Healing Doesn’t Look Pretty — But It Works

[00:00:02] Speaker A: Okay, how about me. [00:00:06] Speaker B: Thoughts on why that is? But I'm sure you hope. Question is, are you doing it massively or abundance? Like, it's. It's. Matt, how you doing, buddy? [00:00:23] Speaker A: Frank. What's up, my brother? [00:00:26] Speaker B: Another day. Excited to be here. Grateful. Appreciate you being on. So we're gonna have a good conversation today. I'm excited for you to tell everybody about your book and what you do. I think it's gonna bring a lot of value. So just thankful that you're here. Appreciate you and looking forward to have some good conversation about the good mood revolution. [00:00:48] Speaker A: The good mood revolution. Because, you know, here's the thing. We can go and stack a bunch of money. We can get super fit and be in the best shape of our life. And if we're not having a good time doing it, we're failing. [00:01:01] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:01:01] Speaker A: Like, there's no point in being a miserable millionaire. [00:01:04] Speaker B: That's so true. And that's going to. I think that's going to be a large part of the conversation because I think that's what people struggle with the most today. And I have a lot of thoughts on why that is, but I'm sure you'll help me clear it up. So. [00:01:18] Speaker A: Yeah, I think it's harder to be happy today than it has been in the past a hundred years. And I'm not going to say that it has been in history because there were times when things were a lot harder for people. But in the last hundred years, some advances in technology have really taken us away from true connection with human beings, and it's taken us further from happiness. [00:01:39] Speaker B: I think that's really interesting, though, because I would also. I agree with you 110%. But would you also agree that it's never been easier to also be happy because there's so much abundance? Like, it's. It's very difficult, but it's also very easy. I don't. I think that's. That's a tough thing to wrap my mind around. [00:02:00] Speaker A: Yeah, dude, you nailed it. You nailed it. We've never been more blessed. I mean, we've never been more blessed. The blessings are just abundant. I was just talking to somebody the other day that went to. They went to Europe and they were having the king's menu, and there was like a big fair in, like, 1800s, and the king had ordered all the food from all the finest places from around the world to have this big buffet. And they were serving what they had at that meal, like, at this castle every day. And my buddy was like, I looked at this menu. And this is stuff that I just order on a weekend at my house. And so at the time, this buffet of all this exotic food was like, such a big deal that he was able to bring all this together and have this big feast. And yet we can just go on Uber Eats and get all of it and more today. And yet people are struggling with mental health at a really, really high rate. And it. And it increased tremendously since the. Since this thing. [00:03:01] Speaker B: Yeah, our phone. Do you think. Since we're on the topic, do you. I agree with all that. Do you think that. How much do you think the phone plays a role? And then so, like, let's say I change a bunch of other things in my life that might make a difference. I'm guessing that you still have this piece of technology that you're going to have to deal with. You can change all these other things, but you still have to manage that. And so do you teach people to. How to manage that device and how to live with this device is like this partnership you have. I mean, because that's where we're at. [00:03:41] Speaker A: Yes. So, you know, I saw a really interesting documentary. It was actually a speech that was given by a political group talking about why Trump won his first election. And they were like, he had no business winning and yet he wins. And of course, this next election, he ends up winning that on a. But his slogan was make America great again. And the guy that was giving the speech said, what were the people of America wanting to be great again? And he had this whole hypothesis that what we were really looking for were the days that we grew up, when families had card nights with all the neighbors and you had cookouts and everybody came over and that you would go and actually meet up with your friends in person. And you had church community, and you had community. And he said that's what his slogan, make America great again. He never said how he was going to make it great, but we all had this nostalgia of when life was great, and the nostalgia was about when we had community. And he said, here's the interesting thing, is that he can't bring us back to community because we're taking ourselves further away from community. I call social media fast food for connection and relationship. Fast food came on and then now obesity is over 70% obesity and overweight is over 70% in the United States. Since fast food convenient, not nutritious. And then fast food relationships came on, which is Instagram likes and Facebook connections and text messaging. And it's really convenient, but it's not healthy. For us, because fewer people are. A bunch of studies show that fewer teens are having relationships and that fewer teens are learning to drive because they don't need to. They don't have to go out and see people. When I was growing up, man, the phone was attached to the