EP 13: From Olympic Athlete to Leadership Coach: Sherry Winn's Transformative Story

Louie Sharp, international speaker, best-selling author, and accelerated business growth consultant, has released his latest episode of “Leadership & Love”, with this powerful message: There's only one difference between people living a life of dreams and those who aren't. They make a choice, and they take action. Which one are you?

In this insightful episode, Louie interviews Sherry Winn, a two-time Olympian, national championship basketball coach, award-winning speaker, and three-time Amazon best-selling author. The discussion is filled with gold nuggets about self-awareness, self-love, gratitude, and maintaining healthy boundaries as a leader.

🌟 Contact Sherry Winn for your FREE 60-minute coaching session by visiting her website:  www.thewinningleadershipcompany.com  Remember to mention this podcast episode!

🌟 Read Sherry Winn’s newest book, Winning Leadership: Seven Secrets to Being a Truly Powerful Leader.  Every page has meaningful and actionable leadership advice to help any leader mature in their role to better succeed with their team.

Louie’s Leadership & Love Nugs (podcast time stamps)

• Remember: When a door shuts, it doesn't mean the dream is over. (6:10)
• Find value in a concept called “downstream” as a leader. (14:49)
• Grow self-awareness, and in difficult situations remember the mantra: “It's not about me, it's about them”. (23:47)
• Be prepared for a major challenge (“life quake”) every 12 to 16 months. (26:05)
• Practice the ho'oponoponam prayer for forgiveness and healing. There are four parts: I'm sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you. I love you. (35:23)
• Invest in personal development through coaching and self-reflection. (49:49)
• Implement a morning routine including intentions, gratitude, and meditation. (50:26)

#winningleadership #selfreflection #downstream #lifequake #ho'oponoponamprayer #Coaching #intentions #gratitude #meditation #LeadershipandLove #Thegiftedleader #LouieSharp #Podcast

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Welcome to the Leadership and Love Podcast.
We will cover leadership, mindset, personal development,
and sales and marketing.
You'll experience thought-provoking conversations with both
nationally and internationally recognized leaders.
Our goal is to inspire you and deliver actionable items
that you can implement that will help you accelerate your

(00:22):
growth.
Get ready to discover the magic and the power when you lead
with love.
I'm really excited and truly joyful to have one of the
wisest,
smartest people I know that's truly an expert on leadership.
And also,
I'm privileged and humbled to call her a dear friend.

(00:44):
So welcome, Sherry.
I'm thrilled.
I am so excited to just have a conversation with you
folks.
Lou and I have had many conversations, and they've all...
I've always come away enriched, smiling,
full of laughter and just appreciative of the time we spend
together.
So that's what I'm..
my intention for you people listening.
That's my same intention for all of you who are listening

(01:05):
today.
Thank you for your kind words.
And I've always loved your heart and your passion to help
other people.
So Sherry stepped into the world as a leader,
first in sports where she attended the highest level
possible in athletics, the Olympic Games.
We're gonna talk about that a little bit.
She then led college basketball programs for 23 years where
she won a national championship and took her teams to three

(01:28):
elite eights.
Three elite eights!
Since 2012, as the CEO of the winning leadership company,
she has delivered over 3,800
hours of leadership programs where she has developed
Olympic level leaders.
Sherry has spoken to audiences as large as 14,000
and has spoken for companies such as Dell,

(01:48):
McDonald's and Adobe.
She has spoken in Gillette Stadium, airplane hangers,
baseball diamonds,
and too many hotel convention centers to mention.
Organizations such as Volunteers for America,
Anytime Fitness, Edward Jones,
and a host of multi-million and billion dollar companies
invest in Sherry's teachings each year.
So Sherry, thanks again.

(02:09):
I'm truly excited.
And you truly have such a wealth of real world experience
and knowledge.
So first I'd like you to share with our audience your
Olympic story,
how you're kind of going in one direction and then you
shifted.
So yeah, so it's really interesting because, you know,
so many times we have this idea of how life should pan out

(02:30):
for us.
We think, well, if I do X, X and X, I'll get to X, right?
We just have this great plan.
We put this plan in place.
We got the blueprint and start working at it.
Well, that's what I did.
I, I mean, at the age of seven, I was like,
I'm going to be an Olympian.
Like I watched it.
My parents were watching the Olympics on television.
I saw the reactions and they're like, ah, I'm like,
I'm going to do that.
That's what I want to do.
Well, I, and then literally the next day,

(02:50):
you probably remember Jack LeLane,
like a lot of people would remember, but I remember...
Yeah.
TV sets on and me and Jack are doing like, you know,
jumping jacks and all the things that Jack...
cause I thought I was training.
I was a full bore, ready to train.
And I, I, you know, from there I went on and I just,
I really believed that I was going to be an Olympian.
There was never a doubt in my mind when I was young,

(03:11):
that was, that was the way I was headed.
And so I thought the sport was going to be basketball.
Unfortunately, uh, when I went through high school,
things just started shifting.
And part of that, you know, when I look back,
part of that was my responsibility, right?
Who I was, how I behaved, my belief systems.
Uh, and I had problems with teammates.

(03:32):
Again,
I've taken my part of the responsibility and then the same
thing happened in college.
And I was, and then my parents were struggling with, uh,
in their divorce and they were ugly with each other.
Unfortunately,
they weren't very kind in their divorce actions.
And I was really lost and,
and I didn't know where I was going to go.
Started drinking a lot. And things didn't pan out for me in

(03:55):
the basketball world.
You know,
I kept thinking this is the way I was supposed to do.
This is, you know, this is, this is my direction.
This is where I was supposed to end up.
And it just, things fell apart in so many different ways.
And so I ended up quitting the basketball team when I was
in college.
And the reason for that was, is again,
this kind of like this problem between me and the team,

(04:15):
which again, full responsibility for my part, which was,
I didn't think people liked me, and I didn't like myself.
If I didn't think people liked me and I didn't like myself,
pretty hard for other people to like me.
Right.
So that created a lot of chaos and the coach took me down
the locker room and she literally said to the team,
tell Sherry what you think about her.
And they did.
And it was, it was nasty.

(04:37):
It was mean.
It was mean spirited.
And I just, my self-esteem was so low at that point,
I couldn't handle it.
So I quit, which then led me to more drinking.
And fortunately for me, there was a classmate who said,
look, you know,
you should come play this sport called handball.
And I gave, I don't even know.
I don't like racquetball.
This is stupid.

(04:58):
I'm not going to do this.
She goes, no, no, no.
I'm talking about team handball, which is different.
It's like soccer using the hands or water polo on land.
Just come, just come.
Like we're practicing, just come.
So I went to watch this wonderful sport that involved
hitting people.
And I was like, yes, I'm angry.
I get to hit people.
This is awesome.
I was so excited.

(05:18):
I could take that anger out on other people,
but it happened to be a sport that was really fun.
And they, the team was a club team,
but they played some other teams.
And I, I played with them about two months in, they said,
we're going to go to the national tournament in New York
city.
Do you want to go?
And I'm like, I had nothing else to do.
Had never been to New York city.
I'm like, sure.

