Staying Curious

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Welcome to beyond you'd why Podcast, where we go beyond just talking about your why and actually help you discover and then live your why. You see, we believe that knowing your why, that driving force behind every decision you make and every action you take, is the essential first step to really knowing yourself. It allows you to move forward faster and have a bigger impact. If you're already a fan of the show, then you know that every week we talk about one of the nine whys and then we introduce you to somebody with that why so you can see how their why has played out in their life. This show will be more powerful for you if you've already discovered your why. If you still need to do that, head over to whyinstitute.com and discover your why today. It'll only take you about five minutes. Now let's meet today's guest.

Today we're going to be talking about the why of mastery. Now, people with this why have an insatiable thirst for knowledge. You seek information over a broad variety of topics and never at a superficial level. You will often pick a specific subject and begin to learn it for the sheer joy and curiosity of knowing something new. You gather and retain substantial knowledge in multiple areas, many of them seemingly unrelated. You are typically viewed as an expert in numerous disciplines by others, although you yourself will insist that you are yet to truly master anything. You find pure enjoyment in the sheer act of immersing yourself in something new. You're fearless when it comes to new subjects or ideas, yet cautious with the expression of your thoughts. Everything deserves to be fully thought out and examined from multiple perspectives. You love to peel back the layers of the onion and go deeper, unearth the nuances and subtle differences in a given subject. Many around you have a deep respect for you as a mega brain. So today I've got a great guest for you. His name is Steve Horowitz. He is a Newport Beach, California based commercial real estate developer, lender and investor. Over the course of nearly 35 years, he has conceived, developed and implemented strategies for the redevelopment of various commercial properties including shopping centers, office buildings, industrial facilities and multi unit housing. Aside from his business interests, Steve has a wide range of personal interests. He's an accomplished mountain climber, skier, surfer, scuba diver and pilot and he has traveled extensively internationally in pursuit of these activities. Steve, welcome to the podcast.

Well hi Gary, thanks for having me. An unusual day and that this country is struggling to get their things together, but we get to sit and talk about fun and positive things so I think that's terrific. Nice break.

Well, you and I met, gosh, a couple months back at a buddy's 60th birthday in Mexico. And so we sat down and started talking. And as I was listening to you, I kept thinking, I wonder what this guy's why is? And so I had you discover your why while we were there, and it came up as mastery. How did that feel to you?

Well.

Once you explained the various categories that you've broken people down into. Chunked. It's a concept called chunking, where you have broken down all the various categories of people into these categories. I was not surprised.

That I was. I mean, I've sort of always been curious about learning and taking on new activities. And the description that you came up with, I felt like it was really, really accurate.

But when you say you're interested in learning, you don't learn like everybody else, right? I mean, you have a different level of depth that you go, well, I think so.

I mean, it doesn't feel normal for you. It feels normal. So it doesn't feel different to me. But I have.

By carefully observing others, I recognize, and I've learned that there's a deeper level. And then also by studying people that are wildly accomplished, I've learned that where I'm fallible, where I'm an amateur, where others might think that I'm an expert, and people that are smarter, that have higher IQs and bigger brain power and the ability to read something once and retain it forever. An example might be Charles Charlie Munger. You know, he's.

You know, he can read something and retains it, and then he moves on to the other subject, and it's just a hundred times deeper than the capacity that I have to understand things. That being said, I feel like I work harder than others, and I stay up later and read more to accomplish my level of mastery, if that's what you want to call it.

So take us back in your life. Give us, like, the. Take us back. Where did you grow up? What was your childhood like? Where did you go off to school? How did you get into real estate? Because that's been a big focus for you. Take us back through your story.

Well, I mean, I grew up in Dallas in a family of five kids. It was a big family, a lot of extended family. And I don't know. I can't say there was a lot of competition. The competition drove it. But I think anytime there's five kids or everybody's got to go find their little niche, right? And so everybody, each of us had their own niche. And I Developed my, my own. I was interested in sports and I always had, I was always playing team sports. And I really like team sports. And I like.

