Creative Catastrophe: The Christmas Train That Broke Me

A true story of public failure, creative heartbreak, and the unexpected path to redemption.

This is the most vulnerable, raw, and unforgettable story we’ve told on the podcast so far.

In this extended episode, Mak shares the real-life tale of a Christmas train festival gone spectacularly wrong; complete with crushed dreams, media headlines, lawsuits, and a moment that nearly broke him. It's a story of public failure, creative heartbreak, and the surprising redemption that came on the other side.

We know this episode is a bit longer than usual, but if you’ve ever chased a big creative dream, risked it all, or wondered if failure means the end — this is one you need to hear.

🔍 What’s inside:
00:00 – The promise we made in Episode 6
03:00 – How failure becomes part of your story
08:45 – The Christmas train begins
16:00 – Going all in on the dream
25:00 – When things start to unravel
33:00 – Public fallout, lawsuits, and heartbreak
45:00 – What came after: rebuilding, redemption, and lessons learned
1:06:00 – Why your worst moments might be working in your favor

This one’s for the dreamers. For the ones who’ve dared greatly. For anyone who’s ever failed loudly and still wondered if they’re meant for more.

Thanks for listening to The UnBound Creative!

If today’s episode resonated with you, share it with a friend or leave us a review, it helps more creatives discover the show.

💌 Connect with us on Instagram:
@valeriemckeehan & @thatmakguy (that’s Mak with a K!)

Keep creating bravely. We’re so glad you’re here.

Episode Transcript

Mak (00:00):
I don't know where I would have gone or what I would have
done.

Valerie (00:02):
You just didn't know what to do with yourself.
I just didn't because I was soheartbroken.

Mak (00:06):
It's one thing to fail.
It's another thing to fail andeverybody on the news is talking
about it Right For days Likethis was not a one story and
it's over.
They were like on the hunt.

(00:33):
So this is going to be like apart two, because we made a
promise in the last one and thendidn't deliver, which is
literally one of the worstthings you can do, especially
when you're broadcasting ordoing a podcast.

Valerie (00:43):
So it was a bait and switch.

Mak (00:45):
It was.
But it was a bait and switch onus too, because we had this
loose plan for what we weregoing to do and then we got off
on tangents.
I think helpful tangents.
I think, so, but then we didn'tget to the meat and potatoes
because we also didn't want tomake a two and a half hour
episode.
Right, hi, I'm Mac, I'm Valerie.

(01:13):
To the meat and potatoes,because we also didn't want to
make a two and a half hourepisode.
Right, hi, I'm mac, I'm valerie, and this is the unbound
creative podcast.
We're so excited to have youhere again.
Episode number seven, sort of apart two on, uh, the fear of
failure I feel like we couldjust make the whole podcast
about failure.
Honestly.
Well, it is like a huge topic.

Valerie (01:27):
Well, because it comes with the territory.
It's sort of like okay, youwant to be an unbound creative,
you want to play outside thelines, you want to get out of
the box, you want to experiencethe fullness and the bigness and
the wholeness of your being andwhat you're capable of, and

(01:48):
that just soul electrifying wayof being.
It's gonna come with theterritory.
I hate to break it to everybody,but it's true there's no way
for you to be unbound and dosomething differently and try
things without the up and downand the fall and the get back up

(02:08):
.

Mak (02:08):
The most successful people I know my, my close friends, who
are doing amazing things orhave done amazing things at big
exits and things like that theythey have just the best stories
about failure.
And this is something that islike unique, because when you're
in the, you know.
You know when you go on like,let's say, you go on a trip and

(02:29):
everything goes wrong, the planeis late or delayed and you end
up in the in the airport for 12hours and then you get to where
you're going and the hotel roomis all wrong and then they lose
your luggage and just everythingis failing.
In that moment, man, what areyou?
You're frustrated, you're angry, you're like I hate this.
Three years later, you tellthat story to your friends over

(02:53):
dinner and everybody's laughing,including you.
It actually becomes funny andentertaining and enjoyable.
That's like this weird thingabout humans that we have we're
able to take these situations inour lives that were at one time
bad and in the moment feltawful, but later look back on
them with a light heart and itactually makes us really unique,

(03:18):
is something cool about who.
We are Part of our story and wealways laugh about those things
.
Always.
We all have stories.
We're in the moment it was badand later on we always laugh
about those things.
Always, we all have storieswhere in the moment it was bad
and later on we laugh about it.
That is literally how I, like,have begun to look at my
failures.
It's something that, like thestory I'm going to share with
you today, definitely was notsomething I was laughing about

(03:41):
at the time, but now, lookingback on it, I'm able to have a
light heart about it and when Itell the story to people for the
first time and I don't reallytell the story a whole lot, so
you have to be really close tome to get the story.
So this is like a littlenerve-racking for me today, but
it's always like everyone's justit's.

(04:02):
It is a little bit of alight-hearted retelling.
So that's something that tokeep in mind If you're afraid to
move forward.
Remember that most of the timewe look back on these things
later with some distance, withsome time, and we're able to to
actually see the good that cameout of it and enjoy telling the
story.

Valerie (04:22):
Right, even if it's not a ha ha ha.
Can you believe that?
Because they're deeply painfulthings.
Nobody wants to feel like theylook like an idiot or be
embarrassed or lose money orthese things that happen.
But like you said, I think withthe distance you cannot help but

(04:43):
see, good, that came out ofevery situation, even if just at
a level like maybe it caused apivot to happen, maybe it caused
an awakening.
That's a really powerful thing,because sometimes we just go
about our lives and it's justsort of mundane and we're like

(05:04):
this low-key, unhappy butnothing's really happening.
But then if you experiencesomething like that, it sort of
shakes things up and it's likeall right, I gotta move, I gotta
try something else, I gotta dosomething else, but it's still
motion.
Failing is is a gift because itsays you're in motion, you're

(05:28):
changing, you're developing,you're growing.
And to me that is so muchbetter than the stagnant, stuck,
soul-sucking, lost feeling Justto be okay, I tried this, I'm
in motion, this didn't go as Iexpected, but what in life does

(05:50):
really?
You know we make our plans justin general, and how often they
don't go.
Like you said, the trip.
The trip doesn't go as plannedor things get canceled or it's
just something of life that wecan have a perception of control
.
But really it's in thesurrender and knowing that your
path is unfolding and we'regoing to respond to what comes

(06:11):
to us and hold ourselves inthose moments with grace and
with gentleness when we're goingthrough something really hard
and what we really want to do inthis episode.
Like I said, this is going tojust be a topic.
I feel like that just comes upagain and again and again
because, as we said last time,we could literally make a whole

(06:33):
podcast on failing and tell oneof our own stories we have many
every single time.
But what we want to do in that,the reason we want to do that,
is because it needs to be talkedabout and, like we said last
time, and like you said, mac,you don't really get this story
because who's going to be like,hey, nice to meet you, can I
tell you about my most epicfailure that I ever had?

(06:55):
Or hey, let me open instagram.
I feel like telling everybodyabout my most embarrassing
moment.

Mak (07:03):
Right, I'm gonna dump on everybody today.

Valerie (07:05):
Nobody's gonna do that, and for that reason, I think
that we have this falseperception that everybody is
doing amazing all the time andthey're never hitting these
roadblocks and everybody justseems to like be hitting home
runs all the time, and it's justnot true.
Failure will come with theterritory of creativity, so how

(07:28):
do we get comfortable with that?
How do we get comfortable abouttalking about it, hearing other
people's stories?
And what we hope is that, inhearing our stories and hearing
Mac's story today, that youstart to understand that your
failure is okay, those thingsthat you try that didn't work
out, there's nothing wrong withyou, it's all okay, it's all

(07:52):
going to be part of it.
And we hope that hearing thismakes you feel one less alone.
Or, if you're having fear ofthis happening, stop you.
We hope that this doesn't scareyou, but that it empowers you
to say you know Spoiler alertMac is okay.

