Running Toward vs Running Away From Problems

Show notes

Running Toward vs Running Away: A Live Coaching Session on Purpose and Change

Are your big decisions about moving toward something, or running away from problems? In a live coaching session, Dr. John Oberg helps Randy Lorensen look at the pattern behind his career moves, and what he's running toward now.

Randy has walked away from a promotion, engineering and his poker career. John and Randy, who discover they both worked at Vector, trace the pattern back to his childhood, and talk about being built for something, track builders vs train conductors, and why knowing what you don't want can help as much as knowing what you do.

Then John switches to coaching. He helps Randy find a two-word why, "spread abundance", that ties together his business, Premium Cabinets, and how he wants to spend his time. A dinner question about relationships uncovers another pattern, and they look at what changed.

They close with mentors, goals and vision boards, what you'd tell yourself today instead of at 20, breaking goals into daily tasks, and asking for help instead of powering through.

Running Away From Problems vs Moving Toward Your Goals

What you'll discover:

How to tell running away from running toward
Why knowing what you don't want helps
Being built for something: track builders vs conductors
Finding a two-word why: spread abundance
What would you tell yourself today?
Breaking goals into daily tasks, and asking for help

Timestamps

[00:00] Welcome: a coaching session for Randy
[01:26] Turning down a promotion
[02:45] Running toward vs running away: both have a place
[04:05] A shared background at Vector
[05:22] Ripping off the Band-Aid: where it started
[06:41] Lessons from childhood
[09:17] Built for something: finding your calling
[10:36] Why engineering wasn't the path
[11:52] Track builders vs train conductors
[13:13] The poker years as a lifestyle
[14:31] A diverse group of friends
[17:09] Moving away from pain vs toward what you want
[19:46] Thinking in percentages
[21:05] Knowing how your own brain works
[22:22] Knowing what you don't want
[23:43] Would he change his path?
[25:02] A negotiation lesson from a podcast
[26:22] Finding a deeper why
[27:40] Premium Cabinets and spreading abundance
[30:16] John's coaching: a new perspective
[32:54] Two words: spread abundance
[34:12] How Randy spends his time
[35:32] Giving back over coffee
[36:52] Frustration with what you can't control
[38:08] A dinner question that revealed a pattern
[40:47] From running away to a great relationship
[42:05] Saunas, routines and pushing limits
[44:41] Getting too close to the edge
[45:59] What came up in the session
[47:18] Mentors who help you see what to run toward
[48:36] Goals and vision boards
[49:55] What would you tell yourself today?
[52:32] Running toward spreading abundance
[53:51] Breaking goals into daily tasks
[55:09] Prayer and meditation
[56:29] Asking for help instead of powering through
[59:06] Wrap-up and upcoming episodes

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About the hosts

This is a hosts-only episode with Randy Lorensen and Dr. John Oberg (Anthony Marino isn't on this one). Host bios are on the host pages linked below.

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📺 Watch this episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTsd7Lgh1mc
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Related episodes

Meet the hosts: Randy Lorensen · Dr. John Oberg · Anthony Marino

Transcript

A full transcript is below. It was generated automatically from the episode audio, so expect some spelling errors in names and terms.

