Escaping the Prison of Prior Conditioning | George Bryant - E67

Speaker A: Welcome M. To Leadership Unlocked, where we uncover the pivotal stories that shape extraordinary leaders. I'm Dusty Holcomb, and on this show, we don't just talk about leadership, we decode it. In every episode, we sit down with change makers who've walked through the fire, challenged the status quo, and emerged with wisdom worth sharing. These aren't just lessons. They are lived experiences, real moments that reveal the mindset of resilience and, and the clarity that comes from creating lasting impact. Today you'll hear one of those stories. Our guest is George Bryant, who went from being a devil dog to a Care Bear and along the way unlocked incredible identity transformations. Our conversation is far ranging and long lasting. And I can't wait for you to pick up some of the knowledge and wisdom that he drops down. Let's get into it. This is Leadership Unlocked. George, I am delighted, excited, and man, I am intrigued for this conversation that we're about to have. And I've been looking forward to it, you know, since we were first connected many months ago. And I want to start with this. How does someone go from being a Marine, a veteran, to a relationship person, to someone who passes out in front of their son doing a, uh, fast, fast. Man, I. There's just so much richness in all of those identities that you have. Talk to me about how you ended up passing out in front of your son.

Speaker B: Oh, my God. Well, there's two questions in there. First, you even missed the part where I became a food blogger in the middle, and I was a New York Times bestselling cookbook author. That was between Marine M and relationships and, and, you know, leading to now. And the short answer is how? Well before I was saved, I was still being obedient and led by the Lord. I just didn't realize he was chasing me down as one of his lost sheep and just asking me to pay attention. Now I just stay obedient and I, I follow the doors that he opens. But ironically, we happen to be recording this in the middle of Lent. And so I made a, A, uh, big leadership declaration. This Lent for me, for my family, for my son. You know, there's just a lot of noise in the world. There's a lot of spiritual warfare. There's a lot of like, uh, darkness. And I was like remembering Matthew that there's just some things that don't go away unless it's prayer and fasting. And so I was like, I'm going to do 21 days. You know, I've done a 10 day water only and had success there that's how I kicked caffeine. And I, you know, just relied on the Lord for everything. And then I was like, oh, this time, like, typical George fashion. Let's go from 10 to 21 and let's. Let's see where we end up. Uh, it was on day eight, uh, last week, actually, you know, like a week and a half ago, where I went up. Me and my son were sleeping. We woke up up, and I went to go open the door, and I went to stick my hand on the doorknob, and I didn't get the doorknob, but my body needed the weight rest of the doorknob, and it wasn't there. And it was like somebody turned off the light switch and I just fell straight down onto my butt in the floor. My son's like, dad, you okay? And I was like, I think so. We had a good laugh. And I said, I think God wants me to eat. Uh, so I'm going to break my fast today. And then last week, I actually, um, just had a pretty normal week. And since now, this is the week as we're recording this leading up into Good Friday and Easter, I started again yesterday. And so just these really deep. You know, I love that you talk about leadership, but, you know, I think for me, leadership is the ultimate pursuit of self discovery, self growth, and embodied leadership and outspoken leadership. And I think, you know, there's a book I read years ago that I love called the Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter. And it made so much sense to me why I thrived in the marine Corps for 13 years. Even though I didn't like it, I was miserable. I complained all the time, but I couldn't not do the things that I was called to do because I would have got put in jail and I was on a contract. And so I did them anyways. And then I just. I found this book, and I. I realized that either whether you're a person of faith or you're not, the moment that you think that there's a finish line, you've already lost the race. You just haven't felt the pain yet, right? There is this constant, constant gift that we forget which is the present. Like, there are so many people just in the last four minutes alone that took their last breath and numbers that we can't even comprehend that, like, didn't wake up today. And by the time this podcast is done being recorded will no longer have the ability to breathe. And yet time is this one resource that we all share in common that is completely fleeting. We cannot pause it we cannot stop it and we cannot deposit anymore. And yet we disrespect it every single day and pretending that we have so much of it. And so I think when it comes to how I've definitely had my fair share of struggles. I was an addict with opiates because of injuries in the Marine Corps. I was suicidal. I had attempted my life. I experienced a lot of abuse in my childhood and growing up. And a lot of that abuse, even in my adulthood was self created. It was the only way I knew how to cope with, know, being homeless at 13 or seeing the things that I saw, or, you know, Somalia in 2004, or friends committing suicide and witnessing it. Like there was so much darkness that I struggled to understand or process, that I just coped by creating pain for myself at these extremes. And so even when I think about leadership, I definitely went the wrong way. A lot of the times. It was the either I am, um. And I remember in my Marine Corps career, there's a plaque on the wall in my storage unit somewhere and they nicknamed me the PT Devil because the only thing I knew was hard. And I was like, I will break myself. I will break you. It's the only way we're going to live. And so I operated on that big extreme. And then I came the other way and I was like, I love you all. I just want to be a Care Bear and a Teddy bear and we don't need that. And then I somewhere ended up in the middle. And I think in the middle is like, what I realized as, like a leader is there is no one outside of us. It's really a game of us for ourselves. And what leaks out of us is leadership right now. I love the sermon. You've heard it 8 million ways from Sunday. But if you squeeze a lemon, the only thing that should come out is lemon juice. If you squeeze an orange, the only thing that should come out is orange juice. I think leadership is not letting the world squeeze you. I think leadership is squeezing yourself and making sure that the juice that comes out matches. And that juice is what leaks onto everybody else and has the biggest impact on their life and on their career.

Speaker A: You're talking about this idea of leadership. And, you know, I have this first principle belief that if you want to have a leadership influence or impact on others, the first and only person you must lead is yourself. Right? And that is a, uh, first principle belief that I have married alongside another first principle belief, which is leadership's not about you. Like you have to. It is never about you. It is about service. It is about creating impact and influence. And I don't mean in a warm and fluffy and kumbaya ish manner. I mean in a value accretive to another human being. Because we all have this fleeting sense of time or spit allowance of time on this earth, uh, which you touched on as well. So there's already like 16 threads I want to pull. One of the things that I want to ask you just really directly I struggle with this and I know a lot of people that do, is how do you reconcile the fleeting of time and the need to be present with the things you want to do? And is that something you have figured out or is that a tension that you navigate in your life? Because it's sometimes, uh, I'll say this for me, it's easy to talk about and hard to do. And I'm very curious to see if you personally find tension in the time and being present and really living in the moment. Because I don't think the world is constructed in a way to validate that in any way. In fact, it's designed in a way to make ourselves our uh, own ego driven little gods. And, and that means that we can't pay attention.

