November 25, 2024 • 37 mins
Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to an inspiring episode of Fat, Dumb, and Happy! This episode we are going to talk about the people that inspire us. Whether it be the amazing innovation someone has or their superhuman kindness, we are going to highlight these individuals and you will probably relate to many of them or share in how they inspire you. We will be getting into our feels, and we’ll be having some fun along the way. Glad you are here to join us!
**In part 2 of this 2-part episode, we highlight the people that inspire us by category -- Kindness, Innovation, Athleticism, Character, Intelligence, Looks, Work Ethic, etc. We also talk about how we do with letting people know how they inspire us and/or how we receive compliments. Then, Ben shares his wisdom about the psychology behind why it is important to look for inspirational people and things.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey, welcome back.
(00:01):
We hope you enjoy listening to part two of this episode.
Let's go on to talking about by category.
So we talked about by timeframe, right?
From childhood to now.
But what about category of people?
So let's start with just kindness, charity, philanthropy, you know, like who is that for
(00:22):
you, John?
So first of all, I want to put my disclaimer on this, that I am speaking directly only
about this one person, not any of his cast mates or anything like that.
And that's Jimmy Donaldson, AKA Mr. Beast.
So he might be the most popular YouTuber ever.
The most, I think it was the first one with like a hundred million subscribers and all
(00:44):
that.
And through his content creation though, no, he does for all his followers, he does all
these games and challenges and stuff.
And he gives them all his tons of money, cars and stuff like that.
And yeah, that changes their lives, which is amazing as well.
Like how much he does for people is insane.
But I like it.
It kind of goes a little bit deeper than that.
(01:05):
So Mr. Beast, he's real, like I said, the real name is Jimmy Donaldson and he gives
away so much of his money because he believes in using that money to create positive change
and make him impact.
He's got a charity called Team Trees.
And one of his goals is to, he runs a campaign to raise a fund to plant 20 million trees.
Nice.
How can you not like things like that?
Cleaning up the ocean, raising millions to clean up public waste.
(01:28):
He's got closed donations.
In 2023, he set out to cure a thousand people worldwide of blindness.
And I think he also did something really recently as well with well water, creating well water
for people, something like drinkable water in remote areas.
And people are like, you know, they give him such crap about why he does it.
(01:50):
Oh, well, he just does this for clicks and views and stuff like that.
That's not even the case, man.
I just think, I think he's inspiring.
I think he does this stuff legitimately because he wants to.
You know, he's got the money to because of his content creation and he tries to use it
for good.
And I think not everybody does.
So kudos to him.
Awesome.
(02:10):
Yeah.
Very cool.
Good choice.
Yeah.
What about you, Ben?
So for me, I like, I don't know, like again, this is one of those things where there's
so many people, honestly, but one that stood out to me was Mahatma Gandhi.
And again, I don't know his life story that well, but I didn't know enough to know that,
you know, like he was willing to go through hard things and not be violent back, you know.
(02:32):
And one story I remember hearing about him was that he's getting on a train and one of
his shoes fell off, like right as I was about to leave.
And rather than get frantically try to climb down there and get his shoe back, he just
took off his other shoe and let it go down there.
So somebody else found it.
They could have a pair of shoes instead of a single shoe, you know.
He was more willing to help out other people and more worried about helping other people
(02:55):
out than worrying about himself.
And that was just one, I mean, there's just so many good people out there in the world.
Oh my goodness.
So many.
What about you, Dave?
We could have put Jesus for all of these, obviously, right?
But to not just repeat that over and over.
Yeah.
So I don't know.
When I think of a really kind, really charitable, really philanthropic person, the name Mother
(03:17):
Teresa comes to mind.
I mean, she was so much about service and kindness and to the individual level too,
which was really cool.
One of her quotes says, if you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one.
Just the idea of just emphasizing, like do what you can and the individual matters.
So I think she's definitely inspiring in terms of kindness and charity.
(03:39):
Yep.
Okay.
All very good picks.
I think all worthy of that inspiration level.
What about somebody who has character?
Like somebody that just defines character in their life.
And a lot of the times I think about like, when nobody's looking, what are their actions?
Right?
When nobody's paying attention, when the spotlight's not on, what are they doing?
(04:01):
Ben, what about you?
Who exemplified that for you?
You know, I love the way you describe that because I think, when I think of this guy,
he was on my RA when I was a freshman in college and he just kind of watched out for the other
guys on our floor, you know?
But he, it just was like so part of his nature, so part of his character that yeah, he did
it when nobody was looking.
(04:21):
He noticed things just naturally without even really thinking about it, it seemed like, just
because just a kind of a caring guy and just he would be one of the first people to notice
someone was missing or someone just looked like they were down.
He was kind of just aware and on the alert.
And that really inspired me to be more like that.
I could be a lot better, but I have, because of him, I've tried to be better.
(04:46):
Yeah.
I think people with character, I think that's what they do to you.
Yeah, that's really good.
Dave, what about you?
Yeah, so kind of similar.
And there was a guy on my mission.
I wasn't even companions with him.
He was one of the zone leader guys or whatever.
And he went with me on a few outings.
And at one point we had to talk to the mayor of this city and we're like 19, 20 year old
(05:07):
dudes and I was nervous out of my mind and he was just so bold and courageous.
That just really inspired me.
I remember when we were like waiting outside to go in to talk to him and his office, he
had this poem memorized about courage and he recited it.
I was just like, that's so cool, man.
Like it was just inspiring to me.
(05:28):
And then he, like John was saying, you know, like I know he had integrity that like, no
matter if he was alone, he was the same dude and he was doing the right thing.
So on a grander scale, I think of Martin Luther King Jr.
For sure.
I mean, he was true to his character.
He did so much for so many people, definitely inspiring in terms of character.
What about you, John?
(05:48):
Yeah.
So for me, mine's a little more recent.
It's an actor actually, if you can believe that.
And he's only killed 439 guys in his most recent series that he made.
We all know him.
We grew up with him as Ted Theodore Logan.
Yes.
But Keanu Reeves, man, if you even knew, like a lot of people know his story, but you
(06:08):
know, just kind of briefly, this guy's been through so much.
And to see the way that he treats people today, it doesn't get really more inspirational
than that.
It's so amazing the way he actually and genuinely cares about people.
He's a non-materialistic guy.
He doesn't have some fancy house in Hollywood or anything like that.
He was born in Lebanon and his father left the family when he was three.
(06:31):
His mother then moved him all to Hawaii, New York and Canada and Australia.
He attended four high schools before he dropped out at 17.
He struggled with dyslexia.
He acted out as a child.
He did find an outlet in hockey.
He lost one of his daughters, Ava.
She died eight months into her mother's pregnancy.
Ava, the death of his girlfriend, Jennifer in a car crash, lost her.
(06:52):
His sister's best friend, an actor, River Phoenix, overdosed at a club.
All this stuff.
And you can go on.
There's more.
There's other things that's happened to him.
But if you're ever on social media, you can see there's a video of him just being the
most normal dude riding the subway.
He is riding the subway in New York City and he gets up to let a lady sit down.
(07:12):
Like class, man.
Dude is full class.
And there's another one where he was sitting there talking to like a homeless guy and just
checking in on him.
And it would come like Dave said, you know, with one of the trees, you know, he is just
for everything that he's had to overcome.
And he doesn't care about money and things like that.
Possessions aren't really things to him, it's not that the world be part of it to him.
(07:33):
It's the people.
And I really do find that guy inspiring.
I like his acting, but him as a person, I'll watch that show every day.
Good choice, John.
It's interesting because in Hollywood, you hear stories all the time, people that seem
nice, but then like behind the scenes are kind of jerks, you know?
(07:53):
It kind of makes sense.
Like they're actors.
They can act nice, you know?
There's always a handful of people in Hollywood that are just like universally known as real,
legit, nice.
Like they're really kind people.
They are truly, they are the real deal.
(08:14):
And you hear stories, like story after story of them.
And it's like, yeah, when you meet people like that, it's got to stand out, you know?
Especially when you're in the swamp of Hollywood where there's a lot of people that are trying
to work their way up or stab people in the back or, you know, just when you become rich
and famous, it's easy to become like a little diva, you know, and feel like you are owed
(08:36):
more than you really are, you know?
Yeah, the entitlement, you know?
And you see people that don't let it go to your head, it stands out even more, you know?
Yeah.
And so to see somebody like that one, you know, Hollywood is just full of trash.
It's pretty awesome.
I like it.
What about innovation?
People that have inspired you or the things they've innovated or invented or improved
(08:59):
upon or whatever?
