GA 636 | Taking Control of Your Life with Joel Steele

It's like most things in life. It's simple in theory, but it's hard to execute. But when you understand that, hey, this is going to work and you believe in that process and you don't have doubt in yourself, you make so much more progress. You build momentum because that's what progress ultimately is.

Today I am excited to welcome Joel Steele to the show. Now, as you'll hear, Joel has written a book called Life Switch, and we really just sort of dive into the book and what what it's all about today on the episode. And now, full disclosure, it's not maybe a traditional sort of continuous improvement book, although I feel like the things that he's talking about are 100% aligned with the things that we're trying to accomplish within our community. But we really just kind of get into how to really take control of our lives as human beings. And that's a big, huge topic, right? Like, what does winning look like in your life and my life? And so we really kind of get through many mechanisms of how to go about that because obviously it's a very daunting task. We also get into the whole idea of failure, and, you know, within our, again, our Lean world and our continuous improvement world, we often talk about, you know, fail fast and learn your way forward, right? And, and so we really kind of dive into that, and Joel gives some really nice context and some ideas for us to consider in that realm. And then, um, you know, obviously this book is— he would consider it probably in the sort of self-help area of the bookstore, but it's not your typical self-help book. And so we really kind of get into why that is and who could best, you know, benefit from this book. So really good stuff. I think you're going to enjoy this one. I know I did. Show notes can be found over at gemba podcast.com. This is episode 636. Again, gemba podcast.com and look for episode 636. Okay, enough for me. Let's get to the show. Joel, welcome to the show.

How's it going? Ron, thanks for having me. It's going really well. Thank you.

All right. Where are you calling in from?

Coming from South Jersey. So I've been here my whole life. I hope to post bail and get out of here someday. But it is, it is a convenient part of the world to be in because I can get to anywhere in the world, multiple airports, but the taxes sometimes and the weather are the trade-off.

Yeah.

Yeah.

All right. Well, welcome down to Texas anytime, man. You know, we love, we love welcoming. We get a lot of folks from the— I'm from Ohio originally, so. Yeah. So a little hot in the summer, but yeah.

Well, I love Texas, especially Austin, and great, great football and basketball and Really good stuff there. Obviously, it's a massive state, but every time I'm there, I enjoy it.

Yeah, yeah. Good stuff. All right. Well, hey, Joel, as you know, we like to begin all of our episodes with our guest sharing a quote. So what do you got?

One of my absolute favorite quotes is from Mark Twain, and he said, the two most important days in your life are the day you're born, number one, and the second day— a lot of people have not figured this one out yet— is why they're here, figuring out why you're here. And so I'm really passionate about the second part of that because everyone's here who's listening to this, but why are you really here? And that is where it comes down to who are you?

I like it. I like it. All right, well, let's just jump in. So I'm wondering, so we were kind of brainstorming a little bit early on as far as direction to go with this podcast. And I guess really the first thing that I want to ask is just really on the idea of just positivity, optimism, that sort of thing. Has that been an important part of your life, or what do you think about that?

Yeah, it's huge. There's so many great sayings. Where focus goes, energy flows. Whatever you focus on is where every part of you is going to be. And I do believe, and it's something I learned in in driving school, performance driving school from BMW, probably 20 years ago. They said when you're going around a curb, whatever you're looking at with your eyes, that's where you're going to gravitate to this several thousand-pound vehicle. And I never forgot that. It stuck with me. So, whatever you're focusing on, your whole body mentally, physically is going to shift towards that. So, if you're focusing on something negative, negative energy, that's what it's all going to be. And same can be said for everything positive. But the interesting thing about my life and my story is I talk about the 3 Ps that I'm living all the time— maximizing potential, living with passion, and purpose, which goes back to that quote, why you're here, who you are, your purpose. But those are the 3 Ps that I talk about all the time. Before that, Ron, I was living the 3 Fs. For much of my life, I was a failure, a follower, and I was almost a felon. And so I was able to have a pivot point or what I call a life switch moment where I just got tired of living an average to below average existence. And I said, enough, I want to be that guy. I want to be able to achieve and accomplish. And I started to ask myself the question that your listeners should ask yourself, and it's, why not me?

