Ep. 24: William Crenshaw

In this episode, I sit down with William Crenshaw. From Hopkinsville to Lexington to Nashville, William has always been rooted in hard work and a call to agriculture. I owe a lot of the early success of Incado to William. He was right along side me during those first two crucial years. I look forward to you all hearing his story.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:20):
All right, everybody, welcome to another episode of the Enkido Podcast.
I'm your host, Casey Cox. I'm here today with a
good buddy of mine, William Crinshaw, and I'm gonna let
you let you. William, tell people what you do now
because people ask me what I do. I mean, he's
got two phones on the table, he's got a water bottle,
and he's got a coffee cup. So he's a man

(00:41):
of man of many things, men of many talents. So William,
thanks for joining me today.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Happy to be here. We usually don't hang out and
talk with the microphones. We do not. It's always good
to see you brother.

Speaker 3 (00:55):
Absolutely, I would say I've gotten pretty good at juggling.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
A lot.

Speaker 3 (01:02):
The going to get a little more complicated child do
in six weeks joining the girl Dad ranks with you
so similar where we met ten well ten plus years
ago in the CPA world doing the professional services, and
we've both evolved understanding how we can better serve small

(01:26):
business owners.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
Continue to do that.

Speaker 3 (01:29):
So I have a consulting business focused in the M
and A and transaction space called Growth Solutions and work
on buy side and sell side and engagements. Basically that
translates to helping people buy and sell operating assets. Still
involved in other consulting arrangements similar to public accounting fashion

(01:55):
where we're you know, documenting processes and systems or helping
executives translate succession planning for you know, somebody who's been
there for thirty five years and nobody's gone in her
office for twenty years, so they don't know how how
it all gets done. And then similar to you that

(02:17):
several things we work on together contract CFO finance resource
for smaller businesses.

Speaker 2 (02:24):
And then.

Speaker 3 (02:27):
The you know, prayers were answered in a big way.
Have have wanted to jump into entrepreneurship buying a business
after helping people do it so many times, and then
the other side of the coin for that grew up,
grew up in a farm town, always have been enamored
with agriculture. My family's on a farm. My family hasn't

(02:50):
farmed since the eighties. So wisely, my mother told me
to go to college. Don't don't try to chase that son.
But but the business I bought is Greener Roots Farm.
It is a hydroponic indoor producer of produce. We specialize
in leafy greens, Microgreens and herbs. The business will be
ten years old in August. So great processes and systems,

(03:14):
wonderful team, and I have a great relationship with the
with the guy I bought it from. So right now
juggling the consulting on nights and weekends and when I
can fit it in while trying to, you know, run
about a six am to four pm business five days
a week.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
That sums it up. We're all good, We're done now.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
No.

Speaker 1 (03:38):
The that is, people always ask for an elevator hits
for me and William, and it's like, we do you
have a tall building, tall enough building for us to
get through it all? And so we start out talking about,
you know, all the things that you're doing right now.
One other things me and William have done is our
past are not they're somewhat aligned. But we've always talked

(04:01):
about these things, whether it was on a golf course
or whether it was at the office by the train
tracks over at Charlesdale, trying to figure out like how
do we get how do we if we were horses,
how do we get the saddles off of us and
just run? How do we run? And so we thought,
or I thought, all right, Well, me and William, we're
just going to do this together and we're going to

(04:22):
figure this out. And we found out, which is great,
that William had a different desire and we both we
as you said, we were both in public counting and
then we I got it heavy into the consulting side,
and then he wanted to get in the ag So
let's talk about Let's talk about real the piece of

(04:43):
the agriculture. Growing up in small town in Kentucky. What
that was like growing up there, getting out of there,
going up to Lexington for college, coming back down to Nashville,
and then how you were able to finally break into
it the way you wanted to do it, not just
buying land and running tractors all day.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
So you know, these are conversations you and I've had
multiple times. And but it growing up in Hopkinsville was
a pretty it was an interesting raising. I'll say by
all standards, I've lived a very privileged life. Both my

(05:26):
mother and father entrepreneurs, taught my sister and I a
lot of great lessons of hard work and and ethics
and you know, doing the right thing, trying hard, putting
your best foot forward. And I think something that you
and I both struggle with is we never leave a
job incomplete? Yeah, got got to see it through or

(05:47):
it drives us crazy. And so so, you know, watched
my dad wake up at three o'clock in the morning
to go have a driver meeting, uh before his his
crew ran the route and he was there till two
or three o'clock when they got back and make sure that,
you know, the bills were paid, the lights were off,

(06:09):
and you know, went to bed at seven o'clock, we
were still running around the house being loud. He's still
he still probably resents us for that. But but I
watched that. My mom is an attorney, has worked for
herself for thirty plus years and interesting dynamic. Now she's
trying to figure out how to retire. But hopefully this

(06:31):
grandchild will change that a little bit. But so so
had that had got to witness that same thing with
my grandparents. My grandfather was a will to do her
in town, help raise money for the local hospital, you know,
huge bond back in the I don't think it's the
sixties or the seventies. And had several different businesses, some

(06:54):
that were successful, others that were break even, and others
that failed. And and Uh, so learned a lot from him. Uh.
And like you said, I wanted to be in the
farming world. The ag world. Didn't know what that looked
like as an immature youth or adolescent, and you know,

(07:16):
was was doing manual labor in the summers working for
my dad. Thought I was hot shot, making ten dollars
an hour, and my mom helped me see that I
needed a trade. I needed a craft. Went to Transylvania
and Lexington with the thought that I'd followed my one
of my grandfather's footsteps and engineering. Those weed out classes

(07:40):
weeded me out. So I found myself, uh, looking for
a direction. Found found the ability to understand and graphs
graphs something pretty quickly in the accounting route. You know,
passed the test there called my mom said I'm gonna
be an accountant and stayed on that path for throughout.

(08:03):
I had a pretty Uh I'll just say my GPA
was below two point zero my first year, and I
didn't make another letter grade besides an A.

