Shock Your Potential

To the Moon and Back - Lisa Kohn

“Even those worst parts of us are helpful in certain actions at certain times and therefore the idea is to be in choice with your response.” Lisa Kohn
A lot of what we become in life is largely determined by the environment we get exposed to and the experiences we get to encounter. Notably, there is no formula for success and this then means that we can always rise above our molded selves and use our experiences to better our lives and the lives of those around us. Our guest today, Lisa Kohn, was able to do exactly that despite her adverse experiences growing up and says that healing from past adverse events entails changing not only the individual’s behavior but their mental models as well.
Lisa Kohn is the award-winning author of to the moon and back: a childhood under the influence: https://amzn.to/3isGg81 and The Power of Thoughtful Leadership https://amzn.to/2UPxPKw. She says that the best seats she ever had at Madison Square Garden were at her mother’s mass wedding, and the best cocaine she ever had was from her father’s friend, the judge.
Lisa is an accomplished leadership consultant, executive coach, and keynote speaker with a strong business background and a creative approach. Lisa earned her BA in psychology from Cornell University and her MBA from Columbia University’s Executive Program. She has taught as an adjunct professor at Columbia University and New York University’s Stern School of Business, and she brings to others the tools, mind-shifts, and practices she’s found that have helped her heal and thrive, as well as the hope and forgiveness she’s been blessed to let into her life. Lisa will always tell you that she is a native New Yorker, but she currently lives in Pennsylvania.
In today’s episode, we will be learning about how our experiences shape our lives and behaviors, and why being aware of ourselves can make use of such experiences to propel us into leading more purposeful lives.
Listen in!
Social Media Handles:
https://www.instagram.com/lisakohnwrites
https://www.twitter.com/lisakohnwrites
 https://www.twitter.com/thougtfulLdrs
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisakohnccg/
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/chatsworth-consulting-group/
FB - https://www.facebook.com/lisakohnwrites
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwx53ZVgUFF709O6EsjiF3Q
I was a member of the Unification Church, Reverend Sun Myung Moon, a self-proclaimed Messiah from Korea and they did mass weddings where large numbers of people got married often to strangers. [4:22]
I grew up in Unification Church which my mum joined when I was ten years and it was my life and there is no more intoxicating drug than having a Messiah. It is the most powerful than I've ever felt. [4:43]
My mother left me and my nine-year-old brother with my grandfather who later fell into a nervous breakdown and then we went to live with my dad to New York City in the East Village. [5:12]
I had a Messiah but in my mind, I lived with my dad a life of sex, drugs, and squalor. [5:37]
I eventually pulled myself out of cults, and then tried to self-implode, explode, where I almost jumped off a bridge and got hugely anorexic. [5:50]
I did do a hell of a lot of cocaine, including with my dad and the judge who had a lot of amazing cocaine, got into abusive relationships, and finally hit a bottom and started to find help and heal. [6:04]
I did go to Cornell and got a degree in psychology because I like people and ended up working in entertainment advertising and later went to Columbia's executive program and got my MBA. [6:20]
A couple of jobs later I hung out a shingle in 1995 to do leadership and I have been doing it ever since. [6:43]
We do leadership consulting including everything from a full day, multi-day, intern, interpersonal skills, customized programs, leadership programs, and management programs. [6:55]
I like to say I'm the executive coach running around the C suite of Fortune 50 companies talking about love. [7:19]
I knew my childhood was weird. When I was young my dad was in a bar fight where he got a tooth knocked out and he made it into an earring and hung it from his ear and my mom got married in Madison Square Garden with 4000 plus people but I didn't realize It was bad. [9:38]
As I imploded and exploded and punished myself for living my bottom, I got engaged with someone who drank a lot and was mean. [10:03]
Someone in my family pointed me to Al-anon and I was in denial before I realized that you become your story and when you are damaged and broken it is a long path to get from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, to post-traumatic growth. [10:14]
I do think it is natural for human brains to blame themselves [11:01]
When you're a child and have a complex, traumatic life like I did or just a regular normal life, when something doesn't feel safe as a kid your brain knows that if you think the world is unsafe it becomes scarier and if you think that something is wrong with you, then it's less scary. [11:08]
It is a very human response that leads us to learn some massive coping behaviors to manage the instability. [11:51]
The issue becomes how to let them be there, move past them and not let them force and push me in a certain direction, and that is the conversations I have with my clients. [12:29]
I firmly believe that people believe that those coping mechanisms did save them, and they still think when they are in danger the mechanisms will still save them. [15:45]
When we are talking about changing thought patterns that saved my life I get terrified because there are parts of me that still know that they're necessary to survive. [16:26]
So it is not just changing behaviors but about changing thought patterns, assumptions beliefs, and things that I created and made up and were intentionally carved into my brain. [16:36]
Commercial Break. [17:29]
So many people came to me and said I need to write a book, you need to write a book. [19:30]
20 years ago I sat down with a coach and decided that I was going to write a hybrid half self-help half memoir. [19:37]
I got wonderful glowing rejections from so many agents who said I couldn’t sell a hybrid book and that I was not famous enough. 19:53]
I got a call from an agent who said if I wrote a memoir they will represent me and so wrote the memoir and the book soon came out. [20:08]
I did it, and what it has done is that it has blown apart up my personal life, my view of life, my recovery, and my work. [20:52]
Before the book came out, I did not know the community of cult survivors but I have found people who went through the same thing as me and were born and raised in my situation. [21:06]
It has cracked open my healing into much deeper levels, which is hard and amazing. [21:50]
The book has touched people and now I go to meet new prospects that I'm trying to win business from and they Google me and they know I grew up in a cult. [22:04]
I share it and it allows me to use my experiences to help my clients and so it has completely cracked open and blown up wonderfully. [22:25]
The book has also reached people who are in pain. The story is unique but the themes are universal. [22:45]
I get Facebook messages, tweets, Instagram messages from strangers telling me their story, and my next-door neighbor who had no idea read it and she said thank you for giving us all the courage to tell our childhood stories.[22:53]
Three messages I share in the book are first, extremists situations exist, they are prevalent and are all over, they are highly intoxicating and it is a powerful feeling and they are therefore very dangerous. [23:25]
Two, for anyone who feels hopeless or damaged beyond repair there is hope and you are not damaged. [23:39]
Third, as a species, most of us are at least way too hard on ourselves and we need a huge dose of self-love and self-compassion [23:55]
There is the possibility that my experience will mildly control me for the rest of my life but it doesn't have to control me anymore because I can make choices. [27:20]
I denied my story because the only way to almost survive was to pretend nothing happened to me and not look at it ever. [28:29]
Now I have gone back to every place and reconnected with almost every person and now it is me in a good way. [28:47]
I say to people that we are only as sick as our secrets and so I share just about everything as long as it's not about my current immediate family. [29:04]
You never know what people have inside because we looked fine on the outside. [29:38]
Even those worst parts of us are helpful in certain actions at certain times and therefore the idea is to be in choice with your response. [31:21]
When I tell my story or hear someone else's story and realize I'm not alone, they dissipate a little bit, or at least I have the courage to go through them with more strength and ease. [33:17]
Be nice and gentle with yourself. Love yourself first and more. Look for love in the world and find reasons to be happy and the rest of it after that falls into place or starts to fall into something. [34:35]
There's no complete panacea but it makes all the hard things easier and a lot of things go better with work in life. [34:51]
……………………………………………………………………………………
Thank You to our August Sponsor!
Tired of the time and expense to get a manicure or pedicure? Try Color Street today!
Base, color, and top coats of high-quality liquid nail polish in each strip results in a brilliant, salon-quality manicure in just minutes. No dry time, smudges, or streaks, and your mani/pedi lasts up to 10 days. Color Street is 100% real nail polish, not stickers.
Learn More: https://www.colorstreet.com/bhroberts/party/2095611

