The Potentialist: Your Future In The New Reality Of The Next Thirty Years With Ben Lytle

In a world full of turmoil, despair and darkness, you need to carry the light. Season three of the Get Attitude podcast is where we will ignite your mind, your heart, and your attitude. Hello, Gappers. This is your man Glenn Bill with the Get Attitude Podcast, and I'm ready to carry the light with a unbelievable guest. You got to buckle in and listen to this gentleman that we have today. I'm so fortunate to have him. He's a newly published author. His name is Ben Lytle, and he has been routinely ahead of the curve in his career and as an entrepreneur, a CEO of a huge company, and an investor, and in how he has chosen to live. For several years, he has been paying close attention to the converging forces of change that few people have recognized. He makes the case that life and people will emerge better in the end, but that there will always be turbulent times, difficult decisions, and rough sledding on the way, particularly for those who are unprepared. In his recent book, the Future and the New Reality of the next 30 years and its upcoming companion books grew out of a project for his adult children and his eight grandchildren. He is here to share with you his strategies, his thoughts, his success, his antidotes on success. And we are just so, so excited to have you. Ben Lytle, welcome to the Get Attitude Podcast.

Well, thank you, Glenn. I'm glad to be here.

It's so cool to have you. And we're just going to jump right in. I hope that's okay, because you know what, that's what we do. And I can't wait to expose and get into your head and to your mind. I guess I'd always like to start with this very simple question. How do you define attitude number one? And I always want to know who was your very first attitude coach?

I think from the standpoint of how I would define it, it's a mindset or a combination of a mindset and a heart set. You meet people who unfortunately have a very pessimistic outlook on life and they tend to project that pessimism. But likewise, you meet people every day who tend to inspire you or make you happy just being around them. And first thing, you have to ask yourselves, which one of those do I want to be? And to me, it's a pretty easy choice. So I think the people, it's absolutely possible and I laud what you're trying to do because you can be influenced by others to change your mindset, and that can make a huge difference. I hear inspiring stories like that every day. So, so that, so that's, that's it. My first coach. Boy, it would probably have to be my parents. You know, a lot of people get the, get to have blame their, their, their situation in life on their parents. I get to thank mine because my parents were, were basically just a little bud subsistence level today, what we'd call subsistence level. We, we had a small ranch and a small ranch. Small and ranch don't go together real well. You know, it's hard. It's hard. It's. And, and so, you know, we struggled. My parents struggled, you know, most of their, most of their life just to make it, make a living. But they always had one thing for us. My brother's also hugely successful and, and a multi, self made multimillionaire. And, and we, we talk all the time about, you know, what our parents did give us is that I can't count the number of times they said to us, you're smart kids, you can do anything. You work, you work hard, you're smart, you can do anything you want to do. Don't let anything stop you. What, you know, what a great way to grow up, you know. And so we were launched. Well, so they were my first coaches.

I love that. And gappers, I call my guests gappers. Just so you know, Ben, I think the challenge that Ben just gave us is in the next week, tell 10 people how smart they are, tell them how much potential they have, and tell them that you're behind them. In other words, let's make the people listening to this today, let's say we're going to make a cognizant effort to say those positive words that Ben just gave us, that his parents gave him to 10 other people in the world. And just imagine what our world would look like if everybody went out with that intention every single day. You saw what it did for Ben. And that's my hope for our gappers.

Been, you know, you know, Glenn, just a slight add on to that. You know, people ask me all the time, you know, you've been a leader, you've led big companies, you've been involved in, you know, where you had to lead at government commissions and things like how, where'd you get those leadership skills? And for me, it's one of the reasons the name of the book is the Potentialist early on. I've been in management since I was 21 years old. And one of the things that I learned at the outset is that leadership at its core is seeing potential in someone or a situation or a company, but particularly in someone and then helping them see their own potential and helping them bring it out. And if you do that, you're going to succeed as a leader. And so it's very similar to what you said. It's look at people's what they can be and help them discover it. It's a great way to lead.

This is so in line with what we talk about in our attitude boosters and in my book. I'm curious, who was that person that looked into you and said this guy's got some potential. Who was the one that did it to you professionally?

Well, there was a whole series of them. I had a series of really inspirational bosses and mentors. And I am a mentor made man. And that is a fact.

Cool.

The first one, I was in IT from the time I was information technology, from the time I was 17 years old. And it fortunately at the time I went into it in the 60s, everybody in it was young, there weren't, it wasn't a very old industry. And, and I, and I was working at an aerospace company and my boss was a, what, over probably 500 people. He was a whopping 27 years old. So it didn't bother him to promote a 21 year old over a whole bunch of people that were older than he was. Wow. And, and, and he was one of the first said. He said, you'll be my boss someday. And it turned out I was, you know, and so. But he was the first one that really saw the potential in me and helped me see what I could reach out and do.

Now, I think just for our listeners, your resume is extensive and impressive and I know you're a humble man and you don't want it, but I just think for the gravity so people know who they're listening to today. Can you just share maybe your three or four biggest titles that you've. That you've had in your life?

Well, the number one is, is, is dad and Papa. I am, I am. I'm the father of three and the, and the grandfather of eight. And that's my number one job always.

Yes.