[00:08] abundance I'm Dr. John Oberg and joining me as always is my co-host Randy Lorensen hey Randy good morning John this is uh it's an exciting one today yeah more so for you than me we're going to rip the Band-Aid off and see where this leads I don't know I don't know I'm not sure that this is the most exciting episode for me because I'm not exactly sure what this is going to un cover yeah you know we do a lot of different types of episodes where we talk about abundance uh this one this one's a little bit different not a lot different but a little bit different we had a conversation in an earlier podcast where we talked about Buffalo running into a storm and to get through it faster versus cows who run away from the storm and then they stay wet longer because the storm follows them it's a yeah so and then but we talked about that and we were talking about some of the things in your career do you want to back us up to that last episode and tell us how we got to this particular topic today yeah big picture when we were talking about my life there were things that just even when I went to college and I didn't know what I wanted to do it wasn't so much running toward what I wanted to do it was running away from I knew I didn't want to be a farmer I didn't want to be a logger all the jobs that existed in the little small town where I grew up yeah none of those were interesting to me so I was going away to college kind of to get away from that um then I worked at Vector I was there I did very well I was moving along I was running a division and they were going to promote me to a bigger Division and a you know a better part of the country and I kind of realized oh if I take this I'm going to be making more money and I'm going to get trapped here and I don't think I want to be trapped here for the next 20 or 30 or 40 years and I left I just very abruptly decided this was not where I wanted to be and I've done that a few a few times in my life and even even in my poker days there was a point where I don't know I just looked around me and I thought I don't think this is what I want to do and I want to be a contributing member of so so there there I moved at least toward being a contributing member of society and we'll we'll put that link in the show notes if you want to go back and listen to ry's kind of like all about Randy episode and Ju Just for the listeners to like this was not me coming to you and saying hey let's do an episode like tell the listeners how we got here so they don't think like I was prying well in that episode about the fourth time I brought up something I thought huh maybe I have an issue here yeah I thought I spent a lot of time figuring out what I don't want to Doh and not running away in a sense that I was scared but well kind of I was I was scared to get trapped right so moving to the next moving away from something versus moving toward something I think some of language we using last time I am in my mind I want to think that I'm moving toward the future that I want right and so I I don't think I think both have their place but I think it should be explored it I don't know we DP the bandaid off we'll see this could be I also had a time in my life where I had serious commitment issues now well let's not get there yet I think we're going to end up there today so yeah but there you know it it does lead me back to it does lead me back to that as well to think that are those two things tied together so Randy came to me after the last episode and not not immediately after it was probably I don't know four or five days afterwards and you'd been reflecting on it as you often do you're very thoughtful very self-aware and and then we started talking about this and then you suggested this could be an episode this wasn't me saying hey let's get on on the podcast let's like expose Randy but I think you're willing to kind of go through the process do you want to tell the listener a little bit about our our background professionally personally so that people know how we got to a place where we can have this conversation yeah I mean I there there's obviously got to be a a level of trust here right I mean John and I met at BNI um networking group 10 years ago give or take um I think it might like 16 or 18 years ago but it was a long time 2006 seven8 I don't know if it's quite that but it anyway in there so we're old it um but we we met at BNI we found out that we had a shared background at Vector which we did not know we were in different parts of the country and did not we didn't completely overlap there as much either but in different parts of the country um you know got together to the network have coffee Etc and from there uh John started coaching me and my business and we've just you know that's been a a valuable relationship and we've become good friends and which has led us here today and I and years ago I put together a group of CEOs who get together once a month and we talk about everything business life and we've been together for gosh 10 12 years whatever it's been and so uh really really close relationships personally and professionally for that group and so we kind of have like a No Holds Barred anything is on the table kind of conversation and and really in that group it goes all directions right so it's true that I've been you know advising coaching Randy for years now but you know certainly Randy has had no shortage of uh feedback from me over the years to help me improve much I mean in a very much appreciated way I don't not not a not a backhanded compliment just a you know it goes both ways but today you said hey let's dive into this and let's figure out what this is all about and so this will be a little bit like a coaching call not like a coaching call and that we're recording it for the world to listen to well like I said let's drop the Band-Aid off and see what's there all right well so let's I mean let's get into it so you it started early when you said you know I I knew that I didn't want to be a farmer how did you know and when did you know God I think I knew when I was a kid I mean I I've never really thought about this right but I watched what my dad did wasn't I don't know it just wasn't that interesting to me yeah right I think farming and you know my dad raised cattle but it's feeding the world right the American Farmer has done a lot but it wasn't it just wasn't my path right and also you know on top of that my dad worked hard I mean he worked from like before the sun came up till after the sun went down and did it seven days a week and cattle need feeding and they get sick they need you know I mean it's they need care yeah right and for very little money I mean I remember at one point I forget if it was three or four years in a row my dad worked long long hours seven days a week and lost money and was going further in debt what why would I why in the world would I want to do that right and did you understand that even as a kid that he was going to death yeah I I watched mean I was always observant I watched I saw I I remember a conversation I and I remember my dad was considering buying these cattle and one of the things I took from him that has been useful from business he sat down with a pencil and a piece of paper and he wrote out this is what the cattle are going to cost this is what shipping's going to be this is what's going to cost to to feed them to to for medicine death is going to be this much insurance is going to be this much blah blah blah blah then he made the assumptions that at the end he was going to sell these whether it was six months or a year later that he was going to sell these and that they would be at a certain weight yep and they price would be at a certain level yep so a lot of variables here right yeah yeah death price weight etc etc etc and a lot of them that even then I realized he control and I remember standing over his shoulder watching him do this and I don't remember what the number was at the bottom but I was always really good at math and I looked at it and the return on investment it was freaking school right like it was I swear you could put money in bonds and do better well definitely back then with what interest rates were right yeah and I just told him I said I think you're in the wrong business I think you should find something else to do and I remember him looking at me and going kind of you know smiling and uh and going well you're right but he like I'm too dumb to do anything else right and he was not dumb but that was his he's like I just this is all I know how to do and he liked being his own boss and being free and nobody telling him what to do but so it was that but it was more just the lifestyle and the work right and there's great