All Episodes

August 18, 2025 91 mins

Send us a text

In this powerful episode of Palm Harbor Local, Donnie Hathaway sits down with local creative and endurance athlete Chay Nott—whose journey from musical theater to photography to ultra-marathons is anything but ordinary. Chay shares his incredible story of personal transformation, driven by a commitment to discipline, self-awareness, and pushing past comfort zones.

Discover what led Chay to run a grueling ultra-marathon in the Florida heat, how a single message from a friend reshaped his purpose, and why he believes extreme discomfort is essential to personal growth. From building a freelance media business from scratch to training for Mount Everest-level challenges, this conversation is a deep dive into mindset, discipline, and the pursuit of potential.

Stroll through the laid-back streets of the Palm Harbor community with this informative podcast, proudly brought to you by Donnie Hathaway with The Hathaway Group, your trusted guide and local expert in navigating the diverse and ever-changing property landscape of Palm Harbor.

Work with me + FREE Resources

Would you like help buying a home in Palm Harbor? - Buyer Consultation
Would you like help selling your house in Palm Harbor? - Seller Marketing Consultation
Download our free buyer's guide today - Buyer's Guide

Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Palm Harbor Local, the podcast
dedicated to building communityand sharing inspiring stories
from the heart of Palm Harbor.
I'm your host, donnie Hathaway,and today we are joined by
Cheynaut, who is a local artistwho's done everything from
graduation photos to filming forbrands and artists.
Now Palm Harbor Local is allabout spotlighting individuals
and businesses who are making adifference, overcoming

(00:22):
challenges and fosteringconnections right here in our
hometown.
If you're passionate aboutgrowing together, getting
involved and celebrating theindividuals who are making
Palmyra thrive, you are exactlywhere you need to be.
In today's episode, you'lldiscover what inspired Che to
run a ultra marathon in themiddle of August, right here in
Pinellas County.
We'll also talk about how hestarted his career while knowing

(00:43):
nothing about photography orvideography, and also why he's
constantly challenging himselfbeyond his comfort zone.
Don't forget to connect with uson Instagram at palmarbalocal
for behind-the-scenes highlights, and join our weekly newsletter
at palmarbalocalcom.
Now let's dive in and buildcommunity together.
Shay, welcome to the podcast.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Thank you, brother, this is going to be fun.
Yeah, I'm excited.

Speaker 1 (01:07):
We were just chatting about all sorts of things, but
I want to dive back into theconversation about.
It started with like timemanagement and you know the idea
of you working towards a goalor a plan that you have for your
life.
So I wanted to ask you likeplan that you have for your life
.
So I wanted to ask you like how, how dialed in like is like

(01:32):
here's, here's who I want to beand and this is what I'm working
towards.
Right, because we were justtalking about, like, you know,
every day you're makingdecisions to work towards that
individual that you want to be.
And I relay that like in my mind.
It's like I want to be the bestversion of myself, right?
So kind of similar concept.
But like, do you have it mappedout of?
Like here's who I want to be.
And then like where did that?
Where did that initiate from?

(01:54):
Where did that come from?

Speaker 2 (01:56):
well, first with like the, I want to be the best
version of myself.
I see that as kind of like anamorphous term, that when I
because I thought that way atfirst too and I was like, well,
I want to be like a betterversion of myself.
I'm like what does thatactually mean?
Yeah.
You know, who do I actually wantto be?
Do I?
What are the traits that wouldmake me a quote unquote better
person?
And in my own mind?
And a lot of people just say,like, who do I want to be and

(02:32):
what am I doing to get there andhow close am I to being that
person?
Is that kind of what you wereasking?

Speaker 1 (02:36):
Yeah, and like, how did you sit down and be?
Like, how detailed do you haveit of?
This is the person that I wantto be.
This is what I'm workingtowards.
Detailed do you have it of of?
This is the person that I wantto be.

Speaker 2 (02:46):
This is what I'm working towards.
When I, when I think ofdetailed, the first thing that
comes to my mind is like I'mgoing to be, I'm going to have
these traits, I'm going to dothese things and this is how I'm
going to operate, and I don'tquite have it laid out that
operationally.
However, on more of a broadscale, I want to be somebody
that says they're going to dosomething and then they do it to

(03:07):
their fullest extent, withutmost integrity and I would say
, and transparency the wholeentire way.
I want to do something, I wantto do it well, do something, I

(03:31):
want to do it well and I don'twant to have any lies or gaps in
truth in anything that I do.
So what that looks likeoperationally, if I'm looking at
like my every day, is a program.
I told you before we startedrolling that I was, I'm on a
program I know called 75 hardand that's a mental, mental
toughness and disciplinebuilding program and it's very
intentionally built to beincredibly inconvenient so you
can build that skill of makingthe decision to better yourself

(03:54):
instead of what feels right orwhat, what, or maybe not what
feels right, but like what'scomfortable, what's fun, what's
what, what whims we might wantto give into, um, what might
give us like joy as opposedwhat's fun, what whims we might
want to give into, what mightgive us joy as opposed to what's
actually going to make usbetter?
And for me that means twothings.

(04:15):
It means having those traits ofbeing able to make that
decision, but also living what Iwould consider as the best
example for other people.
I want to be as athletic as Ican possibly be, with as many
trophies and accolades aspossible, not because I want to
be able to say, look, I'm thatguy, but more so because I've
realized that other people areheavily influenced by their

(04:42):
immediate surroundings, muchmore than I think any people or
individual person reallyrecognizes.
Because even like I don't havea huge following, I just have
like a few friends, basicallyand posting about what I do.
I've seen people actuallymessage me and say, hey,
watching you do what you've donehas actually made me feel like
if I put my mind to it, I can doit too.

(05:02):
And I don't.
I'm not a person of likeinfluence, but I'm still
influencing people and for methat's part of like the reason
behind me being a better person.
Now to actually answer yourquestion about how detailed is
it, who do I want to be andwhere do I want to go and what

(05:22):
am I doing to get there?
I answered it a little bit bysaying I want to be a person who
can stick to a plan.
Who sets a plan, sticks to itwith integrity and transparency.
What I'm doing every day rightnow is, when I work out, I'm
very honest with myself aboutdid I put everything out, into,
did I put everything into thator did I hold back in any kind

(05:44):
of way?
And I don't go 10 out of 10 allout every single workout,
because sometimes Iintentionally don't because, I
know my life scenarios orwhatever.
Um, I try to uphold small thingsin my day to day with um, like,
if I use a dish or somethinglike that, I don't leave any

(06:05):
dishes in the sink, or at leastI try not to, and I try not to
make that decision of allowingsomething to sit.
If I do laundry, I try not tolet the basket sit for more than
a couple hours before I justget to it.
A quote that I really like is wesuffer more in our minds than
we do in reality, and that quoteI've been able to apply to

(06:27):
every little thing because wethink like, oh, I got to do this
, I got to do that, I got to dothis, I got to do that, I got to
wash the dishes, I got to takethe dog out, I got to put
clothes away, I got to clean theroom, I got to vacuum.
All these little things.
That when, when you get to it,it and they're, they're 30
minute tasks If you combine allof them into one, like 30
minutes to 60 minutes session,and then they're done, magic

(06:48):
Right.
So little things like that thatI would say being as excellent
as I can in every little thingin my life, so that if somebody
were to walk into my house andview my finances and view my
relationships and trulyunderstood all of those things,
they could truly look at me andI can honestly say I am doing

(07:14):
everything that I can to live tothe highest standard possible.
Mm-hmm, and that comes in everydecision that I make.

Speaker 1 (07:23):
Yeah, when does that?
Where does that come from?
Is that like, have you always?

Speaker 2 (07:31):
been this way, yeah, no, no, um, and what?

Speaker 1 (07:34):
triggered, what triggered it to to like or what
shifted your mindset.

Speaker 2 (07:43):
So the desire to like , become better myself.
I I've had a drive since I waslike I don't know, probably 17
or 18.
I wanted to have a business andI wanted to make a lot of money
.
You know, I want to be like adecade millionaire.
I would love to be like I would.
I really, really want that?
Um, even more so if I'm blessedwith that opportunity in life.

(08:03):
But, that said, I wasn't reallydoing a whole lot to truly be
better in my physical and mymental toughness, so I wasn't
really going to the gym superoften.
I wasn't.
I was never the athletic kidgrowing up.
I was never the um.
I was never the guy that wouldset a plan and stick to it.

(08:27):
I started a lot of things.
I didn't finish a lot of thingsand that created a tremendous
amount of like anxiety andinsecurity Anytime I talk about
the things I was doing.
I always felt like I wasfronting.
I always felt like I was being.
You know I was.
There were gaps, in truth,because I wanted to make myself
sound, you know, bigger andbetter, and I don't know exactly
where that insecurity came from, but I have it so I would say

(08:49):
towards the end of 20, oh man, Ithink it was 2022,.
I was getting to the end of alonger term relationship that I
was in and I started trying to.
I started listening to podcastI don't know if you're familiar
with Andy Frisella, really so.

(09:10):
I started listening to hispodcast.
I started listening to peoplelike Rob dial, the mindset
mentor.
I started listening to MattGraham some of his personal
development content and someother folks that make very
similar content to those peopleGary Vee, whatever and they were
saying, like you have to bethis type of person in order to
accomplish these types of things, and so I said, okay, well, if

(09:37):
I want these things, I kind ofprobably should do these.
And I didn't do them perfectly,I didn't know anything.
So the things I thought I wasdoing that were actually helping
, you know, you eventually startsifting out like what matters,
what doesn't, what helps, whatisn't, what's what's and I'm
going to use a term that somepeople, whatever, some like
things that are actually puttingyou closer to your goal, and
like what's actually work andwhat's just like the mental
masturbation of working rightit's like what makes you feel

(09:57):
good.
So sifting out all of that overthe last couple of years, that
said, started going to the gym,a little bit more trying, and
then breakup happens.
I'm like, all right, well, nowI have nothing, so let's go.
That was very, very difficulton me and so I just went all in
on the personal development sideand it's been a slow process of
just refining my knowledge basebehind everything between

(10:22):
working out, between eatingright, between how to sleep
better, between how to be moreproductive with the time that
you're actually putting intothings, get more outputs for
your inputs.
And then that was all in aneffort to be better myself,
because I wanted to be better.
Then I think it was late 2023or early 2024.

