#145: Storytelling: Connecting The Right Message To The Right People With Geoffrey Klein

Adam, thank you so much. I appreciate it. And it's always— I find value in communicating with you, whether it's on a personal or professional level.

Thank you, brother. Hey, I've said a few things about you in that bio, but sort of what's not written in that bio that you would love for people to know about you?

Well, you know, the intention of connecting that message, you know, my company is called Nine Dots. We try and connect the dots. For me, everything kind of starts and ends with story. You know, so my TEDx was about the power of story. And both, I think, in the way that I live my life personally, but also professionally, my job is to help others tell their story in a more impactful way. I really believe that it's about connecting with people and that the best way to connect with people is through effective communication. And the best way to do that is by telling a story. And there's science behind it. And there's our own experiences that we find. We've been telling stories naturally since we were little kids. And I think sometimes as we grow up, particularly in business, we become the fact people and We have all the bullet points and things that matter and sometimes lose the ability to connect with people and to have them understand what we're talking about because we're so focused on proving something rather than communicating.

Yeah, the narrative is so powerful. It's funny when you talk about the name of your company, Nine Dots, and this concept of connecting with people, it brings me back to when I was about 23 years old and I was a middle school English teacher, which I did for a couple of years. Which is most— 2 very exhausting years to be exact. And I remember saying to these kids, mostly 7th and 8th graders at the time, I'd say, you know, life is complicated. I didn't have a clue how complicated life really was at that time at 23. But I said, life is complicated. And one of the best things that you can ever do, and the faster you could learn this, the better. And looking back, this was really pretty sage advice to give to these kids. I said to them, it's really just about connecting the dots. If you could just figure out how to connect the dots in life, you will be doing pretty well. And the reason that I was saying that to them was just trying to motivate them to see the relevance of Robert Frost poetry or any of the other things that we were reading and checking out and talking about. I wanted them to see that even if they couldn't necessarily understand exactly what it was or why we were diving into some particular story, their goal was simply to see how they could connect it to some aspect of their life. Where could they connect the dots for themselves? And find the relevance in something. And I think that's in many ways what a story does for people, right, Geoffrey? It helps you. As you said, you did a TEDx all about storytelling. So is that the primary function of a story, to help people to see something in a new or different way and make it relevant for them? Resilience. It's the unsung hero in every success story that you will ever hear about. And in times of massive change and disruption, the kind of rapid change that we're all experiencing as leaders, as business owners, as entrepreneurs, we have to learn how to not only increase our own resilience, but that of our teams. So right now we have a powerful opportunity for you to find out just how resilient you are. Some years ago, my team and I created the resilience assessment that more than 5,000 business leaders across the globe have taken. And all you have to do to get your own free resilience leader assessment is go to resiliencerank.com. It takes less than 3 minutes, and it's our gift to you for being the leader that you already are. Other free resources and tools will accompany your score instantly. So go to resiliencerank.com and find out just how resilient you are.

Yeah, I mean, I think there's a couple things that really allow stories to do with people. And, you know, it's a shame in some ways that the phrase connecting the dots has been overused and become somewhat of a cliché. 9 Dots is based on a puzzle where the concept started. So I feel okay using it because I've gone to the source. But I think with a lot of things that I talk about that are kind of simplistic in their way is to uncover the truth of them for that individual person. And for me, the power of story— I grew up listening to stories, mostly my father and my grandfather sitting across a table. They're both judges and they would regale stories of different cases to each other. And I would just watch them communicate and seeing that point of connection. And I think the thing is that You want to communicate effectively, and I believe that story is the way to tell it, but there's still better stories and not as effective in the way you tell the story or what the story is that you tell. And I think one of the things in businesses, we often are telling stories about ourselves and forgetting about the audience. I think one thing is that you need to try and connect with that audience, be relatable to that audience. And so in terms of the power of what a story can do, it can take personal experience and touch someone out in the audience. And I think that from a personal level is why stories are so wonderful because you can meet someone that you don't know well and you find a story that has some shared threads. I think it's those shared threads that bind people in their experience. And I think we're all looking in life for some sort of sense of belonging. And the way that we do that is through the touchpoints of our experience. And then the way we connect to others is by having those stories where we've had— it might not be the exact same situation. But we can relate to something that someone else has done and we can feel those emotions. We can feel those sensory experiences that we've had because we're all human at the end of the day.

