around and what, why? I mean, I like the idea of
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like, I can have self-discipline and, and, and I don't need structure. Right. I like that idea,
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but it's, I'm not perfect, you know, and I, I'll, I'll be short tomorrow and I'm going to
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F things up next week. And if I'm surrounding myself around like-minded men that uplift me,
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Oh, I agree. It's just a, it's just a really interesting thing. I hear it all the time.
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Guys are like, I don't need that. And I'm going to, I'm a, I'm a, I'm an Omega or whatever they
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call it. I'm going to do it on my own and I don't need anybody else. And you can't rely on other
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people. And I don't know why that started happening. If a guy like that, with that kind
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of attitude looks at other aspects of life, I guarantee that he values the idea of having a system
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in place, even if it's as simple as watching a football game on Sunday, like you watch those
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guys, you're inspired by them, right? They're, they're highly athletic. They're trained, they're
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disciplined, they're committed. Sure. They have self-discipline and all this stuff, but they're
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part of a program. There's play, there's a playbook. There's a literal playbook that they follow. They
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don't just do their own thing. They follow it. And then what they do is they actually go in and they
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review the tape and they see where they messed up and they're accountable. The linemen are
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accountable to their quarterback, right? The quarterback is accountable to his receivers.
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The running back is accountable to his blockers. They're all accountable saying, Hey, you didn't
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do as good a job as you could have done right there. And nobody bats an eye when we see it in
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that context, but when it applies to our life, Oh, well, you know, I don't, I could do it on my own.
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What makes you think that? And why does that, why does that make you weak? You should have
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discipline. You should be committed. All the things that we talk about often. And you can also
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have men around you who support you, edify, uplift you, motivate you, inspire you and keep you on the
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path. Well, and it's kind of a form of arrogance when I think about it, that I know everything. I mean,
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so much possibilities and what's available to me as a man is, was made possible through other men.
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Things that were never on my radar, all of a sudden became possible because I saw it done
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by someone that I have a relationship with. You know, we, we were kind of chatting kind of this,
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this morning and this weekend with, with Tom, I can't imagine, or I would probably bet, and maybe
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I'm making some major assumptions here, but Tom did some great stuff, is doing some great stuff.
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That was more likely made possible through him seeing you do something.
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And he goes, whoa, you know, Ryan creates this movement, makes a difference. If he could do that,
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I, that's now available to me. It's, it's just like the world records around the mile or whatever.
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Once someone beats that record, all of a sudden everyone starts beating it. What changed?
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Was now made available and men and people start going, oh, maybe that's available to me. That's
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now possible for me. Something that seemed impossible is now possible. And it almost requires
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another human to model that for us. So for us to self-evaluate and determine if that's available
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to, you know what I mean? For us in our lives. Yeah.
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Well, and shout out to Dom. He didn't ask for us to mention this, but he, he has an organization
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called Sons of Thunder, which is, it looks like a organization he created through his ministries,
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his church and ministries. And he had 40 guys show up. They're working with a family now,
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a single mother, and they're remodeling a home. It looks like they've donated to, I think,
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tens of thousands of dollars to charity between all of them. Like I said, they're remodeling this home.
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They're helping the youth. And I think his goal, if I remember correctly, I'd have to look at the
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text, something like having a thousand men, part of this organization and helping over a million
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people. That's not only look, I'm not, I'm not going to take any credit for what he's doing,
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but he did start in what we're doing. And he's been a big part of what we're doing here with
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order of man and iron council. And he was, he was a member for a very long time until he got busy
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with his life, which is good. And he might've been inspired to a degree by what we're doing.
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And now I'm reinvigorated and re-inspired by what he's doing.
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So we're all helping each other. And, and I, there's things, a lot of guys will talk about
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competition, especially in this space. There's a lot of men's movements, men's organizations.
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I did very early on buy into the idea of competition where I was like, I'm not going to
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share any of that stuff. I turned that pretty quick. If a guy calls me and he's trying to start
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something similar, man, I'm going to give him a few pointers and give him some advice. I've done
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free coaching for guys who are starting men's movements. There's no competition. There's 8
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billion plus people on the planet. Let's assume that half of them roughly are men. That's 4 billion
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people. I need to be able to serve a thousand, two, 3,000 men hyper, like hyper focused on those
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guys out of 4 billion. I think we're going to be okay. And we need more men in this space doing it
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their own way. And I know you just said it, but I've always been impressed by that, by the way,
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over the years, like I'll see you get on a podcast. And I'm like, it's just another flight,
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like more or less someone like grab what you've done. They got a Robin still, give it a different
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brand. And you're like, you're a guest on their podcast. And I'm like, I remember at first going,
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what are you doing, Ryan? Right? Like, you know what I mean? But it's, it's so true. And it,
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and it's a huge testament in regards to how you show up. I even remember when Dom stepped away
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because he was in leadership in the iron council and, and we had a conversation, he felt, man,
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I feel kind of bad. Like I'm, I'm, I'm abandoning the mission. And I'm like, Dom, this is the mission.
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Yes. Label it whatever you want it, but, but you moving on and, and tackling something else
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is what this is about. It is what order of man is about. It is what the iron council is about.
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Wow. And, and I don't know. And, and you're a, you, you magnify that well. And that's super been
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impressive to see how uncompetitive you are. And it's really an abundance mentality and it's,
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and it's awesome. That's it. No, I appreciate that. I appreciate that kid. There's, there is
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another lesson I think guys ought to be aware of. I have this thought about two types of people in
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the world when it comes to starting movements or businesses or whatever it might be. There's a
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certain group of people who I could share every industry secret, every trade secret, every future
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plan I have. I could literally give them the roadmap to what we've created here and what we will create
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in the future, everything. And they won't do a thing about it. Then there's another group of people
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who I don't have to share anything. I don't have to give them anything. I don't have to share anything.
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I, I keep everything closed and guarded and those people will go out and create it regardless of
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whether or not I offered my help. So you have two people, people who won't do anything and people who
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will do, do something. So you might as well, cause it doesn't have anything to do with you, whether or
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not I help somebody is irrelevant because they're either going to do it or they're not going to do it.
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So I figure, well, if that guy's going to do it without me, I'd rather have an ally and help him
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along the path. Because at some point this may become a friendship or a business partnership or
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an opportunity that would not have existed had I kept everything a secret. He's either going to do
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it or he's not whether I share or not. So I might as well share. Yeah. Yeah. It's fascinating.
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Okay. All right. Let's get into some questions. Let's do it. All right. Nathan Fullerton going into
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2024. What advice would you give men on how to figure out and then execute their one big ass hairy
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goal for 2024? Side note, what is your big ass hairy goal for 2024? And then of course, a little bit
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of hashtag hashtags for Nathan here, men of Mars. He's obviously part of battle team Mars here. So
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got some Mars pride. So what strategies do I have in place? Here's the problem with the answer.
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It's so boring. It's so boring. It does not make for a good podcast. It doesn't make for a good
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soundbite. It doesn't make for something that you could go in and meme later. It's so boring. And we've
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been talking about it forever. It's the battle plan. Yeah, it is. So let me explain that briefly for those of
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you guys who aren't aware of it. The battle plan is number one, casting a vision for yourself.