(10:43):
It was sometime in there.
I think it was after 75 Hardthe first time, which was
November and December of 2023.
Shortly after that, I got amessage from somebody because I
had been posting about trying tobuild a business and my
freelance network and mypersonal development and
everything that I was justtrying to build up my life

(11:05):
overall.
And I got a message from oneperson in particular who I'd
worked with previously youngerguy, I think he's probably 21
now, 20, 20, 20 or 21 now, it'sprobably maybe 22.
It doesn't matter.
He messaged me and said hey man, watching you do what you've
done and build what you have,which is like almost nothing

(11:26):
like it's nothing, you're justshowing it's literally nothing.
I'm just showing that I havebecome better than yesterday.
Yeah, but he's like watchingyou build what you've done has
made me feel like if I commitmyself, I could do it too.
And I don't know why thatmessage, that text message, hit
a little differently, but forsome reason I really quickly

(11:49):
felt that my responsibility isnow no longer to myself although
it still is, but it's mostly tothe other people that are
watching, because I realized inthat moment, and probably about
three to six months after that,I really realized the impact
that you have to your immediatenetwork and your immediate

(12:14):
circle and even like second andthird degree removed, just by
being a little bit better, justby becoming a little bit more
fit, just by showing thesensitive details of personal,
professional, romantic andotherwise.
And so, to answer your questionabout where it came from, it

(12:34):
started in, I would say, late2021, mid 2022.
I kind of started maybe going tothe gym a little bit on and off
, not consistently.
I hadn't built the skill ofdiscipline.
That was the main problem.
And then, late 2022 into 23,really went into it 2023, I
think, 20.
Late 2023 was when I reallylike.
Okay, I am becoming adisciplined motherfucker and

(12:56):
that's what I did with 75 hard,and the mission changed when I
got, when I realized how itimpacted other people.
So now the mission isn't justabout like I don't have to wake
up and say, oh, I want to bebetter, so I have to get up.
The mission is now like otherpeople are watching and I'm
letting them down by not gettingup and going for this run right

(13:17):
now, or getting up and gettingthis project out the door, doing
what I said that I was going todo yesterday, and letting other
people down and showing otherpeople that it's okay to also
not follow through with theirword, which is not the example
that I want to set.

Speaker 1 (13:31):
Yeah, do you think disciplines like that one trait?
You know, if you can conquerdiscipline, if you can be a
disciplined individual like youcan accomplish what it or
whatever it is you want.

Speaker 2 (13:52):
I don't see why not.
Yeah, if you can, if you can seta plan, that is actually good
and you're not doing a bunch ofuseless stuff.
But if you can set a plan and doit over and over again and be
totally honest with yourselfthat you did it without
exceptions for a long period oftime, my understanding is that
it's highly unlikely that youwon't accomplish what you want
to, because that's what I'mworking towards, that's the
direction that I'm trying to go.

(14:12):
Obviously, I haven't achievedthose things, but my life is
dramatically better than it wastwo years ago and so, using that
as an example, I'm like allright, well, somebody has like
zero, absolutely nothing.
Then I can tell you withconfidence that discipline will

(14:32):
take you to a much better place,because I'm in a much better
place.
I can't say that it's going tomake you a millionaire, but I
have a hunch that it will,because that's what a lot of
very, very financiallysuccessful people talk about is
the discipline that's requiredto do something like Alex Ramozy
talks about.
You have to do something that'sexciting until it's boring and
then keep doing it, because whenit's boring is when everybody

(14:53):
quits.
But when you keep doing it, youwill do more than those people
who quit, but then you just haveto keep doing it over and over
and over and over, until youcould do it in your sleep and
you could like, yeah, once you,once you get to that point, then
you just do it again, and thenyou do it again, and then you're

(15:13):
like, oh, this is awful.
And then you do it again.
Yeah, so uh, that I have ahunch that it's gonna get me
there.
But I would say discipline, isit?
It's funny, once you, once youbecome disciplined in a way like
I wouldn't consider myself themost disciplined person because
I'm still actively working on onmaking better decisions for
myself day in, day out, but Ihave developed a higher level of
discipline than a lot of people.

(15:34):
and it's funny when you start todevelop the skill of discipline
, you start to notice in everysingle way and I don't know if
this is a good or bad thing,because it bothers the hell out
of me, but how non-disciplinedthe rest of the world is.
So I see everything that'swrong and I'm like oh, this
really pisses me off, I hate it.
Actually makes my lifesignificantly less pleasant
because I can only see flawseverywhere.

Speaker 1 (15:56):
But do you find, like some joy in being like
disciplined, like doing thething that you actually say
you're going to do, Like isthere some?
Do you find joy in any of that?

Speaker 2 (16:05):
I want to discern really quick joy from
fulfillment, because a lot ofpeople say, you know, I just
want to be happy, I just want tohave joy, I want this, I want
that, and to me those areemotions, and emotions change
and if I am feeling bad, angry,sad or anxious, therefore I am
not joyful, therefore I'm doingsomething wrong, which is

(16:25):
something that, for me, I don't.
I don't use that term.
Most often I'll say fulfillmentbecause, even though sometimes
I'm not feeling the best.
Yes, I am incredibly fulfilledevery single time that I like.
I said I'm going to dosomething.
I fucking did it, and now I canlook at everybody and say I did
it.
Piss off.

Speaker 1 (16:43):
Yeah yeah.
Investing is extremelyimportant, but it can also be
somewhat confusing With taxes,asset allocation, stocks, bonds
and funds.
To know what to do with allthis could be overwhelming.
Jacob Wade is a financial coachand will work directly with you
to put together a roadmap foryour money for life.
Jacob has built a name forhimself as a finance expert and

(17:04):
you can find his writings inplaces like Forbes Advisor,
moneycom, investopedia andTimecom, but he has a passion
for helping people create aclear and simple investment
roadmap to buy back their timeand retire with confidence.
If you could use a financialcoach on your team, then simply
go to palmharborlocalcombackslash roadmap to book a call

(17:24):
with Jacob today and see ifhiring a financial coach could
help you crush your 2025 goals.
Don't wait to have that samefeeling next year of not hitting
your financial goals.
Connect with Jacob today andlet's make 2025 your best
financial year yet.
I feel like working out is aperfect example of that right,

(17:47):
because I think for most people,there's really nothing fun
about lifting weights or goingon a long run, or whatever right
, there may be components of itthat are fun or enjoyable and
stuff, but I would say probably90 plus percent of the time I'm
doing a workout I'm not lookingforward to it, like going into
it.
Yeah.
And then after it you're likedamn, that felt good.

Speaker 2 (18:09):
I'm so glad I did that.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
Which is interesting, but um so any.
So you said you listened tosome podcasts and stuff to kind
of really jumpstart this, thispath, like any books that you've
read, that that have stood outto you.

Speaker 2 (18:32):
One of my all time favorites and I'll give it out
to.
I want to yell this from thefricking mountaintops um extreme
ownership Jocko Willink.
Have you read that one?

Speaker 1 (18:37):
I've um.
I never finished it.
I listened to.
I have an audio version of itDude.

Speaker 2 (18:41):
Yeah, like the concept of extreme ownership
bleeds into discipline in somany ways, because you can look
at something and own how to, andfigure out how to own it so
that you can take accountabilityfor the how to then change it.
And the discipline is in takingthat accountability and then

(19:01):
changing it, and so they're,they're, they kind of go both
ways.
That book is one of my all-timefavorites because now, whenever
I look at a situation, I prettymuch take blame for everything
I I.
A phrase that I like to use isI, I take blame and I give
credit.
So if anything good happens, itwas external and if anything

(19:24):
bad happens, I'll.
I own that a hundred percent.
Um, and by external I mean likeif something good happened
between like whatever we weredoing here and it's like yeah,
donnie fricking crushed it thatwas amazing, wouldn't have
happened if I didn't have him,or wouldn't have happened if
this didn't happen.
Or you know, like I give thecredit, take the blame and I can
look at pretty much everyscenario and say, yeah, I could

(19:45):
have done this better.
That's what I'm going to donext time and that's the whole.
Concept behind the book is howthey use extreme ownership in
the military to build strongerpeople and stronger teams,
because everybody was takingaccountability for their own
shit and then fixing it and thenbeing a bigger contributor to
the squad, and if all of themare doing that, they're just
building a more and morepowerful unit.

(20:06):
And then they went and appliedthat to business and realized
that when they applied theseextreme ownership concepts to
business, it worked the same waythat these businesses started
to become more efficient.
Problems disappeared becausethey were being fixed by people
who were taking ownership forthose things, as opposed to just
bitching and complaining aboutthe concept or the idea or the
problem existing.
So that is one of my all-timefavorite books.

(20:34):
I really liked oh man, what isit?

(20:55):
What is it called?
There's another book by oh AndyFrisella has a book on the book
on mental toughness.

Speaker 1 (20:59):
I like that one a lot .

Speaker 2 (21:01):
It has a lot of examples on mental know, when
somebody had literally nothing,they still did it when they felt
like this that was tough, youknow, and that took a lot out of
their mind.
And so that book is a reallygreat example for people who
want to kind of learn whatmental toughness is and then
apply it to discipline and makethe next step forward.

(21:21):
But Extreme.
Ownership and the book onmental toughness are fantastic.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, another one the ComfortCrisis.
I forget who the author of thatbook is I forget who the author
of that book is man.
I wish I remembered becauseit's a great book.
It's this guy who realized howcomfortable he was and ended up
taking a, I believe, 30-dayexcursion into, I think like

(21:45):
Antarctica or something, withthis guy.
And they flew to Antarctica,got dropped by a plane and they
were in the middle of nowhere,like the nearest city was like
hundreds of miles away, so likethe only option was survive, you
know, and they talked aboutgoing from point A to point B
and through that the 30 daysthey're traveling, they're

(22:07):
trying not to get mauled by.
You know the grizz b and throughthat, the 30 days they're
traveling, they're trying not toget mauled by you know the
grizzlies they're trying to umhunt and they might not get
anything for like three days orfour days.
So like they're going on justconsistent, day after day after
day, and then they got a thingof food and then another 72 hour
fast or something like that.
And they're like the how theyhad to ration food and like what
true hunger and true boredomand true discomfort actually is.

(22:31):
And I really liked that bookbecause it it takes a an extreme
version of what we might calllike a Masogi or something,
where it's doing something whereyou have a 50, 50 shot of
success or failure and it takesit to it's just an absolute,
absolute extreme.
It's like some people mightjust like they might do a murph
or they might run a halfmarathon or a 5k to make

(22:53):
themselves a littleuncomfortable but, like that was
a extreme version of discomfort, to just put everything in
perspective.
And I love those things.
I'm a huge fan of extremes.
I love to just like I wouldlove to climb Mount Everest
someday and that's just a goalthat I have.
That I'm like, yeah, why not?
That book does a great job atoutlining the comfort crisis, as

(23:17):
the title says, in our modernsociety.
Yeah, with everything.
I love that book.
I really liked that book.
That's really good.

Speaker 1 (23:24):
That's interesting.
I haven't heard of that onebefore.
I'll have to check that one out.
But yeah, I mean that's um,it's so easy to be comfortable
um in in here in America, right,like we have so many things
that we take for granted everysingle day.
Um speaking of, like theputting yourself in

(23:44):
uncomfortable situations likeyou just ran um what was it the?
Was it going more ultra?
We did the the four 4.2 mileloop.
Tell me about that experience.
That was fun.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
That was super cool.
So I'm disappointed in my ownperformance, but everything else
about the experience wasabsolutely phenomenal.
Being around that many juststraight killers was so awesome.
Like I was the weakest personthere by far, it was crazy.

Speaker 1 (24:16):
How many runners did they have?