Your ability to tell a story or when you find yourself in someone else's story, there's a sense of belonging. There's a sense of I'm not alone. Is that what you're in essence saying?

Yeah, I think that's, you know, in terms of trying to connect people to feel like, oh, I'm not alone and not only that, but in that interaction, I'm with you. So it's not even that I'm not alone, but in the moment, in that presence, we have an ability to relate to one another. I remember your story about the baseball card as an example. That experience— for those listening, Adam had an incident where he lost a valuable baseball card when he was a kid. And so we've all lost things that we've cherished, whether they were of value financially or otherwise. And so when someone tells you a story about an experience you've had, there's often a corollary in my own life or in someone else's life. And it's that ability that I think really helps people understand and connect what your message is about.

So if I was going to find the through line in what you're saying right now, I would say this is one of the ways, meaning through a story, you can find yourself present with someone else, not just physically present.

Yeah. And again, you look at some of the science in terms of how our brain works. And when this research that was done by this neuroscience in Princeton, They have a concept called neural coupling, so that if you're telling someone a story about when you kicked a ball and the part of your brain, the listener, mirrors that of the teller, where you're both experiencing from a brain perspective the experience of kicking a ball. And so that, in terms of throughline being, it's a way to both be present because you're having the same biological chemical reactions at the same time. And so yeah, you are present and your activity in your brain is heightened when someone tells you a story. They're paying attention, which sadly is something that we keep losing more and more of. And so the ability— I think presence is a great through line in terms of the power that story can have. And again, we're talking about this personally, but in business, I do this for business all the time. We're trying to get at the heart of what matters to people as whatever their product they may be selling, it's the person that they're trying to help. That's the important part.

Yeah.

Trying to understand the audience, making the audience the center of your story.

Right. You mentioned that story of my having lost this valuable 1973 Willie Mays baseball card when I was about 8 years old. And it's funny because you and I met at an event. I don't remember if I told that story there, but it was definitely a story I tell in the book Pivot. And then ultimately you came to one of our speaker trainings because you were in a sort of a pivot stage yourself. Part of your pivot, I think, was in— not in changing your business because you're still in the same business space, but I think you You yourself wanted to be more skilled, I suppose, at not just public speaking but at public storytelling. And that became the topic that you took on when you stood on a TED stage. Why don't you tell us about that? What was it like for you to first go from, let's say, the level of speaker training that you and I were doing together and then ultimately for you to decide, hey, I'm going to do a TEDx? And just what was that journey like?

Well, I should start the journey— we'll start from our experience because it was a pivotal moment in that evolution. During the Heart of Enrollment, I'll give a shout out to the amazing program that you guys do because it's amazing, was, you know, understanding that power story is something that meant something to me and I'd had some experience with it. And how do I take that and share it with others and help them share it with others? And that's kind of, you know, my goal is to help people, to have that impact on people by them not only understanding the value of the power story, but then going and doing it for others. For having that connection and continually growing the kind of network and connecting those dots. And so it's interesting, I had developed a presentation called The Science of Story based a lot on some of the research that had been done in terms of the difference in how our brains react when we're given information only versus when we're given— when someone tells us a story. And basically our brains light up when someone tells us a story. So a TEDx talk was something I was definitely interested in. I thought it would help give me some credibility and it would give me a platform to kind of share my message. And Philadelphia didn't have an active TEDx program at the time, and they're still— so I had been aware of Philadelphia. So I'm like, okay, where else in my area might there be some? And so I found one in Cape May and one in the Lehigh Valley. I reached out to both. The one in Cape May had already gotten their speaker slots. And I applied the one in the Lehigh River and kind of gave, you know, my very kind of simple piece about the science of story and importance of it. And then I had a conversation with Lisa Gensler, who's the license holder for that TEDx. And I can't say enough amazing things about her. She took my small idea and really developed it. And I think that's a critical piece of successful TEDx talks. And I'm sure you've had I mean, you've had a lot of speaking experience, but for me, having the coaching that I had with her, part of it was whether I was open to crafting a talk that would fit in with their program and what they're trying to do and being of value to them. It was curious that their, you know, most of these TEDx have a theme, and the theme of the one I did was called Intention by Design. I liked it because I think what I was— the idea I was trying to share with people was that to be intentional about using story in their lives in ways they may not have been doing to help them communicate better.

