GA 493 | Dealing with Fear with John Knotts

Nobody ever talks about fear. There's actually a phobia of fear, phobophobia. So, you know, a fear of fear. And I think people are afraid to tell other people that they have fears because it's going to make them feel like they're less.

Today, I'm excited to welcome John Knotts back to the show. Now, John is a colleague of mine here at Gemba Academy, and many of you in the Lean and Six Sigma world know who John is. He's a prolific thought leader in our movement. He's all over LinkedIn. He's got some of the most incredible LinkedIn posts that you'll see post daily. And he's got hundreds of comments just about on every post. So just a fantastic guy. I'm so thankful that he's part of our team. But John is also a prolific author. The guy writes more than anybody that I know, and he's written a number of books. One of his more recent books is called Crossing the Zone of Fear. And so a few weeks ago, I was thinking about different podcast topics to do and I thought fear. And I'm oh yeah, John. So I called up John, I said, hey, let's do a podcast about fear. He's like, okay, let's go. And that's how John is. You just, let's do it. And so we didn't have any notes. Normally I'm very prepared for podcasts. I know sort of like three or four questions I'm going to ask right out of the gate. Really had no idea what John and I were going to talk about other than fear. And so it was really fun and really just we were sort of zigging around and there's some continuous improvement talk about fear. But that's really just at a basic human behavioral aspect, like, what is fear? Why are we scared of things? And what can we do about it? Because, you know, if that's a skill that all of us could learn how to be better at dealing with fear, then, gosh, I think there's so much more that we could accomplish in this world. Anyhow, show notes can be found over@gembapodcast.com look for episode 4. 93. Also, thank you so much. I know we've made a push recently to scroll down on that app and hit those five stars on whatever you're listening to and leave their little review. And I know a number of you have done that and I really do appreciate that. So if you don't mind, while you're listening, go like on the Apple app for Example, you gotta. It's kind of weird. You gotta keep scrolling down. It's kind of hard to find. But if you keep scrolling down, you'll see all the links to this show, but then you'll see a little review section, hit the 5 stars if. If you think it warrants 5 stars, and then leave a little review, like what you like about it and you know, that sort of thing, because it does help the show because apparently it'll. It'll pop up more in the. The algorithms and all that. And that's really why we do this podcast. We obviously don't charge for this podcast or anything like that, but we're trying to reach people who maybe don't even know what continuous improvement is about because we are passionate about spreading this. This movement of ours because it will make the world a better place if we all learn how to make it better. So, anyhow, thanks for that and, yeah, let's get to the show. John, welcome back to the show. How are you?

I'm doing great. Thanks for inviting me back.

Yeah, man, I'm excited for this one. It's an interesting topic. I don't. I mean, we may have touched on this a few times over the previous 490ish episodes, but not a lot because it's not a topic that a lot of people talk about, but it's important because it's all around us. So. Well, before we get into the whole topic of fear, which is what we're going to be focused on, what's your quote, John?

So my quote is very appropriate for the topic. And a favorite of mine, everything you want is on the Other side of Fear by Jack Canfell. Let that sink in. Yeah.

Yeah, it's pretty deep. You could sit there and think about that one a long, long time now. Do you think it's completely true?

I think it's absolutely true. You know, I. I spent some time putting together my book that I released in January on becoming unbelievably successful. And over and over again, as I did my research, the number one thing that holds people back is fear. A lot of people call it limiting beliefs, but it really boils down to fear. Some type of fear, specifically professional fear is holding you back. And a lot of times we don't even realize it.

I want to dive so deep. So we're going to go wide and deep on this one before we do that, John, just in case people haven't heard. Heard you on a previous episode, I think most Recent one was 478 where we talked about the discovering your purpose. So that'll be a fun one for folks to go back and listen to. And you've been on a number of other times as well. So we'll get Jessica to link everything up below.

But.

But who is John Knotts?

And.

And how'd you get into all this stuff that we're into?

Well, I've been. I've been working in the field of organizational excellence, operational excellence, since 1998, when I retrained from being a cop in the Air Force to what they call manpower and quality. And I've been doing that ever since. And working with businesses on many different topics to improve how they operate. A lot of it has to do with process improvement, but there's a lot more to it. A lot of strategic planning, a lot of organizational improvement activities like employee engagement and change management, culture building, those kind of things. But I've been doing this for a long time and came to work with gemba back in 2021. Wow.