Speaker 2 (24:17):
A hundred, and so it was marketed as 125.
And.
I think there was like 132.
Cause like maybe I think therewere a couple of special invites
.

Speaker 1 (24:26):
Yeah, or like people.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (24:27):
Maybe like some oversell, I'm not sure, but I
remember seeing on thescoreboard on the first lap, 132
.
Okay, so I think that was likethe final, the final total.
It was so cool, and so theconcept is like you have.
You have 4.2 miles to run 60minutes you have 60 minutes to
run 4.2 miles and get backthere's, there's a home base and

(24:48):
there were two loops thatequaled 4.2 miles total.
Okay, and so you did the firstloop, which was, like, I think,
1.8 miles yeah and then you didthe next one, which was a little
bit longer.
It was like 2.4 yeah, orsomething, no, yeah it would
have been like 1.9 or in twopoint whatever yeah anyway.
So you had those two laps andyou had 60 minutes from when the

(25:08):
bell rang to get out there andget back.
You had to be in the corralwhen the bell um rang to start
that lap or you got disqualified.
You had to finish.
You had to be in the corralwhen the bell rang to start that
lap or you got disqualified.
You had to finish.
You had to be back before thebell rang to not be disqualified
.
You had to start and end withinthat 60 minutes and if you

(25:28):
didn't do any of those thingsyou were disqualified.
So it was so cool, the Texasheat they don't lie about that,
man it's brutal yeah like thatwas the first time like I'm
conditioned to train here inflorida yeah that texas heat was
the first time I really feltlike I might just pass out here,
I might fall over and not knowyou know, is it humid there too,

(25:52):
or is it just like it was alittle?
Bit.
It was a little humid, but itwas just really hot the sun.

Speaker 1 (25:56):
There was not a cloud in the sky, just like it was a
little bit.
It was a little humid, but itwas just Just really hot.

Speaker 2 (25:57):
The sun.
There was not a cloud in thesky for like three hours
straight from like 1pm to 3pm.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (26:02):
Like awful, yeah it was horrible, and you started at
noon.
We started at noon, yeah.

Speaker 2 (26:08):
The first lap was kind of tough because my body
was just getting warmed up.
I did it in like 50 minutes, soI'd like 10 minutes, eight to
10 minutes of rest.
And then the second lap washorrible.
I was like I don't think I'mgoing to finish this.

Speaker 1 (26:21):
Like, I don't think I'm going to finish this.

Speaker 2 (26:22):
It's like a second lap.
I'm not going to make it Thirdlap amazing.
I was like I was on fire.
I finished with like 15 minutes.
I was just kicked back at rest.
I was like, dude, this is easy.
Fourth lap horrible Again, likeI almost didn't finish again and
I got back with like fourminutes left on the clock.
I finished in like 56 minutesget back.

(26:42):
And I had a crew there,wonderful people, chris Ray,
alan Peyton all of them did sowell and they took great care of
me.
But I basically would just runup, sit down, get a bunch of
fluids, get a bunch of food andthen they're like all right time
to go.
I'm like shit I had to go.
That experience was soincredible.
They took amazing care of us.
It was a really expensivelearning lesson for me, which

(27:04):
I'll get into in a minute, butthe experience was just
incredible and the endurancethere and the mental fortitude
and the mindset of those people.
It was incredible feeling likeI was the weakest one there.

Speaker 1 (27:17):
Yeah, so cool yeah, what is it like?
Um, like stopping and starting,like is that?
Is that more difficult thanthan just continue continuing on
and running an?

Speaker 2 (27:30):
ultra.
I actually think it was veryhelpful yeah like I don't know
how far I would have made it ifI, if I didn't if you had to
keep going.
I liked the concept of thisdoesn't end until we all quit
yeah you know, I like thatconcept and I don't know how far
I would have been able to gojust continuously if there was
no end in sight and it reallylike there was.

(27:53):
There was some moments where Ineeded that like two and a half
minutes just to like sit and getthose fluids in and like be
able to take that.
I'm sure if it was continuousthe strategy would have changed
and I would have known whatmiles I needed people at, and so
the strategy would have changedmodestly, but you're still
resting probably if you're doinglike an ultra, anyway, right,
sure, I mean like when I did theptc um ultra back in august

(28:18):
yeah like we had kind of aresting yeah thing there where,
like we met up with our crew, wetook two and a half three
minutes just to like, cool offfor a second, get fluids, get
food, get carbs, and then wewould be back at it once we felt
good you know, it might bethree, four or five minutes, so
the strategy just changes that'sall.

Speaker 1 (28:38):
Would you do it again ?
100, I would love to I.

Speaker 2 (28:41):
I need time.
So what ended up happening?
like some history with me andlike the ultras which you are
aware of, kind of my story with,like the pcc and the knee
injury that I had because ofthat and because my my knee for
context 2023 went all in on 75hard, went from basically doing
a little bit of gym and a littlebit of stuff here and there to
working out every day, liftingweights every single day and

(29:03):
running every single day atleast three to four miles, like
going from zero to a hundred,like that.
And the problem with that isthat I've never been an athletic
guy, so my body was not builtfor that.
Ever been an athletic guy, somy body was not built for that.
And I started to kind of getsome pains and injuries and I
injured myself just doing likean 18 mile long run prepping for
my first marathon in April of2024.
And I was like man, that sucks,but like I'll push through it.

(29:25):
Such an immature runner Ranthat marathon in April, got kind
of like an injury in my rightknee that I bounced back from in
like four weeks, then three anda half four weeks in my right
knee that I bounced back from inlike four weeks, then three and
a half four weeks trained upfor another relay half marathon
in June.
And then August comes and thatPTC comes and I'm like all right

(29:45):
, well, you know 46 miles like Ishould probably be able to do
that just fine.
Right Mile 25, something weirdstarts to happen with my T band
on the side of my knee and I'mlike this feels strange and I
said it on camera.
I had somebody there recordingme throughout the whole thing
and I was like, yeah, there'ssomething going on with my knee.
That.
I didn't like.
By mile 27,.
I couldn't run anymore and Iwalked the last 19 and a half
miles of the of the race on aknee that I couldn't run on for
more than you know 10 seconds.

(30:06):
It was awful.
And then, by like mile 30 orthe arches of my feet felt like
they were going to explodebecause I didn't have I have
higher arches and I didn't havearch support, because I didn't
know anything about shoes and Ididn't know the inserts existed.
And so, yeah, all theselearning lessons.
That said, I have brutally beatmy body from 2023 up until the

(30:27):
g1m.
Yeah, so what happened to theg1m was I was doing loop after
loop after loop.
I was feeling good, I wasfeeling bad, I felt good, I felt
bad.
Like it was just this mentalgame it's like you feel great
and then all of a sudden youfeel awful and it's just back
and forth, and back and forth.
And then I started to feel theexact same sensation that I felt
at the beginning of the injuryduring the ptc in the g1m.

(30:50):
I started to feel that at milelike 32 or 33 and I was like
this is about to happen and Iwas like you know what, put it
out of my mind and until it's aproblem, I'm not even going to
think about it, because whereattention goes, energy flows,
I'm not gonna don't care and Ijust kept on going was
singularly focused on the trailcooling food nutrition mile like
34, 35 I'm like that's creepingup again by mile 36.

(31:14):
I was part of.
I was halfway through the nose,but like mile 34 or 34 and a
half, cause I had just startedthe last loop before I decided
to call it and I was like Iliterally can't.
I can't run without it hurtingand the last time I did this, I
was out for six months.
I can't do that to myself againCause it was one of the worst
times, like mentally, for me notbeing able to do the one thing

(31:37):
that gave me mental clarity,which was run because of an
injury that I got from running.
And then I would get into anegative headspace because of
the injury and I hated myselffor it.
And then I couldn't go out andget go on a run to clear my mind
because I couldn't run becauseof the injury.
So it was this awful cycle andI uh, and I bowed my out of the

(32:06):
race.

Speaker 1 (32:06):
Yeah, that's.
I'm sure that's mentally.

Speaker 2 (32:11):
Yeah, caleb was proud of me, but it hurt.
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (32:17):
Yeah, that's tough, Because I've been there before
too, where you have some kneepain when running.
I feel like if you run at all,like at some point you're going
to experience some discomfort.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
And the reason I said it was an expensive learning
lesson is because I flew threepeople out there paid for a B&B,
paid for all the supplies forme to actually be there and be
fed, and all of my nutrition andstuff, plus the entry for the
event.
Actually, wait, no, I don'tthink there was a cost to the
actual event itself.
No, there wasn't a cost to theevent, it was just the process

(32:51):
of getting there, yeah.
Yeah, they took great care of us.
They had a food truck on sitethat was totally free, like they
didn't they took great care ofus as runners, and it wasn't
crappy food either it was great,it was good food.
Um, it was free.
They sent us products.
They allowed us to just havebpn products and stuff for free
on site.
It was super, super amazing yeahbut it was a super expensive
learning lesson for me becauseof those plane tickets, the

(33:13):
Airbnb costs, the associatedtravel fees of, like car rental,
um the the food and nutrition,plus bowing out.
You know like, yeah, I was inthe race for nine and a half
hours, but or nine hours, but itwas did you?

Speaker 1 (33:30):
did you have a?
Um a goal in mind of like howmany miles you wanted to get in?

Speaker 2 (33:34):
I intended to go until they had to find me on the
trail.
Yeah.
I was fully dead set on, andactually I was just going.
My mindset was just I'm goingto go.
I'm going to go until I can'tgo.
And then Caleb during our lastadjustment, when I was walking
out of the office, looked at meand said, hey, make them find

(33:54):
you on the trail, and I was likeout of the office looked at me
and said hey, make him find youon the trail.
I was like got it.
So then I went to that thingand I was like they're gonna
fucking find me on this goddamntrail like.
I, I'm, I'm not leaving thisplace until I'm on the floor.
Yeah, well, my knee hurts, yeahwhich I didn't expect.

Speaker 1 (34:08):
What.
What did you do?
You know like exactly what,what happened or what's going on
?

Speaker 2 (34:12):
I think it was my IT band um that just like was
stressed and strained up.

Speaker 1 (34:15):
Yeah, I think it was my IT band that just was
stressed and strained, tied up.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (34:17):
I think it was just stressed and strained because it
was like right here, rightwhere the IT band is, where it
crosses the knee, and I don'tknow.
I never got a scan or anything.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, noidea.

Speaker 1 (34:28):
So you, just work through it, let it rest heal
yeah.

Speaker 2 (34:36):
And so the learning lesson was my body needs to be
prepared before I do things likethat.
But to answer your questionabout the goal, um the the, I
had like 300 miles.
I had like 150 to 200 miles.
I was like, yeah, it'd be coolif I did that.
But like my real internal goaland like that's what I told
everybody, it was like 150 to170 miles.
I was like I'll be, I'll be,you know great publicly if I can
do that.
I'll be, I'll be, you knowgreat publicly if I can do that.
But my internal goal was likecould I go for like two and a

(34:58):
half three days?
And that's exactly how long theguys that won actually ended up
going.
They went for about two and ahalf days, they went for about
200 and I think it was like 60miles or something which is
insane Awesome.