Right.

And so I basically had gotten through the first round of candidates and she said, there may be something here. I'm not sure yet. Would you want to, are you willing to go further? Are you willing to, you know, be coachable? And my mother's an executive coach. So That's a term I'm familiar with.

Are you coachable, Jeffrey?

My mother would say yes.

I'm being cheeky with you because I've worked with you, so I know you're coachable. So yeah, so you went in with an open mind, and here she is, she's saying to you, listen, to go deeper with this thing, there's more work required. Yeah,

right. There was work, and I think that was the part that a lot of speakers, including me, sometimes forget. You're like, oh, I've spoken a few times, I'm comfortable on stage, I'll just go up and share my message and it will be easy,

right?

And sometimes what I found that speaking is— can be simple but not never easy. And that even the best speakers have done tons of work in the background that no one sees. And so you see someone on stage and go, oh my God, they're amazing at this. And there's always so much work that goes into it. And that's the part that I kind of hadn't expected as much to do as I thought, because I had my little presentation kind of done.

So what was the most excruciating part? I'm inserting that word, that may not be the case. But having worked with so many people that are preparing to do TEDx Talks or have done them, etc., or keynote speakers, we all know that there's either the element of the construction of the talk can be one area of excruciating pain. Meaning the editing, getting it down to the number of words that would be speakable in 18 minutes or less. That's one excruciation point. And the other is the presentation itself, meaning sort of getting over whatever stage fright you might have or being fully present on stage to deliver in the most impactful and effective way possible. So what was it? Was it one of those, none of those, something else? What was that like?

It was definitely a combination. I like to write, so the writing wasn't hard. But what I realized is the difference between me being a good writer and a much better writer is rewriting. And I'll write something and I'm like, no, no, rather than work on that piece, I'll go start something new. I think a lot of creative writers have that element where they've written and they don't want to spend the time to really make it better. And that was definitely hard. It was hard to hear from the coach, this doesn't work. And for me to have to give something up that I had in there, not only give that up, but then find something else. You take the material very personally.

Yes.

And so it becomes a challenge to give up ownership in that coaching relationship. And then if you like a piece of what you've written, to say, you know what, this doesn't fit, and to have the wherewithal to be like, even though this may be nice and you want to cuddle it, and it's really— to be able to say, you know what, it doesn't go with this talk, I got to get rid of it.

Writing is, on a good day, it's excruciating all just by itself for me. But the good news is we're not alone in this. Even Hemingway said that essence of great writing is to learn how to kill off your darlings. And that's what you're describing, killing off your darlings. I had like 4,000, almost 5,000 words to begin with, which would have been 2 TED Talks, not one, but 2. And you go, well, what do I cut? And what are the things that you're willing to just go, this isn't going to actually serve the through line, main idea? So it is, it's writing is rewriting, and you've got to kill off your darlings and all of that. Over time, like you said, is work. It's just a lot of it is.

It is a lot of work. And again, having someone support you in the way that I had was— made a huge, huge difference, not only in the comfort of giving up my darlings, but in taking what I had and making it better. And I think to have the confidence, like, you've written something you feel good about, and then being able to say to yourself, you know what, this can be better, and to push yourself beyond that comfort zone to get to a place where you feel, wow, this is pretty good. It's better than I thought it could be.

