Bookworm Transcripts

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Oh hi Mike hello.

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Do you hear me playing?

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Uh sort of except my audio is all messed up so it was really quiet.

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Good.

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I was trying to get some inputs outputs nailed down so I was over here one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve.

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No no I missed that.

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Unfortunately that would have been entertaining.

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But you got me doing the repeat so there you go.

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How's Mike today?

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Pretty good.

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How's Joe today?

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Good I just launched the guild.

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So I'm happy.

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Nice.

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Yeah we'll see how it goes.

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It's one of those launch day.

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Assume nobody will show up moments.

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And hope that one person shows up.

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So the way it goes.

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I know I know I hate launch days.

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But at the same time I love launch days so it's way goes.

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In other news we have all kinds of follow up to go through Mike.

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Yeah I'm curious about your your marketing strategies.

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Obviously you went through this because you have implemented some of said marketing strategies.

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I ultimately I think I just landed on I need to be okay sharing things.

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In a heavy way.

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And although I don't think I'm super good at that.

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I know that it's something I can continually get better at.

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And I think you know part of the whole discourse expert thing that we've talked about in the past.

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Is that it's it's simply a mindset and saying it's out loud.

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It's similar to writers who say I am a writer.

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Like being able to admit that something is true about yourself.

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Changes the way that you view the thing itself and how you actually implement it.

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And in this particular case I've got a couple things that I'm launching both today and tomorrow.

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Based on one round of code that I've written and I need to be okay saying that it's really good code.

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And if I admit that.

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It allows me to market it in a very positive and genuine way.

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I think that's what I've landed on.

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I don't know if that makes any sense whatsoever.

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I'm not really sure what that means tactically.

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But it's helped me from a strategy standpoint somewhat.

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That makes any sense whatsoever.

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So if I'm hearing you correctly you've come to peace with the fact that you are a marketer.

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Is that correct?

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I think that's true.

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I think that's that's a good way to say it is that I'm okay saying.

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That's that I've made a thing that's amazing.

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And being willing to say that and know that that's true helps me promote it.

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True, but I think that's a little bit different than the way I phrased it.

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Because you could say, well my thing is amazing, but I'm still not a marketer.

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So don't let me in with all those other guys.

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That's true.

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Well, I didn't mean to sidestep that one.

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I think that you are correct in saying that I know that this is a thing that

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I have struggled with in the past.

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And I think you're kind of in the same, but we've talked about this before.

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We're promoting ourselves and saying that we've made a great thing

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is something that we don't necessarily see as second nature to us.

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It's something we definitely have to work on.

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And I'm coming to grips with that and saying that this is something that I know I can do

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and I should do and I want to be good at.

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And I'm learning that I am fairly good at it if I will simply do it.

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So I'm admitting that yes, I'm a marketer and I'm going to do it.

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Nice.

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There you go.

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That's what I got on that one.

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All right.

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And then I've got a couple of them here.

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First on the list, no window hold on a window fold them.

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This is basically pertaining to the cognitive biases and when to recognize

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that they are impacting my decisions and when to be okay with that.

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I feel like I've done a fairly decent job with this.

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Of course, that has been helped by the fact that I

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haven't had much time to think the whole last couple of weeks.

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I just have a bunch of things that I need to get done.

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We're in the middle doing a bunch of interviews.

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I think I mentioned that to you last time we recorded.

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I've got 19 interviews in this week and next week, which is basically all my time.

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And stuff doesn't stop because I'm doing the interviews either.

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They still hold the dojo stuff.

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They're still the podcast stuff.

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So you add all that up and I don't have a whole lot of time to waste

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on non-important decisions.

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So I've kind of resolved myself to the fact that,

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yeah, I'm going to have these cognitive biases,

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but I'm not going to spend a whole bunch of time trying to overcome them at this particular point.

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You know, after next Friday, when my interviews are done,

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that probably changes a little bit.

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Then I go back to my ways of making things a bigger deal than they really are.

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But hopefully not.

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Makes sense.

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Makes sense.

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Anytime you add a little thing that can help you in the future,

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but it takes a lot of up front work, it always adds a lot of extra stress

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during that time.

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It usually turns out way better in the end,

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but you kind of have to suffer a little bit to get there.

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Yeah.

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By the way, one thing I did kind of notice on this whole topic of making decisions

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is that with certain people,

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like we'll just use the example of like the going out to eat with your significant other.

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I think actually maybe even Josh mentioned this at some point too,

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where we've all been at that point where like you want to go somewhere,

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where do you want to go?

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I don't know.

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Where do you want to go?

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That is incredibly stressful for me that pushes all of my buttons,

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and that's a perfect example of this "no one to hold them when to fold them,"

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because it doesn't really matter.

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Just getting the car go somewhere.

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I hate those conversations.

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Yeah.

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So I'm thinking about this, and this particular situation I use is because I think it's a very

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general example.

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I haven't applied this framework in this particular position,

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but I know it's going to work and I've applied it a couple other places.

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Where if you need somebody else's input to make a decision,

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kind of forget the cognitive biases and just pick a couple of decent options and be like,

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"Which one do you want?"

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You'll get to the bottom of it a lot quicker.

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And so that's been, like I said, last couple of weeks,

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kind of a survival mechanism, but been my approach, I guess.

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I have not had to say I'd rather not.

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And I guess I just haven't been asked to do something that hasn't been something that I've

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wanted to do.

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Like I said, I've been very, I hate using this term busy because I think it's way overused

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in society, but legitimately I have been busy.

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I'm the right things.

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I'm making progress on the things that I need to make progress on,

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but I haven't had the opportunity to be distracted by the shiny objects, if that makes sense.

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And so that's where I can fall into the trap of saying yes to the things that I don't really

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want to do is like, "Well, technically I've got a little bit of time.

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I could squeeze this in."

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In the last couple of weeks, just been like, "No, don't even ask."

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People just don't.

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- Yeah, stay away.

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Until next Friday.

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Go away. There's no way I could do it.

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- Yeah, I understand.

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- So again, I did well on the next point.

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Did you make any decisions stick longer than they should have?

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No, because I've had to make them as short as possible in order to keep my head above water.

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- You didn't have the luxury of taking your time on them.

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- Exactly, exactly.

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- How'd you do on the no news except tech news thing?

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- Oh, I did great on this.

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Even the tech news, like there have been several, okay, so usually throughout my day,

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whenever I have a little bit of a break, I will go on Twitter because I don't follow

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a ton of people and I'll just see what's going on.

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Okay, that's a fairly habitual thing.

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It's not like I do it all the time, maybe four or five times throughout the day.

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During lunch, that sort of thing, where I just want to take a little bit of a break.

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But I have noticed several times in the last couple of weeks that I haven't even looked at

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Twitter the entire day. I'll open it when I'm done with work and I'll see this huge number

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in my timeline.

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It'll be like, "Oh my gosh, I'm not going through all this stuff and then just close it again."

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So, again, victory by necessity.

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- Yeah, so that's where the whole Twitter completionist thing actually helps you

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because you have to go through all of them so you freak out and don't do it at all.

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Is that fair? Is that what you're doing?

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- That is fair. Yeah, now I will also say though that the way I've used Twitter has changed over

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the years and I've really pared it down where I don't follow a bunch of different tech people

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because I don't need 10 different versions of the same story.

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Let me look, see how many people I am actually following.

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Give me just a second.

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Because I know there's only like two maybe three people or sites that I follow that

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give me Apple or tech news in general and it seems like across those two or three,

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I catch pretty much everything it seems without having to follow 15, 20, 100 people

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all tweeting about the same thing.

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- So, I technically follow 175 people and I say technically because there are a bunch of people

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on this list that I know in real life that have not tweeted in years.

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It's probably more like 100 tops.

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So, yeah, it's more sustainable than it has been in the past.

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But yeah, I haven't really followed news.

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I did over here a couple things yesterday this morning which were a little bit concerning but

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yeah, I'll just leave it there.

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- Yeah, dare I ask?

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- Yeah, I mean, no, no, no, no, no, no, this is not a politics podcast,

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generally not a religion podcast, although this is going to be an interesting episode,

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I think we're a lot of people.

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- I got a disclaimer for this one when we get there.

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- Yeah.

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So, yeah, no news is good news, Joe.

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- Okay, good deal.

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Good deal. So, we just alluded to it.

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So, let's just jump in here.

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So, the book for today, The Legend of the Monk and the Merchant by Terry Felber.

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And this is the last of the Dave Ramsey books, Mike.

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So, listeners, you don't have to have me just throw in another Dave Ramsey book on you, sorry.

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But this one is one that I, to be honest with you, I put it on the list,

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and I think I mentioned this last time, I put it on the list, I didn't even look into it.

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I could not have told you what the, what the premise of the book was before I picked it up.

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So, this is a case of pure trust in somebody recommending a book.

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And I do this on occasion, Mike.

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I sometimes have people who recommend a book, and I don't know if I can trust their recommendations

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or not, so I will take their first one, read it.

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And if I enjoyed it, I tend to trust their opinions on book recommendations and pick them up.

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If they recommend another, if I don't like it, I tend to ignore the recommendations.

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Just kind of how I work.

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So, people, you got one shot with you.

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That's it. You just, you got to get the first one to make it good.

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So, this is a case of me trusting Dave Ramsey's book recommendations.

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And I put the disclaimer here that this is going to be an episode where I think

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it's impossible for us to discuss this book without bringing up God and the Bible a significant amount.

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Since this is, it's very biblically based.

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And since Mike and I both fall in the world of being Christians,

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I think it's impossible for us to talk about this without talking about our faith in likely a very

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strong way.

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So, for the listeners, if all of that sounds like an absolute nightmare to you, feel free to turn

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this one off. But I think that's the route we're going to end up going on this one.

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Is that fair, Mike? Do you want to add to subtract to from that disclaimer?

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That is fair, but I would say that this book has a lot of value, even if you don't consider yourself

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Christian, because it shatters a lot of the paradigms regarding the Christian view of success

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and in particular wealth.

