Episode 150: You Have a Duty and a Responsibility to Find More

Welcome to the Unstoppable Profit podcast. Wherever you are today, if you're starting with nothing or are well on your way to the success you desire, with the right people, processes and promotions in place, you will be unstoppable. And now I'd like to introduce your host, Mike Stromso. Hey. The day we stop learners. The day we stop growing. Welcome, everybody. We are here at a very special event to just share, we want to share with everybody what we have learned in a recent adventure that all of us went through together. And there was lots of things that came up. But I am going to stop talking and introduce the amazing people on this collaborative.

Podcast webinar. However you end up seeing it, we will go. Ladies first, please.

Hi, I am Patti Laura.

So give everybody your first name, last name, city, state, just in case they have never heard of you, which I doubt is the case.

Oh, God, yes. So Patty Lawrence in Orange, California.

All right, fantastic.

East Coast, Chris Paradiso, Paradiso Insurance out of Stafford Springs, Connecticut.

Fantastic. Midwest, Midwest.

Bill Butler, Butler and Associates Insurance out of Apple Valley, Minnesota.

Yeah. Recently, the Aloha Kid in the Mahalo.

That's right, recently, the Aloha Kid, which we'll probably chat about quickly.

Exactly. It'll fold in today's session. So, Mike Stromso, Fallbrook, California, an hour north of San Diego, Proud to be here with these three amazing individuals. So let's dive right in. I believe it started. Bill, why don't you go ahead and fill us in what you were saying before we went on how we all got onto this challenge.

So in one of our coaching sessions, Mike's my business coach for those of you through the unstoppable Profit Producer program. And we were having a coaching session and he said, I'm reading this really great book or listening to this really great book on Audible called Can't Hurt Me by David Goggins. And I had not heard of it, so I googled it immediately, ordered the book, ordered it on Audible, listened to the book, the podcast Audible version is spectacular. And then just in Googling David Goggins, the timing was like February of 2021. And on his webpage it had the Goggins Challenge. And. Oh, what's the Goggins Challenge? I've done some dumb stuff in my life, and this sounded like an exact perfectly dumb thing to do. So the Goggins Challenge, for those of you who don't know, is a four mile run every four hours for 48 hours. So if you look at the back of my shirt the four. It's the 4x4x48 challenge. And so he created this challenge when he was working with a multimillionaire who hired him to live with the Navy SEAL for 30 days. And that's where this was born from. And so he.

Well, I didn't know that, Bill. How many years ago was that, do you know?

I don't know. And I don't know the name of the book, but maybe we can throw it in the show notes or something. But he basically said, hey, we're going to go in the Hudson river and sit in ice water and we're going to do this stuff. We're going to do this workout today. And like basically every day was a new day for this millionaire living in New York, living with a Navy Seal for 30 days. And Friday, David Goggins tells this guy, hey, we're going to do this 4x4x48 challenge. And so on a whim last year I decided to do it. Hadn't run in two years.

And just decided to do it. Dropped my wife off for her vacation with her folks on Thursday and Friday. Over the weekend, I did it. And in my Facebook feed and talking about this, both Mike and Patty said, hey, that sounds great. We should do it next year. And I said, deal. And that was it. They were locked and loaded. So this year we kind of collaboratively did it together. It happens the fourth, fifth and sixth, kind of the first weekend in March starts at Friday, 8pm Central or 8pm Pacific time and every four hours. And people all around the world do this together at the same time. So Chris was running the same time that Patty and Mike were running. And I was on vacation in Maui doing the Goggins Challenge on vacation, much to the chagrin of my wife and in laws and everyone that I was with in this condo. So that's kind of the background of how this came about.

Yeah. Patty, what did you learn from responding to Bill last year?

I need to be more careful.

When I say that I will do things because I had no idea. I'm like, sure, Bill, I done a lot of things in the past.

Let's piggyback on that. Are you glad you did it?

Looking back, I am so glad I did it. So thank you. Thank you so much, Bill, because I mean, you are definitely one of my heroes. And truly I many times I said yes to so many different things, but this is one that I just extremely care. I mean, grateful for.

Yeah. So what did you. What was your biggest takeaway in doing this? Looking back Patti.

So I feel like I had, I really didn't have any expectations. And at the same time, I've heard some people say that it was life changing, that it was so reflective when they did it. I'm going to be honest. The very first walk, I left the office at 7:35pm that Friday and my daughter is like, are you out of your mind? You really should have taken some time to think about this. Da, da, da. I went home, changed. I'm like, I'm ready. I'm ready. In my mind as I'm walking, I started to think, okay, I'm supposed to learn something. Like magically, somehow something's going to come into my mind. I'm going to be very clear. I'm going to learn a lot of things. And nothing was happening.

I would say about 20 minutes into my walk, it was dark. And all of a sudden I started thinking of some people that I know, that I know right now are out in the streets for different reasons. Like, you know, we can't judge. But I know that a lot of things happen in their life. And all of a sudden I started to just cry. The emotion of feeling like, how is this person feeling? I'm out here alone. It's kind of dark. I don't know what the heck I'm doing.

Yeah.

Why am I doing this again? And so anyway, so that's the first thought that I can just share with you.