I didn't just learn how to be an athlete. I learned a lot about humans and how they work together in teams. And I compared myself in that experience with others who haven't worked at teams. Let's say somebody focused their whole life on playing tennis or snow skiing or something.

I saw early on the difference of people that worked in teams versus people that didn't. And I think that made a huge difference for me later in life in that as a business person I realized that how to get people to want to work with you, for you.

And to lead.

On some common mission. I don't have a team of people that I work with, that I pay on a daily basis or employees, but I gather and aggregate teams on everything that I do. And so I think that my past learning how to work within, in team activities.

Gave me the skills that I have that I employ today in business. And so getting into real estate, like anybody else, you sort of envision what you want to do with your life. You then go out and test it. I envisioned it when I was 15, 16, 17. I then started testing it by taking on jobs and working, working for others. And then once I ran a few tests, then I picked a horse and I wrote it. And I think that for the most people, that's what people. For the most part, that's what people do. That's sort of the process they go through to figure out what they want to do with their business careers.

So you started your first business when you were how old?

Well, I didn't, it didn't really work that way. I mean, when I was, when I was 15 or 14 or whatever, me and my, one of my brothers would go sell smoke alarms door to door. And so we did that. There was always those little things that we take on. I wouldn't say that was starting a business. It was taking on and then failing at some activity invariably because it was never as easy as it looked. Right. So. But I think, you know, in this, in this process that I explained earlier, I think that by the time I graduated college, I knew what I wanted to do and I actually went on. This is an interesting story. I went on an outward boundary when I graduated college and it was a two week deal up in Fresno or outside of Fresno. And Outward Bound is a terrific program. I encourage anybody to send your kids to an Outward Bound or when you're young or young enough, go do it because it's a great course, a great experience, and it's kind of survival. It's kind of learning how to work in teams, and it's kind of learning how to live on your own when the teams get broken up and you get a period of isolation for a few days. And anyway, I did an Outward Bound, and I sort of wrote a manifesto.

In my Outward Bound. I still have it today. I've got a box in the garage of all these things. And this is something. My manifestos is still in that box and everywhere else. I'll pull it down and take a look at it. But.

Oddly enough, I pursued my manifesto. Exactly. And in some areas, I exceeded my goal. In other areas I failed and fell well short. But that manifesto, it was a real thing. It was not. It wasn't sort of like a New Year's resolution. It was. It was deeper than that.

And.

And it worked. I don't. I don't do so well with New Year's resolutions, but the manifesto was an important part of my life.

So give us an example. I mean, for those people that are listening, that don't really even know what a manifesto is. What is a manifesto?

Well.

It'S your core beliefs and principles filled out on paper and what you want for yourself. What do you want? You know.

It'S a prediction or desire for the outcome of your life.

And.

And also it also becomes working papers because it. I mean.

It was my roadmap to getting what I wanted. I mean, it was sort of, this is what I want, this is what I expect myself. And it also involves some of the how to get it, you know, but most of it was what I want and what I expect from myself.

Here's the interesting thing that really intrigued me about you. Most of the people that I know that have the why of mastery struggle because.

Their focus is on something that doesn't give them freedom.

And your focus right out of the gate was more in line with getting financially secure.

Yeah.

How did that happen? How did you choose that? Why did you choose that? How did you know to choose that? Why didn't you choose something else?

No, part of it was academic and part of it was.

Stumbling along. I had a guy, John Daly, really influenced me at the University of Texas, and he taught a psychology, a speech communication class, Interpersonal Communication. And it was the three Ps. It was really four Ps. But let's talk about the three three Ps. How people decide, how they make decisions on what they want. And it taught me how well, ultimately, it taught me how to influence and get what you want, but it also taught me how to interpret myself, look inward. And it was power, profit, prestige. People generally make a decision based on they want to be power, they want to have power over you. An example of that might be a policeman. Hey, stop. I said stop, and I'm pointing a gun at you. Now. Somewhere in his life, he perhaps was disrespected, and so now he wants to be powerful. He felt powerless at some point, and his overcorrection was, now I'm going to get power.