Speaker 2 (08:14):
I made one.

Speaker 3 (08:15):
I made a C plus after I retook calculus, but
other than that, I made a's all the way through
the rest of college. Again, back to my father, he
set me down and said, it's a job. Son, treated
like a job. You want to go have fun, you
want to do all the other stuff, but you know,
don't stop to the jobs doing. So got through that.
I worked for a company in Lexington that was a

(08:37):
franchise e of Applebee's, had about one hundred and twenty
something restaurants. I granted this was twenty ten, coming out
of the recession. Took all my friends signed up for
the public accounting route to you know, they had their
jobs locked their senior year. For some reason, I missed
that email and I didn't go of that job fair

(09:00):
so I didn't have a job. I looked for two
or three months, finally got lucky to get this job.
And uh it was one of those scratching claw on
my way up. But it was also a sink, not
a sinking ship. They were going down, you know, revenues
were falling. Chipotle and Panerias, the fast casuals were coming online.
Applebee's was not was not popular anymore. So I learned,

(09:24):
you know, learned a lot in that. Uh, we were
selling assets. We were rolling up large number of p
and ls to different investors. So the financial reporting all
started to make sense. To me moved to Nashville when
it when uh it was my time, there was another
mass layoff coming and and so that uh, you know,

(09:46):
and then you know, fast forward there for the next
ten years, I've been doing the professional service thing with you,
realizing that there's there's more to sell than audit and
tax service. There there's a need for analy medical and
forward looking advisory and helping people solve problems that they
may only solve once in their career, whether it's growth,

(10:08):
or it's distress or you know, it's a it's a
tough equity situation with a partner, and through that, you know,
continue to dream about one day being a farmer. You're
gonna ask my wife. I thought multiple times over the
last couple of years, like all right, I'm just gonna
go rental a piece of land, I'm gonna get a tractor.

(10:30):
I'm just gonna try to grow food and see how
that goes. And as uh, you know, my path, my
journey would would have it, I was helping another client
find a business greener Roots popped up and from a
broker he was not interested in it. And so you know,
then we you know, after started talking in July, we

(10:52):
closed the deal in November of last year. So I
can't say that it was methodical that I got to
this spot. It was luck and chance and and being
ready to execute at the right time. And as you
know this, over the last five years, I've had several
swings at buying businesses. Got to eleventh hour on a
couple of them, and twenty thousand dollars lawyer bills later,

(11:16):
we didn't have a deal done.

Speaker 2 (11:18):
So it you know, it was.

Speaker 3 (11:19):
Practice reps failure, success. And but I did start to
put myself in front of opportunities to have reps in agriculture.
This one, you know, grand design. You know, I can't
I can't do anything but be grateful that it that
it popped up in front of me. I didn't I
didn't do anything to find it.

Speaker 1 (11:40):
Yeah, yeah, And I think one of the things that
drew you and I together was I think it was
the reps. It was taking the licks, it was throwing.
It wasn't all about making the money. It like we
knew the money would come, the money would come, the
money would come, the money would come. And I'm trying
to figure out because I don't many people like like that,

(12:03):
and I know where it came from for me. But
one of the biggest questions I get asked is like,
what made you take the risk? What made you do
like not formulate this plan where you had to get
paid a certain amount and you're in that You're in
that space, like literally right now you're trying to figure
it out. There's a lot on the line for you.
But yet you're like, still makes me happier than sitting

(12:25):
in an office, uh, closing books? You know, fifteen clients,
you know, every month, doing that monotonous work over and
over again. So if you can dig into that, it
may be a load of question. But what made you
jump to say, all right, I'm just gonna we're just
gonna risk it, see if we can get a biscuit here,

(12:47):
risk it for the biscuit.

Speaker 3 (12:49):
I think it's three things. One, I think it's just
my faith and I know that everything's gonna be all right,
and if it's not, then I'll be excited for whatever
is laid out for me. And so I've gone through
life with you know, an happen this morning, I'm an
hour late getting over here to see you. Something happened.

(13:13):
I was taking product to a client or to a
customer that I failed and left off last week, and
I got there and the darn thing rolled out of
my truck and spilled all over the ground. So I
had to sit back in traffic and go get it.
But again, I in the moment, I could have screamed
and yelled and been mad and pissed, and I was.
But it's all for a reason, right, And so I

(13:36):
just have to have faith in that and lean into that.
And then you know, two I have learned and watched.
You know, there's obviously a lot of coverage right now
with Buffett and and you know the conference they have
out there every year, the annual meeting. They are long

(13:57):
term investors. Now, you can look at that from an
uh A monetary standpoint, you can look at that from
a happiness standpoint. And so in everything that I've seen,
and I know you've seen nothing. All of the stuff
you see that are that that the media and society

(14:19):
want to portray is easy.

Speaker 2 (14:21):
It's false, right.

Speaker 3 (14:24):
None of these guys or girls that we've worked with
that you know are pulling in seven digits a year
for the family that happened over thirty years, and so
to think something's gonna happen over two months or six months.

Speaker 2 (14:36):
Or eight months.

Speaker 3 (14:39):
Is that I think I just got that realization. I'm
grateful I got that realization early on in my career.
Is it's day by day, it's showing up. It's it's
doing the next thing, and it's doing it well every day,
and at some point you will You'll benefit from it

(15:00):
having that longer term horizon.

Speaker 2 (15:04):
And then the third thing is.

Speaker 3 (15:07):
Dovetails off of that, which is somewhere in that range
of the ten thousand hour rule or you know, staying
in the game, staying in the batter's box. You you
but then there's a chance of lot, right, So you
got to keep showing up. I love Denzel Washington said
it at in some commission speech, but he said, you

(15:28):
hang around the barbershop long enough, you're going to get
a haircut. And so I've just over the last five
or six years, I've kept talking about agriculture. I've kept
talking about wanting to be involved. I've gotten at bats
and reps with different companies, and most of the time
I'm sitting in a meeting, I don't even know what
I'm talking about. I'm not a farmer, like I said,

(15:51):
I am now. But but talking to these people and
just say, what are your problems, what are you seeing?
How do you do this? How'd you get to where
you are? And just continue to show up and keep
doing it. I think those somewhere somewhere in that mix.
I try to live out all those things in every
facet of my life. I'm gonna need some advice on

(16:13):
fatherhood at some point.

