December 13, 2024 • 53 mins
In this conversation, J.R. Martinez shares his inspiring journey of overcoming adversity after a life-changing explosion while serving in the military. He discusses the challenges he faced, the importance of mindset, and how he learned to celebrate small victories. J.R. emphasizes the power of gratitude and mindfulness in navigating life's difficulties, ultimately leading him to unexpected opportunities, including a successful career in acting. In this engaging conversation, J.R. Martinez shares his journey from a challenging past to a successful career in entertainment and motivational speaking. He emphasizes the importance of embracing change, practicing positivity, and trusting the timing of life. J.R. reflects on how experiences shape our purpose and the significance of grieving and moving forward. His insights encourage listeners to recognize the signs from the universe and to remain resilient in the face of adversity.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi, I'm Sabrina Soto.
I believe the bestconversations are with friends
who are really able to openthemselves up and share their
lives, both the good parts andthe bad.
You're going to be listening tosome of those candid
conversations and hopefullygaining some insight to help you
redesign your life from theinside out.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
JR, thank you so much for joining me today on
Redesigning Life.
I think a lot of peopleprobably know you from the
motivational speaking andeverything you've done from your
background, but also becauseyou won Dancing with the Stars.
What 13 years ago?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
It was a while ago and, trust me, if people were to
ask me to try to do that again,it wouldn't look the same as it
did when I was on.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I know that you do.
I mean, obviously you've beenthrough it.
You have been through it and Iknow you do a lot of keynote
speaking on motivation of mylisteners really love discussing
that, because I don't knowabout you, but everybody in my
life is in some sort of like inbetween stage where they don't
(01:11):
know where they want to be, butthey know they don't want to be
where they are now.
And you know, I think, givenyour background and and the
explosion and how that changedyour life instantly, right, you
have been able to overcome whatsome people would imagine would
be like.
I think people would give up, alot of people would have, and
(01:34):
you didn't.
And you've made a huge careerand you've motivated and changed
so many people's lives.
So I know you've probablytalked about this a million
times, so please forgive me, butnot everyone's heard your story
, so just pretend you're tellingit for the first time.
But when you woke up after thatexplosion and obviously your
mom you said that your mom wasthere how did you find the
(01:57):
strength to get up and go?
Like, how did you find thestrength to rebuild your life
when everything seemed to havefallen apart?
Speaker 3 (02:06):
Yeah, listen, first and foremost, thanks for having
me on.
It's a pleasure to be here andhave this conversation and
connect on your platform and forsharing a little bit of me with
your audience.
But you know, and secondly, youknow, it doesn't offend me or
bother me.
I know this is my story, thisis, this is I'm always going to
be tied to that moment, um, andI'm okay with it.
(02:28):
It doesn't affect me, itdoesn't bother me.
I understand.
Not everyone's aware of thebackstory of JR.
They may know pieces of it.
That may you know.
You know they may, they mayknow components of my life and
my story, but you know, so I'mokay with it.
Um, but you know.
So, just to go back to yourquestion 19 years old is I mean,
(02:50):
if you could remember being 19years old and remember just
trying to be in the world,whether you were going to school
, whether you were getting a job, whatever situation you were in
.
You're just trying to figureout who you are, where you fit
in into society, into whateverorganization you're a part of,
and a lot of times thatorganization consists of your
family, your immediate family,your circle of friends, your
(03:11):
circle of acquaintances, and Iwas no different, 19 years old,
trying to figure out where I fitin within this huge
organization of the military ofthe United States Army, military
of the United States Army.
And you know, something thatwas introduced to me prior to my
injury from one of my leaderswas this component of service,
was this idea of service when Ijoined the military?
(03:31):
It was not, for I didn't.
There's no history in my familyof serving in the United States
military.
I graduated the year after 9-11took place.
We already had troops inAfghanistan.
That was a part of the reasonwhy I wanted to join the
military.
It wasn't exclusively, itwasn't like a generational thing
, it wasn't like somebody in myfamily, it was just hey.
(03:52):
That seemed like a goodalternative to the situation
that I'm currently in, where Ijust feel a little lost after
high school.
And so when this individualintroduced this concept of
service, introduced this conceptof teamwork, introduced all of
that, all of a sudden I was like, wait a minute, now I have a
purpose.
Right Now I feel like I'mstarting to have an identity.
And then my injury, you know,happens and I wake up three
(04:14):
weeks later after my injury frommy medical induced coma and
within the first week I tellpeople all the time I lost both
of my identities, and what Imean by that is when I looked in
the mirror for the first time,the person that I saw was not
somebody that I had known for 19years of my life.
Right, I looked at somebodycompletely different and someone
(04:35):
that immediately my mindsetwent to there's no possible way
that I can live.
I'll be alive, but I'll neverlive.
And there's a difference,there's a distinction between
the two, and I just immediatelyjust understood my life was over
, like 19 years old.
I'm never.
Of course I'm interested in theladies.
Of course I want to date, butno one's going to want to date
me.
(04:55):
Of course I thought about maybeone day having kids and having
a family.
No one's going to want to getdown with me and do all that do
life with me.
I is going to want to get downwith me and do all that do life
with me.
I'm never going to be able tohave a job.
I'm never going to be able tohonestly just walk in public
amongst quote, unquote normalpeople.
I'm not going to have that lifeand I just immediately, just
(05:16):
fell into this dark space andthen I was told that I would not
be allowed to stay in theUnited States Army.
So imagine-.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Wait.
Why is that?
Just because?
Speaker 3 (05:25):
of.
So my job in the military was11 Bravo is infantry, it's front
lines, it's combat, it'sphysical.
Um, I had to learn how to walkagain.
I learned I couldn't grab afork, I couldn't feed myself, I
couldn't go to the restroom bymyself, I couldn't do anything
by myself.
And I'm incredibly fragile, likemy skin even now, like it's 21
years post, and I could tell youthat there's times I'll look at
(05:45):
my hands and I'm like, oh, I'mbleeding and my grafts are just
so fragile that I can just hitthem on the side of the door or
the kitchen counter and it just,it just breaks the skin and it
starts bleeding and I lost somerange of motion to a degree.
And so at that time, early on,they're looking at me.
They're saying, no, this is youcan't do, you can't be in the
(06:06):
army anymore, and that's thesecond identity that was taken
away from me.
So now I'm really sitting herethinking what am I going to do
with my life?
And you know, ultimately justto fast forward a little bit,
what I tell people is like whereyour focus goes, your energy
follows.
So if I'm focusing constantlyon this concept of like my life
(06:28):
is over because of all thesethings that I'm feeding myself.
There's no facts, there'snothing to support that thought,
it's just my brain creating anarrative.
My energy follows.
So, of course, I was in thisnegative space for a few weeks
following that and one day mymother and I had this
heart-to-heart, intenseconversation.
(06:48):
And my mother is from CentralAmerica, el Salvador.
I'm first born, I'm firstgeneration.
My father's from Mexico.
My father wasn't in my life.
He left when I was nine monthsold and it was just my mother
and I and my mother instilled alot in me and a lot of times as
parents, you don't realize yourkids are always watching you,
they're always paying attentionto you and I I witnessed the way
(07:12):
my mom would show up and theway that she navigated a lot of
the challenges that sheexperienced.
When I was a kid, my mother wasinvolved in abusive
relationships experienced when Iwas a kid, my mother was
involved in abusiverelationships physically
verbally mentally, emotionally,you name it.
And did you, did you witnessthat as a child?
(07:32):
A hundred percent, yeah, ahundred percent.
So I so it it.
It is one of those unfortunatestories of where, or like
whatever, triggered this man atthe time to start putting his
hands on my mother.
It was my job to pick up thephone, dial those three numbers
and I would go right into acloset in the house we lived in
and I would tell them where wewere and they'd come pick him up
and they'd take him away andthen you know, guess what?
(07:54):
He'd be back at the house in acouple weeks and then, you know,
it was a cycle for a coupleyears.
But he was probably the closestthing to a dad that I've ever
experienced and I remember mymother saying something to me
when I was a kid, after one ofthose you know experiences, the
next day, and I said to her andhe even hit me one time where I
(08:15):
he was on top of her and he washitting her and I came and
grabbed his arm and I said and Icalled him dad and I was like,
stop hitting mom, and he turnedaround just to get me off of him
and he's ended up hitting meand I fly onto the ground and
and he actually put both of usin the car that night and he
started driving around and andyou know, we're in the backseat
(08:35):
of the car, we can't get out,and it was just one of those
scary things and I remember howwe ended up ultimately getting
out.
Was he stopped at a store toget to buy more beer and he
can't?
We didn't run out of the car atthat point and finally, like he
gets back in the car, he drivesa little bit, then he just
stops and he says get out.
And we just got out.
And then we were, we were, youknow, gone, but you know it.
(08:58):
Those are the things that Iexperienced.
And I just remember my mother,the day and the next day after
one of these events, my motherwas just smiling.
I mean Sabrina, my mom's justwalking around, my mom's four
foot 11, little Latina you knowwith but but a big attitude and
big personality and big laughter, and um, you know she's walking
around as if she just won thelotto.
(09:18):
And I remember like I was sortof just taken back by this
approach and I remember askingher I was like why are you
smiling like that.
There is nothing to smile about.
I know what happened.
Why are you?
And she said something to methat at the time didn't make
sense and it always just kind ofstayed with me.
And it didn't make sense untilafter I was injured and I
(09:38):
started navigating my ownadversity and she said I smile
to invite the blessings.
If I'm not smiling, I can'treceive the blessings that are
around us, that are coming to us.
So, of course, as I got, as Igot through my own adversity and
I was facing my own, thatstarted to make sense to me.
And it what?
Essentially what she was saying, in my opinion, was she's
(09:59):
focused on what she can control,or what she can control is how
she showed up despite thatadversity.
And I remember just that wasone of the examples that I just
followed.
My mom, just I just witnessedit.
I, I, just I just it was a filmI was watching for 19 years of
my life.
And then there was a lot ofadversity I experienced prior to
my injury and I always tellpeople that I think all those
(10:22):
things I moved around a lot.
I mean, I just I struggled inregards to, you know, finding a
community that would embrace meand accept me, where I saw a
little bit of myself I was oneof.
I was born and raised in theSouth and the town that I grew
up in and a small town inArkansas called Hope probably
had at the time maybe no morethan 5,000 people really spread
(10:43):
out, so it feels really ruraland predominantly white and
black.
It just kind of felt a littleisolated and just.
You know, like, I think,everybody, no matter who you are
, what we want is to feelunconditional love.
We want to feel like we're partof a community even if the
community consists of yourparents and your siblings and
your aunt or an uncle or grandma, or maybe just some friends,
(11:10):
some neighbors, whatever, justfeel like you're part of
something and I lacked that andI was looking for that my entire
youth.
And so there are all thosethings for the first 19 years of
my life that I experienced,that prepared me for this major
adversity in my life.
And I tell people you know,resiliency isn't something that
just it's like a light switch.
You just come in and you justyou know resiliency isn't
something that just it's like alight switch.
You just come in and you justyou know there's it's not.
You don't just decide you'regoing to be resilient, right
like you.
(11:31):
There are things that you don't,you don't realize in this
particular moment there, butthere are so many things that
have prepared you, that haveconditioned you, that have micro
events that have taken place,micro adversity that maybe in
the moment when you're goingthrough it's macro, it's the
biggest thing you've everexperienced.
But in hindsight, when youreally look at your life later
down the road, you're able tosay, wait, in comparison, that
(11:54):
was not as big as what I'veexperienced later in life.
So all these micro eventsessentially create this
foundation that you essentiallyend up kind of sitting on and
you just kind of build on andand so I had somewhat of a solid
foundation.
Yes, there were some cracks inmy foundation, but for the most
part I had that instilled in meand that's one of the things as,
(12:17):
as far as like being Latino,I'm so proud of my culture and
proud of the experiences andwhat I was exposed to, because
my mother came here as anundocumented immigrant.
My mother I remember recitingwith my mother in the living
room, like quizzing her to takethe test to become a citizen of
the United States.
I mean, whether I wanted to ornot, I was going to have a
(12:40):
different perspective.
Whether I wanted to or not, Iwas going to witness what
resiliency and how you showed up.
And so listen for me.
After I was injured, my motherand I had this real intense
conversation where I was stuckin the phase of asking this
question why, why, why?
Listen for me.
After I was injured, my motherand I had this real intense
conversation where I was stuckin the phase of asking this
question why, why, why, why, why, why?