wall. [00:05:36] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:05:36] Speaker A: And if I wanted to, like, do anything instead of just go bored looking at the paint dry, you know, I'm like, I had to get out on my bike and go find people. And so I did, and it was super fun. But now it's like, my kids just want to get on their iPad. And I'm like, hey, why don't you get on your bike? They're like, it's too much work. [00:05:53] Speaker B: It's pretty crazy. But it shows you also how fast the transition can happen. It hasn't really been that long. No. It's kind of crazy. [00:06:02] Speaker A: No. Steve Jobs was standing on stage presenting the first iPhone in 2003 or 2004, and then I still had a BlackBerry in 2009. Apps didn't really start to come into play until 2011. So we're talking about maybe 14, 15 years. But in 14 or 15 years, we've replaced real connection and real human relationships with fake connection. And we know we're social creatures. Babies without real connection, they even die. That's how much we need real face to face connection and love with other people. And so take yourself, the person listening to this show, if you feel anxiety or you feel depression coming on or you feel some negative emotions, human connection, like, real human connection is one of the easiest ways to get happier faster. [00:06:59] Speaker B: Okay, before we go down a rabbit hole here, because I feel like that's what we're gonna do because this is very interesting. Let's talk about. Let's. Let's first find out a little bit about you before we get deep into this. So tell me a little bit about you. It's something we always do. Tell me about growing up. Where did you. Where are you from? Tell us about. Kind of walk us through at least the first, like, 10 years to 16 years. [00:07:21] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. I grew up in Waterford, Michigan, which is about an hour north of Detroit. Huge die hard Lions fan. Go Lions. This is our year, man. [00:07:30] Speaker B: We won't talk about that on this podcast. [00:07:37] Speaker A: And I come from my. I'll tell you to go back a little bit further about where I'm really from. My grandfather came over from Ireland on the boat, and because Ireland had a potato famine in the 1850s, 1860s, a million or more Irish people died of starvation and Then another million landed on Ellis Island. And my grandfather and his family were one of those million Irish people that immigrated to Ellis Island. And he gets here. And the conditions were really tough because there were so many immigrants coming to New York, flooding New York, and they kind of had to live in some pretty tough conditions. His mom got tuberculosis and died. His older brother got tuberculosis and died. His dad now is a widow without any of his friends. We were just talking about friends and connections. All of his friends and connections are in Ireland. He's here. He's lost the people that mean the most to him. And he became an alcoholic just because it was tough to deal. And he ended up getting kicked in the head by a horse because it's the 1900s and died. And my grandfather was 8 years old. Now he's lost his mom, he's lost his dad, he's lost his brother. He knows nobody, and he's an orphan. And think about these orphanages. They're just completely overrun. Like, you've seen the Gangs in New York. [00:09:00] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:09:00] Speaker A: He described. He died before I was born, but he described to my dad and my dad's brother, that's basically what it looked like. It was that movie, the Gangs in New York. This is how. This is how his life looked. And what happens when big experiences happen. And we're children, we can't make sense of it as a children, we're a little bit all about ourselves. We can't see the big picture. So he took on this idea that there was something wrong with him, that he didn't deserve a mom, he didn't deserve a dad. He wasn't worthy of love and support. And because he was, you know, he wasn't as good as everybody else, he just kind of believed that was the case. Well, he grows up, he meets my grandmother, who also lost her dad. She was given away. She was also an orphan. Interesting how these two energies usually will connect with people who have the same kind of energy. She also didn't think she was lovable. And what do they do if they know they're not lovable? What do they teach their kids? They taught my dad, hey, you're not lovable. You're not enough. There's something wrong with you. And then my dad grew up thinking there was something wrong with him because that's what his parents told him innocently. Like, his parents were innocent. They innocently. My great grandparents didn't mean to get kicked by a horse and die of tuberculosis. It just happened. Right. So this is just an innocent passing down of the Emotion of shame. And then when I'm born, my dad doesn't think he's worthwhile and he doesn't think he's lovable, so he just tells me I'm unlovable. So my early childhood, through his abusive nature and his words and his actions, it was pretty tough being told that I was never enough and I was never good enough. And then to make it worse, I'm already getting all this abuse from my dad. Then he just abandons us. So I'm five years old, so I'm like, I don't want his pain and punishment, but at least it's better than nothing because at least he's there. And then when he abandoned us, my thought was, I'm totally unlovable. My own dad doesn't want to be here, there must be