115 - The Life is Too Short Guy: Discover the Most Practical Guide to Happiness with Scott White

Welcome to Listening with Leaders. I'm Doug Noll, lawyer turned peacemaker. I teach executive leaders how to listen to emotions rather than words so that they can become the leaders everyone wants to follow. And I teach those same leaders how to be authentically present, available, and connected to their families despite being insanely busy. I have learned that we are 98% emotional and only 2% rational. Learning how to listen to emotions is, in my experience, the foundational skill of life. Stick around to the end of the show and I'll reveal how you can be on our next guest in 15 to 20 minutes. So let's get started.

Guy Wyatt, welcome to Listening with Leaders. You are the author of a new book called Life Is Too Short, Guy. Life Is Too Short. And the website, the book website is lifeistoshortguy.com. But you are also a CEO and investor and highly experienced business executive with a whole bunch of different credentials. So we're gonna have a fascinating conversation.

Welcome to the show.

Thank you so much for the invite. It's a pleasure to be here, Doug.

Absolutely. So let's start off with a little bit of a backstory. Tell us a little bit about yourself.

So, um, well, today I'm talking primarily about being an author and speaker around this new platform that I've been building called The Life Is Too Short Guy. But if I rewind, how did I get here? Um, you know, I'm married to my high school sweetheart. I have two daughters that are about to head off to college, so I'm shortly going to become an empty nester. Um, those, those are the important elements of my life. The less important but maybe somewhat interesting is I'm chairman and CEO of a public real estate company primarily focused on healthcare-oriented real estate. And I'm also the founding partner of a student housing development company. So that's where I spend my time professionally, though less interesting than talking about my wife, my family, my book, and my imminent— about to become an empty nester. So we can go in any direction you want.

There you go. Well, let's start with the book because it's an interesting title. Life is Too Short. Where'd the inspiration come from?

So I've always wanted to write a book. It's one of those things that is on my long-term bucket list. I wanna write a book. And during COVID I started working with a new executive coach. I'm a big believer in professional development and working with different coaches. And early on in COVID, I'm working with a new coach. His name is Kevin. I talk about him in the book. And, you know, the first meeting is an assessment. He asks me a lot of questions. He sends me some surveys to fill out. The second meeting, he starts exactly like this. I remember he says, Dude, you are Mr. Life is Too Short guy. Everything is rah-rah, get it done today, positivity. And I'm like, yeah, I get that, that makes sense, but I never really kind of construed it that way. And then that night I mentioned to my wife, and this was, um, I guess about 2 years ago, a little over 2 years ago, I mentioned to my wife, and I'm very fortunate we've been together, uh, since high school and she knows me very well, and she says, huh, maybe that's your, your book that you always talked about. Maybe it's the Life is Too Short guy. And I'm like, What would that book be about? It makes no sense. And, you know, in her own little way, she planted that seed, she watered that seed, she, she percolated it. And I started writing, uh, an outline, call it, in early 2021. And then it died, you know. I went for like a month and wrote a couple of pages of an outline. I'm like, I don't know where this is going to go. And then early in 2022, I was watching a webinar and stumbled across a, a Georgetown University professor. His name is Eric Custer, and Eric was teaching Georgetown MBA students how to write a book. And from that, he created a separate company, a separate course that teach people how to write books. And I called him up and I started talking to him. I'm like, ah, you know, I kind of like writing about creating cultures and leadership. And I guess what he heard was blah, blah, blah. And then I was like, and I got this other idea, like life is too short, live in the moment, create, Positivity, gratefulness, happiness. And he's like, that's your book. And I said, Eric, what would that book be about? He's like, I could tell by your energy, we'll figure it out. And that's what happened. I spent all of last year building it out, developing it, and then New Degree Press picked it up and published it earlier this year, became an Amazon number one bestseller. And since then I've been out telling the story both on podcasts and, um, and a lot of in-person settings. I'm trying to build a platform around spreading this message professionally to corporations and conferences and teams and so on and so forth. And having a lot of fun.

So this is very different than being a CEO of a large real estate investment company.

Absolutely. It's— in fact, I've gone out of my way, both in writing the book and in talking about it now, to separate the two. The principles, the concepts are applicable to business, but this is not a business book. This is not a how do you build a great culture. I'm proud of the culture I've built. We've been recognized year after year as one of the best places to work, but that's not what the book is about. The book is a basic Very basic. And in fact, I emphasize that because I don't want people to think this is some esoteric, egalitarian, academic, you know, ivory tower. It's not that at all. It's exactly the opposite. It's a day-to-day blocking and tackling. Wake up and embrace the day. Make the most of every minute. Go out and learn something new every day. Take chances. Enjoy life. Bring these concepts to your team. Bring these concepts to your business. If you're a leader, wonderful. Maybe you're a leader in your family. Maybe you're a leader in, in your, uh, religious institution. Maybe you're wherever it is. You could take these principles and apply them.

