July 23, 2025 • 53 mins
What does it mean to age with style and impact? Episode 250 of Late Boomers is here to enlighten you! Join us as We chat with Joe Owens, the dynamic author of "Feeling Groovy: A Boomer's Guide to Ageless Aging." From a health scare in his fifties to working with music legends like the Rolling Stones, Joe's journey is a testament to living life fully. Discover his secrets to staying youthful, from mingling with younger generations to embracing natural wellness. Tune in for Joe's insights on maintaining mental and physical vitality and redefining aging with zest! Don't miss this inspiring episode.
Joe Owens' Bio:
Joe Owens writes character-driven novels, short stories, non-fiction and screenplays. Whether set in the gaslit alleys of Victorian England or the everyday corners of modern life, his work reveals what motivates people, what moves them, and what sometimes leads them astray.
Connect with Joe:
Website: www.joeowensbooks.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joeowensbooks
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joeowensbooks
Thank you for listening. Please check out @lateboomers on Instagram and our website lateboomers.us. If you enjoyed this podcast and would like to watch it or listen to more of our episodes, you will find Late Boomers on your favorite podcast platform and on our new YouTube Late Boomers Podcast Channel. We hope we have inspired you and we look forward to your becoming a member of our Late Boomers family of subscribers.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Joe Owens (00:01):
This is the EWN Podcast Network.
Cathy (00:14):
Welcome to late boomers, our podcast guide to creating
your third act with style,power, and impact. Hi. I'm Cathy
Worthington.
Merry (00:24):
And I'm Merry Elkins. Join us as we bring you
conversations with successfulentrepreneurs, entertainers, and
people with vision who aremaking a difference in the
world.
Cathy (00:34):
Everyone has a story, and we'll take you along for the
ride on each interview,recounting the journey our
guests have taken to get wherethey are, inspiring you to
create your own path to success.Let's get started. Hi. I'm Cathy
Worthington. Welcome to the LateBoomers podcast.
(00:56):
I'm here with my cohost, MerryElkins, and boy, do we have
someone here with us who's goingto give us boomers some great
advice about staying youngerthan our years. Jo Owens, author
of Feeling Groovy, a boomerguide to ageless aging.
Merry (01:12):
And I'm Mary Elkins. Joe has worn so many hats it's mind
boggling to keep up with him andall that he's done and still
doing. From working in musicwith rock legends like the
Rolling Stones to real estate tohis work as a fiction and
nonfiction author, filmmaker,and guru of fitness and age
(01:33):
aging. Let me say that right.Aging agelessly.
Welcome, Joe.
Joe Owens (01:38):
Hi, guys. How are you? Thanks for having me.
Merry (01:40):
Great to have you.
Cathy (01:42):
What inspired you to write Feeling Groovy, and what
keeps you feeling groovy aboutlife and about yourself?
Joe Owens (01:49):
Well, I ran out of money. I mean, the Oh. That book
had been following me around fora while. In my late fifties, I
had a heart thing. My wholelife, had had something called
SVT, supraventriculartachycardia, and it would make
(02:10):
In a situation like this, myheart would just take off to
like 160, 180 beats a minute.
And they say it dangerous, butit made you feel funny, and your
knees got a little weak. I had amild case of it. I mean, had it
since I was 14, but I had a mildcase of it. Mine would last
fifteen, twenty minutes. Somepoor people, it lasts for like
days.
(02:30):
Oh. But I had an episode thatdid last for days, which was
very disconcerting, and thenwhen they went to fix it, they
used the wrong medicine, and itgot scary. I had a great doctor.
After I came out of that wholething, I said, They want me to
take medicine. They want me tobe cardiologist.
They want me he said, No, no,no, no. He said, We're going to
(02:50):
lift weights. We're going torun. We're going to eat. We're
going to sleep.
We're going to take care ofourselves. So at 60, I started a
fitness plan, and startedlifting weights, and started
doing all that stuff, and nowhere I am fifteen years later.
When I started all that stuff, Ithought that would be a cool
thing to do, to sort of writeabout this and kind of write
(03:11):
about my journey. So that'swhere it started. The first
title for it was actuallyRunning from God, and that's
what my son said.
Said, You're running from God,aren't you, dad? I said, Oh,
yeah, you know. He'll get meeventually, but I'll need to be
running to do it. So but, yeah,it it it started the sort of
whole genesis for the book waswhen I started working out,
thought, well, I wanna keeptrack of this and and see where
(03:33):
it ends up, and it it's ended upwith feeling groovy.
Cathy (03:37):
So making notes all along the way and and tracking your
progress and everything, right?
Joe Owens (03:43):
And and also what worked and what didn't, because
there's a lot of trial and errorwith that, you know, what you
eat, how much you sleep, youknow, all those kind of things.
The other interesting thing wasthat when I got closer to the
book in the last year or so, Ithought, It might be a good idea
to ask baby boomers if this issomething they care about, The
(04:05):
me writing this book and book atthat point was a workout guide.
It was how many push ups youshould do, and that sort of
stuff, and a little bit more anddiet oriented. And the response
I got was amazing, because theysaid, Nah, not really what we
care about. We want to feel likewe used to feel.
(04:27):
And how do you do that? And so Iwent back and I said, Okay, well
I'll throw out these 80 pages.Kind of heartbreaking. But it
was a really interestingchallenge because it's one thing
to say, you have to stay, andyou do have to stay strong. I
(04:48):
mean, if you're not strong, youinjure yourself as you get
older, you trip and you fall,those So kind of it is important
that you stay strong, and that'swhy I still lift weights, and it
is important that your cardio isgood and all those things.
But how do you feel, Ruby? Sothat took a little bit of
thought, and ultimately what Icame up with was in order to
(05:09):
feel the way you used to feel, alot of that was you were
relevant. You were in the game.You knew what was going on
around you. You knew who theactors You knew who the rock
bands were.
You knew about the new car thatcame out. You knew all that
stuff, and I think there's atendency as you get older to
not. I have a friend who livesin in my neighborhood, and all
(05:30):
of his cultural references stopat like 1972. We're still
talking about Wagon Train andBurt Reynolds and Anne Margaret.
Cathy (05:37):
Oh. Yeah. That's very sad. That means he has no
millennials in his life to tokeep him clued in. And annoying.
Or or younger. Gen z. Becausenow we have to rely on Gen z to
clue us into
Joe Owens (05:52):
Right.
Cathy (05:53):
Social media and all that. It's very important, Which
Joe Owens (05:56):
then sort of makes it difficult for you to have a
conversation with anybody who isnot in your circle, and I think
the way you stay on top ofthings is to talk to people that
are younger than you, or thatknow different things than you
do. Mhmm. Right. So that was abig part of feeling groovy. And
then, I also said, look, youknow, if you're lifting weights
(06:19):
and you feel strong, you feelgroovy.
Right. If you're weak, you don'tfeel groovy. And if you're
constantly coming down withcolds or your back hurts or
whatever, you don't feel groovy.If you do those things
physically, if you eat well,sleep well, you're not tired,
you work out, you take care ofyour skin, you know? I mean, I
have a skin care routine.
(06:40):
Who who would have thought?
Cathy (06:41):
Good. For you.
Joe Owens (06:42):
I do too.
Merry (06:43):
Yeah. I
Joe Owens (06:43):
do. So there you go.
Merry (06:45):
Yeah. Hello, men out there.
Joe Owens (06:47):
Exactly. I mean, you know, otherwise, you end up
looking at a lizard, especiallyin the places that I live
because I live in places thathave lots of sunshine. So I
think
Cathy (06:55):
And you talked about cultural references when Mary
and I started this podcast. Itwas five years ago, almost five.
We're almost at five. And wesaid it to people our age that
are like our contemporaries.They said, like, what's a
podcast?
I don't listen to a pod I don'teven know what a podcast is.
Merry (07:12):
Exactly.
Cathy (07:13):
And so we've had to, like, try and get people to
listen and just how do I listen?I'll send you a link. Just click
it and listen to it.
Merry (07:23):
And then we get, how do I click the link?
Joe Owens (07:26):
Exactly. And what what's the link? Then the next
thing you know, you know,somebody in Kazakhstan is
stealing all their money.
Cathy (07:32):
But Yeah. It's
Joe Owens (07:35):
know, I I think that that feeling part, but it threw
me when, you know, when I heardthat people say, look, you know,
the exercising is good and andall that kind of stuff, but how
do I feel the way I used tofeel?
Cathy (07:47):
Yeah. I'm glad I'm glad you had the right people to ask.
You you might not have gottenthat answer if you asked the
wrong people, so that thatsteered you toward That's really
good.
Merry (07:59):
Have a son, right? You have a son, right?
Joe Owens (08:02):
I have a son. He's 30. He's 30 years old. He is my
worst critic. It's just Oh,Really?
Really? That No, that's notgoing to work. You'd have to or
he'll rhyme off in a sentencehow I should market the book,
(08:22):
like the day I showed up withthe finished book. He said, Oh,
that's great. You go to socialmedia, you put that, and you do
this, and you go there, and youput that, blah, I'm like, Dude,
I know it's English because Irecognize the words, but I don't
recognize that combination ofthem.
What in the world are youtalking about? Which is a tough
part of being an author thesedays. Back in the day, I was
(08:43):
signed to HarperCollins. I had apublisher. I had an agent.
I finished the book. I handed itto them, and then they told me
where to go and do interviews.Now you have to do all of it.
Not my favorite part.
Merry (08:54):
You do. No. Absolutely not. Well, you know, I have to
ask you. You mentioned drugsbefore, and I just kept I've
kept thinking about my dad whenhe was 80.
He said to me, you know, on gooddays, I feel I'm 50. And I
thought I was really young then,and I thought, that's really
old. But it truly it trulyisn't. But I have to ask you,
(09:17):
with all that you've said, doyou believe in the body's
ability to heal itself?
Joe Owens (09:23):
Yes, only. That's what I only believe in. I have a
very uncomfortable relationshipwith pharmaceuticals, because
pharmaceuticals don't cureanything. All pharmaceuticals
do, and I'm going to caveat thiswhole thing by saying, Please do
not watch this podcast and throwall your medicine away. Right.
Cathy (09:44):
Please don't do that. No.
Joe Owens (09:45):
Please don't do that. But to me, pills only mask
symptoms. Pills only treatsymptoms. They don't cure
diseases. Right?
So there's no pill to cureanything that you have. The guys
I love are are the ones who takeLipitor so they can keep eating
(10:06):
cheeseburgers. Like, what iswrong with you? What is wrong
with you? And that goes likethat's a pain medication for me.
I don't take pain medication,because Mhmm. And I have a lot
of military friends, and youknow, the Marines say that pain
is weakness leaving the body.But if something hurts, it means
(10:26):
there's something wrong with it.So if you mask the pain, then
you don't know whether or notthat thing is still wrong with
you. If your back hurts, and youtake medicine to stop your back
from hurting, how do you knowthat you're not going to go out
and hurt your back worse bypicking something up that you
shouldn't be picking up?
Cathy (10:45):
Exactly right. People do.
Joe Owens (10:49):
People do. It's But I think that people tend to rely
on drugs to fix everything forthem, when in fact more
exercise, more water, betterframe of mind, balancing your
chakras, getting your kundalini,doing the stuff that your body
(11:09):
will heal itself. It reallytruly will, if you support it,
if you help it. Because we'veall heard the stories about
people's brains rewiringthemselves after they have a
head injury. You know, there'ssome remarkable things to do.
So I'm not a pill guy, I don'tdo that. I take a lot of
supplements and vitamins andthings like that in an effort to
(11:30):
sort of keep the machineworking. But again, you know, if
you have a car and you neverdrive it, I don't care how good
of a race car it is, you have todrive it. The same with your
body, you have to go for a walk.Know, put down the potato chips,
get off the couch, go for awalk, you know, do something,
exercise.