Tales From the Day - Wayne McFarland

“I decided that like in other things I have done if I was going to fail, I wanted it to be spectacular.” Wayne McFarland
Everyone has a story to tell and many choose to tell their stories by writing biographies and memoirs. But how do you make sure you create a sensory experience for everyone that gets to read the story of your life? Our guest today, Wayne McFarland, chose to go the unconventional way to present his memoir, Tales From The Day; https://amzn.to/3zreUVj, in a very unique and interesting manner.
Wayne McFarland wandered away from a small, mid-western town some years ago. With no planning at all, his history is one of stumbling into one bog after another from the Dakotas to California, from Pamplona to Paris. His main claim to fame is mostly and surprisingly not being dead, plus getting involved with a lot of strange stuff, usually unwillingly or by accident. Yeah, this indeed is a memoir of sorts, if shark fishing in one’s underwear, roping a bear, getting drunk with your grandfather, or losing ten grand at the Hollywood Sign is a memoir. The Day Johnny Cash Hit On My Wife is on the roster as well, for the only name drop in all the stories. There’s also a thing about getting shot in Arkansas and a road trip with a monkey. I can’t deny these were life-shaping events, but truth be told they all happened under the heading of “oops.”
In today’s episode, we get to hear Wayne discusses the reasons why he chose to pen down his memoir in the manner that he did. We will also get to have from him the firsthand account of some of the stories in his memoir.
Listen in!
Social Media
Website: www.waynemcfarland.com
My wife and I sold a business we were running. [2:39]
I have always loved to read biographies and memoirs and so I started reading a whole bunch of them and I can tell you by and large they suck. [2:48]
Those kinds of books only look good or fall off that way in retrospect. [3:14]
So I decided to write a memoir about how things happen and the weird stuff you get involved with just by willing to get out there and live. [3:27]
I took it to the publishers and I got published but their initial reaction was that I had to have a narrative art. [3:40]
But I decided that like in other things I have done if I was going to fail, I wanted it to be spectacular. [4:07]
So, we put it out there and turns out that it struck a code. [4:14]
The riot story in North Dakota goes back a long way to when I was going to school and afterward, I needed money. [5:49]
A friend and I started a little business to throw rock and roll dances and we started with tracking through recorded music and ended up bringing in National Bands. [6:09]
I was then introduced to the world of people being stoned and falling asleep on the bass drum before the music started. [6:26]
One day we brought in a band which was receded in the midst of time. [6:36]
On the night of the concert, 10,000 kids showed up and were shouting and screaming. [7:28]
We hired a bunch of our friends who were letting in people through the doors for cash and thought that maybe were saving for us but it wasn’t so. [8:14]
That night is still whispered about in the far North Dakota. [9:32]
Commercial Break. [10:57]
It was really fun to take the time to put my stories down on paper. [12:41]
The story of pitching to loan sharks happened in Las Vegas. [13:07]
We decided to go sell a cash advertising contract to Big Jim’s Bail Bonds. [15:02]
We got a deal of one year of advertising with cash paid up-front. [17:26]
A study was done by Harvard Medical School where people who were in their 80s were interviewed and wrote a paper on it. [19:55]
What they expected to hear were ruminations of what regrets these people had on what they had done. [20:10]
What they heard instead was the not one person regretted the things they had done, but all of them expressed regret for the things they did not do. [20:20]
If you get a chance to do something, take a swing at it. [20:40]
……………………………………………………………………………………
Thank You to our August Sponsor!
Tired of the time and expense to get a manicure or pedicure? Try Color Street today!
Base, color, and top coats of high-quality liquid nail polish in each strip results in a brilliant, salon-quality manicure in just minutes. No dry time, smudges, or streaks, and your mani/pedi lasts up to 10 days. Color Street is 100% real nail polish, not stickers.
Learn More: https://www.colorstreet.com/bhroberts/party/2095611
 