Well, that's fantastic. And so, Chris, why did you decide to do this?

I'm very curious how Chris got roped into this because all of a sudden I'm in a text thread with Chris Paradiso and he's doing the go. I was like, I thought he was just encouraging us, but he's doing it. So what's up, Chris? How did you get roped in?

Well, I committed mentally to myself last year after seeing you, and then, you know, just I committed to myself and I needed. I said it all year last year to my kids.

And wasn't so sure after about a 29 day stint, after almost a year and three months of not taking a day off with COVID and told my accountability coach, you know, I'm not sure it's the wisest thing, but I'm going to do it. I was saying to my kids I was going to do it. And so I had to stick to my promises just because, you know, because I said I would.

Yeah. So, I mean, great point. He made a promise to himself, to his family, to another person in his life. And ultimately that's what it's all about. I mean, a commitment is the thing you said you were going to do long after the mood you set it in his past. Right. So I think for all of us, and I'll chime in and piggyback on that, I made a commitment and I made a commitment to somebody that I have a tremendous amount of respect for. And when I make a commitment, unless, you know, I'm on my deathbed, I'm going to fulfill that commitment. So we made that commitment.

Let's just.

Let me ask you a quick question, Bill. I mean, we'll revert back to last year since that was the first year you did it, right? I mean, going in, did you have any fear? I mean, what were your thoughts going in, Bill?

I knew it was going to suck.

Yeah.

Like, so for those of you who don't know my background, I 12 years in the military, in the infantry, I've done some military training that's very, very strenuous and very hard. And so when I saw the challenge, I thought, well, that really doesn't sound fun. It sounds horrible actually, just knowing what I know about this kind of stuff. And so I was really on the fence about doing it because I hadn't trained, I hadn't done any preparation, I hadn't run in a couple years.

But listening to David Goggins, I was very fired up. I knew this could be a catalyst for change in my life. I was ready to make a change. I had put on some weight, wasn't doing the things I needed to do from a day to day basis. So I was ready for a mind shift and needed to do something as a catalyst. So the commitment piece, I was really on the fence until about five days before the challenge in 2021. And I posted on social media, I'm doing the challenge. And as soon as I posted on social media that I was doing the challenge, I knew I had to go through with it because I was fundraising. And once you, you know, it's that commitment thing, once you say you're going to do something. So, you know, one of the lessons that I've learned over the years is if you write a check, and when I say write a check, I mean make a commitment to somebody or, you know, referral partner or a center of influencer, you say, hey, I'm going to do this for you now, you've got to follow through on it. So, like if you're working with a business association for one of your commercial niches, like I do, and I say, hey, I'VE got to do this. Well, now I actually have to follow through and make that happen, and it helps my business. So, you know, for me, last year, I was really on the fence about doing it because I knew how hard this can be. And not so much the four miles, but just the amount of time it is.

It's not short, it's the back to back.

Exactly.

Yeah. Yeah. So, Patty, do you have fear going into it? I mean, maybe not maybe yes, maybe no. But, I mean, for anybody out there that might be either watching or listening to this to help them, what were your thoughts?

Well, unlike Bill, I have no idea what it would be to do something like this. And I feel like it's almost as a female, I know you guys don't understand this, but there will be other women out there. It's like giving birth the first time. You have no idea what that's going to be like. And so you're super excited. And until you go through with it, you realize, oh, hell, this hurts so much. And then it's over. And then the reward is there, and it's like this amazing miracle before your own eyes. Right? So basically, that's it. I had no idea. I said I was going to do it. I committed to it, and regardless of what it takes.

I am going to do it. And I realized that I do this a lot. I commit to things sometimes without giving it much thought, and I have no problem doing it, but committing to myself, like something for me, I often break that promise. And so this, for me, it's really a game changer, a life changer. This is why, through our process, I think I texted Chris at one point. In a way, I started feeling disappointment in myself because of the commitment that I set, you know, and just if I had to start a little extra, I could have just done even more anyway. But I would say, like Bill said, for me, it was, hey, I've also put on some weight. I've broken so many commitments to myself, and I'm allowing this to happen in my life. And then here somewhat, you know, Bill reminds us that we said yes to this a year ago. And I thought, oh, absolutely. I, like, no matter. I'm going to clear everything. I got to do this. I had no fear. I had no idea what was going to happen. I don't sleep much anyways. I figured, what? Sleep, whatever. I don't really get a whole lot.

I'll figure it out. I figure out along the way.

So where was the headspace, Mr. Paradiso, going into this? I mean, you told us during some of our back and forth sessions in the middle of the night or whatever it was, you know, you had some issues, physical issues or other things going on, but you pushed through. What were you thinking and how'd you do that?

You know, I, you know, you get in a zone. It's in that zone was really, as you know, Michael, my headset, if I get my headset which allows me to get my reading on.

That'S where my headspace is. So I looked at the challenge as something I could learn, right. Because now I have X amount of hours over two days. And I figured I could get two books in and, you know, struggling with a back issue. But, you know, one of those things is once you get out there and, you know, making sure you're stretching. And Bill had a great point with the ice bath, super helpful.