Speaker B: So 100%. So I, I want to be really honest with everybody. I struggled with it really hard until I met Jesus. And now I realize that God doesn't send me messages of struggle. Like God doesn't communicate with doubt or shame or guilt or fault or blame. Like that's the enemy. And if you're not saved, call it what you want. The anti universe, I don't care, right? I just call it the enemy. But those things don't come from God.

Speaker A: Right?

Speaker B: And I've realized that the reason I struggled with it is because I wanted so hard to live in black or white. Like color didn't exist. There was no gray area, there was no margin. There was no space for flexibility. And I think that that's the beautiful thing about like the human experience is there's space for flexibility. Because in this moment of being present in three seconds, my reality can be completely different. And what presence looks like is completely different. This is going to get really deep for a minute. But what I realized was the, the struggle came from a lack of my identity, not the thing that I was doing in the moment. And so if it's like, oh, I want to be present with my son, I would feel upset that I wasn't present because the story that I was telling myself is number one, I wasn't being a present dad. But number two, I was. I was projecting on what presence was supposed to look like instead of asking and co creating what presence really was with my nine year old, right? Like, if my nine year old is outside playing with his friends, he doesn't want me staring out the window at him like a creepy neighbor. Yet if I was like looking down or I missed something he did, I'd be like, oh, my God, I'm such a bad dad. But ironically, I was being present. But the reason I struggled with, like, the tasks or the present was because of the story that I was telling myself underneath it. And below that story is, like, how I was seeing myself or what my identity was. And so it was everybody else's world, right? It was what my parents did or didn't give me, what my friends said or Siddon didn't have, what social services taught me as a kid, what my neighbors and my pastor and my friends and like, all the way that their present became my barometer. But never was it based on my identity and what I wanted my barometer to be. And one of those things is as an entrepreneur, which you are, and we share this in common. Like, I have a heart of service. Like, I love helping my clients. I love helping people. And there are so many times where I still look at entrepreneurship like it's a 9 to 5, where it's like, oh, my son's home, school's over. I'm not doing anything. And I was like, but if somebody texts me a911, it's in an actual emergency. I want to be able to help them. But yet I still struggle with guilt sometimes. And then, but ironically, I'm like, hey, bud, Daddy got a phone call. It's really, really important. Are you okay if I talk to them for 20 minutes? He's like, dad, I'd be upset if you didn't, of course, go help your friends. But then after the fact, I'll be beating myself up, right? I'll be making up all these stories. And so what I realized is it's still a struggle. And I wouldn't say struggle, it's a pursuit. But what's underneath it is me being really crystal clear on my identity and making sure that I'm making all of my decisions or my choices from that identity. There was something that, you know, and I'm going to butcher this because I'm not really good at memorizing scripture. I'm, um, you know, baby Christian. I've been a Christian for like four years. I'm trying, but I don't have that like scripture memory. But I think It's Ecclesiastes, like 9, 10, where it says, like, basically everything that you do with your hands, do it to the absolute best of your ability because there is none to be done in the grave, right? Which basically speaks to this thing of time. And then I remembered too that like in my Bible, I don't know if you have a different one, but I do get one day off a week and it's the Sabbath, which is Saturday, but other than that, it's not like, oh, 4pm God's not going to use me to sow and reap. Oh, it's 5:30pm and the phone comes in, but I magically am like, oh no. And then I get this really deep calling of like, well, God's orchestrating these. Anyways, like for some reason, whatever it is, at, uh, 9:30 at night, this one person who knows 300 people who I haven't talked to in six months, felt the courage and the call to text me out of everybody that they could text, number one, to think that I even had anything to do with that. And number two, who am I not to pick up the phone? And so in order for me to navigate that, I have to be really clear on who my identity is. And you said this earlier, in my opinion, take it or leave it. The definition of leadership is humble servant. And there is no personal gain within that whatsoever. It is 100 altruistic. I mean, it tells us, right? Is it in Matthew, like, make sure that the right hand and the left hand don't talk together. I think what gets lost in leadership is like, we forget that those principles aren't for when you're just out of work or you're going into a restaurant or you're going to church. Like, no, the question is, like, where do you sleep, where do you eat? Are you bringing all those principles in? And like, that's the way that I've learned to navigate. It is like, even this morning I was at a funeral. Yesterday I flew to Denver. My best friend, his father passed, I went for the services and then I ended up being the babysitter to the daughter. And then they had a moving truck. I'm like, I have eight hours until I have to be at the airport. What do you need? We loaded a 40 foot truck yesterday. I was like, I need a shower for five minutes before you drop me off the airport. They are not letting me on the airport plane. And then I woke up this morning really struggling, really hollow on the inside, like really, really sad. I lost my dad to cancer 18 years ago, and he just lost his. And I was like, I've walked this before. I can be here for them. I can do that. But then, even this morning, I was a very slow start to my day. Like, it was like, oh, I got to get on calls. I got to get in my inbox. I got to do all these things. I was like, oh, no, no. I really got to honor myself. I have to honor that. Like, right now, this is what's truly coming up. And I got on a call with a client and they're like, can we reschedule anyways? I need something else to do. Can we do it later in the week? And I was like, yeah, of course. Then the next client's like, how are you? I was like, I'm doing a little bit better. And they're like, thank you for telling me. I had a rough week too. It's just this, like, allowing our humanity, right? Allowing our authenticity. It has to come from our identity. And then when we know that identity, we make decisions on how we live or where we spend our time or how we're present based on that. And then we're making sure that we're doing it for the right reasons. And ironically, I found that when I did it for the wrong reasons, it's because I never looked in the mirror at my identity. So all of it comes down to identity. So to close the loop all the way back to 16 minutes ago of like, how did I end up here? My obedience is really, really simple now, because my identity comes through Christ, not from the world, not from my feelings, not from m. The situation, but from my belief in Christ and God and who they want my identity to be. And that's where I make those decisions now. And that is not a. I have it figured out. I'm going to own this. I smack my face through wall after wall. I trip, I fall. I feel like I get in a head on collision every couple of days. And then I'm like, lord, where do you want me? How do you want to use me? And magically, we kind of grow in the process. So that's the. That's a very long winded answer to your question.