Recounting the Craftsman Journey - Dmitry Badiarov

“The results are literally in direct proportion with the actions we take and the actions are in direct proportions with the emotions, beliefs that we have.” Dmitry Badiarov
A lot of what we go through in life usually turns out to be the preparation for us to take up bigger responsibilities in the future. This is especially true when we are able to identify our purpose and passionately work to live it, as is the case of our guest today, Dmitry Badiarov.
Dmitry Badiarov is a professional designer of high-end, concert grade violins, as well as a musician, mentor, and entrepreneur and is fiercely passionate to the core. He currently sells his beautifully crafted instruments to world-class violinists, after many years of toil and turmoil studying the ancient secrets of acoustics, and several more of attempting to sell his wares in a competitive industry where factory-made instruments are now flooding the market. Now known within the classical music world as the Ambassador to Ancient Traditions, he credits his successes to the business skills which helped him get his name out there.
However, as true as this may be, there is another driving force that has helped Dmitry get to where he is today: dedication. From the very beginning, he knew that he wanted to create original instruments that paid homage to the thought processes of the ancient masters. But, after many years of intense study and substantial investment in his craft, he found that few people were willing to pay for his creations. He was told time and again that musicians would only buy standard designs, and even that he would never make it as an instrument maker. Try as they might, though, his naysayers couldn’t hold back a man with a vision who was destined for success.
In 2002, Dmitry opened up his violin-making studio in Brussels and was able to quickly build up a client list of famous concert musicians. 28 years later, his business is as successful as it ever was, thanks to the powerful combination of his exquisite design skills coupled with his impressive knowledge of marketing. Today, he passes on what he has learned in both areas to other ambitious instrument makers, working with them to improve their entrepreneurial skills, double their income, and get paid before they even begin crafting their instruments. He helps his students to thrive so that together they can ensure the ancient traditions live on and continue to enrich our culture. Ultimately, Dmitry believes that “if you are going to make instruments, leave a legacy, a mark the world can’t ignore or erase.”
In today’s episode, we will learn more about Dmitry’s journey to being among the best instrument makers as well as an entrepreneur. We will further discuss some of the defining moments he went through and the lessons he learned from those moments that led him to where he is today.
Listen in!
 Social Media
https://www.badiarovviolins.com/
https://www.badiarovviolins.com/
 https://facebook.com/badiarov.violins/ 
 https://facebook.com/dmitrybadiarov/
 https://facebook.com/DmitryBadiarovEntrepreneur/
 https://www.instagram.com/badiarovviolins/
 https://www.linkedin.com/in/dmitry-badiarov-mentor-violin-maker-award-winning-speaker/  https://www.youtube.com/c/Badiarovviolins-Custom-Made-Fine-Instruments-Sale
I began playing the violin at the age of eight. [5:36]
The violin that I played as a child was cheaply and quickly made and was a factory mass-produced instrument. [5:43]
I imagine myself in the room of my professor and it was nothing spectacular and belonged to the local Opera Theatre. And this is where all the musicians lived and also where my parents lived. [6:01]
My father was a musician of the Opera Theatre and so he had a room in the dormitory. [6:14]
It was a very tiny room with just like a bed, the wardrobe, and a music stand, but through the window was the most spectacular view over an immense fruit garden all in blossom extending to the horizon. [6:20]
At the age of 11, I was playing squeaking, terrible, screeching sounds on the violin. [7:09]
I had my very handsome professor, an absolutely incredible pedagogue who I was in love with back then and we're still in a very warm and close relationship. [7:15]
He was telling me how to play and I tried over and over until finally with desperation, I stopped playing and said to him that no matter how hard I worked, I will never sound like him because my violin was not as gorgeous as his and so we needed to fix my violin first. [7:45]
He agreed and I asked him to introduce me to the violin maker in the town who was a kind of a magician. [8:28]
When I saw him I was hypnotized and I did not know what happened. I lost the gift of speech and froze and when I spoke I did not ask him to please fix my violin but asked if he could please teach me to fix my violin by myself. [9:23]
He had an incredible personality, a gentle and mysterious smile and radiating with kindness and love. [9:56]
He had musical instruments on the walls of his workshop and all of the musical instruments were very unusual and very, very exotic. [10:04]
To my surprise, he accepted me and asked me why I wanted to do that yet he could just fix it for me and I told him that I was a violinist and I wanted to know why the violin sounded like it did. [10:25]
He accepted me and so I started frequenting his workshop and this man whose family name is Olbermann, became my hero. [10:42]
When Olbermann settled into town, he decided to not only fix instruments for other musicians but also completely reconstruct the lost culture of folkloric music in that Republic which was lost during the years of communist rule. [11:16]
If people don’t take care of arts culture and music, these things tend to disappear and get lost completely. [11:57]
He noticed that there was an issue and that people wanted to have their own culture which was like national pride. [12:07]
And so over the next five years, I witnessed Olbermann reconstructed enough musical instruments which were completely lost and no one knew them. [12:35]
He traveled the mountains and went to villages where found elderly people who had those instruments and who still remember how to play them and the songs and tunes, recorded them all, and measured all of the instruments. [12:47]
As a result of this work, he created enough instruments for two orchestras which when they got to work for the first time they presented on the national TV and radio, and many other places. [13:15]
This brought a sense of incredible happiness in the air and people were so proud which made me think that if an instrument maker can produce that sort of happiness, fulfillment, pride, and achievement in people then I want to be an instrument maker. [13:40]
That I the role this man played in my becoming an instrument maker and set me on the path to what I'm doing today. [14:04]
Commercial break. [18:16]
Putting the part I played as an eleven-year-old out again is almost like anchoring in the powerful moments in the past so that you can overcome obstacles in the present and it is something that I'm very passionate to speak about to people who feel that they are stuck, and they want to achieve more. [21:38]
This experience from the 11 years of age and several other experiences I had afterward are the kind that are powerful psychological anchors that we create in ourselves which we can use and reuse again. [21:58]
Back in 1992 in St. Petersburg, I was making my first violin and I was studying music violin playing at one of the most elite schools in the country and the world. [22:25]
All of my peers had amazing instruments that cost millions of euros today or dollars and I still played quite a simple instrument and I was thinking how I could get a better instrument yet did not have the money. [23:05]
I thought that I had had a very good teacher of violin making in St. Petersburg, and I had started making my instrument, and I didn't have the tools and therefore was making my very first violin using tools that I had made myself from fingernails. [23:34]
I however had this burning desire not to feel inferior and compare myself with my peers, and so I wanted to have a wonderful violin therefore I was all focused on the process rather than obstacles. [24:19]
At one certain moment, the phone rang and I picked it up and it was my violin-making instructor from St. Petersburg who was informing me about somebody selling violin-making books. [24:40]
The next day I took take a train local train from St. Petersburg to the countryside and I arrived at a wooden Dasha, a Russian-style house. [25:28]
I entered the house and met a lady who was the widow of a violin maker who passed away 30 years ago who had decided to move to live with her relatives. [26:05]
She then showed me the books and they were the kind that was very hard to come by books on violin making belonging to her husband, who died 30 years ago. [26:54]
She also had these 19th century English handmade tools for violin making which she showed to me and I was very much interested and was like a dream coming true. [27:13]
She was selling the tools at $1,000 which sadly was money that I did not have and that made me frustrated and so miserable and destroyed. [27:49]
I decided that I was going to find that money, no matter what and so I made many calls, and by the end of that crazy calling day, I had this $1,000. [29:17]
When you commit to something that you feel is your thing to do, you unleash some kind of energy and you tap on the powers of the universe. [31:03]
I was flooded with work and in less than a year, I earned all this money and I paid all my debt and then earned some which I later invested into moving to go to Brussels to study with the celebrated Maestro to take my life in my career to the next step. [31:20]
So as a result of this story, I have learned that an entrepreneur is someone who believes that there is a mission for them, and they want to do something, but they are afraid that things might go wrong. [31:36]
You just feel the heart and listen to that tiny human voice telling you that there is something that you can you should do it and that is the thing where you will achieve something. [31:57]
The results are literally in direct proportion with the actions we take and the actions are in direct proportions with the emotions, beliefs that we have. [32:18]
Music is important because it is a direct language of emotion and emotion is what we need to feel to take action. [34:24]
That is why you see in all entrepreneurial events, the speakers on stage always provide music that changes the state of the audience because when the audience is in a changed state only then the audience will take the right action. [34:34]
But then what is music? What are musical instruments? And or what is art for that matter? All these things are related to what we call culture but what is culture? [34:18]
The opposite of culture as defined in that same dictionary is the savage hard truth. And this is something that we do not want to have in our lives. [35:50]
Mahatma Gandhi said that the culture resides in the hearts and in the minds of its people and this is why it is important to fill up those hearts and minds with something really valuable because the opposite is being savages. [36:10]
That is why I believe that music, arts, and culture are so important today more important than ever. [36:28]
Listen to your heart and always decide from the position of power because things can and will go right, it is just about commitment and action and the rest will just come to you in the avalanche of ever-increasing abundance. [38:05]
……………………………………………………………………………………
Thank You to our August Sponsor!
Tired of the time and expense to get a manicure or pedicure? Try Color Street today!
Base, color, and top coats of high-quality liquid nail polish in each strip results in a brilliant, salon-quality manicure in just minutes. No dry time, smudges, or streaks, and your mani/pedi lasts up to 10 days. Color Street is 100% real nail polish, not stickers.
Learn More: https://www.colorstreet.com/bhroberts/party/2095611
 

