Sharing The Life You Deserve w/ Todd LaVine

Welcome to Real Estate Business Builders. I'm your host, Lars Hedenborg, the founder of Real Estate B School. Bottom line, the real estate industry has failed to create a clear path to financial freedom. Traditional brokerages and coaching are designed to keep you running on the transaction treadmill with no exit strategy. While I didn't have any sales, marketing or business building experience when I got into real estate, I was willing to bet on myself and figure it out because my family was depending. Having served over 5,000 families with their real estate needs, I've made every mistake you could possibly make in this business. Through Real Estate B School, I've helped hundreds of agents and team leaders realize their goal of true time and money, freedom and living a life without regrets. If you know there's another level of growth inside of you and you want to learn how to build a highly lucrative lifestyle business, then you're in the right place. You won't find any fluff or hype here on this show. Just real world tools, systems and strategies that work. Let's grow together.

All right, welcome back. Real Estate Business Builders. This is going to be maybe a conversation that you didn't see coming, but really, when I met Todd, this kind of hit me in a way because as a business builder, you know, having been in real estate since 2007, you know, I got married in 2006. I went headfirst into real estate. Worked way too many hours. I wasn't present as a dad. I certainly didn't know what I was doing. As a husband. We have a tendency to give our businesses a lot of focus and it gets in the way of things that matter most. So, Todd, you're gift is. And your calling is just to be in that sometimes messy, you know, relationship of a husband and a wife. And you do pre marriage counseling as well. But give us a quick intro. So the reason I'm having Todd on here is that I think that there are a lot. And you're going to tell us the stats. I want you to tell us the stats. It's like 50% are divorced and then it's like 99.9% are unhappy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, we've all heard the statistics that 50% of marriages end up in divorce. Ticks up a little bit higher to 60% on second marriages. But what's staggering is that 20 to 30% of of those that stay in their marriage are unhappy in their marriage. And that's, that's what breaks my heart and that's what I'm passionate about.

Yeah. So tell us a little bit about your background because you have a background in business and ministry and most recently, like you formally launched and kind of stepped out in, in faith, into starting your, your pastoral services business. But tell us a little bit about your background. Only a minute or two, because I want to get into the framework that you teach and all the good stuff.

Yeah, sure, absolutely. So, you know, so my background predominantly was business management, business ownership. I was in the restaurant industry for about 15 years or so and did exceptionally well. Managed multiple restaurants, hundreds of employees, millions of dollars in budget at the time. I was young and in my mid to late 30s. I had a family. I had a wife, three kids at home. Essentially my wife kind of became a single mom to a great degree because the restaurant industry was such a grind. Took so much of my time. And through that all, we just kind of found a way to create a thriving, successful marriage that carried us through, you know, that phase of life when life is crazy and busy. And from the restaurant business, I ended up in full time pastoral ministry. I was on staff at a local church from 2003 till 2013. Kind of felt a calling to move out of that particular part of my life and went back into the marketplace. Worked for a construction company for six years. And now I just launched Agape Pastoral Services because I. I feel like I've got to finish my time here on earth in a capacity where I can make as big of a difference as possible, create a lasting legacy not only in my life, but in the lives of other people. And that's. That's what I'm here to do now.

Man, there's probably a whole podcast episode on that last sentence that you just said. We're going to have to park that one.

Yeah.

Maybe have you on for like part two of this. So let's focus. I want to focus on the framework. You know, when we did our pre call, you kind of unpacked this. Four cornerstones of a successful sort of healthy marriage. So let's unpack those a little bit and then I can kind of ask questions as we go.

Yeah, sure. So let me kind of just tell you what they are. I will go through all four. The first one is called the power of our choices. The second one is our core roles and responsibilities as husbands and wives within our marriages. Communication and conflict resolution, and then creating a divine marriage. And now I realize that, you know, that God is at the center of my marriage with my wife. And not all people will resonate and connect with a faith like mine, but the reality is that we have to have something else outside of ourselves. You know, our nature as human beings can tend to be selfish and. And inwardly focused. And the idea of putting God at the center of my marriage with Jody gets me out of thinking of me and us and she. And really allows us to focus on kind of the three parts of a marriage relationship.