Time flies.

It's actually been two years now. Wow. Yeah. We're just. September of 2021. I started right. Right around Labor Day, like the week before Labor Day.

Wow.

It's actually been two years. Yeah. Working. And we've. I was just going over. This is the coolest thing. I was going over all of my files for all of the coaching candidates that have gone through the Lean Six Sigma program, which there are over 300 now that I've worked with in the last two years. And I take a lot of notes, you know, because you got to keep up with all these. And over the weekend, I saw that 82% of the candidates, from the moment they start the certification path to somewhere within that they get promoted or a new job. And I'd like to think that when businesses see somebody stepping out and investing in themselves, maybe it's because it's a program that they signed up for or something they just decided to do on their own. They recognize that and they recognize that and invest back in the employee. Yeah.

Well, I mean, it happened to me, you know, back in my corporate world. I mean, every time I got a different level of certification. It did. It just opens up new doors. And I also think just tying back to the whole fear topic, you know, I remember feeling really empowered after I got my. In particular, my black belt. That's the one that really, even master black belt was. Was great. But just that step into black belt, like, I mean, because I had a really strong project and ended up winning a big quality award at Nokia, I went to Finland and presented and the first American to win it. And I mean that was a huge point in my, in my career. It really to sort of launch me into this. I mean, I was already in that sort of continuous improvement world a little bit, but boy, you know, it just opened up the, the floodgates at that point and it was a. I don't think I would be talking to you here as with Gemba Academy and all that if I. Well, I know I wouldn't if that. If that didn't happen, you know, so it's not meant to be a commercial for go to Gamma Academy certification, but it is meant really to, you know, encourage people to keep growing and keep developing and improving yourself. Right.

I guess the, the key question is that there was some decision that you had to make that allowed you to be there. And I'm sure that there were points where you were like, I don't know this stuff. I don't know if I'll. I'll be as good as those other people that I see.

Yeah.

And this is the kind of thing when I talk about professional fear that we. I mean just getting up here, this is just an example of it. When you get, when you start getting involved in process improvement, you are going to be facilitating teams. And if you don't feel confident in the knowledge that of process improvement, how to lead somebody through something as simple as a. A cause and effect diagram which to somebody that's brand new in it, it's not. And you're gonna get scared because I know there's many times where I sat with a book next to me. I had one of those little qpc.

Oh yeah, I got a bunch still on my.

I have them. They're right behind me right now. But I, I have paper clips and tape flags and the one that's just all tools. And I know that I've gone to meetings in the past with that because I was terrified that somebody was going to ask me a question on how to do something that I was going to try to do. But that's the whole difference between like how you overcome the fear, you move past it or you say, you know what, it's just too hard.

Yeah.

And I'm not going to do this. Mm.

So. Okay, well, let's, let's jump in. I mean, I am genuinely curious and I don't. I kind of embarrassed that I don't know the answer to this. But like, why did you decide to, to spend so much time on that whole topic of fear? I know it did come up in some of your research. But was that the. The main reason or is there some other reason that you were so interested to devote so much energy towards towards that topic?