(05:39):
Well, that's what the national tournament was.
And look, I'd only played a couple of months.
I didn't know what I was doing.
I was athletic enough that the national team coach invited
me to start training with a national team,
which was trained for the 1984 Olympic games.
So it was a really valuable lesson to me, which was, look,
if a door shuts, it doesn't mean the dream is over.

(06:02):
Sherry, say that again.
That's...
I want everybody to catch what she just said.
This is flipping gold.
Please repeat that.
Well, if the door shut, it doesn't mean the dream is over.
It just means that you have to shift it a little bit.
That the universe, and you can call it source energy,
universe, God, that there's a different plan,
a better plan than you could have ever imagined.

(06:23):
So don't get mad.
Like the dream just shifted.
So it was wonderful for me to understand that, that really,
truly everything was gonna be okay.
It's always gonna be okay, even though we think it's not,
it's gonna be okay.
And that slammed door just meant, hey, look at this.
This is gonna be amazing.
And it was.

(06:44):
And you ended up at the Olympics.
I did. I did. Twice.
And did you medal?
We did not.
So you have to imagine,
I started playing the sport at age 19.
The people I was playing against at places, they were five.
So there was a....
we became competitive,
and we had a shot at actually winning a medal.

(07:06):
Unfortunately, we were one goal, one goal away from that.
But looking back is like, you know,
really what we accomplished in the short of time,
medal time, because my teammates were the same way.
Nobody started playing when they were young.
They all start playing when they were, you know, older.
And we really, we've had, you know,
some phenomenal opportunities there to win a medal.

(07:27):
We were just a little short, still wonderful experience.
Didn't change the experience.
Without a doubt, and it gives you that title Olympian,
right? And that when you think about the number of people
in the world that's pretty rare air,
that's pretty rare air to say I would I'm an Olympian right
so could you share with our audience the transition of how
you you did all of that and then you got into coaching

(07:51):
basketball.
Right?
Well, the thing about team handball is, I love the sport.
There's just nowhere to coach in the United States.
It's a dead end.
Cause there's only, you know, there's no,
there's no competitive teams playing at any level.
Not high school, not college, you know,
there's no competitive teams.
And so there's nowhere to coach.
And I really always wanted to be a coach.

(08:12):
So after I was an athlete, I knew I wanted to coach.
So I went back to the sport that I had loved prior to team
handball.
And I started coaching at a really small college and then
just built up to, you know,
other colleges and other places to coach.
And it was, again, look, I don't think, Louie,
that I've ever worked a day in my life cause I've always
been passionate about what I've done.
And it's been so much fun that I never felt like I worked.

(08:36):
It was just like, oh, I get to go play again.
Yeah,
and that's a great thing for our listeners to take in is
that when you're doing what you love, it really isn't work.
And if your job, your career,
whatever you're doing is work,
then you really need to take a long,
hard look at what you're doing.
Yeah, absolutely.
So, Sherry, I'd like to...

(08:58):
there's so many things, this is,
this could be going so many directions because you've
already, first off,
thank you for being so vulnerable and transparent,
but this could go in so many different directions.
For our audience today,
I really want to focus on leadership.
So when you transitioned into basketball,
and you'd had these experiences on basketball teams,

(09:18):
what was one of the things that you committed to your...
that you were going to,
the kind of leader you were going to be because of the
experience you had in the past?
Well, I think that's so, so important to know, like, Louie,
like all these experiences and people have been called
negative.
And if you call, you're going to live them as negative.
But really, they're just opportunities for growth, right?
Each one of those things that I experienced gave me the

(09:40):
understanding of how to be better and how to interact
better with people and how to honor the players.
So,
so one of the things I really wanted to make sure was that
none of my players would ever be bullied like that was not
going to happen.
I was going to protect that player.
We were going to have honest conversations.
I was going to help that player through whatever was going

(10:01):
on in her world so that we could get through that together
as as an individual, as a team.
So that was one of the things that I committed to.
I committed to having the tough conversations with people,
having the tough conversations with the team and really
finding the unity that we needed to to care about each
other.
And I would use the word love.
A lot of players would be like, oh, love.
But I mean,
it's really that deeper compassion and care that you hold

(10:24):
together.
And that is love.
Compassion is love.
So that was one of the things that taught me was, look,
I'm not going to let any player be bullied or be pushed out
of the circle or feel like they don't go off the team.
We're going to deal with it.
We're going to find a way through it,
first for the benefit of the individual,
but also for the benefit of the team.

(10:45):
Like, it hurts the team when we do that to somebody.
I think that...
so again, for our listeners,
she just hit two things out of the park in a couple of
sentences.
One of them is, is that everything that she went through,
she looked back on it,
and sometimes it's hard in the middle of it, right?
But at some point you have the ability to look back on it

(11:07):
and reflect and say, okay,
what do I need to do differently?
She also was smart enough to turn that into something that
she added to her leadership style,
which really changed the game.
And I wanna say this,
and I think this is very powerful because I'm all about the
love.
And one of the things Sherry and I share is this friendship

(11:30):
and we love each other, but there's no sex,
there's no romance.
It's that compassion.
It's that understanding,
it's the forgiveness that you had because you had been
treated that way that you now gave to your players.
And could you talk a little bit about...
because I want people to understand how powerful this is
because you were not only being this amazing leader in this

(11:52):
space where, especially with young people,
where they need it more, right?
When there's a person like you in their life that's been
successful and you tell them, hey,
you can do this or you're smart or you're talented,
it's really pouring into people,
and you were doing that with love.
Could you just share, and I know you're humble and modest,
but please share some of the success you had because you

(12:13):
ended up being a nationally renowned basketball coach.
Well, I mean, yeah, the success,
I think when we talk about success living,
it's so funny because people say, what was your,
what was your favorite moment,
like as a coach and everybody thinks it's going to be like
winning the national championship,
and it's not. The favorite moment.
And I can recount, you know,

(12:35):
some of them would be when a player made a huge shift and
who she was, from those conversations,
because when you love somebody,
that doesn't mean that you give them freedom to just go and
wander around and do whatever the heck they want to.
Love means I care so much about you that we're going to
have these conversations about how you're behaving and what
you're doing to yourself, right?

(12:55):
So when you hold people in that kind of accountability,
that means love, and people don't understand that,
but that means love.
And so, you know,
when I see people like I had a young lady who, for example,
is really quiet, very fearful, had a lot of self-doubt,
and she started off being an elementary teacher and there's
nothing wrong with that.
I think that's beautiful.

(13:16):
That's not who she wanted to be, though.
She didn't feel like she was smart enough,
she's a 4.0 student,
she didn't feel like she was smart enough to be a
physician's assistant.
And so her senior year, she's like, you know, coach,
I never wanted to be this.
I said, well, what do you want to be?
And she said, well, I wanted to be a physician's assistant.