Awesome. So let's unpack the first one. The power of our choices.

Yeah. So the power of our choices. This is one that people often overlook. I found as I'm counseling and working with couple is. Is realizing that there is an absolute cause and effect on every choice we make in life. Right. You know, from the moment I wake up in the morning, I swing my feet out of bed and put them on the floor and get up to go about my day. I have nothing ahead of me but choices. And. And I. And I teach couples to understand the idea that their choices will lead to one or two places. They will lead to life or they'll lead to death. They'll lead to blessings or they'll lead to curses. You know, when I wake up in the morning, I can choose to treat my. My wife lovingly, tenderly, in a caring type of a way, or I can choose to be harsh and critical and, and. And just not good to her. That's a choice that I have to make every single day. So that's one of the things that. That I really drill down on and focus on with couples out of the gates is that our choices matter. They have all shaped who we are to this day.

Yes. So let me ask a question about that. So there have been times, a friend of mine, definitely not me, There have been times where the business gets the best of us and we are overwhelmed and working too much, we're stressed out, and we're taking on all the drama and all these whatever. Right. If you're doing restaurants and you have a hundred people or we're like, it takes everything in me not to kick the dog when I come home. So my first reaction when I come home at the end of the day is to want to isolate or. I'm not a sports guy, but guys numb out by watching Sports center or having a beer or whatever the things are. So what advice do you give in those situations where they're already in that rut of either one is overworked or stressed?

Yeah, for sure. That's a great question because I certainly lived through that myself when I was in the restaurant industry. And, you know, I guess at the end of the day, in its most simplistic form it comes down to me having to really give it some thoughtful consideration and just kind of meditate on the idea of what, what is it going to look like from the moment I walk through the door at my home and not just take for granted that it's going to just all come together and work together the way it should. Because my mind is racing in a million and one different directions. And I'm thinking about this, that and the other related to my work and my job and my performance and all of the other stresses in life. And then I have to make that conscious choice. I have to choose to walk through that door and park my professional stuff in the garage with my car and then treat my wife the way she deserves and needs to be treated, to treat my kids the way they deserve and need to be treated. And so it's this conscious choice. You have to be very methodical and thoughtful. And, you know, anybody that, that is in business understands the importance of, to do lists and priority lists and prioritizing A through Z. And, you know, your marriage, your family are no different. You know, where are they in your priority list? And what are you going to be willing to check at the door to make sure that you can give your family the, the time and attention that they need?

Yeah, it's really good. One, one thing, and maybe I'll get your comment on it. I, I've been married for, and this is not, I'm not going to ask you to enter into a therapy session with me what I found. I think it was probably so we just celebrated 16 years, and I bet you it was half of that, like a full eight years where it literally was like, my mindset was 50, 50 tit for tat, where I always had this sense of like, well, I'm doing more than you, or like, I did this, you should do this, or. And it, it was, it did not lead to any sort of peace or oneness or it didn't lead us closer together. I, as leader of the household, I made the decision and this has really served me and I fail every day, but I made the decision to give 100%, 100% of the time. And I don't know where. I don't think I came up with it, although I've adopted it as my own. But, but talk about that where you see marriages where, like, they're each kind of like tit for tat on stuff, where. How do you resolve that, that kind of dynamic?

