November 1, 2023 • 54 mins
What if you could transform your life by shifting your focus from achieving to contributing? That's exactly what construction mineshifter, author, and podcast host, Jesse Hernandez, set out to do, and he's sharing his profound journey with us on this episode of the Uncommon Communicator Podcast. Drawing from the most compelling chapters of his book 'Become the Promise You're Intended to Be', Jesse unveils the enriching process of transitioning from achievement to contribution and the liberating power of forgiving oneself.
During this heart-to-heart conversation, we delve into the potency of authenticity and the power of human connection. Shining a light on Jesse's unique term for intuition, 'the whispers,' we explore how heeding this inner voice can guide us towards fulfillment and how ignoring it might lead to friction. Jesse provides thought-provoking insights, alluding to the fact that our perceived "deficiencies" and "defects" are not just our own but are part of the shared human experience, leading to an impactful realization of just how intertwined we are.
Our profound discussion with Jesse threads further into the empowering role of vulnerability in public speaking and the transformative magic of sharing one's story. Jesse's experiences prompt listeners to not just say “I” but also “we” when discussing group experiences, fostering a sense of community and shared experience. So, come join us for this enlightening conversation that not only captivates but promises to inspire you, affirming the strength in sharing your detailed personal journey and the hope it can instill in others.
You can reach Jesse on the socials:
e-mail course to help field leaders get connected with the men and women doing the work: https://www.depthbuilder.com/visible-leadership
link to books on my website: https://www.depthbuilder.com/books
link to all my social accounts: https://depthbuilder.bio.link/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOJqHEhS1CtX3A4nztIBzdA
Instagram: The_Uncommon_Communicator
TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@theuncommoncommunicator
Facebook: The Uncommon Communicator
LinkedIn :https://www.linkedin.com/company/80960291/
Website : theuncommoncommunicator.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jesse Hernandez (00:00):
You want to talk?
Right down to us and a languagethat everybody here can easily
understand.
Do you understand the wordsthat are coming out of my mouth?
What Space, water here, space,what again?
I dare you, I double dare you.
What we got here is a failureto communicate.
The UnCommon Communicat (00:25):
Welcome to the Uncommon Communicator
podcast, where we are here tobring enlightenment to the topic
of communication.
Help me welcome Jesse Hernandez, my guest today.
Jesse is a constructionmineshifter.
He's building a community ofintentional leaders known as the
emotional bungee jumpers.
He's a consultant and authorpodcast host, and I don't agree
with this aspiring social mediamogul.
(00:47):
Jesse is a social media mogul.
Jesse, welcome to the program.
What's going?
Jesse Hernandez (00:54):
on, james.
Thank you, thank you, yes, I amworking on it.
I don't have the numbers thatjustify my mogul-ness, but in
Jesseland I am a mogul and inthe future, in the rest of the
omniverse, I will be that socialmedia mogul.
The UnCommon Communicator (01:13):
You are certainly defined as a mogul
in my world.
If a mogul inspires otherpeople, then you're out there
doing that certainly.
Jesse Hernandez (01:21):
That's it.
The UnCommon Communicator (01:22):
Did I leave anything else out.
I mean, that's from yourLinkedIn, so it's your fault if
I left anything out.
Jesse Hernandez (01:27):
Yeah, no, no, I appreciate that I don't know
about you, james, but craftingthe profile on any of the
socials or even a bio forspeaking engagements and stuff,
it's a really uncomfortablething for me to do because it
feels self-serving andbraggadocious.
(01:49):
Now, I don't mind being thepeacock and getting all the
attention when we're live, andyou got the rooster on your
shirt.
I don't mind that.
But that's different than mewriting about the stuff In terms
of if anything was left out.
(02:09):
No, I think that covers it.
There's probably stuff, but Ithink we're good.
The UnCommon Communicator (02:17):
We're going to dive in and we're
going to cover some of what youjust talked about in one of your
chapters, specifically thechapter on I.
I believe it is, it's the.
When is I write chapter 11?
We're going to dive into thatone a little bit because that
one sparked something within me.
But let's talk about.
We got you on again second timeon the show.
Welcome Right here.
(02:39):
Jesse has written a couple ofbooks and started live streams
and all kinds of things sincethe last time we met.
Hey, it's your baby, you don'ttabulate your own deal, but I
definitely dove into the book.
I've got to say this First, ashout out to you directly.
You are responsible for, Ibelieve, any success that the I
(03:04):
should be giving you royaltieson the Uncommon Communicator
podcast.
We met early, early on, and youinspired me to podcast.
You know we were at this leanevent which was five bucks or
something to go to a Gemba lock,and you were just even a
portion of.
You weren't even leading it.
And you mentioned podcasts andI'm like, hey, what's this about
?
I don't think I listened to apodcast before.
(03:24):
Then.
I thought, man, if Jesse can dothis, I want to do this and I
did so.
You inspired me to start my ownpodcast and I appreciate that
and really, oh, a lot of itsgrowth to following the social
media logo that you are.
But you wrote a book right here.
Become a promise and it is yoursecond first book.
Explain that before we move onto this one.
Jesse Hernandez (03:46):
Yeah, yeah, so the second, first book.
So I had begun writing thisbook, which is becoming the
promise you're intended to be, Idon't know, Maybe two years ago
, I was inspired by my friend,Lee Crump, who wrote the forward
in the book and, as I was, so,when I started writing it, I was
(04:09):
, I was in my head.
I was like, Okay, I want thisto be like essentialism, Like
you've read the bookEssentialism, Amazing book,
Great ideas in there and thefive dysfunctions right, Lindsay
only.
And kind of the way they writetheir books is a story and
there's takeaways.
And so I started writing it andthe idea was I became aware
(04:32):
that two things I became awareof.
One was I became aware of whenI transitioned from achieving to
contribution, my life gotbetter.
The other thing was when thiswas least fault.
He made me aware that my storycould inspire other people to
(04:53):
forgive themselves or to forgivefamily members, etc.
And give them hope.
So, anyways, I was writing thebook.
That's right.
About that time, Jennifer Laceyand I started having the, the
live streams about five s inrelationships, and so after
those live streams and you werea part of those, a lot of people
(05:13):
were part of them Kirby, Kirbycoats had asked like, hey, Jess,
like I wish there was a placethat I could just have like all
the nuggets, all the greatpractices that people shared in
the chat, and I said, Okay, well, I got all the transcripts, the
transcriptions.
I'll go read them and find them.
I spent about 10 minutesreading and I said hell with
this, I ain't going to read allof this.
(05:35):
It was like eight and a halfhours of content.
And then I said, Wait a minute,I've got all this transcribed.
Kim White Princess Kim was.
She was my coach in publishingthe first book.
I sent her an email and said,hey, I got an idea.
This was like December twoyears ago and she said, yeah,
let's do it.
So we did, and so I had topause on this book because that
(05:57):
was the first book workedthrough producing Lean in Love,
and then, once that got out, Ipicked up this book again.
It was interesting because whenI read my original transcript, I
was like this is garbage.
This is like weak sauce,kindergarten tough guy, stuff,
(06:17):
right.
And when I mean by kindergartentough guy, I mean like not.
So this is just superficial topwater skiing crap.
And that's because, through thelive streams, I discovered that
this vulnerability thing was athing, and I didn't understand
it at first.
But people were like, Jesse,it's because you share your
(06:41):
mistakes and you just talk aboutanything, any mistake that you
made, whatever I learned I waslike, oh, and that was valuable
for people.
So Like my mindset had shiftedsuch that it was like that first
draft was like there was novulnerability.
It was very cerebral, superintellectualized, and so I said
(07:05):
hell with that, I'm going to godeep.
And then that's what happened.
So that's why it is my secondfirst book.
The UnCommon Communicator (07:13):
So the first book then in that
pause, really helped you bring abetter product in this book
with a different set of eyes.
Isn't that great?
And I'm a big believer in howthings happen for a reason and
you look at that, and always tothe better if you're looking to
find the better out of it,because it's always hidden in
there somewhere.
So let's talk about the bookfirst, that structure.
(07:35):
I like talking about thestructure of your book.
It is a bunch of stories whichare fantastic, right, and
they're doing the serve.
The purpose which you want isthese stories help impact and
lead to the message.
But there's a couple of thingsthat I noted in here is every
one of your titles are questions, almost every single one of
them, and I thought that isJesse and in it which made the
(07:59):
investigator and me say where isthe question in it?
Because what I really enjoyedabout the book and it's almost
like a mystery novel is you knowif say here's a, you know
here's a chapter, start righthere that says you know, is
there a prize in the darkness?
You don't start the eachchapter with is there a prize in
the darkness and then answer it.
It's in there somewhere, whichis really kind of new.
(08:21):
I don't know if you did thatpurposely, but the question is
hidden in there.
So I love that because and asyou you know, you have master
questionator as your title andthat's something that you know,
a moniker that you have givenyourself.
We've all given.
I've given that to you as well,but it's all the chapters or
questions which is really makesyou dive into.
Does that question fit me?
(08:42):
So I love the idea of it.
I did something I don'tnormally do, which is I read the
first chapter in the lastchapter, because I wanted to see
how you circled this around,and so this is an interesting.
So that at the end of your veryfirst chapter, you said this we
just can't keep living life theway we've been living it.
We have to let people in.
(09:02):
There are too many of us foryou and me to continue walking
alone.
Now that obviously you put thatfor a reason, tell me a little
bit more about that, thatpurpose statement that you put
in there, man thank you, thankyou.
Jesse Hernandez (09:18):
So you know, the gist of that statement is
and it's something that Idiscovered right, and you can
hear all the details throughoutthe book but the gist of the
statement is for a very longperiod of time, I believed I was
the only one experiencing thepains that I was experiencing
(09:39):
and I thought, like I thought,it was unique to me because of
my deficiencies, because of mydefects.
And what I've learned over theyears is that it's absolutely
not unique to me and it's notbecause I'm my character defects
, it's because I'm human andwe're all human, right.
(10:02):
So, going back to thevulnerability thing, when I
share the stuff, the dumb stuff,the short sighted, selfish,
embarrassing, shameful thingsthat I've done and what I've
learned from them, that helpsothers know that they are not
alone and there were none of usare alone, but we're all walking
(10:24):
I shouldn't say all.
Many of us are walking, as ifwe are, and so it's it's a call
out to say, hey, I got you right.
Like we're people, we makemistakes and we can learn from
them.
And, and you know, walking thepath in community is far more
fulfilling than it is to bewalking it independently, which
(10:47):
ties to like the original ideaof achievement and winning,
because when I win, everybodyelse has to lose, and when I
achieve, I have to do better,score higher than everybody else
around me.
So that's the isolatingexperience, whereas contributing
, sharing my gifts and talents,that is a communal experience.
The UnCommon Communicator (11:10):
Yeah , and that's okay.
So now I'm going to jump intothe last chapter, because I
don't, I don't know.
I do know you tied this alltogether and you can see your
very last statement in the book,because you know that I think
about.
In any message that we give,the most important thing is how
we started and the second mostis how we end it, and sometimes
(11:32):
that's the most importantbecause that's what people
remember.