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This is thinking about your future version of yourself. What would you like it to look like?
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How are you showing up when life is good? How do you react when life is bad? How do you respond?
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What kind of goals and dreams and desires? Who is around you? What kind of work are you doing?
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It's that vision of who you want to be in the future. Once we start to craft that vision,
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then we work backwards into objectives. These are goals in four main categories. I won't get into
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all of it right now, but goals in four main categories of life that you can complete in 90
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days, not 120 days, not 30 days, not 90 days. Right. In 90 days, what can you do? So this is kind of
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counter to that big ass, hairy, audacious goal or whatever Nate said. It's just doing it every single
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90 days. And then the next 90 days is something else. And the next is something else. We're adding
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on to what you currently did. Then from there, we work backwards into tactics. Some of you guys are
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already, I can see your eyes glossed over right now. You're already so bored. This is what I'm saying.
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It's boring. Okay. The tactics are the things that you do on a daily basis in order to achieve your
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objective. So if for the first quarter of 2024, you want to increase your bottom line from 100,000 to
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200,000, just using easy math here, that's 100,000 in 90 days. That means that every day you need to
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make $1,000 more, a little more than, but roughly $1,000 more than you did the previous quarter.
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How do you do that? Well, maybe it's making more sales calls and that becomes your daily tactic.
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I got to make five more sales calls per day. Maybe it's getting your current customers to buy more
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stuff from you. That also requires additional sales calls. Maybe it's upselling or selling more where
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your average sale maybe was 500. Now it's 1500. Well, there you go. So what do you need? Maybe it's
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some sales training for your people so they can turn a $500 sale into a $1,500 sale.
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But the point is there's a tactic. There's a measurable, quantifiable tactic that you can employ
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every single day that will inevitably produce that $100,000 additional revenue in the first quarter of
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2024, which will inevitably lead you to being more of the kind of guy you want to be. Maybe you have a
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vision that you want to hire 100 people because you find tremendous value and satisfaction in growing
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your community and putting people to work and meaningful, fulfilling jobs. That's part of your
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vision. See how this all ties together? So I'm not necessarily a big, hairy, audacious goal kind of
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guy. I'm monotonous. I'm relentless. I'm consistent. And I know that the big results will take care of
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themselves. Now I do have some bigger goals that will last longer than 90 days. One is to put
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together a huge men's summit. I don't see that happening in 2024 to the degree that I want,
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which is 1000 men getting together for an annual summit. But I think we can get four or 500 people
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there for 2024. And I'm doing the same exact thing, working it backwards into tactics that I can employ
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every day to accomplish that goal in the fall of 2024. Yeah, it's perfect. Related to that,
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Joshua Collins, he says, what about your vision is the single most driving value you have?
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How did you come to that conclusion? For me, it's my faith as that is what's guided every major
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decision I've made over the past 15 years from going to Bible college, to teaching a Christian school,
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to moving out to where I'm now part of a church plant. I think that's an incredible driving factor.
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If that works for you, great. I am somebody who's spiritual. I believe in God and I do go to church
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and participate in those types of activities. And the guys, I know where this is going already,
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but the guys who are devout are going to say, well, you need to do it this way. And maybe that is a way,
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I don't know. This is the way I do it. I'm driven by being a good man. And what does that mean? Well,
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I have my definition and you can have your definition. A couple of values, since he's
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asking about values, we talked about this last week. For me, it's adaptability. I need to learn
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how to adapt and evolve. And a man who can do that, I think puts himself light years ahead of anybody
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else because life is going to come at you fast. Things are going to happen in your benefit. Things are
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going to happen that are going to work against you. You're going to have situations that you create
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for yourself, situations thrust upon you that are of no fault of your own. And your ability to adapt
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and evolve to those environments and circumstances spells the difference between success and failure
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for you and the people you have a responsibility for. The other value that really drives me, and these
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are things that we don't necessarily talk about, so I bring these up, is that I value trying new
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things, taking risks, experimentation, putting myself out there, experiencing life, experiencing
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ideas, bringing and breathing life into my ideas and dreams. That's a value, a personal value of mine.
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And again, I think a man who's doing that is taking his God-given talents and gifts and abilities
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and putting them into action for his benefit and the benefit of other people. So I choose to look at it
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as be a good man. And frankly, part of that is the gospel. I do look to the gospel as an example of
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what it means to be a good man and how good men show up for themselves and other people. So certainly
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it's infused into my doctrine, if you want to call it that, or my guiding principles.
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All right. Next question, Austin Rudy. What is your strategy for creating a successful
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time block schedule? Do you find it easier to physically write it out, type it out,
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have notification systems on your devices or et cetera? I don't write it out because I don't
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want to take the time to do that. And it's clunky and I'd have to do it every week. And a lot of my
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tasks are reoccurring. That's kind of the point of time blocking. It happens every Wednesday from
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nine to 11. Why would I need to write that out every week? Regarding notifications,
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I don't do notifications on my phone. I don't, I don't, there's no social media notifications. My,
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my ring thing is silent. I don't get text notifications. I don't get games or app
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notifications, nothing. I have no notifications on my phone. That's funny. I turn mine off too.
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I don't get notifications. Not even for a text message. Yeah. It's huge because what,
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here's what happens. Kip, you texted this, me this morning and so did, you know, a dozen other people.
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I'll check that at my convenience. And when did I check the text from you?
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When I, when you, cause I know every Monday morning, you're going to say, Hey,
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we're good for questions or we need a few questions. And so like, I know when you're
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going to send that text. Yeah. If it's something else, I'll do it when it's convenient for me.
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That's it. And then I might check it periodically, maybe an, after a meeting, or I have a two hour,
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two and a half hour block this morning where I'm recording with you. And then I have another
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podcast after this. I can check my stuff in three hours. It's fine. Yeah. So if you turn off
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notifications, that's huge. But what I do for, for time blocking, just calendaring in general is I
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just, I use Google calendar and I live and die by the calendar. And I go in, I set up reoccurring
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tasks. So this, our, our Monday morning, ask me anything is a reoccurring meeting with you.
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I it's, it's not real complicated for me. I've been doing it so long that it just is just the
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calendar. And I, I car, I put it in there and that way I can pull it up. And if somebody says, Hey,
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can you meet at Monday at nine? I can either look at it or for some things I know, because I've been
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doing it so long. And I say, no, I can't meet at Monday at nine because that's a standing meeting
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with Kip. And I literally, it's, it's unavailable. There might be a few exceptions to that,
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right? If there's an emergency or maybe a huge opportunity that presents itself, I'll call and
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coordinate with you. Or I happen to be maybe out hunting or something, and then I'll make the
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arrangements. But outside of that, the meetings are the meetings. And I attend those things like
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they're religious. Yeah, me too. The only things maybe to add for Austin to consider,
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it's not just work. So family life is no different. So my workout is on there. When I pick up drop off
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kids, when they have recitals, I mean, everything is on that calendar. My wife sounds kind of cold,
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but she knows it's the same thing. So she'll send me meeting invites of, Hey, we have this thing.