Mak (08:10):
After what happened, and what's funny is now I even feel
like we're like building it uptoo much that we're going to
tell the story.

Valerie (08:18):
It's going to be like a downer.

Mak (08:19):
That's it, because we're making it seem like I was
moments away from prison orsomething like that, and that's
not even remotely close to whatit was.

Valerie (08:27):
All right, so let's just tell the story.

Mak (08:28):
But what's even now is like as traumatic as it was for me
when I went through it.
Now I even feel like we'reoverselling it.

Valerie (08:36):
So, but I think there's a lot of takeaways and we want
you to feel less alone.
We want to demystify this topic, so so let's hear it.

Mak (08:45):
So this was like I gotta.
I try to think the timeline ofthis.
You know, when did we meet?
Was it?
Oh, sevens, because it wasright before you and I met.
It was literally the christmasbefore we met I think we met in
oh eight was it, oh eight.
I'm always foggy about that.
I gotta, we gotta go.
It was definitely oh eight itwas oh eight, okay, so this was
like oh seven, so this.
So this was quite some time ago.

(09:05):
I had the opportunity.
So I've always been a trainbuff, like steam, and I'm very
specific Okay, I love steamtrains and American style steam
trains.
If I can get really nerdy for amoment, okay, nothing wrong
with the Europeans, but I justlove American style locomotives.
Wrong with the Europeans, but Ijust love American style
locomotives.
So my whole life I dreamed of ofdoing something with trains.

(09:27):
And when I was very young I hadthe opportunity to befriend uh
an older gentleman who installeda park train 24 gauge park
train in the city where I lived,uh, harrisburg, pennsylvania,
and um, he kind of was like amentor to me.
He kind of took me under hiswing.
And I say he was young, I was Idon't know nine, 10 years old,

(09:49):
and he would let me come hangout there.
He's a retired guy, he had acarousel and a train.
He'd come let me hang out thereand, like, taught me how to
take care of the locomotive andall this stuff.
And so I did that for severalyears and I think for him it was
just free labor, because I lovebeing there.
My parents would drop me off inthe morning, I'd work all
afternoon and then they'd comepick me up and time went on and

(10:13):
I got away from that.
But years later I had theopportunity to come back and buy
it, and it was.
It was I was coming off theheels of a failed business and I
said you know what I'm tellingyou, we could do a whole failure

(10:34):
.
I spent.
I spent three years buildingsomething that never worked, and
so I was like okay, this is agreat opportunity for me to get
back to something that I love,that I'm into.
So I signed a deal.
There had been a transfer fromthis older gentleman to somebody
else who I sort of knew,actually, and I was told that it

(10:58):
was for sale, and so I signedan agreement with this guy that
that for that summer seasonthrough December, I would be
able to operate it myself.
We had an operating agreementand at the end of the year I
could buy it.
So, okay, I'm like reallystoked, really pumped, I'm going

(11:19):
to, I'm going to like run thistrain and I'm going to like love
every second of it.
And I really honestly did.
Now I had forgotten everything Ilearned when I was younger, but
I really sucked my teeth intoit and I put a lot of work into
fixing everything up.
I power washed everything andpainted everything.

(11:39):
My dad came and helped and weyou know it had kind of gotten
overgrown.
The guy who had it was justkind of kind of milking it for
the cash and so I was like, no,we're going to, we're going to
fix this thing up and make itreally beautiful.
So we did.
We, I put a lot of.
I put a lot of time, effort andenergy into it and I had a

(11:59):
blast.
And that summer I reworked everypossible thing that I could.
I changed the crowd flow, Ichanged the prices, I revamped
the snack bar, I did a deal withPepsi to sponsor what we were
doing, brought in new food and,you know, redid just the whole
vibe of the place and really gotit fixed up, and I even

(12:24):
increased the prices and no onecared.
So things were going well andthere were always big festivals
because this was going around acity park and I instituted a new
way of transporting peoplearound so you could take a ride
on the steam train, but we alsohad a trolley and so for the

(12:46):
first time ever and I couldn'tbelieve anybody ever did this
actually used the trolley totransport people around the park
because it was fairly large andthe three big festivals that
summer.
I mean I made a ton of moneydoing it.
It was just a buck and we'dtake you from.
There were three differentstops and people loved that, and
there were three differentstops and people loved that, and
so I had both of these entitiesout the same time the trolley

(13:08):
and the train.
It did well.
Okay, long story short, it didwell.
Carousel was great.
It was an antique.
It did well too, and I had areally great summer and I loved
every second of it, if I'mhonest, and I thought this is
really cool and I had all thesebig plans and these big ideas in
my head for for what I wasgoing to do with this thing.

(13:29):
Now, if you know me at all,even slightly, I've got a thing
for Christmas.
Okay, that's just me.
You know I'm.
You know I'm Mr Christmas plugfor tinsel and cheesecom.
And that's another story.
But I do a Christmas radiostation every year.
I've been doing it for, oh mygoodness, what was it?
Was this 20 years this year?

(13:50):
Yeah, it was 20 years, and soI'm a I'm a big Christmas guy.
So in you know, probably Augustof that year, I went to the city
and I proposed hey, I want todo a big Christmas festival on

(14:10):
the Island for Christmas.
And they were, they were all inon it.
They said great, we'll supportyou in any way that we can.
Now the train had neveroperated past Halloween.
They always did like some kindof a charity based Halloween
event, and then that was it andit was closed down for the year.
So I had to make all kinds ofimprovements to make sure it
could run in the cold and allthis other stuff.
So I did, I did what I neededto and I dreamed really big and

(14:32):
I loved it because it wasliterally bringing together
everything that I loved in mylife.
Like even as I'm sitting herenow telling this, I don't really
think I conceptualize thatuntil this moment.
And I went to a radio station Iused to work for.
I've been, I've, as we sit herenow, I've been in broadcasting
for more than 30 years and Iworked at a really popular radio

(14:57):
station in that city for a longtime.
I went back to them after beingabsent forever and I signed
this huge radio promotional dealto promote this Christmas event
and I called upon people I knewto set up vendor villages.
I worked with an entertainmentcompany to have musicians and

(15:19):
jugglers and magicians strollingaround.
I contracted a lighting companyto come in and put up a hundred
thousand Christmas lights, bigdisplays.
That involved me getting allkinds of I mean, it was
infrastructure that I had to do.
We had to figure out a way toshut down the island.
We were going to sell Christmastrees and it was like this
whole thing.
And then the, the, the.

(15:40):
The icing on the cake was Isomehow convinced a carnival
company to come, set up a bunchof rides at one end of the
railroad and you couldn't like.
I wanted to call it the polarexpress, but you can't do that
because it's copyrighted.
So I worked with friends ofmine who owned a marketing

(16:00):
company and we came up with thisconcept of the North pole
express and we turned the wholething into a giant game and we
call it the Great Candy CaneCaper and what it was was.
You bring your kids to theisland, you get on the train,
you'd have hot chocolate, santaClaus would be there.
But we also had Jack Frost andhe had stolen all the magical

(16:21):
candy canes from the North Pole.
And you had to get on the trainand the kids had to find all
magical candy canes from theNorth Pole.
And you had to get on the trainand the kids had to find all
the candy canes as they wentaround the ride, because they
were magical candy canes andthat's what the reindeer ate to
make the reindeer fly.

Valerie (16:35):
Did you come up with all of the whole concept
storyline?
Yes, All of it.