The second is that I am, I am. I am an entrepreneur who's created IS on his sixth company. And I fortunately have been very successful. The biggest, and the one that most people know of because it's such a big company is Anthem. That I started with the company when it was Blue Cross Blue Shield of Indiana and led its building to become Anthem, which today it's enormous. And that's not just because me, because I've been gone a long Time. They've had wonderful leaders and have wonderful leadership now in that company. And so it's a great institution that I was fortunate to help launch. But I also built what became, I think, the fifth or sixth largest insurance broker in the world at the time, a company called Accordia. It was traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Today that same. The what we had is now owned by a company named usi, which is a big insurance broker. But a lot of companies, a lot of companies, a lot of companies in the insurance brokerage industry actually copied our, our management style. And one of the others I'm most proud of, I didn't invent the product. A very brilliant lady invented it, but I helped it become a national name. Is, is. Is Silver Sneakers, which is one of the largest exercise programs in the world. And the average age is 78 years old.

Oh, that's so good.

We built that program because we believed again, we took this marvelous invention by a lady named Mary Swanson and she had a small company and we helped her make it a huge company of this wonderful thing. She invented Silversneakers. And it's thriving today.

So, ladies and gentlemen, that is who is pouring into us during this podcast today. And we didn't really need to know it, but I always think it helps because I know you're going to be gold because I've heard and seen and read what you do. I'm just curious though, did you ever hear of MJ Insurance in Indiana?

Sure, yeah. They're marvelous broker, marvelous.

That's my uncle Michael Bill.

I'll be darn. Yeah, yeah. No, I always had great admiration for, for, for Michael Bill and for MJ and I think when, when I had a Cordy, I think we tried to, to buy it and I think he told us no, thank you very much.

But yeah, he's.

No, they're a great institution in, in, in Indianapolis and Indiana.

Yeah, thank. Thanks. He's been telling a lot of companies that forever. I don't know he'll ever sell. Boy, they want him, I can tell you that. So I want to. You said what a great parents. You know, that's where it started. And I have a follow up and I think this could be a really cool and interesting answer from you. I believe, you know, attitude has passed on from generation to generation. I'm wondering, did you know your grandparents and did they have an effect on your attitude and what was the attitude lesson of the generation before your parents? What did it have on you? Who were they? What did they do? I'd Love to know about them.

Yeah, I knew my grandmothers very well. My, my grand. One grandfather passed away long time before I was born. And then the other one, he only lived till I was six, so. But, but I, but I, I loved him and thought he was a wonderful man. But I think the, the main thing that my grandparents passed on, particularly my, my dad's mother, was she was always a person who, and she had had, you know, had some great challenges in her life, but she was always a jolly person. You know, she just was one of those people you always. She started every conversation and ended every conversation with a smile and a giggle. And, you know, there was just something about that that I just, I loved. And my folks were pretty happy kind of folks too, but she was just especially a very happy person and she spread that to everybody she met.

That's so cool. And a great lesson for everybody. Right, so. All right, well, enough on the history. Let's talk about the new book, the Potentialist. It's powerful. Number one, when did you first. How long did it take you to write it? Number one, when did you first say, I'm going to write this book? What's that story?

Yeah, well, it took, it took several years. And it didn't start out as that. I didn't start out to write a book. It wasn't something that I had necessarily aspired to do. But every year, Bill, I have a process I've gone through for. Good Lord, I can't even remember how many years. 30, 40 years. And every year after the first of the year in January, I. I take a few days and I really think reflect on my life. And I reflect. I call it the who am I? Period.

Cool.

And I process and I ask myself, you know, am I doing what I want to do with my life? Where could I improve? So it's sort of my goal setting, internal goal setting process. Where am I deficient? Deficient. And I, in parallel, going back to my 20s, I've always been fascinated with the work of futurists because science fiction as well. But whereas science fiction does. It looks at the future through. Through stories and fiction, futurists looks at it more analytically and they. But both of them are looking at the future of the human race. And Since I was 20, I have been fascinated with human potential, my own and others, but more as an individual. So suddenly those converged in my early 20s and I became both a futurist and a potentialist. And that really shaped my career. I think it made me successful, quite frankly. I don't think I would have been nearly as successful without that. But. But what happened was I always pay. I have a whole series of news feeds and innovation feeds like MIT's wire and so forth. So I track innovation and where it's going. And I began to realize, you know what? Most people don't get it. We're about to enter an age that is unlike any in human history. Both the pace of change and the degree to which it's going to change life in a positive way. I believe ultimately a great deal positive. But if you aren't looking at it and you aren't preparing, it's real easy to get run over. And we know that because that's what happened in the previous three industrial revolutions. This one we're in is the fourth one. People are, the World Economic Forum calls it fourth. And so I realized my own children and grandchildren, I had never talked to them about this much, you know, because we don't sit around talking about the future. Typically when we're together we talk about other things. And I went, okay, well I got to get them up to speed on this and get them prepared. So I started out researching, getting really do my thorough research and then to, to write a white paper. And I was going to give this white paper to them, they're all very bright folks and walk them through it. Well, the white paper got to be about three inches tall and then it became two white papers and then three white papers. And then finally I said, okay, they're never going to read this the way it is. So I really need to treat this formally like a book. So I decided I was going to write a self published book for friends and family.

Yes.

And as I was in the process of doing it, some people in the, in the around publishing said this is really good stuff, it's unique, it's very personal. Whereas a lot of that stuff is more about global trends. But it doesn't talk about, okay, what do I do with it? Right. And so I decided that's what I would do and that's how I ended up with the book. And it's really three books. You know, this is the first of three books.

Okay, I got it. And so what is the general overall theme and what are a few of the biggest points of the book that people can expect to learn about?

Well, the first theme is that life's going to change more in the next 30 years than it has in centuries for sure, possibly millennia and maybe since the beginning of time.

Wow.