What about you, Dave?
Some names that come to mind that I think maybe are fairly obvious.
Maybe there's controversy behind them.
I don't know.
But Elon Musk, I mean, you can't deny that he's come up with a lot of amazing things.
He's done a lot.
You know, SpaceX, Tesla, even turning Twitter to X. You know, all these things that he's
(09:20):
done is pretty inspiring.
And another one is Steve Jobs.
You know, he created Apple, then he was fired from it, right?
And then he came back and just all the things that he was able to do with Apple is pretty
amazing.
So those are the two I picked.
What about you, John?
Yeah.
And look, guys, nobody's talking about his current political status or anything like
that.
(09:41):
We're talking strictly what made them inspiring about what they've done in their career.
Right.
All right.
So you know, you need the five stars, but you don't need a message with that one.
So for me, I think as far as innovation goes, I think AI can be used.
I've told you all before, I'm not a fan of AI at all.
I think it's used for a lot of terrible stuff.
(10:01):
And I think it's going to be continued to use for bad stuff.
But there are some good things out there that they have some good applications for.
And for the people that use it with the right purpose, I think good for them for improving
upon it.
Over the last two years, it's definitely come miles and miles from where it used to be.
It's pretty freaky, some of the stuff they've done with it.
But the innovation of...
I get tripped out about airplanes, guys.
(10:22):
I've been flying my entire life.
Yeah.
I don't even know how much a plane weighs, but tons and tons of scrap metal are sitting
there flying through the air because of these engines or whatever.
Like the sustained flight is just like, it baffled me sometimes.
I wish that people would get more innovative and we could go back to the lifestyle where
people dress up nicely on planes and stuff like that instead of the trash they have updated.
(10:45):
I think it's the airplane travel, the mode of travel.
I mean, look, to know that I could be here in Houston and then like three hours later
on the same day I can come visit you, it's crazy to me.
That just baffles me sometimes, man, when I think about that kind of stuff.
So those are two pieces of innovation throughout my lifetime.
(11:06):
They have gotten better.
Those are just a couple of things that I thought of.
What about you, Ben?
I'll keep it short and sweet.
Whoever invented ice cream is like way up there for me, man.
I don't know how many thought of this, but it is the bomb.
I love it.
Yes.
I mean, milk from a cow to delicious ice cream.
(11:28):
That's very innovative, very inspiring for sure.
I'm going to mention this in a minute, but when people can see the end game, that dude's
like, yo, there's a cow.
I've got this awesome idea.
Check this out.
Cookie dough ice cream, baby.
Ben and Jerry's Weasel and Chewsers.
(11:50):
You just started with goats probably or something.
I'll see you like that.
But they thought we're not done yet.
We're going to improve this better.
Right, man.
Yep.
Good one.
Good one for sure.
That is a good one.
We're all ice cream fans here on Fat Dumb and Happy, that's for sure.
All right, next category, athleticism.
This was kind of tough, but John, what about you?
(12:12):
So look, I'm going to spoil a couple of your answers.
This was super random, y'all.
Just so y'all know, we put these answers kind of together, like separately.
We all chose Michael Jordan.
Yeah.
And you know, so.
Yeah, dude.
And I mentioned on the last episode, he is the goat.
(12:33):
G-O-A-T, baby, but if I could have the confidence, the confidence of any athletic person, it
was Michael Jordan, maybe mixing with Little Kobe and then Muhammad Ali.
It's no surprise that Michael Jordan and Muhammad Ali were both goats in their professions.
Muhammad Ali, he was so confident.
He once said, if you even dreamed about beating me, you better wake up and apologize.
(12:58):
That was one of the coolest things I've ever heard somebody say.
For real.
Just real quick, I'm going to hit two others.
I left out earlier that I wanted to kind of bring down to this category.
One is JJ Watt.
He started here.
He was drafted by the Houston Texans.
He was a three time defensive MVP player, man.
(13:19):
He is probably one of the most amazing upbeat, positive people you'll ever meet.
You know, everything he's done for his charity, to get schools, teams, equipment and stuff
like that.
But one of the biggest things that he did happen during Hurricane Harvey, he started
a fundraiser to get a million dollars was his goal.
And for those that don't know what Hurricane Harvey was, what, six, seven years ago, something
(13:44):
like that, it devastated Houston.
It was one of the biggest hurricanes we've ever seen here.
And it just destroyed lots and lots of stuff.
And I think he ended up raising about, just because of who he is, I think he ended up
raising about $50 million.
He's just, he's an overall good person.
(14:04):
Somebody else that also inspires me is one of the Houston Astros, Jose Altuve.
If you ever get a chance to hear his story, I'm sure it's on YouTube or something like
that.
And when he was young, he showed up to the Houston Astros, whatever their Central American
division is that they hold, like when I practice, when I'm all through, he showed up to that
and they're like, dude, you're too small.
(14:24):
You know, kick rocks.
He came back the next day, he's like, nah, nah, I'm good.
Let me play.
And they gave him a $15,000 contract.
And you know, he made his way.
They just resigned him to another five year contract and just, he's made a ridiculous
amount of money, life changing generation wealth for his family.
But his whole story, I just recommend y'all YouTube it sometime.
(14:45):
It's pretty dang good.
So yeah, definitely, definitely find him inspirational as well.
What about you, Ben?
Yeah, you mentioned Jordan.
He was definitely someone, especially as a kid that stood out to me, but another that
just always impressed me, inspired me were people like in the Special Olympic athletes,
the people that have had like major disabilities or something.
(15:06):
Like you know, you see somebody who has like one arm and they're lifting these huge weights
with one arm.
And it's like, oh my goodness, you know, like we don't give these kinds of people a credit
enough, you know, where it's yeah, you can look at Olympic athletes who have two arms
and doing stuff like this.
But when you got one arm and doing it, it's like a whole nother level.
(15:28):
And so I don't know, people like that.
Just I look at it and just blown away, you know, it's like, oh man, if they could, what
could I, what, what excuses do I have?
Why am I not doing stuff like this?
You know?
Yeah, like they're lifting these weights with one arm that I can't lift with two.
I'm like, the really cool one is like the track and field for the blind, where they're
(15:51):
being led around by another runner, like they're, I don't know if it's like a handkerchief or
what is it, but they're like running together.
So each blind person has a guide.
So they're both running and they both got a finish and it's crazy awesome.
You know, shout out to Arnold Schwarzenegger, huge proponent of the Special Olympics.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(16:11):
And that's definitely an athlete we could throw on there too, Arnold Schwarzenegger
and but yeah, you know, Special Olympics, whenever I watch those clips, I almost always get emotional.
It's like, it's just so inspiring, like you said, for real.
And yeah, again, Michael Jordan, you know, John spoiled it, but we all put him down there.
No, you're good, man.
And it was like Ben said, you know, growing up with him, that's part of it too, the nostalgia
(16:33):
of just like how huge he was and just John talked about confidence.
I would add like poise too, you know, like up against the clock and he just does these
amazing things.
Like he's, he's got so much confidence and poise in stressful situations.
Another guy I came up with was Gregory Muckett, not a famous person.
He wrote a book and my mom actually gave me the book.
(16:53):
But what's cool about him was he was a really pretty average guy.
He struggled with addiction.
And I think that's actually why my mom gave it to me, but I can relate.
Anyways, he made this declaration that like, if God wanted him to, he could swim the English
channel and that's insane.
And he was like this novice.
(17:14):
He wasn't like a swimmer in high school even or anything like that.
But he made this declaration and then he felt strongly, you know, believe whatever you believe
that like that he should make that promise to his group at church that, you know what,
I'm going to do that.
I'm going to make this promise right now.
And the group that he was with were all struggling with things.
They're going through divorce, struggling with alcoholism, whatever else, all these
(17:36):
other issues that they were going through.
And so he made this like inspiring comment and they were like, you know, they laughed
it off.
But it took him a long time, but he eventually did.
And you know, long story short, he swam the English channel and it's nuts.
The story that I read in his book was just insane.
And so it's just really inspiring to me that like an average person, if they got the grit
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and if they stick with it, they can do amazing things.
So yeah, that's it for me.
All right.
All good choices.
I don't think you'd go wrong with any of those.
What about intelligence?
Who intellectually, who inspires y'all?
Ben, what about you?
You know, so many of the like famous smart people, I don't feel on a level to even judge
like their intelligence.
(18:19):
You know what I mean?
Like it's hard for me to be inspired by them because I don't follow what they're saying
sometimes.