(13:36):
I said, well, help me understand why you didn't do that.
She goes, well, I'm just not smart enough.
I was like, all right, let's talk about this, you know,
and she, you know, she grew a lot in those four years.
I mean, she grew from a quiet person to a better leader,
to more confident, the way she played,
the way she carried herself.
And she also recognized that when she left college,

(13:58):
even though she did get that first degree,
she went back to school and became a physician's assistant.
Now, folks, that's a story,
like that's one of the stories that I hold dear to my
heart,
because you get to see somebody who grew a lot and who
found that wonderful piece of confidence that went on to

(14:19):
achieve things.
And so when we're talking about like moments of a career
that makes you successful, I think about all those moments,
you know, times the number of players that I had,
not everybody came full circle,
but certainly there's people that reached out to me 15
years later, 20 years later, whatever.
And said, Coach, man, I really appreciate you.
I appreciate the lesson you taught me.

(14:41):
I appreciate...
I want to know, I want you to know where I am today.
Those are the success stories that you have as a leader.
That's that's touching, Sherry, that's yeah,
that's just so touching.
It warms my heart,
and that's going to bring me to my next question.
And I'd like you to talk about this because I think I call
it the downstream.

(15:02):
You know,
so all these lives that you've touched and all and this is
true of all of us, right?
People don't understand you don't have to be a nationally
renowned and successful basketball coach.
We are touching lives all day, every day.
Right.
And all of us are leaders.
But one of the things I'd like you to talk about is letting
go of the downstream.

(15:23):
Right?
So we'll just take the example you shared with the young
woman who turned into being a physician's assistant instead
of an educator, a school teacher.
What do you do or what would your advice be to leaders to
not be so concerned about that outcome?
Because that downstream,
you don't know how many lives she's helped or healed.

(15:46):
And I think that's the beauty of what we do.
We just give it and then let it go be what it's supposed to
go be.
Can you talk about that?
Let's give it a gift.
So this is the challenge that a lot of leaders have,
and I had it early in my career,
is when you give somebody a gift,
and that's like you're coaching them,
you're giving them opportunities,
whatever you wanna call it, the gift of coaching,

(16:08):
that's a gift.
And so a gift means that when you give a gift,
your part in it is done.
That's your part.
How they use it is their part.
And so a lot of people get upset, and I did,
as a young coach, I'd be like, man,
I'm giving these people so much information,
so many opportunities, and they're not using it,

(16:28):
and then I'd be mad at them for not using it.
And then I realized that it's a gift,
and when you give a gift, your giving is done.
Then they have to decide if they're gonna use part of it,
none of it, all of it.
That's their decision.
My part is in the gift is in giving.
That's my part, and it ends there, right?

(16:49):
So you have to understand that's what a gift is.
There is no...
a gift is given without expectation of return.
That's what a gift is.
If you have an expectation of return, it's not a gift,
it's a bargaining chip.
So you have to realize what you're doing, right?
So again, for our audience, this is gold, gold, gold.
I can tell you that Sherry,

(17:11):
one of the reasons why I love you.
And so that gift, and I'd like to reiterate what she said,
that gift, if you're expecting something back,
then it's a bargaining chip, it's not a gift.
And that's what most people do with love.
I love you if, I love you but, right?

(17:31):
That's not the condition.
Right, I love you when, exactly.
And that's not a gift, it's just a bargaining chip.
And then it becomes tit for tat,
and then it becomes some sort of competitive relationship.
So I'd like to kind of morph into now, you now,
and it's amazing to me, you're just such a fun,

(17:55):
down-to-earth, humble human.
I mean that sincerely, to your point.
We've had great conversations over the couple of years that
we've known each other, and they're so interactive,
but you've risen to be a nationally renowned and regarded
and highly respected speaker,
trainer that goes into these organizations and really truly

(18:15):
morphs that.
So I'd like you to talk about what's one of the things that
you think is the most important when you go into an
organization or somebody's hired you to do a keynote speech
that you always think is critical that's included in that
for a leader to grow.
Yeah.
So my biggest thing,
and I've written about this in a couple of books already,

(18:36):
printed out in another book soon in April, is this,
is self-awareness.
Because without that, you have,
your potential for growth is almost a zero.
Right?
And so it's the ability to look at yourself honestly,
and being vulnerable, and also with that internal look,

(18:58):
is not to be angry at yourself.
Like it's like that self-awareness that says, oh,
here's what I need to improve.
Here's what...
here's my weaknesses.
Here's, here's what I'm not doing well.
And at that same time, give yourself grace.
What most people do when they start the journey of self
-awareness is they start recognizing who they are,
how they show up in the world,
and then they start beating themselves up.

(19:19):
That's not helpful.
That is not, that's not the space you want to be in.
And so it's really talking to people about the biggest way
to grow,
which means your biggest impact is through you learning
more about you, how you show up in the world,
what are your thoughts that you're thinking that make you
show up as that person, as that individual,
without being mad at yourself.

(19:42):
Taking responsibility with true compassion,
which is self-love, like we talked about self-love,
but when people start this journey, Louie, you know,
and I did it when I was younger,
is I started recognizing who I really was.
I was like, oh my gosh.
And then I turned to like more self-hatred.
That is not a good part of the journey.
So, you know, everywhere I go,

(20:04):
there's always elements of this self-awareness piece.
Maybe I don't call it self-awareness,
but it's always elements of asking people to stop and self
-reflect, so they get a deeper insight into who they are.
And that's the moment where epiphanies happen.
That's the moment where they get an opportunity right there
in that moment to go, oh, that's me.

(20:26):
Right.
Yeah.
And I would agree with that.
I think that there's it's, it's, it's a challenge, right?
It's funny because I think we all go through that.
I know I went through that when I first started becoming
aware of who I was being and what I was doing.
And the thing that my big epiphany was like, well,
you know, all these relationships are messed up.
Who's the common denominator?

(20:46):
The guy in the mirror, right?
The guy I see every morning when I brush my feet, teeth,
I could have had a V8.
And so I would let's go down this road for a little bit.
So what do you share with audiences and these leaders,
CEOs, C-suite executives, when you go in, what,
what do you share with them or teach them on how to become

(21:08):
self-aware?
Because I want you to know,
I'm at a hundred percent alignment.
I tell people once you become self-aware,
you're about 65% of the way there, right?
Because now you're aware of what the hell is going on,
who you're being.
And that's what I thought.
Who are you being and who do you want to be?
But how do you share with leaders on how to start to become
self-aware?
Well, I do have some piece like, you know,

(21:30):
there is depending on what kind of...
if it's a keynote, it's a little bit different, right?
But if it's a workshop,
I do have some papers that ask you questions about self
awareness, so that you can go down and start looking at,
you know, what does it mean to be self aware?
Because Louie, if you ask people are self aware,
most people are gonna say, Yes, yes, of course, I am.
Because they don't know about like...