Yeah, no, that is, that is outstanding. You know, and I'm going to take us into the Bible here briefly. And again, I realize that some out there might not connect with this, and that's okay. But what's fun is that there's over 200 sayings that we've adopted in culture that are biblical. I mean, so everything seems to tie back to the b. The Bible in one way, shape, or form anyways. But these biblical truths that, That I teach and work with my clients on, they're practical, they're. They're real world. They work when the rubber meets the road on Monday morning. Right. And so the Bible teaches us that the type of love that we are called and commanded to demonstrate towards our spouse is an agape form of love. And an agape form of love is sacrificial. And. And it's this idea that if. If I want the best for my marriage, if I want the best for Jody, who is my wife, I need to be willing to sacrifice myself for the sake and the betterment of her. I need to sacrifice my wants, needs, and desires for the sake of her wants, needs, and desires. And I love that you said that you had this shift where you shifted to giving 100% of yourself. I did the premarital counseling for a professional basketball player about 10 years ago, and he was having a difficult time understanding the idea of what it looked like to give 100%, because that's what I was talking to him about. And I said, let me tell it to you this way. When you're on a basketball court, there are five of you, correct? And he said, yep, that's right. And I said, all right, so when all five of you are out there, how good of a team do you think you would be if you only gave 20% effort, each of you? And he said, well, we'd be terrible. And I said, well, that's the exact same concept for marriage. Right. You know, I said, when you go out on the basketball court, you leave it all on the court. You give 100 plus percent of yourself in every attempt to have your team come out with a victory at the end of that game. And I said, our marriage is no different. Our marriage has to have a commitment by both people, the husband and the wife, to come into the game with 100% effort. And. And then when that happens, consistently, a beautiful, thriving, till death do us part marriage really bubbles up and comes out of that.

Yeah, it's a good visual, too. It's like the. The best teams, you know, they have each other's back, too.

Yeah.

If the goal is to win, like, you know, you're it's like the two of you against the world. Like, your kids, like, you know, they're. They're a battleground, you know, and then you've got, you know, trying to keep a sort of a. You know, and we share the same faith, so, you know, trying to live that out in the world we're in today is really hard, you know?

Yeah. You know, one of the fantastic things that Jodi's always done a great job at is she reminds me constantly that we're a team. You know, if all of a sudden we find ourselves a little bit at odds and maybe in a fight or bickering a little bit, she'll quickly say, hey, hey, remember, we're a team. Right? We're a team. We're in this together. It's us against the world. And that all of a sudden, deescalates things, you know, that's a little tip that I teach the couples that I'm working with is figure out what those code words are. You know, when you find yourself going down a path that you're thinking could go sideways and escalate is what's. What's the code word that one of you is going to just spurt out? And then everybody has a reality check and realizes, oh, we're going down a path we don't want to go down. Let's stop it right now. So, yeah, being a team is a big deal.

That's really good. And maybe you can comment on this, too, and maybe it's an experience that others have had, because that saying that you just shared, I find myself saying that to my son. So in some cases, I see my kids having a lot of challenges, and I almost give my kids a little bit more grace than I give my wife, not. Not deliberately or intentionally. And it's a totally different relationship. But I'll tell my son, I'll be like, bud, I'm on your team, man. Like, you know, I'm here for, you know, forever, for the long term, you know, like, I'm on the team. But is that something that you see, you know, when kids come into the picture, when it comes to, you know, these choices and having, you know, we're business builders. We're going against the world in business and killing and eating, you know, killing what we eat and eating what we kill and all that? And then we've got to stay closest to God, and then if that's the faith you share, but then our wife and then our kids, Any dynamic you can talk through around the kids and how that sort of complicates things.

Well, yeah, I mean, absolutely. You know, my three kids now are all grown and gone. They've all launched successfully, they're all married, giving me grandkids, which are the greatest thing in the whole wide world. But you know, it's important for us to remember, you know, the hierarchy, if you will, of the home and this is something that I talk with couples about as well, is that if, if you keep things in order and again, biblically speaking, you know, it should always be God first, our spouse second, our kids third, and then everybody and everything else, including our professions somewhere beneath that. And those, those characteristics, those things that we go about doing and demonstrating, lifing out, lifing it out, if you will, those need to, you know, start with, with our spouse and then they need to trickle down and they're very, very similar to one another as far as, you know, communicating with your kids that you're a team and you know, being able to meet their needs as a parent. Because, you know, males, females, we all have what I call God given needs that is super important to make sure that they're being fed and whether they're a spouse or a kid, it's critical to make sure that we are feeding those needs properly and in a healthy, constructive way.