Mak (16:40):
Now I'm going to be fair.
These guys, the marketingagency, they helped kind of edit
this and help me pull ittogether, but this was me, this
was a true creative project.
This was exercising every aspectof my creativity that I have
ever expressed and it pulledtogether everything that I loved
.
It was Christmas, it wasChristmas lights, it was

(17:02):
Christmas experience.
It was Christmas lights, it wasChristmas experience.
It was carnival rides,amusements, things like that,
because I'm really into thatstuff.
But then I got to promote it onthe radio.
I bought a massive radioadvertising package so I got to
create radio stuff and I went sofar as to literally write the

(17:25):
jingle that was in the radio ad.
So I have a bunch of friends inthe music industry.
We went and sat down one dayand I wrote this jingle and we
recorded it in a recordingstudio and I call it my buddy.
Chad is a big time.
Everyone who's listening nowhas heard Chad's voice.
He's all over the country.
We recorded this incredibleradio campaign and we were

(17:52):
taking we were kind of takingbackhanded shots at Hershey,
because Hershey was just up thestreet and they do this thing
called Christmas candy lane,which I love, and they opened
the park and they have a couplerides open and stuff.
But it was very expensive andso I was like here's what we're
going to do.
We're going to go on the radioand we're not going to like call
Hershey out exactly, but we'regoing to point out that we've
got rides and games andmusicians and entertainment and

(18:16):
trains and lights and the wholenine and it is significantly
cheaper to come do this.
You don't have to go all theway to chocolate town.
So I think we had this line.
It's like, um, we announced allthose things and he said at a
price that would make chocolatetown melt down.

Valerie (18:36):
So okay, I called it out.
I mean I didn't say her, sheyes but here's what happened.

Mak (18:45):
Was that?
But the part of the radio?
I mean, I'm telling you rightnow, if you know me at all, it's
like I got to.
I was doing everything that Iloved and on top of it it I

(19:06):
hired a pr firm.
We got the mayor involved andhe actually issued he went on
television on the news andissued a decree for uh, at all
points bulletin for capturingjack frost.
Like we got the whole thing.
The guy that I hired to playSanta was an actor friend of

(19:27):
mine and we made him the Santain the Harrisburg Christmas
parade.
Like I got this whole thingtied together.
I went huge.
I went huge and it wasfantastic, but it was everything
.
That was me, it was, it wasfantastic, but it was everything

(19:48):
that was.
That was me and it was.
It was shaping up to be a really, really great event and I was.
I was so excited about itbecause it was everything.
It was trains, it was radio, itwas writing songs, it was.
It was strolling musicians,magicians, like I mean, it was

(20:16):
me a hundred percent.
It was every part of me that'screative and it was every part
of me that lights me up.
I put into this thing and it wasalso every dollar that I had
made all summer.
I took every penny I made and Iremember the week before we

(20:36):
opened I had like 500 bucks leftin my bank account and I had
even I even got a couple ofacquaintances to invest money in
this to get a return, um to bepaid out.
And the deal, part of the dealI cut with the radio station was

(20:59):
and this is a very common, atleast it used to be you could,
uh, they sold tickets to thisevent, they sold them themselves
on a website and they kept allthe money and that paid for part
of my ad campaign.
So they, we, I'm telling youthis radio package.

(21:20):
I know you sold radio.
It was unlike anything.
It was a huge radio package.
I know you sold radio.
It was unlike anything, it wasa huge package.
Okay, I mean, we were on theair every 10 minutes for two
weeks.
It was insane.
And I even went in and was onthe morning show.
Like they brought me in to talkabout it and, like I said, we

(21:40):
got the news and all the newschannels were there.
We did a whole brief.
I mean I'm telling you this.
Okay, I made the point, I wentbig, so everything was looking
great.
We were opening the Saturdayafter Thanksgiving and they put
the tickets on sale like a weekor 10 days before then and it
was the fastest they ever soldany tickets to any event that

(22:04):
they had done in the history ofthis radio program, and I think
we sold, I'm going to say, 5,000tickets, or 8,000 tickets or
something like that, in 10minutes and I thought, oh my
goodness, this is it.
My life has changed forever.
This event is it.
So it's the day beforeThanksgivinggiving.

(22:25):
Now this is when things startto go a little south.
So remember, I have fivehundred dollars left in my bank
account.
I had spent every last dime,but I knew that this coming
weekend I was probably gonnahave tickets for pre-sale.
I was gonna have 20 000 peopleshowing up for this thing.
I mean, I had 100 porta pottiesbrought in.
I'm telling you it was big.
So there were.
I was like that's it.

(22:47):
I'm going to have 20,000 peoplehere.
They're all going to pay 12bucks and I'm going to be able
to pay everybody andeverything's going to be great
and life is going to be good.
Thanksgiving happens.
I'm riding a high.
I feel great.
It's Thanksgiving.
I'm, like so excited about thisevent.

(23:07):
But the Wednesday beforeThanksgiving I got a little
ahead of myself.
The Wednesday beforeThanksgiving I get a call from
someone in the parks departmentand they said hey, we're looking
over the plan Now.
I had met with these peopleprobably 15 or 20 times.
I had to put together a massiveplan.
They had to approve everything,which they did.
Part of it was a liabilitypolicy for $5 million, which is

(23:31):
pretty standard.
They called me the Wednesdaybefore.
It was like one o'clock onWednesday afternoon.
They said we need you to makethis a $10 million policy or
you're not allowed to open onSaturday.
So that was a lesson for methat I've carried with me for
the rest of my life.
They like pulled the rug andhow am I gonna get a $5 million

(23:52):
liability policy?
At one o'clock in the afternoonthe day before Thanksgiving,
somehow, we pulled it off and byfive o'clock that night I had
taken that last $500 and acredit card and I got the policy
up and I was like, whatever,I'll deal with it later, but I

(24:14):
figured it out.
That was very stressful for me,but we got the policy and I got
it in on time because they weresaying well, we're not going to
be open Saturday.
So if you don't get it by theend of the day today, we won't
be able to look at it untilTuesday.
So you can't open this week.
I'm thinking I've just beenpromoting this event for 10 days
.
We're going to be open onSaturday.
Now you're telling me I can't.
So that was a lesson that Ilearned in dealing with

(24:37):
governments Always geteverything in writing ahead of
time, which I had not done.
So anyway, long story short,saturday comes.
My staff is there.
I have no money and I'm likebut tonight we're going to be
plumb with cash.
Everything's going to be great.
We're opening.
I don't know what time.
It was six o'clock, somethinglike that.

(24:57):
Everyone's there.
Three in the afternoon, we geteverything ready and get the
train fired up.
You know the carnival company'sthere, they're excited, I'm
excited.
Get the train fired up.
You know the carnival company'sthere, they're excited, I'm
excited, we're all excited andI'm.
I'm like it's 5, 30, nobody'sthere and I'm going.
Well, you know, it's saturday,after thanksgiving.
Maybe some people, you know,just a little late, they're
gonna trickle in.
Six o'clock there's like 20people, 6, 30, maybe 100 people.

(25:25):
We weren't going to close until10, but I had to close that
night by 9 o'clock because therewas nobody left to ride.
That first night we did 300people, 400 people and I was
expecting 20,000.
And I thought, oh no, and I hadjust barely made enough to

(25:50):
cover my expenses for the night,the people I owed money to and
everything.
So I paid that out and I said,well, it's okay, we're going to
open tomorrow, we'll see how itgoes.
The same thing happened onSunday.
We had about the same crowd andthen that was it.
We were closed again until thefollowing Thursday.
And so I started to panicbecause the entertainment

(26:11):
company they were like, look, wehave to get paid, we got to pay
our people and I didn't haveenough to pay them.
And the carnival company wasmad because they were thinking
they were going to have allthese riders and they didn't
have any riders.
They didn't have any riders.
And I'm starting to freak outBecause I have no money.

(26:31):
All these people are breathingdown my neck and I'm going where
are all the people?
We had like those 8000 ticketsthat pre-sold.
We only had like 50 show up andI'm going.
What's going on?
So long story short.
That would be very disorienting,like what's happening I did not
sleep, I don't think Monday,tuesday or Wednesday.
It was just awful.
I felt very, very low and I wastrying to keep a happy face and

(26:58):
maintain composure because Isaid, well, it was opening
weekend, it was Thanksgiving,thanksgiving.
Maybe people are just waiting.
So I was like but we've gotthis coming weekend.
We pre-sold all these tickets.
There's got to be 20,000 peoplegot to be coming this weekend.
So then that Thursday comes andit was the slowest night yet

(27:22):
there were.
That Thursday we only had like30 or 40 people and we shut down
an hour after we opened and Igot a call from the guy that was
running the carnival company.
He's like look, if we don'thave any, if this keeps up, I
can't afford to keep my ridesopen.