something wrong with me. And I'm just a five year old. This is the interesting thing, is that we come up with these opinions of who we are based on circumstances that had nothing to do with us. And so I grew up with this idea that I had to prove I was enough. And I was going to prove I was enough by achieving, like, if I just achieve enough, then everybody will know I'm finally enough. And so I became an achievement monster, right? I just had to more and more and more and more and it was never enough. And finally, when I had achieved more than anything I'd ever thought I could, I looked around and I said, it's still not enough. And I'm like, it never will be. And so I turned my focus from achievement to understanding human psychology and what really makes us happy. And that's what the Good Mood revolution is all about. [00:11:49] Speaker B: So there's a lot there. First of all, thank you for sharing your story. It's so interesting when you say it was never enough, were you trying to. Was never enough for you or never enough for others? [00:12:05] Speaker A: That's a great question. Really. Truthfully, it was never enough for me. [00:12:09] Speaker B: Okay. And did your dad, once he left when you were five, was there another male role model that filled that role or did he ever come back or was he ever back in your life or. No. Is there never a male role model? Just curious, man. [00:12:24] Speaker A: There's always male role models. [00:12:26] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I mean, like family wise, like replacing the father role. [00:12:30] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, there's so many of them. But when I was a kid, so I have an older brother who's 10 years older than me. [00:12:37] Speaker B: Okay. [00:12:38] Speaker A: And he, he was kind of there looking out for me and coaching, you know, throwing baseballs to me. And throwing footballs to me and, like, encouraging me, you know, But. But again, my psyche is, I don't have a dad. [00:12:52] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:12:52] Speaker A: So as a kid, I couldn't see that. Like, I was actually being protected and guided. And there were other male role models that came into my life when I was 12, my mom remarried and, you know, and so then I had. I had another, you know, father figure at that time who was a good guy, you know, and just I could look at another man that was there, and he was providing for our family, and that was a good thing. He wasn't punishing me. That was nice. But the thing is that I could only see this once I started to heal the wounds. And I could go back and say, oh, yeah, okay, I was protected. I was looked out for. But at the time, I was thinking, basically, I'm not lovable and there's nobody here to help me. [00:13:35] Speaker B: It's really interesting. I saw something. It's timely. I saw something recently which was. Do you know what Inside the Actors Studio is? [00:13:43] Speaker A: I don't know. [00:13:44] Speaker B: All right, so there's this. I don't know if it's just on YouTube. I think it is, but I forget his name. I'll think of it. But this guy who teaches college kids how to be actors, it's like a. Actors College. Forget the name of it. Anyway, he had Gene. He always has the famous actors come back on females, males, after they've been famous, and they come back and talk about their career in front of all the kids, and they get to ask questions. It's pretty cool. He's had big list celebrities on there. Dave Chappelle, all these people. Robert De Niro. Anyway, Gene Hackman was on. And Gene Hackman, he asked Gina Hackman about, hey, I heard your dad left when he were 13, and Gina Hackman was 78 when he was on stage answering this question. And he talks about it and he tells. He only talks about it for maybe 20 seconds, 30 seconds, maybe a minute. And he can't finish it because that's how deep it was for him. Like, it scarred him. His dad. I guess his dad had, like, driven by him while he was playing in the street and waved. And then he never saw his dad again. And I just always think about that because that plays such a large role, like a parent plays such a large role. And I see that with other family members trying to, like, the rest of their life that matters, like, whether it's a male or a female role, the mother or the dad, and, like, how much that affects Them. So, I mean, that's impressive that you were able to move on and do all the things that you've done. [00:15:11] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. But think about. Think about the Gift Man. We probably wouldn't know who Gene Hackman is, and he probably wouldn't be able to make the difference he's made if that wasn't his experience, for sure. I have a belief that we choose our parents. I fully believe that we. That we're in charge of our destinies, of our souls at all times, and that there's no experience that we didn't sign up for. This belief is a really happy belief, actually, because one of the signatures of unhappiness is victimhood. And so as long as we're a victim to our story, and this wasn't fair, and why didn't I have it better? Or how come other people had it better than me? As long as that story exists, happiness is going to be hard to find. But with the belief that, hey, I chose this, and then once you say, okay, what if I did choose it? What if I did choose that dad? What if Gene Hackman chose the dad that was going to wave at him one last time at 13 and then create all these feelings