Cathy (11:48):
Oh, you're making me crave potato chips now. Yeah.
Know. You shouldn't havementioned them.
Joe Owens (11:53):
I love potato chips, and I love Coca Cola too. Are
the weekend
Cathy (11:59):
I I kinda I kinda you do
Merry (12:01):
you do actually do a little bit of it?
Joe Owens (12:04):
My so my major problem is that my palate
stopped growing at about age 11.So I have no interest in cigars,
I have no interest incigarettes, I have no interest
in brown liquor or beer or any Ihave no interest in any of that,
never have. But you give me acupcake, I'll massacre it. I
like cookies, cupcakes, allthose kind of things. So that is
(12:28):
a and, you know, you guys knowsugar.
It's addictive. It's likeheroin.
Merry (12:32):
Oh, give me a great chocolate chip cookie.
Joe Owens (12:35):
You bet. And and they're everywhere. I mean, it's
like cookies and cookies and iseverywhere. Although Uh-huh. I'm
a I'm a chocolate snob, so I,you know, I want Hershey bars
and things like
Cathy (12:49):
don't that. Buy it and bring it in your house, it isn't
everywhere. It's not in yourhouse.
Joe Owens (12:54):
And and that's what I do. Yeah. Yeah. Although there's
a trick. There's a little trick.
I buy semi sweet chocolatechips, the Ghirardelli semi
sweet chocolate chips, and I putthem in the freezer. When I
Cathy (13:08):
want That's what I do.
Joe Owens (13:09):
Well, when I want some chocolate, I'll eat one or
two of them, because you
Cathy (13:13):
know One or two, you don't eat the whole Yeah.
Joe Owens (13:16):
I don't. I eat one or two of them. Your what I found
out about cravings for meanyway, and I don't know, but
some other people have said,yeah, you're right. When you
want potato chips, you don'twant a bag of potato chips. You
want some potato chips.
Two or three. You want thegrease, you want the salt. So I
can eat a couple of potatochips. I can eat a couple
(13:38):
because I just want that tasteon my tongue. So that was that
was sort of the discipline.
Was like, okay.
Cathy (13:44):
Can Way way more.
Merry (13:47):
Way more disciplined.
Cathy (13:49):
Most people cannot eat two potato chips because they're
made with ingredients that makethem addictive, so That's you
right. Keep eating Give us somekeys to living longer, and talk
about some strategies forphysical and mental wellness.
Joe Owens (14:06):
So my mom in 1960 had open heart surgery, and she was
one of the earliest people inthe country to have open heart
surgery. Yeah, 1960. She was Ithink 33 when she had it. I have
to do the numbers. In any event,they told her that if she did
not have the surgery, she'd bedead in six months.
If she had the surgery, shecould live another two years.
(14:29):
Two years came and went, fiveyears came and went, ten years
came and went, twenty years cameand went, once she had surgery-
Well, it worked just fine, butwhat was interesting about it
was that she said to the doctorsand nurses and everything, I'll
outlive all of you. So everyyear, there was a nurse who was
a candy striper when she firsthad the surgery, would send her
(14:53):
a Christmas card saying MerryChristmas, and these are the
people in the team that died.Oh. Seriously.
In 1990 That's August, she got aChristmas card that said, The
last member of your surgicalteam died. February 5, the next
year, thirty nine years to theday of her surgery, she died.
(15:16):
She called me when she got theChristmas card, and she said, I
outlived all of them. I told youso.
Cathy (15:22):
And it was like permission for her to die,
though. That was And
Joe Owens (15:26):
she had a goal. So but but she used this people
would say, you know, how haveyou done this? How have you
lived thirty nine years whenthey gave you six months to
live? And she said, Keepreading. I'm like, I don't like
the alternative.
And so she was always verypositive. She was also very,
very funny, had great sarcasticsense of humor. But that was
(15:51):
sort of in me from the get, youknow, like from when I was a
little kid. And so my I think ifyou stay positive, every morning
is a gift. There's a reason whythey call it present, and so you
get a gift every day.
(16:13):
You should be up. You should behappy. You should find things to
do. I sort of get it down topeople and to passion and to
purpose. You have to have thingsthat you love, you have to have
lots of friends, and you have tohave some reason to keep going.
So if you've got those threethings in your life, great.
Fine. You know, you havesetbacks. You have setbacks. You
(16:35):
know, if you want to know aboutabout setbacks and read a book.
You know, the hero is one way,then it's another way, then he
has to change, then bad thingshappen, then good things happen,
and in the end, he wins, and hegets the girl, and he gets the
money, or he gets, you know,whatever. And you're you're the
author of your own book, sodon't quit the book halfway
through. Absolutely. So I mean,I think Yeah. I think that's it.
(16:57):
And, you know, plus take care ofyourself. I mean, you know, I
Yeah. Absolutely. I neversmoked, Barely, you know, barely
drank. Like I said, I was moreinterested in cupcakes.
I worry about how much I weigh.I worry about how I look. I care
about that stuff. I think that'sif you always have a goal. And
also, I I think the best adviceI can give is you need a really
(17:19):
long to do list, because youcan't die until you've done
everything on your to do list.
So just keep
Merry (17:24):
Oh, adding see, things to keep making it longer. Yeah.
Joe Owens (17:27):
Keep making your to do list longer, you'll live
forever.
Merry (17:30):
I love that. That's great. I think I'll start it
today.
Cathy (17:35):
So that's why all the people in history haven't been
living forever. They didn't havethat list. Well, I'm just
teasing you.
Joe Owens (17:42):
No. They didn't. They haven't. If if Alexander the
Great had had a longer listMaybe he is. Conquer.
Conquer. Conquer. He didn't. Hewas
Merry (17:51):
Yeah. He should have come out west.
Joe Owens (17:55):
Okay. To more countries.
Merry (17:57):
Yeah. So you mentioned this a little bit earlier, but
how would you advise babyboomers to reframe aging?
Joe Owens (18:09):
I think, and this sounds goofy, forget about it.
Merry (18:15):
Forget about it.
Joe Owens (18:16):
Forget about it. Just
Cathy (18:18):
Forget about it. It's
Joe Owens (18:22):
a calendar. It's a clock. What's funny is that most
most people think I'm youngerthan than I am, because I I do
care about you know, I'm I'mlike baseball hats, sunglasses,
you know, and a couple of peoplehave said, you don't walk like
an old man. I don't know whatthat means, but you know, you
(18:44):
bounce in your step and allthat. What's what's funny is
that I'll be out doing somethingat a park or a dog park or
whatever, and some guy will bendover to pick up the ball to
throw for his dog, and he'lllike grunt or make some kind of
(19:05):
noise or something, and I'llkind of laugh.
I said, Yeah. Said, Oh, man,when you're my age I said,
Really? How old are you? He's62.
Merry (19:17):
You tell him how old you are?
Joe Owens (19:20):
Well, usually say I have ties older than you, but
yeah, then I tell them how old Iam. They're Dude, I'm 75. Oh,
you don't look 75 yet, and Idon't feel 75 either, but I
don't think about being 75. Idon't wake up in the morning and
go, Oh, I'm 75, so there's onlycertain things I can do. I'm 75,
(19:40):
so I better not lift weights.
Oh, I'm 75. You put those kindof restrictions on yourself, I'm
this, so I can't do that, Uh-uh.And I've always had a I think
it's partly my authority issues.You know, anytime somebody like,
if you wanted me to dosomething, my mom knew this. If
she wanted me to do something,tell me not to do it.
(20:01):
You know? Don't you don't yourake that yard.
Merry (20:04):
Reverse psychology.
Joe Owens (20:07):
Don't you
Cathy (20:07):
rake that yard.
Joe Owens (20:08):
Don't you dare rake those leaves. But I think that
the the best advice that I cangive people is two things.
Number one, don't restrictyourself based on the fact that
you think you're old, or youthink you're sick, or you think
you're, you know, whatever. Andthe other thing is you're dead a
long time, so get like liveevery minute because you have
(20:33):
plenty like, I see people lay,like, sleeping in the middle of
the day. Dude, you got plenty oftime to sleep when the lights go
out for the last time.
Plenty of time. So, I mean, ifyou kind of keep those two
things in mind, don't restrictyourself and remember, at some
point, you're going to crossover to see all those dogs you
(20:54):
had when they were alive. So,yes. Yeah. So that's You that's
your dogs.
Well, that's the only reason Iwant to go, you know, to the
other side, because I want tosee my dogs. Although, like my
grandfather, he used to say,don't want to go to heaven. I
don't I won't know anybody. Ikind of I kind of feel the same
way. But no, think the bestadvice is don't restrict
(21:16):
yourself.
Like, just go ahead. Don't don'tthink about I'm this age, so I
can't do that, and just rememberthat while you're going, go.
While you're here, enjoy everyminute of it, because at some
point your ride is over. So, youknow, that.
Merry (21:35):
It's a ride.
Joe Owens (21:37):
It is. Yeah. But it's a ticket ride. It's a real good
Disney ride. You know?
It's it's a lot of fun. You guysremember Hunter S. Thompson, the
fear and loathing in Las Vegas,and murder okay. All those rage
So Hunter Thompson said that thepoint of life is not to arrive
at the grave in this pristinebody, really sort of well taken
(21:59):
care of, you know, everythingreal nice. It's to kind of slide
sideways on a motorcycle drunk,you know, in a cloud of dust and
craziness with, you know, wow.
What a wild ride. That was thatwas great. That's kind of the
point. It you know, you're livelife with it.
Merry (22:16):
With a perfect body.
Joe Owens (22:19):
With a well, if if you wanna keep going, then you
gotta Yeah. Be of pain. Youknow? I can
Cathy (22:26):
Well, on that note, what's the right kind of
exercise to stay ageless?
Joe Owens (22:31):
So keeping you should keep your abilities in mind when
you exercise, because I Iexercise pretty much the same as
I did when I started at aroundage 60. And I had worked out
before that, but you know, at 60I started paying attention.
(22:53):
Yeah. You do lighter weightswith more reps. So you have to
remember what lifting weights isall about.
The whole point of liftingweights is you're pushing your
muscles to do something. You getthese sort of minute microscopic
muscle tears when you liftweights, and then your your body
(23:14):
rebuilds that muscle. So itfixes the tears, and so you get
more muscle. That's the reasonwhy, you know, the muscles get
bigger and the muscles get, youknow, hard and stuff like that.
So but you need to keep in mindthat my son, for example, can
deadlift like two seventy fivepounds.
Wow. And he's not a big but he'snot a big time weight lifter. I
mean, he's healthy, but he candeadlift like two seventy five
(23:38):
pounds. Doing that kind oflifting now for me or for
anybody, 60, can haveconsequences. But if do 20
repetitions of a 20 pound weightinstead of five repetitions of a
50 pound weight, you're better.
(23:58):
So I think you tailor yourworkouts for those things that
your body wants to do. So morerepetitions with lighter weight,
because all you want to reallydo now is tone. I'm never going
to look like ArnoldSchwarzenegger, but I do want to
keep my muscles toned.
Cathy (24:15):
And you probably don't want to look like that.
Joe Owens (24:17):
It's I don't think so.
Cathy (24:19):
You have to kill yourself to do it. It would be terrible.
Joe Owens (24:22):
And you have to take a lot of steroids.
Cathy (24:25):
Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. But what about meditation and
quieting the mind?
Joe Owens (24:31):
Really, really important. You know, I mentioned
earlier when I chatted, Imentioned chakras and things
like that. And it could beanything. I mean, as you can
tell, I'm a little bit quick,and I'm not the best meditator
to sort of sit quietly in aroom, plus the fact that the
(24:53):
minute I sit on the floor, thedogs are all over me. Right.
Know that, Hey, dad's on thefloor. It must be playtime. But
I can get into a meditativegroove on a treadmill. I can get
into a meditative groove whenI'm running. I run outside.