Valerie (27:37):
We're gonna leave on sunday and I thought, oh, no,
this was supposed to run everyweekend until christmas through
new year's, yeah, and I'm going.

Mak (27:47):
You I said I'm like you can't go.
He's like.
He's like hey, I feel bad foryou.
He's like, but I can't affordlike.
He's like I'm not a charity andI'm like okay, I get it the
entertainment.
The woman that ran theentertainment company was like
I'm gonna dip into my line ofcredit if you're willing to
start paying back my line ofcredit if they, I'm freaking out

(28:07):
going.
Where is everybody?

Valerie (28:08):
What have I done?

Mak (28:09):
Meanwhile all the lights were running on generators
because the island didn't haveenough power.
So I had to have a fuel companycome and refill all the
generators, and that wasexpensive and it was just like
things were snowballing.
I said, okay, friday night,here we go.

(28:29):
This is going to be the bignight.
It's the first weekend indecember.
Everyone's in the christmasspirit.
There's no holiday.
Weather was beautiful, and thatnight we actually had like
maybe five or six hundred peopleand then the following sat we
maybe had another 200.
And that was barely enough tocover what costs that I had.

(28:53):
And I was still in the hole.
And then that Sunday I got acall from the carnival company.
They were pulling out and Ithought I made all these
promises, what am I gonna do?
And I I like didn't know whatto do.
I had no experience with this.

(29:13):
I was just this lone guy.
I don't know how old I was then, 22 maybe and I'm trying to do
and I'm just like, okay, okay,do I reduce the price of tickets
?
Do I give money back?
Like I, because we weren'tgoing to have a carnival now and
it was beautiful.
This, I mean this carnival, wasgreat.
We called it the north polelike people would.
We'd stop, we'd let people off,they'd ride and they'd get on

(29:33):
their rides.
And we came back like 30minutes later and we picked them
up, we took them back and thatfollowing Thursday, I hadn't
made any plans.
I didn't know what to do.
There was an ice storm.
I said, ah, I can close andpeople will be cool with it, and
so I closed Thursday and Iclosed Friday and then I closed

(29:57):
Saturday.
Now the ice storm had beenThursday but not Friday and
Saturday, but we made anannouncement that the tracks
couldn't handle the trainers.
I can't remember, but I wasjust, I was trying to find cash.
I was trying to figure out howdo I get another carnival, it
was all this stuff.
But by Saturday people who hadpre-purchased tickets were

(30:17):
starting to get angry becausethey showed up and we were
closed.
And I remember it was it wasthe Sunday afternoon of that
second weekend.
I'm out with my friend Michaeland the news comes on and the
headline on the six o'clock newswas what happened to the North

(30:41):
Pole Express and had video of meand there was vo saying
customers in an outrage becausetickets you know for the North
Pole Express were not honoredand it was closed and nobody can
figure out why.
And my phone blew up and all ofa sudden every news station in

(31:02):
town was calling me.
The newspaper was calling metrying to figure out what
happened to this event.
And they were like well, therewas a carnival here last week
but it's not here this week andwhat is going on?
And then the mayor came out andsaid we don't know anything
about this.
We don't know.

Valerie (31:17):
Because you were closed for one weekend, because we
were closed for one week andpeople didn't know honestly.

Mak (31:21):
I mean, it probably looked a little shady that we were
closed two days after an icestorm and it had melted, but you
know.
But there the, the, it was soquick, the, the mayor's office,
turned on me in a heartbeat andyou know, I understand politics.
Whatever, they didn't want tohave their name associated with
it.
But, honestly, all of my alllike that, that last minute

(31:45):
change with the insurance reallymessed me up.
I'm not blaming them for that,but at the same time it didn't
help because the credit cardthat I put all the money on was
what I was going to use as mybackup.
If you've ever owned a business, you get it.
So anyway, long story short, itwas very public and by the

(32:10):
following.
So I had to call the PR guy thatI had hired to get me all the
good press and I said you've gotto step in for me and you've
got to explain what's going on.
And he's like okay, well,what's going on?
And I said I don't have anymoney.
The carnival left.
Nobody showed up.
I don't have any money.
The carnival left, nobodyshowed up.
I don't know what to do.
I'm not out here trying toscrew anybody.
But nobody came.

(32:31):
Like we were expecting thismassive crowd.
We sold 8,000 tickets and ofthose, I'm telling you, of those
8,000 tickets, we maybe hadlike 150 come in in the first
weekend and I thought, where,where are these people?
Because I was depending eventhough they had prepaid, for I
was still depending on them tobuy food and do other things
that would bring income in.
So, um, he had to.

(32:56):
He had to start dealing withthe, with the, all the news
outlets and I mean everybody.
It felt like the world wascrashing around me and I said I
can't do this.
I remember his name was Steve.
I said, steve, I can't talk tothese people.
I'm too embarrassed, I'm fullof shame.
I'm like you have to fix this,we have to close.

(33:19):
I can't do this and I'm likeI'm breaking a bunch of
contracts.
I said but I can't, I can't dothis.
And I'm like I'm breaking abunch of contracts and said but
I can't physically afford toopen, I just can't open the
train, I just can't do it.
So we're gonna cancel it, I'mgonna cancel the whole event.
And I called the radio station,said I'm gonna cancel I don't
know what that means for thetickets and they said look,
we'll give, we'll give the moneyback.

(33:40):
You're our buddy.
You worked here for seven oreight years.
We've got your back at least.
They were like cool about it.
But the headlines and the thingsI heard, like my name was being
associated.
It was being said in the mediathat local businessman, mac

(34:01):
mckeon, canceled christmas inharrisburg and all I wanted to
do was make an incrediblechristmas for people.
I was the opposite.
They were.
They were like.
They were saying they weremaking fun of my story.
They were like oh, it turns outjack frost is the is the owner
and operator of the event.

(34:21):
And it was like no, that's notme, but the it was.
I cannot express the pain in mysoul that I had to endure.
And of course, people arecalling me.
What's going on?
And then the piece deresistance, hershey announced if

(34:44):
you purchased a ticket to theNorth Pole Express, you can use
it to get in to Candy Lane.
They did a whole campaign abouthow you purchased a ticket to
my event.
It was good to get you intoCandy Lane and I will say that,

(35:11):
as much as that hurt in themoment, I was really proud of
myself Because I said Like theyheard the ads where I said they
were melting down.
And then I melted down.
But what's crazy is I was like,but I think I freaked them out

(35:39):
a little bit and I thought, okay, maybe I'm a really good
marketer.
So when your name is beingdrugged through the mud,
especially when it's forsomething that you had no
intention of like, I was beingmade to look like a criminal and
I was.
I was anything.
But I was under the sheets inmy bed, bawling my eyes out,

(36:07):
just trying to figure out how tokeep this whole thing together
and I just I couldn't.
I was out of options, I was outof money, I was out of time, I
was out of favors and I didn'thave that intent whatsoever,
whatsoever.
I wasn't trying to screwanybody.
I wasn't trying to.

(36:29):
I was literally trying to do theopposite you were trying to
create magic I was trying tomake magic and I think what
happened was it really shot medown, because it was an
assassination of everything.
That was the definition of whoI am creatively.

(36:49):
It felt like that event was mysoul, like on display for the
world.
It's like I'm giving of myself100% and I want people to feel
good and feel happy and lovethis because I love this and all
I wanted to feel good and feelhappy and love this because I
love this, and all I wanted todo was make people happy.
And it ended with heartbreak andI was sued.