Speaker 1 (16:15):
Yeah, yeah, that's a whole another biscuit, a whole nother biscuit.
As we've as we've worked together over the year. Is
one of the things that kind of going back to
one of the things you mentioned earlier about now letting
the job like it has to get finished even if
it cost us. There was one particular client me and

(16:35):
me and William worked on that I brought him in
to help me try to clean it up, and it
was just a disaster and we ended up like not
working with a client after a certain period of time.
But I just couldn't let it go. And I think
I spent I spent like ten grand just to like,
I don't know, make myself sleep at night, to make
sure that it was in some type of decent shape.

(16:57):
Now did I know as soon as I as soon
as I backed off of it, nothing was going to
happen like that, was it. So I was leaving somewhat
of a good situation for a client that I was
leaving knowing it was going to be a disaster and
nobody's going to take care of it. But that was
kind of the point I had to reconcile in my head.
Otherwise you stay in too long. But I always tried

(17:17):
to figure out where that comes from, because if if
we're not driven by these monetaries, which there is some
drive from the monetary, you gotta you want to make
a good living, you want to get your time back.
We always talk about finite resource of time, But where
do you think that came from? Where it was like,

(17:38):
it's number one is the job has to get done properly.
Then number two three can be whatever it can be,
monetary can be whatever it needs to be, but that
one is like, it's got to get done, It's got
to get done right. Like for me, it's the name
somewhat of the reputation, and then just knowing that it

(17:58):
didn't it just done properly. I still don't know exactly
where it came from because I didn't grow up with
parents necessarily push that in my face. So I still
kind of wander around going why do I care so
much about this? So anyways, I didn't know if you
had any reflections on that.

Speaker 2 (18:18):
Uh, you know, I think.

Speaker 3 (18:22):
I may misquote this, but you know, somewhere in my
my past, my and I apologize for the cuss word,
but my grandfather told me to give it them right,
and what that meant was put the tools up, finish
the job, mow of the yard, you know, be nice
to that person, you know, just go go all the way.

(18:46):
And you know, and another side of that for me
is probably undiagnosed ADHD. I mean, I do think that's
why I do what I do is because I can't
focus on one thing. I can't sit still, and I
I got an exercise to to wear my mind out,
my body out to sit still to do stuff. But

(19:07):
you know, back to your question of where did that,
where did that come from? You know, again, probably another
disorder like O c D. Like you know, my wife
probably driver nuts keeping the house clean and keeping the
clothes picked up and the bed.

Speaker 2 (19:21):
Maid and all that stuff.

Speaker 3 (19:22):
But it it it, I don't know, there's something in
in Nate inside of me. That completes me when I
see something get done and I feel good about the
finished product. And to your point, you know, there is
the There is obviously the enjoyment for you and I

(19:43):
in that moment where it's like, all I checked the box,
completed the task, I did it to my best ability.
I left it all on the field. And I can
go to bed knowing or I can go to sleep
at night knowing that I did the best that I
could do given the circumstance. And and M, I think,
once you've you know, thirty five years old. Now, I think,

(20:04):
once you've done that, it's hard to it's hard to
stop that. But I, you know, and I and I'm
entering a phase in my life where I'm having to
figure out I can't do it all great. I'm doing
a lot of things good, some things moderately good, and
I'm having to focus on all right, I need to

(20:24):
cut those things out and not worry about them. I
need to focus on the core five ten things in
my life. And then to backtrack even further, you you said,
where'd that come from?

Speaker 2 (20:38):
Again?

Speaker 3 (20:38):
I think that came from my raising. The example that
was set you know, my grandma my grandmother was a was.

Speaker 2 (20:47):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (20:48):
Both my grandmothers were didn't leave anything undoing, worked hard,
whether it was cooking or taking care of us, or
taking care of my grandparents, my grandfather's Again, I I
think it just always goes back to completing the task.

Speaker 1 (21:05):
Yeah, I also kind of want to dig into you
had some offers to probably go make a good amount
of money, to go just do what we've been trained
to do, and that's accounting. You know, get into that,
get into that space. But you were like, can't do it,
can't do it. I gotta go run, I gotta do

(21:27):
my thing. And it's been cool to watch because I'm
sitting here on my side, going, well, just just flow
into that, William, and you know, this will it'll this,
all this stuff will kind of just work itself out,
and You're like, I just can't do it. I just
can't do it. I just can't do it. And so
I sit there and I'm like, Okay, that makes sense.
And then I'm sitting there going when I would do

(21:47):
turnarounds and then have to switch every two years, I
get to a point where I couldn't work for that
person for a long period of time. I'm like I
just can't do it. I just can't do it. I
just can't do it. So when I culminate all that,
and I'm looking at like, all right, why why are
we able to make those decisions and give up certain

(22:08):
I guess returns on our career moves over time to
do what we want to do. And I'm just trying
to figure out, like where does that not? Where does
it come from? But what is it about us? And
when most people will play that, they'll play that card
real safe, you know, They're like, I'll continue to do this.
It's safe. I'm not going to make a move. And

(22:31):
then it just on the other side is like everything
you wanted. That's what in Cato has been for me.
It's like never look back, but gosh, it took me
like seventeen years or something to do it.

Speaker 3 (22:42):
You know, you and I have talked about this a lot,
and it's I think it's part of the training, the
in uh, you know, in suite experience that you gained
be in an accountant and it's calculated risk. And so
everybody's story is different, but I know you're you're and
eyes it's pretty similar in that we were able to

(23:03):
handicap the we're able to handicap the moves that we
were thinking about making.