(21:51):
I would have said the same thing.
I would have said, Yes, of course, I'm like, yes,
like I think about things, of course.
So that's one of the ways, but also,
one of the things I love to do is literally just have
people stand up, like I will say to people this, you know,
finish this quote for me, quit taking it.
And then the people almost everybody in the crowd will say
personally, okay, great.

(22:12):
So so you all know the quote.
Yep, yep, yep.
That's okay.
So I get that.
So I want you to raise your hand.
How many of you here have ever allowed what somebody else
has said to you ruin an hour of your day?
100%.
100% of people are gonna raise your hands.
So if you say you know the quote, but you're not living it,
you're not living the idea.

(22:33):
So what's that gap mean?
What's the gap between knowing, like knowing,
I know the quote, and living it?
What's that gap?
And then to help them understand,
like quit taking it personal, I'll have everybody stand up,
you know, have 10 statements I read.
And I will say,
if you've done this in the last six months then sit down. And, Louie, like
I get to the fifth one, everybody sit everybody seated.

(22:55):
Right.
And so now that makes them aware that they're actually
taking things personally.
And that helps them become aware.
Now, occasionally, I'll have like, somebody,
one or two people standing up.
And I'm like, yeah, you're just,
you're the ones who are not self aware,
because nobody should be able to get through this.
Right, right.
You know, one of the questions I would say would be like,
you know, one of the things I would say is,

(23:18):
if you've allowed a stranger, a stranger,
who says something to you have an impact on the on your
emotions.
Right?
And people go, Oh, no, I don't do that.
Well, I still do it.
I taught myself out of it, but quickly.
But let's say somebody turns around says F you and I'm
like, you know, like, I'll take offense.
And I'm like, wait a second.

(23:40):
That's not about me.
That's about them.
Like that.
It has nothing to do with me, right?
So, say that again real quick.
It's not about...
It's not about me, it's about them, right?
It's not about me, it's about you.
It's a mantra I teach.
It's not about me...
it's not about me, it's about you.
You don't say that out loud.
Right, right, right, but you're absolutely right.

(24:00):
And so I'd like you to talk about, it's not about you.
And so I'd like to inject this real quick because one of
the things I share with people is the world's giving us
feedback all the time, right?
A good mentor and buddy of mine, he calls it feed forward.
But I like to share if somebody tells you you're a horse,

(24:21):
they're probably out of their mind.
If a couple of people tell you you're a horse,
there could be a conspiracy at hand.
If 10 or 15 people tell you you're a horse,
it's time to go buy a saddle, right?
And so if the world's giving you the same information over
and over again,
you can continue to push it away and say the whole world's
crazy, or you can start to ask some of these questions.

(24:44):
So when you talk about that,
I'd like you to go a little deeper in, it's not about you,
it's about them.
What do you mean by that?
So the audience understands how they can apply this in
their lives.
The first thing I say, you know,
when somebody's coming at you and they're demeaning,
demoralizing, destructive,
so I always preface it with that.

(25:05):
If they're demeaning, demoralizing, destructive,
then it's not about you, it's about them.
And what that means is you have to remember that somebody
can only speak from their own lifetime of experiences is
the only place they can speak from.
They cannot speak from that which they do not know.
So you have to remember that all of us, without exception,

(25:26):
go through challenges.
There's nobody on this earth that escapes challenges.
It is the process of being human.
So I want to stop you.
Can you hold your thought?
Sure.
People, I want to repeat what you said.
People cannot do what they don't know.
They can only live the experience they've had until they've
had a better experience.

(25:46):
So that's why you don't take it personally.
But please go on.
That's another golden nugget there.
So,
you've got to imagine all these challenges that we go through
in a lifetime and we're going to have a ton of them.
I mean it's not one, it's not two, it's like 50, 60.
I mean the number is astounding really when you think about
the challenges that we go through.
So we're going to have a major challenge every 12 to 16

(26:07):
months and then we're going to have these life quakes,
what I call a life quake that I read from a book by Bruce
Fraley.
But a life quake is a life is the lifelong drain that blows
up in your face.
It's the injury or illness that alters your life forever.
It's the loved one that betrays you in such a way that
seems unforgivable.
You're gonna have like three to five of those as well.
So you know by the time you meet somebody they've gone
through some of this adversity,

(26:28):
and some people get better because they've read books,
they've had mentors, they've had coaches,
they've gone to webinars, whatever,
and other people get better.
So repeat that.
People get better because...
Well, because of what they've done.
So they've had coaches, they've had mentors,
they've read books, they've attended workshops.
I mean, they've done the work, right?
They've done work to understand that that moment was an

(26:52):
opportunity versus being mad at it.
Whereas other people get bitter.
Now, when you meet somebody who's demeaning, demoralizing,
destructive, they're bitter.
And all they're doing is throwing their bitterness onto
you, that's what that means.
And the mistake that we make is we let their story become
our story, and that's when we get upset.

(27:13):
That's when we get sad, that's when we get mad.
And it's not about us, it never was about us.
It's about the person that's speaking to us, right?
And when we understand that, like to me, I'm able to,
when people are being that way, I just start my mantra.
It's not about me, it's about you.
It's not about me, it's about you.
Until I remember the truth of it.
And I remember the other thing that's really huge,

(27:34):
if they knew better, they'd do better.
And the reason they're not getting better is they don't
know better.
Yeah,
Jack Canfield said something that's kind of my mantra.
Everybody's doing the best they can with what they know,
where they're at.
If they knew something better, they do something better,
but they don't.
I'd also like you to talk a little bit about one of the

(27:56):
things that I become aware of is, whatever you're doing,
the only way it's ever going to trigger me if it's still
alive in me.
Can you talk about that?
Absolutely, absolutely.
Nobody can hurt you without your permission, right?
That's the second part to this.
And people will go, well, I don't want anybody to hurt me.
So I wouldn't tell them to hurt me.
I'm like, no,
what that means is when somebody says something,

(28:19):
and you know, the moment that you get defensive, right?
So if somebody were to say something to me, Louie,
I didn't agree with.
So like they said, look, your, your eyes are really ugly,
like, ugly, green, or whatever, I'll be like, they're blue.
So I don't know, like, whatever.
And I don't even take offense to it,
because it's nothing that's true.
I'm like, and I don't believe it.

(28:41):
But let's say that somebody said to me, you're stupid,
and I get defensive.
So that's the first thing that you understand.
The moment you get defensive, what that means is,
is you are...
you believe what they're telling you is true.
It's not that they said it, that hurts you,
what hurts you is you believe it to be true.
That's the moment you get defensive.
And the second thing you do is start trying to prove it's

(29:01):
not true.
So you start trying to say, Hey, Louie, this isn't true.
It's a Hey, Mom, Mom, it's not true.
You start looking for, you know,
that proof that it's not true.
What that means is all they did was tap into a wound that
you have.
So you have a wound,
they could be at a six or 16 or 26 or whatever,
that's never been completely healed.
And what that person is doing is they're tapping into that
wound.