And, and so what are some of the principles that you outline?

So there's 10 principles in the book. The first one, the most important one, the foundational one, is attitude is everything, the power of positivity. And I talk so much about the lens through which you view the world and how you approach life and how much of that perspective impacts your overall happiness. And then I tie that to the second principle, which is choose your attitude and own it. Every day when you wake up, you have a chance to set the tone for the day, to choose your attitude, to choose your direction. And what you choose will in part, I think, set the direction, the roadmap for the day. So choose your attitude and own it. The third principle is little things make a big difference. And I talk in there about how such small things— and when I talk about these things, people are always like, Really? Like, that's it? And then, then it sort of hits them. And it's so funny because I was talking to somebody earlier today and I said, all right, little things make a big difference. He said, give me an example. I said, smile. And he looks at me like— and then we talk about it. And I say, well, look, you naturally smile at certain times in your life, but what if you went out of your way and when you woke up you smiled, and when you went down and you had breakfast you smiled, and when you got in your car you smiled, and when you got to the office you smiled, when you passed somebody in the street you smiled, and when you got in the shower— like, I go through all these little things. And he's like You know, just hearing you, it changes my perspective. And that's what I mean. There's so many small little things make a big difference. What about random acts of kindness? When was the last time you went out of your way to perform a random act of kindness to some stranger that maybe you never knew or you'll never know again? And I talk in the book, and I don't talk a lot about research. Again, I want it to be a very practical guide, but I talk about research that demonstrates that recipients of random acts of kindness appreciate that act substantially more than the provider, the giver, thinks they would. Think about how powerful that is. So little things make a difference. Uh, another principle is minutes matter, and there I talk specifically about how to think about your minutes differently. It's, it's not a guide to making decisions about should I spend time reading a book or watching TV, should I spend time working or being with my family. That's up to each person. That's up to you to decide. That's up to each listener to decide. What I tell people to do is think about minutes as a finite resource. We too often get through a day, a week, a month, a year, and we're like, I'm running as fast as I can, I don't know what I accomplished. So, so be thoughtful, be deliberate, be proactive. And the, the visual I give people to think about is I say to people, think about your, the, your remaining minutes, so to speak, as a barrel of minutes. So for me, I think of a wine barrel. I know you're in California, so, so we'll think about Napa, we'll think about a wine barrel, right? And, and in wine barrel, for me, they're little gold coins. And every time I do something, including talking to you right now, Doug, I reach into that barrel and I grab out, and, and I think about it this way, a couple of gold coins, and I reflect, is this the best use of my gold coins? Am I enjoying this use? And the two messages I have for people about this, this metaphor of the barrel is one, we have no idea how many gold coins are in that barrel. We really don't know how many gold coins. So you gotta treat each one preciously. And two, and this gets back to the point I made before, we all have little leaks in our barrel. That's just invariable. And those coins are dripping out the bottom. Be thoughtful and protective in how those coins disappear and use them, them thoughtfully. So those are a couple of principles. I can go through all of them, but, but there are 3 or 4 feet.

I get the idea. I mean, a lot of this stuff is common sense, of course.

Very much.

But why is it, why is it that, why is it that people have— don't have this common sense?

So I think people do. So, so I'm so glad you brought that up because what I want people to realize, and, and I love nothing more than for someone to say, this is obvious, this is common sense. What I think is we get caught up in our daily lives and we don't be thoughtful and proactive in making this a priority. So some people really focus on their diet, right? They wanna be careful what they put in their body and they're, they're very thoughtful and, and predictable in, in their, their diet. Some people spend a lot of time thinking about their physical health. They're like, you know, I'm going to exercise, I'm going to run, I'm going to bike, whatever. I don't think enough of us spend time on our mental health and on the importance of happiness, gratefulness, positivity. Too often, we need that proverbial kick in the head to remind us. And my mission through this book is to tell some of my own personal stories. And I've had some setbacks and— I don't know if I say tragedies, but tragic events I've dealt with. And more importantly, I talk about, I'd say, a dozen or so other people that have had real tragic setbacks, people that have dealt with death of a child, death of a spouse, attempted suicide, um, catastrophic illness and/or catastrophic, um, injuries, and what they learned. And what I want your viewers to take away, and what I want readers to take away, is this is your aha moment right now. Literally, as you're listening to this, I want you to, when you're done, you'll be like, you know what, guy's a little bit crazy and high energy, but there's something here. So I could smile a little bit more. I could go out and chase my dreams today because tomorrow's not guaranteed. And I don't have to read about someone overcoming a major catastrophic event. Today's my day to go out and do this.