Speaker A: Well, it's laden with wisdom. Um, and you know, one of my good, good friends, Cassie Shea, does a wonderful amount of identity work and identity transformation. Ah. And I've done work with her and this idea of we're constantly, you know, striving for, uh, correct or right identity, whatever the next identity is. And, uh, but along the Way we need grace because we're not going to be that person in every day and every moment. And a friend of mine introduced me to this precept last week that, you know, I think about, and I think about it through the lens of leadership because I think if we're, you know, typically I'm working with leaders who are at inflection points, which means at an identity level, they've. They're needing to, like, shed the skin. The thing that has gotten them to where they are to get to where they want to be. And I think every human goes through this and this phrase that was shared with me last week, and, uh, you said something that triggered it. So I just want to get your reaction to this. You know, that we as leaders, as humans, have to be able to break free from our prison of prior conditioning. And it's not easy. So let me. Let me just say that I'm gonna. I make that statement. Our prison of prior conditioning, what does that bring to your mind and what does it make you think about when you heard me say that?

Speaker B: Oh, bro, I got gooseies. I call them gooseies. Just easier than goosebumps. Or call them God bumps. I got them all over my body when you said that, because that was my life, right? I can't. I can't talk about anybody else. But I had a. I had a coach, a personal development coach, 18 years ago, 17 years ago, and I'll never forget this. It hurts so bad when she said it. And she's like, what you fail to recognize is that you are living your whole life and making every decision for the approval of somebody who's six feet underground. You're never going to get it. I remember those words like it was yesterday. You might as well handed her a scalpel and had her cut straight to the deepest part of the wound and expose it to everybody. It's in a room full of 120 people. It was humbling, it was eye opening, and it was paradigm shifting for me. That's what started my life of obsessing about psychology and personal development and leadership. And from the thousands of books I read and the courses I've done, I found it all in the Bible. I just got to give credit to the og, right? That's the only place I go now. It's loaded like a proverb. A day will keep evil away. And when you say that, though, I think the things that I want to add to that quote, that quote is so, so, so powerful. And I think you nailed something earlier when you were talking about Clients, there's two things. Number one is that we're all going to hit inflection points in our life, but I believe we should be in pursuit of inflection points as frequently as possible.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker B: Because what ends up happening is that we try to make the dashboard of the car really, really clean with no check engine lights, but then the moment one comes on, we flip out and we feel like our whole world is shattering. The truth is, is that you should be trying to break the car every single day to see where those points are. Like, that's where sovereignty comes from. That's where strength comes from. And it's not even that you solve them all. It's that you have an awareness of them. So when one of them comes up, it doesn't create a reaction in you. It creates a pause to where you can respond because it's not running you or forcing you into something. And I. I'd said something to clients for years is that, you know, scaling a business comes down really simply to never allowing a temporary emotion, feeling or situation to create a permanent undesirable result in the future. Because when you lose your number one client, when the deal falls through, when you get that lawsuit, when you're so close to bankruptcy, whatever that pressure is, that check engine light, all it does is exposes the vulnerabilities in our foundation where we thought we were in control, or we thought we had an answer, or we thought we had handled it. And then the whole goal is do not allow this moment to touch any decision. I need to remove you from it. Because we need to think clearly. There's a way out of this, There's a way through this, but not if we're reactive. So I think that that's number one. Number two is the finish line paradox that everyone thinks like, oh, but I've had them all, or I've made enough, or I've already done the work, or I removed that pattern or. Yeah, but like, I healed that with my parents. The moment you fall into that finish line trap, it starts to creep its way back in. And so that quote that you said is so powerful, but you have to understand that with every single bit of growth, there is the law of diminishing returns. If any of you. I've gained and lost £100 four times, right? Not the healthy guide. Okay? So, like, I've done this quite a few times, didn't learn my lesson the first three. I'm keeping it 40 and beyond. I'm just staying healthy, right? So, you know, the first time I Lost a hundred pounds. That first 30 days felt like torture. It was like nothing's moving, nothing's happening. I'm changing my habits and behaviors. I'm doing all these things. But then eventually it starts to go right and it just starts to fall off, right? And then before I know it, the weight's gone. Ironically, when I look back, it was easier to lose the weight than it was to actually keep the weight off, because once it's off, I'm having to do more inputs and more effort to achieve minimal, minimal gains and to maintain this. Let's talk about identity, because that's the one of the undertones of this. When we think about identity, we can release the burden and the weight of all these projections that were put on us, right? Our paradigm is formed zero to nine. That's when our view of the world is formed, right? And then we go live our version of life thinking that that's what we think and believe until life smacks us in the teeth and we start question it, and then we start rewiring that belief system, right? So we pick these things up everywhere. I say this because if you're not in active pursuit, there's something that I say on this podcast that could potentially trigger a child wound that you've healed that brings back a sneaky belief system that starts to permeate and get a hold of you again, if you're not aware of it, every time you go to a dinner, every time you go to a business conference, every time you watch a movie, every time you read a book. And so it's not a passive choice to grow, and it's not a passive action to change your identity. It's actually very, very active. And you are either actively growing it or you are actively maintaining it. But no matter what, you need to constantly be actively protecting it, because any single thing that comes in is a hairline crack. Because it's not about perfection. It's not about right or wrong. It's not about legalism. It's actually about humility, vulnerability, and pursuit and never letting those three things stop. The results don't matter. It's our heart posture going into them. That's where leadership is won or lost.

Speaker A: I love that because I tend to think in models and frameworks. So I'm thinking, I'm seeing this Venn diagram of these three pillars that you had just walked us through. And what I love about it is there's tension between these, right? You have humility and active pursuit. You can't get anywhere without active pursuit. But humility is also wrestling with this idea that you don't have to be the center of attention. It's not about you. And so, like you, there's. There's a natural tension there, and there's this. This challenge, you know? And as you're talking about this, Satan doesn't lie in terms of one or zero. It's either truth or not truth. He. He's pervasive in the 1%, the 2%. You know, one of my favorite readings, and I try to read it every couple of years, it's the Screwtape Letters, my favorite book. It's so simple. And there's the scene for, like, a better word, where the. The. The junior, uh, associate and the senior associate, uh, devil or demon, are talking. And he goes, well, this person was about to get onto this one great, noble thing. And I just whispered in his ear, hey, aren't you hungry? And it was distracted and pulled away and then lost the train of thought. And. And so we, as leaders in this active pursuit could easily get pulled into a place where it's not humility. It's. It is about us. We're in pursuit of the things that we are rewarded for in the world. It's a choice. It's a human choice. And I love. And I made a note very early on in our conversation, and I want to go back there now, because you were just talking about it again. This finish line paradox, like, the minute we think that we have arrived, we've started to die. We've actually begun to cease to exist because we, you know, we've achieved one identity, and that's not yet the identity that we've been called to. And so when you think about this finish line paradox and what it means for you and what it means for, you know, for leaders and for people, how is it that you invigorate the new identity and recharge yourself? Because there's nothing wrong with goals. In fact, we need goals. We need these things that we're striving for and recognizing that they are milestones and, uh, roadmap markers, not destinations. And I'm guilty of that. For so much of my life, I've been so goal focused that I forgot that the real value of it was the journey and along the way. But how do you wrestle with this finish line paradox and ensure that no matter what mile marker you're at, you recognize that you're still on the journey, you're moving to a different finish line? I can imagine that some people are uncomfortable with this idea that the finish line is always moving away from us, but it is. How do you wrestle with that?