Which I think all of us ashuman beings, we fall into that
trap of like why does thishappen to me?
(13:01):
And I was no different.
And ultimately, my mother just.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Was anybody else with you when that explosion
happened.
Did anyone else get hurt?
Yes, yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:09):
So there was three other guys in the Humvee with me
and they all walked away.
They all survived.
One of them was actuallymedevaced back to the stage
because he had injured his legbased on being thrown out of the
vehicle.
The other two guys actuallystayed in country.
They had shrapnel in differentparts of their body but they
stayed in country.
But I was for that particularincident, I was the more
(13:32):
seriously injured, just because,honestly, it wasn't even the
burns to my exterior, it wasn'teven the third-degree burns to
my head, face, arms, hands,portion of my bag, portion of my
legs.
The biggest thing at the timethat was threatening whether I
was going to survive or not wasthe fact that the five minutes
that I was trapped inside ofthis Humvee I was inhaling the
smoke from the fire that was the.
(13:53):
Thing that was really, you know,threatening whether I was going
to survive or not, and you know, just to fast forward.
But when my mother and I havingthis intense conversation, when
I'm sitting here talking aboutmy life is over, she challenged
me and she just said listen, Idon't know why this happened.
I don't know why this happenedto us.
I'm just asking you to try tobe JR, be that positive, funny
(14:16):
kid.
I'm asking you to believe thatsomething good will come from
this.
I'm asking you to have a littlebit of faith, and you know, we
grew up Catholic and so my momwas very big into praying to
every saint, that that that wasever mentioned.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
My mother, would pray to Listen.
I'm Cuban.
I'm also first generation.
I understand what you'retalking about.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
Yeah, like my mom would be, like I'd get so
confused.
I'm like wait a minute, Ithought Nina La Tocha was for
this.
And they're like no, no, no,that's for something else.
And I'm like okay, and Señor delos.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Milagros, now I needed like a saint dictionary,
like when, when this happens,you pray to this saint.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Yeah, I mean, come on , man.
And so you know, in that momentI was willing to say to myself
you know what?
I got to just try somethingdifferent.
I just got to try and see.
And so what I did is I rememberactively making the decision
that I was going to stopthinking long-term and
overwhelming myself with thatthought of the long-term because
(15:16):
we're so conditioned, we'reforce-fed this narrative that we
have to have things figured out.
I mean think about it whenpeople come up to.
I've done it, people have doneit to my kids.
When you come up to kids, Imean, what do we ask?
What's your name and what doyou want to be when you grow up?
That's like one of the firstquestions we ask kids is like
this kid's like I'm eight, Idon't know.
And so what I did is I had to.
(15:37):
I realized thinking of thelong-term and not knowing what
that was going to look like wasalmost a setback in itself.
It was causing too much stressand overwhelming me.
So what I did is I justeliminate that thought process.
I eliminated that that pressureof having to have life figured
out and I focused on the shortterm.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
I just focused on the now.
It's so funny because I think ifsomebody would have come to
your hospital bed at that momentin your life and said, in X
many years you're going to windancing with the stars, in this
many years you're going to getmarried and have children Like
you're going to have children,you're going to, you would have
thought there's no possible way.
But I think that you're rightthat we get so caught up in the
(16:19):
future and the planning and no,that's not possible.
I was with a friend yesterdayhaving lunch and she is trying
to have a baby and she was justworrying and worrying and I said
to her you, you are oneconnection away from changing
your entire life and you don'tknow if you walk out of this
restaurant, if that's going tohappen now, like we just don't
know.
And I think to your, to whatyou're saying, is like it's your
(16:40):
mindset that creates thepossibilities to open your life
to to good things.
But it's hard when you'relooking in the mirror.
It's you and you see what yousee.
It must have been difficult foryou to know that these things
were possible.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Of course.
And so for me, when I say thatI had to pivot, then I had to
celebrate small things, smallvictories.
I had to find small victoriesto celebrate throughout the day.
And I would wake up in themorning and I would look at my
hands that at one point in timethere were like claws, because
of the skin, the burn skin, itcontracts and so it limits a lot
(17:19):
of your range of motion.
So you do a lot of OT just toget that range of motion but you
can end up having a graft orsomething on your hand that all
of a sudden now they sort of goback.
So it's a constant job of doinga lot of OT.
And I'd wake up one day and I'mlike, oh you know what, today I
can actually grab the fork.
I still can't feed myself, butI can grab the fork, I can hold
(17:39):
it.
Okay, that's positive.
Oh, yesterday I could do maybea quarter of a lap around my ICU
room, today I could do half alap.
That's progress.
And listen, in some days I feltlike there was nothing and I had
to almost trick my mind to findthe positive.
It's almost like I have alittle bit of this OCD.
(18:01):
I've never been diagnosed right, but it's almost like I have a
little bit of this OCD or maybeit's called something else
actually but where I have thisthing with when I count things.
When I was a kid I would takesteps or I would count stuff on
the wall and it would alwayshave to end on an odd number.
That was my thing.
It would always have to end onan odd number.
It never got where.
(18:21):
I think there was a show on MTVwhere people were like severe
OCD and it was really infringingon their life.
It never got to that point.
I never had to necessarily flipthe light switch 101 times or
109 times my mom would kill me.
But, like, essentially, I wouldalways have to like train my
mind to just kind of count andso we can end on that thing.
(18:44):
And that was the same practicethat I had to do in the hospital
.
It was like I had to trick mymind to find these things to
celebrate.
And I think that when you dothat, it helps you get through
the day and that's okay.
That's okay to just say I'mjust present and I'm just
getting through this day rightnow and I'm getting through
tomorrow and I'm getting throughthe day after that and it's
(19:05):
okay, and the more of theselittle days that you learned,
because what it did is it taughtme how to practice gratitude.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Right, that's what it really taught me.
Can we talk about the power ofgratitude?
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Yeah, a hundred percent.
I mean but, but.
But in order to practicegratitude, you have to be okay
and understand that.
It's important for you, in thisscope of life, where everyone's
trying to operate at a hundredmiles an hour, or 110, if you're
trying to like, exceedeveryone's trying to operate at
a hundred, you know, miles anhour or 110, if you're trying to
like, exceed it and trying tobypass everybody else, that to
pause and to stop.
One of the things like for along time.
Sabrina, when people would askme about the day that I was hurt
(19:45):
, yeah, I can give you details.
I remember it vividly.
I remember exactly what I wasthinking, how I like my life was
going to end.
I remember exactly what I wasfeeling, the pain.
I remember all of it.
You never forget that right.
But the but in for a long time.
I would just talk about that,the trauma from that event and
over the years, it took a decadeor so after I was injured for
(20:08):
me to finally, when peoplestarted asking me about the 5th
of April of 2003, instead offocusing on the trauma, I
focused on telling this story,and I was only able to really
remember and recount this storysimply because I spent a lot of
time just being sitting, pausing, being intentional, reflecting,
like that's what I did and whatI recall.
(20:32):
What I remembered from the fiveminutes I was trapped inside of
that Humvee was there weremoments, over the course of
those five minutes, my eyeswould get heavy and I would
start to get sort of loseconsciousness and I would close
my eyes.
And in the midst of me losingconsciousness, my eyes were
closed.
I'd felt no pain.
I didn't hear the chaos thatwas outside of my Humvee.
(20:55):
I couldn't see anybody in frontof my Humvee running back and
forth frantically trying toidentify where everybody is.
The only thing that I canconnect with was my breath.
I could actually hear myselfbreathing.
Now it was more of a gaspbecause I had broken ribs and it
was hard for me to breathe.
But I can feel that and I canconnect with that and at the
(21:15):
same time, my thoughts.
I can hear myself thinkingcertain things.
I can hear myself tell stayinglike Jr, if you keep your eyes
closed, that's it.
You're giving up.
Open your eyes, keep fighting,hang on.
I would hear myself say mymom's worst fear is becoming a
reality.
My life's going to end in thisway at this age, I would hear
myself.
(21:35):
So what do you think I carrywith me now?
When life gets overwhelming?
Because it does right, withkids, with family, with jobs,
with all these things that we'reall trying to do, life gets
overwhelming and you end upgiving so much of yourself, and
so what I've learned to do is,when I start to feel that
happening, I just close my eyesand I simply connect with my
(22:00):
breath and I connect with mythoughts, and that's why yoga,
for me personally, has been so,so beneficial, because it forces
you in at the beginning of thepractice.
What do they ask you?
What is your intention?
for the next 60 minutes thatyou're here.
Yep.
What is your intention?
Speaker 2 (22:19):
You know what JR I used to hate?
When people the instructorsused to ask that it puts so much
pressure on you.
It's not just that.
I'm like just let me work out,yeah.
But what's funny is when Ithink about what the intention
is and then they say bring youknow, go back to your intention.
I do and I realized this iswhat I'm here for Stay present,
(22:39):
stay here, stay on the mat,instead of what our minds
constantly do, of getting out ofit.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
And you know, when you, when you mentioned earlier,
like, if someone would havecome into my hospital room and
mentioned that I was going to doall these things, I would have
been like no way.
But here's, here's.
So I believe in yes, I havelong-term goals, of course I do,
but I also I still, to this day, almost have this sort of
day-to-day approach, sort ofthis practice, gratitude, this
(23:07):
short-term view on life.
Like that's kind of like lookat the micros, not always
looking for the big macro reveal, the big lotto billboard, mega
million, like I'm like I'm justlooking at the, celebrating the
five bucks that I got today fromwhatever that is right, like
I'm just celebrating that.
But another thing that I'vestarted to piece together and
(23:28):
this is again, I'm only able toreally pay attention to these
things simply because I pauseand I reflect.
And it is such a big thing forme that about two and a half ish
months after I was injured, I'mstill in my you know, in the
hospital, hadn't been dischargedyet, and every evening at this
(23:49):
point I'm a little bit better.
I'm probably maybe 45 days awayfrom from being allowed to be
discharged, go to my hometownfor a month before I have to
continue my care.
So I'm excited about that, soI'm doing a little bit better.
And my mom and I our routine wasin the evening we'd watch
novellas which for those of youthat aren't familiar Spanish
soap operas and listen.
(24:11):
Whether you speak Spanish ornot, if you put on a novela,
you're going to get hooked andyou're going to know who's
pissed at who.
You're going to know whobackstabbing, who.
You're going to know whose manis sleeping with, like you're
going to know it all.
You're going to know what'sgoing down on the novelas and
this check this out.
I told my mom one day and Isaid to her in Spanish I said
and you were I told her one dayI'm going to be on a soap opera.
(24:37):
There was no basis for me to sayanything like that.
That was me just kind of beinga jokester and clown.
And my mom said oh really,what's the storyline going to be
?
And I said I don't know, Ihaven't thought about that.
I'm just going to have abeautiful love interest.
I just threw that out in theworld, just just jokingly, not
because I had any aspirations tobe an actor, never wanted to be
on TV, never thought of thosethings.
(24:57):
It was just one of those thingsI just threw out.
And five years later I foundmyself auditioning to become an
actor on a soap opera called allmy children.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
So you have to tell me how that came out, like, how
did that even come about?
How did you even get theaudition to be on a soap opera,
which, by the way, soap operasare notorious for being, you
know, based on looks?
Oh yeah, like again who, if youwould have been on your the
hospital bed and somebody hadbeen like you would have been,
you're gonna be a hunk on a soapopera.
You'd be like, yeah, sure, andyou were yeah yeah, and you know
(25:28):
it's funny.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
So how it happened was I was at this point prior to
.
You know I identified that Iwanted to be a speaker.
I was doing a little bit of it.
I was mainly doing a lot ofphilanthropy work, a lot of
advocating work on behalf ofveterans and just really
educating the public about thedifficulties that service
members and their familiesexperience when they transition
out of the military and theirfamilies experience when they
(25:51):
transition out of the military.
And that was a lot of the workthat I was doing.
But I was trying to get moreopportunity.
I was trying to get people tosee me for more than just the
title that was over my head,whether I liked it or not, and
that was disabled veteran, thatwas burn victim, and I was
trying to just scream from themountaintop that I'm so much
more like yes, I'm proud to be aveteran, I'm not disabled, I'm
proud to be a veteran, and I'mso much more like yes, I'm proud
to be a veteran, I'm notdisabled, I'm proud to be a
(26:11):
veteran and I'm not a burnvictim, I'm a burn survivor.