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And, and that's how I coordinate and make sure I prioritize. The other thing that I've done recently,
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so I can get, you know, after action reviews built into my day, I haven't been good at doing margins.
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So I'd go back to back and I realized like, that's not going to work, right? I don't have time to use
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the bathroom. I like run in between meetings. That's not good either. So if I can, I'll have my
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assistant do like 45 minutes instead of an hour. So I have like 15 minute margins or like on this
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podcast, I block hour and a half. That's what I do. That way, if we go a little long or short,
00:22:35.800
or we want to talk after it's not a big deal. And I, and so I try to keep that margin in my
00:22:40.800
schedule. So I have time to do, you know, retrospectives or other things that, that might
00:22:46.860
come up. I've heard people say with margins, I've actually had a few people tell me this, that
00:22:51.960
that cuts out. If they have four meetings per day and they're doing a half hour extra margins,
00:22:56.100
that's roughly two hours that they lose each day. You don't lose it. Cause if we don't go for the
00:23:01.980
full hour and a half, I'm going to send a few emails or some correspondence or my to-do list,
00:23:08.200
which is an, again, our battle planner, I'm going to still be efficient during that time.
00:23:12.920
In fact, I found that when you time block and you set a designated time for it, you're actually
00:23:18.300
going to be more productive than if you don't schedule anything at all. It's, we talked about
00:23:22.800
this last week, it's Parkinson's law work expands to the time allotted. So if you have 30 minutes,
00:23:28.880
you're going to crank out a lot more emails in 30 minutes than you would if you had all day long.
00:23:34.060
Yeah. It's so weird. Yeah. I also, so a couple, one, one more comment about what you said. And then
00:23:40.300
a question for you, you said it's cold. I don't, I don't think it's cold. Like it's just, it is what
00:23:46.580
it is. If that's the system that works for you guys, like we don't need to paint it as cold or
00:23:50.940
impersonal, man, use it. That's great. And then the last thing I was going to ask you about this,
00:23:57.300
do you use different colors and different calendars for different things? I don't do
00:24:02.280
that personally. Yeah. Why? I'll tell you why. I want to hear why you. Yeah. So I use one calendar
00:24:08.400
for everything. I used to like, oh, I'll use Google for my personal calendar and then had a work
00:24:12.720
calendar. I'm like, no, it's Kip's calendar. Things need to integrate. This isn't work-life balance.
00:24:18.860
It's work-life integration. It's my life, right? So everything is in one calendar. I do put colors on
00:24:25.740
there and it's really for, to be frank, I flag when I'm driving. So then that way my assistant
00:24:34.240
knows that, okay, he could do a phone call during these blocks or I prioritize things differently.
00:24:42.080
So like everything that's iron council related or order, man, it's orange in honor of your branding.
00:24:49.540
It's orange on my calendar and, and those are non-negotiables. And so Tori knows like, don't
00:24:56.720
touch those. Now, if she's scheduled other things that are blue, she's managing schedules. So she'll
00:25:04.520
determine like, oh, this, this came up. Kip says it's really important. So I'm going to bump this
00:25:09.300
person and, and move. So she knows what she can touch. And then she knows what she can't.
00:25:15.040
Yeah. And, and that's why I do the coloring. I don't, I don't personally do that. It's all just
00:25:21.560
one color. And, and I've always just said, Hey, everything is important. Like doing this podcast
00:25:27.220
is the same priority as, you know, another conversation I might have later. And the same
00:25:32.800
priority is, well, maybe not the same, but again, if push came to shove, I might need to change some
00:25:37.460
things around, but you know, my daughter's dance recital, for example, but it all has importance.
00:25:41.680
And so I just do one color, but what you're saying makes some sense. There might be some
00:25:45.100
reasons to do that. You know, the other thing that, that crosses my mind too, I block focus time
00:25:51.120
and like deep work time too. We have a tendency not to do that stuff. It's like, oh, it involves
00:25:56.520
someone else. I'll book it. I won't get anything done. I mean, if I look at my calendar, right.
00:26:01.680
If I don't block time to actually get heads down, but there's no time to actually do the work that
00:26:09.060
we're talking about in meetings. And so I, I block that focus time as well.
00:26:14.300
Really. I don't personally do that, but I tend to be pretty efficient with my time when I don't
00:26:20.060
have anything else because I have it all written down. So I can go in and say, all right, I got an
00:26:25.920
hour. What do I need to do? And I'll look for a task that I think will take me an hour or two.
00:26:30.580
That'll take me a half hour each. And I'll just crank through them and, and just having that list.
00:26:35.040
And then literally being able to check it off has been really helpful for me.
00:26:39.640
Yeah, totally. All right. Danny Skolnick. Is it appropriate to keep the same vision
00:26:46.680
for an undetermined amount of time? If it is still applicable? I think the answer is yes,
00:26:51.220
but wanted to verify for my friend, I think in sovereignty and the forge, it's suggested to
00:26:56.520
write out a 10 to 20 year vision. So I'm thinking if I like this quarter's vision,
00:27:01.340
then keep it for the moving forward. Yeah. Completely appropriate. If it's still
00:27:05.880
compelling, if it's still driving you to be aspirational, if it's still something that
00:27:10.280
speaks to you, your heart, your soul, your mind. Yeah. No, no reason to change it. The one caveat
00:27:16.180
I would say, or disclaimer is just don't grow complacent. It's very easy to get complacent.
00:27:21.940
In fact, when I, when I just pulled up my task list that, that I write down from that last question,
00:27:27.480
I noticed something and I just checked it off, noticed something that I didn't check off that
00:27:31.040
I did last week. And I, and I only say that because it's easy to get busy with life and
00:27:35.240
other things that we forget to move forward and we forget to grow. And sometimes we're able to
00:27:41.200
deceive ourselves into thinking that we're better than we are, or we're doing better than we are.
00:27:46.220
Um, case in point, when I went through my divorce, it was a shock to me.
00:27:51.060
It was a complete shock. You were operating from the, like, Hey, everything's fine kind
00:27:56.540
of mentality. Right. I thought it was complacent. Yeah. Yeah. And it's that old adage of put a
00:28:01.860
frog in boiling water, water, he'll jump right out, but put them in cold water and gradually heat it
00:28:06.720
up. He'll stay there and cook himself to death. Like you've all heard that. That's true. I didn't
00:28:11.720
really think it was all that bad. And then my ex told me that I was like, wait, what? It was
00:28:16.620
complete shock to me. Now, looking back where I am in my life now, clean, sober, healthy,
00:28:24.140
emotionally, spiritually. I'm like, yeah, that tracks. That makes sense. Cause I'm in a completely
00:28:30.200
different space. I'm thinking if I was married to that person, I'd, I'd make, you know, the similar
00:28:36.160
moves that she did. So, but I would deceive myself and got comfortable and complacent. And I
00:28:42.960
think not revisiting a vision will maybe exacerbate that problem a little bit, or at least just allow
00:28:48.900
it to continue. So just don't grow complacent and make sure it still is aspirational and motivational.