You were incredibly fortunate too because it's very rare that you get a TEDx organizer or organizing team that will put that time in. In fact, when we work with people, often it's because they are either wanting to do a talk or they've even been accepted to do a talk and now they're literally knees are knocking because they're just not prepared or they don't think they can get to where they want to be. And so that coaching, like you said, is so crucial, but when you have somebody who volunteers themselves to help you that way, It's a big deal. And I'm sure— did you buy a nice present? What'd you do?

Yeah, I still thank her now. I gave her one of my children. I figured that was the easiest way. You know, I got 3, I could give up one.

Yeah, except when they go to college and then she'll give them back.

Yeah, I recognize how fortunate I was. And I did consider at different stages getting professional help. And I think one of the other areas where people don't recognize is, oh, If you're a professional speaker, you don't get help. You're just a professional speaker.

Oh my goodness, yeah. We work, actually work with a lot of professional speakers. I worked with a mentor when I was contemplating this whole thing and I'd been speaking professionally for, I don't know, 7 or 8 years at that point. I'm like, I can't see myself. The blind spots are enormous. Yeah, that might be the worst part is the arrogance of thinking somehow that just because I ran a chapter of the BNI or I used to do my local whatever meetings and you go, oh yeah, I could do this. Wow. The pace of change over the last couple of years has been rapid. And if you're a leader, a business owner, an entrepreneur, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Every day it's something different and something new. But the one thing that I've learned in performing at the height of all of those roles has been that we must be resilient. In fact, it's the unsung hero in every success story that you will ever hear about. And it's the reason why my team and I created the resilience assessment that more than 5,000 business leaders across the globe have taken. And all you have to do to get your own free resilient leader assessment is go to resiliencerank.com. It takes less than 3 minutes, and it's our gift to you for being the leader that you already are. Other free resources and tools will accompany your score instantly. So go to resiliencerank.com and find out just how resilient you are.

Yeah, and I think that the humble— having humility in this as a speaker is important because again, as you've taught me and others as well, your role as a speaker is to be a teacher. And really what you're trying to do as a speaker, at least from my experience, the good ones are trying to serve the audience, not serve themselves. And I think if you're gonna serve the audience, the best way you can do that is making sure you're as good as you can be. And that's a process that goes on every day, every year, and forever. And I think I'm lucky that I have that kind of lifelong learner, you know, DNA in me. My father, who was a judge for 35-plus years, still likes to learn, and he just turned 80. And so that is part of the inspiration I have, and I hopefully share with my kids, is like That thirst, that curiosity, and what you can learn about stuff keeps things interesting and keeps, you know, I think you motivated as well.

And humility is, I think, the most— well, at least for me anyway, I'd say that's the word that's been around, knocking around in my head since I was 18 or 19 years old. And I didn't even know why it was that I was so hung up on arguing with my dad at the time about how important humility was versus, I guess, maybe the other side of the coin is arrogance or something. But

confidence,

yeah, I mean, there's an element in which When we're in, in service of something higher than ourselves, that our own ego or whatever you want to call it, our own agenda is backseated to something that's more important. I think your talk, by the way, give the title of the TED Talk because I'd love for people to check that out as well.

It's called Story Matters: Tell One That Matters to Your Audience.

Okay. So Jeffrey Klein, Story Matters. If you just put that into YouTube search, you'll find it. And the talk has done well.

That means a lot coming from you.

No, I— first of all, I loved it. And when it came out, I was like, you know, I thought you really— you nailed it. I would love for you to share what throughline is, if you'd be kind enough to do that. And then, um, at last I checked, maybe it was 50,000, 60,000, 70,000 views and very positive comments. So I mean, regardless of what I thought, the market has spoken loudly.

I just crossed 100,000, so I feel good about that.

Wonderful.