But one thing that I have, I've always been impressed with are people that are like speed
readers that could read so fast, you know, or people with photographic memories that
just will out of the blue just say, oh yeah, that was on page 374 or whatever, you know,
(18:43):
like, and just like quote it verbatim, you know, and I don't know.
I mean, it's a different side of the brain and they may not necessarily be the highest
IQ person or something, but man, they could do something that I'm just astounded by.
Wish I could learn to do that.
And they are definitely inspiring to me.
Yeah.
If I could be a speed reader, I'd definitely be reading a lot more or reading at all.
(19:05):
Yeah.
I'd be like, oh, two XP, dude.
All right.
For me, I chose one of those that everyone thinks of maybe, but Albert Einstein.
I don't know if you guys saw the movie IQ back in the day with Meg Ryan and Walter Maltho
plays this, Albert Einstein.
It's a pretty good one actually.
It's like a fun, cute, like romantic comedy or whatever, but that started it for me with
(19:30):
him, but definitely, you know, the things he came up with E equals FC squared and some
of his quotes, you know, learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow.
The important thing is not to stop questioning.
That's pretty cool.
And then another one is life is like riding a bicycle to keep your balance.
You must keep moving.
So both of those are inspiring quotes for me.
(19:51):
And I just think he's a pretty amazing man.
What about you, John?
So two things.
One, talking about knowledge and things like that.
You know, when I was a kid, I found myself in the gift shop of the United States Air
Force Academy.
And I remember there was a shirt there that said, one man's flight through life is determined
by the power of his knowledge.
(20:11):
And that's something that stuck with me to this day.
I should have followed it more probably, but just speaking about intellectual things, but
the people that inspired me, Amy here, there's a phrase sometimes, but this guy's out here
playing chess, but more of playing checkers.
So the people that have the ability to think three or four moves ahead of other people,
(20:34):
it's crazy the way their brain works.
You know, just like speed reading, that takes a different part of the brain.
I think people like this, and maybe this might not fall under inspiring, but more like amazing.
I am just strictly amazed people that have that ability to say, okay, this guy is going
to do this.
This will be my counter move.
(20:54):
This is how he'll react to that.
I'm going to come back with this and then ultimately he'll lose.
It's so amazing to me.
Things like that, I find super interesting.
Maybe because it will never be me, but you know.
So I think intellectually, that's just kind of something that inspires me.
Nice, nice.
All right.
This one's a little different.
How about looks?
What do you think about someone who inspires you with their looks?
(21:20):
You know, I gotta go with Stefan Urkel.
I mean, the most amazing looking guy in Family Matters.
No, I'm just kidding.
You do that.
No.
I knew that.
Yeah, exactly.
No, but there's so many famous people that looks are a part of what they got going on.
(21:41):
I think of some of them that have memes like Paul Rudd, who like never ages or whatever.
He's a handsome dude, man.
And he just looks the same as he has for like the last couple of decades, it seems like.
You know, Ryan Reynolds comes to mind.
There's just a bunch of those famous guys.
Ben Stiller a little bit.
Yeah, Ben Stiller.
Yep.
Yep.
He's still fit and everything too.
(22:02):
Yep.
And we mentioned him before, but people that are really fit too, like Arnold Schwarzenegger
and folks like that, that's somebody that's always inspired me in terms of looks.
So what about you, John?
So growing up, man, I thought, this is such a simple answer for me.
And that's the first thing that came to my head immediately.
Growing up, I thought the coolest guy ever.
We got to give them looks, give them vibe.
(22:23):
John Stamos.
Heck yeah, dude.
Yes, Uncle Jesse.
Uncle Jesse, yes sir.
Yes sir.
So, you know, John Stamos, man.
And I think I mentioned this once before, but there was a 4th of July show here where
he actually sat in for the drummer from the Beach Boys that played live during the 4th
(22:45):
of July concert they had here.
That's awesome, man.
And I was up on the stage rocking it, so I've seen Uncle Jesse in concerts.
Heck yeah, dude.
That's so awesome.
What about you, Ben?
You know, for me, one person that, you know, I didn't see him in a ton of movies, but I
thought he always looked good.
Like well dressed was Cary Grant, man.
He just, he always looked like the best guy in the suit.
(23:06):
You know, like his suit fit the best, you know?
And it's funny because he had like, at least at one point he had a tumor in his head.
And for some of his movies, like I just find myself like staring at that spot on his head.
But even as I'm staring at this bump on his head, you know, I can't help but notice that
(23:27):
this guy is like the best dressed guy in every scene that he's in, you know?
And so that kind of inspired me, you know, because I've got bumps on my head.
I don't always look the best, but man, I wish I could dress like him, man.
Yeah, good choice.
So let's talk about work life or work ethic.
What do you guys think about that, John?
Thanks, man.
(23:47):
I think for me, I can pinpoint exactly, you know, growing up, like I told you all in the
beginning of the conversation, the age difference watching my older siblings were able to go
and work and have jobs and stuff like that.
I feel like my whole family, I learned from them to, it's okay to put in 40 plus hours
of work a week.
That kind of started it, but you know, watching my dad as well, I got some from him.
(24:09):
But I think when I started working at the restaurant, I was there for about seven years
and my GM at the time, Dean, I think he was a huge inspiration, a huge help to becoming
a really just a good employee, good at my job, caring about what I was doing, attention
to detail because he was hard on us, but you know, he was an excellent general manager.
(24:29):
And then the other person that I definitely owe a lot to, I've told you about her before,
one of my favorite bosses I've ever worked for was Jess, the Irish lady.
She was amazing, amazing to me, amazing on the things that she taught me, worked for
her for over 10 years and it was just, it was amazing.
So I was grateful to have her in my work life, man.
(24:50):
I really was lucky.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
Well, what about you Ben?
You know, the last decade or so of my life, I feel like I've lived in much more rural
area than I grew up in.
And I have really come to appreciate the work ethic of farmers, man.
They are hard workers and their pain tolerance, it's just like pushing through when the work
(25:10):
needs to get done.
You just got to push through and do it, you know, and that mentality of like, this is
the season, this is the time we just got to do it.
And we do it till done.
It's just, it's inspiring there for sure.
You know, I would add on there, my dad as well was someone that I knew worked hard and
then he'd come home and he would serve in the church or whatever.
(25:30):
And it's like he was one of the last people that would always leave when there was a thing
that he'd help, he's setting up chairs, putting up chairs or whatever, and just like making
sure everything got done, you know.
And so he was another person that really inspired me.
What about you, Dave?
Great answers, both you guys.
And I'm just gonna do a big ditto from Ben.
When I was a kid, I loved arm wrestling and I could either always win or hold my own pretty
(25:54):
well.
And I remember visiting a family in Idaho, a family of farmers, and a kid my age just
like slammed me down.
And I was like, okay, he's got farmer strength.
Like there's something about farmers, man.
Like for real.
Yeah, for real.
And then like Ben said, my dad, I mean, when he wasn't working at his job, he was often
serving.
(26:15):
So he's working in service too.
So he's just definitely a good hard worker.
So yeah, so shout out to farmers, man.
And you can kind of probably even throw that shout out to the Amish.
Yeah, they're hard workers, dude.
Raising barns, man.
They do not play.
Like good for them.
Okay, so something else that doesn't get a lot of focus is when the ability to share
(26:36):
when we see good in others, and how do we react when somebody is trying to compliment
us?
Dave, how do you react in those two situations?
Yeah, it's a really good discussion point.
I don't do either of those very well.
You know, like I see people and they're inspiring and they do good things.
And it's definitely easier in obvious outward actions like in sports, like, oh man, good
(26:56):
job, good shot.
Good job in that pass or that catch or whatever, you know, presentations at work where it's
like everyone saw it.
Yeah.
Hey, good presentation.
You know, I can do that.
But when it's their character or something I see over a long period of time or like,
man, I've always noticed how kind you are.
Like, I don't think to say that enough.
And I definitely am recommitting to try to do that better with this podcast.
It was a good reminder.
(27:17):
And as far as reacting to compliments, you know, I don't do that super well either.
And I think there's a healthy balance between humility and brushing people off and like
not accepting compliments.
I think you give credit to God if that's what you think, what you believe and allow people
to say nice things to you.
Like it's all good.
So I want to do better at that as well.
(27:38):
Maybe it's because I don't care for many compliments.
I don't know.
I'm just kidding.
I compliment you daily, sir.
Hey, thanks, man.
All right, Ben, what about you?
You know, for me, it's one of the things I've noticed is like, I'm not that great at small
talk.
It's not my strength.
And so when people say like, I really enjoyed this about you or I appreciate this about
you, I say thanks.