Speaker B: Oh, man, I wish this might be a sermon that I have to prep and, uh, maybe one of my first ever sermons, because I. I remember reading in my Bible 85 different things about this, and I can't give you any of them. So I'm going to give you my antidote to this, okay?

Speaker A: Please.

Speaker B: Because this is. This is really, really personal for me. So the way that I've come to this is, number one, realizing that I've read my Bible a lot. I've yet to find the word happy in my Bible. I found the word joy a metric boatload. But you will not find the word happy because happiness is a fleeting emotion and it's a temporary state. Joy can only exist when the other end of the spectrum has some semblance of pressure or suffering, because it's a perspective that we must choose over and over and over again. Now, I thank the Marine Corps for putting this inside of me before I was ever saved. Because the running joke was we all hated each other. But since we hated the things they had us doing together, we loved each other a lot more and just did them and found fun in them. Like, there was no way we were getting off that race, right? We couldn't get out of it. And so we're like, if we have to do it anyways, we're going to either choose to be miserable or we're going to choose to make some memories of this, right? And we always chose the memories. Now, ironically, the way that I have internalized this is that if I am upset, sad, disappointed that I'm not hitting the goal or not getting the results, I am idolizing the goal over the guy who gave me my life. So I am putting the goal above the Creator, the goal above God. And that is idolatry. And the way that I have done this and the reason I'm fasting right now, actually, is the way that I pressure test this. It's like if you call me, we're friends, right? And you call me like George after that call, man, like I was really convicted. I don't think you should do this anymore. If I can't in an instant, just say yes, I let it go and not dream, uh, about it, have regrets about it, wonder about it. I am putting that above God and I need to walk away from it. And so that's why I'm fasting right now. I've never had a problem with caffeine, but you know what? A year ago, somebody Convicted me. I did a fast. I cut caffeine out. I'm drinking a decaf coffee. One of my coping mechanisms became. And I, uh, don't ever talk about this publicly. Like, three years ago is somebody gave me one of those nicotine pouches, and I'd never used one before. I'd never smoked a cigarette. I'd never done any of that. I was like, oh, I like these.

Speaker A: Cool.

Speaker B: I start using them. I use them for three years. God convicts me about a month ago, and he's like, ironic that you're using that to curb your emotions instead of your relationship with me. And it hurt hard. And I realized I cut it out cold turkey. It's gone. It was never about the feeling of the nicotine because I've used other pouches. I've used the, uh, like, nootropic ones. All of it. It's that I was having, like, an emotional reliance on it and a comfort that came with it. And I was getting that comfort from somewhere else other than where I should have been getting it. And so for me, when I look at goals, I remember my Bible, where it tells me, and it says, I will be a lamp post to your feet. But it doesn't tell me the next 100 steps. It actually tells me the definition of faith is I have to step into the dark and not trust, not hope and not think, but know if I step, that God is going to have a step underneath my foot, but he's not going to show it to me, he's not going to reveal it to me, and he sure as crap isn't going to give me the next 50 of them. The definition of faith is that I step knowing in my heart that if I'm going in that direction, that he has a step there. But that doesn't mean I get the next 50. That doesn't mean because I set out to launch this business or do this coaching thing or even my podcast, that I'm going to run it forever. It means that today that's what he wants me to do obediently, but it can come tomorrow. And I have. All my friends are like this. Like, they went from entrepreneur and book owner to a ministry and walked away from millions. They went from having one daughter and then adopting three other kids in one day and then had four kids in diapers at the same time. And they're like, this was not on our bingo card. There's a level of, like, obedience that comes with it. And so when I look at goals, I do love, and it is in Philippians I believe it's something on. And I had to pull it up because I didn't want to butcher this one. But I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. I press on towards the goal of the prize. But my prize is not earth. My prize is not of the flesh. My prize is not of my possessions, the materials, because none of them are mine anyways. He is entrusting them into me to steward, and I can't store any of them. And so when I look at goals, my goal is to basically be a player in God's magical game that my ego will never understand.

Speaker A: Okay, so let me interrupt right there because I love that and I want to ask you this question. Does that mean that because that is your focus, that you do not struggle?

Speaker B: No, I struggle hard, so it's okay.

Speaker A: And, uh, that's what I want folks to listen to is even when you are deeply convicted, called, and otherwise focused, struggle, no matter what level or definition of success you are in, is a necessary and real part of the journey. And it's the, in that tension that we get to do what you were talking about, which is decide to choose. One of my favorite books is Victor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning. Because the uniquely human attribute we have is the ability to choose. And it's not the choice that matters, it's the pause before the choice. So let me just put a bow around that. Does that mean that you still struggle even though you have deeply intrinsic. And I choose that word carefully because somewhere else I'm going, but deeply intrinsic motivations and alignments towards your goals.

Speaker B: I feel like I struggle more.

Speaker A: Oh, why? Tell me more.