For me, it was trying to communicate that the best way to connect with people is through story. And I tried to share that a story grabs people's attention in a world where that's not a huge commodity. I think that story can help capture a person's attention in a world where there is very little, where we're always fighting and struggling. There's, there's 2 concepts I talk about in the talk. One is the idea of infobesity. You know, there's more information in the world than ever before. And I think the statistic was that in the last 2 years, there's been more information and more content produced than in history before. And so we're constantly bombarded with noise.

Hmm.

And so whether it's in your personal life or in your professional life, you need to try and cut through that noise. And our attention spans are getting smaller and smaller. So how do you do that? And a story has the power to cut through, A, just by its nature. When someone says to you, let me tell you a story, we perk up. You know, we've been conditioned, we're hardwired for thousands of years to want stories. Mm-hmm. And I think that's the thing is it's nothing new in terms of the way humans behave and want to connect with people and want to share in that collective narrative. It just got harder and harder to do it.

Right. And our attention spans are not just shorter, but they're more in demand. So we're being marketed to or provided information at such a lightning pace that this is actually sort of hacking something that is as ancient as we are.

And I think again, the things that matter to me is about the audience. And I talk about that. I teach in my class what I call the 11th commandment. which is know thy audience.

Yeah.

And because we're so egocentric as people, and in general, you know, I talk about businesses and what do they do? They say how great they are and how, you know, look, we've won this top award, we won this, and nobody cares. Nobody cares about what they can do. They only care about what they can do for them. And I think that the what's in it for me factor is Critical to connect with people from a marketing perspective. If you don't understand what they're looking for, then it doesn't matter what story you tell because they're not going to resonate with it, which is why when we help create videos or animations, we start with the problem of the person that you're trying to market to. So, you know, if you're struggling with, you know, coldness and you need heat, but if you're cold and someone tells you a story about being cold, you're going to immediately Go, oh wait, I'm cold. I need to know how to not be cold. And so for me, the TEDx, the kind of through line was use all these resources that story has for you and find a way to connect it to the audience so that they will care.

That's right. Use their attention. Grab their attention, as you said, using something that is— we're hardwired to want to hear a story and then have that story be relevant for them. Meaning that it's about them, not necessarily just something you wanna share, but something that in the marketing sense will solve a problem that they've got or convince them they've got a problem that they don't know they have.

There's a little of that still going on.

Still a little of that going on.

Again, like, you know, there's a paradox because I talk about something that I believe is the story paradox, which is on the one hand, effective stories are usually personal. And then, but at the same time, we need to make them connect to the audience or they're not going to be interested. And that there are elements of how do you do that? And I think part of it is making sure that you're using things that everyone has. So fear, sadness, excitement, emotions that we all have. So if I'm telling a story about a time when I was scared, if I know that's something that's going to resonate with the particular audience I'm speaking to, then I'm in with a chance. I'm trying to get them to get over their fear, or I'm trying to get them, you know, to get over whatever issue they're having. And so by using those emotional components— and stories are perfect for that because we relate to the characters we're listening to when we identify, oh wait, the hero there had, you know, the journey that the hero takes is something people like to follow along and root for. And if they have that same issue, they're gonna— One of the things I found interesting was, so they did some research and Oftentimes someone will tell you a story and it's a really good story. And a few weeks later, you'll see that your friend at a party that you told the story to, and your friend will tell the story back to you, forgetting that you told it to them because they've made it their own. And I'm like, that's the beauty of it all is when someone does that, then you know that you connected because they like the story so much, they've internalized it as their own story. That's great. And it shows the power that you can have with people. Now you

got me totally curious, Jeffrey, that I want you to close the loop on the story about the Willie Mays baseball card with ultimately what you did, because that was so moving to me. But what was it about hearing that story or reading the story that had it be about you?