Not really the treadmill guywhen I run, because I like
(25:15):
bunnies and squirrels and treesand things like that, and I like
that feeling of doing but youcan get into the so anything
that you can do repetitively,you can get yourself into sort
of a meditative groove. Butsometimes it's just turn off the
stereo, turn off the TV, turnoff the phone, and just sit with
(25:36):
your own thoughts for fiveminutes. And people very, very
seldom do that these days.Breathe. And some of them
believe it's got to sit.
And breathe. I learned how to dothat deep breath, you push your
belly out when you inhale likebabies breathe. Babies naturally
breathe the way we're supposedto. They don't inflate their
(25:57):
lungs when they inhale, theypush out their belly when they
inhale, is sort of yogabreathing is what you should do.
Or just read a book.
Don't listen to the book, Don'tread it on a tablet. Get paper,
and sit down, and read thebooks. Anything, you say, just
things to quiet your mind andcalm yourself down and slow your
(26:17):
heart rate.
Merry (26:19):
I love that.
Cathy (26:19):
I believe in that. I'm a meditator. I meditate right when
I wake up. I just prop up thepillows and sit up and do it
first.
Merry (26:29):
Yeah. I do it too.
Joe Owens (26:31):
I do it too. All day, I think.
Merry (26:34):
It is. And I do it in the morning, but I'm like you. I
can't sit still. I'm always,like, moving, always raring to
go, and when can I get outside?And so it it it takes more
effort to quiet yourself than itdoes if you're a very calm
person.
Cathy (26:50):
But Oh, I think It sets the tone for the day. It makes
you feel better and moretogether and, you know, then
yeah. It's it's a great way tostart the day.
Joe Owens (27:00):
I think meditation though sometimes gets a bad rap
in the sense that people have anexpectation that you have to be
sitting quietly to do it, youcan do that, or I mean, when
you're when you're on a bicycleout riding on a trail someplace
in the woods, you're it'sinsane. But but I tell people,
(27:22):
and and this is something that Itell older people when they ride
bicycles, and it makes me crazy.Do not ride a bicycle with
AirPods in your ears orheadphones on your head, because
you can't hear what's going onaround you.
Cathy (27:36):
That's right.
Joe Owens (27:36):
Yeah. If you're out there listening to Metallica at
full volume pedaling like crazy,you're to get hit by a truck.
Merry (27:42):
That's right.
Cathy (27:43):
That's for the treadmill.
Joe Owens (27:46):
Yeah. That's for the treadmill. That's when some
place where you're not injeopardy. But if you run like, I
I like to ride out in the, youknow, in the woods and things
like that on a on a trail bike,but you take the take the
headphones out and just ridethrough it, it's kinda you hear
the birds, and you hear sort ofwhat's going on around you, and
that's as meditative, I think,an experience as you can have.
Yeah.
The
Cathy (28:05):
other thing I think the other thing I think people beat
themselves up because they say,well, my mind doesn't get quiet
when I sit quietly. Of course,your mind doesn't get quiet.
It's just going all over theplace, but that's fine. That's
what you do for twenty minutes.It doesn't matter what you're
thinking about.
You just can bring it back toyour breathing and just keep
meditating.
Joe Owens (28:25):
A guy once told me a great meditative trick, and
because of that, I think becauseall of us, you know, I'm going
to meditate now. I have to paythe bills. I have to do the
laundry. The car's got to go inthe down, the dentist on tooth.
You know?
All of all of a sudden, yourmind, Yeah. Instead of instead
of sorting suddenly becomingGandhi, you know, it it just
(28:48):
becomes that to do list wetalked about. This guy said,
Okay, so here's how youmeditate, and I do this when I
actually sit down to sort ofquietly balance chakras and do
that kind of cool stuff. Hesaid, Just close your eyes and
visualize a ball sitting on atable. He said, And then lift
the ball with your mind.
(29:10):
Just raise it up, throw it alittle bit, and then stop, and
then turn the ball around toyour right with your mind, turn
the ball around with your left,make the ball go to the left,
and it's remarkable, the focusthat you get.
Cathy (29:23):
So nice.
Joe Owens (29:24):
Like It really is cool. Yeah. It's great, and it
really is you get because you'redoing a task, you're doing
something, you have to work atit, but you know? And you just
visualize the ball, and then andit works like a charm. And all
that other stuff
Merry (29:41):
you were talking, I just did it, and I felt this calm
come over me. It's amazing.
Joe Owens (29:47):
The distractions don't distract you. Like, your
your mind because you cannotmultitask. Like, people say they
multitask. It's impossible. Youcan't do it.
You can change really quickly,but you cannot actually
multitask. But I find that whenI'm doing that with the ball,
it's very, very peaceful. Ican't think of because anything
(30:09):
the fear is that the minute youthink of something else, you're
going to drop the ball. Yeah. Asas soon as something else comes
in, the ball goes plunk backdown to the table.
It's like, okay. Pick it upagain. I
Merry (30:22):
want I'd like to shift gears a bit and go to something
really loud, because I'm kind ofa fan, a music fan. And I know
that you worked with the Stonesand Paul Simon and Bruce
Springsteen among many. And I'dlove to hear stories about them,
and I'm sure our audience would,when you were working in the
(30:43):
music business, and maybesomething else that might
surprise us.
Joe Owens (30:48):
Well, you can tell that from the Rolling Stones
that old age doesn't really haveto hold you back.
Merry (30:53):
That's right. Well, I heard Mick Jagger runs, like,
five miles a day.
Joe Owens (30:59):
Yeah. He does. I mean, know
Cathy (31:01):
Yeah.
Joe Owens (31:02):
Mick Mick is a is a is a wonder. He's a guy's a
national treasure. I I startedin the music business and sort
of promoting records and and,know, taking I was the guy that
took the records around to theradio stations. I was like a
teenager. I mean, I was outdoing this, and I, you know,
took the records around theradio station, asked them to
play them, and then that morphedinto working right after
(31:22):
college.
And when I got out of college, Iwas going to be a writer. That
was it. I was going to writefull time. That was that. But I
loved music, and I always playedin bands and did things like
that, and I got an offer from arecord company to come and work
for them, and I couldn't turn itdown.
Record So company, and right outof the box, I'm working with
KISS and Donna Summer and theVillage People and all these big
(31:43):
groups. When I say with workwith, I was taking the records
to the radio stations to getplayed, and then when the band
would come into town to performa concert, I'd be the guy who
would meet them at the airport,take them around to the radio
stations to do the interviews,and then hang around to sound
and all that kind of stuff. Whatthat turned into, as I went
through that for years and yearsand managing some bands, but I
(32:06):
was always one on one with theartists. Then I got into the
concert promotion business,working with a concert promoter,
so I was always once again theguy who met with the bands, did
the press conferences, took themaround to do the interviews.
Then I get into the corporatesponsorship business, so I
became the bridge betweencorporate America and rock and
(32:28):
roll, and I did $400,000,000worth of those deals.
So the Rolling Stones andBudweiser and Paul Simon and
American Express and, and, andthen got hired by those
companies to be the one who wentout and got them events, know,
tours to sponsor and things likethat. But I was always working
directly with the bands, andBruce Springsteen, just as as
(32:54):
regular guy, as you can imagine,Rolling Stones, great guys But
again, I wasn't their friend,and and, you know, we didn't
like hang out or go to partiesat their house or anything. It
was business, but I was workingone on one, and and got Oh,
Cathy (33:07):
to business know to them.
Joe Owens (33:08):
Yeah. Nick was a consummate businessman. Keith
was just a real good mate tohang out with, and he would
just, you know, sit down and andtalk about stuff. Steve Tyler
from Aerosmith, he would run themezzanine at a concert venue
after the soundtrack. He woulddo laps around the sort of
(33:28):
mezzanine level of the concerthall, know, when we were playing
like the big, know, the bigstadiums and things like that,
and he used to like to getsomebody to run with him.
So I did a tour with the band,and so I ran some laps, and he'd
run like 9,000 laps, you know,and it was like a long run. So
there'd constantly be peoplekind of, you know, jumping in to
run three laps with him, thenthey'd go off and do something
else. But That's that's great.Always great. And rock stars
(33:55):
take care of themselves, becausetouring is brutal.
Touring is an absolutelyhorrible, difficult thing to do,
because you're constantly inthat groove. You're up in the
morning. You're on an airplane.You're flying someplace off the
plane. You're dehydrated on theairplane.
The food is irregular at best,so they really have to pay
(34:16):
attention. When you you readthose stories about the concert
writer that has very specificstuff in the dressing room,
well, it's not because they'rebeing prima donnas, it's because
the food that's around themneeds to not be like M and M's
and and, you know, cupcakes.
Cathy (34:33):
I don't know. There were a few writers where people said
M and M's, but no brown ones andstuff like that. You heard of
those.
Joe Owens (34:40):
That was Van Halen. Yeah. And and they did that to
did that to goof on people. Itwas it was fun. But they did
Yeah.
You know, they did pay attentionto what they ate. The the
Rolling Stones were funnybecause you go into Mick's
dressing room, and there'd betea and incense and a vaporizer
and a yoga mat and soft music,and you'd go into Keith's
(35:02):
dressing room, and there'd besix cartons of Marlboros and 12
bottles of Jack Daniel's. Oh,jeez. You know? Yeah.
Cathy (35:09):
But know. They're both still here. He's outlived
everybody else.
Joe Owens (35:14):
But what what's the joke that the millennials have
to worry about what kind ofworld they're going to leave for
Keith Richards? Oh,
Cathy (35:24):
god. That's great. I love that.
Joe Owens (35:28):
That I loved working in that business. I I worked for
a concert company, which is howI actually ended up working with
all these bands, because it wasa company that was across
Canada. So I was in Toronto, butI was somehow involved in all
these things, and when the bandscame to Toronto, I was the guy
(35:48):
who spent time with them, thenmy team worked across the
country. Then the guy who ownedthat company started something
they called three sixty fiveDegree Tours, which was he would
buy all of the rights from theband, the T shirt rights, the
concert rights, the broadcastrights, everything, and he'd
give them in advance. He'd givethe Rolling Stones $50,000,000
(36:10):
like a check.
Here's $50,000,000, and then itwould be our job to recover all
that money through variousrevenue streams. So that was U2,
and that was David Bowie, andthat was Paul Simon, that was
the Rolling Stones. But what Ifound in the main, you hear all
these stories about rock bandsare self destructive, crazy
people who do nothing but drugsall the time. That's a
(36:33):
percentage of them, and it'sprobably the same percentage as
the general population, but mostof these people know it's their
job, if they mess up, they'renot going to eat. So if you want
to have a long career And somuch of this sort of rock and
roll lifestyle thing wasoverblown.
It was just pure. Of
Cathy (36:54):
all those times, what do you think was the most fun that
you had with somebody or one ofthe groups?
Joe Owens (37:02):
Right. I played golf with Alice Cooper.
Cathy (37:06):
Oh. I've heard that he I heard he loves that.
Joe Owens (37:10):
Great golfer.
Merry (37:11):
Great golfer. Heard that too.
Joe Owens (37:13):
Yeah. Charlie Daniels. Charlie Daniels band. I
played golf with CharlieDaniels.
Cathy (37:17):
Oh, I love him.
Joe Owens (37:19):
Bruce Springsteen, we had a big party for Bruce
Springsteen after his concert,and Bruce was sort of South
Jersey. And when I was that sortof teenager, early twenties, I
was in that area as well, and Iwas also playing in bands. And
it turned out that Springsteenand I had a couple of friends in
(37:41):
common, so we actually sat therefor like twenty minutes and had
a conversation about the olddays playing in bars in Jersey,
which was cool. Phil Collins wasjust an introduced Phil Collins
to Cher. Was working on theBillboard Music Awards, Phil had
never met Cher.
(38:02):
Cher was big, and Cher waswearing high heeled stuff like
that, and Phil was not big. Andso I came up, and he was like a
little kid. I mean, was likeintroducing a five year old to
Santa Claus. He was just a hugefan. I knew him and the Genesis
guys pretty well, because I knewthe manager pretty well.