(37:20):
I was sued by a coupledifferent people and vendors.
I wanted to pay everybody backthat I could and I didn't know
how I of my life.
I was so low and I didn't knowwhat to do and I was like I love

(37:52):
Christmas and this sucks.
And out of nowhere, my friendShane who you know, he was in
our wedding he called me and hesaid hey, man, it doesn't sound
like things are going too wellfor you.
Do you want to go on a cruise?
And I said when does it leave?
And he said tomorrow.

Valerie (38:14):
See ya.

Mak (38:15):
And I said bye, bye, and he's like I'll pay for it, you
pay me back whenever I go.
You know what dude?
There's a long list.
I hope you understand that.
He was great.
He's like hey, whenever, dude,just let's go, I got this and I
think that saved my life.
And, um, I really do, and Iknow that sounds dramatic, cause

(38:39):
I wasn't like suicidal oranything, but what I mean by
that is I don't know where, Idon't know where I would have
gone, or what I would have done.
I just didn't because I was soheartbroken and in that moment,
of course, my family was, wasthere to comfort me and I had
really good friends just saying,hey, you know this is awful and
we're sorry that this happened.

(39:00):
What can we do?
Like I did have those people.
It wasn't like I was all aloneor anything.
But when you're in a place thatlow and you, it's one thing to
fail, it's another thing to failand everybody on the news is
talking about it for days Likethis was not a one story and
it's over.
They were like on the hunt andthank goodness for the PR guyve

(39:27):
I think his name is steve.
I don't know what I would havedone if I had to face that music
and um and so it was tough.
It was.
It was the lowest point of mylife.

Valerie (39:43):
I mean, I've obviously heard this story before, but it
is hard to hear, even hearingyou tell it again.
I feel myself kind of gettingteary-eyed just hearing that and
hearing what happened to you.
I think that going throughsomething like that,

(40:04):
experiencing like your story, isepic and we wanted to talk
about it and tell some of thesethings because it is epic.
But I think experiencingsomething like that as horrible

(40:27):
and heartbreaking and all ofthat, I feel like it really
developed empathy, like I thinkit really gives you empathy for
people who are doing stuff.
People who are doing stuff andI think about Brene Brown how,

(40:49):
in daring greatly because that'swhat you did you dared greatly.
I mean you went big and I knowyou can list out a laundry list
of mistakes that were made thatkind of snowballed some that
were outside of your control,some that were in your control,
and that's what I want to say.

Mak (41:04):
I you know that insurance thing was it?
It it was like kind of theicing on the cake, but I made
about 50 bad calls leading up tothe event that had I made them
differently, I probably wouldhave been okay, um, and I can
recognize what those were now.
So I take full responsibilityfor this.

Valerie (41:24):
I'm not trying to put it off on that one event, but
that that singular thing likedrained my last dollar but what
I was going to say is that,endearing greatly the quote I
think we've even talked about itbefore where it's like when
you're in the rink with otherpeople doing things and you hear
the you know the jest orwhatever from the people in the

(41:48):
stands.
We're not listening to thosepeople.
It's the people who are in therink doing the thing, trying to
bring beauty to the world,trying to do something good,
trying to bring light and givingof themselves, and I think it
gives you just a whole otherlevel of empathy for just people

(42:10):
who are trying to create.
And again, this is aspectacular story, this is an
epic story that most peoplearen't going to experience,
something like that.
So I want it not to be acautionary tale, but it's

(42:36):
actually a tale of going doingsomething, it's a tale of being
in the rink.
So I want to ask you do youregret it?

Mak (42:43):
No, no, I don't, because in the moment I regretted
everything.

Valerie (42:54):
Sure.

Mak (42:55):
But when you come out of it and you come through and you
see the light of day lookingback now, do you know how much
we avoided okay, for as manymistakes as we continued to make
into the future with our futurebusinesses, do you know how
many mistakes we avoided becauseof that singular event?

(43:15):
It made me much stronger in myability to see where holes could
exist.
I was very blind and naive backthen for things of this nature,

(43:35):
but I came out of it with aknowledge that really helped us,
especially when we moved intoour next business, which was an
ad agency, and we started doingevents for people.
We were able to do things sosuccessfully because I failed so

(43:56):
spectacularly and you know asdifficult as that was.
I wouldn't trade that story foranything right now because you
know, in a way it is.
It's kind of painful to sort ofsit here and relive it, but it
helped make me who I am todayand I'm pretty strong, you know

(44:23):
what, and I'm a pretty smart guywhen it comes to marketing and
putting events together andunderstanding what it takes to
be successful in that world.
And I never would be that, Iwouldn't be that guy without
that spectacular failure I hadto go through that to make me
who I am today.
But you know what it gave me?

(44:49):
More than anything else, it it?
It gave me a not a sense ofbeing like risk averse, like I
came out of it understandingthat you can kind of fail big
and still be okay, and so we'vebeen able to take very big risks

(45:11):
that have paid off for us highreward because of that event.

Valerie (45:20):
Well, it's almost to me hearing something that
spectacular it would.
It's almost like if somebody islistening and thinking about
their worst case scenario.
You know, and we kind of we gothere sometimes and we build
things up so big in our heads.

(45:40):
We are storytellers as peopleand as part of being these
incredible storytellers that weare as human beings, that is
also gives us the stories of ourfears and our anxieties and we
have the these ideas of if I dothis, and then what if this
happens in the worst casescenario?
And what if I put this outthere and I get made fun of, or,

(46:03):
you know, we have these bigthings that may be holding us
back.
That giant fear comes true.
There's a level of resiliencethere and just the capability of
human beings to be resilient,to be strong, to have a trust at

(46:36):
the same time with the partsthat were outside of your
journey or outside of yourcontrol, of your control, that
this journey that you are on.
It's like a trust in in that.
At the same time, if that makessense, it's kind of like, okay,
if the bottom falls out and theworst case scenario happens,

(46:59):
I'm still gonna be okay.

Mak (47:01):
Well, I want to say too that that event and thank
goodness for Shane taking me onthe cruise, but when I came back
I still had to face the music.
I couldn't hide from it.
I tried to run away from it butit didn't work, and the after
effects of that in terms ofreputation and finances and

(47:25):
things like that went on for acouple of years.
But I came out of that and Isaid back to basics.
I'm going to go back to radio,I'm going to go to the thing I
know that I can absolutelysucceed in and I'm never going
to open a business ever again.

(47:46):
Because, like I said, I wascoming off a failure Now.
I had a couple of hits beforethat, like I had two really
successful businesses before thetwo big failures.
But I was like I can't do thisagain, I just can't.
It was too big, it was toopublic, it was too hurtful, it
was it.

(48:08):
I just can't.
It was too big, it was toopublic, it was too hurtful, it
was.
It ripped apart everything thatwas me essentially as a
creative and so I went back toradio and I met you.
Yeah, you came into my life twomonths after that three months
after that was Christmas.

Valerie (48:23):
Yeah, we met on the first day of spring.

Mak (48:27):
And so I guess the point there is yeah, I had to have
that failure, but that got meback to my core and I retreated
back in.
I said OK, wait, what actuallylights me up, what makes me feel
good and how can I start torebuild?

(48:47):
And when you fail, the firstreaction I think for most people
is hide in the dark and getaway from the world.
And if you have to do that fora while, do it Feel it Like I
said?
I was like under the sheets inmy bed, crying, but I got that

(49:10):
out.
It's almost like mourning, likewhen you have a death of
somebody you love or a pet orsomething like that.
You go, you gotta feel that,you gotta get that out.
You can't suppress that.
That's bad, and that's what Idid.
I, like, mourned my creativity,I mourned what could have been,
I mourned the dream, I mournedthe loss and it helped me

(49:30):
process it.
And then, when I came out onthe other side sometime after
new years, I said, okay, if I'mgoing to rebuild, I got to get
back to the basics.
I got to go to what I know.
I got to do what feelscomfortable, even if it's a
little humiliating, because atthe time I thought going back to
being on the radio was a littlehumiliating because I had had

(49:52):
major success on a nationallevel in radio years before and,
like now, I'm back on somesmall podunk radio station.
But I had an opportunity to doit and then I met you and three
months later we started abusiness.