Yeah, I like that. I think, I think we live in a culture where we can, we can lose control of our lives too easily.

No doubt.

You know, with the internet and social media and political polarization and career job demands and financial pressure, it's really easy to lose track of the stuff that makes you happy.

No doubt. No doubt. And there's such a cultural bias, I think, particularly here in the US, but probably globally, to focus on negativity, you know, and I throw a bunch of— that, right? It's so much easier. The media is— 90% of all news media coverage has a negative slant. 80% of all thoughts has a negative slant. You look at the rates of depression and they're increasing. You look at the rates of suicide and they're increasing. You know, one of the things I, I mentioned in the book that really is compelling to me is a University of Chicago public opinion study around 2020, 2021. So, so there's a little bit of a COVID taint to this, but Americans are more unhappy than they've been in the last 50 years. Think about that. I know, country greatest time last half century.

And what's amazing about that is, is the economy is doing well. We have super low unemployment, inflation spiked a little bit, but it's coming back down. So it's not the economy. Nope.

We're making major strides and advancements with health, with longevity, like there's so many wonderful things going Why are we focused on the negative?

I think, I think you hit it. I think it's because we've got too many media outlets with lazy journalists who have not been well trained, who focus only on the negative because it's easy. It's much easier to criticize and judge.

No doubt, no doubt.

And then it is to, to be positive and say, look, look at what's going on here. I know in my profession as a peacemaker, you know, peacemaking never gets the news because it's boring. Right. I'm doing my job.

It's boring.

We don't want to read about peacemaking, right?

No doubt. And look, I think about that a little bit with my message too. Is, is this exciting for people? Do people want to hear this? And, and that's sort of something you grapple with because it's, it's more interesting and more controversial if I came on and started spouting out how the world's coming to an end and how we're all living a terrible life and so on and so forth. And that's what people engage with. That's part of why I'm trying really hard to spread this message. Spend more time thinking about positive. Spend more time focusing on today and what is available to you today.

And it's— and to your point, it's not that difficult to shift your attitude.

It's, it's exactly right. You just have to be proactive.

Well, you have to think about it. I mean, I know, I know that I was listening. It was interesting to me to listen to the principles because, yeah, I do that, yeah, I do that, but I didn't used to do that, right? I mean, when I was a— when I was in my career as a trial lawyer I mean, it was, you know, I was being driven by all kinds of different forces and didn't take— this is really about taking time for yourself. 5 minutes a day, 10 minutes, all it takes. But just taking time for yourself and not letting the forces around you push you around. Agreed.

This is self-care. Absolutely agree. Yeah, absolutely agree. And there's real empirical evidence that I talk about in terms of those with a positive attitude have a 75% lower risk of diabetes, live on average 7.5 more years, have a 13% lower risk of death from anything. And I could keep spouting out stats, but that's not important. The point is happy people live longer. Happy people live more engaged lives. You know, one of the principles I talk about in the book that I just love, and I always want to talk about this anytime I talk to people, is it's called Can't Make It Alone. That's the principle, Can't Make It Alone. And I refer to the Harvard study that I think a lot of people have been talking about and focused on lately. I don't know if you're familiar with it, but it's the Harvard study on what makes a good life. The study started in the late 1930s, right? So you're familiar with it, but not everyone is, which is why I think it's important. And the key takeaway— so they followed 700 people over the last, call it, 80-plus years, the longest-running longitudinal study on what makes a good life. What's the takeaway? What is the key sort of the most important thing? The power of social relationships. That's the most important thing. So there's a direct correlation between longevity, happiness, mental health, and social relationships. Less of a tie between diet, between physical health, between hereditary disease. Isn't that amazing? So it is more likely you will live a longer, happier life if you have strong social relationships than if you tie it to sort of genetics or you tie it to illness or anything like that. Isn't that amazing? Yeah.

Uh, I'm not surprised. We're social animals. We're, I mean, we're, our DNA is to be social. And we live in a modern society where that kind of sociability is not so great because we don't live in small tribes or clans anymore. We don't have, I mean, the, how we define our relationships is pretty nebulous. Agreed. And so it makes it a lot tougher in many ways to develop that. But yeah, I can certainly see how that would be a, pivotal, critical factor.

