Interview with Adam Markel, Author of Pivot

Hey guys, welcome to the Better Life Better Business podcast where we have conversations to help you live a better life and build a better business. Imagine that. I'm your host Shawn Ellis, founder of The Speakers Group, and as always we got some great advice coming your way with today's special guest expert. Today's episode is especially for those of you who feel like you might be at a pivotal pivot point in your life, if you've been feeling stuck or if you're feeling like it might be time for a transition, and this could be for you as an individual or maybe it's for your organization. But if that resonates with you, you are going to love today's episode. That's because you're about to hear from the author of the book Pivot, Adam Markel. Adam went through a big pivot in his life and I'll let him tell you about that in a minute, but he has a really interesting background with 20 years as a lawyer, and then also having served as CEO of the largest personal development company in North America, he understands things from a business perspective in terms of the nuts and bolts of leading a business, but also he is very much in tune with the human side of all of this. So I asked Adam for some clues to help you know when you're at a pivot point, and then I also asked him to bust some of the myths that keep people from making a shift when it's time for a transition. And much more. You're going to get some really practical advice, and I know you're also going to get some great inspiration. So let's get into it. Well, welcome, Adam. Thank you so much for joining us here on the Better Life, Better Business podcast. I've got your book Pivot right in front of me, and I have been looking forward to this call. I'm so excited to, to dive in and just give our listeners a chance to, to learn from you and hear some of your wisdom and, and your advice on whatever pivots they may be making in their, their life or business, whether they're an entrepreneur or a corporate executive or wherever they may be. You just got some great stuff to share, so I'm excited to get into that. But again, thank you for being here.

Oh, what a pleasure to be here, and thank you for having me.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, let me start with this, Adam, because I think you write a book like, like Pivot, and the subtitle is The Art and Science of Reinventing Your Career and Life. And, and I know from reading it that it is a, it's a personal, uh, personal book for you coming out of your personal story. So I'd love to give our listeners just a chance, if you'd like to share a little bit about why, you know, how this book came to be, why you wrote this particular book.