parts of the lifestyle but the daytoday monotonous work is especially you know haying and crops and just sitting on a tractor going around in a circle or back and is that's I am not built for that yeah so for all our list who are out there farming right now Randy is not saying it's not good to be a farmer just saying it's not for him no I think it's amazing right I I I really do I mean these are people that that have fed this country and fed the world right and they've worked they've worked their asses off but it just wasn't it wasn't the path for me I think it's important too is like you know I we we've talked a lot over the years about people are built for something and we have exercises we've gone through many times where we talk about you know how you find your calling and and you know then that that purpose right that purpose that there's lots of you know philosophy about this and you know Greek philosophy and Japanese you know philosophy about this and we've done that work but you've you've had that experience of like knowing something wasn't for you throughout your life so it wasn't just as a kid yeah I mean even when I got to college right I I didn't know what I wanted to be I picked engineering because that's what my counselor told me I'd be good at and I was a mechanical engineering major I remember she asked me what I liked and I liked computers yeah and she told me there was money in computers yeah smart yeah she didn't know better right she's a high school counselor in a small town in Minnesota and there wasn't any money in computers at that time she wasn't wrong she just couldn't see the future yeah and so I went into engineering well I also pretty quickly realized and to be fair there still is engineering opportunity today yeah right and it back then it paid a lot more money than computers paid right yeah but I remember taking a class and I just went you know I just put my head down and I went through all the math and the chemistry and the you know the physics and everything I liked physics and the uh I had an engineering class where once a week they had an engineer come in and just tell you what they did or specifically mechanical engineering yeah same thing I figured out oh I don't want to do that over 10 weeks 10 people came and talked about it and at the end I thought there isn't any of those people's job that I want to do yep so again it was me saying this is not what I want to do for the rest of my life yeah okay and Vector you know Vector was very exciting when I first started I was young you know I was a manager at 19 looked like I was 12 and I was learning and I was growing and that part of it was exciting uh I was making real money more money than I was going to make as an engineer and I I wore fancy suits and this and that and I bought a S Series BMW when I was 22 three years old uh you know was slightly used but you know that was a fancy car especially I was in Cedar Rapids Iowa at at the time yeah so while I was growing there was and and I was getting better and new challenges that was exciting and then once it just became real monotonous and that was just doing over and over and over again I realized it wasn't where I wanted to be long term it was just not the same conversations and the same it wasn't challenging enough yeah you know I we've talked it before about like some people are great at building the train tracks and some people are great at conducting the trains and I think one of the things you and I share is we're both um railroad Builders not conductors and it's taking nothing away one from the other there's just some people are wired for different types of work and so again that's no judgment around that right just I think know thyself and put yourself in a situ and by the way in my career at least I haven't always been able to put myself in the situation where was a perfect fit for me I think early career a lot of people have to find themselves and kind of work through different things not unusual but again Vector wasn't the last time that was the big one I mean Poker it happened poker was more about having an impact right or just being able to and a lot of ways that was pretty great right I mean I was at the beginning I was spending all my time in Vegas and la and Atlantic City and I was traveling and coming back and forth to Austin I could play online if I wanted there was a lot of freedom but at the end I figured out oh I can go to Colombia and do this and I can go to Costa Rica and I can go to the Dominican Republic and I you know and I I started traveling the world and so and I had ultimate freedom and you know I I kind of joke it was my backpacking Europe phase except I made good money doing it right so that was but there it was it was the lifestyle and while I met a lot of really nice great people some of which are friends to this day I was also Al surrounded by more people that I maybe didn't want to be in my five or the people I spent the most time with and and you and I know what that mean but maybe for listeners that haven't heard my five tell tell us more about that well I don't know who made this famous but you know you are the five people you spend the most time with right and whether if you want to be healthy if you spend time with five people that are super healthy and eat clean and exercise there's a good chance you're going to become them if you want to be successful if you hang around five successful people you are going to become that if you hang around five people that are criminals you are going to become that and you know the sad fact of Poker while there's all these great people and you meet you know CEOs and doctors and business people and just Professionals of all different types you also meet drug dealers pimps Etc I mean you just I didn't really know people that were on probation and or people that had get locked up and it it was just one for people that don't know you and it's worth mentioning like you're one of the least judgmental people I've ever met like I think your your group of friends is diverse a group of friends across you know backgrounds and uh races and job descriptions and like every variable I can think of about that describes a human being you have some of the most diverse relationships of of anybody that I know yeah and and by the way the people that I wanted to get away from to some extent I liked a lot of them like some of those people were funny and fun and like they weren't you know you know you don't what I'm hearing you say you don't mean get away from like I don't ever want to talk to you just just I want to be I want to understand who my closest Inner Circle is and make sure that that really aligns with who I want to become and the other people I'm happy to be friends with but I I want to make sure that I'm not um becoming someone in a reactive way I want to be thoughtful about who I'm becoming yeah and that was so it can sound I think it can sound bad right that that might have been one of the times where I was running toward contributing to the world as much as I was running away from falling into that trap right I don't think that I was scared that all of a sudden I was going to start dealing drugs or that was going to become my thing um but you know I mean the truth is because of that experience me and another guy went we put pretty significant time into starting what would have been a it would have been a lowlevel and not like a full-fledged bookie thing but we flew to Costa Rica we met with people that um hell we met with the Italian mom I mean they didn't present themselves as much but you know I knew I did not want to be a part of that right like we went down there looking for partners and ended up at this house in the middle of I mean we jump in a cab get dropped off at this house in this nice neighborhood in San Jose Costa Rica the the fence around the outside with the barb wire which is not that uncommon there walk into this great big house that they're running a you know off offshore bookmaking business and we're upstairs is sitting and at some point through the conversation with this young kid I'm like oh he's been kicked out of La he can't go back to the US he's here fleeing and we would be partners with the Italian with with the with the mafia in a country where for $20 the police will probably help you hide the body I'm thinking yeah this is not what we want to do right like that that's just I don't think that was running away from something as well as not put ban experiences I've never had yeah so yeah but that would not have you know I don't think I would have found myself in that position if it wasn't for poker and that community and and just you know that it's it's just a different attitude and a different