That's power. Profit. Let's go about prestige. Prestige, as you meet a guy at a party, says, well, you know, I'm at the fancy law firm of this, that. And this. That law firm might not necessarily pay him as much as one of the others, but because he can sit in the party and say, hey, I work at this fantastic law firm and aren't I cool?

That's what appeals to him and how he decides. And in my particular case, it was profit, but for a reason. I wanted to make money so that I can control my time, because I knew I had a lot of interests that I wanted to pursue, and I had a lot. I love to ski. I love to be outdoors. I love. And so the only way I knew that I needed to make money so that I can convert that money into time. And that because I felt that time was the most valuable commodity in the world. And so that's why I. That's part of why I was. Became a.

Profit, you know, again, largely motivated by profit, so that I can exchange profit for time.

Do you remember the moment that you realized that what happened to you that said, I got to make some freaking money here?

What hit you that said, I think.

It was ingrained from an early. The money part was ingrained from the early age, and the other stuff came as it clarified and refined the notion. But I think culturally from a young age, I was predisposed to make money. I just didn't understand it. Why. I didn't understand the why part of that. And that's. And that's what I learned through John Daly and through, you know, through this. This process that I went through when I was in college that I explained.

So you knew you needed to make money, but you realized later that it was so that you could control time.

Correct. 100%.

That.

Well, not control time, but buy time by time. Yeah, yeah, you could control your time.

Yeah.

And that's the thing that I have found fascinating about you in. And that you did it that way. Because what I see mostly is people with the why of mastery. Like I said, they pick a vocation or they pick a art, or they pick something that does not give them that freedom at the end. Unless they're usually not until they're dead. Right. If it's art, if it's making paintings, a lot of times it's. They don't show anybody their paintings because they're not good enough until they've passed away and they've lived this life of poverty the whole time with no options. Right. I have some people on the podcast with that exact scenario. So you were able to do it your own way.

Yeah.

While we take a moment to give our guest a quick break, I hope you're hearing how important it is to know your why. If you're ready to put an end to your frustration and unlock the code to your personal and business success, then after the show, make sure to head to whyinstitute.com and discover your why. Today. It only takes about five minutes. Let's get back to the show.

What is it that makes you want to dive so deep into learning something? What's inside you that says, I've got to really know this?

I don't know. I mean, it's a great question. And I thought about it. And so.

You look at a medical condition, for instance, somebody with Asperger's, which is on the spectrum, which is a high functioning.

Autistic person, and you say those guys can dive into a subject and just get layers and layers deep, and they just have a wicked ability to focus on a subject. And I'm certainly not that, but I'm a muted version of that. Meaning I'm wildly curious about everything. I mean.

If I can find anybody that's an expert in anything, I'll just go crazy.

In spending time with them and listening and learning from their core expertise.

What I've patterned myself after is, I think Charlie Munger calls it, sort of an interwoven fabric of knowledge on a wide range of subjects that that sort of makes you uniquely you. And so, I mean, that that's how I've lived. I mean, I found all these different subjects that I find interesting in some areas that I'm unqualified and no good at, like physics. I mean, my math skills are marginal, but my interest in studying physics and desire took me to learning how to fly airplanes and understanding the weather and understanding how. And again, that interwoven fabric about going and scuba diving and taking on diving and learning about pressure as you Go down, and then you start to learn how to fly. And now you've got pressure as you go up. And all of these things.

Are interrelated. And I've tied all of my interests together, and.

They'Ve taken me in areas that I never would have expected, like an interest in studying physics. I mean, I would have never expected that. And I'm wholly unqualified to study it, although it's something that I've lived.

So you. Let's go back a little bit. You got into real estate. How did you move so rapidly to the top of the leaderboard, if you will, or to a place where you had found as much success as you had?

Well, I would call it the top of the leaderboard. I'd call it on a high enough limb in the tree to be safe from the predators. I think that's sort of an easier way to look at it. And then how high do you need to be on the tree.

Or how far from the predators that can get to you from the ground? So what I did was I learned by watching.