And that's what we say in ourcommunity.
And so it was.
It was tough, it was challenging, right, you're always trying to
, you know, convince people andtry to.
People's biases and pastexperiences are factoring into
you know that, what they thinkand what they see in you.
And ultimately, my best friendsent me an email one day and he
(26:33):
said and this might be a stretchfor some people and I can, I,
you know okay, maybe, but I'mjust going to break this down
real quick.
So I was, I happened to be inLA cause I was having a meeting
again for the veteran stuff andI was flying to, I was taking a
red eye that night to go to NewYork and I was going to New York
to attend a speakers conferenceand this was for people that
(26:54):
aspire to be speakers andlearning the industry and all
the ins and outs of it.
Right, and my best friend sendsme an email and then he starts
ringing my phone and I, I, I'm,I'm sleeping, cause I'm like I'm
trying to get as much sleep asI can, cause I know I'm not
going to sleep on the red eye.
I answered I'm like, dude, I'mtrying to sleep.
And he's like do you check youremail?
And I said no.
He says check your email, callme back.
(27:15):
So I checked my email.
I call him back and I said what?
What is this?
He says, man, it's an.
It's an email.
It's the casting director forall my children.
They want to launch a storylineabout veterans and they want to
see if there's a veteran withsome acting experience.
And I was like, man, I don't,I'm not an actor Like I've never
taken wait, was this before?
Speaker 2 (27:36):
after dancing with the stars.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
This is before.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
And and I was like no way, no way, and he's like man,
he's like no, gerald, what'sthe worst?
They're going to tell you Right.
And so I hung up with him and Ijust called the phone number on
the email and I called it and Ilanded.
I ended up talking to thecasting director, which is
usually you're going to go to aassistant.
Yeah.
And so I'm talking to her andI'm saying I say, hey, this is
(28:03):
who I am.
I got this email.
She says tell me more aboutyourself.
We start talking.
And I asked her.
I said where are you based?
And she said we're in New York.
And I said, well, I'm flying toNew York tonight.
And she says, oh, how long areyou here for?
And I said, well, I'm there fora few days.
She's like can you stop by?
I was like, of course, so Istopped by the next day.
So I stopped by the next dayand literally I stopped by and
(28:27):
as her and I are having thisconversation, she calls and she
brings in the EP of the show,the executive producer.
So the three of us are sittingin this room having a
conversation and it feels likeit's going well.
They said, hey, we'll be intouch.
And I said, cool.
So I went home and I clearedout my schedule for like the
next month and I watchednovellas and I worked out
because I was like, if I getthis, yeah, you have to be TV
(28:48):
ready.
Exactly, and so I ended upcoming back Fast forward.
I come back a month later, I dothe audition, my screen test.
They say we'll be in touch.
I had to go back to LA for afollow-up meeting and when I
(29:09):
landed in LA, like this is liketwo, three days after the screen
test, I got the call that I gotthe job.
Now they're like we need you tomove to New York right away, et
cetera.
Now, okay, so I fast forward.
I ended up being on the showfor a year, right, so I go from
three months to six months tonine months and a year.
And as I'm approaching thatyear, all of a sudden one day in
the studio we all get calledactors, crew, right, everybody
(29:33):
gets called over to the studiothat we was our neighboring
studio, the view.
And we all go sit in the the,the audience seating, right,
like, and we're like everyone'spanicking like, oh my God, we're
going.
And we're like everyone'spanicking like, oh my God, we're
going to get canceled.
Everyone's stressed about it,and so we're sitting there?
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Why were they calling you to be in the on the in the
audience.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
Right, like well, we didn't know it wasn't for the
view, it was just, we were justusing the view space and to, so
we can all fit in there.
And, uh, and all of a sudden,the big wig of ABC Daytime comes
in and we're like, oh no.
He comes in and he startsexplaining like hey, from a
financial standpoint.
(30:11):
And of course this is like, ohmy God.
And then he says in order tokeep the show on the air, we're
going to have to make somechanges.
And what we're going to do iswe're going to move the show to
LA.
And what we're going to do iswe're going to move the show to
LA.
And he said that'll help ussave some costs.
You know, et cetera, et cetera.
And immediately I'm sittingnext to my co-star, her name was
(30:31):
Shannon.
And I'm sitting next to her andI look at her and I said and he
said, mind you, he said,unfortunately, not everybody is
going to come to LA with theshow.
I look at Shannon and I saidI'm going to go to LA.
And she was like, how do youknow?
And I was like I know, I'mgoing to LA.
Now, the way my mind workedbecause this is what life had at
(30:53):
this point kind of conditionedme, the way to think of things,
this is the way my mind works.
When I found out about theopportunity, I was in LA.
When I found out that I got theopportunity, I was in LA.
When I found out that I got theopportunity, I was in LA.
And now the show's moving to LA.
There is something tied to LAfor me.
There is something that'spulling me and that LA keeps
(31:15):
popping up that I need to bethere.
And, sure enough, when theymoved the show, I went with them
.
And not only did I go with them, I signed a brand new contract
with them to be on the show forthree years.
Now, the show didn't go for anadditional three years, but I
was going to be there for thenext three years, which, at that
point, when the show went offthe air, is when dancing
(31:35):
presented itself and it was likedancing was my opportunity to
show the world that I was somuch more.
It's when my wife and I, whoworked on all my children, not
as an actress, but behind thescenes, when her and I started
dating and we started to getserious that's where my daughter
was born and so clearly, likeLA at that time, served a
purpose for me in my journey andwhere it was going to give me
(31:56):
this life and it was going topropel me and allow it.
And something I think about too, sabrina, someone said
something to me recently wherethey said your DNA can be
changed by your environment.
Yeah, and I remember that afterthis person said that, I really
marinated on this and then Istarted thinking about that and
I remember this man that used toput his hands on my mother.
He would sit in the living roomand he would sing these Spanish
(32:19):
love songs and I would sit nextto him because Spanish was my
first language, even though Iwas born in the States.
That was my first language andand I would sit there and look
at him and just admire that hewas singing these Spanish love
songs, and so then I'd startsinging with them.
Well, he would take me down tothis hole in the wall, bar, and
I would.
He would play the piano and Iwould sit there and sing and
(32:41):
dance in front of all thesepeople, right, and you know, and
I, and I just think aboutthat's who I was born to be not
necessarily born to be.
Yeah, and not necessarily in thesense of like to be famous or
have any sort of notoriety, butto be this personality or this
person that could walk into aspace and be this energy for
(33:01):
people and and not be afraid totalk to people.
More of an extrovert.
That's who I am.
But there were all these things, experiences and environments
that I was in that tried toslowly change that and take that
away from me.
And, luckily for me, after Iwas injured, there were people
and experiences that I had thatslowly started getting me back
(33:24):
to that DNA.
So when dancing presents itself,when all my children and then
dancing presents itself, I'mlike, of course, like this is
what I'm supposed to be doing,like this is part of my DNA,
which is why when I went ondancing, I was never nervous.
I was never nervous, I wasexcited and I couldn't wait to
have my 90 seconds on that stageon Monday night to perform and
(33:46):
to tell a story and to makepeople feel something at home.
I loved it and that's why, forme, when life tends to get a
little shaky and unpredictableand there's a lot of change and
a lot of unknown, I don't tendto honestly really panic about
it a lot.
I tend to kind of look at itand say, okay, like let me, let
(34:07):
me look backwards and look atsome pieces and let me just
trust that that something'sgoing to work out, because I've
spent so much time pausing andreflecting and life has kind of
proven me, like it's kind ofshown me, like we got you, as
long as you're paying attentionto the signs.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
That's right, and I always have to remind myself
that the universe always has myback and it's always worked out
until now.
So what makes me think that allof a sudden the universe is
going to turn its back on me,Like I just?
But it's hard.
You have to remind yourselfconstantly when you're worried
or things start falling apart.
You know it takes work, ittakes work, it takes work.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
That's why I tell people like, listen, I may be
the guy that people bring me into be positive and come inspire
people, and I'm like, listen, Ipractice positivity daily.
Yes, practice positivity daily,like I have to practice this.
It is a practice you have tocondition your mind and your
body no different than anythingelse in life, no matter what
you're trying to excel at.
It takes practice.
Like, some of us have a littlebit more natural ability for
(35:08):
some things than others, butdon't be mistaken, you still
have to practice if you want tohave longevity, if you want to
be at the highest level doing it.
If not, then your talent, yournatural talent, will carry you
to a certain point and thenyou'll sort of fizzle out and
then the people that are puttingthe work in will then, you know
right, surpass you.
We started recording.
(35:40):
But you were asking me as faras, like, my family dynamic and
everything and my you knowmarried, my wife and I was.
I was telling you and you askedme.
It was like is your first, isyour second marriage, or you
know, and I was like no, but mywife and I had a rough stint at
the beginning of ourrelationship, where my daughter
was a year old, we broke up andit was a, it was a 100% a
breakup.
We were not together.
(36:00):
Yes, there were still feelingsfor one another, but we were
nowhere near together.
And it was like that for a fewyears and then, finally, we were
able to one day come togetherand really kind of identify that
we still had these feelings forone another.
And you know, and I had goneand you know done some work and
you know some therapy,traditional, untraditional, a
little bit of all and she hadkind of done her own work, and
(36:22):
we were able to identify somethings that we both needed to
work on and address and thatwould make our unit stronger.
And we can try this again.
And here we are, you know, haveanother, have another kid, and
you know like life is great, um,but essentially, like for me,
the thing that I feel that so so, so just gonna fast forward a
(36:43):
little bit.
So my daughter moved to New YorkCity because that's where my
wife is from.
So and I was traveling all over.
At the time I was filming ashow in South Africa and I was
there for four months out of theyear and I was thinking I might
go back, and so I was just kindof all over the place and I
didn't realize where I wanted tobe.
So in 2015, the speakingindustry started to slow down a
(37:03):
little bit at least for me,right, there wasn't a lot and I
started to panic and oh my God,oh my God, oh my God, why are
things not kicking off?
Why am I not getting all thesecalls and these emails and these
offers?
Why aren't my agents reachingout to me as often?
And I would call my agents andbe like what do I need to do?
Like what needs to happen, likeyou know?
And they were like we don'tknow, we don't know.
And what I identified is that,after dancing and I got all
(37:28):
these opportunities to travelall over the world and speak to
all these different groups andthese brands that we all know
and use and great opportunitieswhat I realized at a certain
point I started to see how muchmoney was coming in and what I
got away from.
I got away from my purpose.
Speaker 1 (37:43):
The reason I wanted to be a speaker from the very
beginning.
Speaker 3 (37:45):
I literally then started pursuing the money.
I started pursuing theattention, the accolades that
I'm one of the best in thisindustry.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
And I'm this young and the universe said jokes on
you, bro.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
The universe said, oh , let me pull this rug real
quick right from under your feetand watch you face plant.
And I'm over here, panicking,looking at external, like what
did I need to do?
What do I need to change, whatneeds to happen?
And honestly, you know how.
What got me back is I would goto the park with my lab, my
black lab, and I would go to thepark and I would sit there and
(38:20):
I would just write and I wouldjust be and I would just think.
And what I realized after,honestly, it took a couple of
months and I I went from.
Honestly, I'm going to behonest with you I went from
having all this money toliterally, almost literally,
being broke, like I'm not even,I'm not even BS and you or your
listeners, I went from because Ibought my mom a house, I was
(38:43):
taking care of my daughter, Iwas taking care of all these
other people, I was doing allthese other things with the
money, and then no opportunitieswere coming in.
And also, now I'm like I got nomoney and but what I realized
is that, oh, I need to get backto my core, to my purpose, why I
got away from that.
And then I started to figureout well, what is it that I want
to do?
What, what, what's going tomake me happy?
(39:09):
And there were two things.
I was like one I want to bewith my daughter, and so you
know what.
I need to figure that out.
And I want to go to school.
I want to go to college.
I don't need college for what Ido, for a profession, but it
was always a goal of mine.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:20):
And so I at the time I was living in Texas, um,
staying with a buddy of mine, mybest friend, um, as I was kind
of in this transitional periodto kind of figure out where I
was going to go in the world.
And I was like, well, maybe doI stay in Texas and I can go to
the university of Texas.
Like, maybe I do that and Ijust go and visit my daughter
and she comes down, whatever, soI go to UT.
(39:42):
It doesn't work out right.
They're like, well, maybe now,and that's not a good fit here.