of, he's not enough for his dad to stay around? What if he chose that? Why would you choose that? And then you'd say, I chose that because there was a lot of lessons for me to learn, and my soul could only become enriched by walking that path. I couldn't have learned it any other way. And what's the big. The big lesson here is that I am enough. And you can only learn that by having to figure it out for yourself, not by anyone telling it to you. [00:16:43] Speaker B: Yeah, it's interesting. Very interesting. So you go on after. So let's talk like, 16 on. So how did you get into this? What made you. What attracted you? Was it because of that? What attracted you to this field, if you will? [00:17:00] Speaker A: Yeah. So 16 on, there's a bunch of addiction. And so there's addiction to success, and then there was addiction to substances, too. And one day somebody says, hey, you should watch this movie, the Secret. And I was 25, you know, and I'm in my daily addictions, and it's not going that well. And she's. And Rhonda Byrne gets on, and she's like, hey, everything in your life is created by your thoughts and emotions. And it's a really simple idea that you're creating your entire life. I just saw Dr. Sue Mortar's talk last week. And she said, you want to know the purpose of your life? This is her opinion. It's not my opinion. She said, the purpose of your life is to recognize that you're a creator. I thought that was really interesting. Now, my opinion is that our purpose of our life is different than her opinion. But her opinion is that we're only here to recognize that we're creating. I was just reading a part of a book today about spontaneous recovery from incurable diseases. And the girl I was reading about had an incurable tumor in her neck that had. Basically, she hardly could breathe, the tumor was so big. And she had a dream. And in the dream, she opened a book and the book was blank. And every page she turned, the book was blank. And a voice came to her and said, the book is blank because you're writing it. And she woke up from the dream and recognized that she was the reason that the tumor was there from her thoughts and her beliefs. And that if she wanted to rewrite the story of her life, she needed to rewrite her thoughts and her beliefs. And she had been feeling like she'd been living her life for everybody else, and that she was never good enough because she didn't live up to the religious standards of her family, and that she was the rebel. And she just decided to write the book. And she said, I know I'm perfectly imperfect, that everything about me is perfect, that my path is perfect for me, that this is my story. And my story may not look perfect to everyone else, but it's the story I'm supposed to live. And miraculously, the tumor goes away, and all the doctors are like, we don't know what you did, but like, no one's ever recovered from this. And she said, what I did is I started to just know that I was okay. [00:19:18] Speaker B: It's really interesting. I agree with that. So essentially, it's. You're writing your own story. It's the story you're telling yourself. So if you tell yourself a negative story or thoughts, that's what you're going to get. If you tell yourself the positive story, then you're going to get that essentially correct. [00:19:35] Speaker A: That's absolutely it. Right. So that was. That's the secret, Like a law of attraction. Right. I'll just. Whatever you think about, you attract to you. But interesting. You know, you think about this disease of cancer. Cancer is your body turning on itself. Well, the second emotion in my book, guilt, is I deserve punishment for doing things wrong. So if we have this emotion that I'm wrong or I do Things wrong, and I deserve punishment. There's a belief I deserve punishment. Well, who's doling out the punishment? We are. There was another book I read on Healing by Dr. David Hawkins, and he also said a lot of disease is coming from unprocessed guilt. So we want to stop feeling guilty. That's, you know, like guilt serves a purpose. It says, hey, you did something that you're not proud of. Great. We want to learn from it. And then let the guilt go and say, okay, I'm imperfect. I'm a human being. I'm doing the best I can. I did something I'm not proud of. I'm going to do better next time, but I don't need to beat myself up for it. [00:20:45] Speaker B: I always tell my coaching clients, you can't. The things that you attain aren't going to make you happy. You have to be happy first. Right? And then those come. But you have to be happy now, today. Is that something you agree with? Is that not. I mean, that's how I've always looked at it. [00:21:05] Speaker A: Yeah. Dude, Frank, you're like, it's no wonder you're such a great coach, leader in the world. And so then this is the thing, is that who teaches you how to be happy and how do you be happy? That's why. That's why I wrote the book Good Mood Revolution, because it's not just as simple like, it's when we're stuck in one of these negative emotions. So I've talked about the first two most destructive emotions. Shame, which is a core belief, I'm not enough as I am. And then guilt, which is a core belief that I deserve punishment because I do bad things. If we're stuck in one of those beliefs or emotions, you can't tell somebody drenched in shame, just be happy. [00:21:47] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:21:48] Speaker A: First they have to go in and they have to undo the shame. They have