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Yeah, I think that's very fair. And I know that for me, I don't have a problem listening to folks

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from a different faith talk about it because I'm always interested in someone else's viewpoint.

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And although I may not agree with you, I am at least interested in your opinion on it.

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And to me, I know that as we go through this, there's a lot of good things that you can get

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from this, even if you don't believe the Bible or in God.

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And I would encourage you to listen to it, because I'm sure there's some things that you can glean

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from it. And I don't think you have to, as Mike is saying, I don't think you have to have

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faith in order to glean a lot of positive things from this.

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Yeah, definitely. And it's not the type of book where they do have like scripture reference after

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scripture reference to validate what they are saying. It is a story. It is a narrative.

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But I think this is a very, very important book because we've all got our preconceived notions

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on how the world works. And regarding faith and specifically Christianity, there is

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a very commonly held belief that if you are really going to be spiritual, then you must have

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nothing. You must be poor because that is the only way that God can speak to you.

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And that's the Mike Schmitt's version, but that's really what it boils down to.

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And you see in this story, you see some of that in some of the characters, but you also see

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the world through other perspectives. And really, the big takeaway from this is that

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you don't have to be, if you consider yourself a religious person, you don't have to be

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resigned to a life of suffering and poverty, that there are spiritual reasons why you are

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supposed to be successful. And I think that applies regardless of your belief system.

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I mean, most of the people that I know in the productivity space, whether they be Christian,

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whether they have another religious belief system, whether they are completely agnostic and don't

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believe in God at all, they believe that they are here for a specific purpose and that they have a

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specific role to play. And that is where this book can be a big help because I think that

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really what it's speaking to is the fact that you're made to be successful. There are certain

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principles which will help you be successful. And then that success, that is a good thing.

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And it's going to help other people. The more, I probably talk about the Asian

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efficiency core values way too much. So we won't belabor this point. Number one, low green,

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but they're good. All those up, they are good. I love them. But the point, you know, you get

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on an airplane and you have to, they always say, put your own oxygen mask on first before you help

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other people. Like you have to make sure that your own stuff is taken care of before you can

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help other people get to where you are. You can only take people as far as you've been. So

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yeah, I think there's a lot of value in this book for just about anybody. And it's really short too.

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It's a very easy read. I think I read this whole thing in one sitting.

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Oh, nice. Nice. I love, we've talked about this before. I love it whenever people write books

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and they tell a story and then they debrief it. It seems like that's the way some of these books

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are going. And this one holds true to that. And it makes it very engaging. The story itself,

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I'm with you. I had a hard time putting it down. There's a lot of the study guide thing at the

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back that I felt like I was skimming. Just I'll just confess to that. But I do agree that it's

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interesting to go through the entire story. I didn't sit down and read it in one setting.

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Some of that had to do with my wife and I tend to have a number of conversations about money

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at this level. We have a number of folks that we, I don't want to say mentor, but we try to help,

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not financially, but from an intellectual standpoint on money. And we try to encourage people with that.

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So we have conversations about this quite frequently. And as I was reading it, something would strike

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me or it would shed new light on something that we have discussed a number of times in an interesting

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way. And I would share it with her. Well, then that led to a 30, 45 minute hour long conversation.

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So I didn't finish reading it in one setting. Otherwise, I probably could have. But I tend to

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read with her on the other side of the room at night a lot of times. And yes, it leads to fun

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conversations whenever you can just share it with her. So it was a good time.

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Yeah, I like the fact that you teased out there that you, I forget exactly how you put it, but

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basically you mentor other people when it comes to finances and stuff like that. And I think that

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that's great. I think that that is missing for a lot of people. I know that my own life, like the

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times where I've been able to work with a coach or a mentor and they can share their own experience

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and say, Hey, I tried this, it didn't work. I tried this, it does work, that can save you a lot of

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pain. And I think that when it comes to faith in Christianity specifically, like that would be

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called discipleship, I guess in the world, maybe it'd be called mentorship, but it's really, really

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important. It's so important that from a Christian perspective, that like, that's the last thing

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that Jesus said is like, go and make disciples, help other people be successful. And when you're

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talking about who you're going to let mentor you, you're only going, at least for me, you know,

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I'm not going to take advice on how to raise a solid family from somebody who's been divorced

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five times. Like you look at, or has no kids, look at the fruit, exactly, exactly, or, you know,

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as it pertains to money, you know, I'm not going to take financial advice from somebody who is

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living month to month above their means and is stressed out because they don't have enough

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money to pay their bills. Like you may know what to do, but you're not actually doing it. So

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I can't really believe you when you say, Oh, this is the thing that you have to do because you

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haven't lived it out. Like there's the chauffeur knowledge that we talked about last time where

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you can spit the stuff back. But do you really believe it? My pastor says that the

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the word that you believe is the word that you actually do. And I think that that's a really

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important key here and why it's so important that this book becomes, well, I shouldn't say

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becomes because it probably is pretty successful already. I mean, Dave Ramsey's giving it to everybody

00:20:52

that works for him and stuff like that. But it's not the type of mindset that I've seen

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traditionally in the churches that I've been involved in. Now the church that I'm involved with now,

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that this is very much in line with their belief system. But that was really shocking to me when

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I started going there. It's like I had never heard this before. I grew up Catholic and I always had

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that view of the monks or the priests. They were super spiritual. They were above everybody else

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and they had taken this oath of poverty. Whether that's true or not, and I know that that's not true

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in a lot of cases. So I have to say that. But that was the perception I had. And right or not,

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that perception is fostered by the environment. And I think that the environment needs to change.

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And if just speaking to the Christian church in America specifically, because that's what I have

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experienced with, if more people understood the concepts that are outlined in this book,

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there'd be a lot more people who would be running things and owning things and they'd have their

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own businesses instead of working for somebody else. Not that that isn't necessarily a bad thing,

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but when you are called to do your own thing, that is a bad thing. One of the quotes I teased

00:22:08

out is page 14, your vocation is your calling. It's the thing you were born to do. When you do it,

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it's not really work at all. There's a lot of people who are quote unquote forced to work.

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They're stuck in that thing that they don't really believe is the right thing. But they've also

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got this improper view of like, well, this is my, I'm just called to suffer in this particular job.

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Or this is, this is my lot in life. Or even even the one that really drives me crazy is,

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well, this is where I am until God opens another door or opens another window. And really,

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what this book is saying is that you can open your own doors, you can open your own windows,

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you just got to connect to your vocation and you got to do the thing that you were created to do.

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You can't just sit around and wait for it to happen someday.

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Well, that takes you to the first key because the whole book is centered around 12,

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12 keys of successful living. And as the story goes on, the main character here, Antonio,

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he writes these principles down. He's being mentored by another merchant. And you're talking

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about the first one here's work hard and God will prosper you. And there's a bit of a caveat

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that comes with that because you have to work hard in the right way. You just just working hard

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doesn't guarantee anything, but you have to work hard for the right reason. And that's where the

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second part of that first principle God will prosper you comes in. Now, I do want to back up a

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little bit because the whole legend of the the monk and the merchant that's told here,

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it really lays out the difference between those who teach the Bible and those who

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build businesses or work in the general marketplace. And those two shouldn't,

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we tend to confuse them as far as their roles go in our, at least in the American society.

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And as we see that in a lot of areas, it seems like there are certain like take a certain

00:24:14

pastor at a church that I'm used to be at. And he would quite often have two or three services

00:24:21

throughout the week, including Sunday morning and would frequently get upset whenever people

00:24:26

wouldn't show up for that because they had to work or they were too tired or I mean, you know,

00:24:31

the litany of excuses that people can give for that. But the trick there is that

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just because the doors are open, that would tell me that those who are working in

00:24:43

ministry in that way, that is their role. That's the choice that they've made. That is their

00:24:49

vocation, if you will, to study the word and share it with other people.

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On the flip side of that, there's the rest of us who don't do that as our main, but we work in

00:25:03

the marketplace, we earn an income, and then it is our job to finance the vision of the people who

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are working in that ministry. So they minister to us, we drive the income that can then

00:25:15

fulfill their vision to which they then minister to us and new believers.

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So it's this nice balance that works between the two, but it's very easy to get them confused and to

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get upset at the one in the other area because you're not doing the thing that I'm doing that I

00:25:33

feel called to. So they need to work in balance with each other.

00:25:38

Yeah, you just called out at the very beginning of the book, the one thing I had issue with.

00:25:42

So a little bit of perspective, I mean, what you just described, the people who are at all

00:25:50

those services, that is us. We are there Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night.

00:25:56

We've got men's ministry, the coordinator for Involved to Worship team, so practice on Thursday

00:26:02

nights as well. But I think that there is an important distinction here between people who

00:26:09

are just going to blanket say, well, my role is in the marketplace. So you should be happy with

00:26:15

whatever time I could squeeze in here. And people who are in the marketplace, who are completely

00:26:21

sold out for, I mean, there's really no way of beating around this one. Like, if you really

00:26:28

confess that God is the most important thing to you, like that has to be reflected in all of

00:26:32

your decisions. And what I see is that a lot of people justify, well, I'm not going to be at the

00:26:35

house of God, I'm not going to be part of what God is doing because I have to work. And I think

00:26:40

that's a convenient excuse. And I think that in this particular book, it's kind of takes place.

00:26:46

It sounds like it's more old school analog where the times have changed quite a bit.

00:26:56

And what I see as people get more and more busy is more and more excuses not to be a part of that

00:27:02

work. And that doesn't mean that you have to be at every single service. But it does mean that

00:27:06

you have to be involved because, I mean, I've got a Bible college degree. Now, I have not gone to

00:27:12

seminary. So I can't say that like, I know all of this stuff. But this is my understanding of like

00:27:19

Ephesians 413 talks about their apostles, their prophets, there are people who are set aside as

00:27:24

the fivefold ministry. But it says that their work is to equip the saints for the work of the ministry.