And I was kind of like, oh,interesting, okay, and I kind of
took it a little personal Cause.
I was like like, like youwouldn't, I can't come to school
here, why, right?
And so then I get connectedwith somebody and they say, hey,
we can connect you with someschools in New York.
And so they, I have aconversation with a couple of
(40:04):
schools in New York.
One of the schools likeabsolutely we'd love to have you
, and it's Fordham university.
And I was like, oh, this isgreat.
So then I said you know what?
Okay, well, I'm going to moveto New York.
Perfect, because I'm going tobe closer to my daughter and I'm
going to be able to go toschool months of really leaning
into that.
And then all of a sudden,opportunity started presenting
(40:25):
themselves again.
So then I'm like okay, so Istart accepting and start doing
more and doing more.
And then I get thisentertainment opportunity on
this show about the possibilityof filming in a show in georgia,
and so I go and I audition andit got pretty far and then
(40:45):
towards the end, they decidedthey were going to go in a
different direction and I wasokay with that, like I'm fine
with that, like I'm a big boy, Ican take that.
But I asked them I said, well,just out of curiosity, is there
any feedback?
Like I'd love some feedback,maybe some areas that I need to
address.
And and the lady said, honestly,you were great, you, you, you,
we liked, we liked, we likedwhat you were about, we liked
(41:07):
this.
We just decided to go withsomebody else who had a bigger
social media following, whichwas another kind of rude
awakening.
That that's the world we're inright now.
Yep, and what I realized atthat time, literally my wife and
I, at literally about a monthbefore that opportunity
presented itself, we startedhaving these conversations and
exploring could we try thisagain.
(41:27):
Everything is about timing.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
That's what I was just going to say.
I was not supposed to go to UT.
Everything is about timing.
Speaker 3 (41:37):
Yep, all those things , sabrina, in the last.
I'm 41, and I would probablysay more the last 21 years of my
life, since that injury, I havetaken all this evidence and all
these experiences right.
(41:57):
You, me, everybody listeningyou have to treat yourself like
the big brands that we love, thebig brands that we follow, that
we're loyal to, right.
What do they do?
They base everything off ofdata.
Everything is based on data Inorder for them to be efficient
and effective and continue togrow.
It's based on data, data of thecustomer, data on what they
like, data when they like it.
Data, data, data, data, data,data data.
(42:19):
Well, we're no different asindividuals.
We have to equally becollecting data and to look at
that data, and so that's what Ihave trained myself to do is to
look at like wait, ut didn'tturn me down because I'm not
good enough to go to universityin Texas because the universe
was like.
You're not supposed to be here,bro.
I didn't get the opportunity inthe entertainment industry,
(42:40):
because I'm not supposed to bein Georgia, I'm supposed to be
here, getting my family togetherand getting the thing that, at
the end of the day, is whatmakes me happy and makes me
whole and completes me.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
But it's funny that you say that, because I think
what I'm taking from the storyis it's important to be able to
understand also the universe isguiding you and that that timing
is important, what you justsaid.
But when a lot of people wouldget would not get admitted to
their school of choice and theneverything would break down,
where you have to be able toallow the universe to guide you
(43:16):
yeah, yep, a hundred percent,and and, but the way that you,
when people ask because I've hadpeople ask, well, but how do
you do that?
Speaker 3 (43:24):
and I'm like like you have to, I, and this is what I
believe you just have to stop,stop, reflect and think of all
these scenarios that there'vebeen, signs that you've
potentially have missed becauseyou're stubborn, we're all
stubborn, or we don't thinkthere's no way that that could
be my life, right?
You think I?
You, let me tell you about thisdancing thing real quick.
(43:46):
Let me tell you how, the howthe universe plants his little
seeds.
So, when I was on all mychildren, um, you know we do
these fan events and, um, and Iremember being at one and you
know I was one of the newercharacters, so I didn't get a
lot of the questions from theaudience.
You know they were asking theSusan Lucci's and the Alicia
(44:06):
Minshew and the CameronMatheson's, like all the big
actors at the time on the show,the Michael Knights, all those
guys.
And I remember somebody askedme JR, would you ever go on
Dancing with the Stars?
Now, the reason this personasked me this is because the
night before it was a party.
And listen, you bring a partyand some music, I'll get down.
I will get down.
(44:29):
And I remember when she askedthis question, I just kind of
smirked.
I was like, oh yeah, that'd befun, that'd be fun.
Now, I was familiar with theshow, but I wasn't a loyal
watcher or viewer.
I just kind of like, oh yeah,yeah, yeah, it'd be fine.
I just kind of that's all I did.
It just kept it moving.
Fast forward 2011,.
All my children announced thatthey're going to cancel the show
later that year.
(44:49):
I now started getting texts andyou know calls from friends and
people, and one person inparticular texted me and said,
hey, whatever happened to thatdancing thing?
And I was like, why does thiskeep coming?
Up.
And so instead of ignoring thatwhich I think a lot of us
probably would do but at thatpoint life had already kind of
taught me and conditioned methat I was like, well, I can't
(45:11):
just ignore this.
So I went and asked theexecutive producer of all my
children Everybody was in herear Can you know what do we do?
Where is there otheropportunities on other shows?
And I just approached, I saidlisten, I'm not going to, I'm
not going to stress you out LikeI've had a great run here.
I don't know where life hastaken me, but I do have one
question.
I keep hearing this pop updancing with the stars.
And she was like, oh, my God,you'd be amazing, I'm going to
(45:34):
make an introduction.
And she made the introductionto one of the producers and the
cast of directors over at dancewith the stars and literally the
rest is history.
But again, I could have easilyjust kind of heard that and just
kind of dismissed it.
Speaker 2 (45:47):
But you have to pick inspired action in life.
Speaker 3 (45:51):
You do 100% Listen.
When I was 16 years old, mymother came into my room and I
was crying and she said what'swrong?
And I said sometimes I thinkabout getting into a car
accident just to see who lovesme, who would show up at the
hospital.
Now this is 2024.
I think all of us, if we hearda 16 year old echo those same
words, we'd respond differently.
Now I don't think I was at thatpoint, but essentially I was
(46:12):
clearly feeling a lack there ofhaving any sort of like
community or outside of mymother community support
connection, like I clearly lacksomething.
Be careful what you throw intothe universe, because three
years later I was in essentiallya car accident.
I was in a Humvee where italmost took my life.
Three months after I wasinjured, I told my mom I'm going
(46:34):
to be on a soap opera.
Guess what?
Five years later, I'm on a soapopera.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
I said this to my friend yesterday your tongue is
a wand.
Speaker 3 (46:41):
Yes, yes, a hundred percent%.
And so you know, listen, it'shard for us to understand, it's
hard for us to process.
My wife and I we didn't wantthis big gap between our kids my
daughter's 12, my son's three.
We would have loved to have acloser gap right.
However, for us, what has madesense?
(47:01):
Because we tried for a coupleof years, we tried Before our
son was born.
We were trying, trying, tryingand experienced a miscarriage
and there was that.
Then you get into this thoughtprocess of she's questioning
what's wrong with me.
I'm questioning what's wrongwith me.
I can't get my wife pregnant.
She's questioning what's wrongwith my body.
(47:21):
You start kind of going downthat road and unfortunately, my
father-in-law was strugglingwith some health stuff and then
he ended up passing and he was,I mean, the head of the table,
if you will, head of the familyand you realize like there were
some things my wife identifiedthat she needed to lean, and
(47:42):
again, it wasn't just her, butshe realized there were some
things that for personally, forher, she needed to lean into.
And once she started to leaninto those things, like from a
therapeutic standpoint andreally addressing some of these,
you know the emotional woundsand the stress and all that
stuff um our son, boom we getright and and and and.
(48:03):
You just don't know, know, andyou just got to trust timing and
I know it's hard because we allare so conditioned to we see
other people, they have whatthey have and we want what they
have, or we want more of whatwe've already had, and the
challenge is being able to getto a point where you can just
trust and say you know what, I'mnot putting any pressure on
(48:25):
anything.
There's clearly a reason whythis isn't happening for me
right now.
Right or maybe, maybe it willnever happen, but there's also a
reason for that and I just gotto trust and be paying attention
and I'll get that.
I'll get that answer, I'll getthe direction and the guidance
that I need.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
And so it's taken me 47 years to figure that out, I
think like 20, when I was in mytwenties, when something didn't
work out, it would devastate me.
Now, if something works out, Isay there's a reason why this
didn't work out.
I just don't know what thereason is right now.
It'll be told to me, it'll beshown to me in due time, but
right now I don't know why.
But I have to trust that theuniverse is like like prolonging
(49:06):
it or postponing it for somereason, for my highest good.
Speaker 3 (49:10):
For sure, and you know, and that's why you know my
mom, my mom again, it was justmy mother and I, and I remember
one day asking my mom for Idon't know what it was, it was
like the latest and greatestthing, but my mom made no more
than 30, it was like $36,000 ayear.
She didn't make a lot of moneyand I remember my mom sitting
down with me at the kitchentable and she put her paste up
(49:33):
there and then she said okay,this is how much money I brought
home.
She said this is how much rentis.
This is how much we have tohave for food.
This is how much for utilities,this is how much, right?
She's like simple math subtractall that from so I do.
And she's like how much is leftover?
And I I'm like not a lot.
And she's like, yeah, and she'slike so when you ask for these
things, you got to understandit's not that I don't want to
(49:54):
give them to you.
You got to understand that justright now I can't.
So back then, layaway was thething, was the thing right, and
she'd be like but we could putit on layaway and I'd get it for
you in four months, when I paymy $20 every other week or
whatever it was, but I would getthat item More.
So the reason I tell that story,what's so important, is I love
(50:14):
that my mother.
I can appreciate that as anadult.
I can appreciate that now as afather.
And so I think for me, as afather with my daughter my son's
still young, but with mydaughter, who's 12 and
understands and comprehends allthis stuff is to be able to have
these type of conversationswith her.
Because when you said you werein your 20s and something didn't
(50:34):
work out, oh my God, life isover.
We're not.
There's never a lot ofconversation around us that if
something doesn't work out, howdo you adapt or what do you
learn from that?
That that is not.
That is not something that isintroduced to our lives at a
young age.
We have to learn the hard wayand over the course of years and
decades, in some cases right,and so with my daughter, I'm
(50:56):
very intentional.
Like my daughter, um, shewanted to be part of student
council.
Well, she found out she didn'tget in, but her best friends did
and oh, she was devastated andshe was 10 years old.
She's devastated, I mean, andshe's crying and whatever.
And I remember telling her Iwas like, listen, it doesn't
(51:16):
make sense.
Now there is a reason whyyou're not in student council.
There is a reason.
I said I know it's hard, but wewill get the answer later down
the road and I said but you'reallowed to be upset and to
grieve, you're allowed to dothat.
That is a human response andthat is how I didn't listen.
I'm one of the most confidentdudes in the world.
(51:36):
I'm not going to lie, despitemy scarring on my face and on my
body, on my face and on my body, like I like listen during
before my wife I'm some badhoneys.
I got it.
I got it.
You get what I'm saying.
You know my, my wife is a.
That's a.
She's a knockout, she's abeautiful woman, right, and I'm
(51:57):
a confident dude.
But before I got to that pointwhere I could accept and be that
confident, I had to grieve.
I had to grieve the loss of theLJR and that was okay and it
took whatever time it took.
That was my process and I can'ttake that or put that on
anybody else.
And so, with my daughter, fastforward this situation later
down the road.
Guess what?
She's now playing softball andshe's like loving softball and
(52:20):
she's more.
Speaker 2 (52:21):
And that's why it allowed her the time to be able
to do that.
Speaker 3 (52:24):
She's like loving softball.
She's more, and that's why itallowed her the time to be able
to do that.
Speaker 2 (52:28):
She's a select softball player.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
She is a pitcher.
She is.
She wouldn't be able to do thathad she been on student council
.
Speaker 2 (52:34):
What I'm taking from this entire conversation is in
life, you're allowed to grieve,but you need to move on, and I
think you are an amazing exampleof that.
For anyone listening, I will,in the show notes, have all of
GR's information so that you canget in touch with him, follow
him, watch his YouTube channelwith all of his motivational
speaks, speaking engagements,and I know you have like a
little journal there too.
(52:55):
Gr.
Seriously, thank you so much.
This was such a greatconversation.
Speaker 3 (52:58):
No, this was fun.
Thank you so much.
This is a lot of fun.