00:28:54.880
Yeah. What other advice would you give around visions? You know, cause I, I feel, you know,
00:28:59.140
Danny's obviously some navigating this water, right. In regards to how does he most effectively use
00:29:05.720
this. And, and one thing that I think that we have a tendency to do, and I've seen this in our
00:29:11.360
council over the years is we'll write this compelling vision. It will move, touch and inspire us. We,
00:29:16.500
we were committed to it. We'll execute the battle plan. And then we'll never look at that vision
00:29:21.920
again. Yeah. Like even through the quarter and a month in, we, we kind of lose our way a little bit
00:29:29.880
maybe and, and not revisit it enough. And so for me personally, you know, I realized that years ago.
00:29:36.700
So, and so my bookmark that I use in my daily journaling is my vision on a card. So I'll write
00:29:44.980
in my journal. And then I read that card as a reminder. So I'm daily focused on what that vision
00:29:52.460
is. And of course, you know, it should pivot and change and adjust and whatever, but that's how I
00:29:58.040
make sure I don't lose sight of that. But what other advice would you give around vision that we
00:30:02.940
kind of common mistakes, you know, that we see in the iron council from time to time?
00:30:07.300
One thing I would say, I have two thoughts on this. One thing I would say is in a vision,
00:30:11.120
don't focus so much on what you want to do and focus instead on who you want to be.
00:30:17.220
Yeah. Because what you want to do is comes after who you want to be. Like you talk about the beat,
00:30:22.740
beat you have, right? Yep. It's, you have to be the person first,
00:30:27.340
and then you're going to do the work and then you're going to have the result.
00:30:30.900
So when you focus on what you want as a vision, I think what you're doing is putting the cart before
00:30:36.180
the horse. You're, you got to figure out who you're going to be and you got to be that person
00:30:40.920
first and the results will follow. That's the natural order of things. So I tend to focus and
00:30:46.020
encourage men to focus on what kind of man do you want to be? What kind of father do you want to be?
00:30:51.560
What kind of husband, what kind of business owner, what kind of leader in your community?
00:30:54.760
When, and I said this earlier, when things go wrong, how do you show up? Yeah. When things go
00:31:01.020
right, how do you show up? When your kid does something that they shouldn't do, how do you
00:31:05.980
respond? When you are faced with a hardship, bankruptcy, medical condition, divorce, loss of
00:31:13.400
a loved one, how do you walk through that? And how do you navigate other people through that?
00:31:18.580
Here's another one. Look at the men who you're inspired by. Maybe it's your grandfather.
00:31:22.600
Maybe it's a complete and total stranger that does something wonderful, but you're inspired by
00:31:26.640
people. Maybe it's a character in a movie, you know, maybe a William Wallace on Braveheart who
00:31:32.420
is, is, is, I know an actual historical figure, but the way he's portrayed in Braveheart is a
00:31:37.480
fictional character, but it still inspires you. It does me. And I want to show up in a certain way
00:31:42.580
based on that. So that's aspirational. That's, that's my vision. That's what it looks like for me.
00:31:48.100
As far as going back and revisiting your vision. I like what you said. I do that as well. I have
00:31:54.120
that vision here in my battle planner and available, and I also have it on my desktop so I can pull it up
00:31:59.520
and refer to it often, but there's another strategy that I use and everything in my house, most
00:32:04.940
everything, not everything, but a lot has significance and meaning that drives me towards
00:32:10.940
being the kind of man that I want to be. I have a couple of, uh, skulls here from hunts that have
00:32:18.200
memories of brotherhood and fellowship and being capable, um, and being a good provider. This sign
00:32:24.860
right here, protect, provide, preside that's built into my vision. I'm a protector. I'm a provider. I
00:32:30.400
preside. I lead. Um, there's a, there's a painting right there of the archangel Michael. I mean,
00:32:36.740
everywhere you turn, there's things that remind me there's a moose over here, like a painting of a
00:32:42.760
moose that reminds me of the time that I had with my son and how I want to show up for my kids. Like
00:32:47.240
it's very deliberate the way that I set up my environment and all these little things show up
00:32:53.020
in an intentional way so that it helps manifest my vision so I can do what I want to do in life.
00:33:00.720
Hmm. I love that. There's a code of, there's also right here along the side,
00:33:04.440
you can't see it just around the corner here. There's a code of conduct that me and my, uh,
00:33:08.640
two oldest sons wrote together. I have it framed. I have it mounted. I look at it every day. I walk
00:33:12.760
right past it. I look at it every single day. I'm reminded of the kind of man I want to be when I
00:33:17.640
see things like that, but it has to be intentional. Yeah. One thing that I, I like to do, um, as well
00:33:24.360
is I'll, you know, we're tying this calendar and these visions together is I'll read that vision,
00:33:30.360
which is to your point, very much focused on how I'm going to show up right as a man for the day.
00:33:37.320
And after I read that, I now pull up my calendar and I, I kind of visualize to be frank of, all right,
00:33:45.780
well, what does that meeting look like? What does that meeting look like? Right. How am I going to
00:33:51.800
have that difficult conversation at 2 PM based upon that vision I just read? How am I going to show up
00:33:56.960
at the mats when I go train? How am I going to walk in the door at 6 PM when I get home?
00:34:03.220
How does that man look? And, and that's, I don't know, I, that has probably helped me more than
00:34:09.960
anything else because I, I, you know what I mean? I get, I might get inspired in that vision, but it's
00:34:15.900
like, no, no, hold on. I'm going to walk in this room and I'm going to show up in that intentional
00:34:21.400
way. And it's so easy to get sideways at least throughout the day. And then by the time I get home,
00:34:26.660
I don't have energy or whatever. And then I'm just, you know, try to find where asshole is on
00:34:32.060
my vision. I'm like, well, it's not on there. I don't know. I don't know why I'm showing up that
00:34:36.480
way. You know, that's, that's not what I'm not doing. Totally. Totally. Actually, Kip, I think that
00:34:45.300
might be one of my favorite things I've heard you say, like, and we've had a lot of conversations,
00:34:50.300
but that, that you just said that you're an asshole was my favorite thing. No, I'm just kidding.
00:34:55.140
Yeah. It's not that true. No, it's not that it's because I'm authentic. No, it's not that
00:35:00.860
what is the favorite thing is your intentionality between behind the way that you step into
00:35:07.860
responsibilities that guys, if you didn't hear that, go back and rewind or like whatever you
00:35:14.300
need to do, actually take that to heart intentionality behind the way that you show up.
00:35:23.860
If you're going out on a first date with somebody, I guarantee you're intentional about how you show up.
00:35:29.780
You go get the car washed, you put on some cologne, maybe a little more than you normally do. You pick
00:35:34.960
out clothes, maybe even went bought new clothes for the first date. You think about where you're going
00:35:39.400
to go. You call for reservations. You're very intentional about it. If you have a big sales
00:35:44.600
presentation, you've researched your potential client, you've prepared your meetings and your
00:35:50.780
documents, you have your conference room set up just the right way to be conducive to a sale,
00:35:56.420
you're very deliberate and intentional about it. But are you doing the same to your point, Kip,
00:36:01.860
when you walk in the door of your house after a long day? Are you doing it the same when you have
00:36:07.560
to go to little Timmy's baseball game and watch him play? What kind of parent are you going to show up?