Because again, you have to be proactive with it, right? It gets back to the question you asked before. So it seems so simple, Scott. Make more friends, right? Isn't like there's an epiphany there? No, there isn't an epiphany there. The idea is, as you're listening to this right now, and I've seen people actually do this when I give talks, I want you to write down 3 friends that you haven't talked to in the last 6 months. And tonight, text one of them, call one of them, email one of them. Just say hi, checking in. Send them a picture of the two of you doing something. Send them an article of something that, that matters to them. These are small things to build those social relationships, to invest in it. Again, having friends, that's not the most esoteric, crazy concept. I want to push people to say, all right, well, today I'm gonna do something to strengthen my relationships.

Exactly. So what is it?

What—

you've created your first book. Congratulations, that's a big milestone. Proud of yourself. You should be. What is it that's unique about you that you bring to the table that was influenced in this book?

So I think it's a lifetime of experience. So we all have lifetime experiences that make us unique, right? No one has the same set of experiences. And what I think makes this book most interesting and some of the feedback that I've gotten on it. So I was talking to someone earlier today who doesn't know me. It was a reporter. And he said, you know, you come across as incredibly authentic. And I appreciated that because as people that know me have read the book or hear me speak, they've said to me, they're like, you know, the unfortunate thing is people that don't know you don't realize this is exactly who you are. Like, this isn't you did some research and you told people, here's the best way to be happy. This isn't you looked at some other people's principles and you put them together. This is how you live. So, I've gone through my life, I've assembled a series of experiences. That create this philosophy that I now call LITZIG, the Life Is Too Short Guy philosophy. It's a combination of personal experiences, professional experiences, bringing them all together into what has become this book and this platform.

I'm curious, how have you been able to pass this on to your children?

I think I still am. I mean, I think I still am. My children are 18 and 20, and they're learning and growing and developing, and they've watched me through the years behave this way. And I think some of it stopped, some of it hasn't, right? They're, they're still in their formative years. And, you know, I can't tell you that— in fact, I can tell you exactly the opposite. I wasn't always like this. I wasn't born and, you know, I was the happiest 13-year-old you ever met. I mean, that's just not the reality. This is something that, that I've learned over a lifetime with some, you know, meaningful setbacks and experiences that influenced it. And I think my children watching me, one, reading the book, hearing me talk about it certainly has an influence on them. But I think they have a long way to go to fully appreciate and understand what it is that I, that I stand for as it relates to these principles.

You know, as you say that, it might be that it takes a certain amount of maturity and wisdom to be able to really understand these principles.

I agree with that. I absolutely agree with that.

And, and as you, as we age and grow, we learn and we're able to prioritize really what's important against that which is used to seem like it was really important, but isn't really important at all. Agreed. Agreed. And maybe that's part of, maybe, maybe it's part of, part of this is the maturation process we all go through to figure it out.

Yeah. And we all explore and figure out our own path and our own principles and our own philosophies. And, you know, one of the things I tell people is, is I've given 10 principles in this book and each of the principles has tools. But not all principles apply to everyone. And to really gain value from the book or from hearing me, you don't need to buy into all 10. In fact, you may respond and be like, you know what, here, one of them is actually funny things are everywhere. Laugh every day. Laugh at yourself. Laugh at others. Don't take things too seriously. And some people have said to me, you know, I'm just not that funny. Like, I can't really understand that principle. And what I say to them is, you don't necessarily have to be funny. The idea is that you don't take things too seriously, that you approach life no matter what it is. And I tell some stories in the book. I tell one in particular about something that happened at my father's funeral. You want to talk about a, you know, one of the worst moments or times in your life. And I made a joke and found humor and made people laugh. And that's the point, is that wherever you are in life, regardless of whether you think you're funny or not, you could find funny things. And again, the point is you may not buy into all 10 principles, but that's okay.

Yeah. So, um, you got another book planned?

I do. I'm percolating, uh, um, taking these principles and applying them a little bit more specifically to business. I'm toying around with a concept of a business parable, you know, a fictitious business parable that teaches and illustrates some of these principles. Because this book, by design, is not meant to be a business book. I really— I don't— I want everyone to pick it up. People say, who's your audience? And I say, do you want to be happy? I mean, that, that's the answer to who's your audience. Um, so, so the next one might have a slightly more business-oriented angle, but we'll see. We'll see. I loved writing it. I love talking about it. And this is my mission in life. This is, is, uh, you know, people have, people grapple with what's your purpose in life. And I struggle a little bit with that concept because I feel like purpose is, is, you know, it's open for debate, but it's kind of like you have one purpose in life and I'm not sure that's true. Right now, this is my mission. This is my passion. This is my calling. And I, I love to talk about it. I'll talk about it every day to anybody that'll listen. I want to talk about it to the world. I want to write more about it. And I'm having a lot of fun.