Again, thank you, as always foryou know, for sharing this
little little this, this thislittle bit of me with your
platform, with your listeners,and I just appreciate the
conversation and, um, you know,just uh, I just want people to
just keep showing up just asbest as you can.
If there's anything you couldtake away from this episode,
despite what state of lifeyou're in, just smile because
(53:20):
there's blessings around thecorner waiting for you.
Thank you.
Hi, I'm Sabrina Soto.
I believe the bestconversations are with friends
who are really able to openthemselves up and share their
lives, both the good parts andthe bad.
You're going to be listening tosome of those candid
conversations and hopefullygaining some insight to help you
redesign your life from theinside out.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
JR, thank you so much for joining me today on
Redesigning Life.
I think a lot of peopleprobably know you from the
motivational speaking andeverything you've done from your
background, but also becauseyou won Dancing with the Stars.
What 13 years ago?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
It was a while ago and, trust me, if people were to
ask me to try to do that again,it wouldn't look the same as it
did when I was on.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I know that you do.
I mean, obviously you've beenthrough it.
You have been through it and Iknow you do a lot of keynote
speaking on motivation of mylisteners really love discussing
that, because I don't knowabout you, but everybody in my
life is in some sort of like inbetween stage where they don't
(01:11):
know where they want to be, butthey know they don't want to be
where they are now.
And you know, I think, givenyour background and and the
explosion and how that changedyour life instantly, right, you
have been able to overcome whatsome people would imagine would
be like.
I think people would give up, alot of people would have, and
(01:34):
you didn't.
And you've made a huge careerand you've motivated and changed
so many people's lives.
So I know you've probablytalked about this a million
times, so please forgive me, butnot everyone's heard your story
, so just pretend you're tellingit for the first time.
But when you woke up after thatexplosion and obviously your
mom you said that your mom wasthere how did you find the
(01:57):
strength to get up and go?
Like, how did you find thestrength to rebuild your life
when everything seemed to havefallen apart?
Speaker 3 (02:06):
Yeah, listen, first and foremost, thanks for having
me on.
It's a pleasure to be here andhave this conversation and
connect on your platform and forsharing a little bit of me with
your audience.
But you know, and secondly, youknow, it doesn't offend me or
bother me.
I know this is my story, thisis, this is I'm always going to
be tied to that moment, um, andI'm okay with it.
(02:28):
It doesn't affect me, itdoesn't bother me.
I understand.
Not everyone's aware of thebackstory of JR.
They may know pieces of it.
That may you know.
You know they may, they mayknow components of my life and
my story, but you know, so I'mokay with it.
Um, but you know.
So, just to go back to yourquestion 19 years old is I mean,
(02:50):
if you could remember being 19years old and remember just
trying to be in the world,whether you were going to school
, whether you were getting a job, whatever situation you were in
.
You're just trying to figureout who you are, where you fit
in into society, into whateverorganization you're a part of,
and a lot of times thatorganization consists of your
family, your immediate family,your circle of friends, your
(03:11):
circle of acquaintances, and Iwas no different, 19 years old,
trying to figure out where I fitin within this huge
organization of the military ofthe United States Army, military
of the United States Army.
And you know, something thatwas introduced to me prior to my
injury from one of my leaderswas this component of service,
was this idea of service when Ijoined the military?
(03:31):
It was not, for I didn't.
There's no history in my familyof serving in the United States
military.
I graduated the year after 9-11took place.
We already had troops inAfghanistan.
That was a part of the reasonwhy I wanted to join the
military.
It wasn't exclusively, itwasn't like a generational thing
, it wasn't like somebody in myfamily, it was just hey.
(03:52):
That seemed like a goodalternative to the situation
that I'm currently in, where Ijust feel a little lost after
high school.
And so when this individualintroduced this concept of
service, introduced this conceptof teamwork, introduced all of
that, all of a sudden I was like, wait a minute, now I have a
purpose.
Right Now I feel like I'mstarting to have an identity.
And then my injury, you know,happens and I wake up three
(04:14):
weeks later after my injury frommy medical induced coma and
within the first week I tellpeople all the time I lost both
of my identities, and what Imean by that is when I looked in
the mirror for the first time,the person that I saw was not
somebody that I had known for 19years of my life.
Right, I looked at somebodycompletely different and someone
(04:35):
that immediately my mindsetwent to there's no possible way
that I can live.
I'll be alive, but I'll neverlive.
And there's a difference,there's a distinction between
the two, and I just immediatelyjust understood my life was over
, like 19 years old.
I'm never.
Of course I'm interested in theladies.
Of course I want to date, butno one's going to want to date
me.
(04:55):
Of course I thought about maybeone day having kids and having
a family.
No one's going to want to getdown with me and do all that do
life with me.
I is going to want to get downwith me and do all that do life
with me.
I'm never going to be able tohave a job.
I'm never going to be able tohonestly just walk in public
amongst quote, unquote normalpeople.
I'm not going to have that lifeand I just immediately, just
(05:16):
fell into this dark space andthen I was told that I would not
be allowed to stay in theUnited States Army.
So imagine-.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Wait.
Why is that?
Just because?
Speaker 3 (05:25):
of.
So my job in the military was11 Bravo is infantry, it's front
lines, it's combat, it'sphysical.
Um, I had to learn how to walkagain.
I learned I couldn't grab afork, I couldn't feed myself, I
couldn't go to the restroom bymyself, I couldn't do anything
by myself.
And I'm incredibly fragile, likemy skin even now, like it's 21
years post, and I could tell youthat there's times I'll look at
(05:45):
my hands and I'm like, oh, I'mbleeding and my grafts are just
so fragile that I can just hitthem on the side of the door or
the kitchen counter and it just,it just breaks the skin and it
starts bleeding and I lost somerange of motion to a degree.
And so at that time, early on,they're looking at me.
They're saying, no, this is youcan't do, you can't be in the
(06:06):
army anymore, and that's thesecond identity that was taken
away from me.
So now I'm really sitting herethinking what am I going to do
with my life?
And you know, ultimately justto fast forward a little bit,
what I tell people is like whereyour focus goes, your energy
follows.
So if I'm focusing constantlyon this concept of like my life
(06:28):
is over because of all thesethings that I'm feeding myself.
There's no facts, there'snothing to support that thought,
it's just my brain creating anarrative.
My energy follows.
So, of course, I was in thisnegative space for a few weeks
following that and one day mymother and I had this
heart-to-heart, intenseconversation.
(06:48):
And my mother is from CentralAmerica, el Salvador.
I'm first born, I'm firstgeneration.
My father's from Mexico.
My father wasn't in my life.
He left when I was nine monthsold and it was just my mother
and I and my mother instilled alot in me and a lot of times as
parents, you don't realize yourkids are always watching you,
they're always paying attentionto you and I I witnessed the way
(07:12):
my mom would show up and theway that she navigated a lot of
the challenges that sheexperienced.
When I was a kid, my mother wasinvolved in abusive
relationships experienced when Iwas a kid, my mother was
involved in abusiverelationships physically
verbally mentally, emotionally,you name it.
And did you, did you witnessthat as a child?
(07:32):
A hundred percent, yeah, ahundred percent.
So I so it it.
It is one of those unfortunatestories of where, or like
whatever, triggered this man atthe time to start putting his
hands on my mother.
It was my job to pick up thephone, dial those three numbers
and I would go right into acloset in the house we lived in
and I would tell them where wewere and they'd come pick him up
and they'd take him away andthen you know, guess what?
(07:54):
He'd be back at the house in acouple weeks and then, you know,
it was a cycle for a coupleyears.
But he was probably the closestthing to a dad that I've ever
experienced and I remember mymother saying something to me
when I was a kid, after one ofthose you know experiences, the
next day, and I said to her andhe even hit me one time where I
(08:15):
he was on top of her and he washitting her and I came and
grabbed his arm and I said and Icalled him dad and I was like,
stop hitting mom, and he turnedaround just to get me off of him
and he's ended up hitting meand I fly onto the ground and
and he actually put both of usin the car that night and he
started driving around and andyou know, we're in the backseat
(08:35):
of the car, we can't get out,and it was just one of those
scary things and I remember howwe ended up ultimately getting
out.
Was he stopped at a store toget to buy more beer and he
can't?
We didn't run out of the car atthat point and finally, like he
gets back in the car, he drivesa little bit, then he just
stops and he says get out.
And we just got out.
And then we were, we were, youknow, gone, but you know it.
(08:58):
Those are the things that Iexperienced.
And I just remember my mother,the day and the next day after
one of these events, my motherwas just smiling.
I mean Sabrina, my mom's justwalking around, my mom's four
foot 11, little Latina you knowwith but but a big attitude and
big personality and big laughter, and um, you know she's walking
around as if she just won thelotto.
(09:18):
And I remember like I was sortof just taken back by this
approach and I remember askingher I was like why are you
smiling like that.
There is nothing to smile about.
I know what happened.
Why are you?
And she said something to methat at the time didn't make
sense and it always just kind ofstayed with me.
And it didn't make sense untilafter I was injured and I
(09:38):
started navigating my ownadversity and she said I smile
to invite the blessings.
If I'm not smiling, I can'treceive the blessings that are
around us, that are coming to us.
So, of course, as I got, as Igot through my own adversity and
I was facing my own, thatstarted to make sense to me.
And it what?
Essentially what she was saying, in my opinion, was she's
(09:59):
focused on what she can control,or what she can control is how
she showed up despite thatadversity.
And I remember just that wasone of the examples that I just
followed.
My mom, just I just witnessedit.
I, I, just I just it was a filmI was watching for 19 years of
my life.
And then there was a lot ofadversity I experienced prior to
my injury and I always tellpeople that I think all those
(10:22):
things I moved around a lot.
I mean, I just I struggled inregards to, you know, finding a
community that would embrace meand accept me, where I saw a
little bit of myself I was oneof.
I was born and raised in theSouth and the town that I grew
up in and a small town inArkansas called Hope probably
had at the time maybe no morethan 5,000 people really spread
(10:43):
out, so it feels really ruraland predominantly white and
black.
It just kind of felt a littleisolated and just.
You know, like, I think,everybody, no matter who you are
, what we want is to feelunconditional love.
We want to feel like we're partof a community even if the
community consists of yourparents and your siblings and
your aunt or an uncle or grandma, or maybe just some friends,
(11:10):
some neighbors, whatever, justfeel like you're part of
something and I lacked that andI was looking for that my entire
youth.
And so there are all thosethings for the first 19 years of
my life that I experienced,that prepared me for this major
adversity in my life.
And I tell people you know,resiliency isn't something that
just it's like a light switch.
You just come in and you justyou know resiliency isn't
something that just it's like alight switch.
You just come in and you justyou know there's it's not.
You don't just decide you'regoing to be resilient, right
like you.
(11:31):
There are things that you don't,you don't realize in this
particular moment there, butthere are so many things that
have prepared you, that haveconditioned you, that have micro
events that have taken place,micro adversity that maybe in
the moment when you're goingthrough it's macro, it's the
biggest thing you've everexperienced.
But in hindsight, when youreally look at your life later
down the road, you're able tosay, wait, in comparison, that
(11:54):
was not as big as what I'veexperienced later in life.
So all these micro eventsessentially create this
foundation that you essentiallyend up kind of sitting on and
you just kind of build on andand so I had somewhat of a solid
foundation.
Yes, there were some cracks inmy foundation, but for the most
part I had that instilled in meand that's one of the things as,
(12:17):
as far as like being Latino,I'm so proud of my culture and
proud of the experiences andwhat I was exposed to, because
my mother came here as anundocumented immigrant.
My mother I remember recitingwith my mother in the living
room, like quizzing her to takethe test to become a citizen of
the United States.
I mean, whether I wanted to ornot, I was going to have a
(12:40):
different perspective.
Whether I wanted to or not, Iwas going to witness what
resiliency and how you showed up.
And so listen for me.
After I was injured, my motherand I had this real intense
conversation where I was stuckin the phase of asking this
question why, why, why?
Listen for me.
After I was injured, my motherand I had this real intense
conversation where I was stuckin the phase of asking this
question why, why, why, why, why, why?
Which I think all of us ashuman beings, we fall into that
trap of like why does thishappen to me?
(13:01):
And I was no different.
And ultimately, my mother just.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Was anybody else with you when that explosion
happened.
Did anyone else get hurt?
Yes, yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:09):
So there was three other guys in the Humvee with me
and they all walked away.
They all survived.