(27:59):
But there's like, I say it in an awkward way, right?
Like follow up anything like I don't have anything else to say.
And it's just like conversation.
And so it's like, it can be awkward just because I don't know where to take it from there.
You know, I want to sometimes I think, well, what's something I could compliment them about
or what sometimes just the situation makes that difficult.
(28:21):
I don't know how to explain it.
But that makes sense.
Or you know, where I'm like, Brian Regan that that made the joke about like, you know, the
you too.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, like, yeah, like someone said, great talk, you know, like you too.
Well, I didn't enjoy your movie.
You too.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
I have that kind of mentality sometimes or a brain part where I don't know what to say.
(28:45):
And I'll say something stupid kind of like that.
You know.
The thing is, even complimenting other people, I feel like I want to be better about that.
And I've noticed that at different periods of my life where I really like consciously
practice it, I got better at it, man.
I got a lot better where I was more comfortable and just handing them out like candy or something,
the trick or treaters or something, you know, where it just comes easier the more you practice.
(29:10):
And then I have periods where I get out of practice and then it feels awkward again.
And so I will say that if you feel awkward about it, it doesn't have to stay that way.
But you're right, Dave.
I think the other thing is that like if you don't get compliments that often anyway, then
it's hard to like get into practice of it.
Yeah.
I had like compliments like from girls from like 40 years ago, 30 years ago that I'll
(29:33):
just remember because it's like one of those few compliments when someone ever complimented
me on my looks or something like that.
Yeah.
Sometimes like we don't compliment people enough that when they get the compliment,
they really do remember it.
What about you, John?
Yeah.
So Dave, first of all, you know, he puts in so much work to editing these podcasts that
(29:54):
we do.
Dave, you're an excellent editor.
And Ben, you are the best specialist of guest experts that we have.
Heck yeah.
Thanks, man.
This is something that, you know, I've actually tried to work hard on over the last few years
to include people and let them know that their efforts have been seen.
Mostly around the work area and that a lot of that comes from, you know, being in supervisory
roles where you need to learn how to compliment, compliment sandwich thing.
(30:17):
And, but I've tried to do it even amongst family and friends as well to where you let
them know that you were watching.
It doesn't have to be about the main topic.
And I think sometimes it's even weird.
Like if somebody gave a presentation and, or they did something at work that maybe others
didn't know this, if you're able to pick that thing out that they did well, I think it still
has to be legit.
(30:38):
You can't fake those.
It doesn't do anybody any good.
But when you're going to pick things out like that, where you're saying, man, hey, that
was really good.
I know everybody liked that, but I really liked this part.
You know, that really, you know, kind of, whatever you say to them.
When it's genuine, man, it does so much good for them.
Now, people try to compliment- John, you are good at it.
You are good.
Yeah, man.
Speaking of compliments, when I get one, it's just like, I like, I'll let it, you know,
(31:03):
it's, it's so awesome hearing about how awesome I am.
And I hear it all the time.
So I'm like, do I let it roll off my back?
No, I'm just kidding.
No, no.
What I do is I kind of, I let the compliment come, but then I tried to roll it back into
why I got that compliment.
So I said, Hey, you know, you did really well preparing this video.
Yeah.
(31:23):
That's when I got the update from the boss.
I said, yeah, well, you know, she did a good job teaching us how to do it.
And that was really the biggest benefit to me.
And that's why it was, you know, that good, something like that.
I try to put you back on others have even made it their credit, even if they don't,
which I know that could happen in this situation, but I think it just takes the focus off of
me just a little bit.
So I don't feel nearly as awkward, but nice.
(31:45):
Yeah.
So, but yeah, that's just me kind of accepting them and just kind of deflecting a little
bit because I know that even if I deflect or give credit elsewhere to include somebody
else in that compliment, I still know how they feel about me.
And I'll just take that compliment later and I'll think about it.
Thanks that one.
And good to go.
So Ben, break down the psychology of inspirational people and everything like that to us.
(32:08):
What's what's going on behind the scenes?
So we're less dumb.
Sure.
Yeah.
You know, it's really important that we have these role models, I guess you could say,
you know, our heroes, people that we admire and look up to because they have so many psychological
benefits, you know, first of all, they model behavior, you know, so when you see someone
do something good, it becomes a pattern in your mind of how a good thing could be done.
(32:31):
And so it creates this sort of like a template, you know, how it can work.
Someone's, for instance, friendly.
What does friendly look like?
You know, well, you probably had a few people in your life that stood out as really friendly
people and that became sort of the pattern of how you could be friendly too.
The other thing is they motivate action.
When you see people that do something impressive or have success, it makes you want to try
(32:56):
it.
You know, like I mentioned, like one time a tree when I'd see Dave climb a tree, I wouldn't
normally even think of that, but when I see him do it, it makes me want to act.
Also builds connections with people, especially when we share, you know, when we compliment
about people that inspire us, there's a stronger connection there.
When we see the good, we praise the good, and then other people see good in us, you
(33:17):
know, it's like those really strengthen our connections with others and then they expand
our view of what's possible.
You know, sometimes people see things in a different way and I never thought of it that
way, you know?
Yeah.
It's a paradigm shift when we see people do things in a totally different way than we
would and be successful, you know, and do it well and be like, wow, maybe that's what
(33:38):
I'm doing wrong with things, you know?
Another thing is it can really heal hurts, you know?
When we're going through a hard time and we see somebody else go through a hard time too
and see how they push through it or whatever, it kind of puts our own problems into perspective
and those that mourn together, they say shared joy is increased and shared pain is lessened.
(33:59):
People that we are inspired by and how they handle their hurts can also be a way of healing
our own hurts, you know?
Increases our capacity, it increases our appreciation, you know, just noticing the good in other
people, man, it just makes you a happier person, man, because you're going to always see the
negative too, like it's going to be there, but when you can also really identify the
(34:22):
good and elevate that and your priority in your life, then it makes your life happier,
man.
On the other side of it, there's some things to watch out for because sometimes we put
some people on a pedestal and it actually does the opposite, it prevents us from making
a connection with people because maybe we don't approach them, we think they're so
much better than us or something like that.
(34:44):
Or maybe we compare ourselves so much to them that we start putting ourselves down, you
know, like, oh man, they're so amazing about this, I could never be like that.
That's when that comparison becomes unhelpful.
And it doesn't motivate us to action, but motivates us to inaction where we're like,
I could never do that.
They are amazing and I'm not.
Another thing is that from seeing the good in ourselves, sometimes people will like idolize,
(35:09):
you know what I mean?
Like you see this with tweens and stuff and teenagers, you know, where they idolize some
famous person, a musician or singer or actor or whatever, and they got posters on their
wall about them.
And they almost make their character to be like that person instead of being their own
self and it's like when we grow up, we learn to just see some of the good in ourselves
(35:32):
and we can appreciate other people's good, but we don't have to emulate them in every
single way.
And so that's another area where, you know, we've kind of got to keep things in check
a little bit, you know what I mean?
As far as see the good in them, appreciate them, but not necessarily, you know, put them
so much on the pedestal that we become subsumed by them in a sense.
(35:53):
Man, that was awesome, Ben.
Thank you so much.
That's like...
Insights for sure.
Yeah, the good and the bad.
We see the good, we see the bad.
That is the facts of life, folks.
We've got to get Justin back on here to sing again, man.
I know, I know, I know.
But you know, that's funny, especially the negative ones, man.
It was such, gosh dang it, some of those kind of hit a little too close for home to me,
(36:14):
but Ben bringing the fire as usual.
Goodness.
Yeah, I mean, talking about increasing your capacity, you know, for there's times when
they think it's like not humanly possible to like run faster than a four minute mile,
for example, or something like that until somebody does.
And then like, multiple people can do it because it's inspiring and changes that, you know?
(36:35):
And then I was here too on the negative side of like, never meet your heroes, right?
Because it's like you find out they're not as amazing as you put them on that pedestal
to be, you know?
So definitely some good insights for sure.
You know, just real quick, who else inspired me?
Pretty much anybody that Denzel Washington plays in a true story.
Yeah, put him on the lift.
Yeah, exactly.
100%.
(36:56):
That is so true.
I need him to play my life in the mood.
Yeah, yeah, I need to get Denzel to play us.
Ben, you're already amazing, sir.
Yeah, for real, both you guys.
Love you for real, John, Ben, you're the best.
So glad to have this podcast with you guys.
Just want to thank everybody for listening.
(37:17):
Another great episode.
This was a little less on the chokey side, a little more in the fields, but I liked it.