Well, back in 2019, I went to go work for myself and I started. I'd worked with a lot of businesses over the years, but I had started to actually coach individuals. And personally, I built my, what I call personal strategic plan, PSP. I built that in 2000. It was rough and just draft on the back of a napkin type of thing, but I stuck to it for the last 23 years, going on 24 years, and that's made a huge difference. So I've been imparting that to individuals on how to find your purpose, which what we talked about the last time, and then develop a plan to get to a vision. So during COVID it just kind of hit me that, boy, I really should just write a book on this. And that's what becoming unbelievably successful was all about. And of course, whenever you write a book, you got to do a lot of research, because no matter what, you know, you don't know enough. So I was doing a lot of deep research and just the topic of fear just kept coming up over and over again. And I tend to write about the things I'm researching, especially the things I'm writing about in LinkedIn and social media. And, you know, I post every day on LinkedIn, which. Oh, by the way, that's a huge fear of some people. But I work with this nonprofit organization called Executive Book Review, and the president of it had seen my posts over and over again. He doesn't comment on stuff, but he reads it and he calls me up, which he likes to call people, not email them. And he said, you're really talking a lot about fear. I really like what you're talking about. Let's do a special presentation for Executive Book Review on the topic of fear. And I was like, wow, that sounds like a great idea. So that was two years ago. And we couldn't find space on the calendar for a special event last year, so they decided they were going to have it this year. And I went out and I started to do some research on books because. Or Executive Book Review. So we're going to talk about books. And I found out that there's not a whole lot written on the subject. And then I started to realize that nobody really talks about it, which you said in the very beginning. Nobody ever talks about fear. They're like, there's actually a phobia of fear. Phobophobia. You know, a fear of fear. And I think people are afraid to tell other people that they have fears because it's going to make them feel like they're less so. I think the last time that we talked, I was working on my book and I was. I had just hit the publish button or something, but I wrote a book in 22 days on that's called Crossing the Zone of Fear. So that I had a book to showcase that really focused on fear and how to overcome it. And in the book, there's 15 exercises that you can use either one time or on a regular weekly basis to deal with fear. But it also explains why it's happening and what causes fear and the fact that we all experience fear. We experience it all the time. And some of us just handle it a little bit better than others. We're a little bit more conditioned to it. But we all. And that's. I think the biggest thing is that people who think that they're alone in their fear are not. Yeah.

Like, so from a human behavioral perspective, like, what are. I know there's not one answer, but what are some. What are some of your thoughts on why fear exists? Like, maybe we could, like, take an example, you know, like, you know, I know people who are very fearful of uncertainty. Right. If there's uncertainty, which. That's what life is. Right. We don't know what's going to happen when you get in your car to drive home. Right. But uncertainty can wreck some people more than others. Some people are more comfortable dealing with uncertainty, and some people are not. Is that a form of fear?

It is fear of uncertainty. It's absolutely a fear. So fears. Fears come from a lot of different places. Generally in our upbringing, there are things that happen or there are things that we're told it might be. It might come from a socioeconomic background, but there. A lot of things are ingrained to stuff that happened to us generally when we're younger, but it could happen to us later in life as well. And a lot of, well, all post traumatic stress situations is really a fear, a fear of something that had happened or a happening in a regular. It's constantly happening. And you know, here at our horse farm, we work with veterans with post traumatic stress, and they're. They've experienced things and they're afraid that those are going to come back. So it affects them. And that's really what PTS is all about. But it's. Fears come from something that happened to us, something some way that we were conditioned in the past and we May not even realize it could be something that. Just the way we were brought up. But then we, you know, we experience it differently because of the fact that one, we don't know how to handle it. And when we do learn how to handle it, it's a lot easier because you can kind of look fast. I've had a lot of experience in change management, two major certifications in change management. So I understand that fear of uncertainty. Most people want change, but they just don't want it to happen to them.

Yeah.

So it's, I mean, like, I get it and it's. It. You're worried that your job's going to go away, that people aren't going to need you anymore and this kind of change that is happening might affect everything in your life and you're not confident that you can even do or follow through with what's going on.

Right, right. Well, even just thinking about, you know, like Maslow's hierarchy of needs, Right. What Phil, was it physiological needs? Right. Like at the base of the period, like we need food and water and.

You know, basically the psychological needs is safety and security. Those are key. I mean, obviously we need air to breathe, we need food to eat, we need water to drink. Those are the, those are the physical needs, but the psychological needs. But then, I mean even. And several years ago I published a book called Overcoming Organizational Myopia. And it was really about working, working through siloed organizations. All businesses in the world have silos. We, we create silos. We purposely do that. We create sales departments and marketing departments and operations departments. And then what happens is that this thing called organizational myopia, short sightedness starts to creep in and people stop thinking about the whole business and they only think about the silo. And our response is to tear down the silo. But when you think about what's going on in that kind of environment, it's all about fear. Fear that I'm going to lose some of the control that I have or that somebody's going to get something more than me or you know, like, you name it. There's a million things out there that could be at, you know, at risk there.

Right. What do you think the relationship is between worry and fear? Like worrying about something? I worry about my, my daughter going out, you know, dancing with her girlfriends because they're going to be out late. So I worry about her. Right. Is that the same thing as fear or so.