Embrace Your Creativity - Rachel Brownstein

"There just needs to be a radical change in sex education." Rachel Brownstein
People join the adults film industry for various reasons, and many do not intend to work in the industry forever. However, the transition from being a sex worker can be quite a challenge for many for varied reasons, as experienced by our guest today, Rachel Brownstein, who had to deal with emotional and psychological trauma arising from the judgmental environment during her transition process. However, Rachel believes there are many misconceptions about the industry and sex workers and tries to change that.
Rachel Brownstein is a no-nonsense public speaker and actress, busting myths about the adult film industry and sex work. She is also a keen vegan chef and has her own vegan cooking channel on YouTube - Auntie Rachel's Chaotic Kitchen. Rachel is a UK-based public speaker and the face of YouTube vegan cooking channel Auntie Rachel's Chaotic Kitchen.
She talks openly about her experience working in the sex industry to educate people about the reality of sex work and dispel many of the misconceptions people have. Brought up in Leeds, West Yorkshire, Rachel first turned to sex work due to a desire for independence. Keen to earn her own money and choose when she worked, she started out working as an escort and a lap dancer before becoming an actress in the adult film industry, working with studios in Los Angeles. This saw her thrust into a completely different world where 13-hour sex scenes and STD-testing became a normal part of her working week.
After eight years working in the sex industry – including five appearing in pornographic films, Rachel is keen to unpick the stigma surrounding sex workers. Her career saw her earn a good living and travel the world, yet since retiring from porn, she has been fired from two jobs by bosses who couldn't handle her past. Now a public speaker, Rachel is keen to talk about the realities of being an adult film actress and is writing a memoir about her life in porn. She can speak candidly about her own experiences and the reactions she has had from other people since leaving the industry.
Rachel has strong views about the need for clear and honest sex education for young people not to grow up using porn as a yardstick for their sexual relationships. She also advocates for sex workers to be given more of a voice when it comes to the laws which govern their industry.
A Vegan Cooking Channel with a Difference Once an enthusiastic carnivore, Rachel decided to become a vegan after finding out more about the animal welfare issues involved in the meat industry. She had her final meat-based meal on Christmas Day 2017 and hasn't looked back. In October 2020, after spending most of her lockdown whipping up vegan creations in the kitchen, Rachel launched her own YouTube cooking channel – Auntie Rachel's Chaotic Kitchen. The channel aims to put the fun into vegan cooking and is aimed at everyone from committed vegans to meat-eaters wanting to try plant-based meal options. The channel is a no-holds-barred cooking experience, and Rachel always includes all her mistakes and successes. Talking to the viewer through WHY she is adding something to the dish, Rachel hopes to remove some of the mystery surrounding vegan cooking to make it more accessible to everyone.
Rachel can also talk about living with a hidden disability after being diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndromes (EDS) – a group of connective tissue disorders – in 2019. She also has postural tachycardia syndrome (PoTS), a blood circulation disorder, which means her heart rate increases at an abnormal rate after sitting up and standing.
In today's episode, our guest will talk to us about her experience in the adult films industry and her motivation to transition towards exploring her creativity and what she is doing now: vegan cooking.
Listen in!
Social Media.
http://www.racheltalksreality.com/
http://www.facebook.com/AuntieR8chel/
http://www.twitter.com/auntier8chel/
http://www.instagram.com/auntier8chel/
http://www.youtube.com/c/AuntieRachelsChaoticKitchen/  
http://www.racheltalksreality.com/
I have a disability called Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, a connective tissue disorder and it manifests in pain in my joints, and I've got the hypermobile type. [5:12]
I was working in the restaurant industry in front of my house and just hated working for minimum wage. [5:33]
I was thinking of how I could earn more money only with a GCSE level and little education, and my mind went straight to sex work. [5:45]
Sex work gave me freedom and choice to whether or not to go to work, depending on how I felt. [6:14]
I just went all in and started doing escorting and then kind of went backward, started lap dancing, then doing photography in magazines, and then started doing films. [6:34]
Being a US citizen, I could travel freely to the US, where they brought in a law, it's called statute 2257, where you have to have two forms of us ID to appear in adult films. [6:56]
It provided a real disposable income and the freedom and opportunity to go and visit different countries and meet many different people. [7:38]
There are so many different reasons people enter the sex industry, and for me, it was money and freedom and not having to work a nine to five job that stifled me. [7:47]
It got to the point where it just wasn't fulfilling my needs anymore as I wasn't using my brain and being creative. [9:03]
I also did start to see a side of the male psyche that I don't necessarily think women should be exposed to. [9:15]
I started trying to transition out of the industry and then started getting fired because I'd be recognized by men who can't keep their mouths shut. [9:31]
I left the industry, try to muddle along, keep my head down, but I would just be hounded across social media, and people would not let me leave. [9:50]
I realized that people need to hear what sex workers have to say about the industry because the voices speaking on it don't know what they're talking about. I think to say porn or sex work is inherently bad is just very reductive [11:03]
I think there needs to be, again, a radical change in sex education by being respectful towards kids as young humans. [13:57]
I started doing lectures about sex work, and I think we need to start involving sex workers in education. [17:00]
Commercial break. [ 21:05]
The kitchen came around because of the pandemic where I was spending full lockdown in the UK, and I couldn't leave the house. [23:06]
I got depression and anxiety and wondered what I would do, so I started cooking. [23:46]
I started adapting recipes that I'd found and trying different things with them, which I then posted. [24:06]
A couple of friends mentioned having my YouTube channel for my cooking, and I thought it was a good idea and started it. [24:20]
I also noticed that many TV chefs did not necessarily explain the ingredients, and I decided that I will be mindful of that, and l will try and always explain why I'm using a certain ingredient. [26:00]
I have had some nice and beautiful supportive messages. [27:19]
The other great thing about vegan food or plant-based food is that it's very hard to poison yourself. [28:50]
I enjoy seeing other people's vulnerability or their fallibility, and I think it just humanizes. [29:44]
I think it's important to stop letting other people put us in boxes that we're not comfortable in, and you need to burst out of them because it's just so limiting. And it's exhausting trying to conform to other people's ideals. [33:32]
I think trying to be someone that somebody else wants you to be can start having a corrupting influence on your life and make you not take care of your own needs. [33:52]
Just embrace your silliness and your creativity, and don't let anyone make you feel shame or embarrassment for the things that bring you joy. [35:05]
……………………………………………………………………………………
Thank You to our August Sponsor!
Tired of the time and expense to get a manicure or pedicure? Try Color Street today!
Base, color, and top coats of high-quality liquid nail polish in each strip results in a brilliant, salon-quality manicure in just minutes. No dry time, smudges, or streaks, and your mani/pedi lasts up to 10 days. Color Street is 100% real nail polish, not stickers.
Learn More: https://www.colorstreet.com/bhroberts/party/2095611
 

Happiness Hall of Fame - Mike Duffy

“It is the daily progress that you make on your purpose that gives you sustainable happiness.” Mike Duffy
The meaning of happiness varies across different people yet still, there are areas of agreement within all these differences. One of the major areas where people agree on about the abstract concept that is happiness is that it involves the act of giving. Our guest today, Mike Duffy is all too familiar with this and even confirms that happiness is not only attainable but can as well be sustainable and it all has to do with how we perceive and treat others. 
Mike Duffy is a philanthropist and an author of five books on happiness including The Happiness Book: A Positive Guide To Happiness; https://amzn.to/2W5O7PT . The Happiness Book For Men; https://amzn.to/36Tt5Ga and The Happiness Book For Kids Volumes I & II: https://amzn.to/375Iaot . He has interviewed the top thought leaders, athletes, rock stars, CEO's and celebrities in the world on happiness, work/life balance, resilience, and success for his books. He was an MC at Woodstock '94 and gave a TEDx talk at TEDx Berkeley. He loves to speak about how you can gain greater happiness and joy in your precious life.
Mike Duffy is the CEO of Happiness Wealth Management in San Carlos, CA. He has over 27 years of experience in finance and he was a Senior Vice President at Merrill Lynch. He has worked with some of the wealthiest people in Silicon Valley. Mike also speaks about crucial, fundamental money management techniques and philanthropic giving. His audiences include corporations, organizations, and universities including Stanford University where he guest-lectures and has a scholarship award.
Mike started The Happiness Hall Of Fame to recognize, encourage and celebrate people and organizations that make other people happy. Members of The Happiness Hall Of Fame include Muhammad Ali, Dolly Parton, Jerry Rice, Serena Williams, The Golden State Warriors, The San Francisco Giants, The Wounded Warrior Project, and The Make-A-Wish foundation. Mike also founded the Happiness Hall of Fame Homeless Outreach which provides money, food, counseling, and hope to the hopeless.
In today’s episode, our guest will talk to us about how to get sustainable happiness and overcoming fear by being your cheerleader. He will also elaborate more on his business of wealth management and how it is aligned to his purpose.
Listen in!
Social Media Handles
The Happiness Hall Of Fame website is: https://www.happinesshalloffame.com
 The Happiness Hall Of Fame: www.happinesshalloffame.com
 TEDx Berkeley talk: www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VRi6gWj98E
At any moment of the day, we are constantly bombarded by negative thoughts. [3:14]
I started the happiness hall of fame about a decade ago to be the antidote to all that bad news and to shine a light on people who do amazing things and the wonderful stories around the world. [3:24]
I decided to live in sustainable happiness because there are two kinds of happiness. [3:49]
There is hedonic happiness which is the happiness you get from making yourself happy and most people confuse it to be good but it not sustainable. [3:58]
Eudemonic happiness is what you can do to have sustainable happiness throughout your life and it is the happiness that we receive eternally when we are good to other people. [4:13]
When you look back on your life, it is the accomplishment story that makes you happy. [6:02]
One of the greatest joys of my life is the homeless outreach. [6:40]
There are moments in all our lives where words can affect the outcome and put us in a trajectory that changes our lives in either a good way or in an amazing way. [7:45]
I started the hall so that I could leverage on the good. [8:18]
Saint Augustine said that it is in giving that we receive and that is why I encourage people at the very least to do something good to someone else. [10:09]
The biggest hurdle that people have in their lives is fear and we all have this narrative that we cannot do what we want to do. [11:40]
My happiness formula is Purpose plus Progress equals Happiness and therefore is the daily progress that you make on your purpose that gives you sustainable happiness. [12:25]
Wayne Dyer said that when you stay on purpose and refuse to be discouraged by fear, you align with the infinite self in which all possibilities exist. [13:52]
Bren Brown uses the analogy, ‘live in the arena’ as an encouragement to shun away the haters. [14:35]
Commercial Break. [18:00]
I am an author and speaker but I learned that most men in the United States read no more than one book after high school. [19:43]
That means that if I am going to get my message out there, I have to be a speaker because they are not going to read my books even though my books are free on Amazon for a prime member. [20:11]
Art is all around us and there is no reason if you haven’t participated in your space, you can’t change that today. [21:00]
I started happiness wealth management about three and half years ago. [23:25]
I did not let fear keep me in my corporate job and so I went out on my own and started my own ship. [23:44]
I specialize in retiring on purpose where we sit down and figure out what makes you happy and how we can get more of that. [23:54]
People need to understand that they are the authors of the stories of their lives and therefore they should make their stories one of unbelievable adventures, generosity, heroic outcomes and sustainable happiness. [25:38]
……………………………………………………………………………………
Thank You to our August Sponsor!
Tired of the time and expense to get a manicure or pedicure? Try Color Street today!
Base, color, and top coats of high-quality liquid nail polish in each strip results in a brilliant, salon-quality manicure in just minutes. No dry time, smudges, or streaks, and your mani/pedi lasts up to 10 days. Color Street is 100% real nail polish, not stickers.
Learn More: https://www.colorstreet.com/bhroberts/party/2095611
 

