Time for What Matters (Part 2)

Hi, guys. My name is Donnie Rouse and you are listening to the podcast One Life Time for what Matters. It is the. Often the things that you don't have time for that are the most important if you want to live a happy and fulfilling life. I think it's extremely important to identify those things that are not important and urgent and really swap them out for the things that are important, because that's where life is happening. Recently, I picked up the tradition of having coffee with my family and my siblings. Again, to give you an idea of where my coffee ritual was prior to that, I would make my coffee and I would make it. It was my alone time. I would make it. I would sit outside and I would enjoy my cup of coffee or my espresso while I was maybe reading a book or even just looking out into nature. But what changed it? Well, I'll tell you, to be honest with you, Covid changed it. Rather, I should say contracting Covid. So for two weeks, I was in quarantine because I tested positive for coronavirus. And looking back on it, I realized that those two weeks gave me a really, really, really good lesson to bring forward in life in several regards. And I'll go through each of those. One of the first, I was watching this, this documentary on street food in Asia. They, I mean, they, they went through not just Asia, they went to South America, they went all around the world. But no matter where they went, every time they interviewed a stall vendor and they asked him what was their reason behind doing what they're doing. They always said, to make people happy. And when I saw that, I thought about my own business and why I do what I do. Because sometimes, be honest with you, sometimes I would even forget. Like, you get into the routine of just going there, doing the production, going to markets, delivering your coffee that you, I, not you. I would forget what my reasoning was. And that was the thing that got me up in the morning. That's the thing that jived me. But I would forget sometimes. And when I would see this look on the face, it was the idea that it was the interactions that mattered. It was the interactions with the customer, the interactions with your loved ones. So while I was going through this, I had to rely heavily on my siblings and my parents to deliver me food. Even just checking in for, like, mental health purposes. Like, because I was spending all this time in, in a room by myself and just having someone text, say, hey, how are you doing today? There was a point in this journey where I was actually very nervous and I doubted whether I was going to see another day. And it wasn't because my symptoms were so bad. It was just that I allowed my head to go to the wrong place. I allowed myself to focus on the wrong things. From, like, day five, I was in day five of my symptoms or my quarantine, and then I was like, oh, well, let me search online. Let me see where do the worst symptoms happen. Let me search day five to ten. I was like, oh, the worst is yet to come. It put my focus in a negative place. And as a result, I started to kind of spiral downward. Thankfully, I had friends who checked in on me every single day. And whenever I was feeling down, like, I would literally feel my symptoms progressing, but in an instant, I would literally feel myself be picked back up because I was talking with someone. They put my mind at ease again, going back to what's important. There would be times where I would literally be sitting in my bed and I would have tears coming down my face. And I was thinking about how thankful I am to have these people in my life. I looked at every interaction I thought of, like, my accounts, the stores that carry my coffee, and the little interactions I have with. With the managers, the buyers, and that brought tears in my eyes. I was like, man, it's the little interactions that matter most. All this other crap that we worry about doesn't even matter. It's the interactions. It's those moments that matter. And it put things in perspective for me. So out of COVID Out of the. Out of, you know, out of the quarantine, I started making coffee. And rather than running back down to my room to start doing work and going about my day, I made it a point. I said, no, I'm gonna stop. I'm going to stop. I'm going to have. My sister is visiting from New York City. I'm going to have coffee with her. I'm going to have coffee with my father, my mother, and I'm just going to spend that time and enjoy it rather than screwing off because I think I have something to do. That is the biggest trap. Because often, as I said before, it's often the important things that get overlooked for the unimportant things because there's demands being placed on you. So you think you have to do these things. But if you just stop and take a moment, you realize the thing that you are overlooking is the most important of the two. And that is the thing that adds the juice to your life. So the intention of this podcast, the intention of this episode, the podcast, the intention is to Grab you and pull you back into life to make you realize what's really important rather than being told from all these other sources out in the world, this is what you want, this is what you should value to really check in inside with yourself first and say, what matters to me, what is valuable to me, and then come from that place internally and start to live your life. So how do you begin to, you know, to dissect these things and say, okay, well, how do I know what's important? How do I know when I should be putting time here or if it should take a few minutes just, just to do this other thing? Let me start by saying life is not a zero sum game, meaning a lot of time. It's not just one thing or the other, right? So it's not like, oh, I'm gonna be late from work, I don't have time to kiss my child goodbye. No, I mean, if you take a few minutes, right, a few minutes to do the thing, to give your child a hug or whatever, tell your wife you love them, whatever it is, often the response you get back from that, that feel good emotion usually will set you sailing. You'll literally go right into whatever you're doing. And often getting better results than you would have if you were Russian, because you're in a different state. So let's rewind. When you experience this thing of this rush and there's someone's asking you to do something, let's give you, I'm going to give you a few tools, some questions to ask, just to kind of reframe and get you thinking about things differently when you find yourself in that moment. Question one, is this thing, how important is this thing that I'm doing compared to what it is that. It's urgent, right? So