And that sounds like hyperbole, but it's not. I think I can easily make the case for it, but it's. And what's exciting about it to me is I think we're going to see this enormous expansion of human potential, that everything we've thought about as, or not everything, but most many things we've thought about as limits to human potential are going to be upended. So, for example, we are all today and less somewhat, not as much because of medicine, but we are less today. We have historically always been limited by the birth lottery. Whatever we got was what we got. Well, that's not necessarily the case anymore. And you can easily see it with medicine because we're living longer. We're defeating the diseases that cut life theoretically short. And that's going to continue. So we're going to live longer lives. We're also. The other very powerful force is we're becoming seamless with automation. So if you think about how we have this incredibly powerful brain and it's a computer. That's how people invented computers. They project what's inside them and they create something on the outside. So we have this incredibly powerful brain, and the cloud is effectively unlimited computing power. Yes, it's this incredible brain. And the speed at which we've been able to do things using all that power today is pretty much governed by how fast we can type and how fast we can read a screen. You change that to now where all I have to do is think it, yes, it's seamless, or say it, and I engage all that power, start thinking about what that could be and what that could empower me to do in terms of basically expanding my human limits into the limb and being aided by automation. And someone might say, well, that seems fanciful. And I would ask you, well, are you the same person you were before you had a smartphone?

Right.

And if we're all really honest, we'd say, no, I'm a pretty enhanced critter. And, you know, if you. If you went back 200 years, you'd been burned at the stake for what we can do, you know, with a smartphone. So these are powerful enhancing capabilities. And if you combine living longer with the power we're getting, as we become seamless with automation, it becomes so easy to use, but we have access to all that power. That's how we really start to expand human potential.

And I actually have a question, Glenn, if you don't mind. No. So what do you think about Elon Musk's neural implant? And is that kind of what you're referring to?

Yeah, except I don't yeah, except that's, that's. Those are being. You know, there's 14 companies of which, Elon Musk Neuralink is one that I've counted so far that are, that are doing. There's probably three times that many that, that are working in the area of basically bypassing the human. Where the human brain doesn't function properly and creates particularly neuromuscular diseases. That's the same concept, except I don't think very many of us are going to sign up to have a chip implanted in us. And so, so I, I'm envisioning something much more like if you can imagine your smartphone, which has an on and off button, a power on and off, it's got a mute button and I control what happens. Now imagine that as a little earpiece behind your ear. And all you have to do to activate it is speak or to think, but you're in control, you have the same controls. So I think that's much more likely what it'll be. But whatever it is, we're headed to eliminating that keyboard and screen limit that we have today.

And where's the screen? Is it going to be in the air in front of you?

Or it can be in your brain. You don't need to see it. But in time, all of the technologies, including holographics, are going to be coming, are going to be much more cheaper and much more available. And that's just one. Artificial intelligence also is remaking the world as we speak. Incredibly empowering technologies, but it needs to be used properly. And that's, of course, the other big theme. Yeah, we're going to have all these capabilities. Yes, we're going to be enhanced, but we have to be wise enough to use it well. And that's the big challenge for humanity. And each of us, every one of us has that decision. You know, we all. Good example. We all made it, Made a deal back when Google first came out and Facebook first came out and they said, hey, it's free. And you went, oh, okay. We all went, oh, okay, no problem. We didn't read the fine print that they could then use our data any way they wanted to. Yes. I don't think we would make that same deal in the future. We'd maybe say, you know what, I'll pay for it, but no, I'm not going to. It's my data, not yours. And that's the kind of wisdom we're going to have to have as we integrate with automation so that we don't lose our humanity and give up all of our security and privacy.

Where do you think a duck duck go? And the possibilities there for totally protected searches?

I think that's exactly in the right direction. And it's us maturing as consumers. I mean, that's a product responding to consumers concerns. And, and so, and that's how things get improved. You know, we, we create innovations and then we make mistakes with them and then we have to correct the mistakes and so good. You know, if you're thinking about automation and integrating with it, as we always say, there's going to be a downside to this and what's it going to be and can I avoid it? You know, that's, that's an important part of, of what automation you accept into your life. And it's sort of nature's quality control system. Right. You know, we advance, we have problems, we fix them, we advance again. That's, that's the way it works.

What was the most astounding revelation as you were doing all the research for these three books? Was there something that, where you were like that just blew my mind. I didn't have any concept like what, what was the day that you found something that just blew you away and what was it?

Well, there are several. One is the whole concept of shared experience. So if I can connect in the cloud theoretically, and you know, probably one of the smartest guys futurists around, and he's not, you know, he is a scientist as well as a futurist. He's got a name, Ray Kurzweil. And you know, he predicts we're going to have this by 2035.

Wow.

Pretty accurate. That's not very far away. But imagine that I can if I want to. I could be contact or be in contact with an aborigine in the Brazilian rainforest. And I could say, you know, Pablo, can I walk with you? And he would say, sure. And at that moment, I feel what he feels. Smell what he smells. I'm experiencing the rainforest. I see it. That's shared experience.

Whoa.

That's not impossible at all.

Wow.

And what we have to do is build all the right controls in and make sure it's safe. And, but that, that theoretically becomes possible. Now imagine what that could do for, for pace of learning, just the pace of learning. And there'll be things not as quite as extreme as that in advance. We're already having it with virtual reality and augmented reality Zoom in its own way. We're sharing an experience in real time. And so those things actually can accelerate learning. And it's why I believe that we can also accelerate wisdom. I know we can. And that's what the COVID of my book means, where it shows that information and knowledge is becoming a commodity. It really already is. We can Google search anything, right? But that wisdom we next have to master, the human race has to next master to reach our potential.

How would you define wisdom number one? And how do you define potential number two?

So wisdom is classically defined, is the art of living.

Well, I love it.