Part of it was being a kid. You know, I'm a big kid. And so, and I have kids. So I think there was something about, you know, and that's something that immediately related to me. It was like you were telling a story about when you were a kid. Well, guess what? Everyone's been a kid. Any adult has had the experience of being a kid. We've had different experiences, but we've all had the experience of being young and having grown-ups around us— good, bad, ugly— but we've all had some shared experience of what it's like not to be a grown-up. And so I think there was something in your story that immediately was like, I had a very loving, wonderful childhood. Doesn't mean there weren't times where I was not pleased with my parents for one reason or another. And so I think that was the element of like frustration, you know, that emotion that you were sharing of like, Mom, what are you doing? How can you let him take— you know, how can you let this happen? Where they were just shoving cards into the bag without any thought of the importance of them to you. We've all had experiences, I think, where parents and children, because we have different responsibilities, And we have different things that— priorities that as a kid, the things that are your priorities are not often, are not always the priorities of your parents.

Sure.

And when they conflict, it's a frustrating place. I felt that. I was there going, how do they not know not to get rid of your Woolly Maze card? You know, that was the card that I would give them every card, but that one card would have been okay. And just, and whether you're a kid or in general, there are times where People don't get you. And you were sad, you know, you lost something too. And we've all grieved the loss of lots of little things along our life and some big things. Without you knowing, those two emotions of frustration and loss that connected with me.

Yeah, I appreciate you sharing that. Having told that story pretty much all around the world to a lot, a lot of people at certain times in the past, I've heard lots of different things about it. You know, there's an element of trust and the breach of trust that comes up in that story, there's a very strong component of anger at an early age, of just being angry and having a lesson about trust that only sort of extended into later years in life that was a part of the through line of that story. And it's so funny because I remember being at— I was doing an event in New Jersey, several hundred people in the audience. I end up telling that story on one of the mornings and my mom was there. And I had invited her. I knew she was gonna show up at some point, but I didn't know she was in the room at that moment. Not that that would have changed it, I would have told it exactly the same way, but it's so funny that later on she said to me, oh my God, I just, I never ever realized. And she didn't remember it that way either. You know, she was in New York and she had sent these baseball cards to me when I was visiting friends of hers when I was just 8 years old in California. And they all, these kids all had cards and I had to have my cards so we could flip and trade and yada yada. And she sends all the cards and she addresses it to the family and the mom of one of the kids gives the cards to the kids. And there I'm sitting on the floor and see my cards in this other kid's room. And, you know, the one card, my favorite card— Betrayal. Willie Mays. It was, it was this betrayal and I could do nothing about it. I was so powerless at 8 years old to change anything. So even after having a shit fit and crying and everything else that was going on, ultimately being able to get my mom to acknowledge that there was a mistake made and them trying to fix it. Ultimately, as the story goes, the punchline is I don't get that card back. That card's gone. And so fast forward, I don't know, it's a lot of years, more than 40 years, let's call it. Jeffrey Klein is coming to one of our speaker training events and brings me this gift. I think maybe it was the 3rd day of that event that you gave me this gift, which was that 1973, fairly mint condition quality as well, this 1973 Willie Mays card when Willie Mays played his last season as a New York Met. And that was just such a touching thing, touching gift, a very thoughtful thing. I've thanked you before, Jeffrey, but I don't publicly say that. You have. Which is beautiful. What a great way to finish that story. Meaning you've become— so it's so interesting because you connected with the story and then ultimately you do something on your end, which I've never asked you why you did it. I just assumed it was incredibly thoughtful, sensitive kind of thing to do. And now you're in the story. Now you're in that story, Jeffrey, because to get that, to receive that card, it closes a loop, right?

Yeah, I think part of it too, for me, what prompted me to get it was Because it struck me in a certain way. And, you know, I realized something, you know, and this isn't a psychotherapy session, but I lost my mom when I was 7. So I think there may have been an element of like, you were angry at your mom for what she did. And I've had anger for my mom dying, which is a silly thing to have. But as a 7-year-old kid, that's what you do. So I think it may have hit me a little more than some with that. Anger that he talked about. I hadn't even identified it when you initially asked me.