Valerie (50:11):
The business you said you would never start.

Mak (50:13):
Yes, and.
But what happened was?
I recognized in myself that,okay, you, you, okay, that
didn't work, but it's okay,you're okay, you can still do
things.
Just because that didn't workand it didn't work in a big way

(50:34):
doesn't mean that you are notcapable of doing big things.
It didn't teach me that, nope,I should never try to do
anything big, ever again.
What it did do is make me alittle wiser, made me a little
more cautious, but it didn'ttamp down my spirit in the long
run.

(50:54):
For a while there it did, but Ithought no, I can still do this,
I can come back from this and Ican grow something bigger and
stronger, and I can use this tomy advantage.

Valerie (51:06):
I think what you were doing was so tied to just you
and those parts of you that arethat are undeniable, and I think
that that's veryquintessentially creative as
well, that when you have thosepool pools of yourself that
you're like, well, this is stillreal.
Pools of yourself that you'relike, well, this is still real,

(51:30):
like that is still very much me,and the dust needs to settle,
and you need to hold yourself inthose moments just with the
gentleness and what you need toalmost nurse yourself back to
health from a blow like that.
But I think in a way, it almostI mean, tell me if it it kind
of solidified it almost, that itwas real.
It sounds like that, evenfacing that kind of a failure,

(51:56):
that you're like, okay, but thisis still very much me and I
still love these things, and italmost it didn't ruin christmas
for me yeah it didn't destroy.

Mak (52:09):
It didn't.
It didn't destroy any of that.
It's weird because in themoment it felt like it was all
destroyed yeah and it felt likeI had no friends and I felt like
everybody hated me and I feltlike I was literally essentially
called the grinch of harrisburgand I was like Mr Like.
I'm like Mr Christmas.

Valerie (52:26):
Yeah.

Mak (52:27):
I love Christmas more than all y'all but, um, but that was,
that was hard and it all.
But what it also taught me,like, like you mentioned earlier
, something I never reallythought about from that
perspective but empathy forpeople who are in.
So I think that's probablyinforming what we're doing today
, even to this moment, why I amsuch a cheerleader for people

(52:50):
who want to try, because youshould, and if you get anything
out of this, I'm here and I wenton from that experience to
build, along with you, the twobiggest companies I ever built.
That was not the period.

(53:12):
End of sentence.
End of story.

Valerie (53:14):
And it could have been.

Mak (53:16):
It absolutely could have been.
But what came next wassomething that I never even
remotely imagined.
I never thought in a millionyears that I would be the CEO of
an ad agency and that I wouldbe doing keynote presentations

(53:37):
on digital marketing.
I never thought that I would besitting across the table from
people at major retailersnational retailers negotiating
deals, and that's what happenednext, and it was like it.
Had I let that defeat me, Idon't know where I'd be right

(54:00):
now.
I'd probably be doing morningson some radio station somewhere,
and not that that would be bad,because I love that.
But look at, look at what we'redoing now.
Like I really love what webuilt and what we've become and
where we're headed.
And the thing that I've learnedthe most is you can't try to

(54:24):
control where you're going.
I have just enough light tokind of see the next step and I
take that next step, and Iunderstand that.
Ultimately, do I have some biggoals?
Sure, like there are thingsthat I want and you know what
those are, and we talk aboutthat kind of stuff.

(54:44):
But what I learned is the pathis never the path you think
you're going to take.
And so, if you look at it thatway you really can't truly fail,
because if you don't know whereyou're going, you can't say you
went the wrong way.

Valerie (55:05):
I think we tend to forget the detours in our lives
because we're in the presentmoment and things feel really
heavy and they feel scary.
But then, just looking back atthe different detours that I'm
sure everybody has, those thingsthat didn't work out the way
that you thought, or it may nothave been even driven by a

(55:26):
failure, but just maybe adisappointment.
Something fell through, youdidn't get the job, or the house
fell through and then you endedup in a different house, and
there's all of these littlepaths and there's definitely a
spiritual component of that forus.
And there's definitely aspiritual component of that for

(55:47):
us in that there's a trust andknowing that we are going to be
held and taken care of, andtrusting that that journey is
going to lead where it needs togo, and that's very, very hard
in the moment needs to go, andthat's a very, very hard in the

(56:09):
moment.
Um, but really all we have isis the present.
Anyway, we can be worried aboutthese things and let it.
Let it stop us, but when we cancome back to the present moment
and just take those next footin front of the other, trusting
that, yeah, the path is going tobe filled with detours.
If everybody knew exactly howeverything they did was going to

(56:30):
turn out and just by doingsomething means that it's going
to turn out then everybody wouldbe doing it.
But they're not doing it Right.
Because Good point, becausethere's an inherent surrender
that happens when you chasecreativity, or when you I
shouldn't say chase or just whenyou follow it, when you follow

(56:58):
the promptings, when you goafter these things, there's the
inherent risk.
So, I think, going into it notwith a posture of fear for
what's going to happen, but witha surrender at the same time,
and you go with the light thatyou're given.
We mentioned my dad in the lastepisode, but that's something my
dad says as well.
So you just go with the lightthat you're given, and isn't

(57:19):
that really all any of us can doanyway?
Because even if you have like asurefire thing, like for you,
you're saying, hey, it was asurefire thing, we had these
tickets sold, it was okay, itwas a little scary, but it's a
surefire thing.
But there's no such thing everas a surefire thing, and isn't
it funny that that's the case inlife?

(57:40):
You know, like we're talkingabout creativity and taking
risks and doing these things andbeing vulnerable and going
maybe a path less traveled, on acreative path.
But even the people who arelike, nope, I'm not doing that
I'm going to stay right where Iam.
I want to stay the safestpossible and and control.

(58:03):
I feel like your life shrinks,your soul shrinks down and
you're not at that fullestexpanse that you could possibly
be.
Oh, by the way, and you stilldon't have control.
So it's kind of the the loselose because it's life and life
comes at you hard and fastsometimes.

(58:24):
So to me, to be living large,whatever that means to you and
and people are cut out fordifferent things, that's the
thing.
There's no one-size-fits-all.
We are huge on that.
We actually absolutely despisethe people who are like we have
a course that's a one size fitsall for everybody.
We hate that, and becausethere's not a one size fits all,

(58:48):
and so what living large to youis going to be different from
what living large to somebodyelse is.
But the point is, it's to theexpanse of your soul and who you
are made to be, and there'snothing in nature that holds
themselves back from that.
You don't have redwood trees ordolphins or things in nature

(59:10):
that it's like no, I need tostay small.
The peony bush does not say, oh, I shouldn't be so showy.
But then you have the violetsand the dandelions, and they're
made to be that, and that'swhat's beautiful about the world
, that's what's beautiful abouthumanity that we have all of it.

(59:30):
But the point being, nothing innature holds itself back from
its fullest expression theplants and the trees.
It's like they're going totwist themselves and twist their
roots and everything to be whatthey are.
Nobody, nothing in nature, isholding itself back from that,
but we, as humans, we do.

(59:51):
We hold ourselves back, andit's not going to look like
other people, it's going to beyour version of what does that
out loud life look like?
What is that whisper to follow?
Out loud life look like?
What is that whisper to follow?
Even if it is.
It has a risk, even if it yourisk looking foolish or having

(01:00:11):
your friends and family thinkwhat are they doing?

Mak (01:00:17):
Well and that's what I want to say, because everything
you're saying is so true, andthat event was like the fullest
expression of who I was, and itdidn't go the way I expected,
but you know what, for thepeople that came, it was pretty
darn magical.
It was, it was, it was reallynice and I was proud of it.
And I think I think one of thekey things I want you to take
home from this is that, eventhough I was all over the news,

(01:00:43):
that even though I was all overthe news and I had this
experience and my name was runthrough the mud within six
months, nobody even rememberedit.
Nobody.

Valerie (01:00:57):
That's a good point.