Well, I will say that I, I believe that worry is a waste of effort. If you're concerned about something Then take actions to do something about it. If you. When we either choose not to take actions or we can't take action, then we worry about it because we feel like it's out of our control. Yeah, but when you. I created something, a saying that I've used for a long time now, is that everything that ever has happened to me or will happen to me is my fault. And a lot of people are going to say, well, John, everything is not your fault. I mean, like somebody rear ends you, it's not your fault. Well, I was driving on that road. I chose to leave at that time. Everything really is my fault. And when you own something like that, it gives you power. When you don't feel like you have power, then you worry. You're concerned. Is worry and fear the same thing? No. Unless there's a specific thing that you are fearing is going to happen. But worrying about, it's more like the fear of uncertainty. I'm worrying about something. I don't even know what I'm worrying about. But with all fear, the first thing that I always say is name it. If you can figure out what it is you really are afraid of. A lot of times the unrealisticness of it goes away and you're like, well, that's really silly. Why was I afraid of that?

Yeah, I mean, I, I've, I've, I've tried to do this, not always successfully, but. But I've also heard other people doing it, like looking at a particular situation, almost like a FMEA type approach, you know, where you look at something like, okay, well, how could that thing go wrong? Right? And then if it does go wrong, how bad is that? Right. And then, you know, what, what could you do if it happens? Right? So you're sort of war gaming it, Right. And so maybe in a way you could do the same thing with, okay, I am. I fear this. Okay? Imagine that happens 10 minutes from now. What are you gonna do? You know, will you survive? Right. Like if it kills you, then it doesn't really matter, Right. You're gone.

Right.

But if it doesn't kill you, right.

Like, well, well, and even what's, what's the likelihood of it actually happening?

Yeah.

You know, that's the other component of it is how, you know, how likely is this really to happen? Right. So here was the thing. I. When I was a kid, I read in an article, I think I was at like a doctor's office or something with a family member, but I read this article in a magazine about swimmers drowning in. In like lakes because their legs got entangled in seaweed. I became terrified of swimming. I was terrified because I thought I was going to drown. And when I really look back on that and why I was fearful, it's because people were dying because they got their feet tangled up in seaweed. And I'm like, well, what's the likelihood of that happening? Especially in like this, the pool at ymca, right? So I mean like the real, the reality of that just kind of went away. And I, I kind of, when I have something that really bothers me, I tend to face it with an unrealistic level of effort. So I went and took a water safety class and I to become a lifeguard. I'm terrified of swimming, so I'll just face it. I was terrified of public speaking and I went and took two speech classes at the same time in college. Terrified of it. And I was like, I'm going to get over this. It's just I'm going to face the fear and realize that really my mind is playing tricks on me.

So is that your recommendation? So you've named the fear and then do you next recommend attacking that fear or is there something else? Are you ready to take the next step in your lean journey now? You can. During one of our premier in person Gemba Academy workshops held at our training center in Keller, Texas, our certified instructors guide you through the process of taking your lean knowledge and applying directly to your industry with real actionable steps that will benefit you and your organization. Whether you're a seasoned lean practitioner looking for inspiration or just starting out, we have the perfect workshop for you. Sign up@gemba events.com that's gemba events.com and then do you next recommend attacking that fear or is there something else?

There's a lot of things that you can do. Well, first off is sometimes my approach to chasing a fear down is probably not always the best. That is one way of doing it. But you could chip away at the fear. So my wife and I, we were going to go on a cruise the Panama Canal and we wanted to go ziplining. She's afraid of heights. So she went, she got some hypnotism. So getting some support. There's a lot of ways that you can get support out there. Then we went over to the main event and they have that ropes course where you can go up and she went up there. She had. Her nephew actually worked there, so he was able to get us in for free. And we got to spend some time and she felt really confident. And then we went out and we did some things that were at heights that, you know, she got to explore and overcome her fear. Is it completely gone? No, as a matter of fact, when we went out ziplining, there was a point in there where she had to cross. Cross this big open area and she was really scared, but it anyways almost passed out, but she still did it. And you know, she talks about that since then. She still has the fear. I believe that we never really get rid of the fear. I'm always. I always feel fear when I'm about to get up in front of a group and speak. Now, fear is actually an emotion. It's energy. And I've learned that I can turn that energy into excitement instead of like some debilitating issue that I can't. Can't move forward. So I get really energized by the fear. And that's. How do you change your. That energy into something positive is another way to look at fears. Getting help, listing out what are the small steps that I can do to overcome this and be able to face my fears. Or like me, just charge right in and say, you know what, it's not real.

