Courageous Living With Ken Foster

Welcome to the Conscious Pivot Podcast with international speaker, business mentor, best selling author of Pivot, and your host, Adam Markell. The Conscious Pivot shares the stories and wisdom of people who have successfully reinvented some area of their business and personal life. You'll gain powerful insights into how you can fully embrace new opportunities, increase your performance and master the art and science of innovation and resilience. So please join. Join Adam as he guides you on your Conscious Pivot.

Hey everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Conscious Pivot Podcast. I'm your host, Adam Markell. I'm sitting here right after the holidays. I know it's always kind of funny when these shows get produced. Sometimes they're a little bit delayed. So it's just after New Year's and starting the year 2020 is pretty trippy. I'm not going to sort of advertise my age. I'm 54, I'm going to be 55 on my next birthday birthday. So just the idea of it being 2020 from the standpoint of somebody that grew up for the most part in the 80s, I mean, I have a lot of awareness of things that were going on in the mid to late 70s, kind of from a little bit of Watergate and moving into what was a pretty tough time in the world in the late 70s. But as a kid didn't really, it didn't impact me so much to mostly just experiencing life in the 80s, seeing the wall come down in East Berlin and a lot of changes and the book 1984 being a kind of a seminal warning, I guess, of what things could look like in our world if Big Brother were more prevalent. So here we are, it's 2,020. And I have grown kids and all that kind of thing, as many of us do, and just feeling, feeling grateful to have made it this far. I'm grateful on a ritual basis pretty much all the time. And I say pretty much because of course, just like all of you, I have my moments when I wake up in the morning and just feel like shit or just not feeling, feeling myself or feeling even depressed for no apparent reason. And it's always a healthy reminder that to have this day is a blessing. And it wasn't guaranteed last night when I went to sleep. And I feel great today. It's a beautiful sunny day in San Diego. I feel incredibly alive. I feel great that I've got an incredible guest on the show today, somebody who is a visionary. I'm going to read a little bit of his bio. We're going to dig into his hairy carry scary pivot stories in life and we're going to learn a lot from him. So I'm excited about that. I feel blessed for that. I feel grateful. I hope you do feel grateful in this moment for something, for anything, it doesn't matter what. But it really, really is impossible to feel gratitude and anxiety at the same moment. It's impossible to feel fear and gratitude at the same moment. And that's just as close to an antidote or a quick fix as I've ever found. And it really does in fact work miracles. So here's to the miracles and here's to the beautiful start of a new decade. A Brand New Decade, 2020. Ken Foster is my guest today. He is a visionary business strategist, radio show host of Voices of Courage which is syndicated in over 100 countries. Ken Fosters courageous living around the world with his courage clubs designed to generate a million acts of courage and inspire courageous living to change the world for the better. Would say we certainly need want that these days. From his starting point as a gas station attendant fighting his way out of a dysfunctional childhood to his rise and starting and running a multimillion dollar financial services business, Ken has experienced a transformation and courageous living firsthand. Ken resides like I do in Southern California with his wife of 20 years. And we have that in common. He practices the discipline of a balanced life through meditation, yoga, healthy eating and daily personal ability improvement. Ken, what a pleasure to have you on the show today. Welcome.

Hey Adam, it's great to be here. It's good to be alive. It's like you said, 2020, new things are happening and I don't know about you, but I'm dreaming a new dream. I think you are too. Dreaming new dreams for 2020. And you know, I'm starting with the end of mind. I'm thinking, wow, at the end of 2020, what do I want to be in awe about? What do I want to wonder now to take me to on that ride? Because of course, as you know, the present moment, actually the future creates our present moment. So if we really visualizing that future, we start to take those present moment actions. That's what I've been thinking about. I've been thinking about that a lot in the last few days. Contemplating what's next. Right. What's next in what is this? You know, there's, there's certain dreams I dreamed last year that didn't happen. Yeah, there's other dreams I, I brought in that were like nightmares. It's like my Dream.