Speaker 2 (23:12):
Using that calculated risk scale. And so for me.

Speaker 3 (23:18):
Again, same thing, you know, and I've talked about multiple times,
is like, hey, end of the day, I'm going to
take you know, especially in a service based business like this,
it's not high capex intensive, the investment's low. It's just
a computer, your time, you know, in your sanity, maybe
some office rent and some stuff like that. If as

(23:40):
you continue to scale, and so, you know, for both
of us, it's like, hey, if this doesn't work, the
worst thing that happen is nobody uses me. I do
the work and I don't get paid, you know, and
by that standard of a business, I fail. Right, I'll
just go back and get a job, right, And I

(24:00):
know what that life looks like. And and so for me,
I took it a little. I took it one step
further with with actual capital and in my time in
those resources. But I think anybody, I think we set

(24:21):
a standard, a life standard for ourselves. And so I
try to look back when I got out of college,
I think I was making twenty eight thousand dollars, was living,
you know, with some college buddies in one of their
house that their parents owned. I think the rent cable included,
which was key, was like five hundred dollars. And it

(24:41):
was like, man, I was, I had enough money for
you know, bearing pizza and paying my gas and you know,
and and so I was like, the that for me
was so I always looked back at like, hey, probably
it will be a little harder with a wife and
a child and and mortgage and all that fun stuff.
But the the reality is, and I'm gonna have to

(25:05):
credit Garrison Smell for this. He opened my eyes to
something I don't think a lot of people aware of.
Is he told me, William, your zero is different than
my zero, And so I said, uh. I had to
sit there and chew on that for a long time.
Like I said, I grew up living a pretty privileged
life in a in a pretty sad, you know, impoverished town.

Speaker 2 (25:32):
H And his zero, I'm sure.

Speaker 3 (25:34):
He told you his story was was by by by
the world standards, was a lot less than mine. But
I so that opened my eye and it really busted
out the floor to my zero. Right at the end
of the day. If if I've got my faith, if
I've got my friends and family I know, and the

(25:56):
hard work that I've been trying to do. Hey, if
I got to go back to, you know, making burgers
at McDonald's, or I'm gonna be the best thinging burger
maker I can be, and I'll climb and I'll pull
myself back up and climb my way up again. So
so that's where I kind of got with the calculator risk.
Now terror listens to this, she may not be so

(26:16):
excited about that, But I say that to say it
for me that that as an enneagram six right, driven
by fear, I've been able to control that that fear
by by the calculated risk taking that I've I've taught
myself that I've that I've learned from watching other people.

Speaker 2 (26:39):
And so.

Speaker 3 (26:41):
I think that answers your question in entirety, which is
you've got to figure out what you've got to gauge
your your risk that you're willing to take. You got
to put a number on it, right. But then the
other side of that is happiness, right, the fullness of life,
the fulfillment that that you your purpose in life. And
for me, I don't think I would be able to

(27:02):
sleep with myself if I didn't go out and and
try it, and so I had.

Speaker 2 (27:07):
To do it.

Speaker 1 (27:08):
Yeah, and there's a you know, when I talk to
people now a lot, they're like, what books are you reading?
What podcasts do you listen to? All this stuff? And
if you really go and look at the guys that
are actually killing it, they're not. They're not actually listening
or reading anything. They're and you call it getting reps.
They're out there just trying stuff. And I read this,

(27:31):
uh on my newsletter day from old Arnold Schwarzenegger. It
was talking about how everybody makes a plan to get
on a diet or get healthy, but they just spend
all their time playing. They never actually get to it.
And so there's a lot of times where people can
look at us and be like, well you failed a
thousand times. I've sitting here and watched you burn. And
it's like, no, no, no, no, that's that's a rep. That's

(27:52):
that's a that's a master's or doctorate and something I
never thought I was going to get. So I want
to talk about kind of shift over to what's the
what was the key deal? Could be monetary, could be
something you learn the most from. Like obviously I think
I've told mine where the the company I invested in

(28:13):
while my wife was very, very pregnant and I had
a convince her at a Denver airport on the way
back from our honeymoon to invest one hundred and twenty
five grand into a company and we were about to
have a baby, and the company almost went bankrupt. Did
not worked out, but it was a touch and go
there for a little bit. So is there any is

(28:33):
there any situation you can point to where you're like, yeah,
I've done it this time, William, You've really done it
this time.

Speaker 3 (28:40):
Everything that I've invested my time in, and I think
you would see the same thing.

Speaker 2 (28:47):
Again. Back to what I said earlier, it's not about.

Speaker 3 (28:50):
The the quick hit the quick, you know success. Yeah,
I've lost tens of thousands of dollars and things and
but I but I built the relationship in.

Speaker 2 (29:01):
Some of those.

Speaker 3 (29:02):
I learned a lot in some of those, and I
think it'll come back to me maybe in a up
to break even or maybe I get close to the
way back from a monetary standpoint. But I've filled the bucket,
even you know, I filled the bucket. Will pass my
my my ro o I that I thought I would
get by that experience.

Speaker 2 (29:25):
Excuse me.

Speaker 3 (29:27):
So I think the key you know, I think the
key moment for me was with you had to be
You showed me, You're like, hey man, we can.

Speaker 2 (29:39):
Do this on our own. We we can.

Speaker 3 (29:43):
And I had to break out of I thought, I
thought I knew that right, but I had to break
out of just just the eight to five get the
work done. And you pointed to me, You're like, hey man,
there are other hours in the day. And I was like, okay,
I can side hustle this thing. And that's where it

(30:03):
all started. I really, you know, so hats off to you.
I mean you're like, hey man, let's go. You want
to try this, and it really blossomed from there. And
then the other thing I'll.

Speaker 2 (30:14):
Say is.

Speaker 3 (30:17):
The you were mentioning books and learning and all that stuff.
I listened to podcasts, I listened to books on tape.
I'm not very good at it, I don't you know.
I don't read as much as I should, but I
have learned. I've kind of cut my teeth my chops.