And naturally doing. But I'm a visual learner.

And.

And so, for instance, I'll give you an example, then I'll get back to the question. I learned how to snow ski from riding a chairlift. So I would ride the chairlift up, and I would look at somebody who I felt was skiing anatomically correctly, and I'd look at their ankles, their knees, their hips, their shoulders, their hands, elbows, and I'd look at their head where their weight was, and I would break down how that person, what they were doing, that using their hands as egg timers. And that's how I learned how to ski. Well, sort of business, the same thing.

I started out as a commercial broker, which gives you a lot of freedom, and the buck stops with you. There's no one else to blame if things don't go well. Everything falls on your shoulders because you're responsible for making your own way effectively. At 22, I started out as doing that, and I just stayed up later and I worked harder, and I read more books and studied more of the mechanics of what I was doing. And I got to a certain point in the brokerage industry where I found that the people that I was around.

I understood more of the mechanics, yet they were better sales guys. And that business, you really. 80% of your job was selling the job, and 20% of it was the mechanics of doing it. Looked at it, and I said, I hate the sales part, but I like the mechanics part. So that's how I sort of transitioned over into real estate investment. And the way I did that is I looked at some other guys that were doing it, some friends, and I said, well, they're not that much smarter than me. I can do that. And that's basically what I did.

So what was it? What were you like.

At that time when you were learning real estate? Commercial. Real estate, commercial investing? What was your life like at that time?

Well, I was crazed. I was hell bent on. I mean, I was focused. I think you know the answer to that one. I mean, I probably. It wasn't the most healthy time because I was so focused. And yeah, I was actively exercising, Jim. But I mean, I was 99% of my brain was focused on learning, learning, contributing time, walking up and down through buildings, talking to as many people as I can talk to, and I just networking and. And all the different things that it takes to be productive in business. You know, I was really, really focused on that. And I mean, I still was allowed to or had time to pursue my other interests, but I was uni dimensionally focused on being a productive real estate broker so that I could get to the next step, which was a real estate investor or developer.

So you took it to a different degree probably than the average person?

Oh, yeah, I'd say so.

Yeah. And that's what's interesting about that. Let me put it this way. What would your mother or your brother say about you at that moment in time when you were trying to do what you were trying to do?

I don't think they knew. And they probably didn't understand or know.

Okay.

Yeah, I don't think they knew or understood my family.

Yeah, I wouldn't. I don't think they had any idea what I was going through.

But you were so focused in on it, and then you started to have some success, right?

Yeah.

And then as you started to have this success in the investment aspect of it, how did your business change? Tell us about what was your business like when you first got going versus kind of where it is now?

Well, it's a good question because I can sort of lay it out. I always said, this is when I was 25, 26, 27 years old, when I was sort of ready, I felt like I was ready to transition from broker to being a principal. As part of the manifesto. Right. The manifesto didn't say when, but it said, you know, use that as a springboard for the next step. That was the manifesto. So when I was in that process.

I really just.

I gave it 100% of my effort, I gave it 24. 7 Focus. I lost where I was going with that.

But then you switched into commercial real estate. And then what was it like when you started? I'm sorry, commercial investing versus what it's like today.

Okay. Basically what happened was I had a bit. Now I know where I was going with it. I felt like at the time, I felt like I needed a million bucks to generate and to invest at 10%. At the time, you can invest at 10% to get 100,000 a year so that I had enough income to survive and to sit back and then be careful about choosing investment deals. And I felt like the time was right. This was back in 94, 95, 96. I felt like the time was right and that asset prices were cheap, interest rates were fairly high, so that you had the potential for tailwinds as you were buying real estate. And I felt like it was. And I'd seen a massive correction that was occurring in California. I'd seen it in Texas years back. And so I sort of recognized that we're in a really good opportunity. But I didn't have a million bucks to go invest at 10% so that I can have 100 grand a year so that I could properly set up an investment company. So what I did is I said I got to figure out a way to manufacture that million bucks through being clever by buying a deal without having any money adding value in a deal before I own the deal. And that's basically what I wound up doing, is I got a contract to buy an asset and I had six months to fix it, which was unheard of at the time, is unheard of today. And in that six month period, I was able to fix it. And I created at the time a million dollars in value, which kicked off, let's say, 100,000 bucks. And all of a sudden, after that first deal, I said, wow, I'm in business. All these other guys that I saw get into the business and they had the money wherever they had it from family money or somebody lent it to them or whatever, I was able to sort of manufacture it. It put me in position to where I could now sit back and say, now I can be smart about the next investment and the next investment. And that's basically how it started. So was it luck? Yeah. Was it skill? Yeah, but it was all. All of them merged together. You know, it was working hard and focusing so that you get lucky.