Just dive right in, Ken. Absolutely, yes.

I'm not bringing that dream into this dream.

Oh, my. Oh, my, my.

Yeah, you know, I've been thinking about it, thinking about what I have to let go of, you know, what. What kind of thinking do I need to embrace and, you know, what people do I want to have in my life in 2020, and, you know, who. Who. Those relationships that I have right now that just aren't working anymore, you know, they were great relationships when we started out. Sometimes, you know, I have to let them go. And it's. I used to get upset losing a pencil yet alone, losing a relationship. But today, you know, it's just a matter of, well, you know, we've grown through this. It's time to move on. Sometimes it is.

Yeah. I want to ask you a question about. About something that, I mean, you. Look, you and I have both been around the block once or twice. I mean, this is not our first rodeo, and in business, and certainly not in talking about our own personal paths, both the paths that have led to great things we'd be happy to share with people and the paths that I think we often share that we wouldn't have shared maybe 10, 15, 20 years ago because it wasn't as safe, or. I'll just speak for myself. I wouldn't have appreciated the value in being so transparent and vulnerable, I guess, and, and risking the shame of admitting the mistakes and admitting the sort of errors in judgment or even admitting the loss as you referred to. I mean, there's nothing worse than the loss of a relationship. I mean, and even health can be looked at as, on some level, a relationship between ourselves and our body. And so the betrayal, when there's betrayal of our bodies, you know, there's, there's, there's just like a relationship. It's something to examine. And, and, and sometimes, as you say, there's things we have to let go of, and then there are times when we sort of make a stand. I'm curious at the end of this, you know, this. The end of this decade. So coming to the end of 2019, it was mid. Mid month, around the middle of the month, my daughter, our oldest daughter, Chelsea, called me up and said, hey, dad, tonight's the last full moon of the month. Be a great time. You know, if there's things you want to release, things you want to invite in, you know, this is a great opportunity to do that. And I spent a good half hour writing down some things I wanted to let go of and release, things that I'd Even actually thought I'd let go of before I met. Pretty sure I had, but still, they were. There was sort of a residue of some resentment or some angst about something. And so it gave me a fresh opportunity to let go of some things and also to invite some things. And did you take any opportunity or spend time, let's say, at the end of last year, either doing something like that or creating a vision board or any kind of.

I. Every year for the last. Since 1992, I have done that release work. And I. I used to do it once a quarter. I do it now usually once or twice a year, but always at the.

End of the year.

And in fact, I wrote a book. It's called Release, Renew, Evolve. Release, Renew, Evolve. And in that book, it's just. I've become an expert at asking the right question questions. And that probably came from my. My father was a Los Angeles police detective for 48 years, and so he was very good at interrogating and asking questions. And so I picked that up. And I like to ask questions that take us into the subconscious mind so that we can pull out those things that they're running our lives, but we're not really aware of that. So the book that I do and I do, the work every year, it's asked people to inventory their. Their mind, to take a peek and, you know, look at any kind of regrets or any kind of places we felt that we were disempowered or we hurt others or hurt ourselves or any kind of shame or blame or guilt or any kind of failures that we perceive that we didn't. Didn't accomplish what we wanted. And I think it's so important, Adam, to do that. And I'm glad you're doing it. I know for me, I don't want to bring any of that stuff into the new year. And it's a conscious choice. It's a conscious choice to grow. It's a conscious choice to let go. So I do that every year. And. And then the next part is. It's like, you know, the glass is all filled up. You pour the water out. Now it's empty. Now what's. What's next? And that's really the most.

That's an invitation.

Yeah, it's an invitation to redream your life. Because this is a dream. So if you're either living nightmares, or you're living nightmares and good dreams, or you may be just living really cool, cool dreams, and you're really going from one dream to the next to the next, and you're generating what you want in your life, whether it be in business, relationship, career, health, vitality. So. But it all starts with energy.