Speaker 1 (35:09):
Insane.
It was so cool and didn't theyhave to call it because I
remember following weather yeah,like they just had like some
flash floods, like crazy flashfloods, like life-threatening
would have swept them away likeso they were still going?

Speaker 2 (35:22):
yeah, they were still going yeah and they would have,
they would have kept going forsure I think they would have hit
300 insane.
That's wild man I truly thinkthey would have hit 300 before
before.

Speaker 1 (35:31):
Those guys are killers.
What's your?
Was your longest race, the um46, yeah, 46 yeah yeah, but do
you like ultras, or or, yeah, doyou like running the ultras?
I mean, I don't think I don'tthink anybody like is like oh I,
I, well, maybe some peopleright enjoy this right, but like
, what do you get out of it?

(35:52):
Like why do?
Why do you keep doing it?

Speaker 2 (35:54):
Partially because I'm proving to myself that I can do
the hard things, because I'vewent so much of my life not
doing anything that was reallydifficult and like when I did
something difficult, I was like,yeah, that felt good, but like
I didn't intentionally putmyself in uncomfortable
situations.
Very often the ultras are my wayof putting myself in

(36:15):
intentionally uncomfortablesituations to grow my mental
capacity for extended suffering,and that's my, that's my goal
with those.
I enjoy them as a method ofdoing that.
What I found is that I don'tlove.
I don't love how I start tolike look, when I start to train
like when I was training forthe PTC and then when I was
training for the G1M like youlose a lot of muscle because

(36:37):
you're just running all the time.
So it's like in order tomaintain the muscle, I have to
work so much harder in the gym,actually lifting heavy weights
to like maintain my bodycomposition, Cause what I
noticed was when I was marathontraining more aggressively, my
muscles would kind of go awayand then I would gain a little
bit more fat, which is normal,because your carb increase like
dramatically, or your carbintake dramatically increases.
You can keep your proteinintake as high as it can, but to

(37:00):
get all the carbs in like youcan barely eat that much, unless
it's like your sole focus and Istruggle with that.
So when I would look at myselfin the mirror and I'm like I
hate how I look right now, Istill looked very good, but I
compared to what I wanted andwhere.
I could be.
I was like I hate this, but Ilove the outcome of the ultras,
so I think I'm going to exploresome other options.

(37:20):
Like I might try to compete inhigh rocks is in like 26 or 27.
I might compete.
There's a couple like oddball,random challenges that I think
I'd like to do, like there'sthis one race that's like I
think it's six miles of justswimming or something.
Like just six.
I think it's six miles of justswimming or something.
Oh wow, it's like six milesdown a river or something and
I'm like sure why not?

Speaker 1 (37:39):
Yeah, let's give it a try.

Speaker 2 (37:40):
Let's give it a shot, Things like that that I'm like
I just want to do hard shit anddo as much of it as possible.
Really would like to take upmountaineering.
I think that would be sick.
Yeah.
Not like legitimately scalingwalls.
Mountaine I would love to climbmountains.
I think that'd be sick.
Like I said, I want to climbEverest at some point.

Speaker 1 (37:56):
I do feel like there's um like that, like
putting yourself in difficultsituations or doing things that
are uncomfortable like thattranslates to like everything
else in your, in your life.

Speaker 2 (38:06):
Well, the harder the things that you do in my
experience, the harder thethings that I've done, the
easier it is for me to say no tothe things that I know I'm not
supposed to do Like scrolling,like not waking up to my alarm.
Like those little decisions.
Like if somebody invites me outto go anywhere and I just don't
really want to go, but I'vealways felt socially obligated
to go to those things.
When my time is asked for andit's not otherwise obligated to

(38:28):
other things, I've always justsaid yes.
It makes it a lot easier to sayno when you're used to being
uncomfortable.
Because the level of discomfortthat I got when I thought my
feet were going to break in halfduring the PTC, or when I
thought my knee was going to beout again, and that stress
during the G1M or the heatexhaustion that I felt during
the relay race that I did inJuly, like all those things,

(38:49):
have put me into positions whereI'm like, all right, well,
somebody asking me for my time.
That little bit of anxiety thatI might feel by saying no is
nothing compared to literallycrying on every single step
because my feet felt like theywere going to break.
It was awful.
But yes.
I think that it translates and Ilike extreme examples of those

(39:10):
things because I want to see howfar I can go before I like
actually break legitimately.
And those goals don't scare meeither.
The funny part is like evenwhen I say climbing Everest out
loud the first time I ever saidthat, I was like, oh, that's a
big one.
But now like I say it and itmight just be like my ignorance
to hard things Cause, like maybe.
I don't know what actually likehard, feels like.
But I'm not intimidated bythose goals.

(39:30):
I'm only learning to respectthe process for getting to them.
You can't just jump into thosethings which is a bigger
learning lesson for me ispatience.

Speaker 1 (39:39):
Yeah, I like that.
I like that.
Do you think you have to putyourself in extreme like
hardship, or extreme difficultsituations to to like master
yourself, or or master likediscipline?

Speaker 2 (39:58):
That's how I've done it.
My only thought to that wouldbe well, if you're going to
experience suffering regardless,how are you going to handle the
involuntary suffering withoutputting yourself through some of
those situations voluntarilyfirst?

(40:19):
So we only have a certainamount of feelings that we can
have.
We can only be sad, anxious,angry, fearful and slight
variations of those things, andeverything that we do can
stimulate one of those things.
Things and everything that wedo can stimulate one of those

(40:39):
things.
So, if you're going to dealwith, if you're going to deal
with, losses of people that youlove or, um, whether it's death
or whether it's like breakups,divorce, whether it's losing a
huge financial opportunity,losing a shit ton of money,
whether it's losing a friendship, whatever those things are,
getting a house foreclosed onall those hardships that would

(41:01):
break somebody down, how muchbetter could they handle
themselves in those situationsif they are familiar with
dealing with anxiety, anger,sadness, fear, in a state of
exhaustion, mm-hmm, in a stateof exhaustion.

Speaker 1 (41:16):
So it's almost like you're training yourself right,
Like the races and stuff aretraining yourself to better
handle life's challenges.
Yeah, and then you have toprepare for those races too
right, or prepare for thoseextreme difficult moments.

Speaker 2 (41:34):
They're just not as hard now, like life isn't as
difficult now because I've donesome things that are harder than
life is Now.
My life hasn't gotten easierbecause now I'm training for
these things.
My every day is harder nowbecause I'm training harder to
be able to do those things.
So, like my life is physicallyharder and because I'm doing

(41:56):
those, but my, my life, instimulus versus response, is
significantly easier because I'mmore used to and accustomed to
stress and dealing with thosestresses and because when you do
something that's thatphysically strenuous and like I
can't, I can't speak for peoplethat do a hundred mile races,

(42:16):
200 mile races, that dotriathlons, ironmans and things
Cause I've never done any ofthose but just as somebody who's
run a 46 mile race, a 39 milerace and then a handful of
marathons, when you put yourselfinto those places, you have to
become very comfortable withyour own brain as well with your
own mind who you are, becausethat's all that's really left

(42:38):
once you've broken down thewalls of the identity that you
try to front, because you cannotfake who you are when you are
that exhausted, when you arethat malnutritioned, when you
are that dehydrated, who you arereally shows, and you are
forced to think about thosethings in the solitude of the

(43:00):
race, the moment when you don'thave somebody to talk to and
you're not listening to musiclike you have to think.
You have no other choice, and Ireally liked the clarity that I
got after the emotional releasesof the things that I was
holding onto, which I have allof this on GoPro, cause I was
recording the whole race on aGoPro.
I have the whole thingdocumented in a 27 minute
documentary on my YouTubechannel and I was recording all

(43:22):
of it, and there's just momentswhere I'm just like talking to
the camera about things that Ihadn't thought about in a while,
because it was just like I'mjust getting everything out.

Speaker 1 (43:29):
And after that race.

Speaker 2 (43:31):
Like I was in physical pain, but my emotional
site was so much better because,I had to face a lot of things
that I hadn't faced before.

Speaker 1 (43:42):
And that was helpful.
Yeah, yeah, that's pretty cool.
So, beyond all of thesephysical feats that you've done
and stuff, you're a photographer, videographer.

Speaker 2 (43:53):
I'm a marketer essentially.

Speaker 1 (43:54):
A marketer.

Speaker 2 (43:55):
Who's just good at camera stuff.
I'm a marketer, essentially amarketer who's?

Speaker 1 (43:57):
just good at camera stuff.
How did you get into that?

Speaker 2 (44:01):
my background is in musical theater and performing
arts, so I actually love likesinging and dancing on stages.
That's like my.
I love it.
It was my whole life for likesix years up until 2020, and
that whole industry was one ofthe first industries to be
dramatically impacted by the,the pandemic and stuff that went
down, and I just wasn't willingto play ball with all of the

(44:21):
restrictions and we'll call itrules.
They put on people in thatindustry being vaccinated 36
times before you went in thevicinity of anything, had to
wear 14 masks.
It just wasn't.
That's an exaggeration, ofcourse, but not entirely.
But I wasn't willing to playball with those things because
they just didn't.
That's an exaggeration, ofcourse, but not entirely.
But I wasn't willing to playball with those things because
they just didn't align with myvalues.
And so I took a step back andwent into the photo video thing.

(44:43):
I had no idea how to use acamera, really.
No experience Not really Istarted I was doing like
graduation photography, butthat's very cookie cutter.
They tell you what settings touse, how far away to be, what
the light should look like.
So, like I knew nothing aboutit, I just knew how to do the
basics with photographyspecifically, and I had done

(45:03):
that for like four or five years.
2019, I started to play aroundwith like some freelance gigs
because I knew something I'vealways kind of understood is
proximity opportunity.
I knew that if I was next tosomething where an opportunity
was being presented, I couldeventually get into that
opportunity.
So with musical theater, for me,I wanted to know how to be in
more films, on more stages andplaying more roles, and I

(45:23):
understood that if you werearound it, you were more likely
to get the opportunity than not.
So in my mind I was like well,this thing that I know almost
nothing about, but more than no,more than somebody, is the
camera.
So how can I be around all thisstuff more?
Well, it's taking photos ofstage productions and it's
taking photos and videos anddoing like behind the scenes or
promotion for short films andwhatever.
So I did that a little bit.

(45:44):
I didn't do it very much, but Idid it a little bit, because I
did it mid to late 2019, hadlike two or three opportunities
to flex that muscle and try, andthen 2020 comes around,
pandemic hits and I'm like, well, all I have left is this thing
that I kind of started doing,which is the camera.
So 10, 12, 14 hour days onYouTube doing that.

Speaker 1 (46:04):
Just learning, just learning yeah.