And what it really means, broken down in everyday language is first of all, perspective. What happens to folks when we're not wise is we lose perspective. We, we become overwhelmed with the action or the demands of today and we lose perspective of what life is or how I can work my way through this. So the first thing is perspective. You go up above, get a bird's eye view, you look back to who we are. Who am I? Well, inside you and I is a hunter gatherer. You know, we only stopped being hunter gatherers 10,000 years ago. And so part of my brain still acts like a hunter gatherer. You know, somebody's going to eat me, somebody's going to kill me. So we have to start, look back to who I am, look at today, and then look forward. Yes. And when you do that, and you do that as a practice, you will be wiser. The second half of it is to take what was timeless. What timeless truths are there out there? There are so many. That's why people love quotes. Every one of those is a timeless truth. And they resonate with us because they live inside of us. We know they're the truth. So you got perspective, timeless truths. And now you have to apply it. It's all the capacity for wisdom until you apply it. And then when you apply it now you have done something wise. Wise people aren't always wise because it's transactional. They may have the capacity, but sometimes they'll make huge mistakes. But. But the idea is to develop that capacity for wisdom.

Wow, that's so good. Well, yeah, it's like you've heard this before. Some people are transactional and some people are transformational. And I think that's the relationships that everybody's looking for. Not a transactional, but a transformational relationship. Even just on a one hour podcast.

Yeah, and you can try. And the thing is, this can be tough. The Greeks were doing it 2500 years ago. It can be taught. We just, you know, sometimes that's one of the truths of history, is sometimes we forget what we once knew. That's why the Renaissance Was important. It brought back some of. From the classical age, a lot of things. And same thing is true today. We've forgotten the importance of wisdom in our life and having wise people run our governments, have wise people leading our corporations. So. But we can, we can do that and we can catch up and you're.

Go ahead.

No, you mentioned potential. Just quickly on that.

Yeah, please.

Yeah. Each of us has, you know, our own individual potential and we can discover it. And then it's a process of self discovery and then applying it. You know, just the old saying, discover who you are and then live it. And so that process again is very old. There's a lot out there on it. I've been studying it for 50 years. And the real art is then actually living it. It has an interesting relationship with wisdom because the closer, the more you achieve your potential, the wiser you get. The wiser you get, the more you want to achieve your potential. So they're interrelated and they feed off each other.

That's so cool. Tell me this. In your experience in life, who is one of the wisest people that you've met and what was their attitude lesson or what did they say to you that changed things for you?

Well, there's a lot of teachers and just literature. You can learn so much from good classical literature, both fiction and nonfiction, but living people. A couple of. Of my mentors. One was a guy named, named Sharad Desai, who had been. He was an Indian and Hindu, but he was very much an Americanized, you know, Americanized Indian and loved both cultures and honored both cultures. But he became a friend and a mentor and he actually became a consultant that I used in helping build a high performance team. That. That's the one that. The same team that built Anthem and Accordia, those two. Those two New York Stock Exchange companies. Yes. And I think he contributed greatly to that. And he was just an amazing source of wisdom and inspiration. And then another was.

Let me, let me stop. Let me stop you real quick. Tell me, what did he say to you? What was the language? What was his attitude, if you will. Can you give us a peek into the words and the thoughts that he had so our people can feel like maybe they knew him almost as you did?

Yeah. So let me describe him. He was a little, kind of a short man, and he was blind. He was a very successful dentist. And he got macular degeneration when he was only, I think, in his late 30s, early 40s. And he converted, went back to school, got a PhD in psychology, and then did management consulting and did work with groups. But one of the things, there are so many things that he said to me, one of my favorites, because it really changed me. I was in my probably late 30s, mid to late 30s. And, and I was a single dad and I was fretting one day. I wasn't. I've never been a very fearful person and I really honestly never have. But, but, but I was fretting, you know, about, you know, how am I, you know, am I doing a good job as a dad. I was going to law school full time, trying to be a single dad. And, and I was, I was just really questioning myself. And he said, ben, you seem like a very strong man to me. And I said, well, I think I am. He said, well then don't you think you can handle whatever life serves you up? And I rocked back in my chair and I went, yeah, you know, I think I can. Yeah. I've never, I've never had even come close to having fear or fretting again. I just said, okay, there's my answer. I can, whatever life serves me up, I'm ready.

That's beautiful. I love that. I love that. All right, now you're going to give us one other guy or one other gal. Who would that be?

Yeah, the, the, the, the other guy who did have a profound effect, at least on my business career, he really taught me how to be a spirit. CEO. Was, was Lloyd J. Banks and he was the CEO of Blue Cross, Blue Shield of Indiana and then the Associated Group before me. He's the one who decided to promote a 36 year old CIO above two layers of management. I was the youngest officer out of probably 30 officers in the company. And I had been at the company the least amount of time. I'd been there six years, many of them had been there 25 or 30 years. And he took that risk on me to take, give me that chance. And I think he's in heaven today. And I'm sure he's looking down, said, hey, I made a pretty good call.

Tell me, when you said he taught you how to be a CEO, what were 1, rule 1, rule 2, rule 3 of his how to be a CEO course. What did he say to you? What was the story that, that would help us understand that man?

He, he was. First thing he, he was, he taught me a whole series of things. First ones, he looked and carried himself like a CEO. And I mean he was one of those people, if you walked into a room, you go, that guy runs something, you know, he was just, he, he just had that gravitas about him. Interesting. And he. Another thing I really admired about him, he taught me very, very quickly. He said, he said, look, you move fast and that's good. This company needs somebody that's going to really make it move faster. And he said, but don't ever. Don't equate good decisions with fast decisions. He said, if don't make a decision you don't need to make before it time, everything has to be the best decisions are the ones that are ripe. I love that word that's always stuck with me. It's ripe. And he said, you know, you'll know it. You'll know it. Trust your gut. But make decisions when they're ripe and don't pick them when they're green.