So I brought him up, and I said,stand back, and here's here's
(38:24):
Cher way up here, and here's,you know, Phil down here. But
but generally, rock stars arevery nice people when they feel
safe. Like when you're backstageor or you're behind the curtain
with them, they can sort of dropall of it, and they feel safe,
and the security's there, and sothey're not afraid. They're just
afraid. They're afraid of thephotographers.
(38:46):
They're afraid of, you know,crazy people. Yeah. And you
know,
Cathy (38:50):
And they found you extremely approachable and all
that, so that's why they couldopen up with you. That's great.
Joe Owens (38:55):
I was the I was the money in the promo guy, so they
knew that I was the guy who wasgonna get them on the radio, and
I was the guy who was gonna getthem a couple of million bucks
from Budweiser. And the funniestthing, though, is that people
ask me about pictures. You musthave a lot of great pictures. I
don't have any pictures. I havetwo pictures.
I have a picture of me with TomJones, and I have a picture of
(39:15):
me with the Pointer I don't haveany other pictures. The reason I
don't have any other pictures,especially on the concert
promotion side, is that theminute I became a fan, I
couldn't be the business personanymore. Yeah. So I would have
broken down that relationshipthat we had as sort of business
(39:37):
professionals, but I wouldalways get the sponsored vice
president to get his picturetaken, or the radio station guy.
I always make sure that thosepeople got those souvenir
pictures.
If I had to prove that I hadthat career by pictures, I'd No.
I can't do that. I don't haveany evidence.
Cathy (39:58):
Tell us what key lessons you learned about life and
success from being in the musicworld, and how can business
entrepreneurs apply rock starthinking to their careers to
help them stand out?
Joe Owens (40:12):
Okay. I'm gonna do something silly right now, but
I'll be right back. Okay? Oneone second. I'm gonna go in the
magic closet.
Okay. Funny you should ask. Newbook.
Cathy (40:33):
New book.
Joe Owens (40:35):
Rockstar Real Estate Agent. Real Estate Agent.
Cathy (40:38):
Oh, good.
Joe Owens (40:39):
Right? Yeah. The the idea for real estate agents or
anybody in any kind of business,the reason why rock stars are
successful, the reason whymusicians are successful, Dolly
Parton, Rolling Stones,Metallica, whoever, they find a
niche. They find a thing that isunique to them. They perfect
(41:00):
that niche, and they attractpeople, and they take care of
those people, and they take careof that niche, and they protect
it, and they don't they don'tveer into another lane.
Establish who they are, Theydevelop develop a reputation for
that. The the real estate agentbook just basically says, look,
(41:23):
guys, real estate agents alwayssay everybody is my customer.
Everybody who can buy a house ismy customer. That's not true.
And the lady who wrote theforeword for the book
specializes in mid centurymodern.
So if you specialize in midcentury modern, you specialize
in beachfront homes, youspecialize whatever, and that
goes for anything. If you dopodcasts about about baby
(41:45):
boomers, if you do podcastsabout bowling. And you guys
would have no following, you'dhave no reputation if this week
it was baby boomers, and nextweek it's bowling, and next week
it's cooking, and next week it'sfishing, because people wouldn't
seek you out for thatinformation about that specific
thing. So I think anybody inbusiness, you find something,
(42:05):
and also that thing thatresonates, that thing that you
love. The girl who does midcentury modern houses loves mid
century modern houses.
So So that's her the thing thatI learned from all those years
in that business is find thatthing that resonates with you,
and be as good at it as you can.Stay in your lane. Just whatever
(42:30):
that is, stay in your lane, andmake that And you can have a
lifelong career, because peoplewho jump from career to career
to career, they're in theirsixties, and they're still
trying to find customers, andthey're still out there to lead
generate, and it's crazy. Ifthey had done something in their
thirties and stayed with it,they would know everybody in the
business, and business wouldcome to them. So I think if
(42:52):
there's if there's one thingthat I learned in my 100 years
of life is that Oh, why?
Something and and in in myworld, the thing that I found
was that I'm good at tellingstories. So whether it's writing
books, or whether it's going toBudweiser and telling them the
(43:15):
story of how sponsoring theRolling Stones tour is going to
sell them boatloads of beer. SoI was as a salesperson, I was
always couching my sales pitchesin stories. Instead of giving
them statistics and numbers andthings like that, I would always
be starting out my my salespitches. What?
Imagine. The lights go down. Themusic plays a little bit, the
(43:39):
band comes on stage, the lightscome on and everybody you know?
And and when you tell the storythat way to the product manager
selling Budweiser beer, he'sexperiencing what his
sponsorship is going to be Yeah.Not getting a statistical
analysis of, you know, what thereturn is gonna be on his
(43:59):
investment.
I love that. Find your passion,and and just live it and perfect
it, and and that's what rockstars do. That's how they become
famous. That's great. That'sgreat.
You've seen when they've goneoff track. I mean, U2 did
Zoropa, and it was a terriblealbum, and their fans stuck with
them. Or who in who in the worldthought it was a good idea for
(44:20):
Aerosmith to rap? Yeah. Right.
Right. Yeah. You would never youwould never confuse Bruce
Springsteen with Metallica, andyou'd never confuse Metallica
with Justin Bieber, and you'dnever confuse Dolly Parton with
Lady Gaga. You know exactly whothey are, and and when I just
said those names, you can heartheir music in your head. So
find something you're good at,develop a reputation, and you'll
(44:42):
be you'll be having a good time.
Cathy (44:45):
So what advice would you give marrying me.
Merry (44:47):
Yeah. Right. Yeah. So what advice would you give to
someone entering the music andfilm business about managing
their mental and physicalwellness? It's a very high
stress environment.
Joe Owens (45:00):
It really is. I could run and get another book if you
want.
Merry (45:06):
That's okay. Tell us. Tell us.
Joe Owens (45:08):
No. Just talk. I did a book last year called
Madhouse.
Cathy (45:11):
Because we're mostly audio. I mean, I know we could
we could
Joe Owens (45:14):
see each
Merry (45:15):
other, but
Joe Owens (45:15):
I I did a book last year called Madhouse, and it
was, again, for real estateagents, and it's basically about
the the mental health strugglesthat people in in business and
in life go through. It was a bitof sort of self help of, know,
there's loneliness and isolationand and anxiety and all those
things that we all go through.It it really goes it really goes
(45:37):
back when you're when you'reworking music, and and movies
now for me, I wrote movies for along time, and I wrote books for
a long time, but I'm now gettinginto the producer side of and
producers basically raise money.That's basically the job is is,
you know, raising money forfilms to be made. And so I'm
(45:57):
doing something new, which iswhich is fun, but I think
authenticity is the key there.
Think you I think you have toreally take a minute, sit down,
who am I? What do I care about?How do I present myself? And and
really figure out who you are,and then be that person through
(46:20):
thick and thin. Because themusic business is full of people
that are always playing a part,whether they're actors or
whether they're business people.
They're always changing being achameleon. They're changing to
fit in, and that gets old forpeople sometimes when they don't
(46:44):
know who you're going to be thenext time they talk to you on
the phone. And if you'reconstantly trying to say the
things that you think they wantto hear, you don't really
develop a reputation forstanding for anything. And I
think anybody who is going to bein those businesses in
particular, you need to beauthentic. You need to you need
to figure out, who am I?
(47:05):
What am I doing? And so they getthe same version of you every
time you show up, and and peoplerespect you.
Merry (47:14):
Yeah. We'll talk a little bit about reinvention, if you
don't mind. I just am curiousabout reinventing yourself,
because what would you advisesomebody who wants to be looking
to make a change in their lives,whether they're old or young?
Joe Owens (47:32):
The key to that, I think, again, is what I just
said. You're not you're notreinventing yourself. I think
the the key to the reinventionthing is all you're doing is
learning a new set ofinformation. That's all it is. I
have been the same person doingthe same thing for my entire
(47:56):
adult life, and whether it waspromoting records, whether it
was working in video games,whether it was working in real
estate, whether it was, youknow, working in sports.
I mean, I worked in in minorleague baseball for, ten years.
Whether it's writing books, youknow, whatever it is, I've
(48:16):
always been the same guy, andall I've done is replaced a a
body of knowledge about musicwith a body of knowledge about
video games, with a body ofknowledge about sports. But all
the things that I've gotteninvolved in, I never sold
photocopiers. You know? Like, II never got involved with
(48:40):
something that I I didn't like.
So I always made sure that Ilike baseball. I like video
games. I like music. I likemovies. I like writing.
So I think if you're going toreinvent yourself, find
something that ignites yourpassion. Find something that
maybe some of the it goes backto passion, purpose, and people.
(49:00):
Find something where you can youcan continue to work with some
of the people that you'vedeveloped. Like, lots of my
music business people came withme to video games. Lots of my
video game people came with meto sports, because they were
marketing people, they werepress people, they were, you
know, relationships withtelevision stations, radio
stations, all that.
So I was just showing up withanother story about another new
thing, saying, okay, well I'mnot doing music anymore. Now I'm
(49:22):
doing video games, but it'sentertainment, and you're an
entertainment editor in anewspaper, so let's do that. And
then I go back to myentertainment editor at the
newspaper and say, give me thesports guy or girl. Who's the
sports person I should talk toat the newspaper? So you you get
those people around you, and youmind those people, and and you
sort of keep those relationshipsgoing.
(49:44):
And all you're doing is it'slike wearing a blue jacket, then
a black jacket, then a greenjacket. All you're doing is
changing clothes.
Merry (49:50):
Yeah. Sounds sounds
Cathy (49:51):
What would what would you like our late boomers podcast
audience to have as a greattakeaway today?
Joe Owens (50:00):
I think the the title of the book is Feeling Groovy,
and I think what I would likeeverybody who is looking and
listening at this is just take abreath and take a beat. Realize
(50:22):
what a wonderful gift it is foryou to be wherever you are in
life. Just enjoy it. Quitworrying about stuff. Mark Twain
said that people spend most oftheir time worrying about things
that never happen.
One of the things that came upwhen I talked to boomers about
this book and everything isthat, Well, know, why should we
exercise? I'm going to wake uptomorrow morning and have some
(50:43):
terrible disease, or I'm goingto this, or I'm going to fall
down. Don't do that. Don't dothat. Enjoy your life for as
long as the ride continues, andthen be able to sort of leave it
with a smile on your face and abunch of people who will miss
(51:03):
you when you're gone, but willtell stories about you.
Native Americans have a phrasethey use when somebody passes
on. They say they've becomelegend. And I think it's great.
I think you just, know, wanna dothings that, you know, people
will think fondly of you afteryou're gone and and tell stories
about you and hopefullyembellish the story so that
suddenly you're Superman.
Merry (51:22):
I love that. You, Joe. That's great. We all are a
legend to ourselves, andhopefully, the people that we
love will pass it on. ThankWell, our guest today on Late
Boomers has been Joe Owens, whois a true Renaissance man.
(51:43):
He's a storyteller, a musician,and film maven, and a man who
knows how to enjoy life. You canreach out to Joe via his
website, joe owens books dotcom. Is that right, Joe?
Joe Owens (51:58):
That's right. And joeowensbooks@gmail.com is the
email I'd love to hear frompeople.
Cathy (52:04):
Oh, that'd great. Yeah. Please tell tell your friends,
our listeners I'm talking tonow, tell your friends about our
late boomers podcast and visitour new website, lateboomers.us.
It's us, where you can easilysee all our episodes and find an
interview that resonates withyou. Join us next week.
(52:25):
We'll be talking with anotherexciting guest. We're on
Instagram at I am KathyWorthington and at I am Mary
Elkins and at Late Boomers.Please subscribe to our YouTube
channel as well. We doappreciate our listeners, and
thank you to Joe Owens today.