to undo those beliefs that say I'm unlovable and not enough. And the first chapter of my book, which is called Conquering Shame, talks about how to get out of that belief system. And really, it's just a tremendous amount of affirmation. Just we've been saying to ourself over and over again, subconsciously, I'm not enough, I'm unlovable. Everything I do is never going to be good enough. And then we start to say the opposite over and over again. Eventually, we can be louder than the old belief pattern. We can write a new path. [00:22:21] Speaker B: How much of this is, you know, in our world, you and I, what we do, it's morning routines. It's habits, it's discipline. It's work. [00:22:34] Speaker A: It's. [00:22:34] Speaker B: It's work. It is so much work. [00:22:36] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:22:37] Speaker B: And so how do you prepare people? You don't get up and you just say an affirmation one day. And then not, you know, you, you could go back to think and grow rich. You could go back to all these books. Right. And all these methods. But it's like you have to believe it. You have to have the intention, you have to have the invoke the feeling. How much of that is, is entwined with what you're talking about or teaching. Because this is work. And I think people need to understand that. Like, you have to be committed. And how long does it take? I mean, if you're. You have some of these moods or these, these things going on, these thoughts. [00:23:12] Speaker A: Well, tell me about it. Let's, let's just say. Let's just say you've never gone to the gym or thought about healthy eating in your entire life. And so I'm 43 years old, let's say for 43 years. For 43 years, I had never thought about health. I just ate whatever was in front of me and I had never worked out one day because it just didn't occur to me that I needed to work out to be in good shape. And, you know, fit is a big piece of your work. How long would it take me if I'm say, 30% body fat and don't have any muscle because I just haven't done, you know, of course I get up and get myself out of bed and I go to work and go to school and that kind of thing, but I just don't just come home and sit on the couch. How long would it take to get me into peak physical condition, do you think? [00:24:00] Speaker B: My answer would probably be based off of the time commitment, like, how much time are you willing to put into it? [00:24:08] Speaker A: Let's just say, what would you put that person on? How many days a week and, and how many years do you think it would take to get them into, like, I'm performing at a super high peak level. [00:24:18] Speaker B: I mean, I would probably. That person probably on a normal schedule and eating right. It's going to be an everyday thing. Most days, probably a year. I'm just going to throw a number out. A year. [00:24:30] Speaker A: Yeah. So 365 days, you know, 12 months. We got 52 weeks of every single day. Every single day. And we're talking like 30 minutes of exercise. A tremendous amount of thought going into our diet. Nutrition. So maybe it's two hours a day that we have to actually commit to nutrition and exercise and water and changing all these habits. And it's going to take a whole year before we're firing at a good physical condition. I would say it's the exact same thing with becoming happy, that if we have never put in the effort to discover what these beliefs are that are holding us back, if we've never even considered that what we've been feeding our mind is unhealthy for us. And now we're starting from, okay, now I want to go be happy. We're talking. It's going to be a daily commitment, probably an hour or more a day. And I'm not saying you have to sit there with a journal for an hour, but, like, you got to start to analyze the thought in the afternoon that's coming to torpedo you. Just like you'd have to analyze, should I eat this cupcake or not? It's like, we got a thought this afternoon that shows up and it starts to totally destroy our day. We got to be conscious to say, no, I'm not going to eat that cupcake. I'm not going to touch that thought. There's a process I can go to as that thought starts to take me over. And I'm going to put in the work right now to avoid the thought, just like I would avoid the cupcake. And maybe in a year of conscious effort, we can start to become a really happy version of ourself. But what's so cool about this is that once we become a happier version of ourselves, just like she says in the Secret, everything changes, man. Everything. Because we have to always be right. So when we say, I'm not worthy of love or I'm not enough, we actually provoke other people to tell us we're not enough. Our subconscious actions will do something that will have them say, you suck. It'll just confirm, oh, yeah, I knew I did. But as soon as we start to clear that out, we say, I am enough and I am lovable. Our subconscious actions do something really cool to other people, and we're like, man, I think you look really great today, and you're such a good friend, and thank you for always being there for me. And they're like, you too, man. You're like, I just love hanging out with you. And all of a sudden, we get a new confirmation. So spending a little bit of time every single day improving our happiness and analyzing these thoughts and these beliefs makes all a life so worthwhile. [00:26:59] Speaker B: It's Interesting. Let me ask you a question. So I think it's. Well, we both have agreed, I