I love it. Well, what we're going to do is this is a little thing that I do with each and every guest. And the book is, is called the Potentialist. I highly recommend that you buy it, you read it. I'm sure that it is on Amazon and you can find it if you just google it. Potentialist 1. Your future and the new reality of the next 30 years. We have heard the people that have shaped your life. We have talked about your book, but one thing that we always know about our guests is that there's a wealth of knowledge in you and in the life that, that you've lived. And I always close our broadcast or our podcast with this thing called Knowledge through the Decades. So if you'll have a little fun with me, Ben, I'm going to, I'm going to take you through your life in the period of when you were born. 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, you might be 70. And I'm going to ask you what the attitude lesson was. If you can go back in your brain and remember. Obviously you probably don't remember when you were born, but you probably remember when your kids were born. What do you think the attitude lesson of birth is?

The attitude lesson of birth probably is I have instincts and I have a body that I have to first take care of before I'm going to pay attention to anything. Because if there's one thing that defines little ones is you got to make sure they, they, they get fed and they sleep.

I love it. I love it. You know, eat well, sleep well. Gappers. Look at. If you want to, if you want to fulfill your potential, here's two really good ideas. Eat right and sleep right. Right.

That's exactly right.

Oh, I love it. We haven't had that Answers. But I had a, I had a feeling you were going to give me gold. That's why I didn't say anything. And I think that's so, so good, good for our people to think about, reflect on as you're, as you're listening to Ben. Ben. I don't know. I'm sure you got to have a memory when you were in third or fourth grade, right? When you were 10 years old. I'd love to know what school did you go to when you were 10? And what is the story or what was the occasion? What was your attitude lesson? Do you remember learning something at 10 years old? And what was it?

Yeah, actually, you picked a perfect age. That was a transformational year for me because we had lived on this ranch, it was kind of felt, you know, remote. It actually probably wasn't that remote, but it felt like it was in the middle of nowhere. There were no kids close by to play with. You know, we worked like dogs day. Even as little kids, you worked hard. And so When I was 10 years old, my dad, Summer before I was 10, my dad, who had always been a carpenter in the winter because in the winters in Texas it's cold and you, you can't really do much outside anyway. And he had become a really, a very good carpenter. And so he decided to become a full time carpenter and a part time rancher. And we moved into the local town of 20,000 people. And suddenly I could get everywhere on my bicycle. I could get to the movies, I could get to see gazillions of friends. I could get to the swimming pool, the it. And it was wonderful. And so to this day, I'm a, I'm an avid biker.

Oh, cool.

One of the things I do, and everyone who knows me would tell you this, I get on that bike, I get less than 100 yards from my front door and I'm smiling. I'm smiling because that move meant freedom to me.

Yeah.

And when I get on my bike, even today, I let everything go. I don't worry about a lot, but I let everything go and I am free.

Oh.

So that was a transformational experience for me that 10 years old never forgot every week.

I love it. And that attitude lesson is, is motion creates emotion. Obviously that emotion is very positive for you. You've anchored that. And I can tell you if you want to improve your attitude, get your butt on a bike and start pedaling. I've never met anybody that's been biking that that isn't smiling or doesn't feel feel better after They've ridden. So I think that's such a great, great thought. All right, so now you're 20 years old, you're at university or by the way, what's the name of your little town that you moved to?

Greenville, Texas.

Greenville, Texas, I'll be darn. So you're 20 years old. It sounds like you might have been at Texas A and M at Kyle Field, possibly watching a football game.

The school I went to was East Texas Texas State University, part of Texas Texas A and M. But, but it's a, it's now, it's now an A and M campus, but back then it was a freestanding university, about 15,000 students, I think. But yeah, and I was working by, by 20, which was normal at the time. I grew up, I was married, had two kids.

Oh my gosh.

And I'm, and I'm. And I'm starting a school, working nights for an aerospace company in IT and work, going to school full time during the day. And so 20 again was one of those transfer transformational years because I'd had to go save some money. My parents couldn't help me with the money to go to school, so I had to save the money to go to school and find the right job that would allow me to. But 20 was great because I started this new job very quickly, I think within a year of me going there. This, this boss, Larry Sweet, who taught me was my first great mentor and saw something in me. And at 21 years old, I'm a supervisor initially over about 15, ultimately about 65 by the time I left. And, and I'm, and I graduated four years with a three point plus. So, so and raised two kids. So it was, it was a, it was a, it was a wild ride. I didn't do a lot of sleeping in those days, but, but it was a wonderful experience and it launched me, it truly launched my, my career.

And so would you say the attitude lesson there would be fortitude from you or what would you describe the attitude lesson when you were 20 there?

Well, you know, it's interesting, Bill, because I gave, I was asked to give a speech recently and I picked the subject of the impossible becomes possible. And it has defined my life and my business strategy, my investment strategy, a lot of things around believing in what other people would see as impossible because I think most people, and they did a lot of people back then said, you're going to kill yourself. You know, you can't raise two kids, go to school and work full time, and work full time. And you got A demanding job. How's that going to work? And I said, well, I think I can do it. And I did. And then, you know, 10 years later, I did the same thing with. With law school, which was even more difficult.

Wow. I'm curious, the mother of your children, did she pass or did that just not work out, or what happened?

Both. Both. We married very young, didn't work out. We stayed friends. We were always good friends. And she passed with breast cancer when she was only 44.