But this is what you said.
Today.
I surround myself with peoplewho appreciate the goodness.
You likely have X-ray visiontoo.
You can see the enormous,gigantic human being that is in
front of you, hiding behind fear, hiding behind perfection and
avoiding rejection.
Because you can see this, it isyour responsibility to let them
(11:56):
know what you see, point it out, show them, help them
understand.
You see them because we allneed to be seen, did I?
Jesse Hernandez (12:06):
write that Damn .
That sounds good.
The UnCommon Communicator (12:09):
And that's how you ended it.
You tied in that very firststatement to the end with some
fantastic stories in the middle.
But tell me about thatstatement, because that one
really it's a challenge but it'scoming straight from your heart
.
Jesse Hernandez (12:24):
Yeah, man, yeah .
First I got to confess I didnot do that tie on purpose.
I absolute like for real, forreal.
When I put the, put the storiesout, I just I did speech to
text and I just had a list ofstories and I shared all the set
, all the stories, blah, blah,blah.
Kim Princess Kim is the one whoarranged the sequence of the
(12:47):
stories.
The only one thing I wanted wasstory number one had to be
number one because people neededto understand the title.
The rest of it was up to her.
I just left it up to her and soI got to credit her for that.
No, but the fact that you putit together like that's pretty
awesome, man.
(13:10):
So that last statement in theend comes from and I think a lot
of I'm not alone in.
Rather, I know I'm not alone inthis.
You know, when I think of me itkind of ties back to the bio
thing.
I see all of my mistakes, allof the nefarious things that
(13:32):
I've done, selfish things thatI've done, all the goals that I
missed, all the people that Ilet down, all the disappointment
that I contributed to people'slives, and I see it like a hull
of mirrors, right With genes.
They're magnified and amplifiedand contorted and really way
(13:53):
bigger than what they actuallyare, and that's all that I see.
And so that keeps me in thisstate of feeling less than when
I interact with another humanbeing.
I'm just like you saying thatI've contributed to your path as
a social media mogul.
I don't see that.
(14:15):
The only time I see it, and theonly time I can believe it, is
when I'm seeing myself throughyour eyes.
And so when people talk to meand share with me of how I've
impacted their life, how I'vegiven them courage, how I've
given them hope, how I pissedthem off, like it doesn't matter
when people are telling me whatthey see, I fall in love with
(14:37):
that version of me because it istrue, but it is foreign to me,
because it's not the versionthat I see all the time.
And so, like I know how I feelwhen I'm around people that
reflect back to me the greaterthings that I ignore.
And so that's the idea, right,surround myself, if I surround
(14:58):
myself with people, because fora long time I doubted it, I
discounted like, no, no, youjust don't know all my garbage,
right?
The only reason you're sayingthis is because you don't know,
I finally got to a point where,it's like you know, I'm very
selective about who I surroundmyself with, and those people
are like ballers, right, likethey contribute to the community
.
They're not just aboutthemselves.
They have accomplished great,they're very accomplished in
(15:21):
their careers, they're honest,they're good people, and because
they are, I need to believewhat they're telling me, and so
it's that kind of it's a littleweird thing, but it's what helps
me get away from operating in asense of deficit, right Meaning
(15:44):
like I'm trying to make up forsomething and keeps me in a
place of contribution.
How do I continue to share mygifts and talents?
I'm not always aware of thegifts and talents, I'm not
always aware of how I impact andtouch people's lives, until
somebody tells me and they showme through their eyes of what
they see.
And so that's the point, rightIs find people around you that
(16:11):
tell you things that you don'twanna believe, cause they're not
lying, and that gives usfreedom, right.
That gives us permission tocontinue being super awesome.
The UnCommon Communicator (16:23):
Yeah , absolutely.
Now the book.
I mean you dig really deep intosome personal stuff and what
was interesting and we've knowneach other for a year and a half
, a couple of years now but toreally understand the backstory
a little bit of what brought youthrough to your sobriety.
I mean, in a lot of sense, thisis a book to help anybody out
(16:47):
of who's into addictions, andyou're specifically talking
about substance and alcohol, butthose type of abuses fit any
type of addiction, and a lot ofconstruction folks have them.
There's a lot of alcoholism, alot of drugs and stuff involved
in any business that you're at,but specifically in our trade as
well, in construction isworkaholism.
(17:09):
I mean, there's a lot of thingsthat we become addictive to.
I come from an alcoholic familymyself and I never, you know,
delved into alcoholism, but do Ihave addictive tendencies?
Yeah, did I have over 40 bonsaitrees at one point, because 39
wasn't enough right.
And then, for the most part,though, my addictions have been
(17:30):
towards work.
Like last night, I worked till7 o'clock at night because I
wanted to get that floor done.
There's things that becomeimportant to us in our work,
which is just as much of anaddiction.
So these things fit.
But in diving into your storiesthere's the reps you talk about,
right, and I hadn't thoughtabout AA and that whole process.
(17:54):
Being getting talking aboutthese things more is something
that you're doing with peoplenow, especially through the live
streams.
You know, there are things thatI'm realizing, like why am I,
who have not been emotional formost of my life, purposely, you
know struggling with some things?
It's because, oh, I've nevertalked about these and you're
drawing these out in people nowas well.
(18:16):
But I see that you've put thereps in because, like, I can't
get through it.
You know I can't barely talkthrough it, but how therapeutic
was it to also put all of thatstuff out there for everybody in
the book?
Jesse Hernandez (18:29):
Man.
So first I want to say this interms of addiction, people have
asked me, especially when I wasin rehab and recovered.
Like in those circles, thecommon question is like what's
your drug of choice?
Right, because everybody wantsto know.
Huh, right, and mine is more.
I'm addicted to more ofwhatever.
(18:50):
Most of the stories in here aretied to my addiction with
alcohol, because that's what Igot arrested for and I'm
grateful that I didn't getarrested for some of the other
things.
But I'll tell you like I'll hiton this and so hope maybe
people can do someself-reflection.
Some of the symptoms of mebeing going down the path of
(19:13):
addiction to whatever it is,like you said work, marathon,
running, womanizing, like all ofthe things, is all.
The rest of my life is indisarray.
My weeds are three foot.
The weeds in the yard are threefoot higher than they ever been
.
None of the dishes are washed,none of the clothes are washed.
Everything's a mess.
The truck's a freaking mess,like the chaos in my life.
(19:36):
It looks the same regardless ofwhat I am being consumed by.
So it is absolutely.
Alcoholism is a thing, right,and there's some other stuff
that comes with alcoholism, buthaving an addictive nature and
over rather neglecting the otherimportant things.
(19:58):
For one thing is also a symptomof addiction and requires
attention.
So but back to the reps.
That was the question.
Right Is the therapeutic natureof getting this book out.
So when I was in South Carolina,when I started doing the speech
to text, it had a lot of roadtime, windshield time.
(20:20):
I was driving back and forth, Iwas going to Clemson with Adam
to do a thing and anyways, I wassurprised at some of the
stories.
I think the last four storiesare the ones that moved me the
most.
It drew out the most emotion.
I didn't expect it to happenand as I was like speaking the
(20:42):
stories, some of the like Icried on most of them, and when
I say cry, I mean like tearyeyed.
I choked up a little bit.
But those four stories, at theend, even when I recorded the
audio book, you can hear myvoice cracking and me trying to
maintain composure.
I ugly cried when I recordedthem right and it was hard,
(21:06):
cause I had to go back and likefigure out what the hell I was
saying, cause the voice didn'tpick it up right and the
interesting thing.
So after I did it I'm like,okay.
Why is that?
Why am I like what is going on?
Because some of that stuffhappened back when I was a kid
(21:26):
and the difference was I used tocry tears of anger, I used to
cry tears of pain and regret.
This time those tears were maybetears of empathy, like cause.
I know what I felt back thenand that kind of feeling came up
(21:50):
and I also know that I havecome a long, long way from that
and I also know the impact thatI've been able to have in other
people's lives because of thatexperience.
And I was also excited about ohmy God, I'm putting this thing
(22:11):
out there into the world.
Imagine the impact it can havegoing forward.
And so the tears this time werelike filled with all of that,
like their tears of hope, theirtears of healing, tears of
understanding, and so, in termsof therapy, it helped me really
(22:34):
cause.
I don't think before then thatI wasn't aware of the progress
that I have made around thoseissues, and so what it helped me
understand was like or maybe ithelped me turn really negative,
dark times into meaningfulthings that could help other
people, and so I experienced amind shift of my own in the
(22:59):
process.
The UnCommon Communicator (23:00):
In the process and that's the whole
key, right.
It's not just you get the magicpill and you don't get some way
to get out of it.
It's that process that I'mdiscovering myself very slowly
in understanding thatvulnerability part and a lot of
that, and we're gonna dive intoa little bit of that let's jump
into.
There's a chapter.
First I wanted to talk aboutthe whispers.
Jesse Hernandez (23:22):
Oh, yeah, and.
The UnCommon Communicator (23:23):
I've heard you mention that term
before and I didn't know thereally the depth of.
You know the idea of thewhispers, but this is here's
another quote from your book.
I was first introduced to thewhispers by Oprah Jesse.
Yes, anyways, the easiest wayto describe the whispers is
intuition.
The whispers pop up randomly,sometimes when I'm running,
sometimes when I'm in the middleof a presentation.
(23:45):
They are like little datapoints.
They look like a comment or aquestion by someone else.
When I'm listening to a book,something in the content I'm
consuming may connect with anidea or a question I've been
chewing on and make the nextrightest step a little clearer.
The feeling in my gut says yes,that's the way, that's the
thing I need to get unstuck.
I call them the whispersbecause I really can't take full
(24:09):
credit for the clarity of thedirection.
It feels more like I'm beingguided into discovery and boy
that.
So that statement, that ideareally connected with me because
and I've heard you mention thatbefore this podcast is a result
of a whisper.
You know, you hear something,you get an idea and somebody
says what about that?
But that whole idea I'm notsure about the Oprah part, but
(24:35):
tell me more like this seemslike the whispers have been a
big part of your life.
Have they always been there?
Or has this been something thatyou decided to start listening
to?
Jesse Hernandez (24:44):
Oh man.
So first Oprah, so raised by asingle mom, right.
And so when I was a kid, I hadto like I didn't have control
over the TV, but she mentioned Iwas like, oh yeah, that's the
thing.
So, anyhow, I'll say thewhispers have always been there.
I have not always paidattention to them and I know
(25:10):
this because, like even early onas a foreman or when I was
transitioning from likeinstaller to foreman, and all of
a sudden there were deeper,greater asks of me in terms of
taking responsibility andleadership.
I fought against it.
The whispers were telling me dothis, this is your gift, go do
(25:32):
something with it.
And I ignored it and continuedto say no, no, no, I'm not gonna
be one of those suckasses, I'man installer, blah, blah, blah.
And the friction that Iexperienced in my life by
ignoring the whispers is one ofthe contributors to my substance
abuse right and to the things Idid to escape from my life,
(25:56):
which most of that wasself-imposed friction.