a different life okay and so what so take me through so we again I don't want to rehash the episode we've already done about Randy Lorensen and and I do want to get into poker in a different episode I think that's just a fascinating topic around um well I I just I think it's sounds like so much fun in so many ways and so many life lessons that can come from that about risk and reward so we can get into that in a different episode but so tell me more when you kind of reflected on that conversation and came back and said this is something I want to dive into take me through your thinking like what what was it that triggered you to think about it after I don't mean emotionally triggered I just mean what what prompted you to think about it after the episode what was the thought process you took through it what made you want to call and say hey John there's something here like take take you just take me through that for a minute I guess part of it is my belief thoughts I think it's better to run toward what you want right and embrace what you want and create the future that you want and I don't believe that you probably do that best by moving away I mean by process of elimination if you move away from everything you don't like or the or places you don't want to be lifestyle you don't want to have that works right and a lot of people a lot of people deal with pain you know by moving away from Pain better than they do moving toward what they want I'm not really that way as much I'm I'm I do much better moving toward what I want than moving away from pain is not as motivating to me it's okay for me to share some of our other conversations as we come forward here because I think there's some things I know about you that maybe you you haven't but I think um the one of the things we've talked about is like when we talk about business planning or thinking about new ideas in the professional space you really like certainty and you like certainty from a high level and you want to break it all the way down to the Gran and so you like to have that view of things right which is I don't know if it's certainty because I don't know certainty is a bad word yeah but you want you want to build it up from from 100,000 feet down to the bottom to understand how it works yes I start I inevitably start from the 30,000 foot view or the 100 ,000 foot View and then work backwards most people most people I've learned don't and can't do that I start with the end in mind and where I want to be in 10 years or 30 years yeah and then I figure out how to get there yeah so I wouldn't call it certainty though because I also part of this is the poker player in me I think in percentages a lot yeah it's fair right but you want sometimes you want to understand like all the different paths to get somewhere and you know I've given you guidance and counsel at times like hey some some of that work may be wasted some of that work may be healthy but as long as you recognize what work is helpful to you and what work is not helpful to you so that you don't you know you don't uh you know toss good time after bad good money after bad but if I have a if I have a plan that's 10 years and in the 30,000 foot view I go back to my dad sitting at that kitchen table with a paper and a pencil and I'm doing the same thing only I use a spreadsheet sure and it's a far more complex and I make this assumption and that assumption I have done that same exercise for almost anything I've ever done I've modeled it out yeah and made assumptions and I go through and I usually do I usually do the one that I you know there's like best case scenario what I think will happen and then worst case scenario right like three different assumptions but yeah that is my thought process I I start at the end and then figure out how to get there and I think most people start with at the beginning what step one well for the listener I would say that you know that's not um that's not like a a a prescription for business planning that's a Randy knows his brain really really well right and you just know the way that you process information so that you can think through it and that's the way that you see it as being help and it's really effective for you too right it really helps you to understand what questions you want to ask and and where you want to head and there's been some times it's helped you understand what path you do or don't want to be on yeah there's also been some times you've made some plans around that where it just hasn't gone at all all like expected and had to like toss the plan out yeah I mean I I on one hand I definitely have an ability to connect dots that I just I don't know I just assume you know a lot of us we assume everybody thinks the way we do and I found out through time I'm connecting dots that I just assumed everybody else could connect and you've been instrumental in helping me realize that you're like you know they don't see that other people and I found out it's almost nobody now that I'm aware of it the downside to that one is sometimes communication I'm having a conversation where they're not on the same page but on the other hand sometimes I don't get granular enough with some of the steps and some of the things along the way I will make assumptions that you know we're going to do boom boom boom to get to this level yeah right well because you've had success in a place in the past you might assume you're going have success in the future whatever the case may be but I think and here's where I would push a little bit I'd say you know sometimes moving away from or knowing what you don't want can be as helpful as knowing what you do want like I you know I was talking to someone earlier in the week and they were getting stuck about what they wanted and I said well just you know tell me on this list of things what don't you want let's just start there because if you can eliminate some of the choices and just you narrow down some of the choices that can make decision- making easier you know there was a study done years ago it was heuristic it was a marketing study not a scientific study but they um went out and offered a $5 gift card or a $5 bill to people this is back when $5 was worth a lot tell how old this was and uh people liked the $5 gift card more than the $5 bill because they didn't have to make as many decisions about how to spend it which was totally counterintuitive to me because a $5 bill by definition has more utility than a $5 gift card right um but but it just it made the cognitive overhead so much lower for people is my assumption I don't I don't know if that's the case factually but my what I took away from that was that sometimes reducing cognitive overhead can be really helpful and so moving away from choices and saying hey I'm not going to choose between 100 things I I know those $50 matter you know just continuing to wipe off as many and that that's one of the ways that we help people find core values which we'll talk about in a different episode but it's it's one way to do things yeah and look everything I've done has gotten me to where I am right and it's and so if I could go back and change it would I I don't know probably not right I mean because it has gotten me where I am and I have a good life and I enjoy it and but so maybe it's okay to move away from some things and move towards some things as long as as as long as there's some maybe deliberate moving toward along the way yeah and you know I I've definitely moved toward things in a way but it it does make me wonder for example when I left Vector I could have went you know probably Phoenix is where I would have ended up like I could have went to Phoenix made some money for a couple of years and then left right like but somehow in my brain there was something there that was like no let's like I wouldn't have actually been trapped what are you moving toward now I mean maybe the reason this pinged on you is because you're moving away from something now and not toward now and that's not satisfying you in some ways that have you considered that maybe maybe this isn't about then maybe it's about now maybe and I've thought about that so you have we have talked about I have been working on my one sentence right which came from you know the book you and Anthony turned me on to Yuri I I possible I think is the book but he the there's an episode on Tim Ferris where Tim Ferris what's his name Yuri something or another you're talking about uh the guy that was yeah the negotiator that has negotiated everything David Accords he he's really famous I'm I apologize I'm gonna look at his name right now I apologize to Yuri that I can't think of his name I'm literally in the middle of reading his book and I don't know I