Oh, my gosh. That's something.

Real tragedy.

Yeah, I bet. Well, that's quite a remarkable story. I didn't have you peg for a guy that had babies at 20, but I had the same experience as you did. So we're kindred spirits in that they've.

Grown into incredible, incredible adults. I mean, these are. They're absolutely. I'm so proud of him. One's a hugely successful entrepreneur on his own, done a great job in health care, and the other is a financial planner and a real. A real leader. He loves his clients and really does a good job serving his son. My grandson is his partner, which is great to watch. That's another sort of tradition. We do family partnerships pretty well, so. And my daughter's a teacher and teaches little ones. And they're all incredible people. I'm really proud of them.

That is. That's beautiful. They got a good dad. There's no doubt. Let's go to 30 years old. Do you remember being 30? And what's your attitude lesson at 30?

Yeah, at 30. At 30, I was really, you know, deep into my career, was really doing well. I was by then on, you know, in line, I think I was one step below the chief information officer, officer at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Indiana. By then I had, you know, a couple hundred people reporting to me. I was going to law school at night, which was really difficult. And I was a single dad, so it was. It was. It was again, a challenging time. But, you know, I did it. I don't regret it. I loved that experience. And I was really growing up. I also then had met, you know, Dr. Desai, and he was. He was working inside my organization at that time, was a great mentor. And I like to say, whereas Lloyd Banks taught me how to be a CEO.

Yes.

Dr. Sharad Desai taught me the finer points of being a human being.

And so I would say, yeah, the attitude lesson there is just like our attitude boosters, number five, have a mentor copy them. But there's a lot of different things. What would you say to the person listening to this right now, like, I'm wondering, what question did you ask yourself? What mantra did you say to yourself? There's somebody listening to you now that I have a feeling is a single parent, may be in law school or is in nursing school that's working two jobs, that's trying to bridge the gap from who they are to who they. What kept you going? Was it faith? Was it a belief, Was it a mantra? Or was it like a powerful question? I mean, how did you do that? That's what people want to know.

Well, I think part of it was that I was really learning and growing. And I believe we either, we only have two states, you know, we're either we're either learning or we've begun dying. And, and so you're growing, or I should say growing knowledge, growing or begun dying. And so, so if you, if you really stick with, you know, if you really stick with that, just always make sure that you've got plenty challenging you to grow because it's from that you're going to feel healthy and you are healthy. Healthy. If you watch plants, you know, if plants are growing, they're healthy and if they're not, they're dying. And so, so that's staying where you're growing. I didn't know for sure at that point. I didn't know whether I would end up practicing law, whether I would, you know, combine the fields and become a specialist in computer law, whether I would continue in the management ranks. I didn't know. But I just said, okay, I don't have to have it all figured out. I've got a really good thing going here right now and I'm just gonna, and I'm gonna keep learning. And I also had a fabulous mentor again in that boss, a guy named Gene Hinkle. He was an incredible, incredible mentor to me.

Very, very good. The. And I think there are people listening who are, and you know, me included, there's almost too much opportunity in the world. And I believe, you know, Bob Proctor was a mentor to me and he's multiple sources of incomes. And when you said I didn't know if I was going to be a lawyer or a CEO and what I was doing, the thought about this continuing to grow, continuing to seek is certainly a strategy that works for the uber successful. Let's go to 40 years old. You remember turning the big four zero. Where were you? And do you have a lesson or a story from when you were 40 that can help our listeners?

Yeah, I think 40 was where I would, where A lot of everything I had been building to be came to bear. So at 40, I was named to succeed Lloyd Banks, who was CEO of Blue Cross Blue Shield, my boss. I was designated by the board to succeed him in two years when he retired.

Wow.

Which I would be 42. And I could have said, well, boy, that was cool. I made it all right, you know, But I said instead. I said, lloyd. And I asked, and he agreed. And then he said, I think you should ask the board. I want to develop a strategic plan. I think there's more to this company than what it is and what it could be. And he said, well, do you have any idea what that is? I said, not sure yet. But I know that we are limited in one state right now, and there's no reason for that. We've got capability to do more and that we've got a limit. We've got. We've got a limitation of what we can do without more capital. As a mutual insurance company, the only way you can raise capital is raise rates. And we didn't want to do that, Right. So I had to figure out a way to do both of those things. And so that really led to the creation of anthem and accordion. And it was that two years of diving in and seeing what could we be. And so I think that was where I really started to feel, okay, I'm in my stride. And one thing I had learned by then, and I would again, encourage your listeners, really pay attention to what lights you up, pay attention to what you're good at and what you're not good at. I did a lot of experimentation in my 20s, 30s even. I mean, I still do it, but of figuring out what is it I'm really good at and what is not so good for me, even if I wish I was. So, for example, I am terrible at doing something where you have to do it just like you did yesterday, but a little bit better. So I was a disastrous golfer. I became a private pilot. But thank God for everybody else I got out of the sky, right? Because who in the world needs a creative pilot, you know, that is not a good skill, not a good thing for creative people. It's stupid. The same way I experimented with all these things, but that's not my forte. So I have to pretty well say, okay, I can do that. I can have some fun, but I'm never going to be great at it, right? But creativity and coming up with ideas other people might have missed, believing in the impossible and then having the tenacity to break it down. Not leave it as an idea. Yes. Okay, I'm gonna go implement this thing. I'm gonna. I'm gonna make this thing work. That's my forte. And you don't have to be everything. Just be good at something that.