The betrayal.

Nothing is that, you know—

That feels like it comes through a little bit too, Jeffrey, right? That the idea of somebody leaving you at such a tender age and you don't even know why, and it's, uh, it's impossible for you to understand that, really.

And I have to think that the flip side of that has been, in spite of that, I had such love in my life. My dad and I are super close. He remarried and I got not the wicked stepmother— well, maybe initially, but eventually a woman who really changed who I was— and a stepbrother who I don't make a distinction between him and my brother. They're just my brothers. And so I think I was able to, in spite of that experience, be grateful for how my life turned out in terms of the family I have. And family, you know, you asked me, is there anything about me that Family's the most important thing to me by a long shot. You started the podcast talking about unconditional love and made me initially think of my children. And I think that's what I liked about the way you put it was that, yes, most parents have unconditional love for their children, which I certainly do. And I'm definitely harder on myself. And I think there is opportunity for people to give themselves a break. And the way they give their kids a break. So that struck me. I think again, part of my unconscious thought about how to be— to take a bad situation in my own life that ended up being— I was very grateful for. I had this opportunity to do that for you in a little way. And I think that's probably what prompted me to say, you know what, I'm gonna see if I can get the card, which I did. You told that story on one of our coaching calls, and I bought the card Even though I wasn't going to see you for 3 months, I bought the card within the next couple of days.

I really hope you're enjoying this episode of the Change Proof Podcast. If you've not yet gone out and gotten your own copy of Change Proof, it's not too late. You can get your copy right now by going to changeproof.com and not only getting the book, and all the bonuses there, but getting access to our proprietary resilience assessment tool. It'll just take you 3 minutes to do, and it's something that will really help you to utilize the book even more effectively to create practices and rituals and habits that will increase your mental, emotional, physical, and even spiritual resilience for the long term. Again, go to changeyourlifebook.com/resilience.

And I think it was a way to be grateful for what you were giving our group.

Beautiful.

So thank you for that.

I'm thrilled with where this conversation has gone, especially having come back to the point of entry where we're talking about being unconditional with ourselves and, and what the benefit for that is. I use as a reference point for myself continually, not every day, it was for a while, but months in between now, but this incredible book called The Presence Process. And we talked about being present as a speaker, as a teacher, as a leader. That ability to be present is so important. It's also something that I think people have— I have difficulty with. I think a lot of us do. This book is really about sort of the root of presence. And The Presence Process is written by a guy named Michael Brown. He's South African. Well, a lot of folks haven't heard of that book or heard of him, but— Really shout out to that, the quality of that. A lot of what we're talking about now when it comes to early childhood influences, things that even are traumas, traumatic experiences, not necessarily negative, but things that just impact us, affect us. These are things that have happened and then ultimately we end up where we are, which is why it's such a blessing that we're here. I use the word resilience when I'm— more often than not these days when I'm out in Keynoting and being hired by organizations to lead a conference or keynote an event, that kind of thing. It's on that topic of resilience. What is it to be resilient? In fact, my own TED Talk in many ways is about what little hack or tool I have for creating greater resilience. I'd love to know what your ritual or rituals— maybe just pick one of them— for creating more resilience in your business or In life, et cetera, as a dad. I mean, there's so many things that exhaust us from day to day.

Well, I work for myself, and I think the decision to do that was intentional, especially when I had kids that were young. And my father, who could have been a very rich lawyer, as you know, didn't. He went to become a judge, and he made that same choice intentionally because it enabled him To spend time he would never have been able to do if he had gone the other path.

Right.

And so the ritual, it's so simple, but I have the pleasure of most days being the first person to wake up my children and most days the last one to kiss them goodnight. It's just a simple little thing, but it connects my day and it's a gift of being present because getting— my wife has a dirty little secret I'll share. She takes photographs of my 10-year-old son sleeping. I mean, she has for years. And so we'll eventually have this collage.