00:27:30

So the issue I have with this book is this view that, well, the monks are going to take care of

00:27:36

the church and they're going to do all the spiritual stuff. And then the merchants are just going to

00:27:39

come and they're going to give the money to fund the work. Like, I don't think that that you can say

00:27:44

that 100%. I think that there's a lot of gray area there and it's going to be different for

00:27:49

every single person what that looks like, how it plays out in your particular sphere of influence

00:27:55

in your particular situation. But I think it is very important if you consider yourself a merchant,

00:28:02

if you consider yourself a Christian, that you make sure that those priorities are always correct.

00:28:06

And that's going to dictate what you're going to do. You're not going to just put in the minimum,

00:28:12

I guess, is a better way to say this. If you really do believe that God is first, does that make sense?

00:28:18

It does. And the thing I want to call out here is that giving and helping fulfill the mission or

00:28:25

the vision of, say, the ministers does not have to be financial. And in a lot of cases, shouldn't

00:28:33

be financial. I just had a conversation yesterday as we're recording this with a guy who is a

00:28:41

financial advisor. And he talks about how certain millionaires that he helps, they often try to

00:28:52

give to organizations that need it. But if the organization is one that receives a lot of donations

00:28:59

and they seem to be on a good path, he doesn't necessarily see that that's a place to give because

00:29:04

they already have the finances. And in those cases, if he wants to help them, he uses the fact that

00:29:11

he is wealthy to set time aside to go volunteer and help them. And I think that's very similar to

00:29:19

what like you and I do. We don't necessarily give large sums of money to the church in such a way

00:29:25

that we can fulfill a huge vision, like add on to the building or start a whole new program. Like,

00:29:32

we're probably not going to be able to do this unless you've got an inheritance. You're not

00:29:36

telling me about Mike. But there's not really that. I for sure am not going to be one that can do

00:29:44

that, at least at this point in life. And when I stop and think about how I give to the church and

00:29:50

how I help fulfill that vision, it's one where I know my best path forward to help them is specifically

00:29:59

from a tech standpoint. And I can do things with technology that a lot of people are confused by

00:30:05

and think are magic. So I can take advantage of those skills and give back to the church. And those

00:30:11

skills are things I've learned in the marketplace and that I've built in the marketplace. Yes, I can

00:30:17

develop finances and work on driving a large income so that I can give back to those in the

00:30:24

monk or the ministry world. But at the same time, I'm building other things other than wealth at

00:30:30

the same point that can then be given back. Do you make a connection there? I definitely do.

00:30:37

The thing, I'm not trying to disagree. So I want to make sure I say this the right way.

00:30:43

No, you're fine. I think what you just said, the way that you can contribute is through a tech

00:30:48

angle. That's really valuable. But I think that you also have to be careful that what you are

00:30:53

contributing is actually what is needed. Yes. You could be really good at juggling kittens and

00:30:59

maybe that's not going to help the drop past there, accomplish the vision of the church.

00:31:05

Also, I think that if you did have large sums of money, you could be giving a ton of money.

00:31:13

That's great. I mean, there are definitely people who have done that sort of thing.

00:31:18

But that doesn't necessarily mean the fact that you have given large chunks of money that you're

00:31:22

fulfilling your mission either. I mean, there's a lot of philanthropists who give incredible amounts of

00:31:27

money. But they're not, I would argue, fulfilling the spiritual duty that they have. And that's not

00:31:33

necessarily their fault. Maybe they don't have the revelation of, or they don't have that belief

00:31:38

system. But I would say that that can be the trap is like, well, I've given a whole bunch of money,

00:31:46

and therefore I'm good. But I mean, Matthew 633 talks about where your treasure is,

00:31:52

their heart will be also. And so I think that that word treasure, that's the key. And it's not just

00:31:57

financial. But it is also your time, your attention and your energy, your focus, like what is your

00:32:02

dominant thought? Locate yourself. If you just show up once a week and you give a bunch of money,

00:32:07

like that's great. But that doesn't necessarily mean that your heart is in the right place.

00:32:11

Yes. Yes. But it's also very difficult to know where someone's heart is at the same time.

00:32:18

Exactly. I can't make that judgment. No pastor, priest, monk can make that judgment. You have

00:32:25

to locate yourself. And that was kind of his point, I think, when he was talking about the,

00:32:31

he goes into the church and he sees the monk giving him the hard stare because he's not in church

00:32:37

enough or whatever. And he's just smiling. He's like, well, I'm giving a bunch of money. I had a

00:32:42

little bit of an issue with that particular part of the part of the book because I do think that

00:32:47

not that particular situation, maybe, in the story, that just kind of seemed like there was

00:32:55

bitterness or resentment harbored towards the guy because he wasn't doing what the monk in this

00:33:01

particular case thought he should be doing. But I do think that if you are going to attend a

00:33:06

specific church, for example, you're going to call somebody pastor, then they do, recognizing that

00:33:12

they do have a special gift and a special anointing for that role. You do have to, you do have to

00:33:22

accept and like seriously evaluate what they tell you to do. You can't just make the blanket

00:33:28

statement like, well, I know what's best because I personally believe that if you are, if you're

00:33:33

called to a specific church, for example, you're called a specific person who is pastor over,

00:33:39

you're they are anointed for you, they know things about you. God shows them things about your life

00:33:43

that you need. And that's what makes the whole relationship work. That's what brings power to

00:33:49

the church. If you don't have that, then I don't know, like, I kind of view like where you end up

00:33:59

being very, very important because I think that it can't be something that you decide

00:34:04

out of your own natural emotion. The church that and I know that that's colored and tainted by my,

00:34:12

I shouldn't say tainted, but it is definitely influenced by my own personal story where the

00:34:16

church that we go to at this point, probably not a story for this podcast. But at one point,

00:34:21

I said, I will never set foot in that church. And funny enough, that's where we go to church now.

00:34:28

There you go, God, sense of humor. So I hope that makes sense, though. Like, I really do believe

00:34:34

that you don't just choose the church that you go to, that you are placed in the church that you

00:34:38

go to, and you are placed there strategically, and you have gifts that complement the other

00:34:43

gifts that are there, and also the things that that lack there. And that's why people get frustrated

00:34:47

in churches and leave is because, well, this church doesn't have what I like. Well, that's why

00:34:52

you're there. You're there to change that. You're there to complete the picture.

00:34:56

I agree with you. I think there's a lot of a disconnect in most churches, it seems, with

00:35:04

folks who, you know, say come from the marketplace. I'll use that term. And by that, I'm simply

00:35:13

meaning folks who are not in the ministry from a technical standpoint. And then there's the other

00:35:20

side of those who are in the ministry who are teaching. And there has to be a balance between

00:35:26

following the leadership of the ministers of the church and supporting them both in skills and

00:35:33

finances. So they teach you, you need to learn from them. And at the same time, if

00:35:40

you can, and I would tend to argue that everyone can, in some form or another,

00:35:49

give back to the church. And again, it doesn't have to be finances. But at the same time, it

00:35:54

should be to a point. But it's very difficult to nail this down because we, as humans, like to

00:36:00

try to come up with hard and fast rules, this one's one where I don't think there are any,

00:36:06

because it just depends on the heart and the subculture, I guess, of that specific church and

00:36:14

the people within it. Is that fair, Mike? Yeah, I think that the real takeaway from all of this is,

00:36:22

and I'm going to look up the reference so I don't mess it up. I believe it's first. Yeah,

00:36:29

first Corinthians. Well, okay, so let me back up first Corinthians 13, probably everybody,

00:36:35

whether you are a Christian or not has heard the verses quoted from this at weddings and things.

00:36:38

It's the love chapter. So one of the things that I've learned in my Bible college studies,

00:36:45

because like I said, I have a degree from Word Bible College in Eskendido, California,

00:36:52

you have to look at things in context. So people look at that love chapter, but the chapter before

00:37:01

that chapter 12, this is where they're talking about one body with many members, and the ear can't

00:37:08

say to the eye, I wish I was an eye or the hand can't say to the foot the other way around.

00:37:13

Everybody's got a specific role to play, and the quicker we are okay with the role that we have,

00:37:23

and we're not just looking for a bunch of other eyes to hang around with, and we embrace our role

00:37:27

in building this body, the better off the church is going to be. Yes, I agree.

00:37:36

This character ties in to, or do you want to expand on that, Mike?

00:37:40

No, no, you're segueing into the second point, which is actually what I was going to do, but I

00:37:45

will say that point number one, "Work hard and God will prosper you," is the author of a book

00:37:50

called "Thou shalt hustle." I completely agree. Link in the show notes.

00:37:55

So this ties into the second key that's mentioned in the book. Financial prosperity is often

00:38:04

connected to sole prosperity. I think this dovetails in quite nicely with what we're

00:38:09

talking about because you really have to be open to being taught and growing spiritually

00:38:17

before you can develop the intellect and the knowledge that can then drive financial prosperity.

00:38:27

And this likely ties into bookworm to an extent, Mike, because so much of what we do with the books

00:38:35

that we're reading is gaining knowledge and learning about a variety of topics that eventually tie back

00:38:43

into how we go about reaching other people, either through helping with technology or productivity,

00:38:51

in our case, or developing a stronger faith in Christ. And as we continue to learn about that,

00:38:59

it's interesting how it then plays back into the first key of working hard and God will prosper you.

00:39:06

Those tend to be very closely interconnected. Yeah, so this is really interesting because

00:39:13

most people think of prosperity as money. One of the things that I picked up from reading the

00:39:19

Art of Exceptional Living by Jim Rohn, and it's actually not even a physical book, it is an audiobook

00:39:25

when I got it off of Amazon, he has a quote in there where he says, "Work harder on yourself than

00:39:31

you do on your job." And I think that that is speaking directly to this point where prosperity

00:39:37

actually occurs in a lot of different arenas. In the Bible calls that I went to, they talk about

00:39:43

the five different levels of prosperity. And so at this point, I suppose people have either

00:39:50

tuned out or they're really jacked about the angle at this episode is going, so I'll just unload.