Empowering Naked Conversations - Sean Tyler Foley

“Art in general binds us together as a human society because we can see how others see the world through their art.” Sean Tyler Foley
Art has long been used to explain the uniqueness in the being of every individual. That every person is special simply because they are unique and have something to offer is an attitude that should be embraced to encourage and inspire self-expression. This is according to our guest today, Sean Tyler Foley, who through embracing his artistic self has been able to achieve tremendous successes in the world of performance. Tyler believes that self-confidence and self- awareness are very important when taking the stage. 
Sean Tyler Foley has been acting in film and television since he was 6 years old after his father passed away suddenly in a motor vehicle accident. He is an accomplished film and stage performer and has appeared in productions including Freddy Vs Jason, Door to Door, Carrie, and the musical Ragtime. Tyler is passionate about helping others confidently take the stage and impact an audience with their stories. He is currently the Managing Director of Total Buy In and author of the #1 best-selling book The Power to Speak Naked.
In today’s episode, we will be discussing more about how people can open up to have more open and honest interactions, and how people can embrace different kinds and mediums of communication to connect with people and have an enhanced understanding of the world around them.
Listen in!
Links to social media accounts
https://www.instagram.com/seantylerfoley/ 
https://www.facebook.com/SeanTylerFoleyYYC/ 
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPaMWxi5lGc_msriWtO45eA 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/seantylerfoley/ 
https://twitter.com/DropTheMicSTF 
https://www.facebook.com/seantylerfoley/
I was born a performer and every time I tried to get away from it or hide it as an aspect of my life it always came back. [2:47]
I have had to embrace the fact that I am who I am and that is just where I have got to live. [3:01]
I found that I have always relied on the use of performance to be better in every other situation that I have. [3:10]
Performance has helped me be a better leader even in school to moving to start my business. [3:19]
I went to a fine arts high school and moved out to be on my own to pursue performance as a career which I later retired from at 25 years. [4:10]
The book came because I found myself giving the same advice over and over again. [6:43]
As a speaker the first thing that any promoter is going to ask is whether you have a book or a course. [7:09]
Every training or facilitation I have done is on film and so we took all of that and transcribed the audio then repurposed it into the book. [7:30]
When you read through the book it is the closest thing you can get to being in one of the training sessions with me and my team. [8:03]
It is the easiest and fastest way to respond to people who ask me for advice. [8:36]
There are three layers to the title of the book. [11:07]
The most upfront one being that I honestly want to empower people who work with me to have such confidence in their ability to take the stage because their message is what people will focus on and not what they are wearing. [11:11]
The next part of the title is having honest and tough conversations because it is the content that matters. [11:39]
The root title is about being exposed and speaking our raw naked truth and saying the things that we are afraid to say. [12:0]
These are the conversations that we are having one-on-one with our loved ones and peers. [12:23]
Saying the things, we are afraid to say are usually how we are going to move ahead and that is true leadership. [12:36]
Those are the conversations that I am trying to empower people to have. [12:44]
Ultimately, I am trying to facilitate the ability to have the self-confidence because that is what it boils down to. [13:45]
To have people know that their messages and stories matter and that that if they hold on to it, it will not be serving anybody. [14:00]
Commercial Break [16:30]
Art is universal particularly story telling particularly in the art that I embrace which is story telling. [16:50]
We have had as a human species an oral tradition for thousands of years, and it is how we have learned and passed down values. [17:12]
It doesn’t matter race, religion or orientation, you can go to the Louvre and have appreciation for these pieces work and art from around the world. [17:54]
Art in general binds us together as a human society because we can see how others see the world through their art. [18:38]
This gives me some understanding and some appreciation for where you are coming from and why you do the things you do. [18:48]
The most effective leaders are those who can tell a compelling story or who can give effective imagery to their mission. [19:10]
That is when you can get people on board and get them aligned in what you want to see accomplished. [19:23]
Advertising is another visual medium and true art form that I think is under appreciated [19:43]
That is why good ad copy speaks universally to your client base. [20:20]
Embrace your story because it matters. [24:34]
Authenticity is synonymous to self-awareness. [24:40]
……………………………………………………………………………………
Thank You to our August Sponsor!
Tired of the time and expense to get a manicure or pedicure? Try Color Street today!
Base, color, and top coats of high-quality liquid nail polish in each strip results in a brilliant, salon-quality manicure in just minutes. No dry time, smudges, or streaks, and your mani/pedi lasts up to 10 days. Color Street is 100% real nail polish, not stickers.
Learn More: https://www.colorstreet.com/bhroberts/party/2095611
 
 