And why not now?

And that really was the beginning of the change of my life, going from average to below average to really above average in everything that I started doing from that point forward.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. So, so really, maybe back up because I already messed up my standard work here. So tell us a little bit about your background then before we— I know obviously you've written a book, but tell us a little bit about who you are as far as your background. And then, and then we'll get into Life Switch, your book.

Yeah. Today I'm a motivational speaker. I'm an author. I run a very successful financial practice. I'm a family man. I'm at every family event. I'll be at a family event tonight watching my son play tennis. And I'm loving life and I just want to keep on doing this. And oh, for fun, I own part of a few professional sports teams, basketball and soccer. But hit pause on that for a second, Ron, and go back a bit. I was staring down multiple barrels of guns. Almost dead, 50% chance of being alive. I was taken to—

Like, literally guns were pointed at you or—

Literally, no, literally, like actual guns in my face, triggers cocked back.

Like bad guys or something like that or—

Bad, some bad dudes that I really should not have been around. But because I was drifting towards the energy of the people I was spending time with, I was a good kid hanging out with bad people, getting involved with bad things, and bullets don't discriminate. You know, if you're a good person or not, if you're in the wrong place at the wrong time, you could be out of luck and out of time. And I was also then escorted down to a prison by a police officer, and he asked me which jail cell I wanted to be in, cell block A or cell block B. So before I got into all the positivity and making choices to win and make the most out of life and find opportunity and everything, I was scraping the bottom of the barrel.. And I share this in my story and in my book because it's not a look at me story. It's a, if these are the things that I was able to do, things I was able to achieve from where I had been, I think pretty much anybody listening can realize that they can go higher in their own life personally and professionally because the only limits are the ones that you place on yourself. So you have to remove the governor, the cap, if you will, of your potential, because once you start to see it, you start to realize how unbelievably high it is and how high you can go in your life. So, my passion is to wake people up to get them from living off to living on. And that's why my book and a lot of my keynote presentations are called Life Switch because either the switch is on in your life or it's off. And if it's off, you're wandering around trying to make your way, figure things out. You can't see clearly. You don't have really the energy and clarity that you need to go after a goal. And when you're on, you're excited to be yourself, to get up, to see what you can make happen in a day. You have energy, you have urgency, you have a why, and it makes it all work. It gives you high-octane fuel in your tank to go from where you're at to where you want to be at.

All right. So, let's say somebody says, "Well, that sounds good. So, what do I do?" Like, how do you start? You know, like, what's the best starting point if you want to gain more control over your circumstances and your life and whatever it might be?

Yeah, great question. So, the visual I use, and I want to use this right now because I know this is audio, but picture a puzzle, right? You go to Target, Walmart, or any store and you grab a puzzle off the shelf. And let's just say it's a 1,000-piece puzzle. You get home, you open up that box, and Ron, what is in that box?

Bunch of pieces.

Bunch of pieces. There's no instructions, right? There's simply a bunch of scattered, miscellaneous, messy pieces. But on the front of that box, you have a really big, colorful, crystal clear image of what it's supposed to look like when you're done. And that's all you need. And that's all you get to figure that out. And so, if you look at your life and anyone listening, you have to create that vision. That clear picture of what it is that you're trying to build with your life. So, take that step back, write down and/or draw exactly what you want your life to look like. And then, you're looking at all these pieces every day. When you know what you're trying to build, where those pieces go and when becomes much more clear. And as you take an opportunity each day to put 1, 2, or 3 pieces into where they belong in your life, also sometimes discarding pieces that maybe don't belong in that puzzle, it really helps give you momentum. Because as you make progress on getting these pieces in the right place, you start to see that picture take shape, and then you're excited. I, I— there's a piece that goes here. I think it might be this. Let me try this. Let me turn it different ways. And it really gives you clarity of all the things that you're doing, all the output of your energy. Is this helping me get another piece in place of my puzzle, or is it just energy, negative energy, or a waste of time?