don't know he wrot getting to yes I think was the also possible is the one that I'm reading right now yeah will it's William Yuri William Yuri there we go all right I apologize to William uh but he talks about in that book and I was it was funny I was already in it's weird how things come into your life at the right time I was already thinking about like my personal mission getting it down and I'd been working and I'd been journaling and it started out fairly and I started reading this book and this book unbeknownst to me somebody gave it to me and I started reading it and the whole thing is about him getting down to his life's work in putting it into one sentence well I started out with a whole paragraph cut it down cut it down and pretty soon I had it to helping bring abundance through the world um you know and that Bitcoin was the best way to do that because it's free it creates freedom and and eventually it will solve all these other problems blah blah blah but I realized it was it was more eloquent than that but but I realized I could simplify it and pretty soon I changed it to getting bureaucracy and roadblocks out of the way and that Bitcoin was no longer in it but Bitcoin I was like kind of a note to myself is currently the best way to do that on a long-term scale right um and at some point I just have been kind of working on this and journaling and writing about it and at some point I got it down to just spread abundance was I love where it's at I've got it i' I've taken that I've put it on the wall next to my vision board um I remind myself just spread abund this this podcast right yeah Tales of abundance is about spreading abundance in the world the book I'm writing is about helping spread and so my company when I can create opportunity for dealers to start their own business and grow that be cabinet dealers just want to make sure we're clear about that based on earlier today so fair enough fair enough so I wasn't sure if we mentioned that or not but Randy runs premium cabinets which is a national uh cabinet company that has dealers in different uh cities and states and they are actually high quality Cabinets not that's not code for something else yes so all of that very well aligns with spreading abundance right and helping people get that in in whatever form right so yeah that I mean there probably is something there but I I never had that if you would have asked me when I was younger it would have been more about freedom and even when I first met you I was thinking more about sovereignty right and I I had you know tweaked freedom to sovereignty and so in a way I've been working on this for 30 years 30 I mean long time that I started working on it and it was helping give freedom and then sovereignty and now it's less about I still think those are really important right I think that bringing freedom and sovereignty to the world is great but that might not be what other people want now I'm I I think I'm much more accepting to just whatever they want is the next thing and if I can somehow assist them in bringing maybe it is freedom and sovereignty to their life or to the world then then that's great I love that right but if it's just starting whatever business or taking care of their family or getting to travel or however it is that they want to bring abundance to the world yeah is a win for everybody and anything I can do to help in that journey is is a win for me is you know potentially a win for the world so me have you tried this one on and you you just tell me if this if the shoe fits right but when when you talk about moving away from something today in your life you can describe that in very concrete terms like something very specific I'm moving away from when you're talking about moving towards something in your life it's a much more amorphous ambiguous and I don't hear the same level of clarity from you about moving toward as I hear when I hear you talk about moving away from well I don't know I mean spreading abundance is really specific it's two words right and it's just now the way by the way the best way to do that I believe right now this is getting into a whole different you know can of worms I believe the biggest thing standing in the way of abundance in the world right now is bureaucracy government people killing jobs people killing op making it hard to start a business making it hard to raise a family just hard to fill out your tax code here's where I want to dive in okay so so I think that that is like I think it's criminal okay so let's I'm I'm going to kind you up for a second because this is where I'm going to try and do a little coaching and see if I can help help you move this forward for for you because and this is I think why we're here on this episode today right when you've talked about moving away from past tense and current tense you talk about things that are squarely inside your area of control and this is what I want you to consider and then maybe reflect on when you talk about abundance and the problems that are impacting abundance you generally talk about things that are far outside of your control where you could influence but you can't directly control and that and that that causes great frustration with you and has for years like this is a conversation that's been ongoing for a long time what would it be like if the moving toward abundance conversation was balanced with the moving away from conversation and all the other things are true like none of that's untrue but what if you brought it back to what are you moving toward for you for your five for the group of people outside the five and then instead of from the outside in looked at it from the inside out in the same way you look at the inside side out moving away from what what if you forced yourself to the same lens what would what would become new information to you and thinking about it that way like what would that perspective offer to you as a as a reflect on this because I don't want to just I think I've done that and I think that's where I was building to we've never had that part of the conversation before you have I believe strongly that Bitcoin is that solution okay I don't think we're going to vote our way out of bad government bad bureaucracy we've definitely talked about Bitcoin as a part of this yeah and this is a long slow I don't know a better solution right now so for me whether it's building a cabinet company and and finding new dealers who want to create a better opportunity for them and their family again that's abundance right that's something I can do I can find new dealers I can train I can develop I can support those people and we're saying for The Listener like I I look at a lot of business models every day all day and what what you've got is a very it's a different it's a different opportunity it really is something unique and different and I don't want to like this isn't a sales pitch for that but but it is a definitely a different different thing so which is cool so specifically and by the way working on my one sentence or what turned out to be two words spread abundance aligns very well with that right like it it helps me to to remember why I'm doing it and I always had that it was there but I just have more clarity with it right I don't know that in 10 years Bitcoin will be the answer because with technology things could change right now I don't believe that you know we want to keep these Evergreen because we don't know when people are going to listen but we're pretty close to election day I don't know that I believe whoever we vote for is going to change it just seems to me we're the same way can can I press here though for a minute yeah and I want I want to press into this a little I I've heard you talk about Bitcoin as the answer and I believe you believe that and you've educated me a lot on how some of this stuff works and I and with and so I I've you you know you've I'd say I'm a Believer not in the way that you are but certainly I I've I've watched how you've been right about a lot of these things but I think that maybe misses part of what I'm trying to ask you to look into and that is that when if you say I want to move away from a job or I want to move away from a life St that's something very very specific I want to move toward Bitcoin that's not no well look I host a Meetup every Tuesday Morning yep I am not really a morning person it forces me to get up early yeah I drive an hour spend my time that I really for for personal gain is not a good use of my time in any way shape or form okay like I I would be much better working and I have decided that this is a really important part of my week yeah and and almost every week somebody comes in that's new and it just helped I helped them