(29:22):
And when they tap into the wound, you get defensive.
Well, look, if it wasn't there,
what they said wouldn't hurt you,
is that some part of you agrees with what they said,
that's what hurts you.
So when you learn to be curious,
this is the point of curiosity.
Somebody says something, I get defensive.
I'm like, Ooh, okay, let me explore why I agreed with that.

(29:45):
What pardon me, what,
what story did I have in my youth or younger now,
whatever that is,
what story did I have that still hasn't been healed,
so that when they tap into it, I go directly to the wound,
and I get upset.
Because if you feel that wound, not if, well,
I guess if I say when, because I'm going to heal it, right?

(30:06):
When you will, the wound, it goes away.
And then no matter what they say,
you can let it go because you're no
longer give them permission.
Yes sir.
So I wanna touch...
so Sherry just modeled something that I very,
very rarely see.
Sherry just modeled something hugely powerful and she's
living what she's sharing with us.
She just caught herself saying if and when in that sentence

(30:30):
and she didn't want her mind to hear if she could heal it.
She wanted her mind to hear when I heal it, right?
What she was referring to is it's that person's choice.
If they're gonna heal it,
but Sherry's moved past that choice, and her mind is aware,
and she caught herself because she doesn't want her mind to
say when, or she wants her mind to hear when,

(30:54):
not if I'm gonna heal it.
So when, and I'm sorry,
thank you for letting me interrupt you because you're
just....
this is, you're brilliant.
I mean, seriously, you're dropping brilliant,
brilliant wisdom.
So what would you suggest to our listeners so that when
they've got to the point where they're aware,

(31:14):
I've realized it's triggered my stuff, right?
It's not about the world, it's my stuff,
and I'm gonna take responsibility for my stuff.
Like you said earlier with these relationships,
these basketball players,
I'm gonna take responsibility for my role in this.
How would you recommend they start healing whatever that
wound is?

(31:36):
Well,
the first thing is you kind of have to figure out what the
wound is, right?
So for example, the whole thing about me being stupid.
Look, I was a 4.0 student.
I was an academic all-American.
I was a valedictorian.
So you would think initially like, well,
that's silly that you would be upset about that.
So I'd have to ask myself what story caused me to believe

(31:56):
that I was stupid.
That I'm still holding on to.
Well, that goes all the way back to third grade.
So in third grade,
they were going to hold me back a grade because I couldn't
read at the third grade level.
They were going to put me in a remedial reading class.
Well, remedial to me meant stupid.
They never used the word stupid,
but I knew that that's what it meant.

(32:16):
And I couldn't let that happen because my dad was
superintendent of schools.
My mom was a teacher and a coach was like, I can't be...
I can't be seen as stupid.
So that was the story, right?
The story of me thinking I was stupid and then carrying
that story forth for, I mean, you know,
even though I had straight A's,
the reason I had straight A's is because I thought that I

(32:38):
had to work harder than anybody else in the world to get
them, that I wasn't really smart.
I was stupid.
So even though I was proving to myself that I wasn't,
I still held the story, right?
So I had to go back and heal the story.
I had to go back and really look at the story and how do I
heal the story?
Well,
first I had to forgive myself for carrying it for so long.

(33:01):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Decades you need to carry a story?
Yeah, exactly.
But then, you know, really looking into it, like, look,
I had proved that even though I had a problem with reading,
I was so smart that I overcame it.
Right?
I mean,
I had to relook at that and understand that the old story

(33:23):
was not true.
It was a story that I chose to have.
And the truth,
the truth of it was how smart did I have to be to overcome
that reading problem that I had to be able to read and
write books.
Now read, read, you know, volumes of books,
tons of books over my lifetime,
and then learn to write books.
So really it wasn't, I was stupid.
It was just a little bit of a challenge and how smart I was

(33:46):
to overcome the challenge without help.
Like nobody came to me and said,
let's help you with the reading.
Like nobody did that.
I did it on my own.
And that's powerful. And,
one of the things that I've come to understand is to your
point when we get defensive on either side of the
relationship we've gone to our emotional brain and the best

(34:07):
thing you can do is walk away from that situation,
right? Because if you get emotional I can't reason with
you, all right? That's out the window,
that's not an option. So I'd like to I'd like you to talk
about how, uh,
I love it when I say something you get a big grin but I'd
like you to talk about how you teach leaders how to handle

(34:27):
that situation because what you're talking about in this
this emotional baggage some people call it,
our story whatever you whatever...
however you want to label it we we need to take
responsibility for that how do you coach leaders into
handling that in the day-to-day situation and interactions?

(34:48):
Well, you just said it, Louie,
which was you need to take a pause, right?
So when you feel yourself getting emotional,
you know you're no longer thinking logically.
You are now your emotional brain, your lizard brain,
whatever they want to call it, is taking over.
So your past, your past experiences are taking over,
and you can't have the conversation at the moment.

(35:08):
So the best thing to do is say, hey, like I would say, hey,
Louie, you know,
this is probably not the best time for me to have this
conversation.
I need to take a little break to think about this,
so I come back to you in the best space I can possibly come
back to you at, and then we can have the conversation.
Can we do this tomorrow at 9 a.m., or can we do this,
you know, later this day at 5 p.m.?
Always give them a time and a date, hold that to be true,

(35:29):
then you got to go work on it.
Like you got to walk away and kind of figure out, like,
what triggered me?
What was it that was said that triggered me?
Now I've got to figure out from that trigger,
how do I let it go?
And so there's all kinds of techniques.
I can't, you know, teach all kinds of techniques that I do,
or there's tons of them out there.
You can let something go,
but it's really like you've got to figure out what was it?

(35:51):
What was it?
And then in your technique, whatever that is for you,
for forgiveness, what that looks like for you.
And forgiveness is not like, I forgive them.
Like, no, you didn't.
That's the other forgiveness.
But you got to do something, you know, like,
ho'oponoponam is one of the things I do,
which is a why in prayer, which is very simple, right?
Four parts.
So I'll give the audience right now just a really simple

(36:12):
way to do it, which is it's four parts.
I'm sorry.
Please forgive me.
Thank you.
I love you.
That's the four parts of that.
So let's say I got...
I practice that, and I've added, I'm so, so sorry, right?
I've really doubled down on the, I'm sorry.
It wasn't who I wanted to be, but please go on.

(36:32):
It's because it's, and let me share with the audience.
Sometimes we think that the solution has got to be some
complicated, really convoluted,
hard thing that we have to do.
And Sherry's going to give you four sentences that you
could practice right now today.
So please repeat it and go on.
I'm sorry, please forgive me, thank you, I love you.