Speaker B: I feel like the, the bigger the calling, the more obedient I am, um, to the Lord, the bigger the struggle because I am still a sinful human that was born of the flesh. Just like as a coach for so many entrepreneurs like you, right? Like I coach seven figure entrepreneurs, eight figure entrepreneurs, nine, ten figure entrepreneurs. The only thing that ever changes, the amount of pressure that comes with the bad choices, right? Like I have clients where if they make a bad call, there's nine figures associated with it. That's way harder to navigate when they made a bad call and there was three figures associated with it, right? There is this increasing amount of pressure, which, by the way, the way that I see it, is the reason why we must endure. Struggle is. Struggle is what conditions our perspective and creates the wisdom for us to navigate and steward those situations without allowing them to take over and dictate our identity. And I look at this because we all like an ironic. Like, I'm a really simple man. I was a marine, right? So I joke. There's only three colors I know black, white, and pink because it's my favorite color, right? But as a Marine, this made simple sense to me when I broke it down like this. And it's like coaching myself. And I was like, why is it that if me and you, Dusty, go on a run, and we're like, hey, we want to run a 5K and you and I go on a run and we haven't run forever. No matter how far or how fast we run, the moment it hurts. We're both going to look at each other and be like, dude, we're doing so good. Look, it hurts. We're getting better. But yet everywhere else in life we're like, oh, my God, it hurts. Get rid of all of it. We can be cheesy with this because there's so many cheesy quotes that we've heard from years, from the egg to the diamond, right? Like a, uh, diamond under pressure, or the same pressure that boils an egg also breaks it, right? Like there's all these different things. But truth, any change, this is scientifically proven that we want to happen in our life comes from two distinct factors. It is repetition and emotional intensity. Paired with that repetition that is the only way to actually change. If you've ever realized things that you've gone through the motions with that somebody else told you that you should do, or you're like, I'll do it just to do it. None of those things ever stuck because you weren't having emotional intensity or connection to the reps. But now we can all think of hundreds of moments where either by choice or by circumstance, we had massive emotional intensity and put the reps in, and it changed who we were in our perspective. And that's what it boils down to for me, right? I think it's in James, like he talks about. The crown of life comes from enduring temptations. I know for me that so many of the things that the world celebrates me for that I think are my gifts and treasures from God that I use for clients. And have the biggest impacts come. Impacts from. Have come from, on paper, the darkest moments I've ever experienced in my life, 100%. And it took me until I was 40 years old and, like, really knew the Lord to realize the only mistake that I made in my life is that when things were hard, I was praying for him to Change them instead of worshiping him for giving them to me. The way that I see this now is the reason, and the only reason I get to worship is because it's me knowing my Father is giving me something as a gift. Because if it's in my space, he either allowed it or he put it there. So why the heck am I praying to remove it instead of just praying gratitude and worshiping him for giving it to me? It's almost like, good job, son. I've got you. Keep going.

Speaker A: Most leaders don't need more advice. They simply need clarity. That's what the Vision to Victory scorecard is all about. It's free, it's fast, and it gives you a clear picture of where you are and what's next. Start now at clarity, alignment, execution dot com. Let's make sure that your next step forward is the right one. We want to remove the friction, we want to remove the pain. We want to remove the struggle. But we're not growing if we do that. We're moving the finish line closer in our minds, when all we're actually doing is to your earlier point. We're moving it further and further away. We can't get there if we've given up, uh, in this pain, this challenge. And struggle is a gift. I mean, the most common thing that I hear in both my work with clients and having been in the room with really successful, amazing people through YPO forum or some other environments is imposter syndrome. I don't belong here. This idea of unworthiness and not enoughness and like, and it doesn't matter if this is a person who's just made their first eight figures, their first nine figures, even their first ten. Good. Dear mentor, friend of mine said, you know, hey, the first time I. I celebrated for a week, and then the next time it was a day, and then now I don't even think about celebrating because he's a multi entrepreneur. And it's like we don't embrace it and we don't live it, and we just get numb to it. But that pain is a gift. I love that you're going there. And so my question, as you wrestle with this and as you are thankful for these growth opportunities, one of the things that you said earlier that I want to, I think it's so powerful, especially when we are as leaders or as people who are in leadership roles are expected to have all these answers. And this is the second quote. I love that we're talking about this because I had no idea we were going to go here. And because I've just been chewing on these quotes for a week, the one about prison of prior conditioning, I mentioned, uh, a minute ago, this idea thesis here, which is leaning into the wisdom of uncertainty and allowing yourself. And so what I'm thinking about, I've been chewing on when I hear this and read this and see this and study this and meditate on this and walk with this is the wisdom of uncertainty, is the embracing of faith. To recognize the gift and to see it as wisdom, you must see it through the lens of faith. Because uncertainty is a gift. Like, we're not growing if we just know it's, uh, how it's all going to work out. We don't have the opportunity to fail. There's not a lot of fun on that anyway. What does that trigger for you? The wisdom of uncertainty.

Speaker B: I love that line. The wisdom m of uncertainty. One of the things that I say to my clients all the time is they come to me and they're like, I have a vision. I know how I'm going to get there. I was like, then you don't have a vision. You have a job. Because that's just telling me you're about to build something that's already been built before. That's all you're telling me, right? There is no space for growth. There is no space for creativity. There is no space for the Lord. Right. Like, I, uh, look at that. And I know for me personally, I know it's really dangerous when I get really confident that I'm like, oh, I'm gonna do this, and this is how it's gonna go. Because what I'm basically saying is, there's no space for you, Lord. Because where faith comes in is that there has to be a gap that my flesh cannot achieve, that only the Lord can. And so when I hear that the wisdom of uncertainty, that's really creating fertile ground for the Lord. And ironically, that's where your identity comes from in those actions and behaviors. But it's also not the popular opinion in the world. But, like, you take anybody, whether they're of faith or not. Like, I remember when everyone said Elon was absolutely nuts. Tesla would never make it. They're never gonna go. You're never gonna send a. And now everyone's like, oh, my God. But literally, he had billions of people calling him an idiot every single day. Never been done before. They had to bridge loans so many times with, like, an hour left to not go bankrupt. But that uncertainty is, I'm going to operate as if it's already happened. And I'm going to stay obedient to it, regardless of the suffering that I'm going through right now. Sleeping on the floor 20 hours a day, people hating me, judging me, acute. Like, all of it you could ever imagine. And then on the other side of it now, we're like, oh, my God, invest on our platform. Do abc. And I was like, you all for. You all forgot, right? And I think that you nailed it. Is like, that's where either wisdom lives or wisdom comes from, is in that uncertainty because it's a variable change, right? It's like, I love watching this with kids, or you do this with dogs. Like, when a dog is acting up, you pattern interrupt it, and all of a sudden it remembers, and you change something, and it's like, boom. And I'm not saying we're dogs. I am very much like, I just need a good pattern interrupt. And I'm like, okay, hit a reset button. Uh, but I love that quote about wisdom because it creates the space for divergence, meaning other ways to think, other ways to activate, other ways to operate. Right? This is the difference. Like, there was a study that I read, and there was a Harvard. Uh, it was either a Harvard or, like, a Wheaton professor, but she had her PhD students, and she gave them an assignment, and they were all stuck. So she assigned a kindergartener in the classroom to each student, and the kids came in and solved almost everything because they weren't operating in, like, oh, I don't know exactly how to do this, so therefore, I can't do it. Or, it has to be this way. They're like, we could fly. We could teleport. We could use a brick. You could draw up this way. The gift of divergence comes from the gift of curiosity. Well, the gift of curiosity and creativity can only exist in a space that has room for it. But in order for there to be room for it, there has to be uncertainty. There can't be a solid of, like, something fits in here. Because I think wisdom is a pursuit, right? Wisdom isn't a state that you, like, live in or you live out of. Wisdom is, like, this thing that I'm pursuing as an active state of, like, how am I learning through this? How can I replicate this? How can I spend this down? Like, values first or principles first? Right. Thinking.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: There's certain things that I always want to do to make sure I'm there. I look at. If we're going to look at uncertainty, I'm going to label it something every entrepreneur leader knows. Uncertainty is the Blue ocean of our world. Very few people live in it because very few people love it. Which actually goes back to your previous point about the imposter syndrome. The imposter syndrome comes because you started attaching your identity to the results that you had and realized that that dopamine and serotonin never lasted because it was always about the result. And so then the more and more you do it, the more numb you become to it. Just like an opiate, just like anything else, because it's on a false hollow identity. Because it was about the result instead of the process. And it was because of the identity of ego instead of identity of the Lord. And so therefore, whether it wins or loses, we still feel the same about it. And we're like, oh, uh, and then you just end up in the suffrage over and over again, over and over again.