So what did. What is your kind of describe what your real estate is like, how you do real estate now versus then, or is it the same?

Well, it's the same. I mean, I look for a huge margin of safety. I look for a lot of the same stuff that you hear that everybody's heard Warren Buffett talk about, you know, which is some sort of mode or some sort of margin of safety. So, you know, at some point you've got to be buying something good at a fair, reasonable price or an off price.

So that you've got a little bit of a margin, and then you don't add so much leverage and you don't borrow so much money so that when things turn against you, because they always do and they always will. You know, the guys that are levered 80% go first, and then the guys that are levered at 70%, well, then they suffer and the guys 60% and they go. So it just a recession or a downturn attacks the highly levered and it works its way down the system. So I've always said, well, just don't grow as fast as the others, but maintain that security by not borrowing too much money. And so that's the way it's turned out. I haven't grown as fast as others.

But I've grown safer than others, and I've maintained that margin of safety.

I remember when I asked you.

Steve, why is it so important for you to have so much depth of knowledge and so much information?

Do you remember what you said?

I forgot. I remember. Well, no, I forgot.

It was about the possibilities.

Oh, yeah, of course. Well, we also talked about ranging in possibilities. You know, where you. Most of what I'm doing is ranging in possibilities. And I'm running. It's sort of like riding a motorcycle down the street. Someone says, well, why do you ride a motorcycle? That's dangerous. Yeah, it's dangerous. But your job in life, all of our jobs, my job, one of my hobbies, is mitigating risk. And part of mitigating risk, it actually allows my brain to relax, is getting on a motorcycle. And you have to run a calculation on every single driver. You have to say, what's that driver going to do? What are their possibilities? Can they go left? Can they go right? Are they going to go straight? Now, if you never see them and they hit you, you lose. Right? But you can mitigate your risk by driving a motorcycle by looking at every single target that can hurt you and calculating what their choices are, whether go straight, left, right, hit the brakes, hit the wrong pedal, whatever. And for me, that's part of the fun of business, is calculating every possibility on A deal, assigning a risk to every possibility and then making your choice and jumping and crossing your fingers and hoping that you. That A, your calculation was right and B, that the cards go your way. And that's life. And most people, I guess people that aren't able to be entrepreneurs, they're not. They might be able to calculate the risk, but they can't do the job. And. Or they've got too much pride. They can't say, hey, I lost. I have no problem saying I lost. I lose. I can't say I lose all the time, but I lose plenty. And I fail a lot. You know, I take chances and I fail. And I think that that's something that's an impediment to entrepreneurs, is they can't. I think maybe that's an exercise in entrepreneurship, is to get people just to explain where they failed and why they failed and what went wrong and to own it 100% and recognize there's nothing wrong with that. I'm going on a tangent.

You know what your hobbies are? Hobbies, or the ones that I know of are hobbies in things that are not financially smart, Right?

Oh, no. Yeah, they cost a lot of money.

They're not winners. As far as money making, how did you pick those? Or, you know, because it's what, boats, airplanes.

I like machines. Yeah, I like building machines and rebuilding machines and, you know, I like mechanical stuff. I mean, that's sort of the physics brain that I enjoy or that I'm curious about.