(36:53):
And so people are like, well,
you have to say that to the person, I'm like, no,
you don't have to say that to the person.
You say it to yourself, you can say it to,
you could say to the person, like not face to face,
you could say it to them from where you're sitting right
here, right now, as if you're talking to them.
I think there's three parts to this prayer that I've
experienced that really changes it, Louie.
One is, I'm gonna say to the other person,

(37:15):
like soul to soul, right, soul to soul.
I'm gonna say it about me, my part in it, to me,
and then I'm gonna say it to the higher power,
because there's three...
there's three parts, I think, that we can get to that.
You just gave me chills up my back that's that's yeah,
yeah...
Yeah, if I was in a situation that, you know,

(37:38):
I could say something like this to,
let's say I have a neighbor who's not very nice.
And I know probably he's not very nice because of the
experiences he had when he's a child.
I don't know what those were,
but I'm sure that he's still holding on to stuff.
And so let's say, I would say to him,
I'm so sorry I don't understand where you're coming from.
Please forgive me for not taking into account like all the

(37:58):
challenges that you've had to this point.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you for giving me this experience of learning once
again, the power of understanding, and I love you.
So that would be like the soul to soul.
So I'm not talking to him,
but I'm talking to his higher soul, right?
And then for me, it might be,
I'm so sorry that I got reactive.
Please forgive me for how I showed up in this conversation.

(38:21):
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to see once again
that there's a different way to handle something,
and I love you.
So that way I was talking to me, right?
So that was talking to me.
Now for the higher power, I might say something like,
I'm so sorry that I've had this lesson 50,000 times.
Please forgive me for having to learn one more time.

(38:43):
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you for ever ending grace, and I love you.
So there's three different ways to go into that and you do
it whatever way it feels good or maybe all three ways.
But it softens that whole experience and now you're ready
to go back to have a conversation.
And I would like, so I love your heart.

(39:04):
I truly love your heart,
because one of the things that I think that what you just
shared, I want our audience to catch, is you open...
when you do these kinds of things and you talk about things
like gratitude, thank you, love, I love you,
you open your heart and your mind to a infiniteness of

(39:26):
possibilities that you would have never imagined or never
thought of.
And so let's go down this road just a little bit.
And again, this is for leaders because it's so powerful.
I'd like you to share some things that you've created in
your life or that have come to you,
because one of the things I'm aware of is inspiration comes
to all of us.
How often it comes is directly related to how fast you act

(39:49):
on it.
But could you share with the audience some things that have
come to you because you've been working on this thing
called forgiveness, gratitude,
and love that you've created that's made the world a better
place.
I would start with my family because I think our family is
the biggest place where we struggle the most.
I think those relationships with families are the biggest

(40:10):
place.
So, when my grandmother passed away,
I can remember walking into the room,
and my mom not sitting close to her but sitting far away.
They didn't have a good relationship sitting far away at
the door.
And my grandmother had not been responsive,
hadn't really not had any conversations with anybody.
And I flew in.
I was living in West Virginia.
I flew in from West Virginia,
and my sister walks into my grandmother's bed and she goes,

(40:32):
Granny, Sherry just flew in to come see you.
And she literally opened her eyes and she goes,
what'd you do?
Flying in on a broom?
That's what she said.
So that was my typical grandmother,
and I thought that was funny and hysterical.
Now my mother gets so mad.
Well, she's going to talk to you.
She hasn't even talked to me.
I've been here for days.
I was like, ooh,
I don't want that to be my relationship with my mom.

(40:56):
And so even though my mother and I have experienced some
very challenging early on life experiences,
I made the decision right then.
I was like,
I am not going to have this relationship with my mom.
I'm going to forgive her, and I'm going to love her.
I'm going to love my mother.
And so because I made that decision,

(41:16):
we've had a much better relationship.
I've learned to love her no matter what or who she shows up
as.
And it changes the family dynamics, right?
When you could show up and love your mother.
Because I'm like,
I'm not going to be the person when she dies.
I'm going to sit over by that door and be mad at her.
I'm going to have done all the work to have loved her right
here, right now.
So that's one of the things that really,

(41:37):
like when we can shift that, it shifts the family dynamics.
Not just my relationship with my mother,
but it shifted my sister's relationship with her, too.
And it gave us a better opportunity to have an experience
of closeness that we would not have experienced.
And I think that that's the work that we do, right?
And the work I do, like I did with my neighbor,

(41:58):
he sued me over something ridiculous and cost me lots of
money.
But you know, why would I be angry at him every day?
Why would I be angry at him?
I wouldn't want to be angry at him every day,
because that doesn't live in him.
It lives in me, right?
And so it's those kinds of things that can really change
your life.
How do you show up?
Like I want to show up as a person who can find the good in

(42:18):
everybody, who can bring more light and love in the world.
That's how I want to show up.
I can't show up as that person being angry and with
unforgiveness in my heart, right?
Right.
That's very true.
You know,
one of my favorite quotes that you just touched on is when
you're busy hating someone,
it's like eating a jar of poison,
expecting it to kill the other person, right?

(42:39):
It's the only person you're really hurting is you.
I'd like you to touch on something that you just hit,
but I'd like you to...
for the audience to really grasp it,
how you do that everywhere in your life,
because we both know how you do one thing is how you're
doing everything.
Like how powerful is that to take that attitude you had
with your mom and use that in a team in those...

(43:05):
because I agree with you completely that our biggest
opportunity for growth is in those closest personal
relationships is nobody can push those buttons and trigger
us like the people that know us best, right?
Because they've been doing it for a long time,
especially our parents and our siblings.
But I'd like you to talk about how important that is to do
it everywhere else.
And also the importance of boundaries as a leader,

(43:28):
because at some point you can love them.
People, I think,
get this messed up in their head where you can love
somebody, but you don't spend time with them anymore,
or you can love somebody,
but you don't let them allow them to do whatever they've
been doing that was hurting you or really destructive to
the relationship.
Can you talk about that a little bit, please?

(43:49):
100%.
I think that when people think of love they think it's like
I mean you talked about like sex and romance before and
they think of like that continual like you have to show up
for them every day. No no no no no no. Sometimes the
biggest love that you can have is allowing somebody else to
be who they are because they have free will,
like you have free will,
allowing somebody else to be who they are which means that

(44:10):
maybe you can't be around them because they're making
choices that are not positive choices for them because we
can't change anybody anyway. It's not our power we don't
have that power you still love them you're sending them
loving energy you just can't be in their presence because
it's so toxic, right? It doesn't but you're loving them.
I mean you're still...