He's gonna love that at his wedding someday, for sure.

Yeah, he's now aware of it, so we may see how long it can keep up. Although strangely, the other day she fell asleep and he took a picture of her, so he's getting back at it. But the idea of when, when a child, or your child, is at peace And the ability to connect with them, you know, as they're just waking up or as they're just going to bed. It's a gift. It's something that whether I've had, you know, it starts my day off pretty well to be able to, you know, they're a little cranky sometimes they get up, but I, I don't mind that because I feel like I'm the one who's really getting the benefit of waking them. Because I feel that's, you know, there's a responsibility in there. They got to get up and get out of bed and all the rest of it.

Yeah.

But I get to be the first thing they see in the morning. And I usually, you know, I'm singing a little bit into their room. And then again at night, I'm usually— my wife usually is asleep before me. So Anita goes to sleep, I usually do my last round of goodnights. And so I go into each of my kids and it wasn't something I intentionally decided, oh, I'm going to do this every night. It's just become the habit that I love and thinking about how nice it is to have that, to bookend my days with—

It's beautiful.

3 of the 4 people I love.

Randy and I, we didn't intentionally divide up that opportunity. I was more often than not, I was the bedtime story guy and Randy is the early riser, get him up and going. But it's a perfect way to transition, I suppose, into what I think is, if not the most powerful, is certainly one very close to the top of the list of the most powerful rituals that any of us can have. And that is the ritual for waking. How do we start? This is the first everything of a brand new day. First thoughts, first walk, first steps, first words, first sensations, etc. So the ritual that, that I've adopted for so many years is the same. I remind everybody of it every time, and it starts with a question for you right now, Jeffrey, which is, did you wake up today?

I did.

Yeah, that's a loaded question all by itself, right? Because Waking up is not just a physical waking, it's metaphorical. There's more to it than just being conscious, but it is something that we get to work on every day, that we are a little bit more awake, a little bit more alive, and a little bit more conscious each day if we're lucky and if we're thinking about it. I think if it's our intention, there's a good chance that we're increasing the odds of that being the case. So you woke up when you went to sleep last night, you did your rounds and everybody was put to bed, and you finally put your head on the pillow. Was there

No guarantees.

No guarantees, right. Your finding yourself here today was maybe not unexpected in the sense that you probably assumed it would be the case anyway, but yet it's, it's still something that was a— is a surprise and a blessing and very much something to be grateful for. And so my morning ritual has been the same for a lot of years. I wake up, I go to the gym, I do some work, I get this sense that there's something I ought to be, I can be easily grateful for. And I recognize, I have this recognition, yes, it doesn't matter, you know, aches, pains, we wake up in different moods. I mean, there's all kinds of things that happen in our sleep, etc. Who knows? But in that moment, there's something we can be grateful for. And the words I use to express that gratitude are, I love my life. I love my life. I love my life. What are the words, Jeffrey?

I love my life.

Do you love your life?

I do.

Yeah. It's like saying I'm grateful for my life. I love myself without condition. When I'm good, when I'm bad, when I make the right choices, decisions, or when I don't. Still can love yourself no matter what. So really happy we ended the— tied things up the way we did and transitioned from this moment into the next. With this kind of presence. So Jeffrey, what a gift to have you on the show today. Thank you so much for being a guest.

Thank you so much again. As always, our conversations are real, are valuable, and appreciated.

Hope everybody's enjoyed that as well. Leave comments, questions. Go check out Jeffrey, his incredible TEDx talk, as well as more about him and his business. Does some incredible work in the marketing space. Look at the show notes for all of that. And I'll just say, everybody, ciao for now.

Thanks for listening, everyone. We hope you now have the tools and greater insights to navigate your own pivot. Help us inspire others by sharing this episode and leaving your comments over at adammarkel.com/podcasts. For more tips, strategies, and support as you consciously pivot into a new business and lifestyle you love, join our Pivot Community on Facebook. At pivotfb.com.