Speaker 2 (46:05):
Trying, failing, trying, failing, thinking I was
great, not being great and iteventually molded into I found
Gary Vee as one of my firstinfluences in like the content
world and so I was like maybe Icould do video and create short
form content, created somevideos that were the worst
videos I've ever created in mylife, and then it's it's just
been a building game of likelearning skill after skill after

(46:25):
skill, becoming a bettervideographer, becoming a better
photographer, learning moreskills to compliment those
things and like what can I do tomake those things more valuable
to people?
And and how can it bestructured in a way that you
know I can actually help morepeople out?
And what is the things that Iactually enjoy making?
Do I want to make social mediacontent?
Do I want to make promotions?
Do I want to do events?
Do I want to do weddings?
Do I want to do like whatindustry?

(46:47):
What type of content in thatindustry?
What role do I want to playwith that content in that
industry?
Just learning everything, justthrowing as much spaghetti at
the wall as possible and seeingwhat do I like, what do I hate.
And I definitely found some ofthose things Like some things I
really liked and some things Ijust absolutely despised.
And that was the goal.
It was really just to learn,but that's kind of that's kind
of where it came from.

Speaker 1 (47:07):
How did you go about doing all that?
Is it just like okay, let metry.

Speaker 2 (47:09):
Let me try wedding photography, Let me try, I went
into every single person's DMSand said, can I shoot free
photos?
Like every single person that Iknew.
I was like, hey, I want to dothis, Can I take?
Like?
I had some friends that hadbusinesses that were in their
more infancy stages, betweenlike year one and year two, and
I said, can I make some photosand videos for you?

(47:30):
And just I just want to learnlike don't even, don't, pay me,
Don't do anything.
Um, can I do like your seniorphotos?
Can I do your senior photos?
Can I do your event?
I'll show up and I'll justphone for free, like one of my
biggest some guy that I workwith super often.
His name's Trey Lowell.
He's a fantastic guy,no-transcript.

(48:03):
I went to an event and I sawthe videographer there, which
was Trey.
I didn't know him at the timeand I just I was like that's, I
didn't know anybody at thisevent.
I just went because the oneperson I did know, who was
involved in the organization,paid for my hotel to be there.
He was like I just I think youshould be here.
I was like okay.
So I went, I met the guy, thevideographer, and I was like you
have a camera, you're my people.
So I walked over.
It was like hey, what's goingon?
Man?

(48:23):
You know how are you?
Um.
Che, I do camera work.
Um, we linked and then Istarted doing events after that.
Um, and that's just.
That's like the one.
The opportunity side of thingsis like it's your one
conversation away from what'shappening, but to answer your
question.
It just came from me messagingas many people as possible.
Let me do this.
Can I make this for you?
Don't pay me, I just want to dothis.
Can we make social mediacontent?

(48:43):
Can we make a music video?
Can we do this?

Speaker 1 (48:45):
yeah, do that.
So yeah, I like that.
It's um, obviously noteveryone's in that position
where they can like let me, letme do this for free, but sure I
think it's a great way to Well.

Speaker 2 (48:55):
until you're good, you have to be in that position.

Speaker 1 (48:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (48:57):
You can't charge for dog shit work.

Speaker 1 (48:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
Because your reputation is going to go down.

Speaker 1 (49:00):
Yeah, but you didn't go to school for any of this.

Speaker 2 (49:03):
No YouTube University baby, Right yeah.

Speaker 1 (49:06):
So, and what do you like through that learning
process and trial and error andstuff like what have you learned
that you enjoy doing?
And like, what is your focuscurrently, because that might
change in a couple years, right,or you think you're pretty set
on well, it does change becausenaturally, as a person, your

(49:27):
interests change.

Speaker 2 (49:28):
So then it comes down to is what you're doing working
?
And if it is, are youdisciplined enough to continue
to do it, which this is mytheory at this point.
Now it's not been tested toohard.
But to answer the questionabout what I'm actually
interested in, to this point,I've kind of found two things
that I really am enjoying andI'm liking, and they all kind of
surround one thing, which is Iam a little bit of a data and

(49:49):
analytics nerd.
I found that I really enjoylearning about how to convert
the most attention, and for methat's views and that's dollar
signs for conversions onproducts.
So what I do most of the time isI make ads, photos and videos
for e-commerce businesses tosell products, and when they
tell me what ads work and whatads don't, I really like finding

(50:12):
and figuring out why socialmedia content or ads do better
and why they don't perform andhow to like kind of game that
system.
I really enjoy that.
The second thing I really enjoyworking with artists.
I found a interesting littleniche where I create short form
social media content for artiststo promote their music, and my
content performs exceptionallywell for those people and I've

(50:35):
leaned into that really hard.
So I have this great clientbase up in Nashville that I go
up there about once a month andfilm with them for five or six
days, take care of them, make adecent amount of money doing
that, and then I come back and Ifocus on that.
But among those things, I alsoreally enjoy events, because I
love working with people and Ilove hyping people up.
I love working a crowd.

(50:55):
I love working a crowd which Ithink that goes into my like
musical theater background.
I love crowd response, workinga crowd, getting them all riled
up, making people smile, lovethat stuff, and then creating a
piece of content from there thatmakes people feel something and
makes other people who weren'tthere feel like they were
missing out.
It falls back into thatattention game of like how can
we create the best piece ofcontent possible that makes

(51:16):
people go yo, that was sick.
It makes them want to come backnext year, sell more tickets,
things like that.

Speaker 1 (51:22):
Cause.

Speaker 2 (51:22):
I've had people that have used my content to
legitimately sell more ticketsthan they did the first year the
next year because of thatcontent that we had.
That's fun to me.
I really liked the advertisingside of things.
Then I started running ads tobook myself clients specifically
for like the artist thing up inNashville.
And then when I saw when I madeads and not only like when I
made ads and sent it to thebrands and then they sent me the

(51:43):
analytics back and said here'swhat happened, like that's fun.
But when I could put my ownmoney into meta with ads that I
worked on and createdintentionally for some reason
and then literally minute byminute, watch the metrics change
, I'm like this is fun.
This is fun.
I like this a lot.

Speaker 1 (52:05):
It's interesting that you enjoy like I would think
it's interesting to have likethe creative side, but also like
the analytical side too, whereyou, you know, find joy in that
and obviously you have tounderstand that.
And, yeah, where do you thinkthat comes from?
Like, if you, as like the data,like, has that ever been of

(52:25):
interest to you?
And anything you've done beforemaybe just ties into the
creative, like like, oh, Icreated this and it's working I
don't know that just shows proofthat like what I'm doing is.

Speaker 2 (52:36):
I've been, like we'll call it hyper fixated on things
before, where I get a lot ofexcitement from like problem
solving, which I think it bleedsinto like I love problem
solving, I love producing andwhat I found in like even the
business side of it, where Iservice the e-commerce
businesses, when I was puttingtogether like productions and

(52:56):
stuff like, yeah, creating thecontent was fun for me, but I
really enjoyed the process ofproducing and what producing is
is you are essentially in chargeof you're the firefighter of,
of the crew, like if somethingis happening, somebody is not
there, you're in charge of, like, finding replacements, you're
in charge of fixing things thatbreak, you're in charge of
booking and creating the entirething, making sure scheduling is

(53:18):
aligned and all that jazz.
So I really enjoyed thefirefighting aspect of it.
I read this book recently thatI actually I think I read it
like two weeks ago.
I read it for the second time.
I read it once, like I don'tknow two years ago, and I didn't
know enough to reallyunderstand what the book was
actually meant for, and then Iread it again recently and I was
like, oh, Rocket Fuel.

Speaker 1 (53:38):
I don't know.
Yeah, have you read it?
I haven't read Rocket Fuel, butTraction is like the Rocket
Fuel is like the EOS system.

Speaker 2 (53:48):
Rocket Fuel?
No, no, no.
Rocket Fuel is the differencebetween visionaries and
integrators and businesses.

Speaker 1 (53:52):
Yeah, so it's same Gina Wickman, is that who wrote
it I?

Speaker 2 (53:55):
think so.

Speaker 1 (53:56):
So, gina Wickman, so like they have this concept,
this model, this EOS model oflike running a business, like
integrators, visionaries, oh,yes, yes, yes.
Yeah yeah, so.
Traction is like their bookthat lays out, like the
blueprint of, like, how tooperate, how to run a business.
Yeah, yeah, well, the visionaryintegrator thing, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:16):
Well, the visionary thing, yeah, the reason I bring
that up is because I alwaysthought that I was a visionary,
because I didn't know enoughabout actually like doing the
active business.
I just thought that I was doingbusiness because I was a
freelancer that made money Likethat's kind of business, but
like not really that's justmaking money as a person, and I
was like, yeah, I'm a visionarybecause I have all these ideas
but I had never done anythingand I still really haven't done

(54:36):
anything.
But like I understand a littlebit more about business now to
be like, okay, I wasn't reallywhatever, so I had to have the
ideas because I was the onlyvessel driving forward.
So I was forced to have a vision, um, but I actually have found
that when given, when given thechoice in a bigger scenario, I
had to audit like the last twoyears of my life and I didn't

(54:56):
know it at the time.
But now hindsight, looking back, I was like I really think I'm
actually an integrator, like Ithink, like I love the public
attention and I am somewhat of apersonality and I love doing
that.
But I really really like theoperational nitty gritty and
learning about that.
And maybe it's just a currentphase and once I've learned all

(55:20):
that stuff I'll go back to beingvisionary.
I have no idea, but right nowI'm in much more of like an
integrator heavy interest phasewhere I'm like I just want to
learn how to put things togetherand problem solve and create
things that work operationally.

Speaker 1 (55:36):
Yeah, it's interesting that you bring that
up.
I think, like I, I think theirconcept too.
I think you know Gino Wickmanwould, they might've say this in
the book or whatever.
But, like, like every business,like you, can't they?
They think, operates the bestright With a visionary and
integrator that are at the topof the business structure.
Yeah, you obviously, like, ifyou're just starting a business,

(56:00):
the chances of you having bothof those in place from day one
are pretty slim, right?
So you and I are operating as avisionary and integrator, like
in our current business andstuff, right, it is interesting,
like to try to decipher, likeas a business owner, like what,
which role do you fit betterinto?

(56:20):
Like the visionary or theintegrator?
I think you have to learn, evenas a visionary, I think you
have to learn like theday-to-day operation stuff so
you understand what's what'shappening in your business and
how to leverage people and thatsort of stuff too.

Speaker 2 (56:34):
Well, my hunch is that it just makes you a more
effective person in whatevercategory you're in.
And this is this is kind ofhypothetical, because I
understand it in like when I,when I was in musical theater, I
knew how to do almost everysingle job with the exception of
like lighting.
I knew how to do almost everysingle job and that made me

(56:55):
better in my role as an actor,because I knew what needed to
happen for those people, whatthose people needed me to do,
and so it was just done.
And the same thing for being onproduction.
I've done most of the jobs on aproduction set, with the
exception of I think I've neverreally been a lighter, a grip,
because I'm not as good atlighting, or gaffer or grip, I
forget.

Speaker 1 (57:13):
What is that Like?