I was going to say it all starts with those questions. And I'm curious, if you don't mind the interruption, just to ask you, what's one of the best questions you've either ever asked yourself that's kind of historical, or maybe it's one that you ask yourself repeatedly.

I can tell you that, what that question is, and it's really the basis of my new book here, the Courage to Change Everything. The question is, if I were courageous, what would I do today? So if I was courageous, what are the three steps I might take today? Or if I was courageous, who would I talk to today? Or if I was courageous, what would I invent today? So it always starts with that question, if I was courageous. Because I found this, Adam, that courage is the bridge between fear and empowerment. So it's the bridge, right. If you're in fear, you go to courage. If I was courageous, what I do now, what I let go of, If I was courageous, who would I talk to? If I was courageous, what would I admit to myself? If I was courageous.

Yes.

What would I do differently if I was courageous? So it all starts with courage.

Yeah. I mean, I go back to the time when I was moving, pivoting, to quote my book. Yeah. Well, it's based on the book pivot, and that's based on real life experiences of people who pivoted. Like the guy here sitting, that spent 18 years in the practice of law and the work and the job of law, and much of that time feeling like it was the wrong calling, it wasn't my right livelihood, as I think is a really important question itself, is, you know, what. What is my right livelihood? I couldn't answer that question in the affirmative based on what I was doing. So I guess back to my lawyer training, it begs the question, what. What. How do you define courage? Because if, again, that's profound in the sense of what would I do if I had the courage to do? Or, you know, what would I do right now if I just was more courageous?

Because a lot of people ask me that. And I want to say this. It's like if I were to ask you, well, can you define fear? Can you define what fear feels like fear does to you? Can you, you know, how do you think when you're fearful? Right. We all know it. Right. But courage is a lost art. So courage is also a feeling. It's an energy. It's a. It's the. The. In the dictionary, it's defined as. It comes from the Latin word core, which means to speak one's heart. I would. I would. Plus that it's really to live one's heart. But it's. What is our heart? Well, our heart is that. That guiding, intuitive, conscious part of ourself that's leading us where we need to go. And courage is in. When you feel courage, let me put it that way. When you feel courageous, think about it, you know, courage. All of a sudden you feel this expanse. Just by asking that question, if I was courageous, what would I do next? Just by asking that, it evokes courage in our being in our mind, and we start to feel empowered. We start to feel like, you know, if I was courageous, I could go do this. Now some people's mind might go a little different. Well, I don't have any courage, but that's not true.

The contemplation is courage as well, right, Ken?

I. I have a practice, Adam, that I do every day. I try to do it in the evening, but sometimes I do it in the morning. And that is, I ask myself, what's working, what's not working? What do I need to improve? I do it every day, and I realize that what's not working is a big list.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And. Oh, and sometimes I want to go to. Oh, God, I'll never get this. But the truth is, you know, it's just. For me, it's like daily, one step every day, you know, 365 days. I do this every year. I'm looking to improve just one little thing. Some things I do really well by that. Other things that are chronic challenges I've had. Patience is a good one. Right?

I'm finding that challenge these days. My. I'm finding that challenge myself these days. You know, as you said earlier, there are relationships that. That sometimes have. Have run their. You know, they run their course. And it does. It takes a tremendous amount of courage. And, And. And when you find. I think there are signs of. Of when asking that question, tough question to ask, you know, has. Has something run its course, meaning it's not in your highest interest, your highest good, you or the other person potentially anymore. You know, when you ask that question, it's a tough one. And I think part of what is a signal or signpost of that is patience is the. Because, you know, to me, Randy and I, my wife and I, we're married 30, 30 plus years. We know each other longer than that from college days and you know, kindness, when people ask us about relationships. So we do some trainings for folks in the relationship area. We do quite a bit of speaker training, individualized speaker training and things like that. And what comes up often people will say is, well, you know what. What has sustained you, like, what has sustained you in the, in the pivot post law, in the professional speaking world, what has sustained the relationship you've had with your wife so, so long? And this ability to be patient, having patience with the process is sometimes something we often will say to folks. You've got to trust the process, be patient with the process. And then in the relational space, that patience also translates into kindness. So I think it's a good. It's something to pay attention to when you've lost your patience with something or someone. Not that that's the end of it in the moment. You know, it's not a sort of. I'm not coming at it from an emotional sort of make a decision in an instant standpoint, but right, Ken, I mean, patience is important.