00:39:55

Just go for it. So first, you've got spiritual prosperity, that would be when you have the

00:40:02

revelation and you've accepted Christ, like you are saved. And then from there, there's other

00:40:10

levels along the way there is mental or emotional prosperity, there is physical prosperity,

00:40:17

because the Word of God, if you believe that it is the Word of God, if you believe that the Bible

00:40:21

is the Word of God, there are answers for every area of life in there. And so as you develop this

00:40:29

relationship and as you study that word and apply those principles, you will see the prosperity

00:40:35

in the other levels. Another level is relational. So your relationships will get better if you're

00:40:40

doing things the right way. I 100% believe that. And that is a spiritual principle, not just a,

00:40:46

how do I say this? Well, I guess worldly principle, but that's a Christianese term. I don't like to

00:40:53

use that because if you're not familiar with that term, it seems like us against them. It's not what

00:40:58

I want to make it sound like at all. But kind of the differentiation that this book is making is

00:41:02

that there's like the church stuff and the non-church stuff. So there's a lot of non-church stuff,

00:41:07

especially in the productivity space, which is based off of, I personally believe in the Word of God.

00:41:12

And that's what got me down the path of writing my book. And then lastly is financial. Like,

00:41:19

that's the last one that you typically see the manifestation of this prosperity. But that's the

00:41:23

one that people look for. And so if you're just looking for the financial prosperity, you can miss

00:41:28

all of the growth that's happening in all of the other areas and all the other ways that you are

00:41:32

being prospered. Brandon Wentlan did a dojo module on journaling. And he talked about the gap versus the,

00:41:40

basically it's like a gap versus growth. I think he used a different term. But what journaling does

00:41:48

is it locates you. And if you don't journal, for example, you look at where you want to be and

00:41:53

where you are now and all you see is the gap. You see, oh man, I wanted to have this. I wanted to be

00:41:58

making this. I wanted to be able to do this. I wanted to have this time for you to whatever.

00:42:02

I don't have that. And you can quickly get discouraged. But when you journal, instead of your reference

00:42:08

point being where you want to be, your reference point is where you were. And when you look at where

00:42:13

you were and you see that growth, that is actually very encouraging. And that creates a sustainable

00:42:18

momentum to keep moving towards that ideal future. Got Mike excited.

00:42:26

Kind of my thing. So I like the opportunity to talk about this stuff.

00:42:31

I don't know if I should say you're welcome bookworm listeners or I'm sorry. Here you go.

00:42:39

Let us know if you hate excited, Mike, then let us know that. Not just kidding.

00:42:45

So I love the concept of having prosperity in a lot of different arenas because it's easy to think of

00:42:55

the traditional term of prosperity. We immediately stereotype it with finances.

00:43:00

Like, oh, he's very prosperous. He's made a lot of money. He's very successful. He's made a lot of

00:43:04

money. Like we tend to just interchange those terms quite a bit. So I love seeing that the term

00:43:12

is being used in other ways. So and I again, it comes back to this key of financial prosperity is

00:43:17

often connected to sole prosperity. So it doesn't necessarily, I mean, you see, it's is often connected

00:43:24

to that doesn't guarantee it. And I think that's what you're getting at there, Mike.

00:43:29

Exactly. And also the place that you give financial prosperity in the order of importance,

00:43:35

the priority, the hierarchy that will determine whether you experience the

00:43:38

prosperity in these other levels. Because there are a lot of people, for example, in the

00:43:43

Asian efficiency community in the productivity community, you hear all these stories about people

00:43:48

who on the surface are very successful. They've got a lot of money, but they are miserable.

00:43:55

In fact, I'm thinking of one thing in particular, there was the planet of the apps, which is the

00:44:00

show that Apple launched as part of Apple Music, but it's a TV show, which is confusing. But

00:44:06

they had this banner ad that they got in trouble for because they showed this guy's picture and

00:44:13

they took out one phrase from the episode. And this really wasn't the point that he was making,

00:44:17

but this is what they chose. And it was something along the lines, if I haven't seen my family for

00:44:22

over three weeks or something like that. And it was because it's a banner ad, it's like they're

00:44:27

advertising and they're lifting this thing up as like, well, this is just the price you got to pay

00:44:33

for success. And there was a lot of legitimate, and I'm glad there was backlash against that,

00:44:37

because that's not right. In a particular case, yeah, maybe your app makes it big,

00:44:43

but you've been burning the candle up both ends. You haven't seen the people who are most

00:44:47

important to you. Maybe you've made a lot of money and a lot of people, they make the money,

00:44:51

and then they look back and they say, oh, man, that was pointless. That was worthless,

00:44:57

you know, according to Ecclesiastes. What was the point of all that? Because I lost the stuff

00:45:01

that was really important. At one point, I did some research on what do a lot of people see as

00:45:11

their biggest regrets as they're on their deathbed? What are these things that people wish they had

00:45:18

done or were glad that they did whenever they know that their life is coming to an end?

00:45:24

And it's a bit morbid to think about this sort of thing, and it's kind of a challenge to

00:45:30

read some of this stuff. But hands down, the thing that people talk about the most is building

00:45:37

relationships and helping other people. That seems to be far and away the number one thing that people

00:45:43

either wish they had done or they were glad that they did. And to me, that should be the definition

00:45:50

of prosperity is, have you helped other people in a strong way and have you been able to build

00:45:57

relationships in a very encouraging way, which is seen through this entire book because it's a

00:46:05

grandfather teaching these keys to successful living to his grandson. You don't really get

00:46:11

more true to form than that. So it's something that this book, even from kind of a meta level,

00:46:19

just in how the story is told, explains that principle in itself.

00:46:24

Yeah, absolutely. Another kind of principle that is throughout this book, based on the

00:46:33

relationship that you just pointed out, is the third key, which is a man must do whatever he can

00:46:38

to provide for his family, not just his immediate family in this particular case, but it's the

00:46:42

grandfather who's teaching these things to the grandson. I really like that because I think we can

00:46:48

narrowly define family. And I'm not just talking like extended family. So let's just use, there's

00:46:57

a term called the church family where let's say that you attend a specific church and the people

00:47:04

that are there can benefit from what you have to give them. You can't just say, no, I got to take

00:47:09

care of my own stuff. You do have a responsibility if you're going to call yourself a part of that

00:47:14

church family. And I think that word family is really important because we can look at it and say,

00:47:20

well, that's somebody else's responsibility. But that's the improper view of this. The best

00:47:25

way to do this is not to come to church, for example, or even to a family, any sort of family

00:47:33

meeting. I think that this principle still applies. Like if you come and you are looking for what

00:47:38

you can get, you're making withdrawals from those emotional bank accounts that Stephen Covey talks

00:47:44

about, that's not going to end well for you. But if you are coming looking for what you can give,

00:47:51

that flips a script gets your eyes off of your own problems. And oftentimes you will find that

00:47:57

your problems are solved by you looking to solve the problems of other people. I think that is

00:48:03

super important, but then specifically pertaining to this number number three, a man must do whatever

00:48:07

he can to provide for his family. The other obvious point here is that sometimes you got to do what

00:48:12

you got to do. And it's not always going to be convenient, but you have a responsibility. You

00:48:18

can not just say, well, I'm not passionate about that. Like go get a job. If your family is having

00:48:24

trouble eating, you need to find a way to support them. I have all kinds of thoughts on this.

00:48:29

It's going to get crazy political if I go there, so I'm going to skip some of it.

00:48:32

I guess the non-political version is just this, that sometimes you have to do things that are not

00:48:40

ideal. Sometimes you have to do things that you don't really want to do, but you do them because

00:48:45

you have to pay the bills. You have to keep the lights on. You have to give miles that you have to

00:48:49

feed. And that's okay. And it's part of the process. And it's not forever. Just buckle up and do it.

00:48:58

It's a season. Winston Churchill said, if you're going through hell, keep going. Just don't stop

00:49:03

there. And don't just sit and wait for, oh, someday the perfect door, the perfect opportunity is going

00:49:07

to open. You make your own luck by doing the things that nobody else will do.

00:49:12

Yes. And this ties into the fourth key. Trials develop your character, preparing you for

00:49:18

increased blessings. So whenever bad things happen, I guess that ties into number five, too.

00:49:24

When bad things happen, don't just sit on your hind, hind in and just worry about it and get

00:49:31

up and do something. This is to help make you better. I tend to refer to some of my early

00:49:38

jobs as some of my first character building experiences. It's like, okay, these were not easy

00:49:46

jobs to be in. They were not fun. I did not like them. But they built a lot of character and taught

00:49:52

me a lot, which has brought me to where I'm at today. So I wouldn't trade those. They were not fun.

00:49:58

But it has prepared me for better things. And I'm very grateful for that. But you have to be

00:50:05

willing to see it that way and not get upset whenever a bad thing comes along. You have to be

00:50:10

willing to see it the right way. And as per the fifth key here, take responsibility for problems

00:50:16

that are a result of your own bad decisions. Don't displace the blame. And we can get into

00:50:20

this one a little bit more or two. But you have to be willing to take responsibility for

00:50:26

something that happened, a trial that's come along. It may not be your fault, but you can take

00:50:31

responsibility for it. Yeah, there's so there's a couple things here, which are really important.

00:50:39

And the whole point of this book, I guess, is it gives you these 12 keys to successful living.

00:50:45

There, I'm sure, have been books written on each one of these different keys.

00:50:48

Oh, easy. Yeah. We're kind of going over them fairly quickly. But the trials specifically,

00:50:55

let me speak to this one first. Trials, I mean, number four, trials develop your character,

00:51:03

preparing you for the increased blessings. Doesn't matter the source of the trial,

00:51:07

like you were saying, like, it may or may not be your fault. You cannot change that now,

00:51:12

but you can change how you are going to deal with this thing. And you can determine that I'm

00:51:17

going to have the grit, I'm going to have the perseverance to see this thing through. And I'm

00:51:21

going to learn from this experience so that it doesn't happen again. And I can avoid this

00:51:27

negative situation. That's a very, very important mindset for people to develop. Because if you

00:51:33

have the other side of that, the other thing you could do is like, Oh, what was me? This is

00:51:36

completely unfair. I shouldn't be in this particular place. All of those things can be 100% true.