Yeah. You know, you mentioned earlier about how fear can happen when you're. Something happens to you when you were a kid or you experience something as a kid. It is so true. Like, I. One of my fears is snakes. I just, oh, I don't like snakes. And I'm going to tell you why. I know why. I was in, oh, maybe third grade, I don't know, third, fourth grade, something like that. So we're at my buddy's house, Quinn Landis. I've lost touch with Quinn, but maybe you're out there, Quinn.

Good guy.

I don't mean to call him out here on the podcast, but I went over to Quinn's house, sitting on his, on his bed. We were just sitting there messing around. And he had this aquarium thing, you know, full of little snakes, probably garter snakes or something. They're just completely harmless, right. I had a hooded sweatshirt on. I remember it's like it was yesterday. And I'm sitting there and I don't know, playing a video game or something. And he took one of those snakes and he put it in the hood of my hoodie. And this snake starts flipping around in my hood. And I remember ripping my sweatshirt off. Ran out the door, jumped on my bicycle, went home. And I don't think I ever stepped foot back into Quinn's house again. Rest of my life. I was still his friend and all, but. But I can remember that feeling of that snake flipping around in my thing. So, like, from this day, I'm 50 years old, people, and I still hate snakes. I tell my wife, I said, maybe you're on your own if the snake any. So that's so true. You know, like, I don't know, maybe I should go learn how to be friends with snakes. But. Oh, gosh.

Well, you know, if you really wanted to step into that and say, I want to overcome this and, you know, I think there's a difference between fears of things like snakes or height or something like that. Where there is, you know, generally. Yeah, there's, you know, you don't want to play with a rattler.

Right, right, right.

Be scared of a real. That is real fear and fear. You know, that the whole purpose of fear is to be a warning system, keep you alive. Yeah, exactly. So, you know, like, hey, you have to be concerned about this. But if you're like, you know, I'm probably not really, you know, I'm not really going to die if I touch, like a gardener snake or something like that. There are ways to work yourself back into that. Now the question is, is that really holding you back from anything?

Yeah, no, not really. I mean, my family, I would. Right. I wouldn't like it.

And you probably surprised what you would do if faced with the situation of having to protect others. But the, the thing that I. I often worry about is when people, they have a fear and it prevents them from stepping forward to something that they need. The biggest one is the fear of public speaking. So when I. I've seen many people who have just not taken a role in any kind of leadership because they know they're going to have to stand up in front of people and talk. And that right there demonstrates an inability to move forward and be successful in your career, in your life. And that's the kind of thing that, you know, you really need to overcome. There's a group here, you know, right here in San Antonio, they have the. The military, the Air Force has a lot of their training facilities. Basic training is housed here, but they also have a lot of flight training here. And they've stood up an organization that is designed to help kids get involved in flying. So hopefully that when they graduate from high school and go on to college, that they'll be thinking about maybe going into ROTC or, you know, becoming a pilot in the. In the Air Force. So they created this program and they go around the country and they involve all these kids in this stuff. The number one fear that they have is doing the solo flight. And you have to be able to do that to complete the program. And a lot of them don't make it. And that right there is an example of how fear is stopping you from achieving the thing that you really dream about becoming, doing in your life. So that's the, that, that's the reason why I focus on this is really. It's about the fears that hold you back.

Yeah, Yeah. I think I want to get your opinion on this. Like, for me personally, and I haven't studied it or anything like that. I've just tried to navigate this thing called life, you know, and like all of us are. I find for me the times and the situations to where I am not fearful is when I'm prepared. You know, like, I think about, like, I coach of a lot of sports teams, my kids teams over the years I've coached. You name the sport, I've probably coached it. The most intense that I ever did was high school football. I wasn't the head coach, but I was offensive coordinator for a team. And in Texas, high school football, as, you know, like, that's. You don't mess around, man. You know, and there was like, there was incredible pressure, right, for every game and, and, and, but I wouldn't call it fear, you know, I mean, there was butterflies and all the rest of it, but we were ready, you know, we were prepared and I put the work in and I kn, you know, win or lose, we were going to give it our best shot.