I found Adam along that I want to. Plus that because of what you're saying is very important. The piece that I found is that if it's not working for you, it's not working for the other person. So if we really get that concept and just be with it for a while, it's like, well, you're in a business relationship, let's say, and you're going, wow, this partner, I can't believe they're doing this, this and this. The truth is, it's not working for them either. And so, you know, same thing with our relationship. I know when my wife and I are off key.

Right.

Which happens in relationships and boy, lots of times, because that's how we grow. It's one of the ways we grow. You know, it's like, okay, it's not working for me, it's not working for her. Why would we want to keep doing this? Right. Why not figure out how it can work for both people? Or like you said, maybe we have to leave the relationship. In some, some instances we do. You know, people have grown apart or people are just don't share the values together or people are, you know, mentally unstable. There's a whole bunch of reasons, but, you know, we have to be able to really understand that if it's not working for us, it's not working for them.

Yeah. You know, I'm finding the theme, it's so interesting. Every morning I start with a statement. Most folks know one of the statements at least. Maybe some said it so many times, I suppose. But it's not that statement that folks are familiar with. It's this new statement that I've added to the other things I'll say. But this one I got from a woman by the name of Judy Whitcraft where she's this magnificent woman in her late 70s and every day she wakes up, she says, I wonder what miracles are coming today. And you used that word wonder earlier. Right. This is a wondering, it's a contemplating. It's a. The idea that there's truly a miracle that's possible in this moment and in what's thematically just feeling like the reason, let's say you and I came together on this show at this period, particular time is to have this conversation around. What do you have the courage to contemplate from a relationship standpoint at the start of a brand new decade? Meaning contemplate whether what's working for me, what's not working for me, what could be done differently. No judgment. I mean, it's ironic. We use that exact feedback loop is what we call it when we analyze. Help speakers analyze their performance. Performance or how they have. They delivered a message or what have you. And we use it intentionally because it's not a judgment thing, it's just what's work. It's, it's a perspective. It's a perception at best. Like you said, if my perception is that this relationship isn't or part some aspect of the relationship isn't working for me, it doesn't make it true. It just is my perception. And as you brought up, it's also likely that it's not working for the other person either. He just energetically, if it's not working for you, how could it be possible? How can it be working for them? Right.

It's not. And, but you know, it's really interesting because I've taught that concept to a lot of business owners who, you know, they, they, they feel like they can't let go of an employee, but they're just not doing their job and stuff. And I'll tell them, listen, it's not working for them either. They've stopped showing up, they've stopped doing what they want to do. They're probably in stuck in a situation and they, they don't want to be here. But you trying to enable them to stay is really a disservice in some, in many instances. Right? Yeah.

Right. To release them, to release yourself and to release them. It actually. Do you think, Ken, that. That there's a positive something really just Whether it's. Yeah, what do you think the positive aspects of releasing someone from a relationship are? Because that's tough for a business owner to let.

It's the old adage, of course, if you release, you know, release the butterfly, maybe it'll come back, but what you're really releasing. And this is the work I've done in our relationship over the years. Sometimes our relationship has gotten a point where I don't like it anymore. It's just like it's not working. Okay. And like you said, dispassionately being able to look and say, well, what's my part in this? And how can I recreate that relationship in a way that really works? So I think dispassionately standing back and giving yourself that feedback of asking yourself, okay, what's my part in this? How can I. How can I change? What can I do energetically to show up differently? You know, relationship, you know, is you've been married 30 years. It's like the question I ask myself a lot, in fact, almost every day, is, what can I do to make my wife's life better? So I asked that question, what can I make her life better every day? And that adds up. I'm not perfect. No, I forget. But when things stop working, it's like, okay, how can this get, you know, if we're at a five or a six in a relationship, what has to happen to take it to a 10?