00:36:12.240
Are you going to be the jerk who's yelling from the bleachers how horrible the coach is doing and
00:36:16.080
why your kid isn't as good as he should be? Or are you going to edify and uplift the coach,
00:36:20.720
support the coach? Maybe even you're actually on the court coaching the team and you're loving on
00:36:26.480
your children in a masculine manly way. Man, if I'm not casting blame or pointing fingers at all of
00:36:35.040
us, myself included, did that in every interaction, our life would be almost unrecognizable in a very
00:36:41.840
short amount of time. Yeah. Yeah, totally. Right. Now I'm thinking about all the other things. I
00:36:48.900
mean, I even thought about this over the weekend, right? I had fight night at the house and I thought,
00:36:53.220
man, I was really intentional with making sure to talk to certain people, right? Because I understand
00:36:57.560
there's a group of guys there and they may not know each other, but I wasn't as intentional as I
00:37:02.800
should have been, you know? And there's some guys that I needed to chat with. And I thought, man,
00:37:07.780
you know, like I didn't do a good job making sure that they felt welcome or going out of my way and
00:37:14.200
letting them know. And how many little things like that just are all over the place, you know,
00:37:19.980
whether it's, you know, replying to Dom's message or reaching out to someone that I've been thinking
00:37:25.180
about, but I didn't do it. And it's just, man, that intentionality around how we show up, whether
00:37:30.600
it's for our families or, or people that we care about. It's so easy to put intention around the
00:37:36.760
superficial and not around those established relationships. It's really unfortunate.
00:37:42.280
Well, I think it's, I think it's easy to do with a novel, a new, a new experience. Like,
00:37:48.720
oh, I'm going to make this amazing. It's novel. It's new. You're excited about it. Do it for 20 years.
00:37:54.920
Yeah. Like be in that business for 20 years and show me a guy who treats a 20 year career like he did
00:38:03.040
on day one. And I guarantee that guy's successful. Yeah. Same thing with, with even a relationship,
00:38:09.500
a marriage, a guy who treats his wife after 20 years, the way that he did when he dated her
00:38:16.200
is a, is going to be in a happy thriving marriage. I can't say that I did that. I didn't do that,
00:38:20.780
which is why I am where I am. But had I done that, it would be different. So powerful. Love it.
00:38:28.080
What's next, Kip? Paul Sanote, in a work environment, what advice can you offer in
00:38:33.920
ways of managing older men? He has kind of two examples and I, I'm going to summarize them.
00:38:39.360
Example one, he has one guy that's belligerent, doesn't agree with the company values. He openly
00:38:44.340
speaks about how unhappy he is with his salary, constant complaining. The other guy kind of misses
00:38:51.780
the mark and throws in the towel easily when things get hard. He says, you know, while this sounds
00:38:57.500
like bitching, I'm grateful for this experience. And I have some hilarious tales that could be
00:39:02.040
straight out of a sitcom, but advice on how to maybe deal with these men.
00:39:08.060
So I wrote down a couple of notes as he was saying that the second guy you need to enlist
00:39:11.960
in the car that throws in the towel. Yeah. You need to enlist him. You need to make him in charge of
00:39:17.720
something. Not, not something, you know, hugely important, but give him a, inspire him, empower
00:39:26.020
him, empower him, give him some responsibility. And he's going to do one of two things. He's
00:39:30.460
either going to start buying into it or he's like, this is dumb. I'm out of here. Fine. I don't care.
00:39:34.620
Either one of those is fine with me. The first guy I'd confront, I would do it in a tactful,
00:39:39.920
respectful way, but let's say you're that guy, Kip, little role play here. Hey Kip, can I talk with you?
00:39:44.380
Yeah. You can talk to me. All right, cool. We go, we do this in private by the way. Right.
00:39:48.140
So we do this, not, not confrontational in front of everybody else. Cause that's threatening. And
00:39:52.040
then he's going to push harder and it's going to turn into a mess. Yeah. Hey Kip, I need to talk
00:39:55.740
with you about something. So we sit down, Hey, look, I'm in a really precarious situation here.
00:40:02.240
I'm, I'm a younger guy than you are. I'm not nearly as experienced as you are. You've been in this
00:40:08.780
business at this game for significantly longer than I have. But that being said, I'm in this
00:40:16.140
position to do a job and the job requires that I have everybody on board. And that doesn't mean
00:40:23.980
just productive. That means helpful and supportive and part of the team. I love having you here
00:40:32.600
because you've been here for a long time. And I think I could learn a lot from you, but in order
00:40:38.580
for that to happen, there's some things that I'm going to need to see change in you. And the way
00:40:44.100
that you show up is not conducive to a team environment and the culture that I want to
00:40:48.920
create. So I'm going to ask you to please stop with the complaining and the griping and the moaning
00:40:57.260
thing in front of everybody. If there's an issue that you have, I will give you the respect that
00:41:03.420
you deserve by hearing your issue. And you will give me the respect I deserve by bringing it to me
00:41:11.020
and me alone and giving me the chance to fix it before you start impacting the rest of the team
00:41:15.820
negatively. Can we work together on that? It's good, man. He's going to say one or two things,
00:41:23.800
screw off or yeah, I think I can do that. And you might have to have that conversation in
00:41:30.860
different forms several times, but you might see improvement. If he says, screw off, good. I don't
00:41:34.800
want you on the team anyways, if you're going to act like that. And you don't have to fire him.
00:41:38.780
You don't have to have any conversations about what can you do with this guy? No, this guy wants to
00:41:44.360
act like a baby. Then you need to treat him like a man because everybody else is accustomed to him
00:41:51.060
acting like a baby. And then they treat him like a baby, which is a faulty incentive.
00:41:57.840
You're incentivizing to be that way. So treat him like a man. And if you can't man up and step up,
00:42:04.780
then he can leave. It might actually be better that he does without you having to fire the guy.
00:42:11.520
Well, and I like playing to the impact that he has, right? I mean, you got experience.
00:42:16.340
Let me say one thing there on that. Yeah. And I want to hear what you have to say. I just want
00:42:21.320
to be very careful. You're not even playing to it. That's real. Yeah. Like the guy does have some
00:42:26.960
value to add. We need to unpack and uncover it and pull all the grime off of it so we can actually
00:42:31.940
see what's going on here. Anyway. So I just want to say that it's not a manipulation tactic.