Mak (01:00:58):
Nobody remembered.
And so what Val is saying is sopoignant, because give your
full expression, give everythingthat you have, put it all out
there, and if it doesn't work,you might feel like an idiot for
a couple of days.

Valerie (01:01:13):
Which not everything will.

Mak (01:01:14):
Right, but nobody's going to remember, nobody's going to
care.
Okay, yeah, your mom might,your best friend, might, might,
but they're your best friend andyou're your mom.
So you move on and you and youdo it again, and you and you
keep living out that fullexpression of yourself until,

(01:01:35):
until it all clicks.
And that's how you deal with it.
That's how you deal with thefailure, like if.
How you deal with the failureLike if it happens.
You feel the pain, you mourn it, and then you get back to
basics and then you start overand you go okay, I'm ready to do

(01:01:56):
this again.
Let's do this again, becausethere's nothing, there's no pain
that isn't worth expressingthat magical spark that you feel
within you.
Take it from me, take it fromme.

(01:02:18):
And this is not the firstbusiness I had where my name was
run through the mud in themedia.
This was actually the secondtime this happened to me
publicly and it never.
It didn't get easier, I can saythat.
But what I can tell you is itdidn't keep me from trying, and
that's the, that's the trick.

(01:02:38):
You just gotta, you just gottabuckle up and do it again and
start over and go okay, thatdidn't work.
I mean, look at Steve Jobs.
That guy got kicked out ofApple and then he went on to
make a company that he sold forlike $700 million and then Apple
begged him to come back andthen he turned it into the most

(01:02:59):
profitable company of all time.

Valerie (01:03:01):
Isn't it interesting how all of the people who have
really done big things, theirstories are peppered with these
things, which is what we weresaying at the top of this
episode is hey, get ready, youwant to live unbound.

(01:03:21):
You want to release thatgorgeous soul of yours and your
purpose and your calling and thebeauty that you want to bring
into this world.
It's like Do it.
But the disappointment, Ishould say, is part of the

(01:03:43):
territory.

Mak (01:03:43):
It is or at least things not going to plan Well, no,
disappointment is going to bepart of the territory it is, or
at least not things not going toplan.

Valerie (01:03:48):
Disappointment is going to be part of the territory.
Yeah, but what we're saying iseven in the most epic and
spectacular of bad situations,which we have other doozies to
tell.

Mak (01:03:59):
Well, and I was going to say, and this sea is spectacular
in the realm of my life, butthere are people with way more
spectacular failures than thisand um, but it's still worth it.
It's still.
It's still worth it.
And I, and now I'm thinking of,and now I'm thinking of
jonathan larson.
We watched tick, tick, boommaybe a couple months ago, and

(01:04:20):
he spent what?
10 years trying to get that hisfirst show on broadway, and it
just wasn't working and itwasn't working and it wasn't
working.
And everybody from StephenSondheim to Stephen Schwartz was
like, look, this just isn'tworking.
And he kept at it, and he keptat it, and he kept at it.

(01:04:41):
And they were just like you,just, you just got to stop.
And so one day he's like, fine,you, just, you just got to stop
.
And so one day he's like fine,whatever.

Valerie (01:04:48):
And he gave up and then he wrote rent.

Mak (01:04:50):
It's almost like and he changed Broadway forever.

Valerie (01:04:53):
He let go of the outcome.
He did Isn't that interesting,like you're holding so tightly
with your fist, like if thisdoesn't go this way, then I'm,
but then you just let go and Godis like, oh, but there's
something else here, but wait.
It's like isn't that sointeresting?

(01:05:14):
It's like in the surrender ofit, in letting go of the grip,
in understanding that we can'talways understand yeah.

Mak (01:05:25):
And I can honestly say that was probably one of my biggest
problems was I was just tryingto control everything so much
originally and because of that Imissed a bunch of stuff and
that's what led to to some ofthe bad decisions is because I
was very outcome focused, like Iwas visualizing me being a
millionaire by the end of theyear.
And instead I.

(01:05:49):
I owed people a million dollars.
It was with the other way, soum but you're here.
Here I am.
I'm going to tell the story.

Valerie (01:06:01):
And I think your story is going to help a lot of people
.
I hope that this story hasencouraged you, that you will be
okay by you following yoursoul's path.

Mak (01:06:13):
The darkest moment of my life led to my wife Like if it
had been a success, you and Inever would have met.

Valerie (01:06:24):
Which is a whole other thing we could get into about my
chain of events that put me atthat radio station, and it is
again.
We can look at these things inthe past and go, wow, so we need
to look at that and think aboutthat for our present situation
too.
That what, if, what if thingsare working out?

Mak (01:06:42):
That's a phrase, that's that's one of my favorite things
.

Valerie (01:06:46):
When things are going wonky or chaotic or it just
feels like, oh my goodness, whatin the world is happening.
We started saying the phrasewhat if everything is working
out in our favor?
And it is amazing, Adopt thatphrase.
What if everything is workingout in my favor?

Mak (01:07:05):
And that's another great way.
That's a fantastic lens throughwhich to look at things when
they don't go well, like I'mthinking now of the Garth Brooks
songs, some of God's GreatestGifts, or Unanswered Prayers.
There's just such wisdom inthat concept and that's
essentially what you're sayingis, if you are outcome focused,

(01:07:26):
then that's all you're focusingon.
You don't really have theability to see how perhaps what
you're going through now, evenif it's terrible, is working out
for something so much better.
It's like when our daughter islike I'm like, oh, I've got an
ice cream cake in the freezerand she's screaming because I
didn't give her, you know, acookie, and I'm like, don't hate

(01:07:47):
, you got to keep it underscreaming because I didn't give
her, you know, a cookie.
And I'm like, don't hate, yougot to keep it under control
because I got something for you.
And she's just so mad about thecookie and she doesn't know
that if she keeps screaming,she's not going to get the ice
cream cake.
It's like, but there'ssomething much better coming
along.
If she would just be patientand be chill about it.
You know what I mean, andsometimes I think that's us.
You know we're.
We let these things get downand we complain and all of this,

(01:08:08):
but then there's something somuch better just on the horizon
and sometimes it's not just onthe horizon.
Sometimes it's 10 years later,but it's coming.

Valerie (01:08:19):
Well, and I think it's the trust, and when you are
consistently seeking your ownalignment and becoming who you
are meant to become, followingthe whispers of not your fear,
but following the whispers ofwhen you really get quiet and
what is nudging you forwardcreatively, then the journey

(01:08:42):
does become the thing, becauseyou are in alignment, you aren't
fighting like, you're nottrying to swim upstream anymore,
you're caught with the flow andyou're just like look, I don't
quite know where this is headed,but I know that I'm following
these whispers of myself andsometimes that really is a

(01:09:03):
journey of self-discovery.
That is a process that happensin a lot of invisibility, where
you may not see the fruit ofthat but know that you are
becoming.
And by you seeking that out andseeking out that alignment, we
often don't know who we are orour calling or what we're

(01:09:26):
supposed to do, and those thingschange too.
So I think that having justthat overall gentleness with
yourself and knowing thatanytime you're seeking your
alignment and that calling ofyour soul, which we firmly
believe for human beings isgoing to be to create, it's
going to be to make a lastingimpression on this world I'm

(01:09:48):
thinking of the book MissRumpius that we read to.
Vienna, where it's the lupinelady and her grandfather told
her you must make the world morebeautiful.
And she plants all of theselupines and I truly believe that
when we do get to our soul'scalling to us, it is going to be
in some form of making theworld more beautiful in an

(01:10:12):
infinity amount of differentways and if you know that, if
you have kids, you probably knowthat book.
I mean it's really famous andif not, it's a great book.
Look up Miss Rumpheus.

Mak (01:10:21):
Yes, if you don't have kids , read the book anyway.
It's a children's book but it'sso full of wisdom.
But my favorite line in thatbook is and it's a single line
on a page after a long winter,spring came.
And every time I read that,even when I'm reading it to to

(01:10:42):
the girls, that's how I read itthere.
I don't even think there's acomma there, but that's how I
read it.
I don't even think there's acomma there, but that's how I
read it.
After a long winter, springcame and that's literally how I
feel it is.
When you go through like ifyour winter is sunny and 65 or
60, when spring comes, you'relike whatever.