Speaker A: What's interesting to me that you mentioned joy versus happiness and so, and where you were just going, I think will tie into this nicely. And I don't have this graphic I can show you, George, but I'll put it in our notes. But I was having a conversation with some folks last week in my uh, WA forum and we were talking about joy versus happiness. And I was doodling, which I'm prone to do, because I'm a, a frameworks thinker. And I, uh, drew, you know, two lines, cross lines. So there's an X axis and a Y AIs and on, on the Y axis I have, this is a perfect cross. I have at the top I have intrinsic, and at the bottom I have extrinsic. And then across the X axis on the left hand side I have others. And on the right hand side I have self. And so when I think about this joy versus happiness, I'm thinking about what are your motivations? Are they intrinsic or extrinsic? And what are, uh, how are you motivated towards people? Are you other motivated or self motivated for yourself? And so as I think about this motivation, you know, depending on where you are on each of these continuums, you have these power levers and these impact levers that drive you towards a place of joy. Durable, sustainable, renewable, all those things, you know, but fleeting, over and over again. It's like that dopamine treadmill you have to get on, you get more joy, more versus happiness. And you know, actually I think I reversed that. Happiness is the thing you can never, you know, that's the one that you can't. It's not in, in the Bible. What I'm um, wrestling with is the reason I'M bringing it up is like when you. We think about this from a leadership lens, it's so easy for us to get into this place where we're seeking happiness, which is extrinsic, which is self motivated versus joy, which is intrinsic coming from within ourselves by that, you know, he who created us and other motivated, which is humble servitude and the ability to impact lives of others and create influence. And so what are your motivations? And then how do you shift your motivations as you shift identities in life? So I'm really curious, as you have navigated many, um, definitions of your identity, you know, as a Marine, as a New York Times bestselling author, where have you been able to tap into motivations of joy that renew you regardless of what the extrinsic world says?

Speaker B: It's a great question, Dusty. I'm going to summarize your question for the people might not understand it because I had to. I had to process that in my brain like four times when you said that, how do I fill my bucket without anything in the outside world or being attached to it?

Speaker A: Way better. That's why you're here, man. You're here to make sense of my nonsensical ranting.

Speaker B: I speak you fluently and I love it. And I can just imagine me trying to get that out in a keynote. Everyone's like, what did you just say? I'm like, you know what, let me just give you the marine version. Uh, what fills my bucket if it's not from the results I create in the world? And I'm going to answer it with a fortune cookie first. Most people spend most of their life avoiding the one relationship they're guaranteed to spend the rest of it with themselves.

Speaker A: Moment of pause. Let that, uh, sink in. Say that again.

Speaker B: Most people spend most of their life avoiding the one relationship that they're guaranteed to spend the rest of it with themselves. It took me until I was 38 years old to truly understand that the only intrinsic for those listening inside of me, fuel sources that I could fill my bucket with weren't from actions, weren't from behaviors, and weren't from hobbies. It was only from being able to sit in the presence of myself with no distraction and love being in that moment. Now, I'm going to tie this all the way back to something Dusty said at the beginning of this. Where we don't live in a world that celebrates certain things, one of them is our autonomy. Because if you know yourself and are confident in your identity, the world media marketing cannot Manipulate you with fear or with marketing. So therefore, you are not one of their puppets. So we don't live in a world that celebrates this. We live in a world that every moment of the number one commodity that we trade, which is attention, they try to get yours. Endless scrolls, notifications, dopamine hits, radios, billboards. Boom. There is a country, by the way, Bhutan, that is banned billboards, and they do not allow advertisements anywhere because they want people to be autonomous. One of the happiest places ever. I had a friend who, on the podcast who went there and, like, met with the Happiness Council. I digress. That's a non sequitur. But it also applies here. You have to understand the field that we live in. We live in a fallen world. This is not God's kingdom. God's kingdom comes after this world. But that means we constantly have to be on guard and we constantly have to be on offense for our happiness. For me, that was really simple. I had a monk on my podcast years ago, Elp, and he lived in a Tibetan monastery for seven years in silence. And he said this to me on the podcast. He said, I can fix. I can fix everybody's happiness in a matter of moments. But you're not going to like how I say this. He said, and I. I quote, I will not cuff, because I don't cuss anymore. But he said, if you can't take a poop without your phone, you've never lived a day in your life.

Speaker A: Uh, for everyone listening, they're going, oh, shoot, I, uh, just, you know, failed that test.

Speaker B: And then think about it. The toilet, the airplane, the car, the drive through the red light. Like, think about how many moments we have in a day. What is it, 86,400 seconds? How many moments we have in a day? And how in every single one of those moments, our default is to disconnect from ourself rather than connect to ourself. And then we wonder, like, leadership, like, why we're in a disconnection with our spouse, where our kids don't feel close to us, where our team can't connect to us. Well, there's a really simple rule. You. You have to be connected to yourself in order to invite that in. But it's not a muscle that we're taught. It's not one that's celebrated. It's not one that's given. And what changed my life was a mentor in the middle of the jungle, where I was at the wit's end, accused of domestic violence, which I never did, going through a divorce Opiate addiction, losing everything. And I paid money to go into a jungle. And I'm screaming, help me, help me, help me. And he asked me one question, and he said, what's the vision for your life? And I'm like, I don't know. That's why I'm here. He's like, wrong answer. And I was like, well, where the heck am I supposed to find this? I wanted to punch this dude in the mouth. His name was Brad. I remember him like, we're still friends. And he looked me dead in the eye. I'm angry, I'm yelling. And he said, george, your biggest problem is that you've never been quiet enough, long enough to hear God's whispers. And it broke me. And that is the one practice that I have kept consistently for 12 plus years is what I call a stillness or a boredom practice. And that is not achievement based. I do this to my clients. I just did this to one a couple weeks ago in Montana. We're sitting down by a river. I was like, give me your phone. She's like, what am I doing? I'm like, you're gonna go sit by the stream for an hour. She's like, for what? I'm like, for nothing. What am I doing? Nothing. What can I bring up? Ah. And nothing. Music? No. What do I do when I'm done? Nothing. You just exist. Like, you just be. But in that space is not where God tunes into us. He's there the entire time. It's where we tune into him. I've tried everything you can imagine. If you Google me, I've tied world records, New York Times, best selling cookbook, number one app. I've done all the things of the world, every hobby. I have a thousand skydives, mountain biker, snowboarder, scuba dive. I've done all of it. I promise you. Save yourself the trouble of convincing yourself that those are anything other than distractions of what really matters, which is can you intimately be in a relationship with yourself and be okay with whatever comes up? And that is a muscle that we all need to practice every single day. Do you remember 2018? 2019 was everybody was obsessed about morning routines.