00:51:43

But how does that help you? How does that change your situation? How does that make anything better?

00:51:48

You know, that's the real key here is looking for the way to improve the situation, looking for

00:51:55

the way to solve this problem, looking for the way to get out of this particular trial. And I think

00:52:01

that the reason that that prepares you for the increased blessing is that those things,

00:52:05

they add to your experience. And then next time you're not going to be so gullible,

00:52:10

you're not going to fall for those things. Okay, like I said, whether it's your fault or not,

00:52:14

you can see the warning signs a million miles away. And you can avoid that thing

00:52:19

if you don't want to do it. And the other thing here, the taking responsibility,

00:52:21

this is like I said, it's kind of related because you may not have been the one who originated the

00:52:27

situation that you're in, but you are the one that can change it. And so taking responsibility is

00:52:33

not saying that, Oh yeah, this is completely my fault. But what I do from this point forward,

00:52:37

that is completely my fault. If I just continue to accept that this is the normal state of being,

00:52:44

then yes, that is my fault. However, why don't I try and change some things? Because who knows

00:52:50

what could happen here? And a lot of the success stories that you read, especially in the types of

00:52:55

books that we read for for Bookworm. And if you study the authors, like a lot of them have this

00:53:00

own their own personal story where everything was going wrong, they were sleeping on the couch in

00:53:06

their friend's basement. And then they found the thing that worked. And then they completely

00:53:11

changed their life. Well, that's that's the the tipping point right there is they found the

00:53:17

thing that worked. But you can't find the thing that worked. If you're not looking to change,

00:53:22

if you are not looking to improve your situation, you will not discover that thing that worked.

00:53:26

And you'll be stuck living on the couch in your friend's basement forever. And that's the thing

00:53:30

that really that really irks me, I guess, is the acceptance of those situations as like,

00:53:38

this is the way it's always going to be. Because I know whether you have a Christian belief system

00:53:43

or not, that these spiritual principles apply, and that energy or motion attracts energy. And

00:53:49

as soon as you make any sort of motion, take that first step, just that first step towards changing

00:53:54

your situation, a lot of things will fall into place that you never could have predicted.

00:53:59

And I think this can play into the second half of the next key. Don't displace the blame

00:54:06

for in this case for problems or as we've been talking about trials. So often we see things where

00:54:15

something really bad happened. And the two questions that normally come up are,

00:54:19

one, why would God do this? Or two, the devil's out to get me. There's usually one of those two

00:54:26

things. But it takes a bit of honesty with yourself to look at the situation and potentially see

00:54:34

that this is your own bad decision that led you to it. The story in the book you talk about,

00:54:42

Antonio, he had built a facility for creating these Venetian trading beads. And he essentially

00:54:51

had too many furnaces going underneath the building. And it ended up catching on fire and the whole

00:54:57

thing burnt down. That's what led to the learning of this principle. And because of the situation,

00:55:04

and because it was so emotional, Antonio struggled to see that it was his own fault in that case,

00:55:13

because he had too much going on. And when it first happened, he was asking, well, why would God

00:55:18

do this? And some of his workers were doing the opposite saying the devil's out to get us. Like,

00:55:23

they were going through this whole thing. Well, then Alicia, who is Antonio's mentor through this.

00:55:30

And I guess I'm destroying some of the book here. Sorry, spoiler alert. After the fact. Sorry about

00:55:35

that. But the Alicia takes him through the process of seeing that you had a lot of furnaces under a

00:55:46

wood ceiling. That's always going to result in bad things at some point. This is your own decision

00:55:55

to lead to this. Don't displace the blame and put it on God or the devil. This was yours.

00:56:00

In this case. And I really don't like this one, Mike. Because I think I tend to fall into one of

00:56:10

those two on occasion, not always. And maybe not even most of the time. But on occasion, I know

00:56:16

that that's my gut reaction is to fall into one of those. Because I don't want to admit that

00:56:21

I've potentially made a bad decision. I don't think any of us really wants to do that. But

00:56:28

being willing to take the blame for something, take responsibility for it. I think there's a lot

00:56:34

of value in that, of course. But it's not easy to do. No, it's definitely not easy to do. I think

00:56:42

it's Genesis 822 talks about seed time and harvest as long as the earth remains, these will

00:56:47

exist. And that is basically cause and effect. And I like the story in the book that you brought up

00:56:54

because a lot of times what we get, the results that we see are literally cause and effect. We

00:57:00

are where we are today because the decisions that we made yesterday, you are a product of your

00:57:05

routine and your habits. But if you don't have the proper perspective, you can't see this stuff.

00:57:12

And so while I'm going to mess up the names in Tonya, Alicia, no, Antonio was the grandfather.

00:57:20

Yeah, so he probably should have known that you throw a bunch of extra furnaces in a wood building.

00:57:27

It's going to get really hot. Eventually, there's going to be a fire. Like, yes, that's not,

00:57:31

you don't need to be a rocket scientist to understand that. But in the moment, like you said,

00:57:36

it's completely out of left field. How in the world is this? Why is this happening to me?

00:57:41

I never could have seen this coming. Well, yes, you could have, if you would have

00:57:44

understood the situation correctly. Lots of hot burning things and wood. It doesn't go well.

00:57:50

Yeah, and a lot of times, all it takes whenever we feel that way is a mentor or somebody who can

00:57:58

correct our perspective and they don't have to be like, you idiot, what were you doing with all

00:58:02

those furnaces in a wood building? All they have to do is say one thing and it's just a perspective

00:58:07

and then you're like, oh, yeah, I guess I should have seen that. And that's the important part of

00:58:15

the process too, I believe though, because another thing that I teased out from point number one was

00:58:21

that God only blesses what we actually put our hands to. In my book, I put it, I said that God

00:58:28

will only delegate what you are able to administrate. Like, if you just sit on what He's given you

00:58:33

and what He's got for you to do, then why should He give you more? But when you have a misstep and

00:58:39

the furnaces that you've built, the fact the warehouses or whatever that you've built, they

00:58:44

go up in smoke, that's not the end. Like the fact that you failed once doesn't mean that

00:58:51

your whole life is a failure. Anybody that I know who has done something great has had missteps

00:58:59

like that along the way. And sometimes it's just a little bump in the road because I tried this

00:59:04

thing and it didn't really work out. Sometimes they really believe this is the thing and they

00:59:07

sink their life savings into it only to find out that, ah, they've misjudged the market or whatever,

00:59:13

you know? But recognizing that this cause and effect system like this is at work in unpacking all

00:59:21

of the circumstances and all of the results and figuring out the root causes is extremely valuable.

00:59:29

And this also, you know, I'm kind of doing tons of segues here, but four, five, and six trials

00:59:34

develop character taking responsibility for problems and then see challenges as stepping stones,

00:59:40

not as obstacles. These all three came out fairly quickly, if not all at the same time in the book

00:59:45

all over that one incident of the warehouse, not warehouse, but the plant basically burning down.

00:59:53

Along with some of his boats actually, which was a problem considering that's how they got things

00:59:59

to different places, but Alicia helped Antonio see that the plant burning down may have been,

01:00:08

and in this case it was, his fault for putting too much fire underneath the wood roof,

01:00:13

but he helped them also see at the same time that although that trial wasn't fun or it wasn't going

01:00:23

to be an easy challenge, it was something to see it as a stepping stone and not as something blocking

01:00:30

him from doing something better. Because Antonio was considering dropping business all together

01:00:35

and going back to the monastery as a result of this, as opposed to seeing it as a chance to build a

01:00:42

better manufacturing plant and grow from it. And I know lots of people who have made that emotional

01:00:51

rash decision is like, well, that obviously didn't work or God didn't obviously want me to do that.

01:00:57

No, you idiot, it's not that, it's that you messed up and it's all part of the process. I think

01:01:03

that's the important distinction here is that the challenges of stepping stones, not as obstacles,

01:01:09

that is in the value judgment that you associate with them. So an obstacle you view it as like,

01:01:16

this is something that I absolutely need to overcome, it's unnecessary, it would be better if it was

01:01:21

not here. But a stepping stone, it's almost like this is a necessary step in the process which is

01:01:28

going to get me to the point where I want to be. And I guess this is kind of getting into some of

01:01:33

the stoicism stuff, the Ryan Holiday stuff, but not making that value judgment of, oh, this thing

01:01:39

is great or oh, this thing is terrible is really important because if you ascribe the value judgment

01:01:45

to it, as soon as you say that, oh, this is a negative thing, you think that you shouldn't have

01:01:49

to deal with this. And when you think that you shouldn't have to deal with it, you resent the

01:01:53

fact that you do have to deal with it and you can completely miss the lesson or the takeaway

01:01:58

from that particular situation. And then that's not to say that God burned down Antonio's factories,

01:02:06

but there is value that from the event that there is something that you can learn from it.

01:02:13

I guess that's the big takeaway for me is always be looking for those lessons that you can learn

01:02:17

and that will help you avoid situations like that in the future if you don't want to

01:02:22

experience the thing, but not being resentful of the process itself.

01:02:25

As people who, as entrepreneurs who are always coming up with new ideas and trying to develop

01:02:33

new things, especially if you're in the world of development, you're going to run across things

01:02:37

that just destroy what you have built very quickly because it's not uncommon to build something

01:02:45

and then have someone else build a competitor right away to try to beat you out.

01:02:50

And you have to be okay with that or know that it's going to be there and not see it as

01:02:56

something that is there to cause pain for you, but at the same time, it's something to help make

01:03:04

you better. I'm trying to think, who is it? Gazelle? They do the, they'll buy your phone back from you.