Joe Owens (52:42):
Yes. Thank you. It was a lot of fun.
Merry (52:45):
It was great fun. Thank you.
Cathy (52:57):
Thank you for joining us on late boomers, the podcast
that is your guide to creating athird act with style, power, and
impact. Please visit our websiteand get in touch with us at
lateboomers.us. If you wouldlike to listen to or download
other episodes of late boomers,go to ewnpodcastnetwork.com.
Merry (53:21):
This podcast is also available on Spotify, Spotify,
Apple Podcast, and most othermajor podcast sites. We hope you
make use of the wisdom you'vegained here and that you enjoy a
successful third act with yourown style, power, and impact.
This is the EWN Podcast Network.
Cathy (00:14):
Welcome to late boomers, our podcast guide to creating
your third act with style,power, and impact. Hi. I'm Cathy
Worthington.
Merry (00:24):
And I'm Merry Elkins. Join us as we bring you
conversations with successfulentrepreneurs, entertainers, and
people with vision who aremaking a difference in the
world.
Cathy (00:34):
Everyone has a story, and we'll take you along for the
ride on each interview,recounting the journey our
guests have taken to get wherethey are, inspiring you to
create your own path to success.Let's get started. Hi. I'm Cathy
Worthington. Welcome to the LateBoomers podcast.
(00:56):
I'm here with my cohost, MerryElkins, and boy, do we have
someone here with us who's goingto give us boomers some great
advice about staying youngerthan our years. Jo Owens, author
of Feeling Groovy, a boomerguide to ageless aging.
Merry (01:12):
And I'm Mary Elkins. Joe has worn so many hats it's mind
boggling to keep up with him andall that he's done and still
doing. From working in musicwith rock legends like the
Rolling Stones to real estate tohis work as a fiction and
nonfiction author, filmmaker,and guru of fitness and age
(01:33):
aging. Let me say that right.Aging agelessly.
Welcome, Joe.
Joe Owens (01:38):
Hi, guys. How are you? Thanks for having me.
Merry (01:40):
Great to have you.
Cathy (01:42):
What inspired you to write Feeling Groovy, and what
keeps you feeling groovy aboutlife and about yourself?
Joe Owens (01:49):
Well, I ran out of money. I mean, the Oh. That book
had been following me around fora while. In my late fifties, I
had a heart thing. My wholelife, had had something called
SVT, supraventriculartachycardia, and it would make
(02:10):
In a situation like this, myheart would just take off to
like 160, 180 beats a minute.
And they say it dangerous, butit made you feel funny, and your
knees got a little weak. I had amild case of it. I mean, had it
since I was 14, but I had a mildcase of it. Mine would last
fifteen, twenty minutes. Somepoor people, it lasts for like
days.
(02:30):
Oh. But I had an episode thatdid last for days, which was
very disconcerting, and thenwhen they went to fix it, they
used the wrong medicine, and itgot scary. I had a great doctor.
After I came out of that wholething, I said, They want me to
take medicine. They want me tobe cardiologist.
They want me he said, No, no,no, no. He said, We're going to
(02:50):
lift weights. We're going torun. We're going to eat. We're
going to sleep.
We're going to take care ofourselves. So at 60, I started a
fitness plan, and startedlifting weights, and started
doing all that stuff, and nowhere I am fifteen years later.
When I started all that stuff, Ithought that would be a cool
thing to do, to sort of writeabout this and kind of write
(03:11):
about my journey. So that'swhere it started. The first
title for it was actuallyRunning from God, and that's
what my son said.
Said, You're running from God,aren't you, dad? I said, Oh,
yeah, you know. He'll get meeventually, but I'll need to be
running to do it. So but, yeah,it it it started the sort of
whole genesis for the book waswhen I started working out,
thought, well, I wanna keeptrack of this and and see where
(03:33):
it ends up, and it it's ended upwith feeling groovy.
Cathy (03:37):
So making notes all along the way and and tracking your
progress and everything, right?
Joe Owens (03:43):
And and also what worked and what didn't, because
there's a lot of trial and errorwith that, you know, what you
eat, how much you sleep, youknow, all those kind of things.
The other interesting thing wasthat when I got closer to the
book in the last year or so, Ithought, It might be a good idea
to ask baby boomers if this issomething they care about, The
(04:05):
me writing this book and book atthat point was a workout guide.
It was how many push ups youshould do, and that sort of
stuff, and a little bit more anddiet oriented. And the response
I got was amazing, because theysaid, Nah, not really what we
care about. We want to feel likewe used to feel.
(04:27):
And how do you do that? And so Iwent back and I said, Okay, well
I'll throw out these 80 pages.Kind of heartbreaking. But it
was a really interestingchallenge because it's one thing
to say, you have to stay, andyou do have to stay strong. I
(04:48):
mean, if you're not strong, youinjure yourself as you get
older, you trip and you fall,those So kind of it is important
that you stay strong, and that'swhy I still lift weights, and it
is important that your cardio isgood and all those things.
But how do you feel, Ruby? Sothat took a little bit of
thought, and ultimately what Icame up with was in order to
(05:09):
feel the way you used to feel, alot of that was you were
relevant. You were in the game.You knew what was going on
around you. You knew who theactors You knew who the rock
bands were.
You knew about the new car thatcame out. You knew all that
stuff, and I think there's atendency as you get older to
not. I have a friend who livesin in my neighborhood, and all
(05:30):
of his cultural references stopat like 1972. We're still
talking about Wagon Train andBurt Reynolds and Anne Margaret.
Cathy (05:37):
Oh. Yeah. That's very sad. That means he has no
millennials in his life to tokeep him clued in. And annoying.
Or or younger. Gen z. Becausenow we have to rely on Gen z to
clue us into
Joe Owens (05:52):
Right.
Cathy (05:53):
Social media and all that. It's very important, Which
Joe Owens (05:56):
then sort of makes it difficult for you to have a
conversation with anybody who isnot in your circle, and I think
the way you stay on top ofthings is to talk to people that
are younger than you, or thatknow different things than you
do. Mhmm. Right. So that was abig part of feeling groovy. And
then, I also said, look, youknow, if you're lifting weights
(06:19):
and you feel strong, you feelgroovy.
Right. If you're weak, you don'tfeel groovy. And if you're
constantly coming down withcolds or your back hurts or
whatever, you don't feel groovy.If you do those things
physically, if you eat well,sleep well, you're not tired,
you work out, you take care ofyour skin, you know? I mean, I
have a skin care routine.
(06:40):
Who who would have thought?
Cathy (06:41):
Good. For you.
Joe Owens (06:42):
I do too.
Merry (06:43):
Yeah. I
Joe Owens (06:43):
do. So there you go.
Merry (06:45):
Yeah. Hello, men out there.
Joe Owens (06:47):
Exactly. I mean, you know, otherwise, you end up
looking at a lizard, especiallyin the places that I live
because I live in places thathave lots of sunshine. So I
think
Cathy (06:55):
And you talked about cultural references when Mary
and I started this podcast. Itwas five years ago, almost five.
We're almost at five. And wesaid it to people our age that
are like our contemporaries.They said, like, what's a
podcast?
I don't listen to a pod I don'teven know what a podcast is.
Merry (07:12):
Exactly.
Cathy (07:13):
And so we've had to, like, try and get people to
listen and just how do I listen?I'll send you a link. Just click
it and listen to it.
Merry (07:23):
And then we get, how do I click the link?
Joe Owens (07:26):
Exactly. And what what's the link? Then the next
thing you know, you know,somebody in Kazakhstan is
stealing all their money.
Cathy (07:32):
But Yeah. It's
Joe Owens (07:35):
know, I I think that that feeling part, but it threw
me when, you know, when I heardthat people say, look, you know,
the exercising is good and andall that kind of stuff, but how
do I feel the way I used tofeel?
Cathy (07:47):
Yeah. I'm glad I'm glad you had the right people to ask.
You you might not have gottenthat answer if you asked the
wrong people, so that thatsteered you toward That's really
good.
Merry (07:59):
Have a son, right? You have a son, right?
Joe Owens (08:02):
I have a son. He's 30. He's 30 years old. He is my
worst critic. It's just Oh,Really?
Really? That No, that's notgoing to work. You'd have to or
he'll rhyme off in a sentencehow I should market the book,
(08:22):
like the day I showed up withthe finished book. He said, Oh,
that's great. You go to socialmedia, you put that, and you do
this, and you go there, and youput that, blah, I'm like, Dude,
I know it's English because Irecognize the words, but I don't
recognize that combination ofthem.
What in the world are youtalking about? Which is a tough
part of being an author thesedays. Back in the day, I was
(08:43):
signed to HarperCollins. I had apublisher. I had an agent.
I finished the book. I handed itto them, and then they told me
where to go and do interviews.Now you have to do all of it.
Not my favorite part.
Merry (08:54):
You do. No. Absolutely not. Well, you know, I have to
ask you. You mentioned drugsbefore, and I just kept I've
kept thinking about my dad whenhe was 80.
He said to me, you know, on gooddays, I feel I'm 50. And I
thought I was really young then,and I thought, that's really
old. But it truly it trulyisn't. But I have to ask you,
(09:17):
with all that you've said, doyou believe in the body's
ability to heal itself?
Joe Owens (09:23):
Yes, only. That's what I only believe in. I have a
very uncomfortable relationshipwith pharmaceuticals, because
pharmaceuticals don't cureanything. All pharmaceuticals
do, and I'm going to caveat thiswhole thing by saying, Please do
not watch this podcast and throwall your medicine away. Right.
Cathy (09:44):
Please don't do that. No.
Joe Owens (09:45):
Please don't do that. But to me, pills only mask
symptoms. Pills only treatsymptoms. They don't cure
diseases. Right?
So there's no pill to cureanything that you have. The guys
I love are are the ones who takeLipitor so they can keep eating
(10:06):
cheeseburgers. Like, what iswrong with you? What is wrong
with you? And that goes likethat's a pain medication for me.
I don't take pain medication,because Mhmm. And I have a lot
of military friends, and youknow, the Marines say that pain
is weakness leaving the body.But if something hurts, it means
(10:26):
there's something wrong with it.So if you mask the pain, then
you don't know whether or notthat thing is still wrong with
you. If your back hurts, and youtake medicine to stop your back
from hurting, how do you knowthat you're not going to go out
and hurt your back worse bypicking something up that you
shouldn't be picking up?
Cathy (10:45):
Exactly right. People do.
Joe Owens (10:49):
People do. It's But I think that people tend to rely
on drugs to fix everything forthem, when in fact more
exercise, more water, betterframe of mind, balancing your
chakras, getting your kundalini,doing the stuff that your body
(11:09):
will heal itself. It reallytruly will, if you support it,
if you help it. Because we'veall heard the stories about
people's brains rewiringthemselves after they have a
head injury. You know, there'ssome remarkable things to do.
So I'm not a pill guy, I don'tdo that. I take a lot of
supplements and vitamins andthings like that in an effort to
(11:30):
sort of keep the machineworking. But again, you know, if
you have a car and you neverdrive it, I don't care how good
of a race car it is, you have todrive it. The same with your
body, you have to go for a walk.Know, put down the potato chips,
get off the couch, go for awalk, you know, do something,
exercise.
Cathy (11:48):
Oh, you're making me crave potato chips now. Yeah.
Know. You shouldn't havementioned them.
Joe Owens (11:53):
I love potato chips, and I love Coca Cola too. Are
the weekend
Cathy (11:59):
I I kinda I kinda you do
Merry (12:01):
you do actually do a little bit of it?
Joe Owens (12:04):
My so my major problem is that my palate
stopped growing at about age 11.So I have no interest in cigars,
I have no interest incigarettes, I have no interest
in brown liquor or beer or any Ihave no interest in any of that,
never have. But you give me acupcake, I'll massacre it. I
like cookies, cupcakes, allthose kind of things. So that is
(12:28):
a and, you know, you guys knowsugar.