So I guess trying to visualize it here in your analogy then, is it you have to have a vision for what the finished puzzle looks like, right? First.

Yeah, 100%.

And then you gotta, the, the pieces are all garbled up and then we gotta start kind of putting them together, right? So, I guess order of operation is having that vision, right? Of— but when you say your life, like, that's a big thing, right? Like, are we talking professional life or personal life or spiritual life or everything life?

We're talking the whole enchilada. We're talking personal, professional, relationships, right? Spouses, significant other, kids, no kids. You know, is there a pet in the house? I mean, the more vivid you are about this, the more real it becomes in your mind.

And the more real it is, the more the whole element that is you, your body, mental and physical, will gravitate towards that. So you're totally cheating, you're totally working with your arms tied behind your back if you don't have a clear image of what you're trying to build. How can you build something, right? Have you ever seen someone build a house without, without the schematics, without the plan, right? It's going to be a disaster if it even gets built. And so, people are trying to put together this masterpiece, their life, and they're doing it without blueprints. They're doing it without an image. They have no idea what it's supposed to look like. You wonder why it's a hodgepodge for most people. They're doing this in the dark. They don't have the clear picture, bunch of garbled pieces. And, a lot of times, people give up just like with a puzzle because, "Oh, my gosh, I can't figure this out. I have no idea where this piece goes.

Forget it.

I'm going to do something else. I'm going to choose the easy option, do something else," which is going to have no payoff. And people should want hard work because hard work is what leads to the rewards, the results that people want.

A big part of our audience are people who practice what we call lean manufacturing and Six Sigma, or generally called continuous improvement. And one of the tools that we use within lean is called a value stream map. It was first like Toyota and companies like that first developed them many, many years ago. Anyhow, the first thing that we do is we create a, what we call a future state map of like, like what do we want? This might be a manufacturing process or it could be anything, right? And you just draw a picture. What do we want the future state to look like? Then we create, all right, well, what are we doing right now? And we create a current state map and then it's like, okay, we want to go from this current state to this future state. What do we do? Right? And then we just start chipping away at it, right? And so it sounds a very similar kind of framework to what you're talking about. Yeah.

Yeah. And Ron, it's like most things in life, it's simple in theory, but it's hard to execute. But when you understand that, hey, this is going to work and you believe in that process and you don't have doubt in yourself, you make so much more progress. You build momentum because that's what progress ultimately is. It's progress is like the, the caterpillar that morphs into the butterfly because it's progress leading to more progress, which then leads to momentum. Momentum is when you have the wind at your back and it makes these things easier and you can then just keep getting better and more efficient in these processes over time. And so, yeah, you're right, it's the same concept. But look, we're people, we're human, we have emotions. We, we wake up sometimes on a Monday or it's a cloudy day and all of a sudden we have no wind in our sail. So you need something to look at, almost like a pilot light, so you can spark that fire even on those cold, damp, dark, dreary days. Without that, without that catalyst and something to focus on, it's hard to stay on track every day.

Mm-hmm. So let's shift gears a little bit. Some people are deathly afraid of failing, just failure in general. And it can be debilitating for some, right? So what would you say to those folks who are scared of losing, scared of failing?

I love failing. If I was a person to have stickers on my car, I'd probably have a big circular heart sticker that says, "I love failure," because failure is probably the biggest thing that's led to the success that I've had. I didn't want to fail in some other ventures, right? Who would want to fail or lose?. But that's what I needed, right? So it's not so much what we want, it's what we need. Failing gets you to grow up, man up, or woman up, or whoever's listening, and realize that I've got to take responsibility, right? Forget blame. I've got to take responsibility because I am the main character in my own story, right? Everyone is the director, the screenwriter, the producer, the main actor in their own story. And sometimes you need that glass of water in your face or slap in the face or whatever it is. But some people, their back being up against the wall from a failed situation, even a failed relationship, can often be the biggest blessing in disguise. You know, it's like cause and effect, right? That's another thing we learned back in school. That was a simple concept. You need certain causes to create those effects. And so my, my restaurant business failing was the last thing in the world I wanted. Being close to almost $1 million in today's dollars in debt at 24 years old. I didn't want that. Who— what kind of a lunatic would want that kind of failure? But that pressed my back up so far against the wall, like the old Gravitron ride, that I had no option but to put both feet against that wall and push off as hard as I could to get away from it. Because without that, I would have maybe been mildly successful at best. And wouldn't have had all these great things in my life.