Yes. What's the missing four or five link?

Right.

Those questions you asked, I think are very powerful tools. I just want to reflect those back for people to not just take note of, but maybe even write down. Because, you know, what's my part, for one thing, what's mine to own, let's say, in any situation where it's, quote, not working. And again, we're talking relationship today, which is interesting because it can be relationship again with yourself first. Relationship. We have a relationship with your body, with another person, with somebody in business. You know, we both do some consulting in the business space. So often that's an issue. And that question, what's mine to own? First of all, right? And secondly, what can I do to make it better? Is there something I can do to make it better? So if you ask that question, what routinely, as you said, There's a compounding effect to asking how it is that you. Not only you show up better, but how you make someone else's life better.

There's another piece to that, Adam. It's what are we projecting? What are we projecting in the relationship? Are we walking in the room projecting joy and happiness. Are we walking in the room excited? Are we rocking in the room, going with blame or shame or guilt or carrying baggage? How we, what are we projecting? Right? For me, just that little tweak when I catch and I become conscious, I go, oh, what is it I want to project to the world today? You know, I want to project happiness or love or bliss or kindness. I, that's an intentional awareness that I show up and I practice that day. And what happens is everybody changes around me. Right? Quick story with that. I had a client come in and she was, she was depressed. She didn't, she wasn't having a good, good, a good experience in her life. And I said, well, her husband was not treating her well and her children weren't treating her well and the neighbor wasn't treating her well and the grocery store clerks weren't treating her well. It was all about them. And I said, well, you know, why don't you do this? Why don't just for the next seven days, just look at what you love. Just think about what you love for the next seven days and really write it down. Journal about it. Project love wherever you go. Just be happy. Fake it till you can make it. Put a smile on your face. You know, she came back that week and she said to me, she said, Ken, I don't really care for kids much, but I had little children trying to connect with me at the grocery store, right? It's, it's about what are we projecting, Adam? Right.

It's so true, Ken. I mean what we project is what we attract. You know, so it's, it is, it is another, another way to look at the, that oft cited law of attraction. I'm curious, have you ever read Emmet Fox? Is that us?

I love Emmett Fox.

Don't you love Emmett Fox?

Man, Emmett Fox reminds me of the seven day mental habit.

No, it's the same seven day mental diet. And the only reason I'm even correcting you, sir, is because I, I wrote it down a second ago. So you and I are very, very much in sync today. And would love for people if you haven't checked this out. It's a tiny little pamphlet, right? I think it's 16 or 17 pages.

Toughest thing I ever did is the.

Most brutal, ridiculous diet you will ever be on.

Ridiculous. Yeah, ridiculous. But I have, I will say this just the audience what happened for me, it took me a year to, to complete his seven day mental diet. And the day I did, I'd forgotten That I. It was a year. That day. I woke up in the morning and literally it was like taking a dark pair of sunglasses off that I didn't know I had on. Yeah, everything in life for three days. It was completely. I guess fluorescent was the only word I could use to describe it. The colors were brighter than I've ever seen. My hearing was more sound. Sense of. My senses were enhightened. And by the way, I wasn't taking drugs or doing anything. I was just. It was just awareness and consciousness of what I had been missing my whole life. Because I had a mindset that was critical thinker. I was a negative thinker. I was a person that. That really looked at what was wrong with everything. And that's how I was taught, you know, I mean, let's, you know, like. Like I said, My father was LAPD for 48 years, so he had some good qualities. Taught me how to interview and go deep into questioning. But there are some. Also some other ways of looking at life. And you're always on, you know, from that point of view that I experienced. You're always aware of what's going to go wrong. You have to be aware of what might happen. And. And I live that life. But I used that diet to change, and I changed permanently as a result of that. I'm glad you brought it up.