It's addictive. It's likeheroin.
Merry (12:32):
Oh, give me a great chocolate chip cookie.
Joe Owens (12:35):
You bet. And and they're everywhere. I mean, it's
like cookies and cookies and iseverywhere. Although Uh-huh. I'm
a I'm a chocolate snob, so I,you know, I want Hershey bars
and things like
Cathy (12:49):
don't that. Buy it and bring it in your house, it isn't
everywhere. It's not in yourhouse.
Joe Owens (12:54):
And and that's what I do. Yeah. Yeah. Although there's
a trick. There's a little trick.
I buy semi sweet chocolatechips, the Ghirardelli semi
sweet chocolate chips, and I putthem in the freezer. When I
Cathy (13:08):
want That's what I do.
Joe Owens (13:09):
Well, when I want some chocolate, I'll eat one or
two of them, because you
Cathy (13:13):
know One or two, you don't eat the whole Yeah.
Joe Owens (13:16):
I don't. I eat one or two of them. Your what I found
out about cravings for meanyway, and I don't know, but
some other people have said,yeah, you're right. When you
want potato chips, you don'twant a bag of potato chips. You
want some potato chips.
Two or three. You want thegrease, you want the salt. So I
can eat a couple of potatochips. I can eat a couple
(13:38):
because I just want that tasteon my tongue. So that was that
was sort of the discipline.
Was like, okay.
Cathy (13:44):
Can Way way more.
Merry (13:47):
Way more disciplined.
Cathy (13:49):
Most people cannot eat two potato chips because they're
made with ingredients that makethem addictive, so That's you
right. Keep eating Give us somekeys to living longer, and talk
about some strategies forphysical and mental wellness.
Joe Owens (14:06):
So my mom in 1960 had open heart surgery, and she was
one of the earliest people inthe country to have open heart
surgery. Yeah, 1960. She was Ithink 33 when she had it. I have
to do the numbers. In any event,they told her that if she did
not have the surgery, she'd bedead in six months.
If she had the surgery, shecould live another two years.
(14:29):
Two years came and went, fiveyears came and went, ten years
came and went, twenty years cameand went, once she had surgery-
Well, it worked just fine, butwhat was interesting about it
was that she said to the doctorsand nurses and everything, I'll
outlive all of you. So everyyear, there was a nurse who was
a candy striper when she firsthad the surgery, would send her
(14:53):
a Christmas card saying MerryChristmas, and these are the
people in the team that died.Oh. Seriously.
In 1990 That's August, she got aChristmas card that said, The
last member of your surgicalteam died. February 5, the next
year, thirty nine years to theday of her surgery, she died.
(15:16):
She called me when she got theChristmas card, and she said, I
outlived all of them. I told youso.
Cathy (15:22):
And it was like permission for her to die,
though. That was And
Joe Owens (15:26):
she had a goal. So but but she used this people
would say, you know, how haveyou done this? How have you
lived thirty nine years whenthey gave you six months to
live? And she said, Keepreading. I'm like, I don't like
the alternative.
And so she was always verypositive. She was also very,
very funny, had great sarcasticsense of humor. But that was
(15:51):
sort of in me from the get, youknow, like from when I was a
little kid. And so my I think ifyou stay positive, every morning
is a gift. There's a reason whythey call it present, and so you
get a gift every day.
(16:13):
You should be up. You should behappy. You should find things to
do. I sort of get it down topeople and to passion and to
purpose. You have to have thingsthat you love, you have to have
lots of friends, and you have tohave some reason to keep going.
So if you've got those threethings in your life, great.
Fine. You know, you havesetbacks. You have setbacks. You
(16:35):
know, if you want to know aboutabout setbacks and read a book.
You know, the hero is one way,then it's another way, then he
has to change, then bad thingshappen, then good things happen,
and in the end, he wins, and hegets the girl, and he gets the
money, or he gets, you know,whatever. And you're you're the
author of your own book, sodon't quit the book halfway
through. Absolutely. So I mean,I think Yeah. I think that's it.
(16:57):
And, you know, plus take care ofyourself. I mean, you know, I
Yeah. Absolutely. I neversmoked, Barely, you know, barely
drank. Like I said, I was moreinterested in cupcakes.
I worry about how much I weigh.I worry about how I look. I care
about that stuff. I think that'sif you always have a goal. And
also, I I think the best adviceI can give is you need a really
(17:19):
long to do list, because youcan't die until you've done
everything on your to do list.
So just keep
Merry (17:24):
Oh, adding see, things to keep making it longer. Yeah.
Joe Owens (17:27):
Keep making your to do list longer, you'll live
forever.
Merry (17:30):
I love that. That's great. I think I'll start it
today.
Cathy (17:35):
So that's why all the people in history haven't been
living forever. They didn't havethat list. Well, I'm just
teasing you.
Joe Owens (17:42):
No. They didn't. They haven't. If if Alexander the
Great had had a longer listMaybe he is. Conquer.
Conquer. Conquer. He didn't. Hewas
Merry (17:51):
Yeah. He should have come out west.
Joe Owens (17:55):
Okay. To more countries.
Merry (17:57):
Yeah. So you mentioned this a little bit earlier, but
how would you advise babyboomers to reframe aging?
Joe Owens (18:09):
I think, and this sounds goofy, forget about it.
Merry (18:15):
Forget about it.
Joe Owens (18:16):
Forget about it. Just
Cathy (18:18):
Forget about it. It's
Joe Owens (18:22):
a calendar. It's a clock. What's funny is that most
most people think I'm youngerthan than I am, because I I do
care about you know, I'm I'mlike baseball hats, sunglasses,
you know, and a couple of peoplehave said, you don't walk like
an old man. I don't know whatthat means, but you know, you
(18:44):
bounce in your step and allthat. What's what's funny is
that I'll be out doing somethingat a park or a dog park or
whatever, and some guy will bendover to pick up the ball to
throw for his dog, and he'lllike grunt or make some kind of
(19:05):
noise or something, and I'llkind of laugh.
I said, Yeah. Said, Oh, man,when you're my age I said,
Really? How old are you? He's62.
Merry (19:17):
You tell him how old you are?
Joe Owens (19:20):
Well, usually say I have ties older than you, but
yeah, then I tell them how old Iam. They're Dude, I'm 75. Oh,
you don't look 75 yet, and Idon't feel 75 either, but I
don't think about being 75. Idon't wake up in the morning and
go, Oh, I'm 75, so there's onlycertain things I can do. I'm 75,
(19:40):
so I better not lift weights.
Oh, I'm 75. You put those kindof restrictions on yourself, I'm
this, so I can't do that, Uh-uh.And I've always had a I think
it's partly my authority issues.You know, anytime somebody like,
if you wanted me to dosomething, my mom knew this. If
she wanted me to do something,tell me not to do it.
(20:01):
You know? Don't you don't yourake that yard.
Merry (20:04):
Reverse psychology.
Joe Owens (20:07):
Don't you
Cathy (20:07):
rake that yard.
Joe Owens (20:08):
Don't you dare rake those leaves. But I think that
the the best advice that I cangive people is two things.
Number one, don't restrictyourself based on the fact that
you think you're old, or youthink you're sick, or you think
you're, you know, whatever. Andthe other thing is you're dead a
long time, so get like liveevery minute because you have
(20:33):
plenty like, I see people lay,like, sleeping in the middle of
the day. Dude, you got plenty oftime to sleep when the lights go
out for the last time.
Plenty of time. So, I mean, ifyou kind of keep those two
things in mind, don't restrictyourself and remember, at some
point, you're going to crossover to see all those dogs you
(20:54):
had when they were alive. So,yes. Yeah. So that's You that's
your dogs.
Well, that's the only reason Iwant to go, you know, to the
other side, because I want tosee my dogs. Although, like my
grandfather, he used to say,don't want to go to heaven. I
don't I won't know anybody. Ikind of I kind of feel the same
way. But no, think the bestadvice is don't restrict
(21:16):
yourself.
Like, just go ahead. Don't don'tthink about I'm this age, so I
can't do that, and just rememberthat while you're going, go.
While you're here, enjoy everyminute of it, because at some
point your ride is over. So, youknow, that.
Merry (21:35):
It's a ride.
Joe Owens (21:37):
It is. Yeah. But it's a ticket ride. It's a real good
Disney ride. You know?
It's it's a lot of fun. You guysremember Hunter S. Thompson, the
fear and loathing in Las Vegas,and murder okay. All those rage
So Hunter Thompson said that thepoint of life is not to arrive
at the grave in this pristinebody, really sort of well taken
(21:59):
care of, you know, everythingreal nice. It's to kind of slide
sideways on a motorcycle drunk,you know, in a cloud of dust and
craziness with, you know, wow.
What a wild ride. That was thatwas great. That's kind of the
point. It you know, you're livelife with it.
Merry (22:16):
With a perfect body.
Joe Owens (22:19):
With a well, if if you wanna keep going, then you
gotta Yeah. Be of pain. Youknow? I can
Cathy (22:26):
Well, on that note, what's the right kind of
exercise to stay ageless?
Joe Owens (22:31):
So keeping you should keep your abilities in mind when
you exercise, because I Iexercise pretty much the same as
I did when I started at aroundage 60. And I had worked out
before that, but you know, at 60I started paying attention.
(22:53):
Yeah. You do lighter weightswith more reps. So you have to
remember what lifting weights isall about.
The whole point of liftingweights is you're pushing your
muscles to do something. You getthese sort of minute microscopic
muscle tears when you liftweights, and then your your body
(23:14):
rebuilds that muscle. So itfixes the tears, and so you get
more muscle. That's the reasonwhy, you know, the muscles get
bigger and the muscles get, youknow, hard and stuff like that.
So but you need to keep in mindthat my son, for example, can
deadlift like two seventy fivepounds.
Wow. And he's not a big but he'snot a big time weight lifter. I
mean, he's healthy, but he candeadlift like two seventy five
(23:38):
pounds. Doing that kind oflifting now for me or for
anybody, 60, can haveconsequences. But if do 20
repetitions of a 20 pound weightinstead of five repetitions of a
50 pound weight, you're better.
(23:58):
So I think you tailor yourworkouts for those things that
your body wants to do. So morerepetitions with lighter weight,
because all you want to reallydo now is tone. I'm never going
to look like ArnoldSchwarzenegger, but I do want to
keep my muscles toned.
Cathy (24:15):
And you probably don't want to look like that.
Joe Owens (24:17):
It's I don't think so.
Cathy (24:19):
You have to kill yourself to do it. It would be terrible.
Joe Owens (24:22):
And you have to take a lot of steroids.
Cathy (24:25):
Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. But what about meditation and
quieting the mind?
Joe Owens (24:31):
Really, really important. You know, I mentioned
earlier when I chatted, Imentioned chakras and things
like that. And it could beanything. I mean, as you can
tell, I'm a little bit quick,and I'm not the best meditator
to sort of sit quietly in aroom, plus the fact that the
(24:53):
minute I sit on the floor, thedogs are all over me. Right.
Know that, Hey, dad's on thefloor. It must be playtime. But
I can get into a meditativegroove on a treadmill. I can get
into a meditative groove whenI'm running. I run outside.
Not really the treadmill guywhen I run, because I like
(25:15):
bunnies and squirrels and treesand things like that, and I like
that feeling of doing but youcan get into the so anything
that you can do repetitively,you can get yourself into sort
of a meditative groove. Butsometimes it's just turn off the
stereo, turn off the TV, turnoff the phone, and just sit with
(25:36):
your own thoughts for fiveminutes. And people very, very
seldom do that these days.Breathe. And some of them
believe it's got to sit.
And breathe. I learned how to dothat deep breath, you push your
belly out when you inhale likebabies breathe. Babies naturally
breathe the way we're supposedto. They don't inflate their
(25:57):
lungs when they inhale, theypush out their belly when they
inhale, is sort of yogabreathing is what you should do.