So it's like sometimes it's raining, right?

Maybe a better example, it's raining outside and you know how it starts raining and you don't expect it. You try to dodge the raindrops, right? Run to your car, you know, go under the tree, try to use your umbrella that's flipping inside out. And then sometimes you just get really wet. You just can't avoid the rain. You get soaking wet. And what do you do? You just kind of put your arms down, go, okay, you got me, I'm soaking wet. Whatever. And then you just, you just live with it. You deal with it. And sometimes people are trying so hard to avoid the failure, trying to avoid those raindrops. Just let it happen if it happens. You don't aim to fail, but if and when it happens, like, okay, I failed. What's next? How am I going to utilize this loss to get to the next win?

Mhm. Now, maybe another way of saying is fail fast, you know, fail fast and learn. Um, again, like when our community, one of the things that we're passionate about is experimenting our way forward, right? So we're trying to figure out something. It's like, well, let's make a prediction. Let's make a plan, make a prediction. What do you think is going to happen? Well, let's do it. What actually happened? What did we learn? Right? And then we just kind of iterate our way forward, right? And so sounds very similar to what you're proposing.

Yeah. And again, just real quick on that example, you know, if you're soaking wet, there's other people, you know, you might say, hey, I'm already soaking Wait, let me help you get from point A to point B. And so people that, that are sometimes, you know, drenched in failure, it's like, okay, you know, you got me, I'm covered. Same thing in sports. You know, someone sometimes needs to get dirt on their uniform before they go, okay, I'm ready. You know, I got my butt kicked. Now I'm going to return the favor and kick some butt. So same idea. So don't try to run from failure. Try your best to be successful, of course, but recognize that if and more importantly, when it happens, there is opportunity in that failure. And when you realize that and you focus on saying to yourself, where's the opportunity? You keep saying it, where's the opportunity? You're going to find it. And when you find it, that's where you can unleash it and harness it and it'll lead to a better result than most likely if you didn't fail in the first place.

Yeah. Yeah. So I understand that you have an idea of a phrase of living on versus living off. What does that mean?

So again, living on is having this electricity running through your veins because you're excited to use each day as an opportunity to see what happens. Living off is the other half of the population or so who's afraid about that same fact that you never know what can happen in a day. Oh my gosh, what can happen? I might lose my job. Someone might tell me I'm ugly or I'm not good enough. And so, it's looking at the same thing in a different way. So, living on, you have clarity, energy, urgency. You're excited to see what you can do in the 1,440 minutes in a day. And those that are living off, they just want to get through the day. They just want to get the sand through the hourglass so they can get back home under the covers, finish watching their Netflix or whatever it is to get away from themselves and their own reality. And that's not living. That is merely surviving. Living on is thriving. It's seeing what you could do, which, you know, fast forward for a second. Thriving is two components. It's enjoying this world for what it is, right? Because we were put here to enjoy the earth, I do believe. And the other part of that is seeing what you can do while you're here to make things happen on this earth, to maybe make it a better place, because that ultimately is what moves the needle as humans, right? We're social beings. We like to help people generally, like to be resourceful.. And if we're just sitting at home watching reels and videos and getting our paycheck from our dead-end job, we're just simply passing time, not dying, but really just kind of waiting to die because you're not really living. So, everybody understands that they don't want to die, but do they really want to live? And living on is really living. And that's the message I'm trying to sort of shock into people, say, "Hey, wake up. Is this what you had in mind when you were a kid?" Are you living the version, the best version of your life that you imagined? It's okay if you're not. But if you realize that and you don't want that, this is your wake-up call to flip the switch from on to off. It's not too late for anybody.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So, so I just thought of something while you were talking just now. Like, what, what role, if any, do you think, like, personality type plays in all of this? Like, for example, um, you know, I'm thinking someone in my life who's got what we maybe call more of like a melancholic kind of personality versus, you know, um, like one of my daughters is like what we call like a, like a, like a sanguine, right? Like, like, like, you know, just, uh, so there's all different types of personalities out there in the world. Like, what role does that play, if any? And all the things that you're talking about here?