It was a good time.
So yeah, thanks to John and Ben and everybody at home listening.
Don't forget to rate and subscribe, share with your friends and your enemies and your
heroes, everybody.
And don't forget to stay fat, dumb and happy.
Bye, guys.
Bye, everybody.
(37:37):
Make sure you catch your alerts.
We're coming back soon.
Come back soon.
Hey, welcome back.
(00:01):
We hope you enjoy listening to part two of this episode.
Let's go on to talking about by category.
So we talked about by timeframe, right?
From childhood to now.
But what about category of people?
So let's start with just kindness, charity, philanthropy, you know, like who is that for
(00:22):
you, John?
So first of all, I want to put my disclaimer on this, that I am speaking directly only
about this one person, not any of his cast mates or anything like that.
And that's Jimmy Donaldson, AKA Mr. Beast.
So he might be the most popular YouTuber ever.
The most, I think it was the first one with like a hundred million subscribers and all
(00:44):
that.
And through his content creation though, no, he does for all his followers, he does all
these games and challenges and stuff.
And he gives them all his tons of money, cars and stuff like that.
And yeah, that changes their lives, which is amazing as well.
Like how much he does for people is insane.
But I like it.
It kind of goes a little bit deeper than that.
(01:05):
So Mr. Beast, he's real, like I said, the real name is Jimmy Donaldson and he gives
away so much of his money because he believes in using that money to create positive change
and make him impact.
He's got a charity called Team Trees.
And one of his goals is to, he runs a campaign to raise a fund to plant 20 million trees.
Nice.
How can you not like things like that?
Cleaning up the ocean, raising millions to clean up public waste.
(01:28):
He's got closed donations.
In 2023, he set out to cure a thousand people worldwide of blindness.
And I think he also did something really recently as well with well water, creating well water
for people, something like drinkable water in remote areas.
And people are like, you know, they give him such crap about why he does it.
(01:50):
Oh, well, he just does this for clicks and views and stuff like that.
That's not even the case, man.
I just think, I think he's inspiring.
I think he does this stuff legitimately because he wants to.
You know, he's got the money to because of his content creation and he tries to use it
for good.
And I think not everybody does.
So kudos to him.
Awesome.
(02:10):
Yeah.
Very cool.
Good choice.
Yeah.
What about you, Ben?
So for me, I like, I don't know, like again, this is one of those things where there's
so many people, honestly, but one that stood out to me was Mahatma Gandhi.
And again, I don't know his life story that well, but I didn't know enough to know that,
you know, like he was willing to go through hard things and not be violent back, you know.
(02:32):
And one story I remember hearing about him was that he's getting on a train and one of
his shoes fell off, like right as I was about to leave.
And rather than get frantically try to climb down there and get his shoe back, he just
took off his other shoe and let it go down there.
So somebody else found it.
They could have a pair of shoes instead of a single shoe, you know.
He was more willing to help out other people and more worried about helping other people
(02:55):
out than worrying about himself.
And that was just one, I mean, there's just so many good people out there in the world.
Oh my goodness.
So many.
What about you, Dave?
We could have put Jesus for all of these, obviously, right?
But to not just repeat that over and over.
Yeah.
So I don't know.
When I think of a really kind, really charitable, really philanthropic person, the name Mother
(03:17):
Teresa comes to mind.
I mean, she was so much about service and kindness and to the individual level too,
which was really cool.
One of her quotes says, if you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one.
Just the idea of just emphasizing, like do what you can and the individual matters.
So I think she's definitely inspiring in terms of kindness and charity.
(03:39):
Yep.
Okay.
All very good picks.
I think all worthy of that inspiration level.
What about somebody who has character?
Like somebody that just defines character in their life.
And a lot of the times I think about like, when nobody's looking, what are their actions?
Right?
When nobody's paying attention, when the spotlight's not on, what are they doing?
(04:01):
Ben, what about you?
Who exemplified that for you?
You know, I love the way you describe that because I think, when I think of this guy,
he was on my RA when I was a freshman in college and he just kind of watched out for the other
guys on our floor, you know?
But he, it just was like so part of his nature, so part of his character that yeah, he did
it when nobody was looking.
(04:21):
He noticed things just naturally without even really thinking about it, it seemed like, just
because just a kind of a caring guy and just he would be one of the first people to notice
someone was missing or someone just looked like they were down.
He was kind of just aware and on the alert.
And that really inspired me to be more like that.
I could be a lot better, but I have, because of him, I've tried to be better.
(04:46):
Yeah.
I think people with character, I think that's what they do to you.
Yeah, that's really good.
Dave, what about you?
Yeah, so kind of similar.
And there was a guy on my mission.
I wasn't even companions with him.
He was one of the zone leader guys or whatever.
And he went with me on a few outings.
And at one point we had to talk to the mayor of this city and we're like 19, 20 year old
(05:07):
dudes and I was nervous out of my mind and he was just so bold and courageous.
That just really inspired me.
I remember when we were like waiting outside to go in to talk to him and his office, he
had this poem memorized about courage and he recited it.
I was just like, that's so cool, man.
Like it was just inspiring to me.
(05:28):
And then he, like John was saying, you know, like I know he had integrity that like, no
matter if he was alone, he was the same dude and he was doing the right thing.
So on a grander scale, I think of Martin Luther King Jr.
For sure.
I mean, he was true to his character.
He did so much for so many people, definitely inspiring in terms of character.
What about you, John?
(05:48):
Yeah.
So for me, mine's a little more recent.
It's an actor actually, if you can believe that.
And he's only killed 439 guys in his most recent series that he made.
We all know him.
We grew up with him as Ted Theodore Logan.
Yes.
But Keanu Reeves, man, if you even knew, like a lot of people know his story, but you
(06:08):
know, just kind of briefly, this guy's been through so much.
And to see the way that he treats people today, it doesn't get really more inspirational
than that.
It's so amazing the way he actually and genuinely cares about people.
He's a non-materialistic guy.
He doesn't have some fancy house in Hollywood or anything like that.
He was born in Lebanon and his father left the family when he was three.
(06:31):
His mother then moved him all to Hawaii, New York and Canada and Australia.
He attended four high schools before he dropped out at 17.
He struggled with dyslexia.
He acted out as a child.
He did find an outlet in hockey.
He lost one of his daughters, Ava.
She died eight months into her mother's pregnancy.
Ava, the death of his girlfriend, Jennifer in a car crash, lost her.
(06:52):
His sister's best friend, an actor, River Phoenix, overdosed at a club.
All this stuff.
And you can go on.
There's more.
There's other things that's happened to him.
But if you're ever on social media, you can see there's a video of him just being the
most normal dude riding the subway.
He is riding the subway in New York City and he gets up to let a lady sit down.
(07:12):
Like class, man.
Dude is full class.
And there's another one where he was sitting there talking to like a homeless guy and just
checking in on him.
And it would come like Dave said, you know, with one of the trees, you know, he is just
for everything that he's had to overcome.
And he doesn't care about money and things like that.
Possessions aren't really things to him, it's not that the world be part of it to him.
(07:33):
It's the people.
And I really do find that guy inspiring.
I like his acting, but him as a person, I'll watch that show every day.
Good choice, John.
It's interesting because in Hollywood, you hear stories all the time, people that seem
nice, but then like behind the scenes are kind of jerks, you know?
(07:53):
It kind of makes sense.
Like they're actors.
They can act nice, you know?
There's always a handful of people in Hollywood that are just like universally known as real,
legit, nice.
Like they're really kind people.
They are truly, they are the real deal.
(08:14):
And you hear stories, like story after story of them.
And it's like, yeah, when you meet people like that, it's got to stand out, you know?
Especially when you're in the swamp of Hollywood where there's a lot of people that are trying
to work their way up or stab people in the back or, you know, just when you become rich
and famous, it's easy to become like a little diva, you know, and feel like you are owed
(08:36):
more than you really are, you know?
Yeah, the entitlement, you know?
And you see people that don't let it go to your head, it stands out even more, you know?
Yeah.
And so to see somebody like that one, you know, Hollywood is just full of trash.
It's pretty awesome.
I like it.
What about innovation?
People that have inspired you or the things they've innovated or invented or improved
(08:59):
upon or whatever?
What about you, Dave?
Some names that come to mind that I think maybe are fairly obvious.
Maybe there's controversy behind them.
I don't know.
But Elon Musk, I mean, you can't deny that he's come up with a lot of amazing things.
He's done a lot.
You know, SpaceX, Tesla, even turning Twitter to X. You know, all these things that he's
(09:20):
done is pretty inspiring.