I would love the opportunity to share my story. I'll keep it brief. I really have been so blessed actually to be able to share some, not so much my story, but what was birthed out of the fire, I suppose, of my own story. And I've gotten to share that all over the world and with many, many, many thousands of people. So this is a grand opportunity. I never take it lightly. It's always a profound honor to do so. My story really kind of starts with pain. I say that and I still chuckle at the fact that it's really where it all began. So I don't want to go back too far, but I grew up in Queens, New York, and I went to college in Massachusetts. I met my college sweetheart there, and we're still married 27 years later. And have just a glorious, just a wonderful relationship, one that I wish for everybody to be married to somebody that really supports, you know, supports what you love as well, supports you in everything that you truly aspire to have. And so I got lucky with that for sure. And it's been hard work as well. We have 4 kids and I could say that I was going about my life on a pretty conventional level, I'd say. I know now that what I was doing was pivoting the whole way through. Didn't see it at the time, but I was a lifeguard and I was a waiter and I was a schoolteacher. I spent 2 years in junior high school English, teaching it. And my wife and I, we wanted to have family and start having kids. We ended up, like I said, having 4 kids. So the teaching thing just wasn't, at the time, a great fit, didn't feel like a great fit. Most of the teachers that I worked with in that junior high school, I remember, were telling me, "Get out, get out while you can." Don't stick around and become and end up like us. You know, so that was a pretty clear indication I needed to make a change. And I did. I saw the writing on the wall, or at least I kind of heard it. So I did. I went back to school. I went back to study law, became a lawyer 3 years later, newly minted. I was working my way through law school. So was my wife. And as I said, we started having a family and I began working 40 hours a week, you know, 50 turned quickly, 60, 70, and within 5 years I was routinely working sort of 70 to 80 hours a week. I will joke with audiences and folks from time to time and I say, "I used to sleep in the office sometimes, not all the time, clearly, but sometimes." I said, "How many of you have ever slept in the office?" Hands will go up and I say, "Don't you think there ought to be an online support group for people like us?" People always laugh. It's a place that if you've been to that workaholic place, then you know what that feels like. But then it was something more than that. And that something more was that I didn't love what I was doing. So I was a workaholic doing something that actually didn't feel good. And I blinked my eyes and 5 years went by. I blinked my eyes and it was 10 years that went by. Like that old Pink Floyd song, you know, that says, "10 years gets behind you. No one tells you when to run. You miss the starting gun," you know, and then it goes into some wailing guitar solo. And that was my life. I wake up in the morning, I put my feet on the floor, and the first thoughts to start my day, it was dark out, you know, it was early, early morning, and my wife was still sleeping, the kids were still sleeping, and the first feelings that I would have inside of my, my body and in my head were dread, anxiety, angst even, about what I was, you know, what I was being, what I was doing, what I was being in the world. And I didn't have any words for that. I didn't have any language for that. I grew up, as I said, in New York City, and my parents weren't personal development people. Very open-minded people, loving people, but not like workshop and seminar goers or anything. So I had no language for this. I just got up Put my feet on the floor. I took a couple of deep breaths. Sometimes I'd say something I can't probably say on this show, you know, as an expletive to start the day. And get in the shower, grab some coffee, get in the car and commute to Manhattan like a lot of other people. And then enter the walking dead, this zombie-like society of people that were dead in the eyes and just, I could feel At a certain point, like my heart was just shrinking. My soul was shriveling up inside. And it sort of culminated in me having what I describe as a near-death experience where I was headed someplace on a Saturday with Randi, my wife, and I asked her to pull over. I pulled over and asked her to drive the car and then had her drive to the emergency room where I got put in a wheelchair and got hooked up with all the electrodes. And I'm sweating profusely. My heart's beating out of my chest. And I'm thinking in that moment, I'm about to expire. I'm never going to see my kids again. I'm like, emotion is coming up. I'm so upset with myself. Like, I'm flat out angry with myself that this is how it's going to end. Like, this is, this is where my life is, is led to this, to this mess where I know I'm not the dad, I'm not the father, I'm not the husband, I'm not the person, um, even that I expected that I would be when I was in my late teens or 20s. And I even get filled in emotion just now, just even thinking about it. And I left the hospital that day having been told by a very compassionate doctor that I wasn't having— I didn't have a heart attack, I had an anxiety attack. And he said to me, you know, this could be very different for you 6 months from now or a year from now, so you might want to think about what's going on in your life. How much caffeine are you consuming? How much stress you have? How much sleep or lack of sleep, you know, is part of that whole mix. And I left that hospital with my wife, holding her hand, and we're both just so relieved that I got a second chance. And I looked up in the sky and I just said, "Thank you, God." And, uh, which was not language I even used. I really wasn't at all religious. So, uh, that day started my journey, this reinvention, uh, that now I refer to as a pivot. And I wrote a book about it Initially, the book was going to be a journal or a memoir for the kids so that if they were approaching some midlife crisis or some other sort of wall in their life, that they would have some strategies and tools and process that would help them to be able to navigate and utilize all of that change and even the fear that was associated with the potential for wanting to change and reinvent aspect of life. And, uh, the book's done really well. People seem to really, really get it and resonate with it. And, uh, and that, that just thrills me and it thrills our team as well.

So, well, Adam, well, first of all, I just want to say, as you were sharing your, your story, I got, uh, chills and my eyes got a little watery myself. So you said that you were, uh, that you felt the emotion. So did I. And I, that's, I think, I think that's partly because I can relate to that story and I know a lot of us can relate to that story. So I'm glad that, I'm glad your story comes out, you know, this way and the fact that you've got the second chance and that you've, you know, really been intentional about what you do with it for your own life, but then the fact that you turn it around and create something that you can, can help the rest of us. That's, that's really cool. I mean, I bet again, I'm I'm glad your story goes that way because it doesn't always go that way. And that's why I'm, you know, another reason why I'm excited to, to talk with you and create this particular episode so we can learn some of the things you've learned and hopefully help some people dodge that, you know, that scenario. Because it's one thing if sometimes life grabs you like that and, and it's up to you to respond. But if we can, if we can kind of be, uh, have a, make a preemptive strike, I guess you might say, or be a little more proactive about it, uh, certainly a little more comfortable that way.