I don't know. I mean, each of them, none of them are vanity assets. Each one takes me somewhere interesting and is a tool for exploring the earth or the sky or the sea or wherever. Each, every one of my activities is a tool for exploration. And none of them are vanity assets. I don't buy fancy cars to drive down the street, say, look at me. I don't do that. They all are basically tools for exploration. And when I look at other assets and things that I.

Pine for, I'd like a submarine or I'd like a train to go explore or a rail car. So usually they have something to do with exploring.

See, I wouldn't have known that that's interesting because I don't know what your boat looks like. I don't know what your plane is like, but I know you have a boat and a plane. And so from an outside perspective, I might have thought, yeah, those are vanity things. But now that I hear you explain them, that makes even more sense.

They don't have one iota to do with. Nothing to do with vanity. I have no interest in.

That sort of vanity. I just love exploring and I like the machinery that takes you there. I think it's kind of cool and it's fun and it's challenging to. I don't just go and buy something that's already done. For the most part, I like to buy something and tweak it and contort it into.

A tool.

So do you maintain your, your toys?

Yeah.

You maintain your plane?

Well, I don't turn wrenches, but I mean, I am actively involved. I turn wrenches in some cases and yeah, I do. I mean, we got a flat the other day and the. In the airplane and I had to figure out a way to get it filled up and to get it back to the shop to change it to continue the trip. And I was head to toe and grease and oil, you know, and jumped in the plane and flew back and had my mechanic meet me. And so I have the skill I learned. Another thing is everything I've ever built to rebuild. I work with the tradesmen. So I know I'm not going to just go and hire a tradesman and walk away and say, and come back when the job's done. I generally like to get dirty with the guys and I like to work with guys, and that's part of. It's fun for me. And more importantly, I learn about each guy's trade and what he does and how he does it. And so that when something goes wrong, I've got something to reflect upon.

So if we go back, Steve, again, and maybe you have, don't. I wonder if you have an answer for this now. You know, why is learning.

Why are you so curious? Why are you so focused in on learning?

How has that been so much in the forefront for you, where everything you do is about learning more, gathering more knowledge, going deeper, looking for nuances, looking for subtleties. How does that. How did that happen?

Or I've, I've. I've thought about that a lot and I've given a great deal of thought and, and I've done a decent amount of research on drive and curiosity, sort of the intersection of that. I'm wildly curious. I want. If I come across any expert anywhere, I'm going to immediately drop what I'm doing and I'm going to focus on an expert and learning all I can about his view on the world.

And.

What causes that. I don't know. I don't. I mean, how do you teach a kid how to have drive? Is it either innate or you're born with it, or is it something that you can learn? I don't know the answer, I think. I mean, I look at a lot of my friends that have done really well in business, and I've been able to draw a link between.

Drive and dysfunction. Dysfunction, meaning somebody was either shamed them or put them down or said, you're no good at this or you're a loser or something. And that caused them to say, well, I'll show you. And that was sort of fuel on the fire.

For drive. And I look back at my life and I can find certain areas where I was put down or criticized, where I sort of wagged my finger back and said, I'll show you. And that was.

Some of the cause. And maybe it was all of the cause of my drive. I don't know. But I've given it a lot of thought and I haven't really been able to come up with anything conclusive on that issue. But I would love to find more to read about that particular subject.

So there's others that are going to be listening to this that have your why of mastery. And what advice would you give to them as far as.

How to construct a life that you want to live that you're happy with in the end? Would you have any advice for them?

Oh, I don't know.

Because as I.

Said, I don't see it that often.

Well, I don't know. I mean, I don't know if it's. If my answer relates specifically to.

The why proposition. But I think it's just do it your way. It's like, just figure out.

You know, draw a manifesto. In other words, you gotta, you know, sort of. You gotta have a bit of a plan, you know, draw. Come up with a plan or a roadmap, or at least a desired outcome of what you want. And then just do it your way. Have the confidence to do it your way. And don't, you know, try to tune out all that external noise. The external noise will alter, will tell you what you can't do, what you're not allowed to do, what's illegal, what shouldn't be done, all these obstacles that everybody else is going to give you along the way. I just say, hey, have confidence in your own views and own beliefs and tune all that garbage out.