01:03:11

Actually, that's where I sold my old MacBook Pro, but they buy that stuff back. Well, there's been

01:03:16

a number of programs that come out from even Apple themselves where they will do a lot of the same

01:03:21

thing. Gazelle welcomed that and saw it as a way to get better and saw it as a way to

01:03:28

continue to deliver a better service to their customers. They didn't see it as competition,

01:03:35

they saw it as a way to help more people and to make the offering even better.

01:03:40

I think that's the way we need to come at this is not worrying about it, but seeing it as a good

01:03:45

thing, which is not easy like we've been saying. Yeah, I would say that it's not even viewing it

01:03:51

as a good thing, but just recognizing that it is and can't change the fact that it's happened

01:03:57

or where do you go from here? If you constantly are looking forward instead of backwards, you won't

01:04:02

get upset about all the missteps that you took. Agreed.

01:04:10

Now, this leads us into the next key here. Be meek before God, but bold before men.

01:04:17

This is my favorite chapter. This is where Antonio meets the pirate.

01:04:21

I'll let you introduce it then. Basically, the point here is that as it pertains to

01:04:32

your standing before God, you always have to make sure that you recognize the fact that you are

01:04:38

not God. That's how I interpret this. You will always not be God, and you can try to make

01:04:44

yourself God. It's not going to change the fact that you are not. So, recognizing that,

01:04:48

accepting your place and approaching God in the right mindset, the right reverence, that is

01:04:55

going to be very, very determinant of what you actually get when you spend time reading your

01:05:01

Bible praying, etc. That's going to be important. That you are meek, teachable. I guess the best

01:05:07

way to describe this is like Julio, for example, in this story. He's not trying to interject with

01:05:13

all the things that he's learned. He's just taking in what his grandfather is teaching him. He's

01:05:20

learning from his own experience because his grandfather knows more than he does.

01:05:24

Now, being bold before men, though, you kind of have to flip a switch. This is not to say that

01:05:34

you are thinking of yourself better than other people, which is, I think, probably the common

01:05:40

manifestation of this mindset, but it is being confident in your abilities and in your rights

01:05:49

before other people. So, in the story, for example, this pirate contacts him and he's kind of a bad

01:05:57

dude. He says, "I want to have a meeting." So, he's kind of scared of this guy. He doesn't want to go.

01:06:02

Turns out he ends up going and then gets a big business deal out of it.

01:06:05

And that's just... Very big business deal. Actually, what he had to do, though, was he had to

01:06:12

overcome his emotion and his fear. So, that is something that everybody deals with. And that's

01:06:19

also why I think something like Toastmasters is so important because the number one fear that

01:06:24

people have is public speaking. Number two is death. So, people are more afraid of getting up in front

01:06:31

of people and talking than they are about dying themselves, which is kind of messed up. But it

01:06:36

comes back to this being bold before men. Most people, they think that they get in that situation,

01:06:40

they've got nothing to say. Like, what can I possibly add to these people? And I've experienced

01:06:46

this in my own very brief, very young public speaking career. Like, I have not appeared before

01:06:54

large audiences, but even the audiences that I have spoken in front of, I suffer from that. I'm like,

01:07:00

well, this person is here, this person is here. Like, why are they here to listen to me?

01:07:06

But if you understand that you do have something of value, that can translate into the confidence

01:07:17

to go before those people. So, this is something literally that I'm dealing with right now,

01:07:22

because I'm trying to get more experience, more visibility. So, I've... I'm reaching out to other

01:07:29

podcasts. And the standard email that you get from people who want to be on podcasts is usually

01:07:37

very self-serving. Like, hey, I'd be great for your podcasts. We get these all the time for the

01:07:42

productivity show. Most of the time they're addressed to TAN, even though TAN's not on the

01:07:46

podcast very much. So, right away when they say hi, TAN, you know that they've never listened to

01:07:51

an episode. Secondly, with the productivity show, we typically focus on specific problems from the

01:07:57

dojo. And so, people will come in and they'll say, hey, I've got a great guest for your show.

01:08:03

And they're... And I'm just like, you don't listen, because we don't really have guests for our show.

01:08:07

And then they go on to talk about how great their guest is. Like, that's what I don't want to come

01:08:11

across as. So, this is really difficult for me, because I have to frame this in a way, especially

01:08:17

in a template, where maybe I've listened to the podcast, maybe I haven't, but communicating in a

01:08:23

way that I'm confident in the message and the value that I can bring to their audience feels

01:08:30

really internet marketing to me. You know, going back to your initial point, your initial follow-up

01:08:36

item. Like, in our discussion about the cognitive biases and how those pertain to marketing,

01:08:41

this can be very difficult, but it's important because you have something of value to add to the

01:08:50

conversation. So, recognizing that is important, but then also not overstepping your balance.

01:08:55

That's really the key to this point, I think, is the balance.

01:08:58

And that's not an easy balance to find, because... And you might not have had a chance to listen to

01:09:07

the latest theoretical, because Josh and I talked about the art of thinking clearly a little bit,

01:09:13

and how it is okay to use some of those biases when you're marketing, but you have to do it in a way

01:09:21

that will help the other person. You have to have their best interest in mind. If you don't,

01:09:26

then it's coming across as the scummy internet marketing thing that you're getting at. But

01:09:31

if you're genuinely trying to help, it's okay to use some of those in that way. And it is really

01:09:39

hard to find that balance. But at the same time, you're saying breaking that fear

01:09:45

in a way that helps you help other people, if you can make that connection, that's the goal and

01:09:54

the purpose behind this key. Is that a fair way to describe that, Mike?

01:09:58

Yeah, I think so. In the study guide thing, at the end, they actually, one of the sections,

01:10:04

talk about the acronym fear, which can be applied a lot of different ways. But the one that I liked

01:10:10

that they used was false evidence appearing real. As it pertains to my personality, and I will say

01:10:19

false humility, the tendency can be to say that, well, I don't have anything of value. I don't

01:10:25

have anything to contribute. I'm not going to say anything. I'm just going to sit here and watch.

01:10:29

And I would argue, and this is something that I struggle with and deal with on a daily basis,

01:10:34

that that is wrong. Like you do have something that you need to contribute. You do have something

01:10:39

that you need to add. You do have something valuable. There is a vocation. There is a need

01:10:43

that you are specifically designed and created to meet. And if you do not do it, we all suffer.

01:10:48

Yes, agreed. Now I want to move on to the number eight, because I'm also looking at the clock,

01:10:57

we got to move. The next three, we can probably lump together. They all have to do with money.

01:11:04

Or the next four, maybe. Yeah, possibly. All right, so let's do this. We're going to lump the

01:11:11

next four together. So number eight, live debt free and below your means. Number nine,

01:11:18

always keep to your budget. Those two for sure could be lumped together.

01:11:23

Yeah, it implies you have a budget to begin with there. Number 10, loaning money destroys

01:11:29

relationships. Number 11, set aside the first 10% to honor God. And this all comes around the idea

01:11:38

of what do you do with your money after you have earned it in some way. And if you try to

01:11:47

lump all of these together, what you tend to see is one, you need to create a budget. So in other

01:11:54

words, decide what your money is going to do before you've done anything with it. So deciding

01:12:01

where I'm going to spend the money that I'm earning before I've actually gotten to that point,

01:12:07

if you follow me there. Once you've got that budget, decide that the first 10% is going to go to

01:12:15

God, to the church in this case, make sure that whenever you're building that budget,

01:12:22

your income is greater than your outgo. You want to make sure that you're on the positive,

01:12:28

not in the red. If you're in the red, that's a problem. And then at the same time, once you've

01:12:34

got all of that decided, do not loan money to other people because it will destroy those

01:12:41

relationships. And if you ever listened to the Dave Ramsey show, one of the number one things

01:12:47

that people struggle with is mom and dad, let me money and I'm trying to pay them back or

01:12:51

my kids need to buy a car and I want to give them the money, like loan it to them. And most of the

01:12:59

time, the complaints that come with that is that this is destroying our relationship and it is

01:13:05

causing a lot of problems within the family. So if you ever want encouragement to not loan money

01:13:12

to other people, just listen to that show. It'll set you straight pretty quick.

01:13:17

Yeah. And in the book, at the very beginning, they stop at this restaurant where it's clear that

01:13:24

Antonio knows the owner and they basically get a really good meal. And then later on in the book,

01:13:30

you find out that the owner of that restaurant is actually a family member that he refused to

01:13:35

loan money to. Yes. Which I thought was a little bit of a sensationalized example. But

01:13:42

I get the principle and you are 100% correct that you do not want to be owing money to other

01:13:50

family members because it causes stress on the relationships. Now I would, I do think it's worth

01:13:55

pointing out here that loaning money destroys the relationships as point number 10 says,

01:14:01

giving money is a little bit different. Now that doesn't, some of the same principles still apply

01:14:06

that when someone comes and asks you for money, you don't just whip out the checkbook and meet the

01:14:11

need. I mean, if you're able to do that, and you want to do that, that's awesome. But even that

01:14:16

can be enabling in some senses. So really the point that he's making in this book is that you

01:14:22

want to stay away from those things because you're not really helping that person. You're the easy

01:14:27

button in that particular situation. And if you enable them, chances are they'll never going to

01:14:31

figure this out for themselves. And so there's going to be failure. And now there's going to be

01:14:35

the added stress that they owe you money. And I completely agree that you should avoid that whenever

01:14:41

possible. I forget where I've heard it, but I've heard the phrase that if you loan somebody in your

01:14:50

family money, Thanksgiving dinner doesn't taste the same. Like it.

01:14:56

Yeah, that's a that's a Dave Ramsey. Changes there. Is that it? Is that where I got that? Okay,

01:14:59

I wasn't sure. Apparently I'm a Dave Ramsey fan, as you can tell.

01:15:03

Well, these four points right here explain why he recommends this book.

01:15:07

Yes. Yes. And if you go through the study guide, you see Dave Ramsey mentioned a lot

01:15:12

when they're going through that area of it. There's a lot of good stuff here, though. And

01:15:16

this is these are things that you read them and you're like, well, yeah, I know that. But do you?

01:15:21

I mean, do you actually keep a budget? And if you do, do you actually spend less than you make?