And another one is Steve Jobs.
You know, he created Apple, then he was fired from it, right?
And then he came back and just all the things that he was able to do with Apple is pretty
amazing.
So those are the two I picked.
What about you, John?
Yeah.
And look, guys, nobody's talking about his current political status or anything like
that.
(09:41):
We're talking strictly what made them inspiring about what they've done in their career.
Right.
All right.
So you know, you need the five stars, but you don't need a message with that one.
So for me, I think as far as innovation goes, I think AI can be used.
I've told you all before, I'm not a fan of AI at all.
I think it's used for a lot of terrible stuff.
(10:01):
And I think it's going to be continued to use for bad stuff.
But there are some good things out there that they have some good applications for.
And for the people that use it with the right purpose, I think good for them for improving
upon it.
Over the last two years, it's definitely come miles and miles from where it used to be.
It's pretty freaky, some of the stuff they've done with it.
But the innovation of...
I get tripped out about airplanes, guys.
(10:22):
I've been flying my entire life.
Yeah.
I don't even know how much a plane weighs, but tons and tons of scrap metal are sitting
there flying through the air because of these engines or whatever.
Like the sustained flight is just like, it baffled me sometimes.
I wish that people would get more innovative and we could go back to the lifestyle where
people dress up nicely on planes and stuff like that instead of the trash they have updated.
(10:45):
I think it's the airplane travel, the mode of travel.
I mean, look, to know that I could be here in Houston and then like three hours later
on the same day I can come visit you, it's crazy to me.
That just baffles me sometimes, man, when I think about that kind of stuff.
So those are two pieces of innovation throughout my lifetime.
(11:06):
They have gotten better.
Those are just a couple of things that I thought of.
What about you, Ben?
I'll keep it short and sweet.
Whoever invented ice cream is like way up there for me, man.
I don't know how many thought of this, but it is the bomb.
I love it.
Yes.
I mean, milk from a cow to delicious ice cream.
(11:28):
That's very innovative, very inspiring for sure.
I'm going to mention this in a minute, but when people can see the end game, that dude's
like, yo, there's a cow.
I've got this awesome idea.
Check this out.
Cookie dough ice cream, baby.
Ben and Jerry's Weasel and Chewsers.
(11:50):
You just started with goats probably or something.
I'll see you like that.
But they thought we're not done yet.
We're going to improve this better.
Right, man.
Yep.
Good one.
Good one for sure.
That is a good one.
We're all ice cream fans here on Fat Dumb and Happy, that's for sure.
All right, next category, athleticism.
This was kind of tough, but John, what about you?
(12:12):
So look, I'm going to spoil a couple of your answers.
This was super random, y'all.
Just so y'all know, we put these answers kind of together, like separately.
We all chose Michael Jordan.
Yeah.
And you know, so.
Yeah, dude.
And I mentioned on the last episode, he is the goat.
(12:33):
G-O-A-T, baby, but if I could have the confidence, the confidence of any athletic person, it
was Michael Jordan, maybe mixing with Little Kobe and then Muhammad Ali.
It's no surprise that Michael Jordan and Muhammad Ali were both goats in their professions.
Muhammad Ali, he was so confident.
He once said, if you even dreamed about beating me, you better wake up and apologize.
(12:58):
That was one of the coolest things I've ever heard somebody say.
For real.
Just real quick, I'm going to hit two others.
I left out earlier that I wanted to kind of bring down to this category.
One is JJ Watt.
He started here.
He was drafted by the Houston Texans.
He was a three time defensive MVP player, man.
(13:19):
He is probably one of the most amazing upbeat, positive people you'll ever meet.
You know, everything he's done for his charity, to get schools, teams, equipment and stuff
like that.
But one of the biggest things that he did happen during Hurricane Harvey, he started
a fundraiser to get a million dollars was his goal.
And for those that don't know what Hurricane Harvey was, what, six, seven years ago, something
(13:44):
like that, it devastated Houston.
It was one of the biggest hurricanes we've ever seen here.
And it just destroyed lots and lots of stuff.
And I think he ended up raising about, just because of who he is, I think he ended up
raising about $50 million.
He's just, he's an overall good person.
(14:04):
Somebody else that also inspires me is one of the Houston Astros, Jose Altuve.
If you ever get a chance to hear his story, I'm sure it's on YouTube or something like
that.
And when he was young, he showed up to the Houston Astros, whatever their Central American
division is that they hold, like when I practice, when I'm all through, he showed up to that
and they're like, dude, you're too small.
(14:24):
You know, kick rocks.
He came back the next day, he's like, nah, nah, I'm good.
Let me play.
And they gave him a $15,000 contract.
And you know, he made his way.
They just resigned him to another five year contract and just, he's made a ridiculous
amount of money, life changing generation wealth for his family.
But his whole story, I just recommend y'all YouTube it sometime.
(14:45):
It's pretty dang good.
So yeah, definitely, definitely find him inspirational as well.
What about you, Ben?
Yeah, you mentioned Jordan.
He was definitely someone, especially as a kid that stood out to me, but another that
just always impressed me, inspired me were people like in the Special Olympic athletes,
the people that have had like major disabilities or something.
(15:06):
Like you know, you see somebody who has like one arm and they're lifting these huge weights
with one arm.
And it's like, oh my goodness, you know, like we don't give these kinds of people a credit
enough, you know, where it's yeah, you can look at Olympic athletes who have two arms
and doing stuff like this.
But when you got one arm and doing it, it's like a whole nother level.
(15:28):
And so I don't know, people like that.
Just I look at it and just blown away, you know, it's like, oh man, if they could, what
could I, what, what excuses do I have?
Why am I not doing stuff like this?
You know?
Yeah, like they're lifting these weights with one arm that I can't lift with two.
I'm like, the really cool one is like the track and field for the blind, where they're
(15:51):
being led around by another runner, like they're, I don't know if it's like a handkerchief or
what is it, but they're like running together.
So each blind person has a guide.
So they're both running and they both got a finish and it's crazy awesome.
You know, shout out to Arnold Schwarzenegger, huge proponent of the Special Olympics.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(16:11):
And that's definitely an athlete we could throw on there too, Arnold Schwarzenegger
and but yeah, you know, Special Olympics, whenever I watch those clips, I almost always get emotional.
It's like, it's just so inspiring, like you said, for real.
And yeah, again, Michael Jordan, you know, John spoiled it, but we all put him down there.
No, you're good, man.
And it was like Ben said, you know, growing up with him, that's part of it too, the nostalgia
(16:33):
of just like how huge he was and just John talked about confidence.
I would add like poise too, you know, like up against the clock and he just does these
amazing things.
Like he's, he's got so much confidence and poise in stressful situations.
Another guy I came up with was Gregory Muckett, not a famous person.
He wrote a book and my mom actually gave me the book.
(16:53):
But what's cool about him was he was a really pretty average guy.
He struggled with addiction.
And I think that's actually why my mom gave it to me, but I can relate.
Anyways, he made this declaration that like, if God wanted him to, he could swim the English
channel and that's insane.
And he was like this novice.
(17:14):
He wasn't like a swimmer in high school even or anything like that.
But he made this declaration and then he felt strongly, you know, believe whatever you believe
that like that he should make that promise to his group at church that, you know what,
I'm going to do that.
I'm going to make this promise right now.
And the group that he was with were all struggling with things.
They're going through divorce, struggling with alcoholism, whatever else, all these
(17:36):
other issues that they were going through.
And so he made this like inspiring comment and they were like, you know, they laughed
it off.
But it took him a long time, but he eventually did.
And you know, long story short, he swam the English channel and it's nuts.
The story that I read in his book was just insane.
And so it's just really inspiring to me that like an average person, if they got the grit
(17:58):
and if they stick with it, they can do amazing things.
So yeah, that's it for me.
All right.
All good choices.
I don't think you'd go wrong with any of those.
What about intelligence?
Who intellectually, who inspires y'all?
Ben, what about you?
You know, so many of the like famous smart people, I don't feel on a level to even judge
like their intelligence.
(18:19):
You know what I mean?
Like it's hard for me to be inspired by them because I don't follow what they're saying
sometimes.
But one thing that I have, I've always been impressed with are people that are like speed
readers that could read so fast, you know, or people with photographic memories that
just will out of the blue just say, oh yeah, that was on page 374 or whatever, you know,
(18:43):
like, and just like quote it verbatim, you know, and I don't know.
I mean, it's a different side of the brain and they may not necessarily be the highest
IQ person or something, but man, they could do something that I'm just astounded by.
Wish I could learn to do that.