And. But really, how you get through those hard times, really, for me, we're all about, hey, I need to get out there. I need to put an audio book, which I was focused on, a Navy SEAL audiobook that I thoroughly enjoyed.

And kind of just forged through it. But I think the big thing that I learned was, you know, the amount. And when you prepare, when you say, do you fear something? To Patty, you know, I mean, I don't really fear a lot of things. I don't. I didn't fear failing. What I feared is, is something that actually came true was, you know, being able to leave it all on the line. And I felt, unfortunately, I felt a little shorted. I cheated myself a little bit.

But you forged through the difficult times because I said I was going to do something, just as all of you did. And I had a little boost when my daughter said, hey, dad, you know, are you okay? And I said, I'm going to be fine. I just need to keep stretching. And, you know, and she said to me, why do you put yourself through that? It's because I said, I made a promise and now I have to fulfill what I promised. Not only did I promise you, most importantly, I promised myself. And I said, if you learn one thing from all of what I'm going through is that when you say you're going to do something, you follow through with it and believe in yourself so much so that no matter how much pain I'm in, I'm going to be fine. That's really the real valuable lesson I needed to prove to my kids that no matter what, it's mind over matter.

So you're setting the example. That's fantastic. So I'm Going to piggyback on that onto another question we wanted to talk about today. What did we learn from this? But bigger than that, what did you learn about yourself? And we'll piggyback on to the 40, 60 portion in a couple of minutes. And you know, we have a duty and responsibility to find more and be thinking about that as well. But what did you learn about yourself? And because of what you learned about yourself through all of this, what are you going to change in the future? Chris, go ahead.

Well, I think the number one thing is we need to be able to challenge ourselves to do very, very, very difficult things. And I think there are two very valuable lessons. Number one, push yourself to the limits. And I know David Goggins says this a hundred times in his book, but we need to callous our minds. We shy away from hard things. We need to forge forward and jump into the fire pit and really take on the challenges face to face and make that promise internally. Number two is the gratitude. Being grateful for so many little things such as sleep, such as feeling rested, such as, you know, how about the importance of food? You know, as you know, we all were going through this. If you're a Navy SEAL or a Ranger who's even tougher than Navy Seals don't always get the credit for it, but tougher. You know, why the Rangers are actually tougher than the seals from David Goggins point of view is that not only in the seals do they deprive you of sleep, but they, they give you the food. Rangers don't get the food. And that food. If the sleep deprivation was tough because it's just we all need sleep. Even people like me who only need four or five hours of sleep, when you're going without it, it's very difficult. But depriving of food, I don't know. I'm just so grateful for every bite and the energy it gave me that. I mean it was a very valuable lesson about how important eating the right food and how that food is fuel for your body. It was a very valuable lesson that I learned.

It was an incredible reminder and just. I agree 100%. Bill, what about you? So what did you learn about yourself through this? And looking back, what are some new things that you are going to change because of it?

Well, first off, to go back to 2021, when I did it, I was only able to run three of 12 legs. So in you know, the Goggins language of the event, there's 12 legs. Mike calls them stages. Cause he's a bicyclist but, you know, there's 12 of these events that you've got to do over the course of 48 hours. And I was only able to run three of 12 last year. And I wound up needing to walk nine of them. And that was, you know, I wanted to run them. The problem is, as Chris was talking about, it's a time issue. So if you walk four miles versus run four miles, that cuts into the amount of time you have between each stage. And so, you know, Patty's, you know, walk, jogging kind of walking and jogging each one. And if you finish in 50 minutes, you now only have 3 hours and 10 minutes between the time you're running again or stepping off on the next one. So, you know, I've made a commitment to myself between last year and this year. I started eating right. I lost 30 pounds. I couldn't fit into any of my clothes to come back from COVID and actually went the other way and had to rebuy all new clothes because I couldn't fit in the, you know, the clothes because I've lost too much weight, healthily, I might add. But it's really, you know, from a mindset and perspective, it's reinforcing the lessons I learned last year. And the reason I like doing these things, Mike, is it just reinforces the lessons I've learned in the past and have forgotten about. You know, you always talk about the best marketing strategy is the one I'm not doing anymore. Like, oh, that works so well. I stopped doing it.

Exactly.

And so, you know, these events or these types of things just reinforce in my mind. I know how to do these things. I know how to be dedicated to something. I know how to make a commitment. I know how to follow through. I know how to whatever it is. But when you do something in this realm, it reinforces I really can do anything. If I apply myself, I can do it. And as Chris said, you callous your mind. So when something hard comes up in work, it's like, well, that's nothing compared to what I did three weeks ago or three months ago or six months ago or what I have coming up. Right.

Patty, what did you learn about yourself? You talked about some things, but I know there's more.