on their journey and sometimes I help them on their journey by just saying oh you should talk to Mike or you should talk to this person because of I ask them questions find out why they're there yeah sometimes it's me helping them sometimes a lot of times it's hey go read the Bitcoin standard or go listen to the first Nine episodes of Michael sailor on the what is money show right and whatever that is for that but that is me working on helping that person get what they need so by the way that's a really important part of community too I think that's a really important part of how we I just think that's if everyone had a way to give back without what they're getting from it I think we'd have a better world so I just want to offer that as a thank you it is it's a you know and I do I wonder I think God I got to get up I got to fight traffic I got to you know I drive an hour both way you know it's 30 minutes home an hour there but you know it does it takes a chunk of time every Tuesday morning and but I also enjoy the community I like the people we go in there we drink coffee we talk we laugh we you know whatever um you know we try and solve The World's problems and whatever else uh but it is it is it's it's a way of giving back and I can control that right like that is I think I've gotten better at this in the last few years I can control what happens to some extent within my company I can happen I can control what happens in my family and I can control what what happens there one by one with people this podcast is a version of running towards something yeah the book I wrote the next book you know I you know I'll probably lose enough money on the first book that it's making me want to write in second book right um you know it's like golf but I already know what that is I actually I don't know I it's funny two years ago I had zero desire to be a writer and now I realize there's something there I've got two other books planned they're going to be much shorter in some book is like 900 Pages worth worth the read uh we're trying I'm trying to cut it down yeah trying to make it shorter so um the next two are actually I think going to be like 100 Pages or less they're going to be simple uh so I think I'm there but I don't know I mean I'm I'm I still need I still need work on it like I still realize sometimes I get drugged down into you're not wrong that I when you said I am really frustrated by some of the things I can't control you're right and sometimes I get drugged down into that but don't don't we all I mean isn't that that's a thing yeah but I also think it's one of those things that I've decided I'm have to allow myself to do that because I have to understand it well enough to solve it like I have to I I sort of have to go dance with the problem in order to to otherwise you can't really offer a solution and I can't really take personal action right so as we talk about this I think maybe more than I realized I've somewhat solved this problem not completely I'm still working on it let's go back let's go back yeah I don't disagree with that by the way I think that might be where we land at the end of the conversation too but let's talk about the commitment issues you brought up earlier like walk me through the how that whole thing played out I know the story but I think it'd be fun for the listeners to hear and I think it might be a good analog for uh growth and getting from here to there so this is it's before I moved to Austin I moved Austin 25 years ago so wouldn't be before that I was dating and I was in a phase where I was dating a lot and I'm at dinner with a girl and she asks me a question nobody had ever asked me what's the longest relationship you've ever and I thought oh I just looked at it I said never thought about it thought for a second I thought about one girl I thought that was 3 months and I thought about the next girl I'm like that was 3 months that was 3 months that was three months and I went through eight different relationships that were all three months and I thought to myself oh wait one of them had to go four and I'm like nope three and a half I don't think so like I mean it was right at three months and I was thinking God they weren't two they weren't two and a half like like I didn't have a calendar out but in my mind they were all like almost exactly 3 months I wish I could know how close it was there's no way of really knowing that right and I just sat back and I looked at her and I said well 2160 hours you are not sorry sorry just I I looked at her across the table and I said in my mind I know this relationship's dead this a this this will be a one date deal right and I I just looked at and I said you're not going to like this answer and she's like why and I go three months eight different times not four months not two months and I just I looked at her and I said I might have commitment issues and thanks to you I just figured that out I literally had no idea to that did you say that to her yeah what' she say back check please I don't I don't remember her response it was more of a self-realization and yeah that was the only date um I don't know that that was going anywhere anyway but it was a uh but it was it was a big realization right and I had to do some soul searching yeah and uh that was the beginning of figuring out how to fix that and and I mean to say you fixed it you've got a wonderful wife Julie now who you guys have been together 11 years tomorrow 12 wait 12 years tomorrow okay yeah significantly more than 2100 hours yes no that's great um God now I'm not sure if it's 11 or 12 but I think it's 12 years tomorrow she forgets more than I do so I'm how about can we commit to doing the math before this episode comes out so you can actually clarify that before it comes out not on not on air more for her we'll we we'll leave it where it is I'll ask her she won't know either she she screws it up more than I do oh that's funny well now it's so long you can't remember which is much longer than three months so and so how did how so I mean obviously you went from commitment issues to a great relationship now I mean is it possible that running away from because running away from things can serve you too right like you know if you find a dragon probably not the best thing to do to run toward it always you know and think there are people that have to do that for their job sometimes we got a lot of respect for people that run into the fire you know and they do that for the benefit of others serving others I can think First Responders and Military in particular that that do a lot of that but I I think that you know fear and moving away from can serve us well also like I had a CEO I think I've mentioned this maybe even on the show before that I had a CEO that said hey can you train my team how to be fearless and my answer is I I have no interest in doing that I'll teach them how to be courageous in the face of fear but getting rid of fear is how you run off a cliff right right and so so is it possible that maybe that wasn't serving you well before but it is serving you well now maybe you know another thought I just had while you're saying is I am I think one of my strengths is I do run into doing hard things whether you know some at the gym when other people don't want to quit I want to do more and I just want to keep going um you know if I go sit in the sauna like I don't want to sit I I want the on at least 180 or 190 degrees 220 would be better and I'm going to sit in there if I'm sick and dying I'm just not getting out in less than 20 minutes right and sometimes I'll sit in there for 50 minutes or an hour this is not a prescription for what you should do at home by the way this is Randy describing himself but but I but you know as you know I did cryo almost every day for for a long time you know ice bows things that like ice basss are miserable cryos where you go into like a like a little area like a machine almost and you stand in it it's like negative I don't know I'd have the iy turn it up as high as he could I think it was like negative 280 or 286 or something you stay like a minute or two three minutes three minutes with gloves and socks on yeah I stopped wearing some of that stuff but yeah um probably not recommended either um but this is not do not try this at home kids this episode is about how Randy does things not about how you should yeah so I like you know I've done fasts you know I I started with a 24-hour fast and then did several three-day fasts and I did a five-day fast and I did a 7-Day like there's a part of me that very much enjoys doing hard things right so I'm wondering has that helped build that muscle has that made me better equipped I don't know maybe that what do you think