And they are definitely inspiring to me.
Yeah.
If I could be a speed reader, I'd definitely be reading a lot more or reading at all.
(19:05):
Yeah.
I'd be like, oh, two XP, dude.
All right.
For me, I chose one of those that everyone thinks of maybe, but Albert Einstein.
I don't know if you guys saw the movie IQ back in the day with Meg Ryan and Walter Maltho
plays this, Albert Einstein.
It's a pretty good one actually.
It's like a fun, cute, like romantic comedy or whatever, but that started it for me with
(19:30):
him, but definitely, you know, the things he came up with E equals FC squared and some
of his quotes, you know, learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow.
The important thing is not to stop questioning.
That's pretty cool.
And then another one is life is like riding a bicycle to keep your balance.
You must keep moving.
So both of those are inspiring quotes for me.
(19:51):
And I just think he's a pretty amazing man.
What about you, John?
So two things.
One, talking about knowledge and things like that.
You know, when I was a kid, I found myself in the gift shop of the United States Air
Force Academy.
And I remember there was a shirt there that said, one man's flight through life is determined
by the power of his knowledge.
(20:11):
And that's something that stuck with me to this day.
I should have followed it more probably, but just speaking about intellectual things, but
the people that inspired me, Amy here, there's a phrase sometimes, but this guy's out here
playing chess, but more of playing checkers.
So the people that have the ability to think three or four moves ahead of other people,
(20:34):
it's crazy the way their brain works.
You know, just like speed reading, that takes a different part of the brain.
I think people like this, and maybe this might not fall under inspiring, but more like amazing.
I am just strictly amazed people that have that ability to say, okay, this guy is going
to do this.
This will be my counter move.
(20:54):
This is how he'll react to that.
I'm going to come back with this and then ultimately he'll lose.
It's so amazing to me.
Things like that, I find super interesting.
Maybe because it will never be me, but you know.
So I think intellectually, that's just kind of something that inspires me.
Nice, nice.
All right.
This one's a little different.
How about looks?
What do you think about someone who inspires you with their looks?
(21:20):
You know, I gotta go with Stefan Urkel.
I mean, the most amazing looking guy in Family Matters.
No, I'm just kidding.
You do that.
No.
I knew that.
Yeah, exactly.
No, but there's so many famous people that looks are a part of what they got going on.
(21:41):
I think of some of them that have memes like Paul Rudd, who like never ages or whatever.
He's a handsome dude, man.
And he just looks the same as he has for like the last couple of decades, it seems like.
You know, Ryan Reynolds comes to mind.
There's just a bunch of those famous guys.
Ben Stiller a little bit.
Yeah, Ben Stiller.
Yep.
Yep.
He's still fit and everything too.
(22:02):
Yep.
And we mentioned him before, but people that are really fit too, like Arnold Schwarzenegger
and folks like that, that's somebody that's always inspired me in terms of looks.
So what about you, John?
So growing up, man, I thought, this is such a simple answer for me.
And that's the first thing that came to my head immediately.
Growing up, I thought the coolest guy ever.
We got to give them looks, give them vibe.
(22:23):
John Stamos.
Heck yeah, dude.
Yes, Uncle Jesse.
Uncle Jesse, yes sir.
Yes sir.
So, you know, John Stamos, man.
And I think I mentioned this once before, but there was a 4th of July show here where
he actually sat in for the drummer from the Beach Boys that played live during the 4th
(22:45):
of July concert they had here.
That's awesome, man.
And I was up on the stage rocking it, so I've seen Uncle Jesse in concerts.
Heck yeah, dude.
That's so awesome.
What about you, Ben?
You know, for me, one person that, you know, I didn't see him in a ton of movies, but I
thought he always looked good.
Like well dressed was Cary Grant, man.
He just, he always looked like the best guy in the suit.
(23:06):
You know, like his suit fit the best, you know?
And it's funny because he had like, at least at one point he had a tumor in his head.
And for some of his movies, like I just find myself like staring at that spot on his head.
But even as I'm staring at this bump on his head, you know, I can't help but notice that
(23:27):
this guy is like the best dressed guy in every scene that he's in, you know?
And so that kind of inspired me, you know, because I've got bumps on my head.
I don't always look the best, but man, I wish I could dress like him, man.
Yeah, good choice.
So let's talk about work life or work ethic.
What do you guys think about that, John?
Thanks, man.
(23:47):
I think for me, I can pinpoint exactly, you know, growing up, like I told you all in the
beginning of the conversation, the age difference watching my older siblings were able to go
and work and have jobs and stuff like that.
I feel like my whole family, I learned from them to, it's okay to put in 40 plus hours
of work a week.
That kind of started it, but you know, watching my dad as well, I got some from him.
(24:09):
But I think when I started working at the restaurant, I was there for about seven years
and my GM at the time, Dean, I think he was a huge inspiration, a huge help to becoming
a really just a good employee, good at my job, caring about what I was doing, attention
to detail because he was hard on us, but you know, he was an excellent general manager.
(24:29):
And then the other person that I definitely owe a lot to, I've told you about her before,
one of my favorite bosses I've ever worked for was Jess, the Irish lady.
She was amazing, amazing to me, amazing on the things that she taught me, worked for
her for over 10 years and it was just, it was amazing.
So I was grateful to have her in my work life, man.
(24:50):
I really was lucky.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
Well, what about you Ben?
You know, the last decade or so of my life, I feel like I've lived in much more rural
area than I grew up in.
And I have really come to appreciate the work ethic of farmers, man.
They are hard workers and their pain tolerance, it's just like pushing through when the work
(25:10):
needs to get done.
You just got to push through and do it, you know, and that mentality of like, this is
the season, this is the time we just got to do it.
And we do it till done.
It's just, it's inspiring there for sure.
You know, I would add on there, my dad as well was someone that I knew worked hard and
then he'd come home and he would serve in the church or whatever.
(25:30):
And it's like he was one of the last people that would always leave when there was a thing
that he'd help, he's setting up chairs, putting up chairs or whatever, and just like making
sure everything got done, you know.
And so he was another person that really inspired me.
What about you, Dave?
Great answers, both you guys.
And I'm just gonna do a big ditto from Ben.
When I was a kid, I loved arm wrestling and I could either always win or hold my own pretty
(25:54):
well.
And I remember visiting a family in Idaho, a family of farmers, and a kid my age just
like slammed me down.
And I was like, okay, he's got farmer strength.
Like there's something about farmers, man.
Like for real.
Yeah, for real.
And then like Ben said, my dad, I mean, when he wasn't working at his job, he was often
serving.
(26:15):
So he's working in service too.
So he's just definitely a good hard worker.
So yeah, so shout out to farmers, man.
And you can kind of probably even throw that shout out to the Amish.
Yeah, they're hard workers, dude.
Raising barns, man.
They do not play.
Like good for them.
Okay, so something else that doesn't get a lot of focus is when the ability to share
(26:36):
when we see good in others, and how do we react when somebody is trying to compliment
us?
Dave, how do you react in those two situations?
Yeah, it's a really good discussion point.
I don't do either of those very well.
You know, like I see people and they're inspiring and they do good things.
And it's definitely easier in obvious outward actions like in sports, like, oh man, good
(26:56):
job, good shot.
Good job in that pass or that catch or whatever, you know, presentations at work where it's
like everyone saw it.
Yeah.
Hey, good presentation.
You know, I can do that.
But when it's their character or something I see over a long period of time or like,
man, I've always noticed how kind you are.
Like, I don't think to say that enough.
And I definitely am recommitting to try to do that better with this podcast.
It was a good reminder.
(27:17):
And as far as reacting to compliments, you know, I don't do that super well either.
And I think there's a healthy balance between humility and brushing people off and like
not accepting compliments.
I think you give credit to God if that's what you think, what you believe and allow people
to say nice things to you.
Like it's all good.
So I want to do better at that as well.
(27:38):
Maybe it's because I don't care for many compliments.
I don't know.
I'm just kidding.
I compliment you daily, sir.
Hey, thanks, man.
All right, Ben, what about you?
You know, for me, it's one of the things I've noticed is like, I'm not that great at small
talk.
It's not my strength.
And so when people say like, I really enjoyed this about you or I appreciate this about
you, I say thanks.
(27:59):
But there's like, I say it in an awkward way, right?
Like follow up anything like I don't have anything else to say.
And it's just like conversation.
And so it's like, it can be awkward just because I don't know where to take it from there.
You know, I want to sometimes I think, well, what's something I could compliment them about
or what sometimes just the situation makes that difficult.