Oh, my God. No, it just. It's like the psychedelics without the. Without this. Without the psilocybin, something.

It's crazy what we could do with our mind. The mind is the cause of our bondage and the mind is the cause of our liberation. A great yogi once said that, and I've always remembered that. It's just like, yeah, this mind will. Will. It looks. Everything looks real from the point of view that I'm seeing it. But as soon as I can shift my mind into another state, everything changes.

And it is almost like taking, taking on and off a pair of glasses. I mean, it is. It's a lens. We. We're not forced. It's not like we're born or even at whatever age we are that. That someone forces us to wear those glasses, whatever the shade they are. We. We do have that capacity. It is our. It's. It is our. I mean, to me, it's the only true freedom we've got. And so you address the root cause of everything that shows up in our lives at the level that truly is the cause of causes. And this is the. This. I haven't yet and I'm still looking and maybe, maybe There'll be a deeper level at which something is the catalyst for everything else. But I just haven't found it yet, haven't read it yet, haven't heard anybody talk about anything that, that goes to a. A grounding level before that.

Well, I could tell you where I found it. I found it in stillness. I found it being still. I tried to find it reading books that it. I tried to find it and doing workshops and doing counseling and therapy and coaching and anything you can imagine. I'm lifelong learners. I'm always looking to learn. But, you know, I really wanted to feel a sense of fulfillment, a sense of joy, a sense of peace, a sense of happiness all the time. Not, not here and there. I tried doing the here and there thing. I buy a new car, I'd be happy for 10 minutes, you know, but. But it was that place where I had to get still. And two people that I know of said, said this quote, one is Leonardo da Vinci and the other one is Paramahansa Yogananda. They both said, isolation is the price of greatness. And I had to really think about that. What the hell are they talking about? And you know, and Einstein said it too. He said, I don't, I don't want to. You know, all I want to know are the thoughts of God. The rest are details. It's Einstein. I thought, well, these people might know something more than me. So I thought, let me tune in. Let me learn how to be still. And I practice that every day. I knew you were going to ask me that. What are some of the practices you do? I wake up in the morning and first of all, at night, I set my intention to wake up in the morning joyful and happy and powerful. I wake up in the morning and I tell myself I'm awake and alert. Boom. I give my mind a command. Or some days I wake up and say, I'm going to be a cat. I'm just going to lie in bed. But I'm going to lie in bed with joy.

So.

But I wake up with alert and alive. Alert and awake. Alive. And then for me, I like to meditate. I like to meditate and go within at least an hour to two hours a day, every day. I've been doing it for many, many years, a couple decades. What I found is everything I was searching for is all inside, not anywhere outside. Never, never was outside of me, never was outside of anybody else. It's all inside. But we have to get there. We have to learn how to get there. So that's been My experience.

Yeah, make. Making time for stillness is. It's almost like saving. You know, they say if you don't pay yourself first at the end of the month, there's usually nothing left to pay yourself. It's. It's one of those things. So you've got to take care of that first. So making the time for stillness for. Or just. Just being alone. I mean, regardless of whether you're meditating or you're praying, I'm a God guy, so I pray and I love to do that. And only recently, I mean, I kind of called myself out in a public forum some years ago where I said I'm just a crappy meditator. I'm not a crappy meditator anymore. I actually really. I mean, I dig it. It's so. It's not just peaceful, really. It's like getting some sleep for the parts of my brain that don't always rest, even when I'm sleeping. And that's a. It's kind of a funky thing. But while conscious, to be able to actually rest is a big deal because resilience and creating resilience both physically and mentally, more mentally I think today than anything else is a big part of how it is that we solve or even just solving problems. But where we get inspired, like you said at the very beginning, dream a new dream or what's your dream for this new decade? Maybe the thing that if you've overlooked doing this is to take some time to be alone, just to get quiet, get out of the noise. And that means your cell phone and all the noise around and maybe do find something where as Einstein said, the, you know, the rest become details. We've got a little time here. Can. I love it. Is there. Is there a. Did you get driven into stillness? Sometimes, I think for a lot of folks and this has been the case for me too. It's sort of getting driven to your knees from some life event where it causes you to do something different, to pivot because. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