What was the end game for your manifesto?

Well, it was freedom and happiness. I mean, the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. That was sort of.

I mean, that's really what. If you read it, that's sort of what it was. Pointing to is, how do you have a life of freedom and happiness untethered by.

You know, societal limitations? I guess that's really what it was about. And, you know, that's kind of. Yeah, that was my mission. That's what I wanted.

I think that is the real key right there. Because what I see a lot of people in general, but a lot of people with the why of mastery do is not look at the end game and look at what they're currently interested in.

And not see where that's going to lead them. So you had a roadmap. You had a, hey, I'm doing this because I want to get to here.

Versus I'm doing this because I want to do this.

Does that make sense?

Of course. I mean, but it's the pleasure of doing it along the way. I love learning, and I know that each again, I'm going to point to Charlie Munger, because that's sort of my favorite person in the world. It's sort of like if you could have dinner with one guy, you know, it would be Charlie Munger. I find him to be the most interesting person that walks around today. And. And again, it's this interwoven fabric of your unique self. And I find it. Each little stitch that I get to make is fun. I love each stitch. And I. And I recognize that each stitch is creating that fabric, you know.

So if I. From my perspective, what I'm hearing, what I'm seeing is that you had purpose.

For the things that you chose to do to get you to a place on your journey. You had a journey mapped out, and you went deep into these different things in order to get somewhere where I see a lot of other people with the why of mastery don't think that way. They do what they're doing to get deep into what they're doing, and then they stay in that thing. Not as that being part of the journey.

Well, that's sort of more along the lines if you study.

Asperger's on the spectrum, autism, the Asperger's guy, it's just like a hole that he dives into and keeps learning and learning and learning and learning Again, I feel like I have just a small aspect of that type of behavioral. And I don't dive as deeply and I don't keep swimming down. You know, at a certain point, I say, hey, you know, turn around and head toward the surface. Right. Whereas I think maybe, yeah, I think that I'm a little lighter on that spectrum than diving so deep that you don't turn around and have a little perspective.

Yeah, you've added perspective to depth.

Yeah.

I love it. Well, Steve, thank you so much for being here today, man. I was looking so forward to talking to you because I just see so many things that you do that other people with the why of mastery can learn from on their own journey, you know, creating that journey. I love the idea of a manifesto. I think if we all had a manifesto, that would be. Be so much nicer.

Yeah. For what it's worth, it wasn't in my particular case. I like speaking about it, but it wasn't. I didn't. It sort of wasn't purposeful. It wasn't. I didn't. I didn't go on this Outward Bound and say, gee, I think I'll write a personal manifesto. It just so happened that, you know, I was making some drastic changes in my life. You know, I was graduating college, packing up and moving to Southern California, you know, away from friends and family and all that I had known my first 18 years of life and setting sail on something that was a total adventure. And there was a great deal of anxiety, and.

It was a really interesting time. And.

It'S just the way that it turned out. I love the fact that I did. I love the fact that I found and took interest and did the Outward Bound. I think that Outward Bound made all the difference for me, not just because the manifesto came out of it, but because I think even if the manifesto didn't come out of it, just going on that trip, it sets so many other things into play, so many other.

Actions into play. It really was a critical juncture.

Well, Steve, thank you so much for being here. I'm sure you and I are going to stay in touch as we go on our journeys, especially when I come out to visit.

Yeah. Come visit soon.

Yeah, it's gonna. It should be soon. I hope so. As soon as this pandemic gets over with.

Oh, geez.

But we've got a good, good mutual friend that'll for sure keep us in contact, so.

Of course.

Thank you so much.

Thank you. All right, have a great day.

I really hope you enjoyed today's episode and that through today's guest, you heard how important it is to know your why and how impactful it can be in your life and the lives of those around you. Be sure to head over to why institute.com and discover your why today. Remember, the more you know about yourself, the more you'll know about others. I'm Dr. Gary Sanchez, and I'll see you on the next episode.