So they've always been there.
When I started deciding tolisten to the whispers, things
have become so much easier andway, way, way more fulfilling
(26:17):
and the reason I have to creditthe whisper, like even in my
when I'm doing, have my 60minutes of thinking time every
day and I'm journaling,sometimes there's something that
comes out like whoa, I gottawrite that down.
Or I was jogging you just kindof.
Like you said, I write it downand I can't take credit for it,
right?
And I think that's an importantthing, because I don't know if
(26:39):
you know, but I have a prettyhealthy ego.
If I credit myself for being agenius and discovering all these
things and creating all thesethings all on my own, I know
where that road takes me right.
And so these things, these ideas, these bits of clarity that pop
(26:59):
up, help me understand or showme like, oh yes, that's
connected.
I can, that's something I'vebeen thinking about.
Now I'm gonna take the nextrightest step, and so what I
mean by that?
So, example I was talking, Igot interviewed, I was
(27:21):
interviewed on a podcast superawesome interview and the line
of questioning was around how doleaders connect with people in
the field?
And so I just kept answeringthe questions, right, it was
good conversation.
And then after that I startedthinking like, well, that's
interesting, because when I wasdoing the in-person training,
(27:42):
part of that was to go out andmeet people in the field and a
lot of the folks that were goingthrough the training struggled
with.
Well, what am I supposed to say?
The UnCommon Communicator (27:50):
Like , what do you mean Like you're a
superintendent, what do youmean?
Jesse Hernandez (27:53):
What are you supposed to say?
And then I was talking to Seanand Sean Moran.
We were on a call and he'sfamiliar with the training, the
sweat equity improvement, that Itransitioned into a virtual
experience and he's like allright, jess, how are you doing
the visible leadership piece,which is where you go talk to
(28:14):
people?
And I said, well, I don't, likethat's not part of the
curriculum, because it's virtual, like it doesn't fit.
And of course he gave me.
He's like come on, jess, you'reweak.
And so after I got off the callwith him and, mind you, these
are things that have happened,let's say, a 24 month timeline,
(28:35):
right Of all of this, he hits mewith that and I'm like, okay, I
need to do something.
So on the podcast the other day, they asked me a bunch of
questions around this.
This happened way back then.
Like there's something there.
I was listening to anotherpodcast and they were talking
about email courses and then,boom, it all came together.
(28:56):
Right Now I wasn't activelytrying to figure out what email
course to produce.
The whispers showed me what thenext rightist step was.
And so it's just that right,and it also frees me up because
I'm obsessive.
It frees me up when I'm stuckon something of like okay, I'm
(29:19):
at a point and I know I need toget the next thing, but I can't.
Now I just leave.
Okay, I'm just going to leaveit, put it on the shelf for a
little bit, because I know thewhispers will show me what to do
with that idea, and it may not.
It may be next week, it may benext year.
I just need to leave it there.
(29:39):
That's the whispers.
The UnCommon Communicator (29:43):
Well , and the key is to respond to
them right.
And you mentioned aboutignoring them in the past and I
think that's the whole key isknowing when to let it lay and
when you need to respond to it,because I would say I would, on
the most part, am guilty ofpassing over and or ignoring.
And then there's times wherethey're so loud that you have to
(30:05):
listen and there's enoughconnection right, and so you
have to find the right time, theright place.
But I just thought that wasthat really stuck out for me in
that section of the book,because that really connected
and then it's going to connectwith a lot of people because
they're going to go.
Oh, that's why that's why I dothat.
So I appreciate you bringing inthe whispers and kind of
sharing a little deeper talkinto that.
(30:25):
I do want to talk briefly aboutchapter five, I believe.
Now, chapter five is what areyou waiting for?
Another question, but the thingthat stuck out for me.
There's a couple of things inhere.
One is so you're preparing forpotentially being incarcerated.
So what does Jesse do?
Jesse's like I'm going to makethe best time of this.
(30:47):
What am I going to learn andget out of this I'm going to
have all this time I'm going to.
You know, you're like theShawshank Redemption.
You're going to become a lawyeror something.
Right, you got it all and youwrote this what could I learn if
I had no distractions?
So you start creating a list ofthis potential time which, for
you to sit, I got to imagine iswas, in your mind, going to be
probably a prison in itself.
(31:09):
But you're like, how am I goingto make the most out of this?
But this is the thing thatstuck out in that chapter my own
thinking can be a prism and Idon't have to wait for
incarceration to take action.
Bingo, there's so many timesthat we wait for that moment,
and this ties into your whispercomment as well, too.
(31:29):
You don't have to wait, likemost people solve problems when
the problem arises.
Yes, that's where, when I havetime, especially on my job, you
know I get some free, free brainload.
In fact, there's one particularjob we were on.
We had just I had taken overand we had a ton of problems
that got to the point where Ithen we had a really young group
of field engineers and otherassistant soups.
(31:51):
I'm like what are we going tosolve today Like we had no
problems, like what are we goingto solve today and that's what
I got from that is, instead ofwaiting for that potential
incarceration?
You know, you're saying I cando things right now.
Jesse Hernandez (32:06):
Yes, yeah, so you know that practice of seeing
, like changing my perspectiveof a really bad situation.
I learned that from one of mysponsors in AA and he would,
because you know when, when,when I'm, when I'm in my
(32:27):
addiction and doing all thestuff, everything seems to be
falling apart.
The world's against me, likeit's just like you can't win, no
matter what.
Most of it is because of my owndecisions and my own actions,
right, and he would always tellme.
He would say what can you learnfrom this?
Right, like I know I'm likewhat do you mean?
(32:48):
He's like I know it sucks, butwhat are you learning about it?
What can you learn from this?
So it was always that.
What can you learn from this?
So, anyways, this last time Iwas like really, really looking
at 10 to 15 years in prison.
It was a, it was a reality thatthat could happen.
And I know that if I get stuckin my head around how horrible
(33:11):
it's going to be, I'm going tolose my career, I'm going to
lose my licenses, I'm going tolose family money, property,
like, if I get.
Those are all true, but what isalso true, or what could also
be true?
I could also learn a lot.
And then I said, okay, what isthat condition that I'm going to
be in if, if I go to prison,like, well, I'm not going to be
(33:32):
distracted, right, like I'm not,I'm not going to have my damn
phone bugging the hell out of me.
Okay, so focus.
If I have focus time and I havethis just enormous amount of
time to do whatever I want withwhat could I do?
What I've always wanted tolearn?
And I start.
I wrote down a list of a wholelike learn the right, left
(33:55):
handed.
I wouldn't do that now becauseI got a lot of things going on,
but I've always wanted to beambidextrous, right, and so what
that helped me do, working onthat list because I didn't just
do it in one sitting it helpedme change my focus.
So every time the like, thescary, negative idea crept in,
it's like, yeah, yeah, that'strue.
And but what could I learn ifI'm while I'm there and writing
(34:19):
down that list?
And this didn't happenimmediately.
So I wrote the list down, youknow, went through the whole
thing, went to, got my attorneythey don't give me prison time
and I think that's actually whenit came together, when they
gave me my sentence, which was,you know, relatively like
considering what I did.
I said you know what I don'tneed to like?
(34:43):
I have this list and I think Imentioned in the book one of
those was reading Moby Dick.
I don't have to wait to be inprison to do that.
So I got Moby Dick on Audibleand I listed.
It was awesome.
I was like, wow, now Iunderstand why people make such
a big deal about the book itself.
And then it was like, well,what else on this damn list can
I do?
(35:03):
Why am I waiting?
Like I don't have to wait.
And then it the realization waswe all kind of create our own
prison.
Like the prison is in our head.
The circumstances or ourphysical environment is a whole
separate thing.
It's not as big or condemningas our own mind is, and so
(35:25):
that's the gist of that idea.
The UnCommon Communicator (35:28):
Yeah , and that's absolutely huge.
To capture that instead ofsaying, all right, I spent 10
years in prison and now I'm, youknow, a doctor.
I'm Dr Hernandez.
You know you didn't have towait to do that, and I think
that that connects with a lot ofpeople, because we wait for
those waypoints, right, andsometimes, when that change is
going to come, when we'resitting here, we are sitting
(35:51):
here, you know, scrollingthrough TikTok and you know,
looking at videos, thinking, youknow, what could I be doing to
better my life?
Well, I'll do that tomorrow.
But when you're in prison, youknow, every day is tomorrow.
I guess, I don't know, I'vebecome a little better saying
than that, but that's, I think,a key point in anybody's
successful journey in life,which you're helping them to
understand.
(36:11):
And also, you know, there's somany threads in there that tie
to your project as well too.
You know, as a lean, you knowso many times I am the victim of
tomorrow.
You know I will do thattomorrow, I will be back
tomorrow.
You know, last night they wereworking until you know, at 3.30,
I was told we had three to fourmore hours left and it's like,
(36:34):
how about tomorrow?
I'm like, no, we're going toget it done today.
I want my tomorrow, yes, sothere's just things that you
become a victim of tomorrow.
And it stops that.
It says what am I doing now tobring purpose?
So, man, I appreciate thatchapter.
I do want.
There's one more chapter.
I want to dive into this onehere.
Chapter 11, when is I right?
(36:57):
This one I have struggled withfor most of a lot of my career
and especially when I got intogeneral construction.
A lot of people don't know that.
You know I was in industrialconstruction mill right by trade
.
So I've worked through thetrades and you know now I'm the
evil general contractor.
You know, and people don't know, that there's an history behind
.
Everybody right that this hasnot been.
(37:19):
It's like oh, you're thecontract.
In fact, felipe said that.
He says you don't post anythingabout your life.
You know, when you were in thetrades I'm like I need to change
that.
But but with that you come intogeneral contracting and a lot
of superintendents are I, I, I,I right, I did this, I built
that.
I was.
I've worked with asuperintendent who built the
(37:40):
Ikea in town all by himself ohyeah, bigel Ikea.
And then he also built thisgigantic hotel at the Denver
International Airport and soeverything that he has done he
built right.
Those are his stories.
But we go and we hear that andand you really touch on it
pretty deeply within, when thishere, when is I right?
(38:02):
I do want to talk about this.
So this is just a quote.
I want to first, you have toknow that these are emotionally
charged conversations.
I credit this to therepetitions, repetitions or reps
we get.
Sharing our issues openly withstrangers.
This builds a high threshold ofvulnerable vulnerability and
real human stuff.
So, first, you know you, you'resetting up this I thing because
(38:22):
the other part is that you knowI'm I'm worried that it's going
to be self centered, you know,and how I used the word I, I
don't right.
I've used we a lot when it isme.
So, because I want to avoidthat.
But I think you opened up.
There's a little bit of a keyin here that you really get in
(38:44):
in talking about the delivery ofthat.
So this chapter, I think herehere's a quote from you he was
extremely vulnerable because thewhole thing about this I thing
talks about somebody who changedyour perspective on stuff and,
in addition, was this, and thiswas somebody who was presenting
at an AA meeting.
He was extremely vulnerable.
(39:04):
He shared details that most ofus spend our whole life hiding.