think that it's very difficult and it takes time and it takes the discipline and it's gonna, you know, you have to work at it. [00:27:12] Speaker A: But what's more difficult? Isn't it more difficult to be miserable? [00:27:16] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, for sure. Well, I always. What I always say is they're both hard. Right. It's hard to be. It's anything, anything's hard to be happy, hard to be miserable. Which one do you want? Choose your heart. Right. I love that saying. [00:27:27] Speaker A: Oh, it's hard. It's harder to be miserable. When I was miserable and I was addicted and I was pushing everybody that loved me away, life was really hard in all phases, I can tell you that. Yeah. The work is just work. It wasn't. Is it hard work? Sure. There was concentration there. There was time and attention and study and it took time. It wasn't like I was roofing a house. [00:27:51] Speaker B: Sure. [00:27:52] Speaker A: Like I was picking up 50 pound bags of cement. You know, it was sitting there with a journal and a pen and analyzing thoughts and reading things and learning things. So it's kind of enjoyable because learning is enjoyable. But on the other side of it, man, like, life is just freaking blissful. I've got four kids, I've got this incredible wife. We earn income beyond what we ever expected, and the blessings just flow all the time, like blessing upon blessing upon blessing. Now, challenges never go away, sure. But I now know that these challenges aren't here to hurt me. These challenges are here to help me grow into like a better version of me. Every single time. Where before a challenge would show up and I'd be like, oh my God, another one. Why me? [00:28:35] Speaker B: So it's perspective. So let's say that, you know, what we've just talked about. I'm assuming that there isn't these. There's always been outside forces, but now I think before we were got on this podcast, we were talking about this briefly. There's never been more negative influence around us because of technology. And I would say, and you as a father, myself as well, I have an 8 year old and you know, first it's. We have to get, we have to get ourselves right. We can't help our kids if we're not right, if we're not aligned. Right. So how does, how is technology affecting us? How do you get into healthy habits with technology? And how do you help people that have kids and they have to make sure that their kids are set up for success? Based on technology and based on their thoughts. Because self talk is probably the number one thing they're going to deal with. [00:29:29] Speaker A: Yeah. So kids always watch you and it's my relationship with technology will be my kids relationship with technology. That can be hard to hear, you know. So the person listening here is like, I saw a study, we touch our phones 4,000 times a day. [00:29:49] Speaker B: So what is your routine? So what do you do? I'd like to know what you do on a daily basis to be a good advocate for your kids and a good model for them with that. What does that look like? [00:30:01] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. So the first thing is if I want to be happy, I have to have space from technology. And for me that's the morning. That's the space. I can control the morning. So when I'm going to sleep, I put my phone on airplane mode. [00:30:19] Speaker B: Okay, good. I got that. All right, good. [00:30:21] Speaker A: And when I wake up, I will find myself still. This has been years I've been putting on airplane mode. As I'm setting my alarm and going to sleep, I'll grab my phone, turn off the alarm and then go click my email and it says, you can't access this. Turn off airplane mode. I'm like, oh yeah, I'm not supposed to do that right now. But there's so much of a habit, so much of a habit loop from the dopamine I get from if there's a new email that I still will go subconsciously like half awake to check my email when I open my phone. But I've protected myself because it's on airplane mode. So I set the phone down and then I told you I'm texting Alan Dick every morning, who's, who's a fitness guy. So I go weigh myself because I have to text him. I wait to the decimal and I text him. And the text won't go through, but it's okay because it says, hey, you got a text message that didn't go through. And I leave. It didn't go through. And I set my phone down and that's when I grab my journal and I start my morning routine. And I see my kids when they get up. I make them breakfast, I drive them to school, then I go to the gym. And when I get back from the gym, and this is, I wake up at 4:30. Not everybody needs to wake up that early. But I get up at 4:30 and by the time I'm back from the gym it's nine. Then I open my email and see what's going on. But this Is. I mean, how many hours is that? Four and a half hours or. No, three and a half hours. [00:31:46] Speaker B: Yeah, roughly. Yeah. [00:31:47] Speaker A: Three and a half hours of pure being. Connection with my children, connection with friends at the gym. Right. Because I'm seeing people and talking with them. I got those earphones that go here. [00:32:00] Speaker B: Or the bone conduction. [00:32:02] Speaker A: Yeah. So that people know they can talk with me and I can talk back with them. And when the earphones are in, and that's how I used to go to the gym, people won't even say hi to you because they know you can't hear them. But human connection is a really important piece of this. So I get