Or just read a book.
Don't listen to the book, Don'tread it on a tablet. Get paper,
and sit down, and read thebooks. Anything, you say, just
things to quiet your mind andcalm yourself down and slow your
(26:17):
heart rate.
Merry (26:19):
I love that.
Cathy (26:19):
I believe in that. I'm a meditator. I meditate right when
I wake up. I just prop up thepillows and sit up and do it
first.
Merry (26:29):
Yeah. I do it too.
Joe Owens (26:31):
I do it too. All day, I think.
Merry (26:34):
It is. And I do it in the morning, but I'm like you. I
can't sit still. I'm always,like, moving, always raring to
go, and when can I get outside?And so it it it takes more
effort to quiet yourself than itdoes if you're a very calm
person.
Cathy (26:50):
But Oh, I think It sets the tone for the day. It makes
you feel better and moretogether and, you know, then
yeah. It's it's a great way tostart the day.
Joe Owens (27:00):
I think meditation though sometimes gets a bad rap
in the sense that people have anexpectation that you have to be
sitting quietly to do it, youcan do that, or I mean, when
you're when you're on a bicycleout riding on a trail someplace
in the woods, you're it'sinsane. But but I tell people,
(27:22):
and and this is something that Itell older people when they ride
bicycles, and it makes me crazy.Do not ride a bicycle with
AirPods in your ears orheadphones on your head, because
you can't hear what's going onaround you.
Cathy (27:36):
That's right.
Joe Owens (27:36):
Yeah. If you're out there listening to Metallica at
full volume pedaling like crazy,you're to get hit by a truck.
Merry (27:42):
That's right.
Cathy (27:43):
That's for the treadmill.
Joe Owens (27:46):
Yeah. That's for the treadmill. That's when some
place where you're not injeopardy. But if you run like, I
I like to ride out in the, youknow, in the woods and things
like that on a on a trail bike,but you take the take the
headphones out and just ridethrough it, it's kinda you hear
the birds, and you hear sort ofwhat's going on around you, and
that's as meditative, I think,an experience as you can have.
Yeah.
The
Cathy (28:05):
other thing I think the other thing I think people beat
themselves up because they say,well, my mind doesn't get quiet
when I sit quietly. Of course,your mind doesn't get quiet.
It's just going all over theplace, but that's fine. That's
what you do for twenty minutes.It doesn't matter what you're
thinking about.
You just can bring it back toyour breathing and just keep
meditating.
Joe Owens (28:25):
A guy once told me a great meditative trick, and
because of that, I think becauseall of us, you know, I'm going
to meditate now. I have to paythe bills. I have to do the
laundry. The car's got to go inthe down, the dentist on tooth.
You know?
All of all of a sudden, yourmind, Yeah. Instead of instead
of sorting suddenly becomingGandhi, you know, it it just
(28:48):
becomes that to do list wetalked about. This guy said,
Okay, so here's how youmeditate, and I do this when I
actually sit down to sort ofquietly balance chakras and do
that kind of cool stuff. Hesaid, Just close your eyes and
visualize a ball sitting on atable. He said, And then lift
the ball with your mind.
(29:10):
Just raise it up, throw it alittle bit, and then stop, and
then turn the ball around toyour right with your mind, turn
the ball around with your left,make the ball go to the left,
and it's remarkable, the focusthat you get.
Cathy (29:23):
So nice.
Joe Owens (29:24):
Like It really is cool. Yeah. It's great, and it
really is you get because you'redoing a task, you're doing
something, you have to work atit, but you know? And you just
visualize the ball, and then andit works like a charm. And all
that other stuff
Merry (29:41):
you were talking, I just did it, and I felt this calm
come over me. It's amazing.
Joe Owens (29:47):
The distractions don't distract you. Like, your
your mind because you cannotmultitask. Like, people say they
multitask. It's impossible. Youcan't do it.
You can change really quickly,but you cannot actually
multitask. But I find that whenI'm doing that with the ball,
it's very, very peaceful. Ican't think of because anything
(30:09):
the fear is that the minute youthink of something else, you're
going to drop the ball. Yeah. Asas soon as something else comes
in, the ball goes plunk backdown to the table.
It's like, okay. Pick it upagain. I
Merry (30:22):
want I'd like to shift gears a bit and go to something
really loud, because I'm kind ofa fan, a music fan. And I know
that you worked with the Stonesand Paul Simon and Bruce
Springsteen among many. And I'dlove to hear stories about them,
and I'm sure our audience would,when you were working in the
(30:43):
music business, and maybesomething else that might
surprise us.
Joe Owens (30:48):
Well, you can tell that from the Rolling Stones
that old age doesn't really haveto hold you back.
Merry (30:53):
That's right. Well, I heard Mick Jagger runs, like,
five miles a day.
Joe Owens (30:59):
Yeah. He does. I mean, know
Cathy (31:01):
Yeah.
Joe Owens (31:02):
Mick Mick is a is a is a wonder. He's a guy's a
national treasure. I I startedin the music business and sort
of promoting records and and,know, taking I was the guy that
took the records around to theradio stations. I was like a
teenager. I mean, I was outdoing this, and I, you know,
took the records around theradio station, asked them to
play them, and then that morphedinto working right after
(31:22):
college.
And when I got out of college, Iwas going to be a writer. That
was it. I was going to writefull time. That was that. But I
loved music, and I always playedin bands and did things like
that, and I got an offer from arecord company to come and work
for them, and I couldn't turn itdown.
Record So company, and right outof the box, I'm working with
KISS and Donna Summer and theVillage People and all these big
(31:43):
groups. When I say with workwith, I was taking the records
to the radio stations to getplayed, and then when the band
would come into town to performa concert, I'd be the guy who
would meet them at the airport,take them around to the radio
stations to do the interviews,and then hang around to sound
and all that kind of stuff. Whatthat turned into, as I went
through that for years and yearsand managing some bands, but I
(32:06):
was always one on one with theartists. Then I got into the
concert promotion business,working with a concert promoter,
so I was always once again theguy who met with the bands, did
the press conferences, took themaround to do the interviews.
Then I get into the corporatesponsorship business, so I
became the bridge betweencorporate America and rock and
(32:28):
roll, and I did $400,000,000worth of those deals.
So the Rolling Stones andBudweiser and Paul Simon and
American Express and, and, andthen got hired by those
companies to be the one who wentout and got them events, know,
tours to sponsor and things likethat. But I was always working
directly with the bands, andBruce Springsteen, just as as
(32:54):
regular guy, as you can imagine,Rolling Stones, great guys But
again, I wasn't their friend,and and, you know, we didn't
like hang out or go to partiesat their house or anything. It
was business, but I was workingone on one, and and got Oh,
Cathy (33:07):
to business know to them.
Joe Owens (33:08):
Yeah. Nick was a consummate businessman. Keith
was just a real good mate tohang out with, and he would
just, you know, sit down and andtalk about stuff. Steve Tyler
from Aerosmith, he would run themezzanine at a concert venue
after the soundtrack. He woulddo laps around the sort of
(33:28):
mezzanine level of the concerthall, know, when we were playing
like the big, know, the bigstadiums and things like that,
and he used to like to getsomebody to run with him.
So I did a tour with the band,and so I ran some laps, and he'd
run like 9,000 laps, you know,and it was like a long run. So
there'd constantly be peoplekind of, you know, jumping in to
run three laps with him, thenthey'd go off and do something
else. But That's that's great.Always great. And rock stars
(33:55):
take care of themselves, becausetouring is brutal.
Touring is an absolutelyhorrible, difficult thing to do,
because you're constantly inthat groove. You're up in the
morning. You're on an airplane.You're flying someplace off the
plane. You're dehydrated on theairplane.
The food is irregular at best,so they really have to pay
(34:16):
attention. When you you readthose stories about the concert
writer that has very specificstuff in the dressing room,
well, it's not because they'rebeing prima donnas, it's because
the food that's around themneeds to not be like M and M's
and and, you know, cupcakes.
Cathy (34:33):
I don't know. There were a few writers where people said
M and M's, but no brown ones andstuff like that. You heard of
those.
Joe Owens (34:40):
That was Van Halen. Yeah. And and they did that to
did that to goof on people. Itwas it was fun. But they did
Yeah.
You know, they did pay attentionto what they ate. The the
Rolling Stones were funnybecause you go into Mick's
dressing room, and there'd betea and incense and a vaporizer
and a yoga mat and soft music,and you'd go into Keith's
(35:02):
dressing room, and there'd besix cartons of Marlboros and 12
bottles of Jack Daniel's. Oh,jeez. You know? Yeah.
Cathy (35:09):
But know. They're both still here. He's outlived
everybody else.
Joe Owens (35:14):
But what what's the joke that the millennials have
to worry about what kind ofworld they're going to leave for
Keith Richards? Oh,
Cathy (35:24):
god. That's great. I love that.
Joe Owens (35:28):
That I loved working in that business. I I worked for
a concert company, which is howI actually ended up working with
all these bands, because it wasa company that was across
Canada. So I was in Toronto, butI was somehow involved in all
these things, and when the bandscame to Toronto, I was the guy
(35:48):
who spent time with them, thenmy team worked across the
country. Then the guy who ownedthat company started something
they called three sixty fiveDegree Tours, which was he would
buy all of the rights from theband, the T shirt rights, the
concert rights, the broadcastrights, everything, and he'd
give them in advance. He'd givethe Rolling Stones $50,000,000
(36:10):
like a check.
Here's $50,000,000, and then itwould be our job to recover all
that money through variousrevenue streams. So that was U2,
and that was David Bowie, andthat was Paul Simon, that was
the Rolling Stones. But what Ifound in the main, you hear all
these stories about rock bandsare self destructive, crazy
people who do nothing but drugsall the time. That's a
(36:33):
percentage of them, and it'sprobably the same percentage as
the general population, but mostof these people know it's their
job, if they mess up, they'renot going to eat. So if you want
to have a long career And somuch of this sort of rock and
roll lifestyle thing wasoverblown.
It was just pure. Of
Cathy (36:54):
all those times, what do you think was the most fun that
you had with somebody or one ofthe groups?
Joe Owens (37:02):
Right. I played golf with Alice Cooper.
Cathy (37:06):
Oh. I've heard that he I heard he loves that.
Joe Owens (37:10):
Great golfer.
Merry (37:11):
Great golfer. Heard that too.
Joe Owens (37:13):
Yeah. Charlie Daniels. Charlie Daniels band. I
played golf with CharlieDaniels.
Cathy (37:17):
Oh, I love him.
Joe Owens (37:19):
Bruce Springsteen, we had a big party for Bruce
Springsteen after his concert,and Bruce was sort of South
Jersey. And when I was that sortof teenager, early twenties, I
was in that area as well, and Iwas also playing in bands. And
it turned out that Springsteenand I had a couple of friends in
(37:41):
common, so we actually sat therefor like twenty minutes and had
a conversation about the olddays playing in bars in Jersey,
which was cool. Phil Collins wasjust an introduced Phil Collins
to Cher. Was working on theBillboard Music Awards, Phil had
never met Cher.
(38:02):
Cher was big, and Cher waswearing high heeled stuff like
that, and Phil was not big. Andso I came up, and he was like a
little kid. I mean, was likeintroducing a five year old to
Santa Claus. He was just a hugefan. I knew him and the Genesis
guys pretty well, because I knewthe manager pretty well.
So I brought him up, and I said,stand back, and here's here's
(38:24):
Cher way up here, and here's,you know, Phil down here. But
but generally, rock stars arevery nice people when they feel
safe. Like when you're backstageor or you're behind the curtain
with them, they can sort of dropall of it, and they feel safe,
and the security's there, and sothey're not afraid. They're just
afraid. They're afraid of thephotographers.
(38:46):
They're afraid of, you know,crazy people. Yeah. And you
know,
Cathy (38:50):
And they found you extremely approachable and all
that, so that's why they couldopen up with you. That's great.