Jesse Hernandez (39:10):
Yes, yes, oh, man.
So you know one thing I got tosay I did not intend to write a
book about my recovery and myexperience in, in, in addiction
and AA, 12 step programs, etcetera.
That's just the way it came out.
So just a side note.
(39:31):
So I'll talk about, like, thereps and how that connected to
this this speaker you knowsomebody had asked me, or a lot
of people would ask me back whenwe were doing the five S and
relationships thing is like, howare you so vulnerable?
It's amazing how vulnerable youare, your vulnerabilities and
so on.
Like, what in the world are youall talking about?
Then I got clear like, oh, youshare your like the dumb things
(39:52):
you know.
Like, oh, okay, that'svulnerable.
Then, yes, I do that.
And then I started asking mysilver so many people asking me
about this and I don't know howI built that.
Like, how did I develop thatstrength to be vulnerable and
share whatever?
And so I was thinking and I'mlike, oh, you know what it was.
(40:15):
It was from the years and yearsand years that I spent in 12
step meetings, because in thosemeetings you are invited to say
hi, my name's Jesse and I'm anaddict or I'm an alcoholic or
whatever, and talk about yourissue.
Whether it's good or baddoesn't matter.
For the first two years I wouldnot.
(40:37):
There was no damn way I wasgonna raise my hand.
But I saw people demonstratingthe behavior right, like they
were doing it.
They were saying hi, my name's,whatever.
This is what I experienced, youknow my wife, my girlfriend,
whatever, the judge, whatever,like all the stuff, and even
celebrating good things.
Until I finally did it myself.
(40:57):
And because I was, you know, Ihad the privilege of going to
these meetings for so many years.
I got very practiced at sayinghi, my name's Jesse, I'm an
alcoholic, and this is what Idid today.
This is the dumb thing that Idid blah, blah, blah, and I
think it was.
(41:18):
I don't think I know those repsof saying hi, I'm a human being
and I have problems, or hi, I'ma human being and I have
something to celebrate.
Built the strength for me to besuper, super vulnerable, you
know, relatively speaking, andwe don't practice that.
We don't.
(41:38):
There's really there's very fewvenues where we can just say it
out loud to discover that thesky's not gonna fall down right
Like me sharing my garbage.
Oh, at first, for two years Iwouldn't, because I didn't wanna
be judged.
I didn't, you know, blah, blah,blah.
And then, when the first time Idid it, guess what happened?
(42:00):
Nothing.
I felt better.
And then I did it again andguess what happened?
I felt better, like, oh, it'snot that bad Now.
So there's that one thing,because I am talking about what
I personally experienced andvery few people will challenge
(42:22):
that or judge that, because it'smy own personal experience.
Now, it drives me nuts whenpeople say I built that, I'd be
like you know damn way you builtthat.
And I'm sure that's not whatthey mean, but I know what I
feel when I hear them say that.
Right, so I was always kind ofsimilar to what you stated.
(42:45):
I'm very like I pay closeattention to me not saying I
when it was a we thing, but thenI went all the way over to one
side of the pendulum when it'salways we and never me.
When I heard this gentlemanspeak, it was powerful, right.
Like you know, he shared hisexperience, but he spoke from I.
(43:09):
He didn't say you know, whenyou're in addiction, da, da, da,
da, da, or when you do like.
He didn't say that.
He said I, my addiction, myexperience, my errors, my
shortcomings, my wins, like itwas all from an eye perspective.
And I remember thinking like,wow, he, he talked about himself
(43:31):
in terms of I, but I wasn'tdisgusted by him, right, it
didn't give me license, like Ididn't disengage like I normally
do.
I was like, oh, wow, what wasthat?
And it was because of the wayhe delivered the message.
He was.
It was from a perspective ofownership.
He was owning his experiences,he was owning his mistakes and
(43:56):
that was the difference.
And so it was really importantbecause it transformed the way.
Like from that point, I decided,okay, from now on, this is how
I'm going to present and Imentioned it in that story you
know, I used to follow thepractices that they right.
Whatever public speaking, likeall those classes you know, make
(44:18):
sure you let them know, givethem your credibility.
You want to give them yourcredentials before you start
speaking, because people want toknow why they should listen to
you.
I stopped that crap, those twoslides with.
You know, my credentials gotdeleted immediately and I just
jump into it and start sharingmy experience around the thing,
whatever it is I'm talking about.
(44:38):
It also helped me stop like,from that point forward.
I have not done a presentationon anything that I don't have
real, real experience doing, andwhat I mean by that is like, if
I'm going to be like teachingor facilitating some learning
and I can't apply the concept orthe practice in my personal
(45:02):
day-to-day, I'm not going to tryto teach about it Because I
can't speak from my ownexperience.
I have to attach it to somebodyelse's article or white paper
or whatever, and if that's thecase, I have no business doing
it.
And so that's gotten me very,very comfortable with I and,
(45:24):
more importantly, it becomeseasy to say I in a
non-self-serving manner when Ionly speak about things that
I've lived and experienceddirectly.
The UnCommon Communicator (45:37):
And nobody can take that from you,
right?
Nobody is sharing thatspecifically from your heart,
and that's something that Ithink really stuck out for me,
and this is important foranybody diving into public
speaking as well too.
So this is definitely ourcommunication moment to talk
about, right, because you are,you're out there, you're a
public speaker, you'veexperienced something that
(45:58):
through Toastmasters they callit the icebreaker.
It's the very first speech thatyou give and whenever I'm
coaching somebody, I'm like thisis going to be the easiest,
hardest speech that you evergive.
It's the easiest because allyou have to do is talk about
yourself, like we can do that.
It's hard because it's yourfirst one, but that whole
principle kind of gets lostthrough the course of these
pathways that we have, becausethen we're teaching on things
(46:21):
that we don't.
And that's now has been mycoaching thing is like what talk
about?
The things that you know?
Because then you can talkendlessly about it and people
know that if you're talkingabout something that you don't
know, then people know that.
They know right away and youknow it right.
And it's hard and it'sdifficult to get through and
it's not fun.
You probably have had the luxuryof giving the same.
(46:43):
You know message more than once.
You know every time that you dothat you build those reps and
in my mind it's getting betterand I'm sure for you the message
is getting better.
But if anything it's gettingeasier because you're having the
ability to meet the audience'sneeds, because you're familiar
with the topic.
That becomes kind of the wholekey to public speaking is be
(47:05):
familiar with the topic and thenyou can go up there and have
fun.
So I think that just it's soneat to see that weaved into
your book.
This whole public speaking youknow huge like tip on how to be
successful is wrapped up in justone little note on the I
portion of chapter 11.
Jesse Hernandez (47:22):
But I did see that.
I'll add James on.
That is if maybe for aspiringpublics, people are just kind of
getting into it.
I can remember clearly when Iwas doing presentations on stuff
that I hadn't experienced.
If somebody asked me a question, the answer I gave him was hard
, like it was weak sauce and andand I knew it.
(47:48):
And they knew it right, like oh, he's a fraud, he just read
some article and now he'stalking about it.
Yeah, but now, whatever I'mtalking about, when somebody
asked me a question I got somedeep real life experience.
Like I have swam Through theexperience.
I know what it smells like, Iknow what it feels like, I know
what it tastes like and theanswers that I can provide to
(48:10):
the questions I get are Muchmore actionable, whereas before
it stayed in the conceptualperspective.
And and so maybe to the to theuncommon Communicator
communicator community, if youcan't answer a question deeply
on the presentation you'vepresented, that's an indicator
(48:33):
that you've got to live andexperience the topic that you're
discussing just a little bitmore.
The UnCommon Communicator (48:39):
Yeah , that's exactly it, and that's
that is really the key to beingcomfortable, being successful,
being a good speaker, and thatreally goes to a lot of even
just general conversation.
Right, you've all been therewith the guy where, you know,
you just know that he's justbabbling on and you know, I do
want to touch on one thing thatyou talked about as well, too,
which is really when you knowthe topic and you're sharing
(49:02):
that topic there's there'ssomething that is being open
about it like one thing that youdo, and one thing I struggle
with is I sanitize myConversations, you know, and
that's something that I juststill in work.
I mean it's difficult for mebecause all of my stories in the
past were this guy, this person, this individual, this company,
(49:24):
and I've sanitized those andlooking at it through this
perspective is Am I just makingstories up, you know, to fit my
need?
And I mean these are, these arereal stories, but I don't have
and I haven't stored those factsin my mind that you know, on
January 7th we did this withBill, you know, out on the Mall
House deck.
You know those are true thingsthat happen and I think that's
(49:47):
an important part of how youtell stories is you use real
names, real people, real color.
You really paint that pictureand it's okay and you share this
with me and not on this podcastyet.
But you talked about how youkind of evolved through that as
well, too, where you thought Ididn't want to mention the
company or get them in trouble,well there.
And then you did it and did you.
(50:08):
Of course, you know you alwayspushing, pushing a little bit,
aren't you?
But did you, did you get introuble?
No, right, and those thingsbring true value and I think
that's the other component Iknow I'm working on.
That's something that I'mprocessing through.
But what I've decided thoseBecause I've stuffed a lot of
emotions and feelings andeverything away for years that
(50:28):
it's gonna have to happen on mynew stories, because I don't.
I don't think I can dig thefacts out of some of these older
stories, otherwise I'm justmaking them up and then I truly
am just making this story Frame.
But, jesse, I've really enjoyedthis time meeting and
connecting with you again, yourway of telling stories, and
especially that you put theminto a book.
(50:49):
Really we use, you know who youare and I think there's a lot
of value.
I'm gonna encourage everybody.
While the link in the shownotes on how to buy the book.
Look into it.
There's an audio version of itas well.
Well, links to your website.
But how else can tell us how?
How else can people get a holdof you?
Jesse Hernandez (51:06):
man.
So obviously the website.
The other way, I am amhyperactive on LinkedIn and, and
so, in terms of like dailyhabits, I spend a good amount of
time on LinkedIn every day, andso if people want to connect,
make a comment, what like, let'sconnect there and and get a
(51:28):
feel for what you're reallydealing with, because if you
want to work with me, this iswhat you're gonna get Right and
and so maybe I'd rather Irecommend that you get a feel
for the flavor that I bring, andyou can do that best through
interacting on LinkedIn.
Obviously, on my websitethere's links to my email
address and all the othersocials, all the other good
(51:50):
stuff, but, james, you and Iwere talking about this before
we started.
Let me know you're there,because the one thing that
drives me nuts is not like goodfeedback, I love it.
Critical feedback, I love it.
No feedback, I hate it.
It drives me nuts.
And so, if you're there, let meknow you're there, because it
(52:13):
really does mean a lot to me.
The UnCommon Communicator (52:15):
Well , we'll definitely provide some
Information on how to contactyou in the show notes.
Maybe together we can tie oursocial media moguling together
for this episode, for people canlearn a little more about Jesse
.
But I'm gonna ask you this andI'm asking all my guests this
now is what do you think is theUC moment?
The uncommon communicatormoment is, says this is you know
(52:36):
, we've been talking for an hour.
What sums up?