three and a half hours right there. That's what we need. So some people can do that at night. You know, when I get home, we got a not zone. No technology. The not zone is dinner. So no technology at the dinner table. There's no phones in our pockets. They're always put up just for dinner. But, you know, then after dinner, I put the kids to bed and I grab the phone again. It's just honest. My wife and I will play Connections, which is like the Wall Street Journal's little app, or New York Times little app. We'll play a little game on our phone together. And then I put the phone down when I go to bed, and it goes back in airplane mode. So those are my two no technology areas. When I first wake up and when. [00:32:55] Speaker B: We'Re eating dinner, we have almost the exact same schedule. I'm actually shocked. But let me ask you, the kids, how often do you let your kids play around with technology? How much does that affect their mood? [00:33:07] Speaker A: A ton. Dude, you know it. You know it. [00:33:09] Speaker B: I'm just asking. You're the expert. [00:33:11] Speaker A: You're on the iPad. And this is how they do it. They. They grab the iPad, they're like, hey, can we play iPad? And we're like, yeah. Like, okay. If. If they went. If they practice a sport today, they got their homework done and they want to watch some tv, we let them. [00:33:25] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:33:25] Speaker A: Now, if they haven't gone outside, if they didn't go play with their friends, if they haven't done anything active. And this goes for weekends, too. Weekends, we don't let technology happen until the afternoon, but every single day, we allow them to have that kind of relaxation time. And I think. And I don't. Who knows if it's right or not, but this is just the way that we do it. But if they get sucked into the couch and they got their iPad and they got the TV on. And they do them both at once. And we're like, hey, can you guys help us set the table? It's like pulling teeth, man. Yeah, but if they never got sucked into the iPad and they never got sucked into TV because they're just playing at something or they're making up a cheer or they're doing whatever they're doing that's fun. And we're like, hey, come set the table. They're in these silly, fun, happy, goofy moods. We tell them that too. We're like, you guys know technology makes you grumpy. And I'll say, you're not your happiest self when you're watching tv. And then I'll be like, do you want to come for a walk with me? So yesterday, my 8 year old, Cameron, we went for a walk. We took the dog for a walk. We had a great time. Her sisters stayed on the couch. We get back, Cam and I are like having just a blast because moving our bodies and getting out in this beautiful sunshine. We went and looked at the water. The dog was having fun. Like we enjoyed ourselves more than the kids that stayed on the couch. And I just make sure to point that out and I'll say, I'll be like, I know you could have stayed on the couch, but I had a lot of fun that we actually got outside. And she's like, I did too, dad. And so these are the ways I'm enforcing it with. Not enforcing it, but just kind of modeling it. The other thing I did is I watched the movie the Social Dilemma with my oldest who's 11, and she kept asking for an iPhone. Now we got our 9 year old and our 11 year old watches because we let them go out on their bikes, we let them go to friends houses. We want to be able to call them. We want them to call us when they're late. You know, like it's five o'clock. We told them to be home at five, we'll call them at five. We're like, where are you? They're like, oh man, we're down at the dock. We're like, okay, come home, we're doing dinner. So the watches we're okay with. But she asked for an iPhone. And so I watched the movie Social Dilemma with her and we get done with this movie. And I said, harper, I'm going to delete my social media apps. This was last April. I deleted every social media app off my phone and my happiness went up. I haven't had social media on my phone now. This doesn't mean, you know, people are always like, yeah, but I need it for business, man. I run a podcast, a YouTube channel. Two YouTube channels. A real estate company, a property management company, a title company. Right. I just published a best selling book. We use the heck out of social media. I just don't have it on my phone. So there's. Yeah, that's these excuses of why is really like, no, it's like, it's like I'm addicted. I'm addicted to the social media, so I can't delete it off my phone. That's what you're really saying. You're not saying, I need it for work. If you wanted to be happier and get off the addiction, you could delete it off your phone. And then you could still use social media to help your business without being. [00:36:39] Speaker B: You're saying like on the computer. Just log in on the computer and use it. [00:36:42] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, Just log into the computer. [00:36:43] Speaker B: Yeah. I love it. Okay. I mean, that's good to know. I think people will get a lot of value out of that because I think that's where people, you know, you. He. I think people hear, whether it's the kids or themselves, how much time, your screen time, blah, blah, blah. And there's no, like, clear. But that helps because that's your schedule and people can relate to that. So I think that's good. Okay, so what else? Like, look, you've got people that, whether they