That's so good. And I think for the listeners, you know, what I heard there was it may be time to take an inventory. Like that's at 40. You said I need the inventory. I need to see. See where we are. I want to do a strategic plan. So gappers. If you haven't taken an inventory of your life, your business, your relationships, an inventory of your problems, an inventory of your health, now's the time to do it. And you just heard it from one of Indy's best.

Well, and Bill, that's what I mentioned back earlier in your program. The what? The who am I?

Yes.

Just maybe around your birthday or do it after the first year. Either. Whatever resonates most with you and really take it seriously. Take, you know, a few days. If. And if you can't, don't have time. You know, if you have to work, do it. Try to do it on a weekend, but get some time when you can really, like you said, inventory your life, really assess. Where am I going? What is it that I've got to bring to this world that I want to let flourish and that I promise that if you take that seriously and you do it year after year and you keep a few notes, you can go back and reference, you can actually see your growth.

Yeah.

And it's very inspiring.

That's so cool. All right, we're up to 50. Do you remember when you turned the big five zero? I mean, it's always, you know, a monumental year. I would curious, did you have a party? Did you go travel? Was it what was going on at 50 and what was your attitude lesson at 50?

Well, it was 50 and I did actually went to the whole family. I got. They gave me me a surprise trip to Colorado and we went up in the mountains and so forth. But the real gift wasn't 50, it was 52. Although I made the decision at 50 around in that age and for. I don't honestly remember, it was 4950 around in there. I made a decision that most people thought was crazy. I'm sitting on top of the world. I've built now two public companies in 10 years. They're both very successful. We're preparing to take Anthem public and I make the decision I'm going to leave at the peak of my career. I'm going to leave and do something else. And literally, a lot of people thought I was insane. They thought, oh, my gosh, poor Benny's having a midlife crisis. And, you know, it had nothing to do with that. I'd been thinking about this for years, and I developed this idea of. And it wasn't my idea, but a guy that, again, a great mentor of mine, he was a financial mentor, and he gave me the idea of refinement. And refinement, he said, is when you figure out what you need to live, how you need to live the lifestyle you need to be happy, and you figure out the. The price of that. And you. Then you get that much money and you stick it in savings or in investments, and it'll pay you enough. It'll pay you enough that you can support that lifestyle. I love it. You're now a free man. You're a free person. You can spend the rest of your life refining and being everything you want to be. And so that's what I decided to do. And I went out to, you know, to see each one of my grandchildren born and be part of their lives in a serious way, to be partners to my children and not just be somebody they saw at holidays and to become physically fit. I wanted. I set out to become optimal fitness for my age, and I'm still there. And. And to. And then to work with my sons. I wanted to work in my daughter. I want to really be part of their lives. And we've done bitten of my sons and I have done businesses together and so. And travel the world and, you know, so that's. I've done what I wanted to do, but I made a. I made a big decision. Yeah, I'm going a different direction, man.

That is. And so who gave you that advice?

Well, that. The. It was a guy named Gene Tanner, and he was. He was managing my. Helping me. He actually, we actually owned a company that he ran called Raffensberger Hughes.

Sure.

On the circle. And Gene was an incredible financial mentor of mine, and he gave me that idea when I was in my third early 30s, mid-30s, I guess it was.

Yeah, that's great.

And it. It's a. It's a life. And it's in the book. It tells you exactly how to do it.

So that's called refinement. And I. Yeah, I almost feel like you need to write a whole book on refinement. I know 90% of the people I know could use a course and a book on that. That's just absolute gold and beautiful, beautiful Ben, that's so good. All right, so you've become refined and now you turn 60. What was that like turning 60? And what was your attitude lesson at 60?

I think the. The biggest change for me at 60 was. Was really starting to. To see my perspective. It was like my perspective before I. I was at. I thought I was at 50,000ft, you know, but I now maybe 70,000, you know, because I could see more how things worked in the world. I'd had a lot of experience in big jobs and multiple industries and, and some government service and knew a lot of very successful, powerful people. And I kept good notes all those years about what all that was about. And it started to really come together for me that I am, you know, and I didn't make a lot of big adjustments. It was more that I began to say, okay, I. And one of the big discoveries in that period, by the way, I want to share with your audiences. If you really go back and study, as I have for literally years, the arc of history. You know, you hear people talk about the arc of history, what is that? Well, that's these, these events that reshape humanity. And there's some really good work out there on it. If you go back and study it, one of the things you see is that the most. The thing that really lifts the human race to a next higher level of civility and living well above subsistence living is innovation. It's always innovation that really makes a huge change. And so I began to. I'd always been an innovator, but now I began to think, even sharpen my view on what innovations could make a huge difference. And what's happened with technology, particularly artificial intelligence in the cloud, is now you can develop technology much cheaper that can change the world. Take a couple examples, gps, Amazon, Uber, literally change the world. And you can have enormous impact by focusing on places where an innovation can make all the difference. I love it. So that really sharpened what I wanted to do the rest of my. With the rest of my life.

I love it. Most people don't want to impact the world, you know, I mean, there's just. There are very few people like us, and that's the way it is. So we'll leave it at that.

I'm glad you brought that up because actually the creed of a potentialist, if you will, the very simple way I try to live, that evolved from me a few years ago. And it. What kicks off my day and it's what closes my evening, is I will do my best to be my best and leave the world and the people I meet along the way, a little better than I found. Now, where does a little come from? Okay, like, I'm trying to have impact and. But. Okay, but why? And I really believe that. And it's. Mother Teresa said, little things done with love change the world. Yes. And I fully believe that my biggest contribution, when it's all said and done, is the love and the guidance that I've. Whatever it is that I've been able to give to my grandchildren, particularly because I was wiser. I did my best as a young father, but I have to give my kids credit. They probably taught me as much as I taught them. But my grandkids, I think I've definitely had a positive influence, and that's really the first place we start. I don't have to change the world. I just have to make sure that the people around me, like my parents did for me, know I'm loved and they believe in me. I love it. That's all you got to do. And you do that. You have. And then, you know, you go to the. You go to the grocery store, and the lady's checking you out, the person's checking you out, and you look across and you make sure they know you see them, really see them. How's it going? You like the new. The new checkout system or, you know, whatever it is. But you see them, and it's not really small talk. You let them know I see you.