Capturing Moments that Matter - Melody Paine

“When we spend time doing things that we love simply because we love them, it fills us for the things that we need to do.” Melody Paine
The universality of art is a reality that is felt by every individual. In most form of arts, it takes intentional keenness and experience to identify and bring out the details that make art unique. This is especially true in photography. Our guest today, Melody Paine, is experienced in this form of art, and says that in photography and filmmaking, the most special and memorable moments are always captured in the most ordinary of times and spaces.
Melody Joy Paine is a photographer and filmmaker for Imperfect Joy. She helps families craft visual memories that pull into focus the beauty in little details that they will want to remember most. She is currently studying under an Emmy-award winning filmmaker to build a new branch of her work called Kama Muta Films. She will work alongside her husband, David, to tell stories of how businesses have made an impact on individuals and communities by keeping their heart at the center of what they do.
In today’s episode, our guest will be discussing more about her journey to being a professional photographer and filmmaker, as well as the transformation that came with her getting into entrepreneurship. She will also talk more about the unexplored opportunities in photography and film making.
Listen in!
Social Media
www.imperfectjoy.com,
https://www.facebook.com/imperfectjoy 
https://www.instagram.com/imperfect_joy_ 
First, I want to talk about art being a core thing that is important to our lives and not just in the business for me. [3:05]
I have always embraced art and I started as a musician when I was in junior high, elementary school. [3:15]
I have always love being able to see the transformation of something and how it takes form. [3:50]
I have a bachelor’s degree in Biology and wanted to be a neurologist specializing in MS. [4:10]
The main reason I got into photography when my mother-in-law and my bother passed away shortly after my husband and I got married and everything got on hold. [4:20]
I decided to spend time at home with my kids because after that experience there was nothing more important than family to us. [4:48]
As a stay-at-home mum, I found something to do which was photography. [4:58]
I started doing it for my kids and family, and it evolved into something artistic and led into entrepreneurship all the pieces of running a business. [5:10]
I began in project photography which required everything to be perfect. [5:36]
I started feeling stuck because my perfectionism started getting in my way. [5:50]
I couldn’t get into my creative space because I constantly had to try to make everything Pinterest worthy [5:58]
I did a lot of bereavement work because that was where my heart was, helping people to heal because it was also the place where I was able to heal. [6:10]
One family called me up to capture the last moments of their 2-year-old son whose heart was failing and had to be taken off life support. [6:20]
For 6 hours I stayed with family at their son’s bedside and captured every moment because it was important for them to be able to remember their son in that journey. [6:36]
It was definitely the hardest bereavement session I had ever done. [7:00]
I edited and put together this gallery and it was the first time I saw the importance of the details. [7:24]
It was the first time that I saw an actual story from beginning to end through the photos. [7:50]
I sent it off and felt that in some way I had encapsulated this moment so that the family could go back in that moment in a way that was not as painful. [8:04]
I realized that I did not want to do that in the moments that suck anymore. [8:32]
So, I wanted to tell stories, let go of perfection and help people capture their ordinary moments that mean the most when they are gone. [8:45]
That is why I named my business ‘Imperfect Joy’ as a reminder to myself of what I am doing. [9:00]
One of the challenges I came across in this business is that people have so much accessibility to capture these moments on their own; however most people don’t see the joy in the moments in front of them until they are gone. [11:45]
Because I have experienced loss myself, and I have been in front of so many families, my art goes beyond the tools and encompasses the ability to capture perspective and details which are so mundane and ordinary for people to notice but make a difference. [12:14]
Before quarantine started, I had been working part time as a mum, where it started as a part time thing but became something really important to me. [14:10]
My husband and I then decided in January 2020 that it was time so he left his job to take care of the kids since it was not realistically possible for me to do both. [14:45]
March came and everything and everything was obliterated and all the plans were changed. [15:19]
I tried different things but they were not going as per to my standards. [15:34]
I also wasn’t really in warm market because a lot of people haven’t seen family seen and don’t know what they are or what goes into them. [16:30]
I am not doing film making where I can control everything, I have to work with whatever components that are there which vary and I have to roll with. [17:13]
With film making not being something new I felt like I was just trying to scratch the surface of something that wasn’t quite ready. [17:28]
There is market for it because of the value it brings both for businesses and families but right now it is really hard and that is why we are transitioning to businesses for those various reasons. [17:45]
Commercial break. [18:19]
There are different types of stories that can be told for businesses and what you are talking about is the impact story. [22:49]
What we want to find are businesses which intentionally have an impact on individuals and communities. [22:56]
It is not only good for the people who join in on this business and are impacted, but also for the business owner to see returns. [23:11]
There is a blending of what I had done in a new market and we are calling this Kamamuda Films. [23:30]
Kamamuda is a new term that was defined by psychologists for an overarching emotion. [23:46]
It is described as a sudden feeling for oneness or belonging and is likened to the reaction people have when they feel connected to a deeply moving event. [24:15]
Art being a journey of transformation and, I have had the frustration of being in the process but haven’t seen it come to life yet and being in between is sometimes a really hard place to be. [25:44]
We have combined the different skills we have with my husband and therefore I have the reminder every day that I am not alone in this journey and this struggle has been shared. [27:39]
In the pandemic I was part of a networking group of business coaches who did better in the pandemic. [28:15]
A lot of the messages that I got from them did not resonate with my situation because their perspective was not the same with the industry that I was in which was hit incredibly hard, and for a while I felt lonely. [28:32]
Now that we are starting to get back to people again, we are planning to do a community event for our grand opening. [29:15]
We want a place where we can show our first business film to our community with a story that is from a local business and give people a reason to gather and celebrate. [29:55]
If we can make progress in the relationships again, then there will be a lot more progress happening in our business as well and that was the biggest element that was missing. [30:22]
When we spend time doing things that we love simply because we love them, it fills us for the things that we need to do. [33:18]
……………………………………………………………………………………
Thank You to our August Sponsor!
Tired of the time and expense to get a manicure or pedicure? Try Color Street today!
Base, color, and top coats of high-quality liquid nail polish in each strip results in a brilliant, salon-quality manicure in just minutes. No dry time, smudges, or streaks, and your mani/pedi lasts up to 10 days. Color Street is 100% real nail polish, not stickers.
Learn More: https://www.colorstreet.com/bhroberts/party/2095611
 

Jack of All Trades - Master of One - Rahul Aggarwal

“You have to believe in people and trust them because the more trust you give the better people perform.” Rahul Aggarwal
When starting out, business owners are always forced to work with tight budgets to remain afloat. With such constraints, businesses have always opted to outsource tasks that are not within their core activities, and sometimes finding qualified professionals to do those tasks can be an uphill task. Our guest today, Rahul Aggarwal, is passionate about technology and the solutions it provides in managing businesses. Rahul has faced such difficulties in the past which motivated him not only to start an online professional talent outsourcing agency but also to go ahead and manage some of the world’s most talented professionals.
Being awarded as the Rising Entrepreneur of the year 2019 and Entrepreneur 35 under 35 in 2020, and Asia’s Most Promising Business Leaders 2021 by Economic Times, Rahul Aggarwal has cofounded Designhill and created a unique online marketplace to overcome the challenges faced by the business owners in outsourcing high-quality creative solutions and designers who have been looking for creative freedom. He’s a serial entrepreneur, passionate marketer, investor, advisor, and a firm believer in the concept of constant learning and growing. His astounding digital knowledge and impregnable business skills have led Designhill to be acknowledged as the Creative Startup of the Year 2019 by Entrepreneur Magazine.
In today’s episode, Rahul will talk more about what motivated him to start his company Designhill and how he has managed to grow it to be a globally recognized platform. He will also give us some leadership insights that he believes works well in managing people and businesses.
Listen in!
Social media handles;
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/raggarwal1/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/A10Rahul
 https://twitter.com/Designhilldh
 https://in.linkedin.com/company/designhill
 https://www.instagram.com/designhilldh/
 https://www.facebook.com/designhilldh
 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoKjPhUAFttvUzQbx_JwOmw
 