I think it plays a big role because when you understand who you are and how you're wired, right? Because everyone's wired a certain way, right? And I can't tell you, you can't tell Ron people how they're wired. They have to figure it out for themselves. But when you learn how you're wired, what it is that gets you excited and inspired and motivated to do these different things and put in the energy and output, that's critical. So, if you say, well, I'm a helper, right? I like to help people. Well, do you like to help them? Would you be a good nurse? Would you be a good teacher? Would you be a good financial advisor? You know, I like to solve problems or people open up to me. They tell me everything.

I'm a great listener.

So when people start to really think about and describe themselves, they're describing traits I call million-dollar traits that they could take them and utilize them in a professional way and really monetize them. So if you could really understand what you're good at. And I don't mean with your degree, I mean just as a person, right? What you're good at, what you really enjoy doing, and then figure out, is there a way to monetize this?

And that's the key for a lot of people. A lot of people are either on the wrong bus, they're in the right bus on the wrong seat. And you know, this happened to Barry Sanders, right? Famous NFL Hall of Fame running back. In high school, he was a cornerback, a defensive— played against receivers, and he hated it.

He wasn't very good.

And only going into his senior year did he finally have the conviction to say, "No, I'm a running back." And he proved it even though it was an uphill battle. He ended up making such a great choice, understanding who he was, who he wasn't, and became, I would say, one of the absolute best running backs of all time. And it almost didn't happen. Because he was on the right team, right sport, wrong position. And so how many people, Ron, are that close to missing out on their calling because they didn't say something or try something or make that push?

What about, like, when do you think of, like, I was having a conversation with a friend recently just talking about, like, success, you know, like, and what is success? Like, like, I have, I know someone who's— I'm Catholic, so I know this young lady who's a— she's a nun now and a very different life than I live, for example, like a father and a business owner and all the rest of it, right? Million kids. And but for her, her life is a huge success, right? That's her calling, right? So how do you How do you think people should view success, right? Like, like that, that they're winning at life?

Yeah. One word: fulfillment. If you are deeply fulfilled, you are winning life. Doesn't matter how much money you do or don't have. I often tell the story of a friend of mine. He's got a brother. One friend makes tons of money, has tons of money. His brother makes very little money. And my friend, who's very well off financially, is highly envious of his brother because his brother is just happy to be himself, be in his own skin, wake up, do his thing each day, which is a combination of enjoying the world he was born into and also trying to make it a better place. So ultimately, though, because there's a lot of time in each day, people, people work because they have to. And, and when they're doing those things, living with fulfillment, they're going to get a paycheck, sometimes a big paycheck, because they've been able to find a way to monetize that. But even if they're not, that's okay because The amount of money you have is not the ultimate scorecard on life. And so many people— when I say so many, I mean like 90-plus percent— people measure their money success and all that. They measure their money and they look at that as one score, black and white.

And it's not.

I believe— and I run a financial advisory practice and have for almost a quarter of a century. I tell all my clients, look, sure, we want to make money, but the main goal of the money is to simply have enough, not to have the most or more than your neighbor Charlie, but to have enough money to do the things that you want to do that bring you fulfillment and happiness.

Yeah, that's awesome. So circling back to your book, there's a whole genre out there in a bookstore, the self-help section. Would you consider your book in that world, or is it just something different?