1992, I was living in Sacramento and my. Had divorced my wife. I was working in a job that speak a bunch of money, spending every dime. I had surrounded myself by individuals that what I call lower companions had my health. I was 50 pounds overweight. I hadn't exercised in years and had collected junk everywhere. I had clutter everywhere. Just I was afraid to let go of anything. And I was in seeing a therapist and I started hearing this little voice and this voice said, you got to feel the pain to make the change. So I Walked to the therapist that day, and I walked in, I said, you know, doc, we've been seeing each other a year, as I mentioned. I said, I've been hearing this little voice, and it says, you've got to feel the pain to make the change change. And the doctor looked at me, had steel blue eyes and this silver hair. Sitting in his chair. He looked like probably Carl Jung. And he says, I can't do anything more for you, Ken. You need to follow that voice. Thank you so much for being. Being here with me today. And as I closed the door and walked out of the office down the street, I was thinking, man, is this guy crying crazy, or am I crazy? What's going. I came here because I'm hearing voices. There are good voices, and, you know, but that was the voice that walked me in about three days later into a recovery center so that I could start recovering from the addiction I had to alcohol at the time and drugs. And I was able to find myself again. So it was hard, you know, it was. Wasn't something that I wanted to do. It's not something I talk about, but it's something that I needed to do.

Yeah.

And I needed to get real, and I needed to get vulnerable, and I needed to have the courage to do what I didn't want to do. Yeah, I tried it many times. I tried quitting on my own. I tried doing everything on my own. And what happened is that my greatest thinking got me right where I was, which is in a place of destitution and desperation. So I know better. In fact, you know, let me tell you one thing. I asked a. A lady that owns a homeless center down here in San Diego. She helps people so that they don't go homeless. I said, what's the number one reason of homelessness? And she said, oh, most people think it's drugs and alcohol. She says, but it's not. I said, well, what is it? She said, they've given up all of their connections. They have no connections with the spiritual path. They have no friends. They have no home. They have no social connections. They've tried to do life all alone on their own terms.

Like being on an island.

Like an island. That's the. So listen, then a lot of us can, you know, we can get to places, and our mind's very tricky, and box us in, get us to places where we think we're okay. But if you just look at the results, that's all you got to do. How am I doing in my relationships? How's my health? How's my fitness? How are my. How's my finances? How's my spiritual life? We just look at the results and we're honest with ourselves. We can change anything.

You know, there's that slogan Nike has just do it. And when you were saying earlier, even I was thinking about, you know, this, this, it. The thing that you don't want to do or the thing you have to do or forced to do or have the courage ultimately to do. I think it'd be. It'd be cool. Ken, someday, and maybe in a parallel life or universe, you and I will create it. Therapy. Therapy. What's that? It. The it factor. But is a big deal. And I've really. I've so enjoyed this conversation. My last question for you really has to do with your rituals for resilience, because having come through your own, just making as far as you've made it, and this is not a. A sort of a, you know, the judging, the results. It's more like we've all lived a life filled with things that are. That we are proud of and filled with things that we're not proud of. And it's a good, bad, ugly. I mean, I haven't met anybody yet that. That's not the case, regardless of position, power, money or anything. But we're here. Just like we started the show with we're here. So we get to start this new decade. We start this new day. It's a blessing, it's a gift. I believe it's for a reason as well. And I attribute a lot of the reason why I'm here and others to this word resilience. What can you tell me about resilience and share with our folks, maybe even a ritual that you've got that has kept you or created resilience for yourself?