01:15:27

Like it's very common sense, but common sense isn't so common. Like you have to look at the

01:15:33

actions, you have to match that up. And that's really what you believe. You know, it's not the

01:15:38

fact that you know that you're supposed to do a budget. It's not the fact that you know you're

01:15:42

supposed to live below your means and have some savings for when things go wrong.

01:15:46

But all of this stuff like is compounded. We're talking about the factory fire, for example,

01:15:52

like that was the result of some choices. One of the things that Dave says in the Financial

01:15:57

Peace University class that he does is the rain falls on the just and the unjust. And really,

01:16:02

what that means is that there is going to be some crisis. It is unavoidable. But most people

01:16:08

don't look for the crisis. They don't look at the fact that, oh, you know, for the last five years,

01:16:13

things have been going pretty well. I guess I should be ready for that rainy day for when

01:16:16

things are going to go wrong. And they don't. They live paycheck to paycheck. And then

01:16:20

the car blows up and you need a new one and you're like, ah, I don't have the money. Like

01:16:24

suddenly never comes suddenly. And you should be expecting these things and you should be building

01:16:30

those into your budget. And if you do do that on a consistent basis, it makes the times that

01:16:34

those things happen much, much easier to deal with.

01:16:39

Agree 100%. So there's a lot here because so much of this is how to manage money in a,

01:16:51

you know, to use the cliche term prosperous way. And it's just not normal. It's just not. And

01:17:01

whenever you think about, you know, take the first one here, live debt free and below your means,

01:17:05

how many people actually do that? And how many people use a credit card to buy something like,

01:17:10

I'll just put that on the card. Like, I don't have anything against a credit card per se,

01:17:15

but when you're using it to buy things you can't afford, that's a problem. And it will eventually

01:17:21

expand to the point that it leads people to very inappropriate ways of managing money. I've heard

01:17:29

stories of people who they get a new credit card and they don't think they ever have to pay it back.

01:17:36

They think it's their money. They don't realize it's a credit card. It is a loan. You have to pay

01:17:45

that back. The number of people who actually think that astounds me. And I can't help but wonder how

01:17:51

they got to that point. And it's it makes me wonder if parents at some point have just said,

01:18:00

I'll just put that on the card, knowing they're going to pay it off later. But the kids don't see

01:18:05

that part. They don't see the the paying it back part. They just see, I'll just put it on the card.

01:18:10

And I wonder if people get to a point where they just see it as, you know, this is my money because

01:18:16

I can just put it on the card. Why? What do you mean I have to pay it back? I just wonder how people

01:18:20

get to that point. All this to say, don't go negative. Be intentional with it. And if you earn

01:18:31

a certain amount of money, make sure that your expenses are less than that.

01:18:35

Yeah, there is a cognitive bias that speaks to this specifically, but I can't find it in my list

01:18:44

of hundred from the last episode. I'll just summarizing what it says is that we tend to discount things

01:18:58

that are in the future. And so that's why if you listen to Dave Ramsey, he always recommends that

01:19:05

you pay cash for stuff because when you pay cash for things, you feel the pain of the money leaving

01:19:11

your account at that exact moment. And you lose that as soon as you use a credit card. And he, by the

01:19:17

way, he he backs this up because I tried to sign up for the entree leadership conference. And they

01:19:25

would not take a credit card. It caused some problems actually, but I was able to figure it out.

01:19:29

But they because I don't really use a debit card, I use the Amazon credit card just because I don't

01:19:34

have to think about it. It's auto paid every single month. And I go into Amazon and I've got a bunch

01:19:39

of points that I can use. So very, very simple system with a little bit of benefit. We always pay

01:19:44

off the entire balance every single month. It's not an issue. But it was an issue when I tried to buy

01:19:49

something from Dave Ramsey. So he lives what he preaches regardless of what you think of him.

01:19:55

The other thing I think is worth calling out here is this set aside the first 10% to honor God. Now,

01:20:04

I am going to hold back a little bit here because I know that my views on this are probably not

01:20:10

the majority, I'll just say. But I really think that this is critical. I believe that if you do not

01:20:21

set aside the first 10%, so that's like 10% of the gross, not the net. If you are going to abide by

01:20:27

this system and say, yes, I am a Tyler, because that's what tied the means 10%. It is critical

01:20:34

that it is the first 10% because that's what activates all of the other systems that God has

01:20:40

said in a place. And I know story after story after story after story after story of people who

01:20:45

have just started doing this just as a way of testing God. You know, most people are thinking,

01:20:51

oh, you can't test God actually in Malachi three, that's the only place where it says,

01:20:55

test me in this if I will not open the windows of heaven for you. And I can tell you from personal

01:21:00

experience that our income has gone up year after year after year when we have implemented this

01:21:06

system, the setting aside the first 10%. And lots of other people that I know have experienced this

01:21:12

as well. Great book on this particular topic, by the way, is The Blessed Life by Robert Morris,

01:21:17

which I believe is another Ramsey recommendation. But it really gets into this whole financial

01:21:23

system concept. Because like I said, there's a lot of this stuff that if you're going to make

01:21:27

the distinction church, not church, there's a lot of stuff that exists outside the church,

01:21:31

which is actually Christian biblical principles being played out in the world around us. And this

01:21:37

one right here is very critical. And I think it kind of ties into the last part here,

01:21:43

understand the power of partnership, because what you are saying when you agree to tie the

01:21:48

do things God's way is yes, God, your system is better than any system I can come up with,

01:21:52

which is probably a fairly safe statement to say. I mean, if you really wanted to get

01:21:59

into that, Isaiah, I believe a 65 says your ways are higher than our ways, your thoughts are

01:22:04

higher than our thoughts like God sees things you don't see he sees all of the opportunities that

01:22:09

are out there in the future that you cannot predict. And if you are in the will of God, if you are

01:22:13

doing things according to the system of God, then that opens up a lot of doors that not that God

01:22:19

doesn't want to bless his people, but he just can't because you haven't completely trusted him. I

01:22:23

know that like if I'm if I want to bless my kids, for example, not that any sort of reward is based

01:22:34

on what they do, but who they are, the amount of blessing that I can give them the whether that

01:22:40

be financial, emotional, relational, whatever, like it requires a response from them. If they are

01:22:47

stone cold teenagers, who whatever, you know, like that's that's going to limit what I'm able to do

01:22:53

for them. And I think that that's honestly where a lot of what parents get into trouble because they

01:22:59

get into those years and they don't see the response and they try to overcompensate from

01:23:03

from their end. And you can enable a lot of bad habits that way. But I think that this is this

01:23:09

is really, really important because when you say when you make a one step to show that, yes, God,

01:23:14

I am I am in I'm going to do things the way that you think they should be done because I know that

01:23:18

you're a lot smarter and better at this than I am. That that that puts the wheels in motion for a

01:23:24

lot of different things. I know that whenever I look at this key, understand the power of partnership,

01:23:33

one of the first things I tend to think of is something we talked about early on in this

01:23:38

conversation is building those relationships and doing mentoring. And it really comes through

01:23:45

in the book with Alicia mentoring Antonio and seeing how he helps him learn these principles

01:23:55

and do something with them. But the story that comes out at the end that really ties a lot of

01:24:01

this together, you know, you mentioned the part where one of the the priests was scowling at Antonio

01:24:08

or Alicia, it happened to both of them. And they both smile back. In Alicia's case, he's smiling back

01:24:16

because the priest doesn't necessarily understand how much he's doing and what he is doing at St.

01:24:22

Peter's because Alicia helped take the old cathedral down and started helping to build from a financial

01:24:33

and a a how do you explain that from an intellectual standpoint, he was using his knowledge and

01:24:42

expertise to help build the new. That was the partnership he was working on, but the priests that

01:24:49

was scowling on him didn't know that likely. So he's getting upset, but for the wrong reason in

01:24:55

that case, he didn't fully understand it in that case. So I thought it was interesting that this

01:24:59

comes out at the end because it ties so much of all this other all the other keys together.

01:25:03

And you don't really see it until the end. So I thought it was interesting that Alicia had this

01:25:09

partnership with the monks as per the story and was able to help fulfill their vision in a lot of

01:25:18

ways. And some of only part of it really was financial, even though it was a huge financial

01:25:24

burden to do that, it wasn't a big deal for for him because he had built a massive empire of

01:25:31

trade. So I love that it all comes together in this power of partnership because the two sides

01:25:41

are definitely not against each other. They are definitely interconnected. And when we finally see

01:25:47

how to do that and fulfill it on both sides together, there's a lot of amazing things that can happen

01:25:55

with that. Yeah, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. And that's why the partnership

01:26:03

piece is so important. And also the perspective that I mentioned earlier, like instead of looking

01:26:07

for what you can get also looking at what you can give, if you approached all of the relationships,

01:26:13

business relationships, whatever that way, then you're going to have a lot more fruit from it because

01:26:20

you've got this partnership where everybody is working together and what you can what you can

01:26:24

build together when you are really in alignment is significantly more than anything that you could

01:26:29

do by yourself. And that can be that can be business. So if you are working in a real partnership where

01:26:38

this is really a win-win, then financially, maybe is the way that you you experience the growth that

01:26:45

way. But I also think we touched at this at the very beginning, the mentorship piece, like you just

01:26:49

mentioned, the discipleship model, like this is important. If we are partners of the gospel,

01:26:56

which is what it says in the Bible, then we need to embrace this partnership mindset. And we need

01:27:01

to go and we need to find those people that we can mentor. Just think like Alicia mentored Antonio

01:27:07

and Tonya mentored Julio or I guess he probably mentored a Felipe at some point. Or at least

01:27:15

he'll mentored up. No, okay, I'm messing this up. There's Alicia, the main guy, he mentored Antonio

01:27:21

Antonio's father was Felipe. He was the monk and then Julio was the grandson. But just in this

01:27:27

story, like we've got a lot more potential for the mentorship to happen. Like what if Alicia had

01:27:35

mentored more people than just Antonio? What if Antonio had mentored Felipe, Felipe mentored Julio

01:27:42

and all of the people that they that were in their sphere of influence? Like imagine, I guess the

01:27:49

thing that gets me excited about this is just thinking about the people who are in my church.