Yeah, well, I feel that I had fallen into this funk where I just could not step out of again. It all boils down to the commitment to myself and being able to do it because it's a choice, because it's a decision that starts up here. And so just that battle with my mind and so for me is realizing that, like my body's a temple truly. And you know, some of this walk, like I thought, gosh, I started to thank my body. Like I started to thank my legs, you know, my feet, like everything. Just being grateful that they're there and to be quite honest, asking for forgiveness of just really asking my own body to forgive me for. For not feeding the right thing, the nutrition that it needs, and for not paying attention. And so there's a lot of that just being really grateful for, like everyone said, you know, food and sleep and ultimately my own body and that I can. I have so much control over it. And we are, you know, God's given us this gift which is life and to live life in your body regardless of what we're going through. It was just really a moment of like I could even see like that lens widening in front of me. Grateful.

Yeah.

A quick question of everyone just did you feel like even though you were tired and hungry, did you feel more alive in the environment doing this type of thing?

I.

Go ahead, Patty, then. Chris.

I absolutely did. I absolutely. Yeah.

Chris.

No question.

Yeah, 100% agree. Without question. You know, each accomplishment, each bit of progress, you felt even more. And I'm going to jump into the 4060 in just a second. But that Saturday morning after the sun came up, so we had our 4am session, which was probably the toughest one. I don't know about you guys, but that Saturday morning, or I guess it was Sunday morning, Sunday morning at 4am that session was probably the harder one if there was one. But once the sun came up and we can taste that, we're heading towards the finish line, that was fantastic. And I'll piggyback on that to the 4060 because I think we all know and I may ask you guys a hard question that you guys don't know is coming, so get ready for that. But you know, I jotted down some notes from my second time through, can't hurt me because I was so fired up after meeting Goggins and all that. I went back through the book again for meeting him.

Huh.

I'm so jealous you guys got to meet David Goggins.

Well, 86% of his all success is showing up, Bill. So.

I understand you had an obligation to your family, but I wrote down some notes. Life is a head game from Goggins. Live a mission driven life from Goggins. A racehorse chasing a carrot I'll never catch. Forever trying to prove myself to myself. So mindset, right? I mean, it's all about mindset. Our mindset is our skillset. And so that was a huge takeaway. I know for me personally was my mindset is stronger than it's ever been because I decided to take the first step and finish the last step. So back to the 40. I'm going to, I'm going to go to, I'll start with Chris again and because I already know where this is going but you know, 40, 60, in the world of 4x4x48 and Goggins thinking and just general mindset, he feels that most human beings in the achievement realm trying to do, whether physical ultra achievement events or whatever, generally only use about 40% of their complete capacity. So they're leaving 60% on the table. 60%. And so we started getting into that and that's one of the things we were talking about during our texting sessions during the middle of the night and into the early morning, whatever. So I'm going to ask each of you, did you use all of the extra 60%, yes or no and if not, what did you learn and how can you help anybody else that might be listening or watching this? Chris?

No, I didn't. And I feel I cheated myself. And I mentioned that to my accountability partner and it hurts. It's something called a regret. And.

I set a goal and one of the things that nobody knows nor do you guys is I wanted to do 13, 13 different sessions.

And.

I felt I, I cheated myself and I, I felt I, I didn't use that extra 60%.

Okay, Patty?

Well, I felt that when we committed to this from the very get go, I said that I would be 40 minutes and I feel like absolutely cheated myself because.

I could have done the four miles. I was so close many times towards the end, not even at the beginning. It was more towards the end of this, you know, legs or stage, whatever you want to call them towards the end. And after leg four, I, you know, actually took the. Chris, I'm like, I feel like such a cheat. For an extra few more minutes I could just do the four miles and do I stick to it? And then somehow I got into my head and that. But I said 40 minutes so I'm going to stay to the 40 minutes. Then I started going late, you know, anyway, I just felt like I could have done so much better because your support and I was there at the very end. We ended up leg 12 running it within the same amount of time that I did every other leg before at four months. And then that day I didn't sleep at All. And at noon, I actually did 3.5 miles. At 8am I actually did 3. You know, like, I did more towards the end and I still was able to finish sooner. So I feel that I get to really prepare and definitely get to do redo it, because I do have regrets for not doing all four miles.

So when you left a little bit more on the pavement, if you will, I think you said at the end of stage 12, I remember you told me something. And hopefully you're willing to share it here because it was already on the end of the video. I don't know if you remembered it or not. How did you feel at the very end when you gave it everything you had at that moment?

Well, it's such a great feeling. And one of the things that I said is that when. Before we turned, like when we were getting there.

No, right. Right after we finished. I'll repeat it if you want.

Please do.

I had to listen to the video, like three times. You said, I'm going to puke.

Yeah. You said, I feel sick.

I feel sick.

Yeah. But let's talk about that for a minute. After you gave it everything you possibly had and you felt sick, how did you feel after you recovered because you left it all on the pavement, so to speak?

So rewarded. I felt so proud of myself. And I always say something really funny, you know, at the end, I'm like, oh, I'm just gonna sprint. And I thought I was going so fast. I watched that video and I'm like, I'm barely moving. I'm like, going like this. I'm like, oh, my gosh.

Yeah.

Funniest thing. I'm like, billy, Mike, don't show that video. That was going super fast.

Yeah. Yeah. So, Bill, you had an advantage because you've already. You had done one going into this year. And I know because of that you wanted to up your game, but did you use all 60% for every leg, as you call?