What do people leave with thatthey could use from this
conversation today?
Jesse Hernandez (52:43):
Oh, man, that's a good one, I'm gonna say.
The one thing that peopleshould take away from this
conversation is the value insharing your story From your
perspective, with all the dirtydetails.
The value is it's liberatingand healing for you as an
(53:04):
individual.
It gives people hope and Givesthem permission to do more of
the same.
I mean, james, you've said itseveral times there's a lot of
things that you haven't sharedFor multiple, for many reasons,
and you're not the only one andso, in sharing our story as
courageously as as you can rightnow right, you'll get more
(53:26):
courageous or as you get thereps in but share, share, share
your perspective with all thedirty details, and it will help
you build deeper communeconnections with the person
that's directly in front of you.
The UnCommon Communicator (53:41):
I love that.
That's a great UC moment.
Share your story with all thedirty details.
What more do we need than that?
We're gonna end with that andthat's all we got.
See you, bye.
You want to talk?
Right down to us and a languagethat everybody here can easily
understand.
Do you understand the wordsthat are coming out of my mouth?
What Space, water here, space,what again?
I dare you, I double dare you.
What we got here is a failureto communicate.
The UnCommon Communicat (00:25):
Welcome to the Uncommon Communicator
podcast, where we are here tobring enlightenment to the topic
of communication.
Help me welcome Jesse Hernandez, my guest today.
Jesse is a constructionmineshifter.
He's building a community ofintentional leaders known as the
emotional bungee jumpers.
He's a consultant and authorpodcast host, and I don't agree
with this aspiring social mediamogul.
(00:47):
Jesse is a social media mogul.
Jesse, welcome to the program.
What's going?
Jesse Hernandez (00:54):
on, james.
Thank you, thank you, yes, I amworking on it.
I don't have the numbers thatjustify my mogul-ness, but in
Jesseland I am a mogul and inthe future, in the rest of the
omniverse, I will be that socialmedia mogul.
The UnCommon Communicator (01:13):
You are certainly defined as a mogul
in my world.
If a mogul inspires otherpeople, then you're out there
doing that certainly.
Jesse Hernandez (01:21):
That's it.
The UnCommon Communicator (01:22):
Did I leave anything else out.
I mean, that's from yourLinkedIn, so it's your fault if
I left anything out.
Jesse Hernandez (01:27):
Yeah, no, no, I appreciate that I don't know
about you, james, but craftingthe profile on any of the
socials or even a bio forspeaking engagements and stuff,
it's a really uncomfortablething for me to do because it
feels self-serving andbraggadocious.
(01:49):
Now, I don't mind being thepeacock and getting all the
attention when we're live, andyou got the rooster on your
shirt.
I don't mind that.
But that's different than mewriting about the stuff In terms
of if anything was left out.
(02:09):
No, I think that covers it.
There's probably stuff, but Ithink we're good.
The UnCommon Communicator (02:17):
We're going to dive in and we're
going to cover some of what youjust talked about in one of your
chapters, specifically thechapter on I.
I believe it is, it's the.
When is I write chapter 11?
We're going to dive into thatone a little bit because that
one sparked something within me.
But let's talk about.
We got you on again second timeon the show.
Welcome Right here.
(02:39):
Jesse has written a couple ofbooks and started live streams
and all kinds of things sincethe last time we met.
Hey, it's your baby, you don'ttabulate your own deal, but I
definitely dove into the book.
I've got to say this First, ashout out to you directly.
You are responsible for, Ibelieve, any success that the I
(03:04):
should be giving you royaltieson the Uncommon Communicator
podcast.
We met early, early on, and youinspired me to podcast.
You know we were at this leanevent which was five bucks or
something to go to a Gemba lock,and you were just even a
portion of.
You weren't even leading it.
And you mentioned podcasts andI'm like, hey, what's this about
?
I don't think I listened to apodcast before.
(03:24):
Then.
I thought, man, if Jesse can dothis, I want to do this and I
did so.
You inspired me to start my ownpodcast and I appreciate that
and really, oh, a lot of itsgrowth to following the social
media logo that you are.
But you wrote a book right here.
Become a promise and it is yoursecond first book.
Explain that before we move onto this one.
Jesse Hernandez (03:46):
Yeah, yeah, so the second, first book.
So I had begun writing thisbook, which is becoming the
promise you're intended to be, Idon't know, Maybe two years ago
, I was inspired by my friend,Lee Crump, who wrote the forward
in the book and, as I was, so,when I started writing it, I was
(04:09):
, I was in my head.
I was like, Okay, I want thisto be like essentialism, Like
you've read the bookEssentialism, Amazing book,
Great ideas in there and thefive dysfunctions right, Lindsay
only.
And kind of the way they writetheir books is a story and
there's takeaways.
And so I started writing it andthe idea was I became aware
(04:32):
that two things I became awareof.
One was I became aware of whenI transitioned from achieving to
contribution, my life gotbetter.
The other thing was when thiswas least fault.
He made me aware that my storycould inspire other people to
(04:53):
forgive themselves or to forgivefamily members, etc.
And give them hope.
So, anyways, I was writing thebook.
That's right.
About that time, Jennifer Laceyand I started having the, the
live streams about five s inrelationships, and so after
those live streams and you werea part of those, a lot of people
(05:13):
were part of them Kirby, Kirbycoats had asked like, hey, Jess,
like I wish there was a placethat I could just have like all
the nuggets, all the greatpractices that people shared in
the chat, and I said, Okay, well, I got all the transcripts, the
transcriptions.
I'll go read them and find them.
I spent about 10 minutesreading and I said hell with
this, I ain't going to read allof this.
(05:35):
It was like eight and a halfhours of content.
And then I said, Wait a minute,I've got all this transcribed.
Kim White Princess Kim was.
She was my coach in publishingthe first book.
I sent her an email and said,hey, I got an idea.
This was like December twoyears ago and she said, yeah,
let's do it.
So we did, and so I had topause on this book because that
(05:57):
was the first book workedthrough producing Lean in Love,
and then, once that got out, Ipicked up this book again.
It was interesting because whenI read my original transcript, I
was like this is garbage.
This is like weak sauce,kindergarten tough guy, stuff,
(06:17):
right.
And when I mean by kindergartentough guy, I mean like not.
So this is just superficial topwater skiing crap.
And that's because, through thelive streams, I discovered that
this vulnerability thing was athing, and I didn't understand
it at first.
But people were like, Jesse,it's because you share your
(06:41):
mistakes and you just talk aboutanything, any mistake that you
made, whatever I learned I waslike, oh, and that was valuable
for people.
So Like my mindset had shiftedsuch that it was like that first
draft was like there was novulnerability.
It was very cerebral, superintellectualized, and so I said
(07:05):
hell with that, I'm going to godeep.
And then that's what happened.
So that's why it is my secondfirst book.
The UnCommon Communicator (07:13):
So the first book then in that
pause, really helped you bring abetter product in this book
with a different set of eyes.
Isn't that great?
And I'm a big believer in howthings happen for a reason and
you look at that, and always tothe better if you're looking to
find the better out of it,because it's always hidden in
there somewhere.
So let's talk about the bookfirst, that structure.
(07:35):
I like talking about thestructure of your book.
It is a bunch of stories whichare fantastic, right, and
they're doing the serve.
The purpose which you want isthese stories help impact and
lead to the message.
But there's a couple of thingsthat I noted in here is every
one of your titles are questions, almost every single one of
them, and I thought that isJesse and in it which made the
(07:59):
investigator and me say where isthe question in it?
Because what I really enjoyedabout the book and it's almost
like a mystery novel is you knowif say here's a, you know
here's a chapter, start righthere that says you know, is
there a prize in the darkness?
You don't start the eachchapter with is there a prize in
the darkness and then answer it.
It's in there somewhere, whichis really kind of new.
(08:21):
I don't know if you did thatpurposely, but the question is
hidden in there.
So I love that because and asyou you know, you have master
questionator as your title andthat's something that you know,
a moniker that you have givenyourself.
We've all given.
I've given that to you as well,but it's all the chapters or
questions which is really makesyou dive into.
Does that question fit me?
(08:42):
So I love the idea of it.
I did something I don'tnormally do, which is I read the
first chapter in the lastchapter, because I wanted to see
how you circled this around,and so this is an interesting.
So that at the end of your veryfirst chapter, you said this we
just can't keep living life theway we've been living it.
We have to let people in.
(09:02):
There are too many of us foryou and me to continue walking
alone.
Now that obviously you put thatfor a reason, tell me a little
bit more about that, thatpurpose statement that you put
in there, man thank you, thankyou.
Jesse Hernandez (09:18):
So you know, the gist of that statement is
and it's something that Idiscovered right, and you can
hear all the details throughoutthe book but the gist of the
statement is for a very longperiod of time, I believed I was
the only one experiencing thepains that I was experiencing
(09:39):
and I thought, like I thought,it was unique to me because of
my deficiencies, because of mydefects.
And what I've learned over theyears is that it's absolutely
not unique to me and it's notbecause I'm my character defects
, it's because I'm human andwe're all human, right.
(10:02):
So, going back to thevulnerability thing, when I
share the stuff, the dumb stuff,the short sighted, selfish,
embarrassing, shameful thingsthat I've done and what I've
learned from them, that helpsothers know that they are not
alone and there were none of usare alone, but we're all walking
(10:24):
I shouldn't say all.
Many of us are walking, as ifwe are, and so it's it's a call
out to say, hey, I got you right.
Like we're people, we makemistakes and we can learn from
them.
And, and you know, walking thepath in community is far more
fulfilling than it is to bewalking it independently, which
(10:47):
ties to like the original ideaof achievement and winning,
because when I win, everybodyelse has to lose, and when I
achieve, I have to do better,score higher than everybody else
around me.
So that's the isolatingexperience, whereas contributing
, sharing my gifts and talents,that is a communal experience.
The UnCommon Communicator (11:10):
Yeah , and that's okay.
So now I'm going to jump intothe last chapter, because I
don't, I don't know.
I do know you tied this alltogether and you can see your
very last statement in the book,because you know that I think
about.
In any message that we give,the most important thing is how
we started and the second mostis how we end it, and sometimes
(11:32):
that's the most importantbecause that's what people
remember.
But this is what you said.
Today.
I surround myself with peoplewho appreciate the goodness.
You likely have X-ray visiontoo.
You can see the enormous,gigantic human being that is in
front of you, hiding behind fear, hiding behind perfection and
avoiding rejection.
Because you can see this, it isyour responsibility to let them
(11:56):
know what you see, point it out, show them, help them
understand.
You see them because we allneed to be seen, did I?
Jesse Hernandez (12:06):
write that Damn .
That sounds good.
The UnCommon Communicator (12:09):
And that's how you ended it.
You tied in that very firststatement to the end with some
fantastic stories in the middle.
But tell me about thatstatement, because that one
really it's a challenge but it'scoming straight from your heart
.
Jesse Hernandez (12:24):
Yeah, man, yeah .
First I got to confess I didnot do that tie on purpose.
I absolute like for real, forreal.