is that a conturing factor ises that help I don't know I think the thing I was trying to get to is just understand like the whole this whole episode started with moving away from yeah and then moving toward and and the way that was framed in our first conversation off the air was like I want to dig into that and and the insinuation was it's a problem and so I think that like many tools you know there are tools can be used and create a problem when they're used inappropriately but then there are tools that used well are really good tools to have and I think moving away from things like moving away from the side of a cliff is something I still do and I'm I'm cool with that you know um but I I live in a I live in a a condo in in a tower and um I'm scared of heights and so for the first six months like getting closer than six inches to the window was like freaky for me I did not know you so you're on the 35th floor yeah and you chose the 35th floor and you're scared heights yeah that's I didn't know that till just now yeah yeah but again you're really scared of falling to be clear um that probably true yeah and that's one of the two fears we're born with right so like there's a there's a real biological reason we have that fear and I think it's smart to be afraid of that you know I I was just in the in the um news recently there's been several people that have kind of gotten too close to the edge and fallen over and happens pretty regularly and it's you know I think um got gotten too close to the edge of what like Cliffs like you see hikers go over cliff and die and you know um you know unintentionally right um and so I think having a healthy fear of heights is reasonable you know um but I think there's also you know so so moving away from the edge is okay and then I think there's also fear that's you know some some fear is not healthy and so I think having an awareness about where where it serves you or it doesn't serve you the way that I talk about it with people is like it's okay to um be afraid of things but I don't want fear driving the car I want fear being an informant buckled into the back seat and giving me information and then I can choose how I use that information you know there are times that I react a fear to I don't want to make it seem like I'm like this you know perfect but but I think that when fear is an informant versus a driver I find that to be more helpful in my life and so the question I was trying to get us to was you know is this running away from thing gone from an unhealthy running away to a healthy informant maybe it's always been healthy for you I I don't know the answer only you could answer that but I think you today is the lens like this is a problem or is this lens like hey maybe this is a that I'm using well you know at the beginning of this I really was a little worried I was like what are we going to rip up what bandaid is just going to rip off that what what shit's going to come up that I'm going to have to deal with right and to some extent for the listeners I think I wish that would have been there right but for me it's a little bit I'm no stranger to kind of making you dig in and dive deep and I mean we've had some conversations that have been like oh now I got to deal with this or I got to figure this out right and that's not what this has almost been I think a rare time where I think maybe yeah was a problem I think when I was younger and I think maybe while I haven't fully figured it out well I think it was a problem because I think if I would have run toward what I wanted to do I would have gotten to success happy just I would have got to a better place faster right Fair um and you know me well enough to know that I'm like I'm just not going to keep doing something for money or that like if it's making me miserable or it's not where I want to be so um so running toward something I think would have always been healthier I think I just didn't know how to do that and I do think sometimes it's easier to figure out what you don't want than to figure out what you do want and some and and sometimes people just and this is where mentors can play such a great role is they can help people think through the what to run toward I I've also seen this happen though where sometimes mentors um you know they're a hammer so everything they see is a nail and they only know their way of doing it so I think great mentorship is someone who's had enough experience to recognize like they've done it a way but there are lots of other ways too and that's I think the difference between a good Mentor and a great mentor can be someone who accepts that there's more than one path to get there and and there are certainly times in my life where I thought my path was the only path and um you know somebody called me out on that and they're like that's a pretty arrogant you know way of thinking and I as I reflect on that I was like that's that's Way Beyond arrogant like that's just plain destructive you know um but but I had to have someone kind of shine that mirror at me and recognize like I don't have a monopoly on the right way to do things which which is interesting right because I often offer Frameworks to people and and those Frameworks are really well informed by lots and lots of research about lots of ways of doing things but but the reality is it's a way not the way yeah right and I think also some of the tools you've helped me with right like it's not like I hadn't heard of core values but with you know with your help I really set core values right for my company had made me think about it personally right a vision board um I'd always set goals but having a vision board I mean I think some of those but ironically those are episodes we already have planned in the future so great things for the listeners but I think maybe maybe I didn't know how to run toward things in a weird way I think that's a lot of it right I think I think that's you know we're we're a product of our environment and um you you know we don't always have all the tools that we wish we'd had and so I think that yeah I mean I don't know for me I I was lucky to have a mentor early on in my career who um introduced me to the concept of Life planning and the first I the first time I was introduced to the concept of Life planning I was 19 years old um and uh and now with my kids I you know I write my kids a letter on their 18th birthday and talk about the most important decisions I'll make in their life there's three of them and then I talk about decision- making as a concept and how to think about decision- making but I really want them to learn how to make make a decision more than I want them to learn to make the decisions that I've made I think that's really decisions is one of those things and I I just don't think that moving away from in and of itself is unhealthy yeah I just I guess my thought is if I was younger and I would have been running toward like if I would have just real and again hindsight 2020 right I'm not sure like I said I don't know that I'd change anything but if I would have went back to I was 20 years old if I could go back to tell my 20-year-old self you know you always hear if you could go back and tell yourself at 18 what would you tell yourself right and most people are like you know buy apple or buy Amazon or or something yeah something like this right if I could go back and tell myself maybe the answer is spread abundance and if I was on that path from that point forward yeah I I don't know I think you're being tough on yourself we talk about those Four Seasons but the four seasons of your career Arc I think that people have to go through that Arc and sometimes I think we romanticize the idea of helping people on a shortcut because we wish it hadn't been so hard but you know the real I was thinking this in the way in today like I have always not enjoyed going to the gym and working out I've enjoyed the sport of it like I've I've enjoyed the competitive nature so it was if it was running versus soccer I wanted to play soccer if it was swimming versus water polo I wanted to play water polo if it was you know um Kata versus sparring in karate I wanted to spar like that like like because I enjoy that interactive nature and so much the better if it was a team right right but for the first time in my life I enjoy going to the gym um right now and the reason I enjoy going to the gym is uh a number of new things for me there was some camaraderie with the the trainer that I have I'm getting to see some results that I really want to see but it's it's a new way of looking at something and so I guess you know so today I would say you know forget what you would go tell your 20-year-old self what would you tell yourself today