Speaker 2 (57:14):
you're holding somebody, holding somebody
somebody that can, that cancreate and shape the the scene
with lighting okay and I'venever been exceptional at that,
so I've never done that role,but most of the other roles I've
done, and it makes me betterbecause I know what needs to
happen for those people, and soI know two things.
One I know what I can do tomake their life easier before
they need to tell me that theyneed it, or I know when they're

(57:36):
not operating at a higher enoughlevel so I can actually audit
what's going on around me aswell for operational
inefficiencies.

Speaker 1 (57:44):
Where do you see your business going from here?
Where do you want it to go?

Speaker 2 (57:48):
Super interesting.
Right now I'm in a bit of atransitional phase, so because
of it's super interesting, so Iwant to be very, very clear with
people that are watching thisso that I'm not putting any
weird like pedestal category.
My business has never done morethan $120,000 a year.
So I and that is with very lowmargins because the, the the

(58:12):
media industry is typically verydifficult to make a lot of
money.
Yeah industry is typically verydifficult to make a lot of money
, and the agency model,specifically, is very difficult
to make good margins in.
So I haven't made a tremendousamount of money and I haven't
done a tremendous amount in thatcategory.
So, with that being the prefaceto this, I'm actually in a

(58:33):
little bit of a transitionalphase right now, because I
stated earlier that my goal isto make a tremendous amount of
money, become a very financiallysuccessful person, and with, as
long as I'm staying within themoral and ethical you know
bounds that I've set for myself,that are things that I'm not
just I'm not willing tocompromise on.
That said, the agency model andthis is only like the last
couple weeks doesn't really makesense to do that at all the way

(58:56):
that I was doing it To be likea marketing agency?
Yeah To be like a marketingagency that will ultimately.
I was a.
I was a production agency thatwould handle the creative side
and then hand it off so thatsomebody else could market the
assets.
So I wasn't actually doing anyof the marketing myself, so we
were just the creative outlets.
So they would come to us, theysay we need these photos, these
videos.
We would do it all, send it andthen their team would handle
the rest.
We did that well, but marginsare low, the time needed and the

(59:23):
time demand super high.
So the drag was crazy,operational drag was crazy and
it just doesn't make sense as amodel.
So the last couple of weeksI've actually been thinking,
like you know what, to have moreleverage doing what I do, what
I.
What I found was that I as aperson am a decent marketer
myself.
I'm good at creating the assetsmyself, because anytime I've

(59:45):
tried to outsource it, it justkind of goes down.
So I'm like I should probablyjust lean into chain not being
an effective marketer, and stepaway from trying to do that work
for a ton of people and justtake some level of ownership in
one or two things and just spendall of my time doing that and

(01:00:05):
then maybe I'll focus on growinglike my own business or
something, when I'm maybe like26 or something like just spend
the next couple of yearsfocusing on one or two things,
have stake in the outcome andreally actually learn what it's
like to make more than a hundredthousand dollars a year because
I'venever done that and I have
theories about what that's likeand I know what videos do fairly
well.

(01:00:25):
But the big shift for me was Ihad this idea of like well, I
know that if I can make somebodyelse $10, I can make one.
So I just need to learn how tomake people a lot of money and
then I can make a lot of moneyright behind them.
Yeah.
And then somebody who'ssignificantly more wealthy than
I am and successful than I ambrought up to me.
They're like, well, why makethe dollar when you could have

(01:00:46):
partial ownership in the thingthat's making 10?
And that was a kind of punch inthe face, not in a bad way for
them, but it was like oh, I nowhave to think of this a little
differently.
My goal is to make money.
That's not a bad thing, and thevessel that I'm doing it
through right now just doesn'tmake sense to do that.
So, to answer your questionabout where do I see the
business going, I'm actuallylike doing away with the agency

(01:01:07):
completely.
And.
I'm not going to be pursuinglike, not shots as an agency.
This is the first time I'msaying that out loud, publicly

(01:01:35):
no-transcript so one of them isa personal brand that I'm
directly partnered with.
Yeah.
Somebody who has a much biggerfollowing than you or I do, and
the other one is an e-commercebusiness.

Speaker 1 (01:01:50):
Okay.
Yeah.
So just creating content forthose companies.

Speaker 2 (01:01:56):
Just strictly being the marketing asset in both of
those bodies.
So for the e-commerce business,what that looks like is I'm
going to take a look ateverything that they're doing
and everything that I've learnedfrom working with dozens of
brands prior to them, andeverything that I've seen work
and not work, applying it tohere, seeing in true real time

(01:02:19):
if a lot of these theories I hadactually work, iterating on
those, learning what it actuallytakes to market effectively and
then growing that brand as bigas I possibly can, Because the
bigger that I get, that, themore money that I make, the more
money that they make, thebigger the business gets, which
is a net positive for everybodybecause I learn, they win, I win

(01:02:43):
and it's good.
The personal branding sidewe're trying to figure out how
to monetize this brand thisguy's built over the last 15
years.
So we're trying a few differentthings, but it's they're two
very different models, but bothof them are intended on making
money and helping people, and soif we can do both of those
things, I think that I canmarket effectively well, and I
want to see how the marketingprinciples differ between those
two bodies and what I canactually do and really learn,

(01:03:07):
cause, like, I know a few things, but I don't know much in
retrospect.
In comparison to somebody who'sbuilt multimillion dollar
businesses, I don't knowanything.

Speaker 1 (01:03:16):
Right, Right.
So, but you know, you knowthings around like your niche,
like marketing and that sort ofstuff.
I think so A little bit a fewthings, probably probably more
so than the business ownerthemselves, right.

Speaker 2 (01:03:30):
Uh, in some instances I've had some suggestions that
have worked fairly well and someinstances I've said things that
have not worked well at all.
So, yeah, yeah, there'ssometimes when I get a business
owner that just has no idea whatthey're talking about and those
people are very obvious andthen I get somebody who knows
more than I do and I'm just avessel for their vision.
That's not entirely uncommoneither where they're like we
need this, we need this, we needthis.

(01:03:51):
I'm like yes, sir, yeah what'sum, um hermosi?

Speaker 1 (01:03:55):
I think he talks about this right like he.
He likes for, like hisbusinesses, like he likes the
idea of of hiring an agency orhiring somebody who does
something that's really well,that he wants needs in his
business yeah learns from themand then and then, you know,
makes that a part of his company, transfers it over right as the
agency.

Speaker 3 (01:04:15):
Yeah, it's a great idea, yeah, honestly.
Yeah.
It's a really idea.
Yeah, honestly yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:04:18):
It's a really efficient way to do that,
without bringing on a full-timeemployee and then training them
and then hoping that they'll dothe right thing and train you
how to do it Like it's.
Yeah, his idea is super smart.
Yeah.
I think as somebody who doesn'tknow anything.

Speaker 1 (01:04:33):
Yeah, and it makes sense because then everybody,
everybody wins, right, right,the agency gets a partner for
five years, however long it is,and then, as a business owner,
you're learning how to operateyour business more efficiently,
more effectively, to make moremoney.

Speaker 2 (01:04:48):
I think, so I think that I think that that's a very
effective it seems like aneffective way to do things.
I've never done it, so I don'tknow yeah I don't know if it
actually works, yeah, but itseems to for people that do a
lot more than I do.

Speaker 1 (01:04:59):
Yeah all right.
So, circling back to the um,like personal, personal
development stuff, sure, I wantto ask you this one last
question what are?
Because I think this isdifferent.
This is like what I.
So I got into personaldevelopment, like when I got
into real estate, and I read abunch of different books and
everybody has like their own wayof like here.
Do these five things to youknow, live better, to be the

(01:05:22):
best version of yourself, orwhatever.
But what I've learned is it'slike those five things, or
whatever number there are, aredifferent for everybody, right,
and times a day when you'redoing them, how often you're
doing like all that's different.
Times a day when you're doingthem, how often you're doing
like all that's different.
And you have to find your ownthings that work for you, that
feed you know what is it, whatit is that you're trying to

(01:05:43):
accomplish.
So, for you, what are, what areyour like?
These are the five things, fourthings, three things, whatever
it is that make me that I haveto do daily, to make me the best
version of myself.

Speaker 2 (01:05:56):
With that type of question, it's pretty easy to
fall into what's your morningroutine or something similar to
that.
Right, it's like what are thethings that you do every single
day?
Otherwise everything's fucked.
I don't.
I wake up, I caffeinate andthen I do what I need to do.
That's pretty much it.
My foundation and my baselineis, if something needs to get

(01:06:18):
done or I say that I'm going todo something, it gets done, and
just making sure that I'm doingthose things A system that I've
found that works very well.
Andy Frisella has the powerlist system.
You make it the night before andthen you work on it the next
day, planning your day the nextday, what you're going to eat,
where you're going to be, whatyou're going to work on for how
long.
Those are very effectivetactics.

(01:06:40):
I don't think it's so much whatyou have to do every single day
.
There are things that I've donethat helped me, and for me, I
cold plunge most days.
I have a freezer that isconverted to be a plunge at my
house, and so I use that to geta to get a plunge in most days,
cause I think cold exposure is agreat way to wake your body up.
It's a great way to expose yourbody to a high dose of cortisol

(01:07:03):
, which is good for you firstthing in the morning.
So that's something that I do,but it's by no means necessary,
like I haven't done it in alittle while, um, so it's not
like a necessity.
I try to get as good good sleepas I can, so I did as many
things as I could to likeoptimize my sleep.
I wear a mouth tape at nightand I wear a nose strip, and if

(01:07:23):
there's light pollution, I wearan eye mask, um, and then if my
roommates are watching a moviein the other room.
I wear earplugs so I'm likeliterally closed off to the
world.
Um, and that I found I can wakeup with less sleep and more
energy because I get deepersleep and deeper REM sleep most
nights when I do that.
So, I started doing that moreregularly when I I work out

(01:07:44):
almost every single day andpeople are like, oh, you need
rest days, Shut up, Like, yeah,you can rest and be intentional
about it.
But for the most part peopleuse that as a as a crutch or an
excuse to not work hard, andthat bothers me a lot.
So I think it really just fallsdown to discipline.
If you say you're going to dosomething, do it, and if there's

(01:08:05):
something that's going to helpyou and you have the means to do
it, you should probably try tofigure out how to do it.
And for me that was like themouth taping the cold, plunging
the, the.

Speaker 1 (01:08:15):
Getting good sleep.

Speaker 2 (01:08:16):
Yeah, getting good sleep.

Speaker 1 (01:08:17):
Working out.

Speaker 2 (01:08:18):
I think most of most of what I've found has made my
life better in how I feel andhow I am able to focus.
Has focused on if I eat right,sleep right and train right.
Has focused on if I eat right,sleep right and train right.
If I put good food in my body,I train properly, and often

(01:08:38):
physically, and I recoverproperly with good deep sleep
and I don't fuck any of thosethings up.

Speaker 1 (01:08:47):
I'm pretty good, you're feeling pretty good.