When I put the, put the storiesout, I just I did speech to
text and I just had a list ofstories and I shared all the set
, all the stories, blah, blah,blah.
Kim Princess Kim is the one whoarranged the sequence of the
(12:47):
stories.
The only one thing I wanted wasstory number one had to be
number one because people neededto understand the title.
The rest of it was up to her.
I just left it up to her and soI got to credit her for that.
No, but the fact that you putit together like that's pretty
awesome, man.
(13:10):
So that last statement in theend comes from and I think a lot
of I'm not alone in.
Rather, I know I'm not alone inthis.
You know, when I think of me itkind of ties back to the bio
thing.
I see all of my mistakes, allof the nefarious things that
(13:32):
I've done, selfish things thatI've done, all the goals that I
missed, all the people that Ilet down, all the disappointment
that I contributed to people'slives, and I see it like a hull
of mirrors, right With genes.
They're magnified and amplifiedand contorted and really way
(13:53):
bigger than what they actuallyare, and that's all that I see.
And so that keeps me in thisstate of feeling less than when
I interact with another humanbeing.
I'm just like you saying thatI've contributed to your path as
a social media mogul.
I don't see that.
(14:15):
The only time I see it, and theonly time I can believe it, is
when I'm seeing myself throughyour eyes.
And so when people talk to meand share with me of how I've
impacted their life, how I'vegiven them courage, how I've
given them hope, how I pissedthem off, like it doesn't matter
when people are telling me whatthey see, I fall in love with
(14:37):
that version of me because it istrue, but it is foreign to me,
because it's not the versionthat I see all the time.
And so, like I know how I feelwhen I'm around people that
reflect back to me the greaterthings that I ignore.
And so that's the idea, right,surround myself, if I surround
(14:58):
myself with people, because fora long time I doubted it, I
discounted like, no, no, youjust don't know all my garbage,
right?
The only reason you're sayingthis is because you don't know,
I finally got to a point where,it's like you know, I'm very
selective about who I surroundmyself with, and those people
are like ballers, right, likethey contribute to the community
.
They're not just aboutthemselves.
They have accomplished great,they're very accomplished in
(15:21):
their careers, they're honest,they're good people, and because
they are, I need to believewhat they're telling me, and so
it's that kind of it's a littleweird thing, but it's what helps
me get away from operating in asense of deficit, right Meaning
(15:44):
like I'm trying to make up forsomething and keeps me in a
place of contribution.
How do I continue to share mygifts and talents?
I'm not always aware of thegifts and talents, I'm not
always aware of how I impact andtouch people's lives, until
somebody tells me and they showme through their eyes of what
they see.
And so that's the point, rightIs find people around you that
(16:11):
tell you things that you don'twanna believe, cause they're not
lying, and that gives usfreedom, right.
That gives us permission tocontinue being super awesome.
The UnCommon Communicator (16:23):
Yeah , absolutely.
Now the book.
I mean you dig really deep intosome personal stuff and what
was interesting and we've knowneach other for a year and a half
, a couple of years now but toreally understand the backstory
a little bit of what brought youthrough to your sobriety.
I mean, in a lot of sense, thisis a book to help anybody out
(16:47):
of who's into addictions, andyou're specifically talking
about substance and alcohol, butthose type of abuses fit any
type of addiction, and a lot ofconstruction folks have them.
There's a lot of alcoholism, alot of drugs and stuff involved
in any business that you're at,but specifically in our trade as
well, in construction isworkaholism.
(17:09):
I mean, there's a lot of thingsthat we become addictive to.
I come from an alcoholic familymyself and I never, you know,
delved into alcoholism, but do Ihave addictive tendencies?
Yeah, did I have over 40 bonsaitrees at one point, because 39
wasn't enough right.
And then, for the most part,though, my addictions have been
(17:30):
towards work.
Like last night, I worked till7 o'clock at night because I
wanted to get that floor done.
There's things that becomeimportant to us in our work,
which is just as much of anaddiction.
So these things fit.
But in diving into your storiesthere's the reps you talk about,
right, and I hadn't thoughtabout AA and that whole process.
(17:54):
Being getting talking aboutthese things more is something
that you're doing with peoplenow, especially through the live
streams.
You know, there are things thatI'm realizing, like why am I,
who have not been emotional formost of my life, purposely, you
know struggling with some things?
It's because, oh, I've nevertalked about these and you're
drawing these out in people nowas well.
(18:16):
But I see that you've put thereps in because, like, I can't
get through it.
You know I can't barely talkthrough it, but how therapeutic
was it to also put all of thatstuff out there for everybody in
the book?
Jesse Hernandez (18:29):
Man.
So first I want to say this interms of addiction, people have
asked me, especially when I wasin rehab and recovered.
Like in those circles, thecommon question is like what's
your drug of choice?
Right, because everybody wantsto know.
Huh, right, and mine is more.
I'm addicted to more ofwhatever.
(18:50):
Most of the stories in here aretied to my addiction with
alcohol, because that's what Igot arrested for and I'm
grateful that I didn't getarrested for some of the other
things.
But I'll tell you like I'll hiton this and so hope maybe
people can do someself-reflection.
Some of the symptoms of mebeing going down the path of
(19:13):
addiction to whatever it is,like you said work, marathon,
running, womanizing, like all ofthe things, is all.
The rest of my life is indisarray.
My weeds are three foot.
The weeds in the yard are threefoot higher than they ever been
.
None of the dishes are washed,none of the clothes are washed.
Everything's a mess.
The truck's a freaking mess,like the chaos in my life.
(19:36):
It looks the same regardless ofwhat I am being consumed by.
So it is absolutely.
Alcoholism is a thing, right,and there's some other stuff
that comes with alcoholism, buthaving an addictive nature and
over rather neglecting the otherimportant things.
(19:58):
For one thing is also a symptomof addiction and requires
attention.
So but back to the reps.
That was the question.
Right Is the therapeutic natureof getting this book out.
So when I was in South Carolina,when I started doing the speech
to text, it had a lot of roadtime, windshield time.
(20:20):
I was driving back and forth, Iwas going to Clemson with Adam
to do a thing and anyways, I wassurprised at some of the
stories.
I think the last four storiesare the ones that moved me the
most.
It drew out the most emotion.
I didn't expect it to happenand as I was like speaking the
(20:42):
stories, some of the like Icried on most of them, and when
I say cry, I mean like tearyeyed.
I choked up a little bit.
But those four stories, at theend, even when I recorded the
audio book, you can hear myvoice cracking and me trying to
maintain composure.
I ugly cried when I recordedthem right and it was hard,
(21:06):
cause I had to go back and likefigure out what the hell I was
saying, cause the voice didn'tpick it up right and the
interesting thing.
So after I did it I'm like,okay.
Why is that?
Why am I like what is going on?
Because some of that stuffhappened back when I was a kid
(21:26):
and the difference was I used tocry tears of anger, I used to
cry tears of pain and regret.
This time those tears were maybetears of empathy, like cause.
I know what I felt back thenand that kind of feeling came up
(21:50):
and I also know that I havecome a long, long way from that
and I also know the impact thatI've been able to have in other
people's lives because of thatexperience.
And I was also excited about ohmy God, I'm putting this thing
(22:11):
out there into the world.
Imagine the impact it can havegoing forward.
And so the tears this time werelike filled with all of that,
like their tears of hope, theirtears of healing, tears of
understanding, and so, in termsof therapy, it helped me really
(22:34):
cause.
I don't think before then thatI wasn't aware of the progress
that I have made around thoseissues, and so what it helped me
understand was like or maybe ithelped me turn really negative,
dark times into meaningfulthings that could help other
people, and so I experienced amind shift of my own in the
(22:59):
process.
The UnCommon Communicator (23:00):
In the process and that's the whole
key, right.
It's not just you get the magicpill and you don't get some way
to get out of it.
It's that process that I'mdiscovering myself very slowly
in understanding thatvulnerability part and a lot of
that, and we're gonna dive intoa little bit of that let's jump
into.
There's a chapter.
First I wanted to talk aboutthe whispers.
Jesse Hernandez (23:22):
Oh, yeah, and.
The UnCommon Communicator (23:23):
I've heard you mention that term
before and I didn't know thereally the depth of.
You know the idea of thewhispers, but this is here's
another quote from your book.
I was first introduced to thewhispers by Oprah Jesse.
Yes, anyways, the easiest wayto describe the whispers is
intuition.
The whispers pop up randomly,sometimes when I'm running,
sometimes when I'm in the middleof a presentation.
(23:45):
They are like little datapoints.
They look like a comment or aquestion by someone else.
When I'm listening to a book,something in the content I'm
consuming may connect with anidea or a question I've been
chewing on and make the nextrightest step a little clearer.
The feeling in my gut says yes,that's the way, that's the
thing I need to get unstuck.
I call them the whispersbecause I really can't take full
(24:09):
credit for the clarity of thedirection.
It feels more like I'm beingguided into discovery and boy
that.
So that statement, that ideareally connected with me because
and I've heard you mention thatbefore this podcast is a result
of a whisper.
You know, you hear something,you get an idea and somebody
says what about that?
But that whole idea I'm notsure about the Oprah part, but
(24:35):
tell me more like this seemslike the whispers have been a
big part of your life.
Have they always been there?
Or has this been something thatyou decided to start listening
to?
Jesse Hernandez (24:44):
Oh man.
So first Oprah, so raised by asingle mom, right.
And so when I was a kid, I hadto like I didn't have control
over the TV, but she mentioned Iwas like, oh yeah, that's the
thing.
So, anyhow, I'll say thewhispers have always been there.
I have not always paidattention to them and I know
(25:10):
this because, like even early onas a foreman or when I was
transitioning from likeinstaller to foreman, and all of
a sudden there were deeper,greater asks of me in terms of
taking responsibility andleadership.
I fought against it.
The whispers were telling me dothis, this is your gift, go do
(25:32):
something with it.
And I ignored it and continuedto say no, no, no, I'm not gonna
be one of those suckasses, I'man installer, blah, blah, blah.
And the friction that Iexperienced in my life by
ignoring the whispers is one ofthe contributors to my substance
abuse right and to the things Idid to escape from my life,
(25:56):
which most of that wasself-imposed friction.
So they've always been there.
When I started deciding tolisten to the whispers, things
have become so much easier andway, way, way more fulfilling
(26:17):
and the reason I have to creditthe whisper, like even in my
when I'm doing, have my 60minutes of thinking time every
day and I'm journaling,sometimes there's something that
comes out like whoa, I gottawrite that down.
Or I was jogging you just kindof.
Like you said, I write it downand I can't take credit for it,
right?
And I think that's an importantthing, because I don't know if
(26:39):
you know, but I have a prettyhealthy ego.
If I credit myself for being agenius and discovering all these
things and creating all thesethings all on my own, I know
where that road takes me right.
And so these things, these ideas, these bits of clarity that pop
(26:59):
up, help me understand or showme like, oh yes, that's
connected.
I can, that's something I'vebeen thinking about.
Now I'm gonna take the nextrightest step, and so what I
mean by that?