(44:30):
you're not hate...
there's no hatred. You're, you're...
you have compassion for where they are you're you're hoping
you're sending them positive energy you just can't be there
because it's too hard. It's too hard on you to be in the
presence of that toxicity,
right? So there's that kind of love that we have,
and so I think well you know when I work with teams it's

(44:52):
about a heavy compassion for that person where they are
right now it doesn't mean that it's a it's as loud that
they're allowed to show up that way. So let's make sure we
understand that. So a greatest love for somebody on a team
might be that you decide to terminate them, after, after,
after,
after having conversations giving them opportunity to
grow right? It might be the biggest love you have is to say

(45:14):
you know what it's the time for you to understand we've had
conversations, I've given you options,
we've worked on some personal improvement plans,
you haven't taken the opportunity that to move forward,
so now it's time for you to move on and in doing so you
might be giving them the best opportunity for them to learn
the biggest lesson they need to learn. It's not from hatred

(45:35):
you're doing it. You're doing it from complete love you
know so that they have the opportunity to recognize what
they're doing to themselves and to the team
And so that's powerful because that link again,
I want the audience to catch this. That links back to what
you said.
You just give the gift.
right? You give that...
you don't, you don't jump the gun. You give them thgift.
You give them the gift of coaching. You give them the gift

(45:56):
of your wisdom, your knowledge, your experience.
The things that you've used habits, p
rocesses that have helped people in the past and then at
that point it's their deal,
and sometimes you come to that crossroads, w
here it's time to go on.
I love that...
I read it...
I'm a big fan of John Wooden,
and I've read a bunch of stuff about him and read some of

(46:17):
his own books And one of the things that he would do is
when he would terminate.
I just let somebody go in one of my organizations because
they...
to your point...they really want to have their own
business, and I told him, you know, you're not a fit here,
but I'll help you,
I help mentor people all the time to grow their business
and prove their business.
I said I'll be able to hel...
I'm happy to help you. And John Wooden used to you

(46:39):
know...he would take a player that was trying to make the
team and he'd say hey You know,
I'm gonna introduce you to the swim coach because I can see
you got some skills But they're they're probably gonna be
better in the pool than they are in a basketball court but
that's again, that's that gift and whether they whether...
he goes and sees the swim coach or not or whether they
learn the lesson...it is like you said,
I'm in the same school that you are in...

(47:01):
There's there's things I went,
you know thousands of times over and over and over and over
before and duh, Louie It's you. You know,
you were doing this you were saying this you were thinking
this you create And you created this thing every flippin
time and then it...
but you'd get angry and blame the world, right?
And so that it's just...
this is such a rich conversation.
One of the things I'd like you to share at this point is w

(47:24):
hat's one of the things that you would you would share with
leaders on how to be a strong loving leader for their team?
Well,
the greatest gift you can give yourself and give your team
is to love yourself more, right?
That's the greatest gift you can ever give.
And so that means, again, we talked a little bit, you know,
I said this before,
but getting a coach that can help you get there or getting

(47:44):
a mentor or, you know, if you get reading books,
you can certainly read books.
You know, I've written books, you've written books.
Reading a book, listen to podcasts, it's,
you have to retrain.
This is the hard part for people.
You have to retrain your thought habits that you've
developed over decades.
And it's not simple.
That's not an easy task.

(48:05):
It's worth it.
It is well worth it to retrain your brain.
So a lot of us grew up in situations where we're taught
we're unworthy or we're failures or we're not good enough
and all kinds of messages that come our way.
And when we believe those messages,
it's going to impact the way that we treat other people.
We have to, we have, it's a must.
Like when I, it's a must,

(48:28):
like the way that I became better to, as a coach,
was I invested in myself.
I invested in my personal growth, right?
And so that's, you know,
first it was reading and watching videos and then it became
getting coaches, you know,
and it's that ongoingness of talking to people like you,
Louie, you know, you grow me every time we talk.

(48:48):
I mean,
it's really being around those kinds of people that help us
move a different direction.
And so if you're a leader and you haven't invested yet in a
coach, I would suggest, I highly suggest, whether it's me,
Louie, or somebody else, it doesn't really matter,
is really investing in a good coach to help you on your
journey.
Yeah, that's really profound, wise advice.
And one of the things I'd share with the audience is that I

(49:11):
tell people all the time,
never work with a coach that doesn't have a coach, right?
Because at some point you're gonna get into these
conversations and you're gonna be helping your coach or the
coach is gonna have personal problems.
But I think that's profound advice because somebody sees
your life from a different perspective than you do because
you're in the middle of it.
You're in the middle of that emotion.

(49:31):
You're in the middle of the day-to-day interactions and
reactions of what's going on.
And so I wanna tap into this for a minute.
What's one of the things that you share with leaders on a
way they can start practicing self-love because I'm a huge
advocate of it as well.
Well, so, you know, uh, man, I,

(49:51):
I think that the first thing I just said to you is invest
in yourself.
So how do you do that?
I mean, it could be, you know,
I spend the first 45 minutes of every day investing in
myself.
And what does that mean?
That means, you know, I,
I go down to my basement where it's really quiet and I do
several things.
Number one is I write my intentions down for the day.
So attention is different than a goal.
So goal is like how much money I'm going to make,

(50:12):
how many calls I'm going to make, blah, blah, blah.
An intention is like every today,
one of my intentions was I'm going to look for abundance
everywhere.
So when I look outside, it's like, Oh my gosh,
what there's clouds that is stretched for everywhere.
Right?
Or look at that sunshine.
It's in, it's in every mountain peak that I can see.
So looking for, that's an,
that's an intention that I write down gratitude statements.

(50:33):
So five things I'm super grateful for.
Right?
And then I write down something I'm grateful for my body
because one of my biggest challenges is,
is that I have had, um, an autoimmune disease,
which affects my health.
And so I like to judge my body.
And so I have to really work at looking at my body and
being loving and kind to it.

(50:56):
And then I write down a miracle, Louie,
that I've experienced or somebody else's experience,
because the more you believe in miracles,
the more they show up.
And so when I write one down, I'm like, Oh my gosh,
you know, I just talked to this person.
They told me how they overcame this and this and this.
It's a miracle.
So I'll do that.
I read something positive or listen to something positive.
And then I meditate.

(51:17):
I am invested in me in the morning.
Like I am,
and I am filling my cup before I start the day with
everybody else.
I think that's critical for everybody to do and invest in
yourself because that's the way you get greater self love.
Right?
And I have to work on it.
Like I said, I judge my body.
It doesn't work like I want it to work.
I judge it.
Well,
that's not like my body is like part of every cell is, is,

(51:40):
has its own intelligence, right?
And I'm telling it, I don't like you.
Well, how's it going to show?
Right.
But so I want to touch on something.
So she's talking about her morning routine.
This doesn't take money.
It just takes her concern and consideration to make it a
priority, right?
You do it on a regular day.