Speaker 2 (01:08:51):
I'm doing okay and my baseline is good and I can
pretty much do everything elsethat I need to.
Yeah.
So, yeah, there's not reallylike I don't think you have to
like make your bed every day, dothis 14 step morning routine.
I think a lot of people getcaught up in like these five
things from most, most people,what I.
This is what I've heard onlinefrom like who mostly talks about
it?
Andy talks about it, a lot ofpeople talk about it and then

(01:09:12):
when I applied it to my life, Iwas like, oh my God, it's true
Crazy.
Most of what successful peoplehave is not from what they have
that you don't, but from whatyou have that they don't.
It's distraction, it's thingsthat are taking your time away
from the things that actuallymatter and your time away from
the things that actually matter.
And for me, I had to get very,very, very, very honest with

(01:09:33):
everything I was spending mytime on, everyone I was spending
my time on and everything thatI was doing and how it actually
impacted bottom line.
Because, at the end of the day,if you are not getting stronger
, then what you are doing inyour physical exercise is not
working.
If you aren't, if you are,maybe it's also a nutrition
problem.
If you're not making more money, maybe the things you're

(01:09:53):
spending your time on are noteffective.
And of course you have to thinkof time horizons and like if
you don't get, of course if youdo something you're not going to
see money the next day in mostscenarios but you have to be
honest about that as well thetimeline of how long you're
willing to do it before it'sconsidered a failure but,
you have to really audit, likewhat are you doing with your
time?
People will be like oh, I worka lot.
Like I have one person who Ican think of that works all the

(01:10:16):
time and has these hugeaspirational visions.
And I'm like you watch a moviefour days a week at night and
then you struggle to wake up inthe morning because you were up
until 1130 instead of going tobed at nine when you were tired
but you still wanted to watchthe movie.
Little decisions like that.
I'm like if you really wantsomething, you just have to be

(01:10:37):
honest with what's actuallygoing to get you there,
eliminate everything else andjust do those things.
It's like, if you've committedto something, do that, but
outside of those actuallegitimate commitments, don't do
anything except for what'sgoing to get you closer to the
person that you know you'resupposed to be and the goals
that you want to have.
That's what I've done.
That's what I did in 2023 tobecome the person I am now and

(01:10:59):
it's what I continue to plan.
It's what I, what I, what Iplan to continue doing from now
until I get to where I am, untilI'm proven wrong.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:11:08):
I think a lot of people probably struggle too
with um being clear on what itis they want to accomplish or
who it is they want to becometoo, or not understanding that
they need to change in order toachieve the goals that they want
to achieve.

Speaker 2 (01:11:25):
Yeah, something that I used personally was a lot of
people have like the what wouldJesus do?
As like their moral compass.
I have the what would Hermosido if?
Given my situation.
He probably wouldn't go and dothat thing.
So, if I want to be more likehim, I probably wouldn't do that

(01:11:45):
thing either.
If I want to be more like GaryVee, I probably wouldn't do
these things.
If I do want to be more likeGary Vee, I would probably go
and do these actions, and for me, comparison was a huge vessel
for me in my decision-making.
When I didn't know anything, Ididn't know what was going to
get me to where I wanted to be,but I knew I wanted to be kind
of like these other people whohad a successful life that I

(01:12:06):
kind of wanted to emulate insome way.
And so I do the things thatthey talk about doing, or use
the what would they do as myfunnel for decision-making,
until I knew enough to startmaking some of my own decisions
about what I kind of believedwas going to get me there.
And that's what I'm now able tospeak on.

(01:12:27):
As, on the discipline front islike I know that if I make these
decisions, I'm going to becomethis type of person and I'm
going to continue to hone in onon my ability to make the
decisions I know I'm supposed tomake in the moments I know I'm
supposed to make them,irregardless of how I feel about
that decision in the short term.
Make a decision when you feelgood, stick to it when you feel
bad and your life willultimately be closer to where

(01:12:47):
you want it to be.
But I didn't know that.
Four years ago.
I didn't know that four yearsago I only had the North star of
people who did what I didbetter than me, and that's part
of why I take so much personalresponsibility when I realized
how many people were watching,like, even if it's just three
people that are watching me, aslike, if Che is doing it, I can
do it, or would Che do that?

(01:13:07):
Probably not, so I shouldn't doit If there's anybody using me
as their decision-making funnel.
That's why it takes so muchresponsibility.
In that Cause I realized howpowerful it was for me, for the
people that I was payingattention to, so I plan on
trying to do the same thing forthe people that are behind me,
because it's our responsibilityto live that example and bring
other people up in that in thatway.

Speaker 1 (01:13:29):
I love that.
I think that's a great way toto start right.
If, like you don't know whatyou want your life to look like,
like, find somebody who is isliving that life and do some of
those things right that they'redoing.

Speaker 2 (01:13:41):
It's like trying to find what you love, what you.
What do you want to do?
What do you?
Want to spend most of your timedoing.
I was fortunate to try a fewthings and find photo and video
pretty early, or find musicaltheater pretty early, and find
photo and video pretty early orfind musical theater pretty
early.
But a lot of people don't eventry to start doing those things
and they never experienced thefact that they hate it or love
it because they don't do thething.
You just have to try a lot ofdifferent things in order to get

(01:14:04):
closer to finding what's goingto work for you, and that also
stems from people don't try tomove their life in any type of
direction because they don'tknow what to do, but they're not
willing to look at these.
There's a few trails that arealready blazed in the forest by

(01:14:25):
these people that are makingcontent for free on the internet
talking about how they did it.
Maybe just start there and thenyou can start blazing, like
they have a 20 mile trail thatthey've it.
Maybe just start there and thenyou can start blazing, like
they have a 20 mile trail thatthey've created.
You don't have to follow itexactly, but you can at least
use it as a starting point andthen, six and a half miles in,
start kind of blazing your owntrail, realize that was the
wrong direction, come back, getback on their trail and then cut

(01:14:47):
a trail from where they areover to Gary V's trail at mile
eight.
And then you're like, oh okay,like that makes a lot of sense,
let me go here.
And then you go to go on thattrail until mile 11 and a half
and then you cut over and youstart to create your own trail
and then all of a sudden you'vegot your own 20 mile trail that
you've created but you don'thave any of the knowledge unless
you started on somebody else'strail.
I think for the most part forme worked, at least I like.

Speaker 3 (01:15:14):
I love that analogy yeah, yeah, I kind of like it
too.

Speaker 1 (01:15:15):
Actually, that worked that worked pretty well because
but yeah, because it's.
I mean you're 100, right, likeyou just gotta.
You gotta start somewhere andit's just like okay.

Speaker 2 (01:15:21):
Um when, you know nothing, piggyback on somebody
else's knowledge until you knowsomething and accept that when
you think you know something,you don't go further and what
somebody else knows to discoverwhat you actually don't know,
and then you can act on it.
It's a huge thing that Istruggled with for a long time
and I still catch myself doingit, and it's something that is a

(01:15:43):
consistent effort.
When you think you knowsomething you don't, it's like
when you think that you knowsomething, like Alex Hormoi
talks about and I right now I'min a heavy phase of like doing
what hermosi does and that'slike I'm using he's like a huge
decision making funnel for meright now, but he talks about
doing something for anabnormally long period of time

(01:16:04):
without convincing yourself thatyou're better than you are, and
that was something that I fellinto like crazy just over and
over and over was like I'm thisgreat marketer.
Three years ago I thought I wasa great marketer.
Wild concept like I didn't knowanything and you have to be
able to understand that.
Like you're going to makeincorrect decisions.
But forward towards a wrongdecision is closer to knowing

(01:16:26):
what the right decision is thannot moving in any direction at
all yeah and so it's just whenyou use those people, when you
don's just when you use thosepeople, when you don't know
anything, you use those funnels,those people, as your
decision-making funnel.
Then you make a decision andthen you think you know
something.
You try to make a decision onthat knowledge that you think
you have.
You realize that it might stillbe the wrong decision.
So you have to go back to thedrawing board, re-figure out

(01:16:49):
what decision you should havemade, why you should have made
it.
I've just become relentlesslyobsessed with the
self-analyzation of the ideasand decisions that I've made,
the concepts that I have, thethoughts that I have.
Something that my dad actuallyinstilled in me super, super,
super early was thinking andbeing self-aware with the
thoughts that are going throughyour head, why you're having

(01:17:11):
them, what it makes you feel asa result of having them.
Like somebody cut too oftentraffic.
Your immediate response A lotof people anger.
A lot of people fear.
A lot of people, whatever.
You can go back later and kindof have an after action report
of like why did it make you feelthat certain way?
Like I don't really have a lotof actual physical emotions that

(01:17:33):
I feel when I'm driving anymore?
because, I've actively worked on.
It doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter.
I used to be like fuckinghitting the steering wheel for
real, for real.
It was awful, it was terrible itwas a horrible, horrible way to
live and you have to becomfortable with looking at what
happened and saying, okay, do Ihave to feel that way?
Because, ultimately, nothingreally matters at the end of the

(01:17:57):
day, like we're just here onthis earth to do things and so
nothing is really a quote thatI've used that has helped me get
through some more stressful,better times.
Whatever has just been.
Nothing is ever been.
Nothing is ever a bad decisionif it brings you to where you
are.
Nothing is really bad if itbrings you to where you are and
if where you are isn't dead, youhave a second shot.

(01:18:18):
So is anything really a goodthing or is anything ever a bad
thing?
They give us emotions and wehave Rob Dial talks about in his
podcast.
Between stimulus and response,there's a space, and in that
space is where you get to choosewhat the response is.
So you have something thathappens to you.
I sat down here.
You felt something.
Whatever that thing was, youcan choose whether or not to

(01:18:39):
acknowledge it or not.
Promosi's extreme example ofthat is like if you have a
family member pass away like,what would it take for that to
be?
Like?
It sounds strange, but whatwould that?
What would it take for thatthing?
To be the best thing ever.

Speaker 1 (01:18:54):
It's a really weird kind of twisted thought
experiment.

Speaker 2 (01:18:56):
But is it really a bad thing?

Speaker 1 (01:18:58):
We're just conditioned to think that
certain things have, we shouldfeel a certain way or act a
certain way.

Speaker 2 (01:19:04):
And those things might be painful, and I'm not
saying you don't have to look atlike death and stuff as a
non-bad thing, like death andstuff as a non-bad thing.
The argument there is that wehave predetermined descriptions
of or prescriptions forcircumstance when in reality we

(01:19:25):
get to decide if something'sgood or bad and how much it
affects us, based on how muchwork we're willing to put in and
how vulnerable we're willing tobe with our own mind.
And most people are superuncomfortable with their brain.
Most people are not comfortablesitting in it.
Like you see it all the timewith people who just cannot sit
still and not be on their phoneright now, like I've done
podcasts with people who wouldhave had their phone right here
and they're just checking,checking, checking.

(01:19:48):
I've been at dinner with peoplewhere, like I'll leave my phone
in the car and like they'll haveit and they'll just like check
it or whatever.
Or if we stop talking andthere's just like a moment of
silence.
Something my dad taught me very, very, very early was we had
it's super, super strange and Ididn't appreciate it at the time
, but now I really, really do hewould literally practice
silence with me.
Like let's just be like, let'sjust be like, let's just

(01:20:10):
practice being quiet for a while.
How old was it, how old wereyou?
12?
okay yeah, 10, 12, 13, 14 andjust practice being being silent
.
And now I'm very comfortablewith there being silence and
it's not uncomfortable like ifwe're sitting here, I can just
sit, I can look around the room,I can just look at the camera
and I'm very just.