Yeah, awesome. All right, we've got to get on to number two. So go through the core roles and responsibilities.

Yeah, so again, this, this goes back to the Bible and God's word. But out of Ephesians, chapter five, we see basically that the two primary principles, and the interesting thing about that passage of scripture is that it, it communicates what we are to do, not because we're to do it, but because it's to fill a need of our spouse. And so at the end of the day, again, this is as practical as it is biblical. And if someone who does not share my, in your particular faith, you know, would just grab ahold of the tactical, practical aspects of it, they could walk away from this time learning something that they could begin applying immediately in their, in their marriages. And, and so for the, for the wife, the single number one greatest need that any woman needs. And I've, I've seriously talked to hundreds of women over the years and I can tell you that unequivocally, whether it doesn't matter what age they are, doesn't matter for what part of the country they're from, it doesn't matter what their religious background is. Faith, no faith, whatever. Every woman has a primary need to be sacrificially loved. That it goes back to that agape, that Greek word, agape again. And what does that mean? Practically the single greatest need a woman has is to be listened to. There was a study my wife and I have done years ago, and the woman who was teaching this course talked about interviewing hundreds of women all over the country. And she would ask them to answer this question, I wish my husbands would love me by. And then they were to fill in the blank. And then she said, I did this for about a year or two and collected the answers. And what was bizarre was that no matter where I was or who it was that I was talking to, they all answered the question the same exact way. So it got redundant. I stopped doing it. And she developed what she calls her top 20 list of a woman and how a husband can sacrificially love his wife in these ways. And the number one response was listening to me. I wish my husband would love me by listening to me. And I won't for the sake of time, go through the other 19. But maybe we could even put a link in the comments area below where they can grab this PDF document and see what those other 19 needs are. But because, you know, as human beings, we're inherently selfish, it takes every bit of power within me to sacrifice myself for listening to Jody or for doing those other 19 things for Jody. And so that's hands down for women, what their greatest needs are. And I'm on the hook as a man to meeting those needs in the context of my marriage. Otherwise. Scary thing is, is she may start looking for those needs elsewhere. Not necessarily that she's going to have an affair, but maybe she gets those needs at work met because she's not getting them met at home. Maybe she gets them met by her neighbors or other parents at kids, sporting events or whatever the case is, a need that should be exclusively met by me is now getting met by other people. And now let's flip it real quick. Let's take a look at the husband comes out of the same section of scripture, Ephesians, chapter 5, verses roughly 22 through 32. And what it talks about there is let the wife see to it that she respects, honors and reverences her husband. So the single greatest need that you and I have as men is to be respected, to be reverenced, to be honored. And, and, and these aren't things that we chose to want to need. They were inherently wired into us by our Creator, in my personal opinion. And so again, if my need for respect, honor, reverence are not being Met, I'm going to tend to look for that elsewhere. And this is especially prominent for men in the workplace. Right. If I've got employees, which I've had over my entire professional career, I can get my need for respect, honor, and reverence met very easily by my employees, my staff, my team, praising me, complimenting me, hey, Todd, job well done. You know, my boss, you know, my peers. That need can. Can be met in the workplace pretty easily, but it's ultimately designed to be met by our wives.

Yeah, that's really powerful. Yeah. It makes me think of the resource, Love and respect. It's a big. It's a book. And I don't know if you.

Have. Fantastic.