(01:11:03):
Spring comes, you're likewhatever.
But if the winter is is longand dark and cold, a little hard
, when spring comes it's such a,it's like it feels so good and
that's what being creative andgiving of yourself is like,
because there is no springwithout a long winter.

Valerie (01:11:31):
But the real secret is learning how to love the winter.

Mak (01:11:33):
If you can figure out how to love the winter, then when
spring comes it feels evenbetter.

Valerie (01:11:43):
There's something to be said for a preparatory season,
and aren't we always in that?
Because, as human beings, we'renever arriving.
And so isn't it interesting tothink that you, right now, could
be in a real season ofpreparing, and that could be
through failure, that could bethrough disappointment.
Nothing in your life is wasted,not one thing.

Mak (01:12:08):
And so that was probably one of the last points I wanted
to make was with the wisdom ofremoval now from that situation.
There hasn't been a day Ihaven't thought about that train
.
I mean literally every day ofmy life since then, because I
loved it.

(01:12:29):
There is something about thatthat just filled me up in a way
that most of the things I'vedone hasn't.
And I just tell myself I wastoo early, I was too early, it
was too early, I got there toosoon and I it wasn't for me yet.

(01:12:59):
And I firmly believe thatsomeday coming and I don't know
when it is it's probably notgoing to be that train, but I'm
going to own one again and I'mgoing to get another shot and
I'm going to do it right.
And that's a very comfortingthought for me and it's
something that I look forward to.
But I'm not trying to force it,because I know when it's time

(01:13:19):
it will happen and it willhappen organically, because a
lot of that situation was forced, even the opportunity to take
it over.
The guy that was leasing it tome, I don't think, really wanted
to let it go.
He wasn't ready yet, he wasmaking things difficult.
There were, I mean, there werelots of little things that that
now, as a guy my age, lookingback with all my experience, I'm

(01:13:43):
going yeah, that's a red flag,that was a red flag that was a
red flag.
That was a red flag but how doyou know?
A red flag until you do itUntil you have a red flag.

Valerie (01:13:51):
That's with anybody that's with anything.

Mak (01:13:52):
Right, yeah, and so, um, so now I'm, I'm now.
I'm just sitting inanticipation, and that's an
exciting moment because I knowsomeday, at some point, I'm
going to be sitting minding myown business and the phone's
going to ring and they're goingto be like you know, what Do you
want to train?
And I'm going to know thetiming is right, and so that's

(01:14:17):
something else to take with youIf you have a failure.
Maybe you're just a little toosoon, but that doesn't mean that
you do nothing in between.
No, you keep going it's.

Valerie (01:14:28):
you keep going, you put one foot in front of the other
and again, you continue tochoose that alignment, day after
day.
It's like alignment pluscourage plus action.
That, to me, is the saucealignment followed by courage to
take the action.
Yes, that is the path, that isthe way through, that is, to me,

(01:14:53):
the way to a life well livedthat will feel in just alignment
to your calling and thatexpansiveness of what you're
capable of and the beauty thatyou're capable of bringing from
those parts of your heart thatthat are real.

Mak (01:15:08):
I couldn't have said it better myself.
I couldn't.
That's, that's really good sowell, thank you, mac for sharing
your story.
I know that that was that was alot.

Valerie (01:15:20):
I don't think, I don't think you build it up too much.

Mak (01:15:23):
It was pretty, too much it was pretty, it was a lot, but um
well, I mean I guess that'spart of the point is that with,
even with time removed, you knowit doesn't feel that big
anymore and that's what I wantto encourage you with Like and
it could just be, it could beanything, it just it.
With time it does get betterand it's like, if you can learn

(01:15:46):
to be comfortable with that, ifyou can learn to be comfortable
with the discomfort.

Valerie (01:15:50):
Or learn how to fail.

Mak (01:15:52):
Yes, learning how to fail is probably.

Valerie (01:15:54):
Learning how to fail well, learning how to fail fast.

Mak (01:15:58):
You know, all of those things One of the best things
that I can say, because thatwill serve you very, very well,
because, oh man, there's nothingworse than feeling something in
your soul and just not doing itRight.

Valerie (01:16:10):
And I do feel like you made this point before, but I
just want to punctuate it thatthere's not a whole lot of
scenarios that happen now onyour entrepreneurial or creative
journey that you don't feellike, oh yeah, I can handle that
, like it built something in youthat's like all right, if I
could face this, then I can dothis, I can face this, and

(01:16:33):
that's really just the journeyof growth and becoming, and
although it's painful, I mean wehave how many analogies we can
say about going through the firelike that and then having the
more capacity, having thecapability and the strength that
that brought well.

Mak (01:16:49):
The other thing it taught me is when I, when I, I've
always sort of searched outmentors in my life.
Now, when I, when I seek advicefrom people, I seek advice from
people who failed.
That's way more valuable to methan someone who, like, got an
mba and now they're a lawyer, abanker or they're you know, just

(01:17:11):
you know, in some kind ofbusiness.
I'm not knocking that, but in akind of a way I am because the,
the people I know who havefailed and then gone on to do
big things, they're there,they've got the biggest hearts.
They want to give away the most.

Valerie (01:17:27):
It's part of that empathy.

Mak (01:17:29):
They encourage you and they also know what the heck they're
talking about.
But more importantly and what Ireally learned is they know
what they don't know and so,instead of pretending or acting
like, oh, I've got this figuredout, they go you know what.
I really don't know how toanswer that question, but these
three people might, and that'ssomething that I've really loved

(01:17:52):
.
Learning is I really know.
I can speak so confidentlyabout what I do because I know
what I don't know, and I knowwhat I don't know from having
failure.

Valerie (01:18:02):
Yeah.

Mak (01:18:03):
And that's a really powerful place to be, when you
don't have to know everythingand you know that not
everything's going to work, butyou're okay with it and you know
what you don't know, so youknow who to ask for help, and
that is such.
I think you just feel like alike, you feel like a superhuman
when you can finally look atlife from that position.

Valerie (01:18:26):
Yeah, well, I hope that this episode was helpful for
you.
I hope that it made you feelless alone in your own fears or
your own experiences ofdisappointment, of failure, of
letdown, and let's just againnormalize that it's okay.
Like you were saying, mac,about the people who have

(01:18:49):
experienced this, they have alevel of empathy, there's that
level of like you, like look ateach other.
You're like I get it.
This is hard, you're doing,you're taking the road less
traveled, because everybodywould be doing it if it was easy
.
But you choosing your alignment, you choosing to enter this
unbound way of being andcreativity is going to what

(01:19:09):
ultimately open you up.
But if it were easy, everybodywould do it.
So we hope that this makes youfeel less alone.
We hope this makes you feelempowered, that even in the
midst of those things that don'tgo right, there's always a
sliver of light in there.
There's always you moving toyour becoming.
Nothing is going to be wastedand we're going to be back again

(01:19:33):
continuing to hopefullyencourage you on this journey
and on this path and sharingmore stories and all of it.
So we hope that you are gettinga lot out of this.
If so, we would so appreciate areview.
It really, really helps othercreatives who need to feel less
alone because we have a darkworld out there.

(01:19:55):
We need more people putting outbeauty into the world, putting
forth their souls, alignment andwhat they are called and
specifically made to do.
We need that.
Yes, there's not too manypeople doing that out there, and
so if this would help acreative that you know, share it

(01:20:15):
with them, leave a review.
We would be so grateful.

Mak (01:20:18):
Reviews mean a lot and subscribing too.
Yes, hit the subscribe button.
That really does help juice upthe algorithm and help more
people find us.
It makes a big difference.

Valerie (01:20:26):
So thank you so much again, and we will talk to you
soon.
Bye.

Mak (01:20:30):
Bye-bye.