I want to just take a second to riff with you on what you just said because this isn't about me and it's not about my book. I want to say that. This is just the subject matter is just— there's such a great depth to it. It's such a relevant topic today. I think so many people that I speak to and see around all over the world are in this stage of reinvention and people are just really trying to get the right mix of work and life, you know, the balance between those two things and the balance between the heart and the head, the balance between, you know, wanting to earn more money or, you know, the making money process and the fulfillment process and the dream that was birthed with you when you were born, you know, that piece of it, that this discovering purpose and things. And what you said a moment ago about, you know, there are changes that are, you know, change is the only constant. I mean, it is an everyday constant in the universe that we can count on like, I don't even know, I don't even say clockwork. I mean, count on it like the sun is going to come up tomorrow. And there's kind of two changes at least that we define in pivot. And one is a change that's by design and the other is a change by default. And you put your finger right on it that sometimes we have a little bit of an advanced look in our lives. And so for me, the trigger was the pain. I was in great pain. And so I started from that day that I got that reprieve to say, okay, what can I do? What can I do differently here? What are the creative opportunities? My wife always reminds me, what are the creative opportunities that are presented by what we're experiencing right now? And in that case, it was this pain. And so I began to design a pivot for myself and for our family. And that's, you know, in part what we discuss in the book is the process of how you actually proactively, to use your words, pivot. And then there's this other kind of pivot that is by default, as in the universe is changing, everything is changing. You know, you could walk into work one day and get fired. Your, your business could be going, you know, south, as so many businesses have had challenges. It could be that you've had challenges in your finances or your money, and you know, you've lost a home or, or you want to move You like, you know, someplace different. You don't want to live where you live. And, or it could be that you want to improve your relationships, or you're dealing with some kind of a, of a physical illness, uh, or have in the past, and, and you want to make changes so that you're healthier. I mean, there's so many things that can come upon us, um, you know. So by default is you get the diagnosis, you know, um, change happens when you, you, you're not necessarily expecting it, and now you've got to sort of respond when, of course, most people, you know, their first instinct is to react, and that's this fear-based way of dealing with things. But you have to respond to that change that's now in front of you, or you can proactively look to navigate your future and the future path ahead of you with some design, design-build intentions. So I just wanted to drop that in because I think what you said was really, really astute right there.

Well, thanks for that, Adam. And that's a perfect segue to what I'd love to get into for the time we have together is to talk more about, okay, when you come to this place where you feel that it's time to make a pivot, when you want to be more, more proactive, and maybe to start with, you can kind of offer some, some advice on kind of discerning when that, when that moment is, or if you are at one of those points, but once you figure out, okay, it's time to make a pivot, and then processing through that, some different, you know, thoughts we have that may hold us back, or how to, how to, uh, position ourselves, things we need to do mentally to prepare to, to propel us through that, uh, because it's not, it's not easy, certainly. So I'd love to spend, you know, spend a good bit of our time here. Granted, we only have, you know, a short time here, and you've written an entire book about this, you do workshops on this, so, so obviously not that we can get into everything, but, um, Something earlier you said that you, you mentioned that you were a workaholic who didn't really love what you were doing, which again, I think it's, uh, something that we, a lot of us can relate to. So if you feel something like that, maybe it's, it's clear that it might be time for a pivot. But what are some other ways you can kind of sense, uh, that it's the right time for a pivot in your life, or you might be at one of those points?

Yeah, that's a really great question. I think that we, we have things. What's great about living is that we're constantly given messages. We're constantly constantly, you know, things are being reflected back to us all the time and it's just a question of how self-aware are we to pay attention, to be present, to be present enough in the midst of Facebook and text messages and emails and every other imaginable thing that's vying for our attention. You know, where can we put our attention and intention and our presence so that we can actually pay attention, you know, to receive the messages that are around us. So symptoms. Somebody that's potentially in a pivot situation might be that you don't love your job. It might be that you're like me, that you don't get up in the morning and jump out of bed enthusiastically waiting to get to the next— to get to work or whatever, get on the phone and start doing your thing. That's a good sign. It's something to pay attention to. It's not— it does not have to be the norm. I would say Even if it is the norm, and it may be truthfully, you know, Henry David Thoreau, I think, said that everywhere people live lives of quiet desperation. It's not your goal. It's not my goal to live a life in that realm of the normal, right? Quiet desperation. Are you kidding me? Like, our lives are meant for so much more. So if you don't get up out of the bed with enthusiasm, kind of loving your life, love being life, there's something to look at. You know, if you're lethargic during the day, if you have trouble sleeping at at night. I mean, look, this is a multi-billion-dollar industry, the sleep aid pharmaceutical area. People are not sleeping, or they're getting up in the middle of the night, or they're having bouts with anxiety like the one I described earlier, or they need to get sugar or caffeine at 4 o'clock in the afternoon just to keep themselves going because they don't have enough energy. Again, it could be that those are the symptoms. It could be that you've always dreamed of starting a business, but you didn't know how to begin, so you just thought, "Well, I'm just going to keep down this road. I'm paying my bills. I've got a steady job, and maybe that's not meant for me. Maybe that's too risky," or whatever it is. I think paying attention is really where I wanted to direct that inquiry because whether it's a new job, expanded, you know, aspect of the career you currently have, or a business on the side, or it's, it's looking at your health or your relationships. There are signs all around us, and it's just a question of paying attention and recognizing that the universe may be sending you a message that a change is either one that you can plan for or one that may show up on your doorstep when you least expect it.