Really, really good. Awesome. Yeah. And the word I have for. I mean, I'm a guy, so I can relate to the. To the wife part, but there are women that are hard charters in business that need to do this. So when we are wired, you know, for this unnatural growth in business, which is sort of, you know, has been. Been my. My challenge, we tend to, like, we think the stuff that we're worried about and we're stressed about is more important than anything else. And even when we're physically somewhere, we're racing in our head about the real estate deal that's happening or the issue with our team member or how we're going to grow the business faster or whatever, you know, so any advice for, like, I've heard it said, like, when your wife starts talking, you physically turn to your wife. Like you are present and locked in. Any sort of, like, quick hacks, you know, for.

Absolutely, yeah. That's a. That's a great point. You know, and there's a statistic I just recently read that said that if a conversation takes longer than two minutes, as far as you trying to communicate a point, within two minutes, the other person's attention span is going to drop by 30%. So at that point, they're only listening to 70% of what's being said, while all of us know that are married, that that's a recipe for disaster. Right. And. And so, you know, what we've got to consider is something that I call. There's a difference between listening and hearing. You know, this is another thing that I teach couples that I work with is that, you know, and I. An example of Jodi and I listening to one another might be she and I just get home from work. I might have picked up the mail at the mailbox. I'm thumbing through mail, opening up the mail. She might be preparing dinner. That evening for the two of us, and we're listening to each other. You know, we're talking about each other's day, what we're going to do the rest of the evening. And, you know, maybe we're really hearing 30% or 70% of it, and it kind of goes in one ear and out the other with some of it. But if all of a sudden the conversation shifts, and all of a sudden maybe we're talking about an argument we had the day before, she or I need to be aware enough to catch that and say, hey, we need to shift gears here. We need to shift into a hearing mode, not just a listening mode. And that means let's turn off our cell phones, let's turn off the television in the background, let's go sit down in the living room on the couch and look each other eye to eye so that we can see what's really behind our eyes in each of our cases, and. And really try to hear one another. And then maybe stepping it up to what I would call active listening. Right. It's the idea of repeating back to them what I believe they just heard, because there's a Dennis Prager quote that I heard one time that I just loved, and he said, I prefer clarity to agreement. That is such a powerful statement, because 90% of arguments and conflict in marriage are a result of poor assumptions, misunderstandings. They're just not grabbing a hold of all of the truth. So active listening allows you to get to the point of clarity. I mean, we can agree to disagree at the end of the day, but let's make sure there's clarity so that we both know with complete certainty that what we're doing here is right and accurate.

Awesome. All right, so part three of the framework is communication and conflict resolution. So unpack that for us.

Yeah. So, I mean, the idea here is with communication, one of the keys to communication is listening a lot more than we're talking. As human beings, we've got this incessant need to talk, to get everything out of our head and out of our mouth, to get the last word in, to debate our point, to argue our point. And. And all of us, I'm sure, can relate to the idea that that doesn't go well very often. And so what I'll share with clients is I said, let me give you this illustration. So I remember when my oldest daughter, Olivia, was 16 years old, as any teenage girl can only do is she's just. She and I found ourselves in this argument. I remember it clear as yesterday were standing in our living room or fighting about something, and things were escalating. And I knew. I knew she was going to say something that she was going to regret and she'd end up getting grounded or whatever the case might be. And I said, olivia, I remember saying to her, shut up. You know, I just shut up. And I think it was the first time in my life I ever told her to shut up. And she stood back, her eyes got like this big, and. And I said, olivia, all that stuff going on in that pretty little head of yours does not have to come out of your mouth, you know? And it was this idea that she just had to say everything that was going on in her head. And I've counseled enough couples to know that communication and conflict resolution, generally speaking, are the top two things that are causing that marriage to struggle. And when I dig deeper with couples, there's far more talking, arguing, getting my point across, debating, and getting out of my head what I. What I need to get out of my head, then listening. You know, I, I, In a funny, lighthearted way, I'll tell couples, hey, listen, God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason. Right. You know, we got to do far more listening in our. In our marriages, in any relationship, for that matter, whether we're employers or. Or our friends or other family. But we got to listen more than we talk because our tongue will get us in trouble more times than not if we're not careful.