It is a self-help book. It's an inspirational book. And it was, it was completely done to try to help people have the wake-up call similar to the one that I had, the life switch moment of really looking in the mirror and realizing I needed to make a change and flip the switch. And I fortunately had some experiences where I knew what it felt like to live on, to feel invincible and believe that anything was, was possible 100% with no doubt. But other people, they haven't had an experience like that.. And so, I'm trying to get them to utilize some of my examples to say, "You know, I did have something similar to me happen like this and I didn't really look at it that way, but yeah, that is a great opportunity or jump-off moment. That was a valuable experience. I can go into the past and extract value to now go into my future." So, it is a self-help book, but I did do it more in a sense of my story because I think people need those examples. They need those vivid retellings of, What happened? Why? When? How? All that stuff. And when you really can see something, right? And I'm that example. You can see what I did. It makes it more believable that you can do that too.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Good stuff. So maybe to wrap things up, I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about— I understand that you have an interesting donation program set up where you're going to be donating some money to some charities. Maybe talk a little bit about that.

Yeah, that's the most exciting part. I mean, I am just so amped up about this. So if my book Life Switch sells 1 million copies, I'm going to personally donate $1 million to charities. I'm so excited. And it's funny too, because I'm a pretty frugal guy. I've never been this excited to write out big checks in my life. And so, people, it's real simple. You buy the book, which you can get on Amazon. It's audio. It's the ebook. It's the hardcover. It's on Amazon. It's on a bunch of places online. You could visit my website, bookjoelsteel.com. And on that site, there's a page where it says $1 Million campaign, the charity. And then you just vote on the website for your favorite charity and the top 10 charities voted for by the readers. I'm not picking the charities. Top 10 voted on charities are going to split the million dollars. So, they'll get $100,000 each. And all people have to do is get a copy of the book, get inspired, be entertained, and then they become part of a 7-figure donation that I would assume most people aren't going to be able to do on their own. So, it's almost like a social experiment that we're doing together. We're showing the power positive power and impact we can have by doing something together. And even if you read the book and you say, yeah, it was good, you know, or that was entertaining, or yeah, I already knew some of that, you're still part of that million-dollar donation. But ideally, people will read it and really change their lives in a positive way and then be a part of that million-dollar donation.

Yeah, that's fantastic. Fantastic. Well, hey, Joel, this has been a lot of fun. I enjoyed the conversation. I'm wondering if you have any sort of final words of wisdom that you want to leave with the listeners. And then if folks wanted to connect with you, what's the best way? I know you gave out your website just now, but perhaps there's other ways as well.

Yeah, the best way to communicate is to go to bookjoelsteel.com and click on the contact link and shoot me a question or a note. If you, if you took something from today and find success with it, you know, that's what I love more than anything is hearing about these seeds that we're planting together, hear about them sprout up. But, but I'll use that same as a closer here. Planting seeds. People often talk about the grass is greener here, there, across the street. The grass is greenest where you plant and nurture the most seeds. So, in your current life as it is, you do not need to tear the house down and move. You might be able to do it right where you're at. So, look at this. Where you're at, is there opportunity? Are you happy? Is there potential? And maybe you can plant more seeds and let those seeds harvest and realize Every day is an opportunity to plant more. They won't all sprout, but some of them will. So keep planting those seeds.

Yeah, love it. Good stuff, Joel. Well, hey, man, I appreciate you coming on. And if I— I'm curious to follow the story as far as like if you get to that million, you know, mark, like, is there a way for people to kind of follow that or track that?

People can follow me on Instagram, which is LifeSwitchOfficial, and also LinkedIn, just under my name, Joel Steele. And I'll give updates as we hit different milestones as we go. But, you know, it's only been about 6 months since the book's come out, and it's off to a really good start. But we got a lot more work to do, and I'm up for the challenge. And again, I'm a guy who believes anything is possible. So we're going to do it.

Got it.

Awesome.

Awesome. All right, man. Thanks a lot. Appreciate you, Joel.

Thanks a lot. Take care.

Thanks for joining us today. We know the path to continuous improvement can be challenging to walk alone. That's why Gemba Academy exists, not just to provide training, but to be your partner in problem solving. Whether you're just taking your first steps or leading a global transformation, our goal is to help you bridge the gap between knowing and doing. Beyond our library of Lean and Six Sigma resources, We're here to coach and guide you through your journey, whether that's through personalized support or joining us for a live training to get that immersive hands-on experience. To learn more, go to gembaacademy.com.