So, example I was talking, Igot interviewed, I was
(27:21):
interviewed on a podcast superawesome interview and the line
of questioning was around how doleaders connect with people in
the field?
And so I just kept answeringthe questions, right, it was
good conversation.
And then after that I startedthinking like, well, that's
interesting, because when I wasdoing the in-person training,
(27:42):
part of that was to go out andmeet people in the field and a
lot of the folks that were goingthrough the training struggled
with.
Well, what am I supposed to say?
The UnCommon Communicator (27:50):
Like , what do you mean Like you're a
superintendent, what do youmean?
Jesse Hernandez (27:53):
What are you supposed to say?
And then I was talking to Seanand Sean Moran.
We were on a call and he'sfamiliar with the training, the
sweat equity improvement, that Itransitioned into a virtual
experience and he's like allright, jess, how are you doing
the visible leadership piece,which is where you go talk to
(28:14):
people?
And I said, well, I don't, likethat's not part of the
curriculum, because it's virtual, like it doesn't fit.
And of course he gave me.
He's like come on, jess, you'reweak.
And so after I got off the callwith him and, mind you, these
are things that have happened,let's say, a 24 month timeline,
(28:35):
right Of all of this, he hits mewith that and I'm like, okay, I
need to do something.
So on the podcast the other day, they asked me a bunch of
questions around this.
This happened way back then.
Like there's something there.
I was listening to anotherpodcast and they were talking
about email courses and then,boom, it all came together.
(28:56):
Right Now I wasn't activelytrying to figure out what email
course to produce.
The whispers showed me what thenext rightist step was.
And so it's just that right,and it also frees me up because
I'm obsessive.
It frees me up when I'm stuckon something of like okay, I'm
(29:19):
at a point and I know I need toget the next thing, but I can't.
Now I just leave.
Okay, I'm just going to leaveit, put it on the shelf for a
little bit, because I know thewhispers will show me what to do
with that idea, and it may not.
It may be next week, it may benext year.
I just need to leave it there.
(29:39):
That's the whispers.
The UnCommon Communicator (29:43):
Well , and the key is to respond to
them right.
And you mentioned aboutignoring them in the past and I
think that's the whole key isknowing when to let it lay and
when you need to respond to it,because I would say I would, on
the most part, am guilty ofpassing over and or ignoring.
And then there's times wherethey're so loud that you have to
(30:05):
listen and there's enoughconnection right, and so you
have to find the right time, theright place.
But I just thought that wasthat really stuck out for me in
that section of the book,because that really connected
and then it's going to connectwith a lot of people because
they're going to go.
Oh, that's why that's why I dothat.
So I appreciate you bringing inthe whispers and kind of
sharing a little deeper talkinto that.
(30:25):
I do want to talk briefly aboutchapter five, I believe.
Now, chapter five is what areyou waiting for?
Another question, but the thingthat stuck out for me.
There's a couple of things inhere.
One is so you're preparing forpotentially being incarcerated.
So what does Jesse do?
Jesse's like I'm going to makethe best time of this.
(30:47):
What am I going to learn andget out of this I'm going to
have all this time I'm going to.
You know, you're like theShawshank Redemption.
You're going to become a lawyeror something.
Right, you got it all and youwrote this what could I learn if
I had no distractions?
So you start creating a list ofthis potential time which, for
you to sit, I got to imagine iswas, in your mind, going to be
probably a prison in itself.
(31:09):
But you're like, how am I goingto make the most out of this?
But this is the thing thatstuck out in that chapter my own
thinking can be a prism and Idon't have to wait for
incarceration to take action.
Bingo, there's so many timesthat we wait for that moment,
and this ties into your whispercomment as well, too.
(31:29):
You don't have to wait, likemost people solve problems when
the problem arises.
Yes, that's where, when I havetime, especially on my job, you
know I get some free, free brainload.
In fact, there's one particularjob we were on.
We had just I had taken overand we had a ton of problems
that got to the point where Ithen we had a really young group
of field engineers and otherassistant soups.
(31:51):
I'm like what are we going tosolve today Like we had no
problems, like what are we goingto solve today and that's what
I got from that is, instead ofwaiting for that potential
incarceration?
You know, you're saying I cando things right now.
Jesse Hernandez (32:06):
Yes, yeah, so you know that practice of seeing
, like changing my perspectiveof a really bad situation.
I learned that from one of mysponsors in AA and he would,
because you know when, when,when I'm, when I'm in my
(32:27):
addiction and doing all thestuff, everything seems to be
falling apart.
The world's against me, likeit's just like you can't win, no
matter what.
Most of it is because of my owndecisions and my own actions,
right, and he would always tellme.
He would say what can you learnfrom this?
Right, like I know I'm likewhat do you mean?
(32:48):
He's like I know it sucks, butwhat are you learning about it?
What can you learn from this?
So it was always that.
What can you learn from this?
So, anyways, this last time Iwas like really, really looking
at 10 to 15 years in prison.
It was a, it was a reality thatthat could happen.
And I know that if I get stuckin my head around how horrible
(33:11):
it's going to be, I'm going tolose my career, I'm going to
lose my licenses, I'm going tolose family money, property,
like, if I get.
Those are all true, but what isalso true, or what could also
be true?
I could also learn a lot.
And then I said, okay, what isthat condition that I'm going to
be in if, if I go to prison,like, well, I'm not going to be
(33:32):
distracted, right, like I'm not,I'm not going to have my damn
phone bugging the hell out of me.
Okay, so focus.
If I have focus time and I havethis just enormous amount of
time to do whatever I want withwhat could I do?
What I've always wanted tolearn?
And I start.
I wrote down a list of a wholelike learn the right, left
(33:55):
handed.
I wouldn't do that now becauseI got a lot of things going on,
but I've always wanted to beambidextrous, right, and so what
that helped me do, working onthat list because I didn't just
do it in one sitting it helpedme change my focus.
So every time the like, thescary, negative idea crept in,
it's like, yeah, yeah, that'strue.
And but what could I learn ifI'm while I'm there and writing
(34:19):
down that list?
And this didn't happenimmediately.
So I wrote the list down, youknow, went through the whole
thing, went to, got my attorneythey don't give me prison time
and I think that's actually whenit came together, when they
gave me my sentence, which was,you know, relatively like
considering what I did.
I said you know what I don'tneed to like?
(34:43):
I have this list and I think Imentioned in the book one of
those was reading Moby Dick.
I don't have to wait to be inprison to do that.
So I got Moby Dick on Audibleand I listed.
It was awesome.
I was like, wow, now Iunderstand why people make such
a big deal about the book itself.
And then it was like, well,what else on this damn list can
I do?
(35:03):
Why am I waiting?
Like I don't have to wait.
And then it the realization waswe all kind of create our own
prison.
Like the prison is in our head.
The circumstances or ourphysical environment is a whole
separate thing.
It's not as big or condemningas our own mind is, and so
(35:25):
that's the gist of that idea.
The UnCommon Communicator (35:28):
Yeah , and that's absolutely huge.
To capture that instead ofsaying, all right, I spent 10
years in prison and now I'm, youknow, a doctor.
I'm Dr Hernandez.
You know you didn't have towait to do that, and I think
that that connects with a lot ofpeople, because we wait for
those waypoints, right, andsometimes, when that change is
going to come, when we'resitting here, we are sitting
(35:51):
here, you know, scrollingthrough TikTok and you know,
looking at videos, thinking, youknow, what could I be doing to
better my life?
Well, I'll do that tomorrow.
But when you're in prison, youknow, every day is tomorrow.
I guess, I don't know, I'vebecome a little better saying
than that, but that's, I think,a key point in anybody's
successful journey in life,which you're helping them to
understand.
(36:11):
And also, you know, there's somany threads in there that tie
to your project as well too.
You know, as a lean, you knowso many times I am the victim of
tomorrow.
You know I will do thattomorrow, I will be back
tomorrow.
You know, last night they wereworking until you know, at 3.30,
I was told we had three to fourmore hours left and it's like,
(36:34):
how about tomorrow?
I'm like, no, we're going toget it done today.
I want my tomorrow, yes, sothere's just things that you
become a victim of tomorrow.
And it stops that.
It says what am I doing now tobring purpose?
So, man, I appreciate thatchapter.
I do want.
There's one more chapter.
I want to dive into this onehere.
Chapter 11, when is I right?
(36:57):
This one I have struggled withfor most of a lot of my career
and especially when I got intogeneral construction.
A lot of people don't know that.
You know I was in industrialconstruction mill right by trade
.
So I've worked through thetrades and you know now I'm the
evil general contractor.
You know, and people don't know, that there's an history behind
.
Everybody right that this hasnot been.
(37:19):
It's like oh, you're thecontract.
In fact, felipe said that.
He says you don't post anythingabout your life.
You know, when you were in thetrades I'm like I need to change
that.
But but with that you come intogeneral contracting and a lot
of superintendents are I, I, I,I right, I did this, I built
that.
I was.
I've worked with asuperintendent who built the
(37:40):
Ikea in town all by himself ohyeah, bigel Ikea.
And then he also built thisgigantic hotel at the Denver
International Airport and soeverything that he has done he
built right.
Those are his stories.
But we go and we hear that andand you really touch on it
pretty deeply within, when thishere, when is I right?
(38:02):
I do want to talk about this.
So this is just a quote.
I want to first, you have toknow that these are emotionally
charged conversations.
I credit this to therepetitions, repetitions or reps
we get.
Sharing our issues openly withstrangers.
This builds a high threshold ofvulnerable vulnerability and
real human stuff.
So, first, you know you, you'resetting up this I thing because
(38:22):
the other part is that you knowI'm I'm worried that it's going
to be self centered, you know,and how I used the word I, I
don't right.
I've used we a lot when it isme.
So, because I want to avoidthat.
But I think you opened up.
There's a little bit of a keyin here that you really get in
(38:44):
in talking about the delivery ofthat.
So this chapter, I think herehere's a quote from you he was
extremely vulnerable because thewhole thing about this I thing
talks about somebody who changedyour perspective on stuff and,
in addition, was this, and thiswas somebody who was presenting
at an AA meeting.
He was extremely vulnerable.
(39:04):
He shared details that most ofus spend our whole life hiding.
Jesse Hernandez (39:10):
Yes, yes, oh, man.
So you know one thing I got tosay I did not intend to write a
book about my recovery and myexperience in, in, in addiction
and AA, 12 step programs, etcetera.
That's just the way it came out.
So just a side note.
(39:31):
So I'll talk about, like, thereps and how that connected to
this this speaker you knowsomebody had asked me, or a lot
of people would ask me back whenwe were doing the five S and
relationships thing is like, howare you so vulnerable?
It's amazing how vulnerable youare, your vulnerabilities and
so on.
Like, what in the world are youall talking about?
Then I got clear like, oh, youshare your like the dumb things
(39:52):
you know.
Like, oh, okay, that'svulnerable.
Then, yes, I do that.
And then I started asking mysilver so many people asking me
about this and I don't know howI built that.
Like, how did I develop thatstrength to be vulnerable and
share whatever?
And so I was thinking and I'mlike, oh, you know what it was.