No. So there's, you know, for me, there's. There's two components to this type of event, right. Number one is finishing. That's the number one goal goal. Whether you give it 80% or 40% or 100%, the number one goal is finishing. And so, you know, last year I had an injury, right? Wanted to run them all, but I just physically couldn't, had to walk them. And so this year it was, I'm going to run all the legs. And so that was the, you know, the 100% goal for me was, you know, maybe not physically, but just I'M going to run all of them and make sure that I can run all of them. And there's, you know, where we were in vacation, there were some hills and I didn't run all of them. I walked some uphills. And part of that, you know, this is an ultra event and there's ultra event strategy that goes into this. If you're going to do a 50 mile run, you walk the uphills, you run the downhills. Like there's just strategy to be able to physically allow your body to finish even if you want to give it at all. But when I got to the last, the 12th leg, I thought, okay, I'm going to let it. There's nothing to save it for now. I'm going to finish this four miles. I want to try. I'd averaged about a 9:16 pace running the prior 11 and I wanted to run a 32, a sub 32, so less than an 8 minute mile pace. After running 44 miles, I wanted to run a 7, 8 minute pace and I did. And it was 2 in the afternoon in Hawaii. It was 86 degrees. And I thought this is really stupid, but I'm going to give it this so that, you know, I probably gave it about 50%, 60% on all the prior legs, but the last one when I didn't have to save it for anything and I knew I could give it 100% effort, I did. And that last leg I did give 100% effort and I finished in 31, 25. And so, you know, there's, there's one goal of finishing, but then also of being strategic about how and when to apply that energy as well.

So looking back on what you learned, would you do it the same way again or would you pursue 100% on every leg?

No, because, you know, that's the other thing is, you know, as business owners, I think if you want to relate that we can't give 100% all the time. So in an area of business, if I can have a team member who does it at 80%, I can allow that to happen. So, you know, you have to be strategic about when and how to apply 100% effort. Because you can't go 100% 24, 7, 365.

Even though we want to as a business owner, but when it's time to apply ourself and give 100% effort, we have to know that we can dig deep and do it in the right moment. And that's one of the, you know, that's one of the Key lessons I've learned over my life is how and when to apply that maximum effort.

So did this help you transition, translate over to business life as well? Because you know about the 100% level and you can do it in business as well.

Yeah. So if I'm working on a difficult task and I need to apply 100% of my mental and physical focus to sit in a chair, do the thing thing, deal with a client, work with a team member, work on a project, I know I can do it because I've done it at other points in my life, in other events. It's the same mindset. It's just a different type of an event.

I'm dying to know what Chris might be thinking about Bill's comment on, well, can't give 100% all the time or something similar to that.

Chris.

I just disagree. I don't disagree that you can't. You can give 100% every time. And.

I felt that I cheated myself, and.

I would definitely have a different strategy and I would go a lot more aggressive off the bat and feel.

I'm okay if I, if, if I fail. And I felt by going 40, 50, 60, 70%, I could complete it. And after completing it, I felt I cheated myself. So I would disagree with Bill. I would rather fail and not complete it. And given 100% on all the legs, just a different approach. You live and learn. And I feel like I have regret, and I told my accountability coach that. And every night I've slept with that regret. And I don't. I just don't like. I don't like regrets. They're little cancer spots that sit in my pit and they just, they don't go away.

Well, we definitely have less than 360 days to go, maybe less than 350 days to go. So countdown is on and we're going to get rid of that for you. So, Patty, what do you have to say to that?

I absolutely agree. I feel like I cheated myself. And I feel like, honestly, I. Because I didn't feel a whole lot of pain in my body, I felt fine, and I thought I'm supposed to feel pain. I know my body can still take in a whole lot. And the only thing, honestly, I really feel that I was probably definitely a 40, if not 30% of my capacity. It also allowed me to just, again, have to be really, really clear in my mind of what I want to do and why I'm going to do it, to make it happen.

Yeah. So I know preparation is a big thing. My take on it is. I absolutely did not leave it 100%. I was mostly running on pavement through all 12 stages. That's on me. I own that. And I'm not sure I was quite hard on myself. Maybe I need to change my thinking, my mindset, like Chris is alluding to. But I know that we have more within us, and that's why I've kind of gotten on the bandwagon. It's our duty and responsibility to find more, find more within our minds and our bodies. And our mind does control a lot of our actions. So preparation is a big key. I know that. So I want to piggyback onto one other thing. I'm looking again at some quotes that I wrote down from the book. Don't surround yourselves with people who speak to our desire for comfort.

All right, that was hard for me on vacation.

I understand that. So what would you say after having gone through this with that statement? What do you say for everybody out there either listening or watching this, who might be in their comfort zone or think, I don't want to take on something like that.

Your friends want to challenge you.

Oh, go ahead, Chris.

Yeah. Yeah.

True friends are not going to let you stay comfortable.

That's right.

What you do realize is, you realize that you don't have a lot of true friends because a lot of true friends.