I like that. And what do you do if you're sensing, you're, you're, you're seeing those symptoms, you recognize them and you feel like, okay, it's time to, it's time to make a change in one of those areas, like you just talked about, but then, you know, fear sets in or doubts or something that you kind of feel like you should, but then something in your brain tells you no, not yet. Or, you know, that, that kind of thing. I'm sure you can, can relate to that. Uh, unless that's just me, but what, what do you say to someone in that scenario?

Well, I mean, I say first of all, fear is a healthy thing as long as it doesn't stop you from living the life you want to live. I mean, there it is, right? Yeah. Fear will keep you from running out into traffic, and that's a good thing. And fear has its place. I just think it's not— it doesn't belong in the driver's seat of your life. It belongs in the backseat. And it shouldn't be holding the GPS or holding the map as, you know, I'm old enough to remember what it was like to hold a map instead of, you know, electronic device. But yeah, I mean, fear has its place and you should acknowledge it. And be— acknowledge its value, but know that your heart and your head in combination will work together if you want it to. And it can guide you in the direction of something really great— greater, I would say, greater than you currently have. I mean, look, our pivot process really begins with many, many of the things you believe, and it's the first step is in examining what you believe, because there's a good chance that what you believe is what's actually holding you back from some of what it is that you truly want. I don't believe the adage that people, you know, that some people say 90% of folks don't know what they want, that's what they don't get, that's why they don't get what they want. Well, I don't buy that. I think, you know, for the most part, people do know what they want. I think it's the beliefs that they have that stop them. And so unbelieving, unknowing in some ways what it is that you've been programmed and I've been programmed to believe and to know is sort of the root, you know, place that we begin in order for you to create greater clarity. Like, the book is divided up into, into two main sections. One is creating clarity and the other one is getting into momentum. How do you create momentum? And so clarity is all about beliefs in many ways. And so recognizing what you believe, being able to let go of certain things, being able to face your fear the way you just described, to be able to identify what your identity What's he is? Things of that sort are really incredibly powerful to create a clearer vision for your life because you cannot go anywhere and you certainly can't go anywhere quickly if you cannot see the road ahead. Clarity and vision are essential. Once that's established, when you've got a clearer vision of the road ahead, what do you do to baby step? What do you do to move going— get yourself going forward. That's about behaviors. To me, behaviors are all about the little things that you do to begin something. How you do anything is an old Zen saying. How you do anything is how you do everything. It's about looking at the littlest things that you do. Those are the baby steps or the dominoes even, the tiny little dominoes. I actually share this analogy in part 2 of the book about how momentum is the most incredible thing. You just take a look at dominoes, you know, I think there's like the world's record is more than a million dominoes, one tipping over into the other, and you could see how body in motion, you know, the physics law, body in motion tends to stay in motion, etc. And everybody gets the power of that, but what they really are surprised by often is when I explain that from a physics standpoint, a tiny little domino that's just even 3/8 of an inch tall has the— at which anybody can blow over, okay, this tiniest little domino, 3/8 of an inch high, can knock over another domino that's 1.5 times its size. You might not think, well, that's not such a big deal, but that domino will in turn knock over another domino that's 1.5 times its size until by the time you get to the 28th or 29th domino, it's the size of the Empire State Building, for crying out loud. And that's what momentum really looks like. And that's why it's so important that people actually are able to recognize when there's something they want to change in their life, when there's something they wish to make better or reinvent, or something that's not working, like what was going on in my case. And then you take a step in that direction, and that step could be just the step of greater awareness, a mindset shift, a step that, that has to do with understanding how your mind actually keeps you stuck or keeps you in a safe place versus following maybe your heart or something inside of you that is saying, man, if I could do this, I'd really be living, right? And the only thing that's stopping me from doing that thing that would feel like really living is the fear, as you said earlier, that I'll screw it up, you know, or I'll fail, or I'll look foolish, or people won't, you know, won't understand me, or people will will, will, uh, you know, somehow leave me. Um, yeah, so it, it's a deep, deep well. Um, I hope I, uh, I, I, I added, uh, you know, I answer your question maybe a little more, more than you wanted, perhaps.