00:42:36.200
It's true. Totally. Yeah, totally. Well, and, and a lot of people that have that negative
00:42:40.840
approach, they're playing small. It's like, you can run, you can complain all you want. And you
00:42:48.200
might be right on those complaints, but dude, let's let, instead of just complaining, let's do
00:42:53.640
something about it. Let's pivot. Let's change. And, and, and for that to be possible, I need you
00:43:02.540
to level up on the issues, right? Playing small is running your mouth. Playing big is, Hey, let's
00:43:11.280
grab that complaint, that issue, that feedback that you have, and let's address it in a positive
00:43:16.820
way that gets people on board. Let's make some adjustments. Let's make some pivots and empower
00:43:22.340
our people instead of just running our mouths and playing small. Yep. Right. I had kind of an
00:43:28.940
example of this, a little bit example of this, you know, last week where, where I had, and, and I get
00:43:36.840
to have this fun conversation today, actually with this individual, but this, this person pings me and
00:43:41.500
says, Hey Kip, man, I got some feedback on this person over here. Right. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
00:43:46.860
And I'm like, Hey, that's some really good feedback. I need you to tell him. Hmm. Oh, well, I don't know
00:43:53.720
if I have a relationship like that. And I'm like, no, no, he needs to know, right. You, you should
00:43:59.940
tell him. And it's more powerful coming from you than you telling me. And then some executives like
00:44:06.400
circumventing things and communicating with someone. It's better for the team for you to have that
00:44:13.440
communication directly with that individual, not coming from me. It's good for that person.
00:44:19.180
It's good for you. The one that's wanting to communicate, it's going to be better for your
00:44:23.380
relationship. And Hey, you're uneasy about it. Awesome. Let's get the reps. Let's work through
00:44:30.440
it. How do I have an awkward conversation and get feedback to someone without being concerned that
00:44:34.880
they're offended? Let's figure that out. That's something you need to know. Obviously,
00:44:38.600
if you're avoiding it, those are plain big running your mouth and complaining about someone that's,
00:44:46.660
that's plain small. I agree. Yeah. I like that. You'll have to let us know how that,
00:44:51.720
how that conversation goes. Well, there's actually more to it because he ended up
00:44:55.220
not having that conversation and ended up telling me, telling what he told me, ended up telling someone
00:45:01.360
else. And so now I'm like, dude, now you're colluding. Yeah. Now you're going around you. He's
00:45:08.040
messing with the chain of command. Yeah. And now you're, you're undermining someone. Hey,
00:45:13.680
we're one team. Stop running your mouth. Now you're gossiping. Now you're colluding with people.
00:45:18.860
Yeah. That's not, it's very, it's very childish behavior. You know, this is called order of man.
00:45:24.660
And look, we've all run away from confrontation in one form or the other, but that's, that's not
00:45:30.980
mature to do it. The mature thing is to address it, even though it'll be uncomfortable, bring it up
00:45:36.600
and take care of it. Just take care of it. Yeah, totally. All right. Bob Ross. Why are most men so
00:45:43.780
quick to put others down or chastise them for being a wimp if they spend time creating? So I'm assuming
00:45:50.500
he's kind of leaning into the arts example. I'm proud that I'm a potter and a painter, but most times I'll
00:45:56.220
let other men know that they scoff at the idea. It does not affect me. I just don't think I understand
00:46:02.440
why some choose to mock instead of support. I may not choose your form of relaxation,
00:46:08.260
but I will not be critical of what you enjoy. I don't know. I don't, I don't really care.
00:46:13.940
Yeah. It does. Like the answer to the question is irrelevant to me. I look, we can discuss it.
00:46:19.380
To some extent should be unrelevant to you, right? Cause otherwise if you're, you're giving too much
00:46:23.400
attention to it is, is kind of what I'm hearing you say. Yeah. I'm not saying your question is
00:46:27.720
unimportant. I'm just saying, even if I gave you the perfect answer, what would change about your
00:46:32.160
life? Yeah. Would anything, I don't, I don't know that the answer is real relevant in, in the,
00:46:39.100
in this acute context that you're talking about in the greater scheme of things. Yeah. The, the,
00:46:43.960
the idea that people put each other down and mock each other and poke at each other and in unhealthy
00:46:50.000
ways. Yeah. I think we should certainly address that. And we see it. Like I see it in the Facebook
00:46:54.540
group all the time. I see it. And I don't, I don't understand. I don't understand it either. I don't,
00:46:59.240
I don't get it. I don't, I said this the other day, I've never looked at a profession or, or a hobby
00:47:04.740
or an activity and, and, you know, like lifted up the skirt of that hobby and saw a pair of little
00:47:09.320
testicles because that makes it a manly hobby. Pottery that's unmanly. I don't, I don't feel that
00:47:17.020
way. So I'm going to focus on people who support me, who, who edify me, who inspire me, who motivate
00:47:25.460
me. And then the rest doesn't matter. But I, to answer your question in the spirit in which it's
00:47:29.860
asked, I would say that that's some insecurity on, on the part of other guys, like secure men
00:47:37.840
don't make fun of other people. It's not even on their radar. I, I'm not saying this in a, in a bad
00:47:48.020
way, it might come across wrong, but like, I don't, you doing pottery is not even on my radar
00:47:54.480
because I have other things I'm excited. And now I'm glad for you. I'm happy for you. And you've
00:47:59.840
been a big supporter. He has, he's been a big supporter of what we're doing here. And he always
00:48:03.600
asks questions and engages. I'm excited. You're, you found something you're passionate about,
00:48:07.720
but it's just not on my radar. Why should it be? Why should anything be on my radar that doesn't
00:48:14.240
pertain to my job and responsibilities, but it is on people's radars who feel inadequate.
00:48:19.620
And rather than focusing on their own lives and what they should be doing and how they can improve,
00:48:26.180
they go around poking at everybody and pestering people and bullying people and making fun of people
00:48:32.280
and mocking others for finding something they found joy and value and fulfillment in. So to me,
00:48:38.600
it's an insecurity issue and it's an integrity issue. That person knows they can do better.
00:48:45.660
And instead of doing the work to improve themselves, they'd rather tear other people down.
00:48:50.420
And it's unfortunate. But what I would suggest is that when we run across these individuals,
00:48:57.400
like we don't immerse ourselves in their environment, number one, but we also don't play to their level.
00:49:02.840
And I, I used to do that a lot and I still do it from time to time because it gets the better of me.
00:49:07.020
But when somebody says something ill of me or my work or what we're doing here,
00:49:11.460
that's somebody who's struggling. There's nothing to do with me. I'll give you an example.
00:49:17.140
This was probably two or three years ago. I had posted something on social media,
00:49:22.860
on Instagram about how I was staying up late. In fact, I think it was during the holidays.
00:49:27.400
I was staying up late to fulfill orders and I was excited about it, but I was tired. And I said
00:49:32.700
something like that. And somebody came by, came on and commented and he said it very,
00:49:37.740
very condescending and arrogant was like, you know, men used to die on the railroad tracks and
00:49:43.720
there's guys that have it way harder than you. And you're complaining about having to stay up late.