(30:40):
On networking, I mean I have met all sorts of
people in this town and outside of this town, taking meetings,
going to coffee, just listen to people's stories, ask questions,
gone in rooms that were pretty uncomfortable. When I walked
in outside and shook a couple of hands, and the

(31:01):
next two times I came back, I knew everybody in
the room. And that all stemmed from something I read.
I can't remember, I can't quote it now, But when
I moved to Nashville, it said it was talking about
being a yes man, and so I took I said
yes to most, most meetings, most networking, and so really
just it's called street smarts, learned from other people through

(31:26):
those conversations, those interactions, those relationships, and you know, conversely now,
again can't quote where it is, but I know Brian
Adams talks about it a lot at Excelsior Capital. He
and I've gleaned a lot of a lot of wisdom
from him. Now he's at a point, or he turned

(31:47):
that corner with kids that he has to be a
no man and you got to let you You have
to be real selective about the things you say yes to.
And I think I'm entering that phase in my life.
So call it twenty you know, twenty five to thirty five,
I was a yes man I did, everything went went,
probably overextended myself, and so now I'm having to be

(32:07):
a no man to focus on my relationship with my
wife and my business is my faith, and I need
to get back to the exercise, you know, maintaining that
well being. But I'm having to say no to things,
and so that has turned off a little bit of
that learning faucet, and now it's just now I'm in

(32:31):
the game and I'm learning trial by fire.

Speaker 1 (32:33):
Yeah, yeah, I think that's important. You said it exactly
the way that better than I could. But there's a
time in life to build that structure up and then,
like we've talked about, then you use your network for
you advantage, like to get where you want to go,
whether it's monetary or business or whatever, relationships or whatever

(32:54):
it is. And I find that there is a time
and a place where those skills are. You talk about
the ten thousand hours things earlier. You've probably done enough
of that, and it's like, Okay, the network's built. How
big can your network be? It's time to move on
to the next space, which I think is growth. I
think where people get stuck as they continue to do
the same thing over and over again, like man, I

(33:16):
go to the networking meetings all the time. I'm like,
because you're spending all your time at networking meetings, you
got to be back actually getting things done and providing value.

Speaker 2 (33:26):
Yeah, I still go back.

Speaker 1 (33:28):
When you sat down, it reminded me we were sitting
at Star Bagel in Silvan Park and I was like,
you were telling me what you wanted to do, and
I was like okay, and then I was doing the
same thing kind of. And then it was like, all right,
let's go. So obviously the success of and Cato for
most of you that don't know because William's out doing

(33:51):
his own thing now was William was kind of the
guy that was bringing the people in. And then I
was like, all right, well then I'm going to close
it with this problem I've built and we tag team
this thing. So for Willim to walk away and go
do his own thing, I thought he was nuts, just saying,
just thought he was crazy. I'm like, dude, you've helped
build this, now you're walking away from it. But it

(34:12):
was and then people were like, hey, is William competing
against you? Now you guys are offering the same thing.
I'm like no, I was like, he's doing what he
always said he was going to do. There was no
there was no It was only if anybody was confused
about that, it was me thinking that, no, I can
talk him out of going out on his own. And
what I'm grateful for is that I there was a

(34:35):
point in time, and it's probably after we did that
deal in Swanse Swansea, South Carolina, that I don't know.
We were getting dinner or something and I think I
made some offer to you and you're like okay, and
I was like, oh, he'll take this, and you're like, yeah,
I think I'm still going to go try to do
my own thing. I said, all right, this mustang just
needs to run. And so what it did for the

(34:57):
first time for me it helps shift me to run
alongside somebody instead of either try to lead them or
basically kick them in the butt to get them to go.
So I've kind of watched watched that, which has been
which has been really fun. But I think the big
thing is is you you know kind of what we're
dealing and going into next is more of a vulnerable place.

(35:18):
But you you walk into a room, you know how
to work it. Now you've learned these skills you've if
you know, anybody knows anything about enneagram six is worried
about everything. And my wife is one God bless her heart.
And you know you need answers to stuff, you need
to it. Everything is a calculator risk, but that can
take your life over, you know, those those those things.

(35:41):
And is everything safe? Is my safe? Is? Is this
person safe? Is my loved one's safe? And it could
be tied to money, it could be tied to medical,
it can be tied to anything. And I guess I
wonder what because most most people that are quote unquote
in that six range don't do that. They're shells, they're

(36:02):
busy bees. They work a certain job that they can
literally clock out. They never realize their full potential because
they must play it safe. So you talked about calculat risk,
but people that have your personality don't do that. They
just don't. I don't. I don't know many that do.
They either go into therapy, or they go into nursing,
or they go into something where they can go in,

(36:22):
come out, go in, come out. What do you think
it was? That two part question? What do you think
it was that kind of made you go, I'm just
gonna I'm just gonna keep putting myself in these scary
situations where it might be ten times scarier for you
than it is for me. But you did it, and
I'm just like, I don't feel like I'm not gonna
do it, you know. And then the second thing is

(36:45):
is what's going through your head when all these things
aren't working out all this time? Like, what's happening in
your brain? What's what are you feeling, what are the
what are the hits to the ego that are happened?
And how did how did you stay resilient through that process?
Because you are come, in my opinion, based on your personality,
You're not fighting with the full confident deck like I do,

(37:06):
where I'm just like I go in a room like
I just don't care, you know. So anyways, take us
down that road, because I think this is super huge.
It's one of the reason why I wanted to have
you in is because I've just never seen it where
someone with that that's geared that way has somehow just
just keeps going for it. And I'm just like, there's
nothing safe about anything this guy's doing, but yet he's

(37:27):
still he's still doing it and it's working.

Speaker 2 (37:30):
Uh, there's a lot that goes on in my head.

Speaker 3 (37:36):
And to the backtrack, I would say I was a
pretty outward facing, you know, social butterfly, sports, cool kids,
always with you know, always with my friends in high school.