Right.

And. But there's been times to where I've gone into situations to where maybe I probably could have prepared a little bit better or, you know, you go, you got to go take the test, you know, in school and you didn't, you didn't study, you didn't prepare. Yeah, you better be a little bit scared, you know, because, you know, you might get grounded and not go out Friday night. You know, there's real repercussions here. Right. But what do you think about that as far as the role of preparation and how that could be a potential countermeasure to fear?

Well, it. Absolutely. Preparing yourself for it. Understanding, of course, understanding what it is that you're really afraid of. Again, I'll go back to the very first step. Name the fear. Understand the fear. Break it down. What is it really preventing you from doing? Does it really matter? But one of the big things I think people face is imposter syndrome. And imposter syndrome is kind of like a dual edged sword. In one way, your Fear is telling you that you might not be ready. And people who sometimes blindly go into doing something without preparing themselves appropriately might be actually applying the Dunning Kruger effect where you are completely confident in your abilities and they aren't there. Yeah, but then there's the other side of it where you actually are confident in doing something or competent in doing something, but you're not confident in it and it holds you back. And I think that that's. People experience that a lot and they're just not sure because they maybe have never done this before. I'm sure when you had the first opportunity to come in and be that assistant coach, you were probably thinking to yourself, am I really ready for this? Right. And you said, you probably looked back and said, you know what, I've coached this and this and that and I, you know, like worked in all these system fields. Yes, I'm ready. And were you? Maybe not 100%. Okay. But this is how we overcome that issue. We tend to go back, as I always say, and when you're trying to learn something, first level is reading and listening to a course or getting the information from an instructor. You know, it's basically I'm absorbing. The second level is to take notes about it, write it down in your own words. The third level, and this is the one that terrifies people, is to teach it back to somebody else. Because when you do that, suddenly you realize that maybe I don't know everything and I might get asked a question that I don't know and I'm going to look stupid and I don't want to do that. And that is in essence imposter syndrome. Yeah, I know this material but I don't know if I'm confident enough to really teach it to others. So that's where anytime that we do anything new, we're facing that. And again it takes you, you mentioned Maslow. It takes you back to things like the esteem layer. And I don't want to lose my personal self esteem, so I don't do that. But in not doing it, I'm destroying my self esteem because self esteem and self confidence go hand in hand.

Yeah.

So those are, that's a huge double edged sword that people have to deal with.

Yep, yep. Well, you even think of like, I mean with your military background and you think about, you know, Special Forces type operators. I mean these folks are doing stuff that human beings weren't really designed to do. Right. And they enter into it and I gotta believe it is be due to their training and their preparation and their Mindset and their ability to control their, you know, control all aspects of their physiological abilities, whether that's through breathing or whatever. But, but really it comes down to had they not put all those reps in, right, and, and all that training and all that mindset work that well, they would fold just like anybody would. But they don't. Right. And so those are fascinating people to me just to. Seeing how, how, how they operate and how they've, how they prepare, really.

When I went into the, when I went into the Air Force, the very, you know, you're going through basic training, I was going to be a cop in the Air Force. That was my career field. That was after basic. And they come in and they look for people that potentially could be Air Force special ops, so either pararescue or combat controller. These are the red. They wear a red beret and they, you know, they know how to do a lot of stuff. And I, you know, raised my hand, said, sure, I'll take the tests. And I remember that one of the tests was swimming. And I was like, man, I'm going to fail this. But I. You had to. I don't even know how many links of the pool you had to swim. I don't really. I don't believe that there really were any specific numbers that you had to hit on anything that you did, calisthenics wise or anything. I think really what it was is they were looking to see how much grit that you had. But I swam. I did the sidestroke the entire time and just slowly. I don't know if it was timed or anything. And I would look at, as I would do the sidestroke, I would watch this, basically the instructor or whatever he was, and he would walk and he would watch people the whole time. And I'm just sitting there swimming and women. And when I found out later that officially, I don't know if this is actually true, but everybody says it, that you actually have to pass out underwater because you have to rely on your buddy to save you and Special Forces. And that's kind of like the washout point where most people that are in the program wash out. And I was like, no, you don't.

Want to have that, huh?