One of them was actuallymedevaced back to the stage
because he had injured his legbased on being thrown out of the
vehicle.
The other two guys actuallystayed in country.
They had shrapnel in differentparts of their body but they
stayed in country.
But I was for that particularincident, I was the more
(13:32):
seriously injured, just because,honestly, it wasn't even the
burns to my exterior, it wasn'teven the third-degree burns to
my head, face, arms, hands,portion of my bag, portion of my
legs.
The biggest thing at the timethat was threatening whether I
was going to survive or not wasthe fact that the five minutes
that I was trapped inside ofthis Humvee I was inhaling the
smoke from the fire that was the.
(13:53):
Thing that was really, you know,threatening whether I was going
to survive or not, and you know, just to fast forward.
But when my mother and I havingthis intense conversation, when
I'm sitting here talking aboutmy life is over, she challenged
me and she just said listen, Idon't know why this happened.
I don't know why this happenedto us.
I'm just asking you to try tobe JR, be that positive, funny
(14:16):
kid.
I'm asking you to believe thatsomething good will come from
this.
I'm asking you to have a littlebit of faith, and you know, we
grew up Catholic and so my momwas very big into praying to
every saint, that that that wasever mentioned.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
My mother, would pray to Listen.
I'm Cuban.
I'm also first generation.
I understand what you'retalking about.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
Yeah, like my mom would be, like I'd get so
confused.
I'm like wait a minute, Ithought Nina La Tocha was for
this.
And they're like no, no, no,that's for something else.
And I'm like okay, and Señor delos.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Milagros, now I needed like a saint dictionary,
like when, when this happens,you pray to this saint.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Yeah, I mean, come on , man.
And so you know, in that momentI was willing to say to myself
you know what?
I got to just try somethingdifferent.
I just got to try and see.
And so what I did is I rememberactively making the decision
that I was going to stopthinking long-term and
overwhelming myself with thatthought of the long-term because
(15:16):
we're so conditioned, we'reforce-fed this narrative that we
have to have things figured out.
I mean think about it whenpeople come up to.
I've done it, people have doneit to my kids.
When you come up to kids, Imean, what do we ask?
What's your name and what doyou want to be when you grow up?
That's like one of the firstquestions we ask kids is like
this kid's like I'm eight, Idon't know.
And so what I did is I had to.
(15:37):
I realized thinking of thelong-term and not knowing what
that was going to look like wasalmost a setback in itself.
It was causing too much stressand overwhelming me.
So what I did is I justeliminate that thought process.
I eliminated that that pressureof having to have life figured
out and I focused on the shortterm.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
I just focused on the now.
It's so funny because I think ifsomebody would have come to
your hospital bed at that momentin your life and said, in X
many years you're going to windancing with the stars, in this
many years you're going to getmarried and have children Like
you're going to have children,you're going to, you would have
thought there's no possible way.
But I think that you're rightthat we get so caught up in the
(16:19):
future and the planning and no,that's not possible.
I was with a friend yesterdayhaving lunch and she is trying
to have a baby and she was justworrying and worrying and I said
to her you, you are oneconnection away from changing
your entire life and you don'tknow if you walk out of this
restaurant, if that's going tohappen now, like we just don't
know.
And I think to your, to whatyou're saying, is like it's your
(16:40):
mindset that creates thepossibilities to open your life
to to good things.
But it's hard when you'relooking in the mirror.
It's you and you see what yousee.
It must have been difficult foryou to know that these things
were possible.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Of course.
And so for me, when I say thatI had to pivot, then I had to
celebrate small things, smallvictories.
I had to find small victoriesto celebrate throughout the day.
And I would wake up in themorning and I would look at my
hands that at one point in timethere were like claws, because
of the skin, the burn skin, itcontracts and so it limits a lot
(17:19):
of your range of motion.
So you do a lot of OT just toget that range of motion but you
can end up having a graft orsomething on your hand that all
of a sudden now they sort of goback.
So it's a constant job of doinga lot of OT.
And I'd wake up one day and I'mlike, oh you know what, today I
can actually grab the fork.
I still can't feed myself, butI can grab the fork, I can hold
(17:39):
it.
Okay, that's positive.
Oh, yesterday I could do maybea quarter of a lap around my ICU
room, today I could do half alap.
That's progress.
And listen, in some days I feltlike there was nothing and I had
to almost trick my mind to findthe positive.
It's almost like I have alittle bit of this OCD.
(18:01):
I've never been diagnosed right, but it's almost like I have a
little bit of this OCD or maybeit's called something else
actually but where I have thisthing with when I count things.
When I was a kid I would takesteps or I would count stuff on
the wall and it would alwayshave to end on an odd number.
That was my thing.
It would always have to end onan odd number.
It never got where.
(18:21):
I think there was a show on MTVwhere people were like severe
OCD and it was really infringingon their life.
It never got to that point.
I never had to necessarily flipthe light switch 101 times or
109 times my mom would kill me.
But, like, essentially, I wouldalways have to like train my
mind to just kind of count andso we can end on that thing.
(18:44):
And that was the same practicethat I had to do in the hospital
.
It was like I had to trick mymind to find these things to
celebrate.
And I think that when you dothat, it helps you get through
the day and that's okay.
That's okay to just say I'mjust present and I'm just
getting through this day rightnow and I'm getting through
tomorrow and I'm getting throughthe day after that and it's
(19:05):
okay, and the more of theselittle days that you learned,
because what it did is it taughtme how to practice gratitude.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Right, that's what it really taught me.
Can we talk about the power ofgratitude?
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Yeah, a hundred percent.
I mean but, but.
But in order to practicegratitude, you have to be okay
and understand that.
It's important for you, in thisscope of life, where everyone's
trying to operate at a hundredmiles an hour, or 110, if you're
trying to like, exceedeveryone's trying to operate at
a hundred, you know, miles anhour or 110, if you're trying to
like, exceed it and trying tobypass everybody else, that to
pause and to stop.
One of the things like for along time.
Sabrina, when people would askme about the day that I was hurt
(19:45):
, yeah, I can give you details.
I remember it vividly.
I remember exactly what I wasthinking, how I like my life was
going to end.
I remember exactly what I wasfeeling, the pain.
I remember all of it.
You never forget that right.
But the but in for a long time.
I would just talk about that,the trauma from that event and
over the years, it took a decadeor so after I was injured for
(20:08):
me to finally, when peoplestarted asking me about the 5th
of April of 2003, instead offocusing on the trauma, I
focused on telling this story,and I was only able to really
remember and recount this storysimply because I spent a lot of
time just being sitting, pausing, being intentional, reflecting,
like that's what I did and whatI recall.
(20:32):
What I remembered from the fiveminutes I was trapped inside of
that Humvee was there weremoments, over the course of
those five minutes, my eyeswould get heavy and I would
start to get sort of loseconsciousness and I would close
my eyes.
And in the midst of me losingconsciousness, my eyes were
closed.
I'd felt no pain.
I didn't hear the chaos thatwas outside of my Humvee.
(20:55):
I couldn't see anybody in frontof my Humvee running back and
forth frantically trying toidentify where everybody is.
The only thing that I canconnect with was my breath.
I could actually hear myselfbreathing.
Now it was more of a gaspbecause I had broken ribs and it
was hard for me to breathe.
But I can feel that and I canconnect with that and at the
(21:15):
same time, my thoughts.
I can hear myself thinkingcertain things.
I can hear myself tell stayinglike Jr, if you keep your eyes
closed, that's it.
You're giving up.
Open your eyes, keep fighting,hang on.
I would hear myself say mymom's worst fear is becoming a
reality.
My life's going to end in thisway at this age, I would hear
myself.
(21:35):
So what do you think I carrywith me now?
When life gets overwhelming?
Because it does right, withkids, with family, with jobs,
with all these things that we'reall trying to do, life gets
overwhelming and you end upgiving so much of yourself, and
so what I've learned to do is,when I start to feel that
happening, I just close my eyesand I simply connect with my
(22:00):
breath and I connect with mythoughts, and that's why yoga,
for me personally, has been so,so beneficial, because it forces
you in at the beginning of thepractice.
What do they ask you?
What is your intention?
for the next 60 minutes thatyou're here.
Yep.
What is your intention?
Speaker 2 (22:19):
You know what JR I used to hate?
When people the instructorsused to ask that it puts so much
pressure on you.
It's not just that.
I'm like just let me work out,yeah.
But what's funny is when Ithink about what the intention
is and then they say bring youknow, go back to your intention.
I do and I realized this iswhat I'm here for Stay present,
(22:39):
stay here, stay on the mat,instead of what our minds
constantly do, of getting out ofit.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
And you know, when you, when you mentioned earlier,
like, if someone would havecome into my hospital room and
mentioned that I was going to doall these things, I would have
been like no way.
But here's, here's.
So I believe in yes, I havelong-term goals, of course I do,
but I also I still, to this day, almost have this sort of
day-to-day approach, sort ofthis practice, gratitude, this
(23:07):
short-term view on life.
Like that's kind of like lookat the micros, not always
looking for the big macro reveal, the big lotto billboard, mega
million, like I'm like I'm justlooking at the, celebrating the
five bucks that I got today fromwhatever that is right, like
I'm just celebrating that.
But another thing that I'vestarted to piece together and
(23:28):
this is again, I'm only able toreally pay attention to these
things simply because I pauseand I reflect.
And it is such a big thing forme that about two and a half ish
months after I was injured, I'mstill in my you know, in the
hospital, hadn't been dischargedyet, and every evening at this
(23:49):
point I'm a little bit better.
I'm probably maybe 45 days awayfrom from being allowed to be
discharged, go to my hometownfor a month before I have to
continue my care.
So I'm excited about that, soI'm doing a little bit better.
And my mom and I our routine wasin the evening we'd watch
novellas which for those of youthat aren't familiar Spanish
soap operas and listen.
(24:11):
Whether you speak Spanish ornot, if you put on a novela,
you're going to get hooked andyou're going to know who's
pissed at who.
You're going to know whobackstabbing, who.
You're going to know whose manis sleeping with, like you're
going to know it all.
You're going to know what'sgoing down on the novelas and
this check this out.
I told my mom one day and Isaid to her in Spanish I said
and you were I told her one dayI'm going to be on a soap opera.
(24:37):
There was no basis for me to sayanything like that.
That was me just kind of beinga jokester and clown.
And my mom said oh really,what's the storyline going to be
?
And I said I don't know, Ihaven't thought about that.
I'm just going to have abeautiful love interest.
I just threw that out in theworld, just just jokingly, not
because I had any aspirations tobe an actor, never wanted to be
on TV, never thought of thosethings.
(24:57):
It was just one of those thingsI just threw out.
And five years later I foundmyself auditioning to become an
actor on a soap opera called allmy children.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
So you have to tell me how that came out, like, how
did that even come about?
How did you even get theaudition to be on a soap opera,
which, by the way, soap operasare notorious for being, you
know, based on looks?
Oh yeah, like again who, if youwould have been on your the
hospital bed and somebody hadbeen like you would have been,
you're gonna be a hunk on a soapopera.
You'd be like, yeah, sure, andyou were yeah yeah, and you know
(25:28):
it's funny.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
So how it happened was I was at this point prior to
.
You know I identified that Iwanted to be a speaker.
I was doing a little bit of it.
I was mainly doing a lot ofphilanthropy work, a lot of
advocating work on behalf ofveterans and just really
educating the public about thedifficulties that service
members and their familiesexperience when they transition
out of the military and theirfamilies experience when they
(25:51):
transition out of the military.
And that was a lot of the workthat I was doing.
But I was trying to get moreopportunity.
I was trying to get people tosee me for more than just the
title that was over my head,whether I liked it or not, and
that was disabled veteran, thatwas burn victim, and I was
trying to just scream from themountaintop that I'm so much
more like yes, I'm proud to be aveteran, I'm not disabled, I'm
proud to be a veteran, and I'mso much more like yes, I'm proud
to be a veteran, I'm notdisabled, I'm proud to be a
(26:11):
veteran and I'm not a burnvictim, I'm a burn survivor.
And that's what we say in ourcommunity.
And so it was.
It was tough, it was challenging, right, you're always trying to
, you know, convince people andtry to.
People's biases and pastexperiences are factoring into
you know that, what they thinkand what they see in you.
And ultimately, my best friendsent me an email one day and he
(26:33):
said and this might be a stretchfor some people and I can, I,
you know okay, maybe, but I'mjust going to break this down
real quick.