Well, I'd say the. I gave you a couple of them. First one is how I wake up in the morning. That's a habit, success habit that I've gotten into the same thing as meditation. The other thing that I do is I make time for myself. I make time to be alone. I make time for planning in my day. I have spaces in my day, and those spaces are for a reason. See, when I was 1992, when I just told you that story, what the truth was, is I'd forgotten who I was. I didn't have a clue who I was at that time. I didn't realize that I was an infinite being, that I was powerful beyond measure, that I. That I could overcome any obstacle, that I could. I could manifest the life of joy and happiness and bliss. And it doesn't mean there's not crap along the way. But I could overcome anything. I could become fearless, I could become courageous. I could step into parts of myself that I just. They're either atrophied or pretty much non existent. So I didn't realize who I was and I didn't realize from a non ego point of view, just a place of being the observer of my life and, and being the chooser of which direction I could go that by. By allowing myself that. That distance between my thoughts, that distance between my physical physicality, the distance between my environment and I could, I could be in choice and I could, I could do things differently. So every day I take time in the day to read something empowering, like this book that I created that has daily actions around it, actually has daily astute wisdom that I've studied from the east and also cutting edge strategies from the west that I read every day. I journal every day, exercise every day. Yeah, I project joy every time I think about it.

It's a great distinction, I think, between rituals and habits. Habits are things we are already doing unconsciously, like the way we brush our teeth or how we drive home or where we sit, you know, at the dinner table and things like that. Whereas rituals are things when we know, as you said earlier, that maybe not everything's working exactly how we'd like. And I don't know anybody, again, haven't met anybody yet that would say everything's working exactly how I like.

You know, I don't know any of those people either.

We've all got those improvements to make. And I think that what's great is that when we consciously choose to change something, to create some new result, we can ritualize it. I sometimes say we ritualize to habitualize it. And reading is a big part of that. So a part of our show notes everybody, as you know, in the show notes that accompany the podcast, you'll have access to information about Ken's book and Ken's work, and links to find out more, etc. So I will leave everybody, not just today, but as we enter into, or have entered into this new decade. This will be the first time I'm sort of officially reminding myself and everybody else that's listening at this time what that is. And that is that we have a profound choice to make. Every single day, every single, every day we get this choice what lens we're going to put on, the glasses we wear for the day. At the very instant that we Wake up. The instant that we become conscious of the fact that we are actually breathing and it's a brand new day, There is no guarantee, of course. Like, you know, when you went to sleep last night, you set an intention. I do the same thing. I set an intention I got from an old book called the. Oh, it's an Ogmundino book, the Greatest Salesman in the World. And there's a tenet in the book that says, I will greet this day with love in my heart. That's an intention. At night, before I go to bed, I greet this day. I'll greet the new day with love in my heart. So even at the making of that intention, there's no guarantee we're going to wake up the next day. Right. I mean, again, you got to wake up today.

Right?

Bonus.

That's what counts. So I'm in the. I'm in the moment.

Yes. So three parts of this ritual for everybody. You wake up, that's the first piece of it. And in the moment that you're actually taking that first breath, first aware, awake, conscious breath, recognize the fact that there are people in that very moment, that same exact moment, who are taking their last breath. And that makes that moment sacred. It's special. That's the first thing. Just to be aware of the reality. That's. That's very pragmatic. It's realistic. It's a fact. And at that same moment where you've got that realism right in your face, it's also just as evident that that means you can be grateful. Grateful for your life. And the way that I express my gratitude for being alive is by saying these four words that. That are the title of the TED Talk I gave, and it's the message I share as often as I can with as many people. And that is. I love my life. I love my life. What are the words, Ken?

I love my life, comma, I love my life.

No matter what.

No matter what.

Yeah. It's been a pleasure, Ken. Thanks for being on the show today.

Adam, thank you so much for having me. This has been a blast.

Awesome. Way cool. Ciao for now, everybody. We'll see you on the flip side.

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