I mean, like, I have too much of a fear of swimming to begin with, but that was one of the things that I'm just like, I couldn't believe that they had selected me to move forward in the program. They. They called out, there was probably like 25 of us, 30 of us, and it was whittled down to a small group for the swimming. And then I was one of two that was selected at the end and I turned it down because what I had learned and whether it was true or not, I was like, I'm not doing that.

Yeah. Why? Were you scared of that or were.

You fearful of that passing out underwater? Just like, that's my drowning scenario coming right back to me. Yeah. So it was like, yeah, I just not gonna do it. Yeah, it was interesting because no, no, I don't regret any decisions I made in the past because I wouldn't be who I am today if I had made those. I don't know who I would have been, but I don't regret them. The reason why I wrote Becoming Unbelievably Successful is actually I wrote it for myself. So hopefully I would have learned things that I think people in high school and college need to learn. But because I didn't even know about the career field that we're in, it never came up on a radar anywhere. And things like that, like, boy, if I had known to dig a little bit deeper into things, I might have found this. Which I didn't find until like 1990.

Yeah.

And started in 98.

So maybe to wrap things up, John, how about we, we circle all the way back and back to continuous improvement and something that I know you and I are both passionate about, scientific thinking, otherwise known these days, Toyota Kata. Mike Rather popularized that wording when he wrote the book. But just the sole idea of experimenting against obstacles as we work through that so called threshold of knowledge that, that place where we don't know, like how do you see things like scientific thinking working itself into helping people overcome what they're scared of or what they're fearful of?

Well, in process improvement, the thing that people I think are most scared of is the change that's associated with it. The minute that you decide that you want to make this better is the minute that you accept that what you're doing isn't good enough. And people don't really like that. They want to believe that they're doing a great job and it really can't be any better. But when you come to grips with the fact that work can, can be continually improved and I mean there's. Until the, the true Shangri La of Lean exists where nobody touches it, the minute the customer orders it, it's available and it doesn't cost anything to make it like that's perfect. Right. But when people are faced with the challenge of I'm going to have to have I'm going to have to change what I do. Then they get scared. And that's, I think, the one thing that we have to address in scientific method that when we're. That the first thing is we have to overcome our fear of the unknown. And we have to understand that it can always be better. Once we know that, then it's not as bad. And honestly, there's so many opportunities when you do improve things. I talk about business transferable skills and if you get good at problem solving and improving things, then you're a commodity to a company.

Yeah.

And you figure out that everything is a process and everything can be improved. Then you can look at anything and it doesn't matter. You know how to do it, you'll learn that. But improving it and then you have skills that can't be replicated easily.

Yeah, for sure. Oh, good stuff, man. Hey, John, if folks want to connect with you, obviously LinkedIn is probably one of the best places to go.

Yeah. So LinkedIn is, is definitely the best place. John. John knotts gain o tts on LinkedIn. My moniker is Success Incubator. I incubate success of others. That's what that's really my purpose is about promoting the success of other people and celebrating that success, whether I had something to do with it or not. But I post out there every single day. I'm very active. I contribute on other people's posts. I love to create discussion. Some of it's a little bit creating angst, but that's okay because it creates discussion. Ye. I like people to think through stuff and I challenge them at times. I'll challenge them on my posts and I'll challenge them in my comments. But that's so that we can dig deeper into things so they can definitely reach out to me. And I know that, you know, social media, especially LinkedIn, is a fear. There's so many fears around that. I know people right now, today that won't post and won't comment on people's posts because they're afraid. So don't be afraid. Say hi.

Yeah, yeah. Start by commenting on John's post if you're scared. Right.

Exactly.

Good, good. All right. Well, yeah, we'll link to everything. Everybody just scroll down on the app there, whatever you're listening on. And we'll have, we'll have John linked up there and we'll link all your books as well. Well, so you know, you're, you get more done than probably 10 people that I know combined. John, you're, you're kind of a machine, man. So I'm so thankful.

Process.

It's all the process. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I admire it though, so thank you for everything that you do, John. All right, well, until next time.

Awesome. Well, thank you very much again. I always enjoy coming on here, having conversations.

Yeah.

Especially open ended ones like this one.

This baby. We didn't have any notes. Nothing, man. We're just like talking about fear. I was like, okay, let's do it.

Good stuff.

All right, take care, John.

Okay, thanks.

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