Speaker A: Oh, yeah.

Speaker B: Remember when it was like ever? You know, Robin wrote the 5am Club? We got everybody 4am, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Everybody studied it, but nobody looked deep enough. And I asked this question to everybody. I was like, all right, what do they all have in common? And everyone's like, uh, oh, they get up at 5:00am I'm like, nope, not all of them. Some of them are nine, some of them are 10. And I was like, and I just dig and I dig and I dig. And I was like, if you go back and you look deep enough, there is one thing that's correlated to the amount of success that somebody has and how much of it's in their morning routine. What is it? So easy. The more alone time somebody spent in their morning routine, the more correlated success they had everywhere in their life and in their business. And the only line that carried through all of them, because I got really geeky about this to prove a point, was that the more and more worldly money that they made, the more and more time they spent alone in thought, in creativity and processing. Keith Cunningham has an incredible book called the Road Less Stupid where he talks about this in every chapter with Thinking Time. Richard Branson runs all of the companies in an hour a day because he meets with one person, tells them everything, answers every question, and then is completely alone to do whatever he wants until the next day. There are so many examples of this, and it's the answer to that question of like, there is nothing short answer outside of you that can fill you and the only sustainable fuel that can fill you. You have to create intrinsically. And the only way to create it is to spend as much intimate time with yourself as possible and know yourself better than you could ever know any hobby, any person, any client, any business. But you have to have the curiosity and the willingness to step into the uncertainty to find the wisdom of yourself.

Speaker A: You remind me of a quote that I heard, a huge Andy Stanley fan. He shared, you know, the more successful you become, the less accessible you must be. And it's that whole paradigm of being able to be able to do what it is only you can do and spending time alone. I happen to be an early morning riser, so I love it in the morning. But I know people who are late night people and that's when they do it and they just get that alone time for, for those listening, I have a routine, in fact I recommend to people to build a rhythm of success. That's what I call it is a rhythm not a, ah, not like a linear routine. But what would you tell someone or what would you advise someone as a method? I love what you did. Taking the phone on the side of a creek, by the way. I can't imagine a better place to do that in Montana. But there's no better place. That's why I like big country where I'm um, really really small and the world is very, very Large. How do you tell somebody to get started? Like, what is the first step they can take?

Speaker B: This is not a Mike Tyson original. He's ripped it. But I love it because I have a deep respect for Mike as somebody who can be that authentic and open about his story. I feel like God is working on him hard. Is the magic you're looking for is in the work that you won't do. The secret you're looking for is through the door that you won't walk through. Ironically, Dusty is that question that you just asked. Everybody listening to this already knows the answer to the challenges is that we overvalue intensity and we undervalue consistency. So we keep giving ourselves evidence that we can't do it. I'm going to give you a model that I give every one of my clients. I call it the consistency compass or the wedge of expectations. Whichever one lands more for you because it's half and half. It's the same model, whatever that thing is. And if you want one that rocked me. For everybody listening, I invite you to do this whether you are a believer or not. This was the most powerful prayer or intention I ever set. I wrote in the top of my journal, God, please show me all the things that I ask and expect others to do that I am not doing for myself. I thought my page would be empty. Dusty, my hand hurts within about 45 seconds because I wrote a lot for everybody listening. You write that on a piece of paper either. Lord, universe, whatever you believe in, Jesus, please show me all the things that I ask or expect others to do that I am not currently doing. And then you silence the world and you go sit somewhere you haven't sat before. It could be a coffee shop, could be outside. It has to be out of your routine. No phone, just pen and paper. And you sit until you find an answer. What if I don't get one? Go back tomorrow and then go back the next day. I promise you one will show up. And whenever it shows up, whether it's one or a hundred, you pick the one that foundationally will have an impact on all the other ones. You might just get told you need to have a bedtime routine and sleep more than six hours a night. And you might be irritable, you might be overeating, you might be struggling with your weight. You might not have a lot of energy. Well, guess what? We'll fix that. Your sleep. So you pick one, and then you have to ask yourself two questions. Question number one is, on my absolute dream day, if I could do this, I Felt great. I was motivated to do it. What would I commit to? So let's say it's working out. You're like, I'm gonna go to the gym for an hour a day, every single day. Great plan. We call that your ceiling. Then I ask you the most important question, which is your floor. On your absolute worst day, when everything is stacked against you except you are still breathing. Your wife left, you got hit by our car, your friend died, you went bankrupt. What's the minimum that you can commit to? Because you are still alive. And you have to protect your progress regardless of how you feel. And that might be, I'm going to go for a five minute walk outside. Regardless of the weather. Most people lose because they aim for the ceiling. Everybody who wins hits their floors every single day. This is not a game of intensity. This is a game of compound interest. And as long as you give yourself the opportunity to get on the field, you can actually do something. But staring at the field, wondering what it would be like at the field, regretting not getting on the field is actually not making deposits in a positive direction. It's making withdrawals from your future. And so you need to protect your floors. So that's where you begin. For some of you, it might be actually 15 minutes a day just sitting still. Go drive to somewhere you've never driven. I do this. I live in Montana. I can do this for the rest of my life and never run out of spots. I will just pull over on the side of the road. There's a bald eagle hunting. I will drive up a mountaintop. There's a goat. I'll put my window down and stare at a lake. Find moments to build that relationship with yourself, but also make them sustainable and make them consistent so that you can stack the deck in your favor.