Yeah, I can tell. It's your baby.

It's my baby. It's my pride.

I've got that. I mean, my last book came out in 2017. And I still— it's what I teach, you know, and the book is just sort of the platform. And, you know, once you get onto a concept that you really love, you just It defines, it defines and helps you find meaning in life.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

I think that's significant. So how, how is all this affecting your professional work as a CEO and guy who invests in real estate of all different kinds?

You know, so my, the company that I run today, I helped found about 8 years ago, and we've built an amazing culture there. It's something I'm most proud of. If you Google around, I mean, you'll see I've written a little bit about culture and you'll see that our company has been recognized for 4 years in a row now as one of the best places to work in the geography that we're based in. And so much of that culture is tied to these principles.

They—

we've empowered people to, to build their own careers, to run their own businesses. We've given people immense flexibility for many years. Like this whole work from home post-COVID concept is— I've been working from home for 10 years. I run a public company and I do it remotely. Now I do travel a lot. But we've given people a great deal of flexibility to work where they want, when they want, how they want. And we hold people accountable. There's no doubt about that. But a lot of these principles are just naturally occurring in how I run the businesses that I run, how I am involved in any of my professional endeavors. I do things that I enjoy doing. I work with people that I enjoy being with. Again, the overarching principle, if you look at the name of the book, it's called The Life Is Too Short Guy. Life is too short. I'm not going to spend time doing things I don't want to do.

Right. And that probably leads you into some pretty good deals.

Yeah, at least I'm having fun. There's no doubt about it. I love what I do. I love the people I work with. I love the opportunities, you know, and it's not all easy, you know, when things get hard, I say, and I find myself saying this a lot, it's intellectually stimulating. I'm learning, I'm growing, I'm developing. And that again gets back to this perspective. It gets back to the lens through which you view the world.

Right. I think of You know, I, I keep, I tell people that I, I've never been happier in my life than I am right now, but I really didn't start being happy until I, I turned 50. And what happened then was I left the practice of law, very successful career as a trial lawyer, to become a peacemaker and mediator and serve, serve others. And I think if somebody were to ask me, what is it that has made your life so fulfilling? I would say service to others. Learning how to, learning how to serve others, teaching them how to be peacemakers, teaching them how to stop fights and arguments forever in their lives, teaching them how to listen others into existence. Um, I think that's how I would define it.

That's awesome.

And that's why I can get up every day at 72 years old and say, let's keep going, man.

That's awesome. I love it.

You know, I'm so— it's pretty cool.

Well, one more question.

I'll let you go, Scott. What's one thing about yourself that we wouldn't know about unless you revealed it to us?

That's a good question. One thing that you wouldn't know about, um, hmm, I don't know. I don't think I have a great answer to that because I'm, I'm, you know, through the book and just in general, I'm pretty open.

I share and I, uh, let's see, one thing you wouldn't know, you wouldn't know unless I told you that I'm a jazz violinist and play jazz and blues violin.

Well, look, I mean, it's in my bios, you might know, but I'm pretty seriously into athletic training. I've run 15 marathons, I've completed an Ironman triathlon, and, um, that's intense. Yes, I, I love to, you know, I rode 35 miles this morning. I rode on my bike, and I love to ride and run and get outdoors and play golf and just be a part of, of the outdoors.

Good for you. Yeah, that's why I live here where I live. I get to ski in the winter and whitewater raft in the summer and hike and fish and have fun.

That's awesome.

Scott, thank you so much for sharing your time with us. It was a great, great meeting you.

This was really fun. Thank you so much for the invite.

You're welcome. Doug Noll here. Thank you so much for listening to Listening with Leaders. If you are a successful executive leader who would like to be on this program, please visit podcast.dougnull.com/podcast. If you got something out of this interview, would you please share this episode on social media? Just do a quick screenshot with your phone and text it to a friend or post it on the socials. If you know someone that would be a great guest, tag them on the social media to let them know about the show and include the hashtag #ListeningWithLeaders. I love seeing your posts and guest suggestions. We are regularly putting out new episodes and content. To make sure you don't miss any episodes, go ahead and subscribe. Your thumbs up ratings and reviews go a long way to help promote the show and mean a lot to me. Me and my team. Want to know more? Go to my website, DougNoll.com, or follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. That's @DouglasEnoll. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you on the next show.