So I was, I happened to be inLA cause I was having a meeting
again for the veteran stuff andI was flying to, I was taking a
red eye that night to go to NewYork and I was going to New York
to attend a speakers conferenceand this was for people that
(26:54):
aspire to be speakers andlearning the industry and all
the ins and outs of it.
Right, and my best friend sendsme an email and then he starts
ringing my phone and I, I, I'm,I'm sleeping, cause I'm like I'm
trying to get as much sleep asI can, cause I know I'm not
going to sleep on the red eye.
I answered I'm like, dude, I'mtrying to sleep.
And he's like do you check youremail?
And I said no.
He says check your email, callme back.
(27:15):
So I checked my email.
I call him back and I said what?
What is this?
He says, man, it's an.
It's an email.
It's the casting director forall my children.
They want to launch a storylineabout veterans and they want to
see if there's a veteran withsome acting experience.
And I was like, man, I don't,I'm not an actor Like I've never
taken wait, was this before?
Speaker 2 (27:36):
after dancing with the stars.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
This is before.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
And and I was like no way, no way, and he's like man,
he's like no, gerald, what'sthe worst?
They're going to tell you Right.
And so I hung up with him and Ijust called the phone number on
the email and I called it and Ilanded.
I ended up talking to thecasting director, which is
usually you're going to go to aassistant.
Yeah.
And so I'm talking to her andI'm saying I say, hey, this is
(28:03):
who I am.
I got this email.
She says tell me more aboutyourself.
We start talking.
And I asked her.
I said where are you based?
And she said we're in New York.
And I said, well, I'm flying toNew York tonight.
And she says, oh, how long areyou here for?
And I said, well, I'm there fora few days.
She's like can you stop by?
I was like, of course, so Istopped by the next day.
So I stopped by the next dayand literally I stopped by and
(28:27):
as her and I are having thisconversation, she calls and she
brings in the EP of the show,the executive producer.
So the three of us are sittingin this room having a
conversation and it feels likeit's going well.
They said, hey, we'll be intouch.
And I said, cool.
So I went home and I clearedout my schedule for like the
next month and I watchednovellas and I worked out
because I was like, if I getthis, yeah, you have to be TV
(28:48):
ready.
Exactly, and so I ended upcoming back Fast forward.
I come back a month later, I dothe audition, my screen test.
They say we'll be in touch.
I had to go back to LA for afollow-up meeting and when I
(29:09):
landed in LA, like this is liketwo, three days after the screen
test, I got the call that I gotthe job.
Now they're like we need you tomove to New York right away, et
cetera.
Now, okay, so I fast forward.
I ended up being on the showfor a year, right, so I go from
three months to six months tonine months and a year.
And as I'm approaching thatyear, all of a sudden one day in
the studio we all get calledactors, crew, right, everybody
(29:33):
gets called over to the studiothat we was our neighboring
studio, the view.
And we all go sit in the the,the audience seating, right,
like, and we're like everyone'spanicking like, oh my God, we're
going.
And we're like everyone'spanicking like, oh my God, we're
going to get canceled.
Everyone's stressed about it,and so we're sitting there?
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Why were they calling you to be in the on the in the
audience.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
Right, like well, we didn't know it wasn't for the
view, it was just, we were justusing the view space and to, so
we can all fit in there.
And, uh, and all of a sudden,the big wig of ABC Daytime comes
in and we're like, oh no.
He comes in and he startsexplaining like hey, from a
financial standpoint.
(30:11):
And of course this is like, ohmy God.
And then he says in order tokeep the show on the air, we're
going to have to make somechanges.
And what we're going to do iswe're going to move the show to
LA.
And what we're going to do iswe're going to move the show to
LA.
And he said that'll help ussave some costs.
You know, et cetera, et cetera.
And immediately I'm sittingnext to my co-star, her name was
(30:31):
Shannon.
And I'm sitting next to her andI look at her and I said and he
said, mind you, he said,unfortunately, not everybody is
going to come to LA with theshow.
I look at Shannon and I saidI'm going to go to LA.
And she was like, how do youknow?
And I was like I know, I'mgoing to LA.
Now, the way my mind workedbecause this is what life had at
(30:53):
this point kind of conditionedme, the way to think of things,
this is the way my mind works.
When I found out about theopportunity, I was in LA.
When I found out that I got theopportunity, I was in LA.
When I found out that I got theopportunity, I was in LA.
And now the show's moving to LA.
There is something tied to LAfor me.
There is something that'spulling me and that LA keeps
(31:15):
popping up that I need to bethere.
And, sure enough, when theymoved the show, I went with them
.
And not only did I go with them, I signed a brand new contract
with them to be on the show forthree years.
Now, the show didn't go for anadditional three years, but I
was going to be there for thenext three years, which, at that
point, when the show went offthe air, is when dancing
(31:35):
presented itself and it was likedancing was my opportunity to
show the world that I was somuch more.
It's when my wife and I, whoworked on all my children, not
as an actress, but behind thescenes, when her and I started
dating and we started to getserious that's where my daughter
was born and so clearly, likeLA at that time, served a
purpose for me in my journey andwhere it was going to give me
(31:56):
this life and it was going topropel me and allow it.
And something I think about too, sabrina, someone said
something to me recently wherethey said your DNA can be
changed by your environment.
Yeah, and I remember that afterthis person said that, I really
marinated on this and then Istarted thinking about that and
I remember this man that used toput his hands on my mother.
He would sit in the living roomand he would sing these Spanish
(32:19):
love songs and I would sit nextto him because Spanish was my
first language, even though Iwas born in the States.
That was my first language andand I would sit there and look
at him and just admire that hewas singing these Spanish love
songs, and so then I'd startsinging with them.
Well, he would take me down tothis hole in the wall, bar, and
I would.
He would play the piano and Iwould sit there and sing and
(32:41):
dance in front of all thesepeople, right, and you know, and
I, and I just think aboutthat's who I was born to be not
necessarily born to be.
Yeah, and not necessarily in thesense of like to be famous or
have any sort of notoriety, butto be this personality or this
person that could walk into aspace and be this energy for
(33:01):
people and and not be afraid totalk to people.
More of an extrovert.
That's who I am.
But there were all these things, experiences and environments
that I was in that tried toslowly change that and take that
away from me.
And, luckily for me, after Iwas injured, there were people
and experiences that I had thatslowly started getting me back
(33:24):
to that DNA.
So when dancing presents itself,when all my children and then
dancing presents itself, I'mlike, of course, like this is
what I'm supposed to be doing,like this is part of my DNA,
which is why when I went ondancing, I was never nervous.
I was never nervous, I wasexcited and I couldn't wait to
have my 90 seconds on that stageon Monday night to perform and
(33:46):
to tell a story and to makepeople feel something at home.
I loved it and that's why, forme, when life tends to get a
little shaky and unpredictableand there's a lot of change and
a lot of unknown, I don't tendto honestly really panic about
it a lot.
I tend to kind of look at itand say, okay, like let me, let
(34:07):
me look backwards and look atsome pieces and let me just
trust that that something'sgoing to work out, because I've
spent so much time pausing andreflecting and life has kind of
proven me, like it's kind ofshown me, like we got you, as
long as you're paying attentionto the signs.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
That's right, and I always have to remind myself
that the universe always has myback and it's always worked out
until now.
So what makes me think that allof a sudden the universe is
going to turn its back on me,Like I just?
But it's hard.
You have to remind yourselfconstantly when you're worried
or things start falling apart.
You know it takes work, ittakes work, it takes work.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
That's why I tell people like, listen, I may be
the guy that people bring me into be positive and come inspire
people, and I'm like, listen, Ipractice positivity daily.
Yes, practice positivity daily,like I have to practice this.
It is a practice you have tocondition your mind and your
body no different than anythingelse in life, no matter what
you're trying to excel at.
It takes practice.
Like, some of us have a littlebit more natural ability for
(35:08):
some things than others, butdon't be mistaken, you still
have to practice if you want tohave longevity, if you want to
be at the highest level doing it.
If not, then your talent, yournatural talent, will carry you
to a certain point and thenyou'll sort of fizzle out and
then the people that are puttingthe work in will then, you know
right, surpass you.
We started recording.
(35:40):
But you were asking me as faras, like, my family dynamic and
everything and my you knowmarried, my wife and I was.
I was telling you and you askedme.
It was like is your first, isyour second marriage, or you
know, and I was like no, but mywife and I had a rough stint at
the beginning of ourrelationship, where my daughter
was a year old, we broke up andit was a, it was a 100% a
breakup.
We were not together.
(36:00):
Yes, there were still feelingsfor one another, but we were
nowhere near together.
And it was like that for a fewyears and then, finally, we were
able to one day come togetherand really kind of identify that
we still had these feelings forone another.
And you know, and I had goneand you know done some work and
you know some therapy,traditional, untraditional, a
little bit of all and she hadkind of done her own work, and
(36:22):
we were able to identify somethings that we both needed to
work on and address and thatwould make our unit stronger.
And we can try this again.
And here we are, you know, haveanother, have another kid, and
you know like life is great, um,but essentially, like for me,
the thing that I feel that so so, so just gonna fast forward a
(36:43):
little bit.
So my daughter moved to New YorkCity because that's where my
wife is from.
So and I was traveling all over.
At the time I was filming ashow in South Africa and I was
there for four months out of theyear and I was thinking I might
go back, and so I was just kindof all over the place and I
didn't realize where I wanted tobe.
So in 2015, the speakingindustry started to slow down a
(37:03):
little bit at least for me,right, there wasn't a lot and I
started to panic and oh my God,oh my God, oh my God, why are
things not kicking off?
Why am I not getting all thesecalls and these emails and these
offers?
Why aren't my agents reachingout to me as often?
And I would call my agents andbe like what do I need to do?
Like what needs to happen, likeyou know?
And they were like we don'tknow, we don't know.
And what I identified is that,after dancing and I got all
(37:28):
these opportunities to travelall over the world and speak to
all these different groups andthese brands that we all know
and use and great opportunitieswhat I realized at a certain
point I started to see how muchmoney was coming in and what I
got away from.
I got away from my purpose.
Speaker 1 (37:43):
The reason I wanted to be a speaker from the very
beginning.
Speaker 3 (37:45):
I literally then started pursuing the money.
I started pursuing theattention, the accolades that
I'm one of the best in thisindustry.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
And I'm this young and the universe said jokes on
you, bro.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
The universe said, oh , let me pull this rug real
quick right from under your feetand watch you face plant.
And I'm over here, panicking,looking at external, like what
did I need to do?
What do I need to change, whatneeds to happen?
And honestly, you know how.
What got me back is I would goto the park with my lab, my
black lab, and I would go to thepark and I would sit there and
(38:20):
I would just write and I wouldjust be and I would just think.
And what I realized after,honestly, it took a couple of
months and I I went from.
Honestly, I'm going to behonest with you I went from
having all this money toliterally, almost literally,
being broke, like I'm not even,I'm not even BS and you or your
listeners, I went from because Ibought my mom a house, I was
(38:43):
taking care of my daughter, Iwas taking care of all these
other people, I was doing allthese other things with the
money, and then no opportunitieswere coming in.
And also, now I'm like I got nomoney and but what I realized
is that, oh, I need to get backto my core, to my purpose, why I
got away from that.
And then I started to figureout well, what is it that I want
to do?
What, what, what's going tomake me happy?
(39:09):
And there were two things.
I was like one I want to bewith my daughter, and so you
know what.
I need to figure that out.
And I want to go to school.
I want to go to college.
I don't need college for what Ido, for a profession, but it
was always a goal of mine.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:20):
And so I at the time I was living in Texas, um,
staying with a buddy of mine, mybest friend, um, as I was kind
of in this transitional periodto kind of figure out where I
was going to go in the world.
And I was like, well, maybe doI stay in Texas and I can go to
the university of Texas.
Like, maybe I do that and Ijust go and visit my daughter
and she comes down, whatever, soI go to UT.
(39:42):
It doesn't work out right.
They're like, well, maybe now,and that's not a good fit here.
And I was kind of like, oh,interesting, okay, and I kind of
took it a little personal Cause.
I was like like, like youwouldn't, I can't come to school
here, why, right?
And so then I get connectedwith somebody and they say, hey,
we can connect you with someschools in New York.
And so they, I have aconversation with a couple of
(40:04):
schools in New York.
One of the schools likeabsolutely we'd love to have you
, and it's Fordham university.