(01:20:31):
I don't have any weird feelingsabout silence, but people just
cannot stand there beingsilenced.
They have to do something, orthey feel they have to do
something and so they act on itand they get so much anxiety
from that, or if it's like ifsomebody asks a question it's
like God forbid they have to bein their own mind.
Yeah, you can going to have aresponse like immediately right

(01:20:52):
and I'll spend a lot of thatsilent time just thinking about
past experiences, Like why did Ithink a certain way?
What?

Speaker 1 (01:20:58):
did I say earlier.

Speaker 2 (01:21:01):
It sounds strange, but I literally all the time am
just going back and reassessingstimulus in my response, why I
felt a certain way, why I said acertain thing, stimulus in my
response, why I felt a certainway, why I said a certain thing.
I'll literally replayconversations in my head and go
through scenario after scenarioof different conversations how
things could have gone worse,how things could have gone
better.
What would I say if they saidthis?
What would I say if I said that?

(01:21:21):
And people, one huge thing thatpeople compliment me on at like
events is I'm very quick wittedand I'm very good at working a
crowd.
I have played the scenario ofsomebody talking to me and
working a crowd in my headhundreds of thousands of times.
By the time I like evensometimes out loud to myself in
the car.
It's super weird, but I'verehearsed that scenario

(01:21:47):
thousands of times.
I've assessed my thoughtshundreds of thousands of times.

Speaker 1 (01:21:54):
So where does that piece come from?
Is that just something?
Did that change when youstarted listening to your
podcast and trying to be abetter version of yourself?
Or is that something you'vealways done, because it's
self-awareness or or whatever?

Speaker 2 (01:22:12):
whatever it is there the skill set was built, or the
foundation for the skill set wasbuilt, by my dad doing those
silence exercises and talking tome about being aware of your
own thoughts and then facingyour thoughts and confronting,
not not confronting.
You never said it in thatverbiage, but it was like if you

(01:22:33):
have anxiety, why are youfeeling fearful?
If you feel sad, why are youfeeling sad?
It's not a bad thing to feelany way, but why?
What is it there for?
And can you control it?
Can you mitigate it?
Can you not respond that way?
Do you have to feel that way?
So the skill set was built andI don't think it was fully
utilized until I started divinginto trying to be a person that

(01:22:57):
I could be more proud of.
Yeah.
Like could I actually vouch formyself and would I want other
people to vouch for me?
If other people vouched for me,what would they say?
Or if other people were talkingabout me, what would they say?
Who am I If they knew everysingle thing about me that I
know about me?
How would they say?
Or if other people were talkingabout me, what would they say?
Who am I If they knew everysingle thing about me that I
know?
about me how would I bedescribed?
I didn't like the answer tothat most of the time, not

(01:23:22):
because I was a bad person, butI was a.
I wasn't loud, know it all, andI was constantly fronting a
lack of knowledge with this kindof fake filling the gaps with
half-truths, personality and Ijust didn't like the answer to
that.
And so I started trying to belike okay, how can I be more

(01:23:43):
honest and be a person I can bemore proud of?
And then that turned into thepersonal development stuff, and
then that turned into the 75hard and all these things I
think all go together.
It became easier to be moreself-aware and audit those
thoughts.
I think it became important tome to audit those thoughts when
I was 17, 18.
And I started thinking how am Igoing to build my life into

(01:24:03):
something meaningful?
What do I want to do?
How do I want to impact people?
What business do I want tobuild?
I had to be very honest withmyself in those thoughts and I
had to be very honest withmyself in those thoughts and I
still wasn't very good at it.
It's a skill.
It's a perishable skill.
You have to practice itconstantly.
And the time I had thefoundation, but I wasn't good at
it, but I still did it to thebest of my ability.
And it came, it went, it gotbetter, it got worse.

(01:24:27):
I've let it go, I've rebuilt itand it became a way of thinking
over the course of time, ofconsistent practice.
It just became the way that Ithink that's where my mind just
kind of naturally goes is whatwas I thinking earlier and why
did I feel that way?
Or like what am I feeling rightnow?
Constantly I'm giving myselfthat really strange like third
person kind of feeling.

(01:24:48):
Like I'll just kind of touchthis skin and really hyper focus
on like that feeling of touchand get myself kind of in this
third person state of mind likewhat am I thinking?
What am I feeling right now?
Can I feel the blood flow hitmy fingertip?
And then go back to the likereally strange hyper, self-aware
states of being.
Yeah, I'm constantly puttingmyself through that and people
freak out at the idea of doingthat.

(01:25:09):
So, like I don't want to feellike I'm in my own skin, that's
weird.
Like I've seen people actuallyhave like physical, visceral
reactions to that.
I'm like that's weird to me.
Yeah.
I get it, but it's weird to me.
It became easier over time, butit definitely wasn't there
always.
Yeah.
It was a foundation that wasset by my dad, and then I was
able to be self-aware enough tobuild on it, To build on it yeah

(01:25:30):
, I think it all starts with.

Speaker 1 (01:25:32):
I think everything that you're doing and we've
talked about like it all startswith self-awareness, Like if you
don't have that skill, you know.
Like, first find that skill andhone that skill.
You also.

Speaker 2 (01:25:45):
self-awareness is also like there's layers and
there's levels to the game,because you can be self-aware
about your basic eating habits,but you might not be aware of
where those things come from,and then you have to learn
yourself.
It's like constantly learningyourself and you'll have a new
thought.
We all have thoughts that arelike what was that thought?
You know like what in the worldwas that I would never act on
that, but it's a part of who youare because you had the thought

(01:26:07):
, so look into that.
Where does that come from?
What is that like?
And it's just a constant gameof learning yourself, because
people can be self-aware, butthey can only know what they
know, and they don't know whatthey don't know until they
discover or are prompted tothink a different way, which
then allows them to learn more.
But they have to be activelytrying to learn in order to get

(01:26:28):
the opportunity to learn morethrough those prompts and
experiences.
It is a consistent game that youhave to be playing all the time
and it sounds labor intensive.
Yes, initially you have tochange how you think, but that's
done through constantlyevaluating your thoughts and

(01:26:50):
trying to shift your thinkingwhen you get the same stimulus
One of my favorite definitionsthat Hormozy has for learning,
and I think it's how smartsomeone is or knowledge is
learning is same stimulus,different response.
And learning is same stimulus,different response.

(01:27:15):
And intelligence is rate oflearning.

Speaker 1 (01:27:22):
Like how quickly you can learn something.
Yeah, it's like if you reach.

Speaker 2 (01:27:25):
If you reach for the cup and I smack your hand and it
takes you four times of doingthat before you realize you
shouldn't reach for the cup,you're not as intelligent as
somebody who then reaches, getssmacked and learns the first
time, and that to me I'veapplied that to.
Okay.
Well, if I can have, I havethis set of thoughts or this set
of emotions or this set offeelings when I experience a
certain thing.

(01:27:45):
Somebody cuts me off in trafficas an extreme example of that,
or as just an example, notextreme.
The next time that that happensI don't necessarily want to
feel that way.
So when that happens and then Iget that feeling very quickly,
just kind of dismiss it.
It's like not important,doesn't matter.
Fight every urge.
You have to feel angry, upset,sad or otherwise yeah and you

(01:28:07):
will.
Through that effort, it willeventually become second nature
and it will eventually becomewho you are.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:28:14):
So in that scenario or that definition, intelligence
is like you have, you know, acertain level of intelligence in
an individual and that doesn'tchange or that can change, but
you're right.

Speaker 2 (01:28:29):
You can.
It can change because somepeople will learn faster than
others.
But if you want to beconsidered more intelligent
intelligent if we're using thatas the definition you just have
to decide to change your rate oflearning.
Rate of learning yeah, becausethat's something that's
controllable, like people thinkthat intelligence is
predetermined by to somecapacity that's what I was
getting at.

Speaker 1 (01:28:49):
Right is is like your intelligence, like set, like
your intelligence is is here, myintelligence is here, and like
that's not going to change.
I don't think so.
Yeah, because I think I could.

Speaker 2 (01:28:57):
Really.
I think if I got hyper fixatedon something and then lost my
ability to learn as quick or Ididn't I wasn't as adaptable
because I let certain skill setsgo but you became more
disciplined and honed in onthose things, our perceived
intelligence would definitelyshift.
I will say that it becomesharder to allow that to happen

(01:29:22):
when you start focusing ondiscipline, because the moment
like 75 hard has this effectwhere now that you know that you
can do what the programrequires, you can't not know
what you're doing.
That's screwing up your life,the level of self-awareness that

(01:29:42):
you gain.
You have to work exceptionallyhard to get rid of that
self-awareness, because noweverything that you do that is
inconsistent with who you wantto be becomes painfully obvious
where otherwise you were justliving in ignorant bliss.
So I think the more that youdive into that endeavor and the
more intelligent and disciplinedyou try to become, the harder

(01:30:02):
it is to lose the skillset, eventhough it is perishable, but
the harder it is to lose itbecause you notice everything.
You notice when you made thesame mistake three times and
you're like, oh my God, I'vemade the same mistake three
times.
And you're like, oh my God,I've made the same mistake three
times.
Holy smokes, I was doing thatfor the last 10 years of my life
.
Got to fix that, yeah.
Yeah.
And then it comes down to yourdiscipline to actually make the

(01:30:23):
decision to fix it To fix ityeah.
I like that I think that you'rein full control of who you are.
You just have to do the things,and they're hard to do.

Speaker 1 (01:30:34):
Very hard, but it can be done If people want to
follow you and follow yourjourney and just learn more
about what you're doing.
What's your Instagram?
What's the best way to connectwith you?

Speaker 2 (01:30:46):
Instagram is five.
The number five TV went out.
The number five C-H-A-Y.
It's my first name, five chayon instagram.
My first and last name chay.
Not on youtube.
Chay not on youtube.
And then my tiktok is five chaynot, because chay not and five
chay were both taken, so nowit's different across all the

(01:31:07):
platforms chay not on linkedin.
I post most on Instagram.
It's mostly where I am.
I will be focusing very hard onshort form content and written
content on LinkedIn and TikTokhere shortly, but that's to be
determined.

Speaker 1 (01:31:21):
Nice.
Che thanks for being here, man.

Speaker 2 (01:31:23):
This is fun, man.
This is a good time, dude, hellyeah.

Speaker 1 (01:31:26):
Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Palm
Harbor Local.
We are incredibly grateful forour sponsors and our viewers,
who make this show possible.
Be sure to check out Jake withRoadmap Money you can find his
link in the description belowand keep supporting local
businesses and let's buildcommunity together.
Advertise With Us

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.

The Joe Rogan Experience

The Joe Rogan Experience

The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.

Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.