No, no, that was, that was all great. And I, I love that, talking about the, the fear specifically, and your vision and clarity. And what I picked up on as you were saying that is getting a, a bigger, clearer image of of where you're headed or what you're trying to create, then that almost becomes more powerful than whatever this fear is on the front end, shifting your focus to where you're headed and the life you want to create or the business, whatever it may be. So that becomes more powerful or bigger than the fear. That's kind of what I got out of that.

Oh, without a doubt. I mean, fear is an interesting topic. We could spend hours discussing that. We won't. But I mean, fear is a bluffer. I'd love people to just to know that it's there. It comes up, and yet when you move into it, it disappears for the most part. It finds its way into the back seat where it belongs. Um, when you're, when you're doing something that, uh, that you know is, is good, is good for you, it's good for your heart. And even being on your growth edge, doing, doing things that actually scare the you-know-what out of you, know that? Yeah, that's good for you. It's good for your soul as long as it's something that that you know, that you know is, is, uh, you know, that you're called to do. I just followed a calling in this— at that stage in my late 30s, it was just more about following a calling than it was, um, you know, getting into, into that crisis mode.

Yeah, I like that. The other thing, when you were talking about the dominoes and something I know you write about in the book about taking baby steps as far as when you take action and using that domino metaphor you mentioned, where it's like, you know, you don't have to knock down the Empire State Building today. You can take that, take that take a small step, I think that's another thing that helps take some of the power out of fear too, is that you don't have to go all the way right now, just taking that initial step.

Well, it's a myth, and I think there are, I won't get into all the myths, but there's 6 myths that we actually identify and expose for what they are in the book, and one of those myths is that you have to burn the ships, right? It's every, I mean, it's great for the media, I mean, it's great for dramatic TV or movies and things that people, you know, They'll burn the ships. They'll push all their chips into the center of the table. You know, they'll risk everything. And then, of course, we love to see them succeed. But more often than not, my experience in the case studies that are part of the book as well, the people that take great risks often fail. And because it's a lot— failure is a process. It's a part of life. It's a part of the learning process in life. And so people, when they risk everything, often get burned pretty badly. And it's not the process for change as we define it. To me, it's more of a building a Plan B, building a second bridge while you're still driving over and utilizing the bridge that you're currently on. And so you don't have to burn the bridges. You don't have to quit your job tomorrow or move to Tahiti simply because you're not happy or 100%. Joyful with what's going on in your life. And so baby stepping is one of those ways that you can overcome the fear. It can be with you and know that it's there, and, and it's— but it's in the right place. It's in the back seat as you continue to, to move forward in a way that, that, that is actually intelligent and responsible.

Yeah, that's, that's really refreshing because you're right, the, the burn the, burn the ships, that's, you know, that's what sounds big and exciting, but it's also what sounds really scary. So it's really refreshing to hear, hear what you said. I appreciate that. And I wanted to go back on the clarity point because something you— I really appreciate what you said here, and I appreciate what you write about that in the book. And something in the book, you said one of the things that can hold us back with, with getting clarity, because it's easy to say we need clarity, but you write in the book about this thing called selective blindness. And I know that was That was just a good reminder to me. Would you like to share something about that just with our listeners, just something that we need to be aware of when we're trying to get that clarity and get our vision straight?