Speaker 2 (37:53):
But at home I dealt with.

Speaker 3 (37:58):
Like I guess you call him, like fixations that helped
me control my anxiety. Some of those, you know, I
won't get into all of them, but i'll i'll. You know,
I would say that an outsider would look at me
and like, man, that's weird, but that helped me cope,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (38:16):
It was routine.

Speaker 3 (38:18):
It was I forget the word that the right word
for it, but it was these routines or these things
that I did that basically took my mind off of
the fear and the anxiety and thought, oh, look, okay,
everything's in its place, everything's in its order.

Speaker 2 (38:34):
My room was neat.

Speaker 3 (38:35):
My friends, you know, made fun of me for that.
They moved something. They would go in my room and
move stuff just to mess with me. But but that
was my comfort. Like so, you know, going through that
and then moving into college, really I think the answer
was I had to do something one time, and once

(39:00):
I did it, I wasn't scared anymore, right, So it
was a function of forcing myself to go do it
and experience it.

Speaker 2 (39:11):
You know.

Speaker 3 (39:12):
I was with my buddy this weekend at the derby.
He was talking about scott diving. I say here anything like, man,
I would never go scott diving, but I would cyche.
But if I had to do it, I'd psych myself up.
I guarantee you the next time I do it, I'd
feel fully confident because I paid attention. I did it,
I experienced it, and I'm like, man, I could do
that again.

Speaker 2 (39:32):
So for me, it was Uh. I think the breakthrough
was just having the having the.

Speaker 3 (39:43):
The motive to just go or the motivation to just
go do it. And and yeah, I'm a nervous wreck
leading up to it. You don't know what's going on
in my head.

Speaker 2 (39:51):
And and.

Speaker 3 (39:53):
So I think so so then back to the enneagram thing.
And and a lot of this stems from from from
church and the faith based relationships and communities that I
have just listening to other people. And then also, like
I said, I think I learned at a young age
the fear and the stuff that was going on in

(40:13):
my mind. I just turned it over to prayer, right,
I just turned it over to.

Speaker 2 (40:19):
It's gonna be all right.

Speaker 3 (40:20):
Like you know, my wife hates I say this, but
like I die, you know, I'm believing that this soul,
this body stays here and the soul goes somewhere else.
I just got to keep leaning into that. If I ever,
you know, and I think if I ever leave that,
I'll if I ever don't have that, I think I'm
in trouble. And so so that's one thing, and then

(40:43):
the other is like community and friends. And again this
goes back to the faith, the faith community as well
as like I look at other people and I and
I have uh, you know, sadness and pity and happiness
and all the emotions for other people situation, and I
try to have none of that on mine.

Speaker 2 (41:04):
Like I said, this.

Speaker 3 (41:05):
Morning, I could again could have gotten real mad. I
could have gotten pissed off. Why is this happening to me?

Speaker 2 (41:09):
Whate was me?

Speaker 3 (41:11):
But instaid I looked over on the side of the
street and saw a homeless guy walking and I'm like, man,
I hope he has a really good day. Yeah, And
so that was kind of rambling, but but at the
same time, it's like to your point. I have to
live in this constant day to day and I like,
you know, I had forty eight hours of fun this

(41:32):
past weekend, got to go to Morgan Wall and went
to the derby, played some golf, and but you know
that last four hours I was feeling really guilty that
I was not getting my work done. I wasn't working,
I wasn't doing the checklist, you know, finished up what
I had to do in the nursery for my wife
last night, but didn't do a lot of the like

(41:54):
paper pushing stuff and task on my computer I needed
to do. And so I will say, it's a constant
battle in my head to not to shut it off.
And I don't think I think that's the ADHD thing.
I'm grateful my parents didn't try all the drugs and stuff.
They just they made me go outside, and so I

(42:15):
did a lot of them, you know.

Speaker 2 (42:16):
And that's another thing. You know.

Speaker 3 (42:18):
Didn't mention this, but I swam up until college. You
think about it, I'm four hours a day by myself
swimming laps up and down that pool. I got a
pretty good imagination. I got a pretty good way of
coping with my mind, you know, with with the thoughts
that go on in my mind. I'm able to calm them,
I'm able to distract them, and I'm able to analyze

(42:39):
the situation. Whereas my wife wants to talk about stuff
and we're working on this, you know, I can pretty
well solve any problem I got in my head.

Speaker 1 (42:48):
Yep, yep, yeah. And that's that is a thing where
I don't generally need to talk about stuff either because
I've already processed it. And what I've learned over time
is people are like, well, but you hadn't processed it
with me. You hadn't you hadn't turned it all out.
So as we're as we're continuing to mature and grow,

(43:09):
and you're obviously getting into you know, about to be
a dad, and that's gonna be a whole nother deal.

Speaker 2 (43:14):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (43:15):
I guess practically with your schedule and things like that,
how are you mapping out your time or are you
just kind of like, all right, what's and you know
this this could just be where you're at? Is it
the biggest fire? Is it?

Speaker 2 (43:27):
Like?

Speaker 1 (43:27):
All right, I'm these days are for this, These days
are for dad or side hustles at night, Like how
are you? How are you managing it all because obviously
in your head it's like, all right, your brain gets
used to it after a while, you can kind of
keep it all up there. But the implications, like you
talked about, you have to take time off, Like I
don't work weekends anymore. I've just made a it's taken

(43:49):
me six years to get there, but no weekends, no nights,
and I'm like, how do I get it done within
the daytime? That's it. So you may be at the
beginning of that stage, you maybe in the middle. You
maybe where I'm at. I don't know, but kind of
where you at in the process, because I think it's
important for other people to know, like you've got to
keep grinding until you you gotta keep trying stuff until

(44:10):
you find something that works for you, even if you
try fifty thousand times and it doesn't work.