like if if you were really being thoughtful about what we've talked about today and running away versus running toward like most of us don't take a minute and see like and you do a good job of this like what's the lesson right here right now so maybe why we're in the listeners listening in you just pull the curtain back on that for a minute and say okay Randy let's take a minute like let's even if it's just quiet aboute like what's the lesson what's the lesson around running toward versus running away and are you know with those tools side by side in your kit and if you could you know step into the future for 10 years Look Backwards and tell yourself today something what would that to like what would you know about running toward and running away 10 years from now you could look back today and say okay what do you want Randy to know about how to use those two tools together in a way that's healthy productive and in a way that you're getting what you want from them well I think by the way I think this is different for different people I think a lot of people are more motivated by running away or or moving away from pain right I think that's a fact so some people it might be really the way to go I'm just personally more motivated by running toward so if we're coming back to spreading abundance in the world and I'm looking back I mean I think it's I think it's that I think I'm myself just make sure everything aligns with that and make sure you ask ask God and ask the world and how do you do this and how do you best do that in every situation every interaction not that that's possible to to be that perfect but are you doing that today better and better and so what have you done because we actually have worked on this in the last week unnown to you but what have we done in the last week to make that more real for you well I mean we're accountability which I've just you know on my company I had a I had a bad quarter last month hitting rocks and some of there's a lot of stuff going on that we don't have to dig into here that outside of myself not has very little to do with me personally but so Ro just for the listener Rock like goals right and so we set goals every 90 days and Randy had some goals he didn't accomplish and one of the things we came to was that ry's personal accountability wasn't what he wanted it to be yeah and so I have been stepping back this is something I did in the past where I Randy you're one of the most accountable people I know by the way so that's like I just want to make sure we level we really dro the ball me personally which my so it's me we really dropped the ball for the last for the 90 days of the last quarter and that can never happen again right so it's breaking it down into daily tasks and really getting granular I'm not probably not what I need to do for 5 years but for the next 90 days or maybe it's the next six months a year whatever I think this will serve me well right as as getting into those tasks it's an important part of behavior change by the way it takes anywhere from 90 days to a year to kind of reestablish or to establish a new Behavior set and you just some habits you let get off track a little bit and that's look that's okay it happens to all of us everyone on the planet has this happened to them um if they're aware that they're yeah of their habits and so do you want to be more specific even because I mean we're doing some really specific things just every day I text you and my business partner or and the these are the three things I'm going to accomplish today and then at the end of the day it you know I text that they're done or not done or whatever right um I don't think you've missed a day yet you certainly have missed a day of texting and I don't think you've missed a day of doing things today's going to be challenging cuz recording but um so today might be a late night but the no that's good and I generally have not needed that for the last several years that is not something that I would have found beneficial but somehow I just got off the path a little bit got distracted or whatever else so that's good and some of this is you know I have been really trying to focus on prayer meditation this is this is a whole another can of worms but on a on a iasa journey my big takeaway was that just ask God ask the universe what should I do today and then do it right and even I've been I'm not very good in fact I met with a mutual friend of ours a couple days ago to pick his brain on prayer and some of the other things um to get better at this and another friend of ours you know has I don't know got months now of 20 to 30 minutes in the morning of doing this which I think is outstanding because I have a hard time getting my brain to slow down for 30 seconds to do it yeah what I have been better at though is just stopping even in the middle of the day and saying what should I be doing right now right what what should I be doing to spread abundance and the more frequently I ask myself that it's the answers tend to just you know I kind of know if I ask right um which is a a big jump for me cuz historically I'm somebody that I'm like I can figure it out and it's not me asking it's me powering through and figuring it out and you know one of the things I've learned from you like you are very good at when you take something you're like okay what's Best Practices what's the model let's start there where historically what I would do is I would start something and I would just start from scratch and figured out from first principles and I've learned that oh if I just start with best practices and do that probably that will be better than what I come up with or even if it's 90% there it saves me a ton of time right um learning from others is a skill all by itself yeah yeah okay so let's put a bow on it then so so what what are your big takeaways from our conversation today I will tell you they did not it was not what I expected coming in no me either this is completely different than what I expected this episode to be um I don't know I feel good I I really thought we'd rip the a Band-Aid off some I thought something would come out but we did Rip the Band-Aid off we found that the scar healed and you've been using vitamin E for years so yeah I think that's I think it's I think it's keep focusing on my two words right spread abundance keep doing it keep working on it and stay diligent right I think it's that yeah maybe it served me well for a time but I don't even I actually don't I let me rephrase that I don't think it did serve me that well but it was the best that I knew how to do because I probably didn't know what to run toward so running a so figuring out what I didn't want to do better it it was the best option that I had available to me at the time yeah got you moving in a direction yeah and you can use both those things in the future right like they're both effective they're both effective tools when employed at the right times right like there are times it's good to run away from things there was a fire in a building next door uh where I Liv last night big big Flames out the ceiling fire you know okay like fire engines all that like you know so and and uh that's a good thing to run away from unless you're a firefighter right and you're equipped to deal with it and and then and then it's a good thing to run toward if you're a firefighter on duty because that's what you're equipped for and so I think that's there's a lot in that metaphor that uh can be good for us is you know you can run into really tough situations if you're well equipped well protected well prepared but the people if you're not if you can recognize and move away from that that serves someone well too so it's been good all right listeners we're going to leave a couple links to the uh the podcast where Randy talked about this the first time and then as we get a podcasts put up on some of the topics we have today core values and and things like that life planning and you know the four questions for figuring out what's you know what what you're designed for if you believe in you know being designed by a greater being or or if you just want to learn about like you know the Japanese iagi that we talked about today which was the finding purpose and meeting in your life or some of the Greek you know philosophy around that we'll put all that stuff into the show notes for you so you have some reading materials there and then as always uh you know if you like what you like you're hearing Please Subscribe like listen uh refer tell people to subscribe as well and we'll look forward to having you back next time thanks Randy for opening up this is like I said unexpected and fun yeah thanks John talk

Running Towards vs Running Away