And I was like, oh, this isgreat.
So then I said you know what?
Okay, well, I'm going to moveto New York.
Perfect, because I'm going tobe closer to my daughter and I'm
going to be able to go toschool months of really leaning
into that.
And then all of a sudden,opportunity started presenting
(40:25):
themselves again.
So then I'm like okay, so Istart accepting and start doing
more and doing more.
And then I get thisentertainment opportunity on
this show about the possibilityof filming in a show in georgia,
and so I go and I audition andit got pretty far and then
(40:45):
towards the end, they decidedthey were going to go in a
different direction and I wasokay with that, like I'm fine
with that, like I'm a big boy, Ican take that.
But I asked them I said, well,just out of curiosity, is there
any feedback?
Like I'd love some feedback,maybe some areas that I need to
address.
And and the lady said, honestly,you were great, you, you, you,
we liked, we liked, we likedwhat you were about, we liked
(41:07):
this.
We just decided to go withsomebody else who had a bigger
social media following, whichwas another kind of rude
awakening.
That that's the world we're inright now.
Yep, and what I realized atthat time, literally my wife and
I, at literally about a monthbefore that opportunity
presented itself, we startedhaving these conversations and
exploring could we try thisagain.
(41:27):
Everything is about timing.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
That's what I was just going to say.
I was not supposed to go to UT.
Everything is about timing.
Speaker 3 (41:37):
Yep, all those things , sabrina, in the last.
I'm 41, and I would probablysay more the last 21 years of my
life, since that injury, I havetaken all this evidence and all
these experiences right.
(41:57):
You, me, everybody listeningyou have to treat yourself like
the big brands that we love, thebig brands that we follow, that
we're loyal to, right.
What do they do?
They base everything off ofdata.
Everything is based on data Inorder for them to be efficient
and effective and continue togrow.
It's based on data, data of thecustomer, data on what they
like, data when they like it.
Data, data, data, data, data,data data.
(42:19):
Well, we're no different asindividuals.
We have to equally becollecting data and to look at
that data, and so that's what Ihave trained myself to do is to
look at like wait, ut didn'tturn me down because I'm not
good enough to go to universityin Texas because the universe
was like.
You're not supposed to be here,bro.
I didn't get the opportunity inthe entertainment industry,
(42:40):
because I'm not supposed to bein Georgia, I'm supposed to be
here, getting my family togetherand getting the thing that, at
the end of the day, is whatmakes me happy and makes me
whole and completes me.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
But it's funny that you say that, because I think
what I'm taking from the storyis it's important to be able to
understand also the universe isguiding you and that that timing
is important, what you justsaid.
But when a lot of people wouldget would not get admitted to
their school of choice and theneverything would break down,
where you have to be able toallow the universe to guide you
(43:16):
yeah, yep, a hundred percent,and and, but the way that you,
when people ask because I've hadpeople ask, well, but how do
you do that?
Speaker 3 (43:24):
and I'm like like you have to, I, and this is what I
believe you just have to stop,stop, reflect and think of all
these scenarios that there'vebeen, signs that you've
potentially have missed becauseyou're stubborn, we're all
stubborn, or we don't thinkthere's no way that that could
be my life, right?
You think I?
You, let me tell you about thisdancing thing real quick.
(43:46):
Let me tell you how, the howthe universe plants his little
seeds.
So, when I was on all mychildren, um, you know we do
these fan events and, um, and Iremember being at one and you
know I was one of the newercharacters, so I didn't get a
lot of the questions from theaudience.
You know they were asking theSusan Lucci's and the Alicia
(44:06):
Minshew and the CameronMatheson's, like all the big
actors at the time on the show,the Michael Knights, all those
guys.
And I remember somebody askedme JR, would you ever go on
Dancing with the Stars?
Now, the reason this personasked me this is because the
night before it was a party.
And listen, you bring a partyand some music, I'll get down.
I will get down.
(44:29):
And I remember when she askedthis question, I just kind of
smirked.
I was like, oh yeah, that'd befun, that'd be fun.
Now, I was familiar with theshow, but I wasn't a loyal
watcher or viewer.
I just kind of like, oh yeah,yeah, yeah, it'd be fine.
I just kind of that's all I did.
It just kept it moving.
Fast forward 2011,.
All my children announced thatthey're going to cancel the show
later that year.
(44:49):
I now started getting texts andyou know calls from friends and
people, and one person inparticular texted me and said,
hey, whatever happened to thatdancing thing?
And I was like, why does thiskeep coming?
Up.
And so instead of ignoring thatwhich I think a lot of us
probably would do but at thatpoint life had already kind of
taught me and conditioned methat I was like, well, I can't
(45:11):
just ignore this.
So I went and asked theexecutive producer of all my
children Everybody was in herear Can you know what do we do?
Where is there otheropportunities on other shows?
And I just approached, I saidlisten, I'm not going to, I'm
not going to stress you out LikeI've had a great run here.
I don't know where life hastaken me, but I do have one
question.
I keep hearing this pop updancing with the stars.
And she was like, oh, my God,you'd be amazing, I'm going to
(45:34):
make an introduction.
And she made the introductionto one of the producers and the
cast of directors over at dancewith the stars and literally the
rest is history.
But again, I could have easilyjust kind of heard that and just
kind of dismissed it.
Speaker 2 (45:47):
But you have to pick inspired action in life.
Speaker 3 (45:51):
You do 100% Listen.
When I was 16 years old, mymother came into my room and I
was crying and she said what'swrong?
And I said sometimes I thinkabout getting into a car
accident just to see who lovesme, who would show up at the
hospital.
Now this is 2024.
I think all of us, if we hearda 16 year old echo those same
words, we'd respond differently.
Now I don't think I was at thatpoint, but essentially I was
(46:12):
clearly feeling a lack there ofhaving any sort of like
community or outside of mymother community support
connection, like I clearly lacksomething.
Be careful what you throw intothe universe, because three
years later I was in essentiallya car accident.
I was in a Humvee where italmost took my life.
Three months after I wasinjured, I told my mom I'm going
(46:34):
to be on a soap opera.
Guess what?
Five years later, I'm on a soapopera.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
I said this to my friend yesterday your tongue is
a wand.
Speaker 3 (46:41):
Yes, yes, a hundred percent%.
And so you know, listen, it'shard for us to understand, it's
hard for us to process.
My wife and I we didn't wantthis big gap between our kids my
daughter's 12, my son's three.
We would have loved to have acloser gap right.
However, for us, what has madesense?
(47:01):
Because we tried for a coupleof years, we tried Before our
son was born.
We were trying, trying, tryingand experienced a miscarriage
and there was that.
Then you get into this thoughtprocess of she's questioning
what's wrong with me.
I'm questioning what's wrongwith me.
I can't get my wife pregnant.
She's questioning what's wrongwith my body.
(47:21):
You start kind of going downthat road and unfortunately, my
father-in-law was strugglingwith some health stuff and then
he ended up passing and he was,I mean, the head of the table,
if you will, head of the familyand you realize like there were
some things my wife identifiedthat she needed to lean, and
(47:42):
again, it wasn't just her, butshe realized there were some
things that for personally, forher, she needed to lean into.
And once she started to leaninto those things, like from a
therapeutic standpoint andreally addressing some of these,
you know the emotional woundsand the stress and all that
stuff um our son, boom we getright and and and and.
(48:03):
You just don't know, know, andyou just got to trust timing and
I know it's hard because we allare so conditioned to we see
other people, they have whatthey have and we want what they
have, or we want more of whatwe've already had, and the
challenge is being able to getto a point where you can just
trust and say you know what, I'mnot putting any pressure on
(48:25):
anything.
There's clearly a reason whythis isn't happening for me
right now.
Right or maybe, maybe it willnever happen, but there's also a
reason for that and I just gotto trust and be paying attention
and I'll get that.
I'll get that answer, I'll getthe direction and the guidance
that I need.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
And so it's taken me 47 years to figure that out, I
think like 20, when I was in mytwenties, when something didn't
work out, it would devastate me.
Now, if something works out, Isay there's a reason why this
didn't work out.
I just don't know what thereason is right now.
It'll be told to me, it'll beshown to me in due time, but
right now I don't know why.
But I have to trust that theuniverse is like like prolonging
(49:06):
it or postponing it for somereason, for my highest good.
Speaker 3 (49:10):
For sure, and you know, and that's why you know my
mom, my mom again, it was justmy mother and I, and I remember
one day asking my mom for Idon't know what it was, it was
like the latest and greatestthing, but my mom made no more
than 30, it was like $36,000 ayear.
She didn't make a lot of moneyand I remember my mom sitting
down with me at the kitchentable and she put her paste up
(49:33):
there and then she said okay,this is how much money I brought
home.
She said this is how much rentis.
This is how much we have tohave for food.
This is how much for utilities,this is how much, right?
She's like simple math subtractall that from so I do.
And she's like how much is leftover?
And I I'm like not a lot.
And she's like, yeah, and she'slike so when you ask for these
things, you got to understandit's not that I don't want to
(49:54):
give them to you.
You got to understand that justright now I can't.
So back then, layaway was thething, was the thing right, and
she'd be like but we could putit on layaway and I'd get it for
you in four months, when I paymy $20 every other week or
whatever it was, but I would getthat item More.
So the reason I tell that story,what's so important, is I love
(50:14):
that my mother.
I can appreciate that as anadult.
I can appreciate that now as afather.
And so I think for me, as afather with my daughter my son's
still young, but with mydaughter, who's 12 and
understands and comprehends allthis stuff is to be able to have
these type of conversationswith her.
Because when you said you werein your 20s and something didn't
(50:34):
work out, oh my God, life isover.
We're not.
There's never a lot ofconversation around us that if
something doesn't work out, howdo you adapt or what do you
learn from that?
That that is not.
That is not something that isintroduced to our lives at a
young age.
We have to learn the hard wayand over the course of years and
decades, in some cases right,and so with my daughter, I'm
(50:56):
very intentional.
Like my daughter, um, shewanted to be part of student
council.
Well, she found out she didn'tget in, but her best friends did
and oh, she was devastated andshe was 10 years old.
She's devastated, I mean, andshe's crying and whatever.
And I remember telling her Iwas like, listen, it doesn't
(51:16):
make sense.
Now there is a reason whyyou're not in student council.
There is a reason.
I said I know it's hard, but wewill get the answer later down
the road and I said but you'reallowed to be upset and to
grieve, you're allowed to dothat.
That is a human response andthat is how I didn't listen.
I'm one of the most confidentdudes in the world.
(51:36):
I'm not going to lie, despitemy scarring on my face and on my
body, on my face and on my body, like I like listen during
before my wife I'm some badhoneys.
I got it.
I got it.
You get what I'm saying.
You know my, my wife is a.
That's a.
She's a knockout, she's abeautiful woman, right, and I'm
(51:57):
a confident dude.
But before I got to that pointwhere I could accept and be that
confident, I had to grieve.
I had to grieve the loss of theLJR and that was okay and it
took whatever time it took.
That was my process and I can'ttake that or put that on
anybody else.
And so, with my daughter, fastforward this situation later
down the road.
Guess what?
She's now playing softball andshe's like loving softball and
(52:20):
she's more.
Speaker 2 (52:21):
And that's why it allowed her the time to be able
to do that.
Speaker 3 (52:24):
She's like loving softball.
She's more, and that's why itallowed her the time to be able
to do that.
Speaker 2 (52:28):
She's a select softball player.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
She is a pitcher.
She is.
She wouldn't be able to do thathad she been on student council
.
Speaker 2 (52:34):
What I'm taking from this entire conversation is in
life, you're allowed to grieve,but you need to move on, and I
think you are an amazing exampleof that.
For anyone listening, I will,in the show notes, have all of
GR's information so that you canget in touch with him, follow
him, watch his YouTube channelwith all of his motivational
speaks, speaking engagements,and I know you have like a
little journal there too.
(52:55):
Gr.
Seriously, thank you so much.
This was such a greatconversation.
Speaker 3 (52:58):
No, this was fun.
Thank you so much.
This is a lot of fun.
Again, thank you, as always foryou know, for sharing this
little little this, this thislittle bit of me with your
platform, with your listeners,and I just appreciate the
conversation and, um, you know,just uh, I just want people to
just keep showing up just asbest as you can.
If there's anything you couldtake away from this episode,
despite what state of lifeyou're in, just smile because
(53:20):
there's blessings around thecorner waiting for you.
Thank you.
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