Yeah. So what I tend to do this, and it's. Where do you think it comes from? Where it is, this sort of need to be right or get the last word in, and it literally achieves the last thing you would want in your marriage. Right. It just pushes your wife away from you, and, you know, nothing good comes from it. But why do you think we do that?

I think we do that more times than not because we lack clarity. Because I don't really understand Jody's feelings, the emotions behind her actions, the emotions behind what it is that's gotten us to that point, or vice versa. It could be my feelings. That's where we need to really focus on gaining clarity. Because once we gain clarity, then we'll no longer feel the need to defend, argue, debate, or whatever. Clarity just. I mean, it just. It takes the cloud away. It takes the mystery away of why. Why are we fighting like this? Why do we always seem to be bickering and going after one another when we're a team? And it shouldn't be the case? And so clarity, I think, is. Is always to be the number one goal in communication if you hope to ever be able to resolve it in a healthy, constructive manner.

Awesome. All right, so the fourth part of the framework here is. And again, this one's pretty sort of in your faith, in your faith, in your face being the center of our marriage. But, you know, unpack this one. Surely you can unpack this one from that perspective, but also, you know, from the perspective of, like, you guys have to be living out your marriage for something greater than our, you know, our selfish needs, but so dig into that one for us.

Yeah, no, that's. That's a good one. And again, if, you know, it's because I'm. I'm a follower of Christ, that I have this. This belief and this core cornerstone. But it goes beyond that. It goes back to the idea that. That we are inherently selfish. There's got to be something bigger than me. There's got to be something else to get the focus and the attention off of me so that I can set me aside and that I can look more objectively at whatever it is, you know, that I'm wanting out of my marriage. And so for Jody and I personally, that's. That's God. He's at the center of our marriage. We both are on parallel paths. You know, I guess that might be another way to explain it for someone who may not align with my. With my faith background would be. Is. Is. Is. Is the vision for your marriage moving in the same direction? Do you have the same goals, the same aspirations? Are you rowing the boat in the same direction, so to speak? You know, because Jody and I. Because God is at the center of our marriage, you know, we're both ascending, and we are both working our way towards one common goal with one common vision and mission for our marriage relationship. So I guess that might be the best and easiest way to describe it. At the end of the day, it really comes down to unity, to being a team. Recognizing enemies of peace within our marriage relationship. There's things that can attack my marriage. My profession was one of those for a long time because of the demands of working 60, 70, 80 hours a week in the restaurant industry. That was an enemy of peace that Jody and I know who our enemy is. It's an enemy of peace. My time that I'm devoting to my work and us agreeing on, because we have a similar vision for our marriage, for our family and where we're going and wanting to be, that we would then work together at pairing that back and bringing balance. So many of us as business Owners and entrepreneurs live on the edge. We live on the edge in so many areas of our lives, and it takes very little. It takes just a whisper of a, of a blow of air to push us over the edge. And now we're going down to a deep dark spot that, that none of us wants to be at. So how do we, how do we pull ourselves in from that edge and get some margin back in our lives? And so those are all bits and pieces of, of what it looks like of, of creating a divine marriage. Is finding those, those balances.

Awesome. I'm taking that. I'm on my third page of notes here, so it's really, really good. Last question I'll have for you. And then we'll, we'll break. So go into that a little bit more. You know, you talk about having margin in your life, and I think that's the number one thing. And this is just total practical and tactical. It just happens to, you know, be biblical, that the, if you give anything too much focus, that thing becomes the idol. Right. And then other things suffer for that. So talk about maybe practically what have you seen? Hard charging husband or hard charging. I'm sure you've had hard charging wives, you know, that you've had, you've had to coach through this. What's the practical tactical advice when you're working 70, 80 hours a week and there is no margin, there is no energy, there is no, you know, like you said, you're running at 110% and you don't have the extra, you know, margin to be able to give to the things that matter most. How do you coach people in when, when that's the issue?