00:49:47.800
And it just kind of went on and on. And I, yeah, I, I wrote back very respectfully in a moment of
00:49:53.240
clarity. I said, look, I don't know what your job is. It sounds like it might be very mentally,
00:49:58.820
emotionally, physically draining and exhausting. And Hey, I'll respect to you. Like I don't have
00:50:05.220
to do that. And I'm grateful, but I also don't compare my challenges to other people's and would
00:50:10.980
hope that other people don't compare theirs to mine. We all have different things that we're going
00:50:15.600
through. And I said something very, I would say very classy, right? Like I just handled it with some
00:50:20.920
grace in class. And months later, I only remember this story because months later, this guy reaches
00:50:28.440
back out to me. And he said something to the effect I'm paraphrasing here, but Hey, Ryan,
00:50:34.120
I made this comment months ago. I don't even know if you remember, but I was having a bad time. I was
00:50:41.520
going through something at the time. And I said something just that I shouldn't have said,
00:50:46.160
and you handled it really respectfully. And you said something really respectful back.
00:50:50.440
And I just wanted to say, I'm sorry. And of course I accepted it. Hey man, no problem.
00:50:55.900
I've had bad times too. I've responded poorly in a, in a moment of confusion or
00:51:01.340
cloudiness. And it's all good, man. I'm glad, I'm glad we talked about it. I'm glad you're here.
00:51:07.120
Still here supporting. Awesome. Let's drive on.
00:51:10.580
That's crazy. I had, I had one a couple of years ago. No joke, dude. And it, I didn't even forward
00:51:16.700
it to you, but it was talked about you and me. And this guy straight up was like,
00:51:21.320
hope you guys rot and die in hell. Kind of like, it was crazy. Like out of nowhere, I'm like,
00:51:28.940
holy crap. And it had to do something with like being Christian and stuff. Right. Oh yeah. You
00:51:35.340
know, hope you die. And, um, and I didn't, I just didn't reply. I was just kind of like,
00:51:40.760
dude, that guy's just straight up. That's a bad day. And, uh, you know, it stung a little bit
00:51:47.300
and it was great, crazy. Like a couple of weeks later, yeah, I text or not text, but send a
00:51:52.600
message. He's like, I'm sorry, I'm going through some hard times and blah, blah, blah. And I was
00:51:58.120
like, Hey dude, we all, I get it, you know, but it was, you know, but I could have lashed out and
00:52:04.900
of course you could have escalated the thing and, you know, wouldn't have benefited anybody.
00:52:10.520
So, and then you would have looked just as foolish as he know he, he looked.
00:52:13.700
Yeah. So I I'm not immune to looking foolish and opening my mouth and doing that. I'm just saying
00:52:21.440
that it's always 100% of the time been better when I rise above it. It either gets no response,
00:52:31.040
which is fine. Cause then I can just move on or you get a positive response, which is,
00:52:35.120
Hey man. Yeah. You know what? Maybe I was a little harsh. Like, I'm sorry. Let me scale it. Let's try
00:52:39.420
this again. I actually, I had an interaction in the iron council maybe like three weeks ago.
00:52:44.600
And I said something about, ah, what was it? I can't remember. Oh, about dating. I was talking
00:52:50.800
about dating and somebody said, why did you date? Why did you start dating so early or something?
00:52:56.100
Yeah. And I, I took it and I like infused my own meaning behind the question and, you know,
00:53:02.640
got offended about it. And then we started bickering, you know, and I'm like, okay, just stop.
00:53:09.860
So I sent this guy a message. I'm like, look, man, let's reset. I, I, this is what I said to him
00:53:15.900
in a mess private message. I said, I handled that incorrectly. I jumped to some conclusions and some
00:53:20.920
assumptions. Obviously that question is a little bit raw for me clearly with the way that I responded.
00:53:27.480
So, you know, let, let's, let's do this again. And he was good about it. Like he was like, yeah,
00:53:34.220
it's, it's all good. Maybe I did. We had a great conversation, no harm, no foul. We all do it.
00:53:41.040
It's better when you don't. Yeah. And, and in the spirit of Bob's question, right? There's power
00:53:47.500
in empathy. There's power in understanding human behaviors because often ill responses and people
00:53:57.720
getting triggered will jump to way different perception and conclusions versus reality of
00:54:05.540
human nature is, oh, no, someone's lashing out. Oh, that person's overly arrogant. Well, actually
00:54:11.140
when most people act overly arrogance, because they actually have a low self-esteem, like there's
00:54:16.500
power and understanding a little bit of that human condition. And it allows us to just possibly deal
00:54:23.020
with what's so, and not think things as personal as, as we normally do. You know, one, one situation
00:54:29.660
that could be coming up and I've seen things like this happen where, you know, somebody pokes fun at
00:54:33.860
you for, for pottery. This could actually be a real thing. I've seen scenarios like this. That kid was
00:54:40.380
young and he was super into the arts and his dad said, why are you such a little pussy?
00:54:47.480
Men don't do that. Yeah. And then he put down the paints, he put down the pottery, he put the clay
00:54:54.040
down. Something he loved and wanted to do and found value in. And then he went and played football
00:55:00.000
instead or whatever his dad told him to do. And he grew up thinking that that was infused into him.
00:55:06.780
And now he has some bitterness and contention and resentment around it. And he's regurgitating
00:55:12.280
what he learned as a kid. I know it sounds extreme. I've heard of scenarios like that.
00:55:17.220
I feel it. And in that case, the best thing that you can do is to your point, show some empathy
00:55:22.780
because maybe you inspire him to pick up the paintbrush again. Now that he's a 40 year old man
00:55:29.060
and no longer under the thumb of his father, which was a toxic relationship. I know it's like we're
00:55:34.340
jumping to some big things here, but this is stuff that happens. Yeah. Yeah. Totally.
00:55:42.500
All right. Last question. Justin Doyle, what do you think about the concept that at some fundamental
00:55:49.160
level, certain aspects of people are simply that person being who or how they are? For example,
00:55:55.940
for some, it's their deeply held religious beliefs and others ethos, like a man's belief that he must
00:56:01.760
provide to have value in the household. Ultimately, where is the line between areas of change versus the
00:56:09.480
idea of a package deal? I am who I am mentality. Well, that's certainly true. Yeah. People are going
00:56:20.440
to adopt certain doctrines or dogmas that wherever they picked it up from and they're just not going
00:56:26.680
to change. Yeah. You should recognize that. I actually, on a global scale, I actually have a
00:56:33.740
problem with America inserting its values into other regions and countries as if they just need
00:56:40.320
democracy and then all of their problems will be solved. That's our value. Yeah. That may not
00:56:46.040
necessarily be theirs. Would it be good for them? Maybe. Are they interested? Probably not.
00:56:51.200
Yeah. Because these countries have been in and around much longer than America. So if that was
00:56:56.980
something they genuinely valued and wanted, we would see that already. And we don't for a reason.