(28:21):
I don't know how to explain it.
But that makes sense.
Or you know, where I'm like, Brian Regan that that made the joke about like, you know, the
you too.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, like, yeah, like someone said, great talk, you know, like you too.
Well, I didn't enjoy your movie.
You too.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
I have that kind of mentality sometimes or a brain part where I don't know what to say.
(28:45):
And I'll say something stupid kind of like that.
You know.
The thing is, even complimenting other people, I feel like I want to be better about that.
And I've noticed that at different periods of my life where I really like consciously
practice it, I got better at it, man.
I got a lot better where I was more comfortable and just handing them out like candy or something,
the trick or treaters or something, you know, where it just comes easier the more you practice.
(29:10):
And then I have periods where I get out of practice and then it feels awkward again.
And so I will say that if you feel awkward about it, it doesn't have to stay that way.
But you're right, Dave.
I think the other thing is that like if you don't get compliments that often anyway, then
it's hard to like get into practice of it.
Yeah.
I had like compliments like from girls from like 40 years ago, 30 years ago that I'll
(29:33):
just remember because it's like one of those few compliments when someone ever complimented
me on my looks or something like that.
Yeah.
Sometimes like we don't compliment people enough that when they get the compliment,
they really do remember it.
What about you, John?
Yeah.
So Dave, first of all, you know, he puts in so much work to editing these podcasts that
(29:54):
we do.
Dave, you're an excellent editor.
And Ben, you are the best specialist of guest experts that we have.
Heck yeah.
Thanks, man.
This is something that, you know, I've actually tried to work hard on over the last few years
to include people and let them know that their efforts have been seen.
Mostly around the work area and that a lot of that comes from, you know, being in supervisory
roles where you need to learn how to compliment, compliment sandwich thing.
(30:17):
And, but I've tried to do it even amongst family and friends as well to where you let
them know that you were watching.
It doesn't have to be about the main topic.
And I think sometimes it's even weird.
Like if somebody gave a presentation and, or they did something at work that maybe others
didn't know this, if you're able to pick that thing out that they did well, I think it still
has to be legit.
(30:38):
You can't fake those.
It doesn't do anybody any good.
But when you're going to pick things out like that, where you're saying, man, hey, that
was really good.
I know everybody liked that, but I really liked this part.
You know, that really, you know, kind of, whatever you say to them.
When it's genuine, man, it does so much good for them.
Now, people try to compliment- John, you are good at it.
You are good.
Yeah, man.
Speaking of compliments, when I get one, it's just like, I like, I'll let it, you know,
(31:03):
it's, it's so awesome hearing about how awesome I am.
And I hear it all the time.
So I'm like, do I let it roll off my back?
No, I'm just kidding.
No, no.
What I do is I kind of, I let the compliment come, but then I tried to roll it back into
why I got that compliment.
So I said, Hey, you know, you did really well preparing this video.
Yeah.
(31:23):
That's when I got the update from the boss.
I said, yeah, well, you know, she did a good job teaching us how to do it.
And that was really the biggest benefit to me.
And that's why it was, you know, that good, something like that.
I try to put you back on others have even made it their credit, even if they don't,
which I know that could happen in this situation, but I think it just takes the focus off of
me just a little bit.
So I don't feel nearly as awkward, but nice.
(31:45):
Yeah.
So, but yeah, that's just me kind of accepting them and just kind of deflecting a little
bit because I know that even if I deflect or give credit elsewhere to include somebody
else in that compliment, I still know how they feel about me.
And I'll just take that compliment later and I'll think about it.
Thanks that one.
And good to go.
So Ben, break down the psychology of inspirational people and everything like that to us.
(32:08):
What's what's going on behind the scenes?
So we're less dumb.
Sure.
Yeah.
You know, it's really important that we have these role models, I guess you could say,
you know, our heroes, people that we admire and look up to because they have so many psychological
benefits, you know, first of all, they model behavior, you know, so when you see someone
do something good, it becomes a pattern in your mind of how a good thing could be done.
(32:31):
And so it creates this sort of like a template, you know, how it can work.
Someone's, for instance, friendly.
What does friendly look like?
You know, well, you probably had a few people in your life that stood out as really friendly
people and that became sort of the pattern of how you could be friendly too.
The other thing is they motivate action.
When you see people that do something impressive or have success, it makes you want to try
(32:56):
it.
You know, like I mentioned, like one time a tree when I'd see Dave climb a tree, I wouldn't
normally even think of that, but when I see him do it, it makes me want to act.
Also builds connections with people, especially when we share, you know, when we compliment
about people that inspire us, there's a stronger connection there.
When we see the good, we praise the good, and then other people see good in us, you
(33:17):
know, it's like those really strengthen our connections with others and then they expand
our view of what's possible.
You know, sometimes people see things in a different way and I never thought of it that
way, you know?
Yeah.
It's a paradigm shift when we see people do things in a totally different way than we
would and be successful, you know, and do it well and be like, wow, maybe that's what
(33:38):
I'm doing wrong with things, you know?
Another thing is it can really heal hurts, you know?
When we're going through a hard time and we see somebody else go through a hard time too
and see how they push through it or whatever, it kind of puts our own problems into perspective
and those that mourn together, they say shared joy is increased and shared pain is lessened.
(33:59):
People that we are inspired by and how they handle their hurts can also be a way of healing
our own hurts, you know?
Increases our capacity, it increases our appreciation, you know, just noticing the good in other
people, man, it just makes you a happier person, man, because you're going to always see the
negative too, like it's going to be there, but when you can also really identify the
(34:22):
good and elevate that and your priority in your life, then it makes your life happier,
man.
On the other side of it, there's some things to watch out for because sometimes we put
some people on a pedestal and it actually does the opposite, it prevents us from making
a connection with people because maybe we don't approach them, we think they're so
much better than us or something like that.
(34:44):
Or maybe we compare ourselves so much to them that we start putting ourselves down, you
know, like, oh man, they're so amazing about this, I could never be like that.
That's when that comparison becomes unhelpful.
And it doesn't motivate us to action, but motivates us to inaction where we're like,
I could never do that.
They are amazing and I'm not.
Another thing is that from seeing the good in ourselves, sometimes people will like idolize,
(35:09):
you know what I mean?
Like you see this with tweens and stuff and teenagers, you know, where they idolize some
famous person, a musician or singer or actor or whatever, and they got posters on their
wall about them.
And they almost make their character to be like that person instead of being their own
self and it's like when we grow up, we learn to just see some of the good in ourselves
(35:32):
and we can appreciate other people's good, but we don't have to emulate them in every
single way.
And so that's another area where, you know, we've kind of got to keep things in check
a little bit, you know what I mean?
As far as see the good in them, appreciate them, but not necessarily, you know, put them
so much on the pedestal that we become subsumed by them in a sense.
(35:53):
Man, that was awesome, Ben.
Thank you so much.
That's like...
Insights for sure.
Yeah, the good and the bad.
We see the good, we see the bad.
That is the facts of life, folks.
We've got to get Justin back on here to sing again, man.
I know, I know, I know.
But you know, that's funny, especially the negative ones, man.
It was such, gosh dang it, some of those kind of hit a little too close for home to me,
(36:14):
but Ben bringing the fire as usual.
Goodness.
Yeah, I mean, talking about increasing your capacity, you know, for there's times when
they think it's like not humanly possible to like run faster than a four minute mile,
for example, or something like that until somebody does.
And then like, multiple people can do it because it's inspiring and changes that, you know?
(36:35):
And then I was here too on the negative side of like, never meet your heroes, right?
Because it's like you find out they're not as amazing as you put them on that pedestal
to be, you know?
So definitely some good insights for sure.
You know, just real quick, who else inspired me?
Pretty much anybody that Denzel Washington plays in a true story.
Yeah, put him on the lift.
Yeah, exactly.
100%.
(36:56):
That is so true.
I need him to play my life in the mood.
Yeah, yeah, I need to get Denzel to play us.
Ben, you're already amazing, sir.
Yeah, for real, both you guys.
Love you for real, John, Ben, you're the best.
So glad to have this podcast with you guys.
Just want to thank everybody for listening.
(37:17):
Another great episode.
This was a little less on the chokey side, a little more in the fields, but I liked it.
It was a good time.
So yeah, thanks to John and Ben and everybody at home listening.
Don't forget to rate and subscribe, share with your friends and your enemies and your
heroes, everybody.
And don't forget to stay fat, dumb and happy.
Bye, guys.
Bye, everybody.
(37:37):
Make sure you catch your alerts.
We're coming back soon.
Come back soon.
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