Yeah, I think selective blindness is really us not being willing to examine, fully examine aspects of our lives and to be run by the belief that our minds actually know what's best for us. And I know it's kind of a strange thing to kind of call out the mind as potentially a conspirator in your unhappiness or in anybody's, but the mind is not necessarily our best friend. And it often talks to us. I mean, it's talking to us all the time, right? I mean, and it's often talking to us in ways that are not terribly supportive or kind even. And so we choose to be blind often in many ways from the things that are around us. As I said at the beginning, you know, the things that would be symptomatic of our— of things not being in alignment with our higher purpose or with what our heart might call out to us or what emotionally we feel, and so we just kind of go about our day-to-day the way I was doing, with your head down and just being selectively blind to the feedback that is around us that is saying, "You know what? This is not a good long-term recipe for your wellness," whether it's how you're eating, what you're doing for a living, who you're hanging around with, where you're living. It could be any number of things. And there's, there's really incredible ways to turn those things around when you have the gift of self-awareness.

Yeah, that's awareness. That's, that's perfect, uh, because it can be, it can be deceiving. Our mind can be deceiving. So that's, that's great. I thought that was, uh, that was enlightening, and I just wanted to touch on that here. So I've, um, just the notes I've been, I've been making notes here, and hopefully those of you who are listening are making notes as well. But to, uh, kind of simplify the process, or at least maybe give people some, some kind of keynotes here as we're going through.

I'm—

I've got first, as far as recognizing where, when it may be time for a pivot, to, to notice the symptoms, be on the lookout for those, pay attention to those. Then, then from there, getting clarity, addressing our beliefs, getting clear on what it is that we want, and, and then starting to take some baby steps toward creating that and ultimately building momentum. And I know I've oversimplified that and there's a lot more to it, but as far as if somebody's listening to this and looking for, for some, you know, initial steps, did I catch that or is there anything else you would add to that?

No, you did. I'd say, you know, the clarity piece is about examining those beliefs and again being able to go through some process that helps you to gain clarity. Look, if you're not 100% clear about your direction It just means there's kind of dirt on your windshield. Knowing that is the first step to being able to create some process or read the book even or what have you, but to be able to clean that windshield. Momentum, as you said, initially it's baby steps, but then it's like the things that support you to continue to be— I see people all the time that will take an action and then they stop. They'll start a diet or they'll start some new thing. Thing as a resolution at the beginning of the year and then they stop. It's baby steps and then it's the rituals. It's the practices that you have and you've got to upgrade those practices and rituals. It's the people around you that we call pivot people, the stakeholders, the mentors, the people that you actually— your peers that you mastermind with, those 3 distinct groups. Then it's things like how do you create a ritual for resilience? How do you have a recovery ritual? Because the world and business in particular is so stressful, and it's almost inundating and overwhelming at times. I mean, not almost, it is. How is it that you're able to be resilient? Because in studying success and being in that endeavor for a long time and working with a lot of very, very successful people, resilience and recovery are keys to that effective moving forward, which everybody is doing. We're all making mistakes. Everybody's pivoting, whether you know it or not, and it's just a question of Where are you able to take those pivots to utilize what you've learned and move to a higher ground in consciousness and in what manifests physically in your life? Then once you've gone through clarity and momentum, you're able to actually have something to build a plan on. People move to strategy in business and in many things, in entrepreneurial pursuits and in other areas of their life, they move to strategy too quickly. They want to move to planning right out of the gate because it feels secure to do that. Ultimately, it's the cart before the horse. We teach it as clarity, momentum, and then the planning aspect that comes naturally or more naturally from having done that work before.

Good. Thanks for clarifying that. I wanted to touch on resilience. I'm glad you mentioned that because I was going to ask about that. Your whole book, I mean, one of the things that I love about it is that it's very real because obviously it's your story. But it's just, it's, you know, it's real world. It's not just fluff. It's, you know, it works. And the resilience piece I think is so important because a lot of times, like, I— you might expect a book like Pivot to be kind of about this one moment in your life where you make this pivot, you make this grand change, and then after that everything is, is great. But you talked about in your, your own story at the very beginning of our conversation here, you talked about how you recognize now that you were pivoting the whole way through. And, and you share, um, the, the famous Lincoln, the Abraham Lincoln story that we've, we've all heard in your book about how his mother died when he was 9, and then his sister died when he was 19, and he lost this job and went bankrupt, and on and on. We've all heard that story. But then you share another side to that story that I had not heard, or at least not, not heard illuminated in that particular way, just to recognize that this is a process. It's not a one-time thing, but resilience as far as being able to, to stay on that path and stay strong to, to keep going. I'm glad you— I'm glad you included that, and I'm glad you shared that here.