Speaker 3 (44:17):
I'm at a wide open, no boundaries stage, which is very,
very unhealthy, right, But again, as I said, I'm looking
at it from the long term, you know, child, I've
been using this as like an endpoint, like, all right,
I got to get it all organized and under control.

Speaker 2 (44:37):
Things are falling into place, you know, having faith that
it will.

Speaker 3 (44:43):
But you know, I knew from when we started talking
about doing this deal and it got real serious that
I was going to spend the first year learning again
that this guy ran the business for nine and a
half years, Like, I can't expect to pick that up
in a month. So I knew for you know, twelve
to eighteen months, I was just gonna have to bust it,

(45:05):
learn it, excuse me.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
And that aligns with the monetary side of it too.

Speaker 3 (45:10):
We did the deal where the first year is money
that you use to pay for expansion and for paying
off you know, the seller, so I get getting zero
from it. My wife reminds me of that, but but
the plan is in the future, uh, for for me
to have the ability to get something out of that.

(45:30):
So you know, I am actively trying to get to
a point where I know it's gonna happen where I've
got to shut other things out and focus on my family.
And right now, you know, my wife has given me
the leniency and she knows that I'm grinding hard to
get us to a spot that these we start to

(45:52):
reap the benefits from all all this hard work.

Speaker 2 (45:56):
I do think.

Speaker 3 (45:59):
I have I do think as as humans, we can't
go seven days a week. We've got to have a
time to sit down relax. And even for me that's
a busy body in canse, it's still. That can mean
playing golf, that can mean exercising, that can mean working
in the garden, that can mean family time. That's still

(46:22):
I'm not sitting on my butt watching TV. I have
no social media. I had to That was another conscious
thing I had to do. I had to get the
distraction out of my life. And again something I read
I can't quote, but I got rid of all my
social media. I guess it's been eight years seven years now.
But you know, I don't watch shows. I watch love sports,

(46:44):
you know, follow CNBC daily. But but outside of that,
I don't really have any other margin in my life
for other stuff. So so it. But I do think
but to your point, I need. I am working towards
a place in life where I can control it. But
right now there is no control. The Governor's off, it's

(47:06):
it's wide open. I think that the I've focused in
on the relationship with my wife. You know, still got
some work to do. But but the thing that's probably
suffering the most for me right now is I used
to work out every day. I try to do my
I try to do my push ups every day. But

(47:27):
other than that, the health side of it for me,
I feel mentally a little bit stretched, but I still
feel pretty healthy physically. I'm not working out as much
and not sleeping as much, so trying to get those
things back in bounds.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
While getting it all done.

Speaker 3 (47:43):
And then to your first question, prioritization is key, and
it's it really is firefighting at the moment. I and
I think you and I talked about this years ago,
but it's like, how do we cope with this life
where we're we're firefighting for somebody else, and it is
it may feel like life or death to them when

(48:05):
the bank account's running low or the business ain't doing
good or whatever it may be. But you know, we
talked about it. We said, hey man, we're not surgeons.
Nobody's gonna die on the table. We can do this tomorrow.

Speaker 1 (48:17):
Yep, yep.

Speaker 2 (48:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (48:20):
It's it's wild. It's a wild deal with all of that.
And I think too, I mean, the the world in
some ways has gotten very like you said, social media
driven filters. Every nobody knows the true story behind, you know,
the fake smiles and all the other stuff that goes
on with all that. And somebody asked me on another

(48:44):
podcast if like, how do you get on this podcast
and just talk about whatever you want? Aren't you worried
about what people think. I'm like, I'll never know because
I'm hunting on social media. So buddy of mine has
an Instagram page for us, but I don't ever see it.
I'm never on it. But I think two going back,
let's go back a few years, just just because I
think it's important. The pandemic did a lot of things

(49:08):
to a lot of people. Uh with you for for
many reasons. I mean even the culmination of like your
your wife and your relationship now, it's like that was
years of struggle to find her at the right time,
at the right place too, cause you're thirty five, you're

(49:29):
just having your first kid. Some may say that's late,
somebody say that's early, some whatever. But with you, it
just all kind of I don't know, it just it
through through the things you've been through, and we won't
we won't be able to cover all those on this
on this podcast. But just like your ability to be
patient with your personal life, and maybe it's just you

(49:52):
weren't patient with it. That's just it is what it is.

Speaker 2 (49:55):
But what about that?

Speaker 1 (49:57):
I mean, you it's like you found the right person.
You've gotten married. It seems whether you're working on you're
always gonna work on your marriage. But we used to
have a joke about, uh, just any people that William
data were like, all right, well they got to be
the total package and we kind of joke about it
and to be about different different things, what what what

(50:19):
job they had or this or that. And then you
told me one time you just called your your wife
now that by it just came out of you that day.
So what was it about that kind of maturation process
of life and just it all kind of come into
this place in the last couple of years and it's
like all right, and it was just, you know, perfect

(50:40):
timing for you.

Speaker 3 (50:42):
Uh, I'm glad you brought up the the TP shout
out to David Howard. But that is that's the fault
that I had to overcome, which is control. Yeah, I
thought I could call my shots. I thought it had
to be my way, no way. You ask my wife.
She probably still says that's the truth. But control is

(51:06):
a is a nasty is a nasty characteristic and it
is in any faith journey, you know. They they say
the opposite of love is fear, right, and when you
have fear, you're trying to control the situation.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 3 (51:25):
The opposite of faith is fear. Sorry, And and that's
all baked into oh I gotta have it my way,
I gotta do it. So that's a that that that
you know, years back, I I just had to make
the conscious effort that again, I'm not in control it.

Speaker 2 (51:41):
It's it all boils down to that, I mean, and
that was, you know, not to get into two women.
But that's what you know.

Speaker 3 (51:50):
I was trying to be my own matchmaker and set
my standards and really I needed to just be in
relationship with that person. And for you know, from my
wife and I, I think the thing that was not
at the top of my list but is at the
top of our connectivity points is faith.