I'm an entrepreneur and I started Designhill with my brother, who is also a co-founder and we live together despite having worked together for the last eight years. [4:15]
We started this business about seven, eight years back. We thought of it in 2013 but we ended up starting it in 2014. [4:40]
It was something that just got born out of the individual needs that we had at that point in time. [4:50]
I joined the family business and I wanted to get our branding organized since design was not something that was given a lot of value at the time, however, that's changed a lot in today's time and world. [4:57]
I was struggling to get a good agency or designer to get the business brand rebranded and have everything more consistent and quality. [5:14]
My brother was working as a freelancer, and he was having his struggles in terms of finding good clients, how to communicate with them, and getting paid on time. [5:24]
We happened to speak about our problems and we realized that this was not a local issue, but a global problem, and technology as an enabler could facilitate and solve that. [5:38]
Good design is omnipresent and every business needs it whether it's an online business or an offline business. [5:52]
When young or new entrepreneurs come with business ideas and concepts they are always vibrant and they look for something that represents that idea that helps them show that they are serious about what they're talking about. [6:29]
We as a company help these individuals and businesses to accomplish those dreams by facilitating or helping get their business on the ground. [7:05]
We have tried to have services that can cater to every kind of customer with every kind of budget because design is very important for the success of any business. [7:33]
When starting a business, you don't want to spend so much money on professional branding or with an agency or you don't even have the resources at the time. [8:49]
With design, it is always something that is always on the back of the mind as you are always thinking of acquiring new customers or getting more traffic on your website but you don’t want to invest in a full-time designer. [9:00]
That is where we come in or any other online platform comes in because we help you connect with the best in class people around the world. [9:17]
You might have somebody who might charge you a lot more maybe in us but a designer with an equal level of quality may be sitting in Australia or Brazil or India and they might be able to do a great job for you at probably 1/3 the price. [9:27]
I think that's the beauty of the internet in the kind of world that we live in today, that you really don't need to travel anymore and you can just get connected and get on a Zoom call with anybody from anywhere in the world on a click of a button. [9:43]
This allows businesses to experiment, explore, and understand somebody before making that commitment to hire them. [10:54]
Technology and platforms allow businesses to experiment to know different skillsets and get different options and varieties while working with different people. [11:40]
Sometimes you may have a particular stream or school of thought that this is how you want certain things to be done but get swept away with other kinds of options and varieties that people with different backgrounds can come up with. [11:53]
I think what the pandemic has done is it has sort of accelerated working online businesses that get coupled with work-from-home situations. [13:04]
I think that is wonderful because it not only gives people the opportunity to make that extra buck but also follow their passions and dreams. [14:10]
There's a lot of dynamism and flexibility that you get today with the kind of things that are getting built up. [15:00]
We have sold to more than 1 million businesses, marketing professionals, small and large companies, from all over the world and the majority of them come from the United States and Canada, UK, Australia, English speaking countries. [15:21]
We have over 300,000, creative professionals, designers, and artists who have their portfolios on our platform and sell their artworks, services, and merchandise. [15:38]
We have launched a platform called Print Shop last year where these artists from all over the world are selling their artworks on merchandise and we do shipping worldwide. [15:50]
Commercial Break. [16:50]
The dynamism of working has completely changed now and we were lucky enough that we were already a technology company and are using a lot of these online tools to manage and break down our processes for our daily communication reporting mechanisms. [18:10]
Having all these tools threaded with each other enables you to run your business on your mobile. [18:46]
I think technology adoption is really important and if you're able to break down your processes with the right tools you can scale your business because most of the things are already laid down in your tools and processes. [19:07]
From a leadership perspective, I feel it's really important to delegate and give ownership to your colleagues because you can't do everything on your own. [19:24]
You have to believe in people and trust them because the more trust you give the better people perform. [19:44]
We are all humans and we are going to make mistakes but as long as we are trusting people to do a good job and trusting them to be honest about their work, you will often find people overachieving. [19:50
We have to be successful very few times, it's good to fail many more times because then we know what not to do. [20:18]
We live in a dynamic world especially in technology and so many things happen every day. So we should always do that. [20:25]
Experimentation is something that I value and we do encourage our teams to experiment. [20:35]
As a leader, you should be a jack of all trades, and a master of one. You should know about all the facets of your business. [20:48]
Create micro-projects and make individual team members owners of each of those micro-projects or processes. [23:20]
We need to delegate and give ownership which is very important to do as a leader. [25:40]
Failure is something that we should accept warmly because it is going to be there daily. Success comes far and few and it takes time for success to come in. [25:45]
Be consistent and persistent as a business owner because you don't know what is around the corner. Success will come if you have the right intent; you just have to persevere a lot. [25:58]
At the end of the day, it's all about team effort and so you have to have a great team because you can't do everything alone. [26:25]
………………….
Thank you to our July Sponsor: Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being 
Imagine starting a long journey without a map…or even a clear idea of the obstacles ahead. That’s exactly what it’s like for entrepreneurs who start companies with a lot of passion, but without the financial expertise to grow and scale their businesses and create long-term wealth for their families.
Wayne Titus shows you how to find a financial adviser who can help you map a better journey. In his book, The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being.  With the right adviser at your side, you’ll have the freedom to focus on what really matters to you.
Get The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being at Amazon.com and in the virtual bookstore on the Shock Your Potential app.
 

Evolution is Required - Joe Bernstein

“More people can be open-hearted and heart centered and that is a form of leadership that the world is aching for today even in the business.” Joe Bernstein
Self-transformation is not an easy journey. However, what is even more damaging is choosing to remain complacent and sticking in the comfort zone. Our guest today, Joe Bernstein has lived on both worlds and understands well the importance of changing oneself and aligning individual values to the realities that surround us. According to Joe, playing safe due to fear is not an option for individuals who want to be future leaders.
Joe Bernstein Founded Drop the Armor Wellness because he is on a mission to help other men feel the love and freedom that he learned to cultivate when his life fell apart in 2013. After learning to thrive romantically in response to divorce, losing 160 lbs without diets, and leaving his 1st career to build a mission focused business, he became LIT UP to help other men do the same. His clients are often successful business owners, executives in tech, top individual performers, leaders, creatives, entrepreneurs or anyone who wants a Lit Up Life. They are big hearted men that often feel stuck in their heads, stuck in their careers and desiring more social or romantic connection. Joe helps them to let go of overthinking and using stress as a motivator, to live a life rooted in a clear head, an open heart, and solid guts. He also leads transformational men’s initiations in the Mankind Project and is involved in Showing Up for Racial Justice DC Chapter Healing Team.
In today’s episode we will discuss more about how leaders can get pas their comfort zones to realign their values with their goals. We will also talk about why it is important to take risks to pursue greatness as well as to be open-hearted when communicating with people.
Listen in!
Social media handles
http://www.joebernsteincoaching.com/
 https://www.linkedin.com/in/joebernsteincepc/
 https://www.facebook.com/joe.bernstein.902  
https://www.facebook.com/groups/DropTheArmorDojo
 