Joe Owens (38:55):
I was the I was the money in the promo guy, so they
knew that I was the guy who wasgonna get them on the radio, and
I was the guy who was gonna getthem a couple of million bucks
from Budweiser. And the funniestthing, though, is that people
ask me about pictures. You musthave a lot of great pictures. I
don't have any pictures. I havetwo pictures.
I have a picture of me with TomJones, and I have a picture of
(39:15):
me with the Pointer I don't haveany other pictures. The reason I
don't have any other pictures,especially on the concert
promotion side, is that theminute I became a fan, I
couldn't be the business personanymore. Yeah. So I would have
broken down that relationshipthat we had as sort of business
(39:37):
professionals, but I wouldalways get the sponsored vice
president to get his picturetaken, or the radio station guy.
I always make sure that thosepeople got those souvenir
pictures.
If I had to prove that I hadthat career by pictures, I'd No.
I can't do that. I don't haveany evidence.
Cathy (39:58):
Tell us what key lessons you learned about life and
success from being in the musicworld, and how can business
entrepreneurs apply rock starthinking to their careers to
help them stand out?
Joe Owens (40:12):
Okay. I'm gonna do something silly right now, but
I'll be right back. Okay? Oneone second. I'm gonna go in the
magic closet.
Okay. Funny you should ask. Newbook.
Cathy (40:33):
New book.
Joe Owens (40:35):
Rockstar Real Estate Agent. Real Estate Agent.
Cathy (40:38):
Oh, good.
Joe Owens (40:39):
Right? Yeah. The the idea for real estate agents or
anybody in any kind of business,the reason why rock stars are
successful, the reason whymusicians are successful, Dolly
Parton, Rolling Stones,Metallica, whoever, they find a
niche. They find a thing that isunique to them. They perfect
(41:00):
that niche, and they attractpeople, and they take care of
those people, and they take careof that niche, and they protect
it, and they don't they don'tveer into another lane.
Establish who they are, Theydevelop develop a reputation for
that. The the real estate agentbook just basically says, look,
(41:23):
guys, real estate agents alwayssay everybody is my customer.
Everybody who can buy a house ismy customer. That's not true.
And the lady who wrote theforeword for the book
specializes in mid centurymodern.
So if you specialize in midcentury modern, you specialize
in beachfront homes, youspecialize whatever, and that
goes for anything. If you dopodcasts about about baby
(41:45):
boomers, if you do podcastsabout bowling. And you guys
would have no following, you'dhave no reputation if this week
it was baby boomers, and nextweek it's bowling, and next week
it's cooking, and next week it'sfishing, because people wouldn't
seek you out for thatinformation about that specific
thing. So I think anybody inbusiness, you find something,
(42:05):
and also that thing thatresonates, that thing that you
love. The girl who does midcentury modern houses loves mid
century modern houses.
So So that's her the thing thatI learned from all those years
in that business is find thatthing that resonates with you,
and be as good at it as you can.Stay in your lane. Just whatever
(42:30):
that is, stay in your lane, andmake that And you can have a
lifelong career, because peoplewho jump from career to career
to career, they're in theirsixties, and they're still
trying to find customers, andthey're still out there to lead
generate, and it's crazy. Ifthey had done something in their
thirties and stayed with it,they would know everybody in the
business, and business wouldcome to them. So I think if
(42:52):
there's if there's one thingthat I learned in my 100 years
of life is that Oh, why?
Something and and in in myworld, the thing that I found
was that I'm good at tellingstories. So whether it's writing
books, or whether it's going toBudweiser and telling them the
(43:15):
story of how sponsoring theRolling Stones tour is going to
sell them boatloads of beer. SoI was as a salesperson, I was
always couching my sales pitchesin stories. Instead of giving
them statistics and numbers andthings like that, I would always
be starting out my my salespitches. What?
Imagine. The lights go down. Themusic plays a little bit, the
(43:39):
band comes on stage, the lightscome on and everybody you know?
And and when you tell the storythat way to the product manager
selling Budweiser beer, he'sexperiencing what his
sponsorship is going to be Yeah.Not getting a statistical
analysis of, you know, what thereturn is gonna be on his
(43:59):
investment.
I love that. Find your passion,and and just live it and perfect
it, and and that's what rockstars do. That's how they become
famous. That's great. That'sgreat.
You've seen when they've goneoff track. I mean, U2 did
Zoropa, and it was a terriblealbum, and their fans stuck with
them. Or who in who in the worldthought it was a good idea for
(44:20):
Aerosmith to rap? Yeah. Right.
Right. Yeah. You would never youwould never confuse Bruce
Springsteen with Metallica, andyou'd never confuse Metallica
with Justin Bieber, and you'dnever confuse Dolly Parton with
Lady Gaga. You know exactly whothey are, and and when I just
said those names, you can heartheir music in your head. So
find something you're good at,develop a reputation, and you'll
(44:42):
be you'll be having a good time.
Cathy (44:45):
So what advice would you give marrying me.
Merry (44:47):
Yeah. Right. Yeah. So what advice would you give to
someone entering the music andfilm business about managing
their mental and physicalwellness? It's a very high
stress environment.
Joe Owens (45:00):
It really is. I could run and get another book if you
want.
Merry (45:06):
That's okay. Tell us. Tell us.
Joe Owens (45:08):
No. Just talk. I did a book last year called
Madhouse.
Cathy (45:11):
Because we're mostly audio. I mean, I know we could
we could
Joe Owens (45:14):
see each
Merry (45:15):
other, but
Joe Owens (45:15):
I I did a book last year called Madhouse, and it
was, again, for real estateagents, and it's basically about
the the mental health strugglesthat people in in business and
in life go through. It was a bitof sort of self help of, know,
there's loneliness and isolationand and anxiety and all those
things that we all go through.It it really goes it really goes
(45:37):
back when you're when you'reworking music, and and movies
now for me, I wrote movies for along time, and I wrote books for
a long time, but I'm now gettinginto the producer side of and
producers basically raise money.That's basically the job is is,
you know, raising money forfilms to be made. And so I'm
(45:57):
doing something new, which iswhich is fun, but I think
authenticity is the key there.
Think you I think you have toreally take a minute, sit down,
who am I? What do I care about?How do I present myself? And and
really figure out who you are,and then be that person through
(46:20):
thick and thin. Because themusic business is full of people
that are always playing a part,whether they're actors or
whether they're business people.
They're always changing being achameleon. They're changing to
fit in, and that gets old forpeople sometimes when they don't
(46:44):
know who you're going to be thenext time they talk to you on
the phone. And if you'reconstantly trying to say the
things that you think they wantto hear, you don't really
develop a reputation forstanding for anything. And I
think anybody who is going to bein those businesses in
particular, you need to beauthentic. You need to you need
to figure out, who am I?
(47:05):
What am I doing? And so they getthe same version of you every
time you show up, and and peoplerespect you.
Merry (47:14):
Yeah. We'll talk a little bit about reinvention, if you
don't mind. I just am curiousabout reinventing yourself,
because what would you advisesomebody who wants to be looking
to make a change in their lives,whether they're old or young?
Joe Owens (47:32):
The key to that, I think, again, is what I just
said. You're not you're notreinventing yourself. I think
the the key to the reinventionthing is all you're doing is
learning a new set ofinformation. That's all it is. I
have been the same person doingthe same thing for my entire
(47:56):
adult life, and whether it waspromoting records, whether it
was working in video games,whether it was working in real
estate, whether it was, youknow, working in sports.
I mean, I worked in in minorleague baseball for, ten years.
Whether it's writing books, youknow, whatever it is, I've
(48:16):
always been the same guy, andall I've done is replaced a a
body of knowledge about musicwith a body of knowledge about
video games, with a body ofknowledge about sports. But all
the things that I've gotteninvolved in, I never sold
photocopiers. You know? Like, II never got involved with
(48:40):
something that I I didn't like.
So I always made sure that Ilike baseball. I like video
games. I like music. I likemovies. I like writing.
So I think if you're going toreinvent yourself, find
something that ignites yourpassion. Find something that
maybe some of the it goes backto passion, purpose, and people.
(49:00):
Find something where you can youcan continue to work with some
of the people that you'vedeveloped. Like, lots of my
music business people came withme to video games. Lots of my
video game people came with meto sports, because they were
marketing people, they werepress people, they were, you
know, relationships withtelevision stations, radio
stations, all that.
So I was just showing up withanother story about another new
thing, saying, okay, well I'mnot doing music anymore. Now I'm
(49:22):
doing video games, but it'sentertainment, and you're an
entertainment editor in anewspaper, so let's do that. And
then I go back to myentertainment editor at the
newspaper and say, give me thesports guy or girl. Who's the
sports person I should talk toat the newspaper? So you you get
those people around you, and youmind those people, and and you
sort of keep those relationshipsgoing.
(49:44):
And all you're doing is it'slike wearing a blue jacket, then
a black jacket, then a greenjacket. All you're doing is
changing clothes.
Merry (49:50):
Yeah. Sounds sounds
Cathy (49:51):
What would what would you like our late boomers podcast
audience to have as a greattakeaway today?
Joe Owens (50:00):
I think the the title of the book is Feeling Groovy,
and I think what I would likeeverybody who is looking and
listening at this is just take abreath and take a beat. Realize
(50:22):
what a wonderful gift it is foryou to be wherever you are in
life. Just enjoy it. Quitworrying about stuff. Mark Twain
said that people spend most oftheir time worrying about things
that never happen.
One of the things that came upwhen I talked to boomers about
this book and everything isthat, Well, know, why should we
exercise? I'm going to wake uptomorrow morning and have some
(50:43):
terrible disease, or I'm goingto this, or I'm going to fall
down. Don't do that. Don't dothat. Enjoy your life for as
long as the ride continues, andthen be able to sort of leave it
with a smile on your face and abunch of people who will miss
(51:03):
you when you're gone, but willtell stories about you.
Native Americans have a phrasethey use when somebody passes
on. They say they've becomelegend. And I think it's great.
I think you just, know, wanna dothings that, you know, people
will think fondly of you afteryou're gone and and tell stories
about you and hopefullyembellish the story so that
suddenly you're Superman.
Merry (51:22):
I love that. You, Joe. That's great. We all are a
legend to ourselves, andhopefully, the people that we
love will pass it on. ThankWell, our guest today on Late
Boomers has been Joe Owens, whois a true Renaissance man.
(51:43):
He's a storyteller, a musician,and film maven, and a man who
knows how to enjoy life. You canreach out to Joe via his
website, joe owens books dotcom. Is that right, Joe?
Joe Owens (51:58):
That's right. And joeowensbooks@gmail.com is the
email I'd love to hear frompeople.
Cathy (52:04):
Oh, that'd great. Yeah. Please tell tell your friends,
our listeners I'm talking tonow, tell your friends about our
late boomers podcast and visitour new website, lateboomers.us.
It's us, where you can easilysee all our episodes and find an
interview that resonates withyou. Join us next week.
(52:25):
We'll be talking with anotherexciting guest. We're on
Instagram at I am KathyWorthington and at I am Mary
Elkins and at Late Boomers.Please subscribe to our YouTube
channel as well. We doappreciate our listeners, and
thank you to Joe Owens today.
Joe Owens (52:42):
Yes. Thank you. It was a lot of fun.
Merry (52:45):
It was great fun. Thank you.
Cathy (52:57):
Thank you for joining us on late boomers, the podcast
that is your guide to creating athird act with style, power, and
impact. Please visit our websiteand get in touch with us at
lateboomers.us. If you wouldlike to listen to or download
other episodes of late boomers,go to ewnpodcastnetwork.com.
Merry (53:21):
This podcast is also available on Spotify, Spotify,
Apple Podcast, and most othermajor podcast sites. We hope you
make use of the wisdom you'vegained here and that you enjoy a
successful third act with yourown style, power, and impact.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!