01:27:54

My church is not a big church. It's roughly 150 people. But if I am able to communicate and mentor

01:28:02

in a sense, the things that I understand as it pertains to this particular area, as it pertains

01:28:10

to this particular book, and I'm able to get even a handful of people who start their own businesses

01:28:16

and it becomes successful and it completely changes their life. And then they go and they

01:28:20

find five more people. Like within one generation now, we've gone from one to five to 25.

01:28:25

I think that that gets lost in the translation of this particular book because it's so focused on

01:28:29

that one relationship. But there is exponentially greater potential impact through the power of

01:28:36

multiplication that is in this partnership. Do you want to move on to action items? There's more

01:28:45

you want to go over on this because I think that's a great place to say we've tied this all together.

01:28:50

We can end it there. People want more excited. We want to contact me directly.

01:28:56

I was like, I think we could just go on and on and on and on. So we need to draw a line here

01:29:02

somewhere. So I'm looking at the action items that you have on here, Mike, or lack thereof.

01:29:07

Start talking. Well, like I said, this is a subject that is near and dear to my heart.

01:29:16

I literally wrote a book on this exact topic. So I feel like this is a great book and the narrative

01:29:23

that they share is awesome. And there's a lot of stuff that you can glean from it. It's also a

01:29:28

lot of stuff that I have. I've gotten a revelation of through my own personal study. I would say,

01:29:35

so I had trouble picking out an action item, but the one thing that I really do want to change

01:29:41

now that I am looking at this, I want to do a better job with our budget. So my wife and I

01:29:48

are going over this literally right now. And what we're recognizing is that we've kind of let it

01:29:53

slide a little bit. And I know that that is something that we need to get, we need to get on top of.

01:30:00

I want to be able to go in there at any given moment and know exactly where everything went

01:30:04

and where everything is going. So we've got a program that we're using to do that. And

01:30:09

I guess that would be my action item would be get the budget 100% up to date.

01:30:15

Yeah, I know my wife and I have been running a personal budget for a number of years now,

01:30:21

and it's been incredibly enlightening and very helpful. So I can't say that that's a takeaway for

01:30:28

me in my personal life, but I also know that I haven't really done that for my business. It's

01:30:35

always operated as keep expenses as low as you can and drive as much of an income as you can. But

01:30:40

I've never sat down and written a full on budget for my business. It's easily in the black by a

01:30:48

long shot since it's a web business. So there's very little for expenses in respect to what it

01:30:56

drives as an income. So I don't really have to worry about that. But at the same time,

01:31:00

I couldn't necessarily tell you that all the expenses that I have for that are the right ones.

01:31:06

So I need to be a more intentional about that. So that's going to be one of my takeaways here.

01:31:12

The other is, and I wrote it as be okay with being aggressive in business. That might be a bad

01:31:18

way to say it. But I want to make sure that I'm not being complacent with what I'm doing in my

01:31:28

business and being okay with trying to help more people. And that's been kind of my drive with

01:31:35

the guild lately. And it's something I want to be better at. I want to be

01:31:40

able to help more people in this way. And I say being aggressive. And again, I don't know that's

01:31:46

the right term for it. But I'd like to use my business to help more people. And that's what I'm

01:31:51

shooting for. Nice. So author style rating hit me, Mike. Well, I definitely like the author style.

01:32:01

I really enjoyed the book. I thought it was very engaging. It was very interesting. There were a

01:32:10

couple things that I had minor issues with. But overall, I really, I really like the message of

01:32:17

the book. I think it is very needed. Honestly, I have trouble rating this one. Because I think

01:32:28

that there's a lot more here that you really have to understand in order for this stuff to really

01:32:33

stick. So I think it's great as like a first step. But I also think that there's a lot more

01:32:40

that you have to understand before you're really in Antonio's shoes, where you're super successful.

01:32:47

And I think that's not necessarily deceiving, but it's kind of lost in the in the translations.

01:32:54

Like, well, if you just understand these 12 things, then your life's going to be radically

01:32:57

different. It kind of reminded me of those posts that you see, like one small hack to change your

01:33:03

life in only two minutes a day, you know, seems a little sensational to me. Just a little.

01:33:09

Yeah. And I know that this is colored because of my past and my own personal experience with this

01:33:16

subject, my Bible college degree, and my own personal research that I literally did hours and

01:33:21

hours and hours of on this exact topic. So I don't expect everybody to come from the same

01:33:26

reference point. But I'm going to rate this at four stars.

01:33:29

Nice. I will agree with you on author style. Very easy read. And I do like that it's story form.

01:33:38

The again, I mentioned early that the study guide on this was something that I did read,

01:33:46

but there were some bits of it that I jumped over just because I felt like we'd already talked

01:33:52

about it. And that kind of, I think if I was sitting down and I was going through this with a group,

01:33:57

that would be a different story because it looking through some of the discussion questions,

01:34:02

I could see how it would be very helpful in a group setting. So that's something that I know

01:34:06

I could see as helpful. I also know that I would agree with you in that this is a great starting

01:34:12

point for people. I can't say that this is going to, and even in at the end of an Antonio's talking

01:34:19

to Julio, his grandson, and saying that he needs to meet, he's going to meet someone back at the

01:34:28

steps of St. Peter's in a year. So even that he's talking about how you're going to be connecting

01:34:35

with somebody else to learn more about this. So I think there's there is a level of it doesn't

01:34:41

stop with the book. And I kind of wish that had been called out a little bit more because if you

01:34:47

just read this and think it's going to solve a lot of problems, it's not going to happen. I don't

01:34:50

think any book is really going to do that. So there might be a bit of a misconception with that.

01:34:55

For a rating, I think I would put it at 4.5 here, Mike. I'll up you one. I think this is one that I

01:35:03

plan to and have already recommended to a handful of people who are struggling with some of their

01:35:11

mindset when it comes to money and the church and how do you work through some of the issues on those

01:35:18

two and how do they work together. So this is a case where I have a few friends and family members

01:35:26

who are well off. I wouldn't say they're super wealthy, but they do all right for themselves

01:35:32

and they really struggle with their relationship with that and the church and how those two play

01:35:38

together. So I've recommended it to them and I think it's a great starting point for people in

01:35:41

that position. That's why I put it there. Yeah, I would agree with that.

01:35:46

All right. So the next book then is Thinking Girl Rich by Napoleon Hill, which is my choice.

01:35:54

One of those classic books that is referred to a lot that I'm kind of ashamed to admit that I

01:35:59

haven't read yet. You like to pick these. Yeah. I feel like I should have done this. Okay,

01:36:04

now we'll do it publicly. Online accountability. There you go. There you go. Following that,

01:36:12

I've selected the Art of Asking by Amanda Palmer, which is should be an interesting read. It's all

01:36:19

about being willing to put yourself out there and ask for things and get over the fear of doing that.

01:36:26

Nice. My gap book is one that I ordered off of Amazon and I always ordered the hardcover versions.

01:36:35

Turned out that the hardcover version was actually not available through Amazon, but it was also

01:36:41

available through an affiliate seller and it still offered the prime shipping. So I got it. It was

01:36:47

fairly cheap. It was only like five or six bucks and I got it and turns out it's a signed copy.

01:36:53

So that's super cool. So my book is Do Over by John Acuff.

01:36:58

Nice. I'm a fan of Acuff. He derates some good stuff.

01:37:03

Yeah, he's a very entertaining author. Very easy to read.

01:37:06

Yeah. I'm reading kind of a, I don't want to say textbook, but it's definitely a long in depth.

01:37:14

Book. We'll see if I get through this one in a week.

01:37:16

If you read a book, which is by a person who writes textbooks, does that make it a textbook?

01:37:23

I don't know. That's a very good question because it's very easy to read.

01:37:27

By someone who writes curriculum, I guess. Is it a textbook?

01:37:30

So this is by Charlotte Mason, Towards a Philosophy of Education. My wife and I are planning to

01:37:39

homeschool our girls and this is a book that was recommended to us by a long time follower of mine,

01:37:47

Matt. And I know that he homeschools his kids and they have some very similar viewpoints to us.

01:37:56

And I'm very interested in his take on this. They've been at it longer than us.

01:38:00

And he highly recommended this as a place to get started in understanding how to homeschool

01:38:06

in a very positive way. So I'm interested in this. Again, we'll see if I get through it in a week.

01:38:14

It's what is it? 250 plus pages long and a fairly small type and long pages. So we'll see. We'll see.

01:38:22

Good luck. Thanks.

01:38:25

All right. If you want to recommend a book, I know that Joe specifically has mentioned that he's

01:38:32

going to be grabbing a bunch of recommendations. And I was looking through the list too. I'm definitely

01:38:36

going to select a couple as well. So we would love to get your recommendations. And you can do

01:38:42

that by going to bookworm.fm/list. And there'll be a button to recommend a book. You will also see

01:38:48

a list of all the books that we have covered, as well as the books that are on the schedule,

01:38:53

and also all of the books that are currently recommended.

01:38:57

Yeah, I'm planning to do that likely in the next two to three weeks. So get them out there,

01:39:04

get them out there now. So since this episode was very different, I'm very curious to see what

01:39:12

people think of it. So there's a couple ways you can let us know if we're headed down a path that

01:39:17

you absolutely hate, or if you absolutely love this, because I have a feeling this is a polarizing

01:39:21

episode. A couple ways you can do that. Leave us an iTunes review. So you go to the link in the

01:39:26

show notes and you can get there that way. Or you can go to the productivity guild where we have

01:39:31

our conversations about each episode. So you can do the feedback thing on one of those two places,

01:39:37

and links to both of those will be in the show notes.

01:39:41

Thanks everybody for joining us. If you're reading along, the next book up is Think and

01:39:45

Girl Rich by Napoleon Hill, and we will talk to you next time.