(40:15):
It was from the years and yearsand years that I spent in 12
step meetings, because in thosemeetings you are invited to say
hi, my name's Jesse and I'm anaddict or I'm an alcoholic or
whatever, and talk about yourissue.
Whether it's good or baddoesn't matter.
For the first two years I wouldnot.
(40:37):
There was no damn way I wasgonna raise my hand.
But I saw people demonstratingthe behavior right, like they
were doing it.
They were saying hi, my name's,whatever.
This is what I experienced, youknow my wife, my girlfriend,
whatever, the judge, whatever,like all the stuff, and even
celebrating good things.
Until I finally did it myself.
(40:57):
And because I was, you know, Ihad the privilege of going to
these meetings for so many years.
I got very practiced at sayinghi, my name's Jesse, I'm an
alcoholic, and this is what Idid today.
This is the dumb thing that Idid blah, blah, blah, and I
think it was.
(41:18):
I don't think I know those repsof saying hi, I'm a human being
and I have problems, or hi, I'ma human being and I have
something to celebrate.
Built the strength for me to besuper, super vulnerable, you
know, relatively speaking, andwe don't practice that.
We don't.
(41:38):
There's really there's very fewvenues where we can just say it
out loud to discover that thesky's not gonna fall down right
Like me sharing my garbage.
Oh, at first, for two years Iwouldn't, because I didn't wanna
be judged.
I didn't, you know, blah, blah,blah.
And then, when the first time Idid it, guess what happened?
(42:00):
Nothing.
I felt better.
And then I did it again andguess what happened?
I felt better, like, oh, it'snot that bad Now.
So there's that one thing,because I am talking about what
I personally experienced andvery few people will challenge
(42:22):
that or judge that, because it'smy own personal experience.
Now, it drives me nuts whenpeople say I built that, I'd be
like you know damn way you builtthat.
And I'm sure that's not whatthey mean, but I know what I
feel when I hear them say that.
Right, so I was always kind ofsimilar to what you stated.
(42:45):
I'm very like I pay closeattention to me not saying I
when it was a we thing, but thenI went all the way over to one
side of the pendulum when it'salways we and never me.
When I heard this gentlemanspeak, it was powerful, right.
Like you know, he shared hisexperience, but he spoke from I.
(43:09):
He didn't say you know, whenyou're in addiction, da, da, da,
da, da, or when you do like.
He didn't say that.
He said I, my addiction, myexperience, my errors, my
shortcomings, my wins, like itwas all from an eye perspective.
And I remember thinking like,wow, he, he talked about himself
(43:31):
in terms of I, but I wasn'tdisgusted by him, right, it
didn't give me license, like Ididn't disengage like I normally
do.
I was like, oh, wow, what wasthat?
And it was because of the wayhe delivered the message.
He was.
It was from a perspective ofownership.
He was owning his experiences,he was owning his mistakes and
(43:56):
that was the difference.
And so it was really importantbecause it transformed the way.
Like from that point, I decided,okay, from now on, this is how
I'm going to present and Imentioned it in that story you
know, I used to follow thepractices that they right.
Whatever public speaking, likeall those classes you know, make
(44:18):
sure you let them know, givethem your credibility.
You want to give them yourcredentials before you start
speaking, because people want toknow why they should listen to
you.
I stopped that crap, those twoslides with.
You know, my credentials gotdeleted immediately and I just
jump into it and start sharingmy experience around the thing,
whatever it is I'm talking about.
(44:38):
It also helped me stop like,from that point forward.
I have not done a presentationon anything that I don't have
real, real experience doing, andwhat I mean by that is like, if
I'm going to be like teachingor facilitating some learning
and I can't apply the concept orthe practice in my personal
(45:02):
day-to-day, I'm not going to tryto teach about it Because I
can't speak from my ownexperience.
I have to attach it to somebodyelse's article or white paper
or whatever, and if that's thecase, I have no business doing
it.
And so that's gotten me very,very comfortable with I and,
(45:24):
more importantly, it becomeseasy to say I in a
non-self-serving manner when Ionly speak about things that
I've lived and experienceddirectly.
The UnCommon Communicator (45:37):
And nobody can take that from you,
right?
Nobody is sharing thatspecifically from your heart,
and that's something that Ithink really stuck out for me,
and this is important foranybody diving into public
speaking as well too.
So this is definitely ourcommunication moment to talk
about, right, because you are,you're out there, you're a
public speaker, you'veexperienced something that
(45:58):
through Toastmasters they callit the icebreaker.
It's the very first speech thatyou give and whenever I'm
coaching somebody, I'm like thisis going to be the easiest,
hardest speech that you evergive.
It's the easiest because allyou have to do is talk about
yourself, like we can do that.
It's hard because it's yourfirst one, but that whole
principle kind of gets lostthrough the course of these
pathways that we have, becausethen we're teaching on things
(46:21):
that we don't.
And that's now has been mycoaching thing is like what talk
about?
The things that you know?
Because then you can talkendlessly about it and people
know that if you're talkingabout something that you don't
know, then people know that.
They know right away and youknow it right.
And it's hard and it'sdifficult to get through and
it's not fun.
You probably have had the luxuryof giving the same.
(46:43):
You know message more than once.
You know every time that you dothat you build those reps and
in my mind it's getting betterand I'm sure for you the message
is getting better.
But if anything it's gettingeasier because you're having the
ability to meet the audience'sneeds, because you're familiar
with the topic.
That becomes kind of the wholekey to public speaking is be
(47:05):
familiar with the topic and thenyou can go up there and have
fun.
So I think that just it's soneat to see that weaved into
your book.
This whole public speaking youknow huge like tip on how to be
successful is wrapped up in justone little note on the I
portion of chapter 11.
Jesse Hernandez (47:22):
But I did see that.
I'll add James on.
That is if maybe for aspiringpublics, people are just kind of
getting into it.
I can remember clearly when Iwas doing presentations on stuff
that I hadn't experienced.
If somebody asked me a question, the answer I gave him was hard
, like it was weak sauce and andand I knew it.
(47:48):
And they knew it right, like oh, he's a fraud, he just read
some article and now he'stalking about it.
Yeah, but now, whatever I'mtalking about, when somebody
asked me a question I got somedeep real life experience.
Like I have swam Through theexperience.
I know what it smells like, Iknow what it feels like, I know
what it tastes like and theanswers that I can provide to
(48:10):
the questions I get are Muchmore actionable, whereas before
it stayed in the conceptualperspective.
And and so maybe to the to theuncommon Communicator
communicator community, if youcan't answer a question deeply
on the presentation you'vepresented, that's an indicator
(48:33):
that you've got to live andexperience the topic that you're
discussing just a little bitmore.
The UnCommon Communicator (48:39):
Yeah , that's exactly it, and that's
that is really the key to beingcomfortable, being successful,
being a good speaker, and thatreally goes to a lot of even
just general conversation.
Right, you've all been therewith the guy where, you know,
you just know that he's justbabbling on and you know, I do
want to touch on one thing thatyou talked about as well, too,
which is really when you knowthe topic and you're sharing
(49:02):
that topic there's there'ssomething that is being open
about it like one thing that youdo, and one thing I struggle
with is I sanitize myConversations, you know, and
that's something that I juststill in work.
I mean it's difficult for mebecause all of my stories in the
past were this guy, this person, this individual, this company,
(49:24):
and I've sanitized those andlooking at it through this
perspective is Am I just makingstories up, you know, to fit my
need?
And I mean these are, these arereal stories, but I don't have
and I haven't stored those factsin my mind that you know, on
January 7th we did this withBill, you know, out on the Mall
House deck.
You know those are true thingsthat happen and I think that's
(49:47):
an important part of how youtell stories is you use real
names, real people, real color.
You really paint that pictureand it's okay and you share this
with me and not on this podcastyet.
But you talked about how youkind of evolved through that as
well, too, where you thought Ididn't want to mention the
company or get them in trouble,well there.
And then you did it and did you.
(50:08):
Of course, you know you alwayspushing, pushing a little bit,
aren't you?
But did you, did you get introuble?
No, right, and those thingsbring true value and I think
that's the other component Iknow I'm working on.
That's something that I'mprocessing through.
But what I've decided thoseBecause I've stuffed a lot of
emotions and feelings andeverything away for years that
(50:28):
it's gonna have to happen on mynew stories, because I don't.
I don't think I can dig thefacts out of some of these older
stories, otherwise I'm justmaking them up and then I truly
am just making this story Frame.
But, jesse, I've really enjoyedthis time meeting and
connecting with you again, yourway of telling stories, and
especially that you put theminto a book.
(50:49):
Really we use, you know who youare and I think there's a lot
of value.
I'm gonna encourage everybody.
While the link in the shownotes on how to buy the book.
Look into it.
There's an audio version of itas well.
Well, links to your website.
But how else can tell us how?
How else can people get a holdof you?
Jesse Hernandez (51:06):
man.
So obviously the website.
The other way, I am amhyperactive on LinkedIn and, and
so, in terms of like dailyhabits, I spend a good amount of
time on LinkedIn every day, andso if people want to connect,
make a comment, what like, let'sconnect there and and get a
(51:28):
feel for what you're reallydealing with, because if you
want to work with me, this iswhat you're gonna get Right and
and so maybe I'd rather Irecommend that you get a feel
for the flavor that I bring, andyou can do that best through
interacting on LinkedIn.
Obviously, on my websitethere's links to my email
address and all the othersocials, all the other good
(51:50):
stuff, but, james, you and Iwere talking about this before
we started.
Let me know you're there,because the one thing that
drives me nuts is not like goodfeedback, I love it.
Critical feedback, I love it.
No feedback, I hate it.
It drives me nuts.
And so, if you're there, let meknow you're there, because it
(52:13):
really does mean a lot to me.
The UnCommon Communicator (52:15):
Well , we'll definitely provide some
Information on how to contactyou in the show notes.
Maybe together we can tie oursocial media moguling together
for this episode, for people canlearn a little more about Jesse
.
But I'm gonna ask you this andI'm asking all my guests this
now is what do you think is theUC moment?
The uncommon communicatormoment is, says this is you know
(52:36):
, we've been talking for an hour.
What sums up?
What do people leave with thatthey could use from this
conversation today?
Jesse Hernandez (52:43):
Oh, man, that's a good one, I'm gonna say.
The one thing that peopleshould take away from this
conversation is the value insharing your story From your
perspective, with all the dirtydetails.
The value is it's liberatingand healing for you as an
(53:04):
individual.
It gives people hope and Givesthem permission to do more of
the same.
I mean, james, you've said itseveral times there's a lot of
things that you haven't sharedFor multiple, for many reasons,
and you're not the only one andso, in sharing our story as
courageously as as you can rightnow right, you'll get more
(53:26):
courageous or as you get thereps in but share, share, share
your perspective with all thedirty details, and it will help
you build deeper communeconnections with the person
that's directly in front of you.
The UnCommon Communicator (53:41):
I love that.
That's a great UC moment.
Share your story with all thedirty details.
What more do we need than that?
We're gonna end with that andthat's all we got.
See you, bye.
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