maybe it is saying that you are, you know, your, your son wants you to stop by his baseball game, but you're going to be late for a meeting. I don't know, how important is it that you, I mean, of course you probably have to go there, but maybe you can stop by for a few minutes. Like I said, it's not a zero sum game. How important would it be to you as well as to your child? And then this question number two, if you can, say, look back 10 years, if you could look 10 years back, let's imagine we're 10 years in the future. Now you're looking back at the decision that you made. What would you value more? This is a great way to give distance to what it is that's going on in our lives to be able to say, okay, you know what? Yeah, when I look out 10 years, this thing is insignificant. What really matters is connection I have with this person or doing that thing that I've. That lights my heart on fire because I've been wanting to do it for the last decade, like travel to Italy and you know, and backpack around the world, whatever it may be. When you give yourself that distance, you're able to take yourself out of that moment. And when I say take yourself out of that moment meaning like all the shoulds and have to's. Because if you allow yourself to listen to everyone else around you, they're gonna shit all over you. I like that phrase, but you know what I mean. But what I want you to do is I want you to turn in and really understand what are the things that are important to you because that is what's gonna make your life fulfilling. When you come to the end of your life, the, those are the things you're going to look back on and say, wow, you know what? I really wish I did these things. You're not going to look back at the meeting you had to do for work or like the, you know, the, whatever it, I don't even, I can't even make these things up because it's far away from me. But you want to look back and you want to really take an account for what it is that you're going to value in life and start and make your decisions from there. They call it like, I think some people call it like the rocking chair test where you project yourself out at the age of like 90, 100 or something around there, and you look back at whatever that conundrum is that you're facing in life, you say, okay, well looking at this experience, what decision would I make, knowing what I know now, now meaning like the 100 year old you, what would I value more? What would I regret more? Not doing? And you make your decision based on that. That is all I got for you guys today again. So in short, what I want you to do is just value the time that you have with every single person, every interaction. These are the things that matter most. These are the things you as well as everyone else remembers. It's the impact you had on them. I'll go for one little last little rant really good just because I think it'll add to the point I'm trying to make as well as it'll kind of drive the point home for you. So while I was in quarantine, there were times where Like, I felt extremely lonely, and there are times where my head would be getting the better of me. I often describe this thing as like, this downward spiral, like being in that very, very low place. And it's a shitty place to be because you can get there. Everyone. When you think you're high, riding high in life, no, things could change in a moment. You could be in that low place. So before you judge other people, realize that it could happen to anybody. But with that being said, you could also pick yourself up just as easy. And when I say pick yourself up, what I'm really referring to is having somebody else pick you up. The thing that makes life worth living, the relationships you have with others. I had a friend of mine, my friend Ryan, who would check in with me every single day and say, hey, buddy, how are you? Just want to check in, see how you're doing. It made all the difference. And especially there were some nights where I would start to get nervous because maybe there was, like, I felt something different, like in my lungs. And as a result of that, I would call him up, say, hey, you know, can you talk? And he would always give me time. And I'll tell you what, I mean, we were. We're good friends. But after that experience, like, I would take a bullet for the guy, I really would, because I am so grateful for the time that he spent just making sure that I felt good. And as a result of that experience, I realized, like, you know what? I want to do this for other people. So I have friends who are going through the same thing. Friends who had tested positive with COVID 19, and they weren't doing so good. Mentally, they're great now, but at that time, they were going in that same dark place. And because my friend Ryan, I made myself available to them at any point. Listen, if you ever want to talk, give me a call. And I made sure to check in with them on regular intervals. And the same response they gave me back, you know what? Thank you so, so much. You have no idea how much it means to me. It meant to them. So that is it, guys. I want you, in closing, look at what you value. Make sure that you're putting your time where you're putting your time, your energy towards the things that matter most for your life. So that when you look back, you're not regretting where you place that time, but you're doing on things that fulfill you, things that are going to leave you happy and impact others as well. That is all I've got for you guys today. If you enjoyed this, please give it a share. Please consider subscribing to this podcast. This way you don't miss a single episode. I have some great episodes coming up. One with an interview from a man who did five attempts before climbing to the top of Everest with his son. And I'm going to start going into more bucket list items and stuff like that to kind of inspire you to kind of grab more for life with these people who literally grab life by the by the by the baseballs and are literally going at it at full speed. That is it. If you have any questions, you can send me a message via Instagram. Onny D o N N Y R A U s you could sign up for my mailing list at my website, donnyrous.com d o n n y r a u s.com there you could sign up for by signing onto the mailing list, you'll be kept abreast of new events, new webinars, and maybe even trips. When I travel abroad, I'll be inviting a small group of people and that is it. Guys, thank you so, so much for tuning in. I know you could be listening to anything, but you chose to spend your time here with me. I hope I enriched your life and gave you a little bit of a lesson to live going forward. God bless and I will talk to you again soon.