Speaker A: I love this man. The ceiling versus the floor, uh, that is such a rich framework in finding the time to be with yourself. And for me, it's a morning walk. Like, I love my morning walk. George, we could talk for two more hours. Uh, I won't, I won't do that to you because I would be doing it for me and it would be selfish. Let me shift to a couple of rapid fire questions because I'm really curious how you're going to answer some of these because I'm going to chew on all that we've talked about. Like, I've got. I always listen to these episodes a couple of times and even, you know, months later, I'll go back and listen to one and go, oh, I learned Something new. This one's going to be really, really rich for me for, for many, many years. Here's the first question, and you can't use a book you've already mentioned. What is one book that you believe that every leader should read?

Speaker B: The Go Giver by Bob Berg and David Mann.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And ironically, that the second one is an understanding science book and it's called the Wedge.

Speaker A: M.

Speaker B: The wedge is the gap between stimulus and response and how you can train it and how you can understand it and how you can utilize it. And I think that is a requirement for leaders is knowing how to stand in the noise and prevent it from getting in. Which means you have to understand yourself and how your nervous system responds. Right. I look at leadership and the way that I define it is similar to masculinity in a relationship. A man should have a strong back and a soft front. That's what leadership is. Right. And that wedge is our ability to stand in that gap.

Speaker A: What is the best leadership advice that you've ever received? The nugget that someone gave you. That was an incredible gift.

Speaker B: I'm going to give a summary of some of the most powerful ones from like Marine leaders and personal development coaches. Remember, it's always about people because you never make it to the top alone. And I, I, I say that for everybody because it does not matter. In the world that we live in right now, there is no such thing as solo success. That doesn't matter if you pay somebody, if it's a neighbor, if it's a family member, if it's a child. There are so many people that are responsible for wherever you are. And the moment you lose sight of it, you lose the entire plot of the game.

Speaker A: What's a leadership myth that you want to debunk?

Speaker B: That leadership happens in the front? Lead from the front. I was a Marine, by the way. I got in a lot of trouble for this one. That is not leadership. Leadership happens in the middle. You are no greater and no less than you are. One of you just have a different role. But in the middle, you can see the people ahead of you and you can push them. In the middle you can see the people behind you and you can reach out and lend a hand. But you will never win in business if you are ever disconnected from the people that are inside of your business. And your business might be your family, it m might be your church, it might be your men's group. It doesn't matter. Your business. Interchange that word. But leadership happens on the same level of every single human not above, not below, not in front of. Drives me absolute wild. You do not need to be the best at everything to be an incredible leader. I would submit, having a team that's better than you at everything makes you the best leader.

Speaker A: 100% agreement. And double emphasize that you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room or your egomaniac.

Speaker B: Both can be true at the same time.

Speaker A: Uh, yes, they can. And I'm really curious about this one. It's my favorite question to ask. I've been asking for 20 years with people. At the end of the day, when you wrap up your day, when you close out and prepare to go to sleep, what must have happened during that day for you to lie down and go, today was a good day. Today I was successful. I was able to live a good life. What must have happened?

Speaker B: It's, ah, a, uh, Maya Angelou quote. And it's how I measure my days. It's that I improved upon the silence. And for me, what that means is there's a lot that comes into my day. I'm still navigating a divorce four years in, I'm a single dad. You know, 70% of the time, my partner lives 2200 miles away. I am in all of these things. And the default for me, and this is, might not land for anybody, but my default coping mechanism is I want to hide in a cave. Sometimes I just want to curl up in a ball, and I just want to hide. And so at the end of my day, I ask myself, did I live true to the words of, uh, like, do you need me, God? If you do send me, I'm right here. And as long as I can say yes to that question, meaning I helped somebody on a call. I went above and beyond. I prayed without them knowing. I gave them the shirt off my back. I found an opportunity to serve. I did something to improve upon this world and the kingdom. I can always fall asleep peacefully.

Speaker A: I love it. Dude, this was awesome. Again, I could talk for hours. And I am deeply grateful that you gave me, you know, an hour and a half of your time. And, bro, I'd give you three more

Speaker B: hours if I wasn't gonna, like, pee my pants all day.

Speaker A: Let's not do that. I would, too. So this will be the first of many for folks that want to learn more about you and your journey, your identity shifts, your, uh, work. How do they find out?

Speaker B: I'll make it really easy. Pink is 100. My favorite color. I'm not joking. Like, I have Pink bobblehead. Like, I have pink cups. Like, if to see the website that a Care Bear threw up on, that is the best place. So I have a podcast. Dusty will be coming on the podcast. I'm still scheduling that with his team because I've been in the ringer. But I'm about to pass 700 episodes, and I give away everything for free. I talk about mindset, I talk about business, I talk about scaling. I do two shows a week. One is just me teaching a topic, and one is me interviewing somebody incredible like Dusty for their perspective on business. And so my mission with the podcast, as God called me, to do it, is anything I know I share with you. And so if it's helpful in any way, my email is mentioned in every show. My Instagram is mentioned in every show. So mindofgeorge.com pink website. You can't miss it. Mindofgeorge. Uh.com the podcast is there. Our events are there. Our, uh, resources are there. But most importantly, it's a resource for you. And I say this to everybody. You gave me a gift I can't give back to you today, which is time. The only other thing I can't do, though, is I can't reach through the laptop and help with something I'm unaware of. So if there's anything you might think it's silly, you might think it's stupid, ask it anyways, because you might be surprised if I can help. If I know somebody that can help, I would love to help. That podcast is my ministry. My business is my ministry. And so the way that I see is, if you reach out, I'll respond, or I'll put you in touch with somebody who can help. But make sure that you break that veil so I can. So it's mindofgeorge.com that's the best place. And the podcast is the Mind of George show. Everywhere you see podcasts, Amazing George.

Speaker A: I will make sure those are in the show notes. And, brother, thank you so much for investing your time with us, uh, today. And it's just such a genuine pleasure and an honor. So thank you.

Speaker B: Ditto, brother. Thank you.

Speaker A: Hey, before you go, if this episode helped you see leadership differently, I have three personal requests. First, and this is the most important one. Share this with one leader who needs it. Think of someone in your network who's frustrated with their team's execution or is trying to scale their own impact. Copy this episode link right now and text them, hey, I just listened to this episode, and I think you'll get real value from it. That simple act of sharing that is servant leadership in action. Second, subscribe to Leadership Unlocked. Whether you're on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or your favorite podcast player, just hit subscribe or the follow button. That way you won't miss the next episode and it helps us reach more leaders like you. And third, if you're willing, this would be a huge help for us. Leave a five star rating and write a quick review. I know it takes 60 seconds of your time, but here's what it does. It helps other leaders discover the show. Every rating, every review. It's how we expand our impact together. So those three things Share with a friend, subscribe, leave a review. I'm deeply appreciative and that would give us so much help. Thanks for being part of the Leadership Unlocked community. Now, uh, go create some clarity for others.