Yeah, no, it's true because Lincoln's story is a story of success, but you're right, it's often told from the story of, look what this man, you know, like, he dealt with and all this failure. But in between those failures, he had little successes and not so little successes, and, and, and it was his ability to keep the proverbial getting up, getting back on the horse, as that was more appropriate back then. For folks that are listening now, I'll just sort of give you the recipe really, really quick. It's 3 things that we believe contribute to your ability to advance, go up the mountain to a higher spot, which is to develop this recovery ritual. The first piece of it is to take a look at where you're at or in some situation in your life and frame it. In a way that enables you to see what the creative opportunity was in what happened. Meaning, sort of frame it positively, but not so much positive thinking, but just to really look at it objectively and say, where's the creative opportunity in what's happened? You know, whether you— you know, whatever that situation may have been. It could be that there was cancer in your life, or there could be a death, or it could be a loss of a job, or anything. I mean, look, Or it could just be that you're living a life where you don't feel 100% thrilled with life, right? Even though you've got money and you've got good things going on and you've got a lot to be grateful for and you're still not happy, you know, there's a creative opportunity to examine. So that's first, the first step. The second step is to say, what am I learning? What have I learned from where I've been? Because if you don't take the nugget of learning, you tend to repeat the same thing, like, you know, rinse repeat. Cycle. So you've got to learn something. What's the lesson? How do I own the lesson there so that I'm able to then advance? And the third piece is taking care of yourself mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically, taking care of yourself. And I, I quote from a Harvard Business Review article about the comparison, comparing high-performance athletes to high-performance business owners and entrepreneurs and executives, and showing that the athletes athletes were able to bring their heart rates down or just their heart rates would go down, their biorhythms would change to a place of relaxation, almost like resting state in between points of a tennis match or golf shots or in between games, etc. In the executive world, in the business world, oftentimes the stress levels are higher than they are in performance sports because they're more constant. You know, people don't get 2 months to 3 months off between the seasons, you know, and hours or days off between points, you know, when you're working in a business, a job, you own a business, that kind of thing, or you're an executive in a company. You know, it's a constant pressure. So the resiliency is so much more important there. And what that looks like is, you know, if you love getting massages than making sure that you get massaged on a monthly basis or weekly basis, or taking a 20-minute walk in the middle of the day to clear your head and to be able to create some space to be able to think, to meditate, to eat better food, to start your day with a green drink, to create a spiritual practice, to just take deep breaths. I mean, there's so many things that can become these rituals to recover quickly and to be more resilient. And nothing could be more important in the disruptive environment that we're all living in today.

That's so good, Adam. Thank you. Thank you for that. Because yeah, if we have, if we have the pivot strategy, but we're not taking care of ourselves doing what you just talked about there, and then we, we burn out in the process, or we're exhausted, whatever it is, then we can't do everything else that's, that's part of the pivot. So thank you again for being here. And those of you who are listening, if, if you found some, some value here, and I know you have, and you want to get more help from Adam to help you through your personal pivots or organizational pivots, I can't recommend this book highly enough. Pivot: The Art and Science of Reinventing Your Career and Life. But also, you know, before you even go pick up the book, head over to adammarkell.com. That's A-D-A-M marquel.com, and you can enter your email and get Adam's Pivot Kickstart Guide. That's totally free, so that'll help you start your pivot right now. And then grab the book too. And then Adam's also got some other great resources on his website. He's got his podcast there, so you can listen to, to more good advice from Adam and some of his interviews. You can check out his blog, all kinds of great stuff. So adammarquel.com. Or if you're planning an event and of course if you want to bring the Pivot message to your people, we'd love to help you here at The Speakers Group. You can call us and we'd be glad to support you on that and connect you with Adam to facilitate that program. But Adam, thank you so much. I have thoroughly enjoyed it. Those of you who are listening, thank you for being here and we look forward to talking to you again down the road.

Thank you so much. What a pleasure.

Thank you.