You know, they wouldn't sit back and let you be average or they wouldn't sit back and let you know. A good friend of mine, Mike, that, you know, Scott, says, hey, you know, how much pain were you in? I said, not enough. And he says, I see the regret in your face. And I said, yeah, I'm very uncomfortable, but not uncomfortable enough, which. And he looked me in the eyes and he says, well, you know what? And this was on Sunday night. He says, well, then you got to get up and run nine miles tomorrow morning. When a lot of people would tell you, take the day off. I did, and he challenged me, and I did. Nine miles is nine miles the day after. I'm not going to tell you it was comfortable. And I thanked him for that. I know he's a true friend. Why? Because he literally says, you know.

True friends are going to challenge you to become more and be more. And the only way you're going to do that is by truthfully pushing yourself to do things that you don't want to do and that are uncomfortable. And the pain level, once you're at a certain pain level, you got to fight through that.

That's right.

We can't suppress and Allow our brains to allow us to say, oh, that's all you have. That the one thing you will learn from, from something like this is your mind plays tricks on you. There's a rationale, and it truly does. And don't allow your friends to play tricks on you either, to allow you to stay in that comfort zone and challenge your friends if they're true friends. Challenge? Why would you say that? And I did challenge a friend and he called me back a couple days later. He says, you're right, I was wrong. I said, don't ever allow me to be mediocre or allow me to hurt 40 or 50%. Push me to say, hey, Chris, I know you're better than that. That's what a true friend would do.

Wow, that is awesome. And hey, our mind is already messing with us, right? Don't let friends mess with you too. We got a big enough battle on our hand with our own minds. Bill, what do you have?

What do you have?

Yeah, I think.

One of our late night text threads, David says it in the book. And I'll give you the PG version of that. When your body's telling you to quit, that's just your mind effing with you. And you got to go through the pain because you have another level, you have another gear, and that 40% is the pain level. And then you get to 60%, 80%, 100%, whatever that might. And one leg, you might have to give 100% just to finish. And you know what I found over doing this twice and just knowing from my own past history and doing stuff, your body will adapt to the current environment. I overslept one of the legs. So that 4:00am leg for you, that was really hard. Sunday Morning was my 2am leg in Hawaii. I woke up, looked at my watch and was like, it's 2:40. That's really weird. I thought, oh, I should be finishing right now. Thankfully, I woke up, basically put on my running stuff, don't warm up, nothing went out and ran. That was the most painful leg of the entire event for me was that 2am sun came up, I only got three left. I'm going to knock these out and I know the last one, I'm going to give it 100%, you know, and again, everyone's in a different place, strategy wise. If I had injured myself on vacation in Maui, I would have been in way more trouble. So it's like it's finishing, it's staying healthy and safe. It's all these things. So you have to always think about where you're at from a perspective as well, of, you know, what's. What's everyone's individual goal in this. And, you know, I would have had regret because I know a hundred percent I could run and do all 48 miles, but if I hurt myself on leg four and not finished it, then I'd have regrets. So, you know, everyone's regret is a different component as well. So, yeah, you know, that. That's.

I think that should be repeated, what Bill said, because I don't think it's talked about. Everybody's regret is different. And, Bill, you couldn't have said it better because there's just. We all. We all have different regrets.

Well, and we all have a different starting point, and we have. We all have a different ending point, and we all have a different influence point, and our mindsets are in a different place. I think that is great stuff. Fantastic stuff. So, Patty, don't surround yourselves with people who speak to our desire for comfort. What do you have to add?

I just want to say that I felt so comfortable knowing that I knew that I would make it through regardless of what others like in my office, even though they were proud of me, but they're like, why are you doing this? And that's crazy. And all of this negativity, if you will, because it wasn't supportive, and I could easily just be very comfortable and say, yeah, why the heck am I doing this? You're right. I don't need to do this. But the fact that you guys were part of this, I knew that at any moment I couldn't quit. And I knew that I have your. You know, that you'd have my back and that you would have the right thing to say. And then, you know, when Chris joined us as well, I'm like, wait. He just supported. Like, he's so nice, right? He's just supporting us and encouraging. I'm like, no, he's actually doing this. It's almost like.

I have to say, it's so honored. And Chris, truly, what matters is really surrounding yourself with people that exactly will accept you and support you just of who you are, but also that can, you know, support and bring you to the level that you are capable of.

Doing or living or anything. And I just feel very, very honored that I was with you guys. Because you're crazies, by the way, and a lot of people have those shirts. I'm like, yes, I am with this group of crazies. And I love it because they bring me. They really, really bring the best out of me. And even though I don't like to put myself in uncomfortable situations, I do it just by default because I don't think about it. But thank you. Thank you for, for everything that you, that you do and for bringing me with this group. And I just feel so honored now.

It was good.

So you know Rudy Rudiger right here, That's a picture of Rudy getting carried off of the field at Notre Dame. He talked about it at one of your boot camps about people having negative attitudes and wanting to see you fail. You know, there's people following us along on Facebook wanting to see us fail because this is too hard and they think we're nuts and we're crazy for doing this and why would you do this to yourself? Why would you do this to yourself on vacation, Bill, did any family members involved? Yes, I had family members in Hawaii questioning my sanity and why I would do this. My brother in law is a runner and former cross country ski athlete in high school and he had a hamstring injury and he was really bummed that he couldn't do some of the running with me because he had an injury. So you have to surround yourself with people who are going to pump you up and give you motivation in the face of, you know, and Rudy talked about, you know, the people who want to see you fail and want to see you quit, want to see you give up. You have to use that as motivation to keep going and then surround yourself with the people who are going to say, yeah, you can do this and just let you do it and not give you the negative attitude.