I was raised pretty risk averse and my family was loving and very supportive. [3:36]
There wasn’t a lot of accountability and there was a lot of playing it safe. [3:46]
I embodied the beliefs of scarcity, fear and risk aversion. [4:05]
On top of that, we were caught up in the eighties trying to be really healthy but eating all the crap we were told was good for us and I was really overweight. [4:11]
I ended up embodying a lot of limiting beliefs and what we believe is what we create. [4:31]
By the age of 26; I was working at a retail job that I loved and thriving in my career but nothing else in my life was happening. [5:27]
Fast forward I dated and I found somebody and we got married, but that went downhill really fast. [5:47]
At 31, I had been obese most of my life and at the peak of my career without a college degree and out of nowhere, the woman I was with and who I thought I will be with forever decided to leave and everything fell apart. [5:56]
I had played it safe all along and just did the stuff that I thought was easy to get a comfortable life but that did not get me to where I wanted and everything fell apart. [6:45]
I had to make a choice between taking responsibility and learn about what had gotten me to this point in my life or continue on this path.[ 6:57]
The breakdown in my life was when I got an insatiable desire to learn about human potential and started actively reading and leaning on personal growth. [7:12]
Within a year I had lost over 100 pounds, transformed my dating life and had a lot of confidence in my social life and started performing better in my leadership roles. [7:32]
I was very connected with men’s work where I had worked in men’s organization to help men with emotional intelligence and leadership and so I decided to be someone who helps other men. [7:52]
Since then, I have been on the path to creating my own life, where every day I am excited to do what I do and what I spend my time in and I am really aligned to values. [8:08]
For me, shocking potential is really about helping men in that place where they got comfortable in life and are feeling stuck and not aligned anymore with their value.[8:23]
We are in this time where things have changed and it has been a wake-up goal for a lot of people. [11:18]
A lot of people are in a place of reassessing values and taking big leaps and to me that is what getting lit up is all about. [12:43]
More people can be open hearted and heart centered and that is a form of leadership that the world is aching for today even in the business. [15:54]
When the world changes around us and we recognize that our values have shifted, it can be really hard to claim the space. [16:57]
Things change in our lives and if we aren’t aware of how they have changed and make a shift in our priorities, then that is where we can feel really stuck. [17:44]
So many are conditioned to think they don’t have the power but if you are at your work, you do have the power to negotiate terms. [18:38]
Commercial break. [20:15]
We think about evolution as these big sweeping changes physically within a species, but reality is evolution for humanity because we are so conscious and intelligent. [22:45]
It is really about making small shifts all the time to be connected to what really matters. [22:59]
We are at a stage in humanity where evolution for leaders is required. [22:06]
The ability to understand our own values, feel, take responsibility and also communicate in a healthy way that is non-damaging. [23:13]
We are taught to lead based on force, scarcity and creating fear, efficiency but people do not want to be led that way. [23:48]
We cannot as leaders be cookie cutting anymore but understand individuals that we are working with on both sides of the transaction. [24:20]
When we are hiding what is truly important to us whether it is from us or others, other people feel that and they end up trusting less and responding less to calls for action. [24:48]
Leadership and emotional intelligence is the point where we are evolving to in order to help people experience emotional fluency. [25:50]
There are capacities that leaders need to develop and for me the two most important ones are courage and compassion. [28:31]
The future is not going to be led by a lot of the old strategies. [29:40]
There are only three choices in life, love or fear, courage or comfort, and creation or consumption. [31:37]
You can create the levels of mindfulness where you have awareness of your choice points and you will stack good choices that will lead you in life, and before you know it you will look back and your whole life will be different. [31:55]
……………………………………………….
Thank you to our July Sponsor: Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being
Imagine starting a long journey without a map…or even a clear idea of the obstacles ahead. That’s exactly what it’s like for entrepreneurs who start companies with a lot of passion, but without the financial expertise to grow and scale their businesses and create long-term wealth for their families.
Wayne Titus shows you how to find a financial adviser who can help you map a better journey. In his book, The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being.  With the right adviser at your side, you’ll have the freedom to focus on what really matters to you.
Get The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being at Amazon.com and in the virtual bookstore on the Shock Your Potential app.
 

Unleash the Champ - Kyle Sullivan

“For every person that I have ever gotten an opportunity to lead, I ask them to always remember seven words, ‘I trust you,’ and ‘I believe in you.’” Kyle Sullivan
The leadership journey is not easy considering the numerous challenges that a person has to overcome and the endless lessons along the way. This experience can however be very different when a leader has a supportive and encouraging force in the form of a couch. That is what our guest today, Kyle Sullivan gives to his clients. He trusts and believes in the abilities of people which, according to him, give them the motivation to be better.
Kyle Sullivan is the founder of a company called Unleash the Champ, whose goal is to create powerful coaching experiences for successful people. Toe who are in leadership and want to discover the inner champion and be the best they could be without sacrificing the things that matter most in their lives. Kyle has more than years of organizational leadership and team development and has led thousands of people in the course of his leadership journey. Kyle strives to inspire people everywhere to unlock the cages they are in to unleash the champ within.
In today’s episode, our guest will discuss about his journey in leadership and getting into entrepreneurship. He will further talk about how leaders can grow their people by simply trusting and believing in their abilities.
Listen in!
Social Media
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kylejsullivan/
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/kylejohnsullivan1 
I started the company in July of last year. [2:30]
When I held my daughter for the first time, I knew everything had changed. [2:50]
I wanted to be present in time and not just give presents of things and had no clue how that was going to happen. [3:15]
I started working from home and I saw all the milestones in my daughter’s life. [3:45]
When our staff decided to go back to the office I strongly felt that it was time. [3:58]
My wife said to me that she thought I may be the last person to realize was you should be doing. [4:37]
That was the confirmation and I stepped off from being a pastor and I was 51 percent that this would work, and that was all I needed. [5:02]
The pillars of ‘Unleashing the Champ’ deal with your calling, your heart, attitude, mindset, and performance. [6:34]
When someone is questioning whether or not to do something, we look at whether or not that is their calling which could be or could not be what they are currently doing. [6:45]
The pandemic shocked all of us to see how quickly our world can crumble. [7:29]
My definition of success is getting to the end of my life with as little ‘what ifs’ as possible. [7:47]
People are getting into entrepreneurship and taking a bet on themselves at a rate that has never been seen before. [11:30]
It is producing some really beautiful things in the marketplace. [11:47]
Commercial Break. [11:57]
For every person I have ever gotten an opportunity to lead, I ask them to always remember seven words, ‘I trust you,’ and ‘I believe in you.’ [13:27]
We live in a society where trust has to be earned and I think that is BS [13:56]
We are placing people on a deficit and condition ourselves to look for things to confirm our bias. [14:04]
My favorite response to a question someone would ask me as their leader is, ‘you decide.’ [14:47]
We are used to people telling us what to do and barking orders and top-down leadership. [15:09]
I believe that you will make the right decision based on where you are at right now in your development, leadership, and ability. [15:40]
I come from a stance of humility saying that if this decision was made, obviously there is information that I don’t know that impacted this decision. [16:50]
The question, ‘help me understand,’ is the most disarming question a leader can ask that allows them to improve their leadership because it comes from a place of trusting and believing people. [17:25]
The tension is getting a leader to embody that. [18:51]
Typically, leaders get to places of higher-level management areas because they did it all and that was what was affirmed. [19:00]
In leadership, what gets celebrated gets repeated. [19:18]
It is a hard thing for a leader to admit they have been closed-handed and they need to now open their hand. [19:38]
When I first got into leadership, I was a bulldozer because I always had my way. [20:54]
As I learned more about emotional intelligence as I grew in leadership, my preferences had to be diminished for the productivity of the team. [22:01]
Most people I work with have solved the money problem, but have not yet solved the sacrifices that they took to get that success. [23:35]
Most often when people have incredible success professionally, when you peel the layers of the onion, they are not in a good place. [23:46]
I realized that the people who have incredible success would never go back to their pastor and say something is wrong. [24:10]
I hold the space for leaders to take the mask off. [24:28]
As a leader, you need to understand that you are not as important as you think but you are also more important than you think you are. [26:40]
In leadership when things go bad you are a mirror, when things go well you are a window. [27:07]
If you are a leader you are leading by choice, design, on purpose, and for a purpose, so work and live out of that so that you can unleash the champ. [27:22]
………………………………………………….
Thank you to our July Sponsor: Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being
Imagine starting a long journey without a map…or even a clear idea of the obstacles ahead. That’s exactly what it’s like for entrepreneurs who start companies with a lot of passion, but without the financial expertise to grow and scale their businesses and create long-term wealth for their families.
Wayne Titus shows you how to find a financial adviser who can help you map a better journey. In his book, The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being.  With the right adviser at your side, you’ll have the freedom to focus on what really matters to you.
Get The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well-Being at Amazon.com and in the virtual bookstore on the Shock Your Potential app.