Speaker 1 (52:11):
Yeah. Yeah, it is weird how it all comes back
to that if it's all based on that. Yeah, And
it's not a cliche. Sometimes you'll get people talking about
their faith and stuff and you're like, what's this guy
talking about? But it's but it is it is. I mean,
it all comes back to this, this sense of like,
all right, who's in control, who's really in control? Who's

(52:32):
the master? And for guys like us that are not,
you know, you look at the rich dad, poor dad concept.
You got your w two employees. They live one way.
You got your entrepreneurs, they live another way. Two different
worlds within one world. And the entrepreneurs are always like,
I control everything, I do everything. So to put a
faith layer of faith on top of that and make

(52:54):
that number one priority, it's a freaking grind all the
time because you just want to do things you're but
a buddy of mine over the weekend we were talking
about that. He's like, but when I'm not when my
face not guiding me, I'm not allowing it, everything I
touch breaks and so I was like, I've never heard
anybody say it like that. I'm like yeah, And he's like,

(53:16):
I just wonder why everything was breaking during that time.
I was like, well, how how was your spirituality going
on at that time? He's like, well, it was non existing.
I'm like, well, that's probably why everything was breaking. And
I can go back to that same thing with me.
It's just like oh even now, like yeah, things are
things are good, and my back is healthy business is
running fine, but then when you get one or two problems,

(53:38):
then the next problem reveals itself and it's all it's
been lying in wait. And that's why I love about
the faith thing about you talked about the soul leaves
and the body says here, it's like, all right, well,
then there's something to look forward to, because this life's hard.
It's a run and gun. Once you got it all
figured out, your kids grow into a different age, different
their personalities developed, and then you must leave that thing

(54:02):
that you had built and you got to transition into
the next phase. And it's always this moving thing. And
I think that's it's just been cool to be on
the journey with you on that and just going okay, yeah,
it's all. It just all seems to work out. And
but at the same time, it's it's respecting the grind,
respecting the work ethic, and then just kind of seeing

(54:23):
where we go as we as we wind down here.
And me and William could say one of the things
that the podcast came from is all the conversations me
and William have had, whether it be on the phone
or talking about all the different people we've talked to
and all those just like I mean, being in cars
with from some very wealthy guys saying a lot of
things after drinking a bunch of uncle. Near's like, we've

(54:46):
we've heard some things in our in our time, and
you're just kind of like, man, if there was a
microphone right now, we'd be, uh, we'd be in good shape.
But I think as we close out, as you're as
you're kinda and I don't really give it vibe people like,
what's well, what's advice you'd give to the people listening
to this? I don't really want to ask that. I
think I want to ask more of like if there's

(55:09):
one thing that you could just push across the board,
doesn't matter where the personality is, what point in life,
there is any of that if you look at the
core of who you are then and we obviously have
talked about faith, but is it is it just finishing?
Is it not giving up?

Speaker 2 (55:26):
Like?

Speaker 1 (55:27):
What is that thing that anybody could basically grab onto,
no matter what their personality is.

Speaker 3 (55:35):
I think it's this is like a mishmash of the
things that define who I am. But for me, I
think it's it's as I said before one and again,
this helps me suppress my anxiety and suppress my you know,
uh desire to add to to to add up. Right,

(55:57):
it's just doing doing the job, whatever it is, to
the best of your ability and finishing it. I love
the you know, the admiral that gave the this commission
speech at U T Austin. You know, he gave you
like ten points to life and he said the you know,
the first thing is wake up in the morning, make
your bed. That's one completed task. And if you have

(56:20):
a crummy day, you can come back and you can
get into bed that you made right. So that there's that,
and then this, you know, we could this is a
can of worms. But like doing the right thing, there's
so many different competing thoughts in this society about what's

(56:40):
right and what's wrong, what's truth and what's false. But
I think looking around at at at your you know,
the people that are in your sphere, the people that
you interact with and experience every day, they're a pretty
good barometer of what's right and wrong. And you're I

(57:03):
think as humans we're innately set to do good.

Speaker 2 (57:07):
Right. I think we're aligned to do good.

Speaker 3 (57:10):
Too much of a good thing is a bad thing, right,
And so right now we've got a lot of too
much of the good things and it's allowed us to
go the opposite way. And then I you know, I
think third is how you define wealth again. I think

(57:30):
our society looks at x's and o's dollars in crypto
and you know, smiles, happiness, relationships, those are all key.
I mean, and you gotta that should be what's in
your well, that should be what's in your wealth bank account,
and that's what you should you know, that's what you

(57:52):
should worry about. And then last thing just just life's
a journey, right, And you lot alluded to. You know,
if you at twenty one, if you had asked where
I'm at at thirty five, I probably would have given
you a whole different story.

Speaker 2 (58:07):
Right.

Speaker 3 (58:07):
Yeah, but man, I've enjoyed every second of it. It's
not all been fun, but you know what I'm saying,
it's it's it's a journey. And so having the having
the ability to to look and say, hey, today's today,
I'm gonna go out and give it my best, and uh,
I get to do it again tomorrow, and don't worry

(58:27):
about too much about the future.

Speaker 1 (58:29):
In the past, yep, the old thinking neutrals staying in
the moment. Willie, it was good to talk to you, man,
and on the on the the old microphone. Glad we
got to Yeah we could. We could sit here for hours,
but we got stuff to do. So appreciate you coming on, man.
I think it's uh, it's been cool to watch the

(58:50):
journey unfold. And then I also I just you know,
part of this is letting people know what's going on
inside our heads. They see they see it. They proceeds
is one thing, but they don't know how much we're
working and battling to make it all happen. So appreciate
you coming on.

Speaker 2 (59:07):
Man.

Speaker 1 (59:08):
This has been fun, and thank you guys for listening.
I keep doing them because you guys keep asking for them,
so we'll just keep We'll keep going and hopefully I
can get more and more people on here to just
kind of talk about how they live and what they do.
Appreciate you, William, Thank you buddy, Love you man,