00:57:01.380
And it's naive and arrogant to believe that you can change somebody because what you think
00:57:09.720
is the best way is universally the best way. Just let people live their lives. I'll tell
00:57:16.020
you where it becomes a problem. You start messing with mine. Yeah. Once your dogma or doctrine
00:57:22.520
messes with mine, I have a problem. But outside of that, yeah, believe what you want. And these are
00:57:30.880
even people that I love and care about. I have close people who do things and make decisions that I
00:57:37.060
wouldn't advocate for or suggest. They're a grown person. I have to at least respect the idea that
00:57:47.340
they can make their own decisions. I don't respect the decision itself. I respect that they can make
00:57:51.760
their own decision and then they have to live with the consequences. If they would like to change or they
00:57:57.420
ask me for advice or there's something I can share with them that I think might serve them in some
00:58:01.760
way. Sure. I can do that because I love people and I want them to win. But I also simultaneously
00:58:07.420
embrace the idea that this person gets to choose for himself how they live their life. Do you feel
00:58:14.100
that, I mean, in summary, do you approach this concept with the idea that people are probably
00:58:24.560
package deals? The idea that most people don't change, they are what they are. Obviously,
00:58:30.640
we can't cause change in other people anyway. So see them as a package deal. But when it comes to you,
00:58:37.400
are there elements of you that you say, is there any element of you, Ryan, where you go,
00:58:42.760
this is just the way I am? Or is anything up for grabs and these are choices that I get to choose?
00:58:48.420
No, there's certain things that are deeply seated beliefs, moral principles that you're just not
00:58:58.600
going to convince me are okay. Here's an extreme example. Child molestation. I don't embrace,
00:59:06.620
I don't accept that. I don't tolerate it. I don't, nothing. No, never. And I know that's an extreme
00:59:13.180
example, but yeah, sure. There's things that are just so ingrained into my DNA that I will never be
00:59:19.500
accepting or tolerant of, of course. But the other things that are like, well, is this the best way
00:59:26.200
to do it? Or is this the best way to do it? Yeah, I'm open to that. Yeah, for sure.
00:59:31.040
I think what, what Justin's trying to get to is there, is there, is there elements of people that
00:59:36.260
that is who they are and it's not due to experience. It's not due to upbringing. It's not
00:59:42.080
due to anything other than it's fixed. No, we're all conditioned. We're all conditioned. Yeah. Of
00:59:48.680
course. And I think that's really what he's asking ultimately. No, we're all conditioned,
00:59:52.340
but that doesn't mean that's who you are. Yeah. Like, in fact, that's, that that's exactly what
00:59:58.360
it means. That's not who you are. If I, if I take a child and I raise him in a loving, caring,
01:00:08.940
healthy environment that honors other people that respects life. And I take another child
01:00:16.860
the same age and I put them in hit into an abusive, destructive, toxic home where he learns
01:00:24.600
that life is not important and life isn't, has no value. And there's no moral compass guiding.
01:00:31.160
Like we're going to have two different people, you know, same age, just different cultures and
01:00:39.260
experiences. Now that said, I believe that there is some, some qualities, some moral qualities that
01:00:47.240
I think everybody just inherently knows because we have the gift of the spirit of God. Yeah. And that
01:00:55.480
gets subdued through social conditioning and overwritten by social conditioning or
01:01:02.240
magnified. Yeah. So I don't, maybe I don't understand why you're asking the question. I mean,
01:01:10.520
the, the, I think, and I'm trying to understand, I just, maybe I don't understand why. Yeah.
01:01:15.120
There's certain people who you're never going to change and there's other people who are open to
01:01:20.360
change. Hang out with those people. Yeah, totally. Totally. And I love the idea. I don't know why
01:01:28.640
that's empowered me over the years that understand that most people don't change. It really helps me
01:01:36.960
because then I stopped running around thinking everyone's wrong and that they should be, you know
01:01:44.380
what I mean? Like, but I don't accept that for myself, but I understand that for most people they
01:01:51.800
won't. And, and it's, and it's a little sad to be frank, but it's on their terms through their agency
01:01:57.380
and freedom that change is made available. And, and all that we can do is, is be a light of that and,
01:02:05.000
and support them in the process of their agency and freedom of choice.
01:02:09.200
So I wrote this question down. Do we serve others because they'll change or because it's the right
01:02:19.020
thing to do? Yeah. And how, and let me add to it. How often do we do things because we're expecting
01:02:28.700
change out of people? That's where you're going to get yourself into trouble. Yeah. Because if you're
01:02:33.460
doing something with the expectation that somebody will change, you are going to be disappointed.
01:02:39.180
Yeah. It's, it's out of your control, but if you're serving because it's the right thing to do,
01:02:45.880
which I believe it is, then the outcome, you're separated from the outcome. Yeah. The outcome
01:02:51.480
really doesn't matter. It's about how you show up, who you are. Like when you're donating,
01:02:55.780
when you're donating money to charity, do you have to have your name blasted all over everything or not?
01:03:01.800
And now if your business is doing it, you know, you can make a case that it's market. Yeah. I get it.
01:03:05.840
But if you're trying to just be genuinely help people, you don't really need the recognition
01:03:11.720
because the outcome doesn't matter. That's not why you're doing it. Yeah. You're doing it because
01:03:16.780
you believe that's one of your values, that it's the right thing to do. And what happens of it doesn't
01:03:21.880
actually matter all that much. And I believe that as, as a believer in God, I believe that one day we're
01:03:28.140
going to stand with our creator and he's going to say, let's look at your life. Let's look at what you did.
01:03:32.380
And, and all that I need to do is show that I've attempted to do the right thing.
01:03:40.540
Not that I always did, not that it was always received, not that I changed a million hearts
01:03:44.700
of people, not that I changed any, but that I took the talents I was given by God. Yeah. And I
01:03:52.960
magnified them and I put them to use and I try to live a fulfilling life and I try to do good by other
01:03:59.080
people. Yeah. And, and if he can look at that and say, if he can look at that and say, Hey, you know
01:04:05.720
what? I can see that you tried. Then I got the key. That's what I believe. Yeah. Other men.
01:04:14.140
All right. We mentioned this earlier. Enrollment is open for the iron council. We're going to have
01:04:19.700
that open until the first week of January to sign up and join us there. Go to order of man.com
01:04:26.340
slash iron council. Of course, you can always join us on Facebook as well. That's facebook.com
01:04:32.160
slash group slash order of man. And of course you can get your swag, your order of man swag at store
01:04:39.020
dot order of man.com. And that's simple. Well, I forgot, man. Connect with Mr. Mickler on,
01:04:47.020
on the X and the gram at Ryan Mickler. The M I C H L E R right. Or Mitch. I think that's right.
01:04:54.000
I think that's right. We still need to do skip Jorgensen and Brian Mitchler as a, uh,
01:05:00.420
yeah, as a podcast. Yeah. And give all the wrong answers to you guys. All the wrong answers. Yeah.
01:05:06.200
We'll go woke on you guys. It'll be great. All right, guys. Great questions. Um, I hope you guys,
01:05:13.180
I think we'll be, no, let's see. Christmas is on a Monday. Yeah. So we'll, we'll, that's next week.
01:05:19.160
Oh my goodness. So we got to talk schedules after we hang up here. Why we said, are you
01:05:25.280
want to record on Christmas exception? Come on now Christmas morning, 9.00 AM. Let's go. We'll
01:05:30.240
talk schedules. All right, guys. I appreciate all you guys have a great Christmas, have a great
01:05:34.240
holiday, new year's, all the things, uh, keep asking those questions. We'll keep providing
01:05:38.260
answers. Hopefully they serve you in some way. I'll go out there, take action and become a man. You
01:05:42.240
are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of
01:05:47.600
your life and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.