Yeah, fantastic.

Bill is a lot of them won't challenge you to your face and I would, I encourage them. If you challenge somebody to their face, I thoroughly embrace that. I'm sure you would too, Bill and Mike and Patty. I just, I wish some of the, you know, the chibber chabber behind the scenes would just say it to our say it to my face. Even if it's not on social media. That's fuel. And that fuel doesn't mean hatred or anger internally. It just says we got this.

Yeah, yeah. And we saw our back and forth. Chris, I know you like to get up early in the morning. Have you encountered any of your competition out there yet?

No. And that's why I will continue. And if I have to, I'll get up earlier and work harder and run longer and run more stairs and do more push ups.

And the other thing is it talks about, I think it is chapter 11 in the book, Goggins book. What did the lady that you did encounter out there one morning, what did she call you?

I got it. If you don't.

Yeah, she. She basically pulled over. Because I run, I try to run on. Not on the sidewalk because it's. It's different pavement. I actually like the road on my knees a little bit more. She said I was. What did she say, Mike?

She said you were unnormal.

Yeah, unnormal. And I looked at her and I said, that's about the best compliment you could ever give me.

I don't want to be normal. Somebody challenged me the other day on Twitter and they said, you know.

Because I said something. Michael Jordan sacrificed a lot. In order to be iconic or to be great, in order to become something out of the ordinary, you have to sacrifice. And someone said, hey, well, I don't think you do. I think everything can be, you know, your success can be a balanced success. There is no such thing with the word success. And balance. You cannot. There's no success. If you want to be successful in life or business or as a dad or as a mom or whatever you want to be. Balance doesn't work in there.

Yeah, I agree. No denying that for sure.

So what I was talking about in the book, just to put an exclamation point on this, is David Goggins. He's Got Shirts about. It is being uncommon amongst the uncommon. So we all network with very successful insurance agents and everything else, but there's only four of, you know, two Mike's coaching clients. There's only four insurance agents that I know that did this. We're very successful, but now we're uncommon amongst the uncommon.

Well, let's lead an even bigger uncommon charge for next year. And anybody that's watching or listening to this, we respectfully ask you to join us next year. Let's create a huge group of people who are doing this together. And my next comment is, we need to move to wrap this up just because of time and other commitments. Most wars are won or lost in our own heads.

Amen.

In a foxhole, we usually aren't alone, however. Ok. And failure is all about repetition. So we were all in this together. Very quickly. Just talk about one of your big takeaways about being together through the text strings, through the middle of the night and through all of this. What was the benefit to you and what was your takeaway from that? Patty?

I never felt alone. So even at the moment when everyone was sleeping, everything was quiet. I get up and be ready and I knew that I was not alone. So thank you.

Yeah. Bill.

Last year, during the two worst sessions, I had a fellow Rotarian for my Rotary Club come walk with me. And this year, and so, you know, I had some. Some local support, but for the most part, I was just on my own with Facebook. And this year, having more of a team capacity or team thought process behind it was a lot more motivational. Just to even banter back and forth about how we're feeling or whatever. Just that you're. You're in this together with somebody.

Absolutely. Chris.

Teamwork, motivation has an expiration date, and then once it expires, you need discipline and that ultimate teamwork that I feel. We will be friends forever just through the bond of this 48 hours.

The discipline is there for each other. So that is all I got to say.

Yeah, and absolutely. You know, during the cat naps, we got maybe 20 minutes, 30 minutes, sometimes up to 45 minutes of sleep between the stage's legs. It popped me up knowing that I needed to be there for my teammates to get started again, and that meant everything because it is my responsibility to show up, to be there for everybody else. And just knowing that I had to continue to stretch, it really helped through the stretching. And that is a great big takeaway for me was the stretching and the ability to need to be up 40 minutes before it started to get the stretching in, which I've learned a lot of that from Goggins and from you also, Chris, because it's so important to be able to perform at the highest level, even though we didn't even get to that flipping 100% this year. But we're not done. We're far from done, right, everybody? So I've got one last takeaway around the horn, and then we'll wrap this up for this session, at least. My comment from the book, don't let any person cap your potential. More importantly, don't let your own mind cap your potential. And we'll likely title this session. It is your duty and your responsibility to find more anybody that is watching or listening to this. Fill in that blank for them from your own experience. Patty.

Well, just to wrap this up, I want to share this. And this is what came up. When I thought I wrote, I wrote, I took a little bit of time, and when I thought of Bill, what came for me was encouragement and relentless. Well, thank you for being that Bill for me, Mike. What came out for me was commitment and show up like no other. Thank you for showing up and thank you for staying committed. Chris. Just a silent power behind love, support, and just always encouraging, making a difference in so many people's lives. And I actually wrote Patti and I wrote, you know, encouragement, inspiring possibility. There's a possibility for every one of us if you really want it. Just got to stay committed and go out and get it.