Yeah, for sure. So, you know, Joyce Meyer was quoted once as saying, excess is the devil's playground. Right. You know, anything that we do in excess is, is an opportunity for things to not go well or go right. And you know, when Jodi and I, when I think back to when I was in the heart of my entrepreneurial career and lacking margin in time, I can equate it very easily to, you know, our financial budgets. Right. You know, if we want margin financially, if we want to achieve our financial goals and dreams, you know, we have to live within a budget, we have to live within our means. And in order to, in order for that to happen, we have to plan. You know, there's a Bible passage that says my people perish because of their lack of knowledge. You know, and so there's this idea that we need to, as a husband and wife team, going back to the team idea again, you know, we have to be aware of the circumstances. We have to be aware of what is going on around us in this moment. Is this something that is going to be a short lived season? You know, am I going to be working like a, a mad person for the next six months and I see a light at the end of the tunnel? Or is this something that maybe we need to look at together as a team and realigning my goals and where I am professionally to create some margin. And so I think it's critical for a husband and wife to sit down with pen and paper if necessary and to thoughtfully and considerately talk about the reality of our future. What's our six month or one year, our three years? It's a vto, right? Vision Traction Organizer. For anybody out there that's familiar with traction tools. You know, it's, it's one of those, those short term rocks, those, those intermediate one year, three or five year, ten year types of goals. Where do we want to be as a husband and wife? Where do we want to be as a family? Well, okay, so we've identified the vision. Now practically speaking, what does that look like? Let's start putting some stuff down and committing to these things. I'm going to commit to a season working 70 hours a week. But because I'm doing this, this, this and this, I see an end of that season in a period of time. You know, otherwise we just put our marriage, our kids, our, our families just at high risk.

Man, that's, that's so important. I remember back in the day and this was pre me being saved, where I still made sure because I didn't have a good example in my data how to be a husband and a father. So I knew that I wanted to be a good husband and a good father. Even though it didn't have a biblical basis. When I first got married, I did make sure like I had big plans for, to build a business, but I was a real estate agent working seven days a week. I remember telling my wife like the vision is for this to become a business where I can get back to a normal workweek, but we could have the financial blessings. And I didn't use the word blessings because I wasn't saved. So, so we can have a lot of money. Probably back then that was the goal. But I remember she knew that I was putting in the long hours because I don't know if she believed it, but I at least talked to her about it and we negotiated, you know, a couple evenings a week I could, I could work late. And Saturdays I work by appointment only. And Sunday, maybe five Sundays out of the year, would I leave the house? You know, I still probably worked on a contract here or there, you know, so the advice that you is just to make sure you're on the same page as your spouse and it's not this chronic. Like, this is the 12th year that.

This was the season.

It's the whole game.

Yeah.

The whole career. So, man, this has been really good. What's the best way that folks can get connected with you? Because I know you do virtual coaching and all of that stuff. What's the best way to get connected with you?

Yeah, absolutely. So the best way to reach out to me would be through my website and it's Agape and it'll be down in the comments area, so I won't attempt to spell it. But Agape pastoral services, all1word.com. You can find me under that, that name on Facebook as well. You can connect to me through Facebook or Instagram. Number of other means. So that would be the best way.

Awesome. Todd, this has been great. Like I said, I took a bunch of notes, so I know this is going to serve a lot of our listeners and you know, like, like you kind of teed it up. This is practical and tactical even though it is biblical. Right. So if you don't share our faith, there's so much good coaching in here. So appreciate you keep doing the work that you do. My prayer for you is just, just strength and perseverance and endurance. And like you said, this is your second mountain. You sort of done the, you've done the mountain of, you know, hours and money and business and this is so relevant and timely. So I just, I lift you up and a lot of strength to do this work and for you to just crush this ten times the way you crush business, that's my prayer for you.

I appreciate that, Lars. Thank you so much for your time. It's been great.

All right, we'll see. We'll talk to everyone soon.

Foreign.

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