(52:01):
I want to share something with you so our audience grasps
the power of two things that just intersected.
And this was,
we're doing this off the cuff because we're busy living it
so it's not hard for us to discuss it.
We don't have to think about this because we've done it
over and over.
One of the things I do when I write my gratitude,
I write things that I'm thankful for that haven't

(52:21):
manifested yet.
So every morning, every morning,
I'm writing thank you for the miracles, the opportunities,
and the abundance that I'm going to find in this day.
And one of the things that you
I'm gonna do that.
You just gave me something new.
Yay.
And so it went because because to your point and let's talk
about this for leaders because we're now we're you know...w

(52:43):
e're in leadership and mindset and personal development,
you know, and they're all connected, right?
I've got four pillars for this and I asked you and you want
to go to leadership But this is truly how we lead ourselves
is with personal development is with changing our mindset,
right?
But it's, it's a daily practice.
It's a habit and isn't that what is so important?
And I like it to talk about that on how just little things

(53:06):
every day At the end of a month at the end of a year.
It's huge.
Yeah
Yeah, I have this coaching client who, it's a young girl,
so she's only 22, and most of my clients are CEO, CFO, COO,
I mean the CEOs, right, the people and the C-suite,
but her parents met me and wanted me to coach her, I said,

(53:29):
sure.
Her willingness to go down this path of, you know,
self-development has been incredible.
I mean, just the beauty,
like she's worked with me for over a year,
and we started out and she had no self-confidence,
no self-esteem.
She thought she was unworthy.
She's a beautiful, beautiful young woman, you know, golfer,

(53:52):
and she said the most incredible thing to me the other day.
Now, you're going to get this.
Some people might not.
She ended up last place in a golf tournament, like last,
and she called me and she goes,
it was the worst I've ever played in my life.
This is after working with me, right,
and we've had some great successes.
Like, she's really gotten better at great success,
but this was not one of them,
and here's what she said to me.

(54:14):
She said, it was the worst I've ever played, and she goes,
and that golf tournament does not define me, I am worthy.
Yes.
Wow.
And I was like in tears.
I was like, oh my gosh.
Wow.
Wow.
And so, of course, you know,
what did she do the next time she played better, right?

(54:34):
Because she didn't let that tournament decide for her who
she was.
She reached for worthiness.
And if I can tell people out there,
like some of you might not get that,
but the power of that to move forward,
to find better things...
incredible, incredible.
And so that's what I think they want to talk about.

(54:55):
Like, if you do something, and you keep working at it,
that's where you'll end up.
That's the place you end up.
Like, even if something goes bad, you're still happy,
you're still in love with yourself.
And so I can tell you, you put tears in my eyes and again,
warmed my heart.
I was beaten bloody by a stepmother who told me I was
useless and I was never going to amount to anything,

(55:16):
and she couldn't wait till I got out of the house.
And I want to reap for our audience.
I don't tell you that for sympathy.
I tell you that because I started thinking different
thoughts and I, and I believe those thoughts for decades,
right?
I think this is so important why we have to go back to the
youth and get them before they have decades and decades of
this message that we repeat in our head over and over,

(55:37):
and then we buy into it, right?
And then we think it's the truth and it's not the truth.
It's the furthest thing from the truth.
Sherry, we could go on, we could go on for days, my friend,
but I'd like to, uh, I'd like to ask you, uh,
I like to usually end with two questions.
One is, if there was one book you,
you could recommend to the audience.

(55:58):
What would be one book?
For those of you that are listening and not watching,
she just held up her book,
hold that up again so I can read the, it's, it's called, T

he Winning Leadership (56:09):
Seven Secrets to Being a Truly G
reat, Powerful Leader.
So, so, so, okay.
So that answers my first question.
My second question is tell,
tell us what you love the most about your work that you do
now, your keynote speak, speaking, your workshops,
when you're going into these organizations and you're

(56:30):
really creating this great transformation,
what do you love most about it?
Well, the ability to offer gifts to people.
So the ability to influence and impact.
And so, you know,
sometimes people will come out and nobody has received
anything.
And maybe they need,
that's the first seed they've ever had planted.
But really the opportunity to share with folks what I've

(56:51):
spent decades in learning.
And when that light bulb comes on or that change in their
life comes, it wasn't because of me,
but I was part of the seed planting.
I was part of the gift giving that helped people get there.
And I see so much sadness and anger and depression and fear
in the world.

(57:11):
And if I can just erase a little bit,
if I can just help somebody else erase a little bit,
that's a powerful step.
Amen, sister.
It's a drop in the bucket.
Headed in the right direction.
I couldn't agree more.
I want to stress a couple things for our audience before we
go.
Sherry and I have had many conversations,

(57:31):
and there's great power in asking questions.
I've learned a bunch of things about Sherry that I didn't
know.
I've learned a bunch of things from Sherry,
and both of us consider ourselves experts in this thing
that we're talking about.
But that doesn't mean, and Sherry touched on this,
you should consistently be learning.
Sherry,
I want to thank you truly from the bottom of my heart.
This has just been an unbelievable hour,

(57:53):
and I would highly recommend, as those of you listening,
please go back and listen to this,
because I can tell you there's great depth,
and there's so many seeds that she planted,
and it might not sprout today,
it might not sprout tomorrow,
but if you consistently stay at this and review things like
this, it will sprout at some point.
Sherry, before we go,

(58:14):
can you please share with the audience how they can get in
touch with you,
if they'd like to bring you into their organization,
where can they find your books, those kinds of things.
You can find me at www.thewinningleadershipcompany.com,
thewinningleadershipcompany.com.
And any of those of you who are listening,
here's what I'm gonna offer you today.
It's free,
a one hour free session with me so that you can discover

(58:37):
like any of the challenges that you've had,
so you can discover three takeaways that will help you get
through those.
And so when I say free, here's what I'm gonna tell you,
here's the catch.
Folks, if you choose to do this, and you go to my website,
you choose to do this,
then your promise back to me is that you will promise to
rant and rave about me to other associations,
organizations, and people.
So that's why it's free,
because you're gonna be my marketer.
That's what you're gonna do for me, so thank you.

(58:59):
Oh, my gosh.
So now here's here's what I want all of you listening to
understand.
There's only one difference between people that are living
the life of the dreams and the people that aren't.
They make a choice, and they take action.
And so Sherry just gave you 60 minutes.
And so let's do this just so to put this in perspective.

(59:20):
Sherry, if I was to hire you,
what's it cost for me to 60 minutes of your time?
It's $350 for 60 minutes.
So she just gave you $350.
The question is,
are you gonna go to her website and take action,
or are you gonna think, yeah,
I'll get to it some other day?
I just put a quote on Facebook this morning that, T
he Road to Someday Leads to a Town called Nowhere.

(59:44):
So I highly recommend,
and I've built this podcast for you to take action, right?
So Sherry has given you an action to take,
she's given you about 15 or 20 of them that were brilliant,
but now she's given you an action,
so you can call her and ask her and delve deeper into
whatever she said that might have touched your heart or
that you might have questions about.
And the other thing that she said, call her up and say,

(01:00:06):
hey, this is my stuff, and how can I get out of it?
And she just said, I'm gonna give you three things to do.
Thank you so much, Louie.
This has been a lot of fun.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I love you Sherry, it's truly my pleasure.
My pleasure, enjoy the rest of your day.
Thanks again for joining us and listening to this episode
of Leadership and Love.
I would like to challenge you to ask yourself,

(01:00:27):
what's one thing that you heard today that you can
implement immediately to improve your leadership and
accelerate your growth?
If you've gotten value out of this episode or learned
something that you can implement today,
we'd ask that you please share it with those that you care
about.
Our goal is to create more leaders who are leading with

(01:00:48):
love.