Well, and as you know, I think I learned this from you, Patty. Anyway, the definition of impossible. Reword it. I'm possible. You are. Absolutely. It's your duty and responsibility to find more. Don't let any person cap your potential. Fill in the blank, Bill.

Just need to continue to challenge myself. You know, I did this last year. I did this this year. There will be future challenges, whatever they might be. And you know, that's. No one's going to be able to challenge me more than myself. And it's being able to adapt to the situation and be uncommon amongst the uncommon. And you know, what anyone else is going to say is completely irrelevant. It's totally up to me. You know, you shared with me Earl Nightingale and the only competition we ever have is the competition we have for ourselves. And so, you know, that's really what it all boils down to. We're only competing against ourselves in life and whatever we're doing. And so that's the mindset that I have.

Awesome.

Don't let any person cap your potential. It is your duty and responsibility to find more. Fill in the blank on the rest of that. Chris.

Easy. Matthew McConaughey said it best in man made Roof. It's our mind. Allow our mind for a man made roof. In Patty's Woman made Roof. Your mind puts a roof and you have a choice to tear that roof down. Anything is possible if your mind is set in the right way and you are thinking the right way. And do not let your mind limit you to do anything you put your mind to.

Fantastic. I'm going to add on to this one. First of all, yeah, I could not be more thankful and grateful for the team that we had going into this and through this together and finishing it together. However, we left some on the field, on the pavement, whatever it might be. We have got more work to do. One, it is my duty and my responsibility to find more. I have got so much more within me, but I let pain, I let my own mind and I'll let other thoughts get into my head. Oh yeah, that thief that's running around out there all the time. Doubt. I let that get into my head too. And you know, like Chris said, leave no regrets. I've got regrets also. Maybe not as strong as Chris's. But not going to let that happen again. But my great encouragement is, you know, we do become what we think about, and we've got to find the rhythm in our own mind to fill the right stuff into our mind. And when stuff comes into our mind that's not supposed to be there, get rid of it and get right back to that rhythm. I can't tell you. That's all I think about in my. My physical exertion after the 4x4x48 is I keep saying to myself, it's your duty and responsibility to find more pain. That's just a fricking excuse. Don't let pain be an excuse. It's only an excuse in your head. And don't let it happen. Because ultimately, we can only go as far as we allow ourselves to go and as far as our mind allows us to go. So this is just a test. This is just the next step in our evolution of making sure that our mind is stronger than anybody else's out there. And if somebody else is telling you that it's not possible or you can't do it, or, you know, you deserve to rest and all this kind of crap, I don't know what you guys have to say, but I respectfully say B Fricking S. I'm going to go find more because it's my duty and responsibility, and I've got that duty and responsibility to my family and to my teammates in business and everybody else that cares to be on the influence wagon. So fantastic stuff. To wrap this up, I'll just go quickly around the horn. Okay. And I know we're at the time. What would you say? Is pain an excuse? Yes or no, Patti?

No. Absolutely not.

Pain is not an excuse. No.

All right, Bill?

Absolutely not.

All right, Chris.

I think pain is an excuse. Look, in a cemetery. There's more talent and more regret in a cemetery than anywhere else in the world. Pain's an excuse.

Pain is an excuse only if you let it be an excuse. I think that's the.

That's kind of where I was trying to lead into. Yeah, in my mind it is, because I allow it to be an excuse, a limiter in my own mind. And I'm not going to let that happen anymore. So. And the great thing is, it's here, public now. It's here between all of us. And we had that collaboration to piggyback on something that Chris said. Now we are a band of brothers and sisters because we have been through this together, and we can't wait to. For lots of others to join this brotherhood and sisterhood. Just going through these things together. Phenomenal, Phenomenal. Privilege and an honor. Fantastic, guys. Thank you so much for sharing from your hearts, your minds, your souls today. Any last words from any of you?

Grateful for all of you in this journey. I'm so glad that you joined me on The Goggins Challenge 4x4x48 2022 and just proud of our accomplishments and the commitment and grateful to get to do it with you virtually.

Yeah. Fantastic. Patty, you're going to say something.

Yes. You said you invited others to join. Respectfully. I like to respectfully say we challenge you all to join next year.

Game on. Let's go, Chris. Last. Any last words, Chris?

You don't. If you don't want to join us and you want to sit on the sideline and eat potato chips, you know, unfortunately, that's going to be your loss. And I promise you, you will learn. You will become a band of brothers and sisters. And I promise you one thing, you will not regret doing this with us.

You can do it. Absolutely. It starts with a decision and then action and being in the mix with somebody else. Most wars are won or lost in our own heads in a foxhole. We usually aren't alone in that foxhole. We're going to be together.

Absolutely.

All right, everybody. Thank you so much, Patty, to Bill, to Chris, to everybody out there. We will see you next year on the 4x48 channel 4x4x48 challenge. And we will be dropping reminders, I am very sure. All right, everybody. Until next time. And maybe through the collaborative effort of ourselves, maybe we will have version two or.

The second part of this, part two, because we will come up with other stuff because of the inspiration. Thanks, everybody. Grateful for every one of you.

Thank you. Bye, guys.

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