Right.

Because a lot of times they don't feel seen. Those little things like that make all the difference in the world.

So we have in our book the 10 attitude boosters. And literally, you have hit on all 10. Number one is be nice. And we talk about the ability to compliment others and to see the beauty and to see the potential, I guess, in every person that you meet. And every time you interact with somebody, is their day just a little bit better? All right, I got to get you to 70. I want to respect your time. Are you 80 yet?

No, no, no, no. I'm 76.

All right, well, so this will be our last one. Tell me what you did on your 70th birthday, and what is the attitude lesson from turning 70?

Well, it's one of the things about it is your kids and my grandkids know me. And so for my 70th, we got together as a family, and we went to Flagstaff. So, you know, it's a couple hours from here, and we spent a couple of nights up there, and we did an aerial. An aerial obstacle course. So we're the trees and we're walking through all kinds of stuff, and it's very challenging. And, and me and one grandson were the only ones to do the entire course. So I love it.

Way to go.

But, you know, knowing my kids and my grandkids, they probably threw it for me, you know? Right. They probably just to make me feel good. But no, it was, it was a great way I, I felt, you know, hey, I'm 70. But you know what? I'm not going to feel 70 or act like 70. I'm who I am.

I started a business and owned a business at 23, and all my partners were 14, 15 years older than me. So many of my dear friends and my mentors are all hitting 70. So I always love when I get to interview somebody because it seems awfully young now. It's, it's getting close and I'm like, 70 is not old. Hell, it's young.

Oh. And it's not people's imagination. One of the things about when life expectancy extends, when it gets longer, we never think about it, but the stages of life extend. Just like if you were to stretch a rubber band that had colors in it, it stretches. So kids are growing up slower, getting married later, having children later, but midlife is now stretched. And so the 70, real 70 really is the new 50. It's not everybody's imagination. Wow. And there's a great good news item in that is in the future, if we continue to expand life expectancy, my experience is people are at their peak and their wisdom and their desire to do good work for other people as well as themselves. And from about 45 to 70. Well, now imagine that period of life 40 years long instead of 20 years long. And then because of the percentage of the population that will be older as the population ages, a bigger share of the population will be desiring to do something good and have the wisdom to do it. That's an exciting possibility.

Yeah, that's something. And I gotta. I wanted to ask you this, and this is gonna be. Be totally off the train, but regarding biology and health and all that, there's lots of studies that the male testosterone levels are drastically reducing in a rapid way. Have you heard about that? Was that in the book?

Yeah, it's somewhat disputed. I mean, it's gotten a lot of controversy, but they have. The study results are not real pure. Having said that, you know, we've got. We've had falling birth rates now for over 50 years. And we're now at a stage where the developed world is all under replacement rate. You have to have 2.1 children per female to stay flat. There's not a single developed country in the world that's there. Everybody's below. Wow. That's when you're suddenly starting, and you're suddenly starting to see there's not enough pilots. There's. We're going to have, we have a real doctor shortage coming in. Virtually every specialty. You may have noticed there was A news report two days ago that army recruiting is now was 25% below its goal armed forces recruiting. And this is going to be a very new world that none of us have lived in before. It's been arriving for a long time. 20. A guy that I knew very well wrote a book in 2004 called Fuehre F E W E R. He's a scholar and he laid out exactly what's happened. We're going to all be asleep and suddenly we're going to wake up and there's not going to be enough people. And we've never lived in that. And so. But there's good parts to it as well. And, but that's one of those forces of change like automation and medicine that are really converging to change the world that we live in.

I love it. Well, if you are listening to this and you believe that the world is going to be a different place and if you just open your eyes and look around, the world is rapidly changing. You need to buy the book the potentialist, your future and the new reality of the next 30 years. I am going to literally, after this conversation, buy a carton of them. I'm going to buy 24 and get them to my kids and to my grandkids and my business partners. This is so relevant. The science of it, the potential of it is great. But you know what, Ben? Getting to know you, getting to know your story, hearing your antidotes of life, that's what makes this podcast, the award winning podcast that we've that we've so fortunately been awarded with. And it's just having great guests like you. We always like to close our show, Ben, for you to stand up and give your motivational speech and your message of hope to those people that are walking on the beach, driving in their car, walking their dog. What's your message of hope for our gappers, our listeners, to come close out our podcast.

Don't fear the future. Embrace it. Don't be pessimistic about the future. You'll miss the. You'll be blind to the opportunities, modern communications and unfortunately some business models and political models want to only feed us bad news and it distorts our view. You got to I would tell you from traveling the world, the vast majority of the people of the world are good people. They just want what you want and I want. They just want to raise their families, have a good life. Don't lose sight of that and be excited about it. Be pragmatically optimistic. Optimistic. If you study it as I have, probably more than just about it. Certainly anybody you're going to or meet talk to, you will come away saying wow, I wish I could live another hundred years to go through this one.

I love it. Ladies and gentlemen, that's the one and only Ben Lytle, the author of the Potentialist. And Ben, thank you so much. It was an honor to talk to you today, sir, and you are now an esteemed member and alumni of the Get Attitude podcast.

Thank you.