have past trauma, whether they just can't get over something, something bad happens to them. We're both in real estate. Oh, my gosh. Two people backed out. What am I going to do? The world's going to end. No one wants to buy new president, whatever their reason. How are you getting them staying in a good mood? How are you helping them? [00:37:34] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. So that's what the emotion you're describing right now is fear. So it's one of the eight. There's only eight negative moods. [00:37:45] Speaker B: I don't want to go through all eight because I want people to get your book. [00:37:47] Speaker A: But look, I'll just name them off. We talked about it. Shame and guilt. The next one is overwhelm hopelessness. And then we got grief. And then we've got fear, which we'll talk about. This is this anxiousness. It's like the whole world is anxious right now. After fear, it's desire, which we were talking about. It's never enough. Never enough. And desire is insatiable. It's good and bad, but it's insatiable. And then we move into anger and finally, pride. And those are the eight bad moods. And any other bad mood you can think of is going to file into one of these eight categories. But this idea that, oh, my God, everything's falling apart and now it's not going to be good in the future. Fear says the future will be bad. It's just a story. The future will be bad. It's so helpful. Thank God. Our brain is saying, you're in trouble. You just lost these two deals. You needed them to pay your bills, or the president changed and you're worried that you're not going to make enough money to survive. That's all it is. It's just this worry that something's not going to be okay in the future. So what I coach on fear is again, I'm going to say, grab a pen and paper. Because I can't solve things in my mind. I'm going to grab a pen and paper and I sit down. And if I feel any anxiousness, which is usually a tightness in my chest or if I start to spiral about fearful thoughts, my question is, what specifically am I afraid of? So let's just take Two deals fell apart. Two deals fell apart. And I'm just really fearful. I'm anxious. What specifically am I fearful about? Well, I'm fearful that I'm not going to make enough money. Okay, is there anything else? Is there anything else I'm afraid of? Well, I might be afraid that I'm just not that good at this, that maybe no one else is going to want to work with me. Okay, let's write that down. And then I'm going to look at these statements. I'm going to say, are these really true? That's the next question. The first question is, what specifically am I afraid of? The next is, are these really true? So the statement that I'm afraid I'm not going to make enough money. Well, yeah, you could say, yeah, you know, I am afraid I'm not going to make enough money. Okay, what's another way to look at that? What's a different possible alternative? Because I want to diffuse it. I want to show you that. I want to show my brain that not making enough money is one possible future. But another possible future is I'm going to be blessed. I'm going to have so much abundance. I'm going to find all these clients. That's another possible future. So I would just write, what's a different possible future? Well, I'll have more money. I'll make it up and then some. And then we got this other idea. Well, I'm really not that good at real estate or I'm really not that good at my job. What's another possible idea? Well, I'm really good and these just happen to be coincident circumstances. Okay. I just want to diffuse it. And then the last piece here is what action could I take that would improve my situation? And in this case, it would be, well, I just lost two deals. I need to replace those. I'm going to prospect twice as much tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day and the next day. And as soon as we. All our brain is giving us this fearful thoughts of the future. All it's trying to do is get us to act. Sure, as soon as we take action, the fear goes away. But if we don't get the fear out of our head, this is the weird thing. It's fight, flight, or freeze. We run away from prospecting and we might try to fight with our clients or with the world or with our spouse. Like, this isn't fair. And I can't believe. So we create all these fights or we freeze and we do no action. [00:41:31] Speaker B: Yep. Which is the worst? [00:41:33] Speaker A: All of those things, fight, flight, or freeze, are counterproductive to what we really want. So that's why we have to get the fear out. Write it down. What am I afraid of? Is that the only possible future or is there a different one? And then what action am I supposed to take right now? And we start taking action, all the fear goes away. Action solves it all. [00:41:53] Speaker B: Could you write down. I mean, I'm. Without really going through them all, but I guess you could take that method with any of those, right? Write it down. Ask yourself that question about each fear or whatever the mood is or, you know, and. Okay. [00:42:08] Speaker A: Yeah, this is part of my journal process. I have a five step journal process I teach. And the first step is in the morning, you ask yourself, are there any negative thoughts going on? Because a lot of times people get into this fake positivity. And the journal process is write down three things you're grateful for, three things you did well, or what your goals are. And you could write your goal that I'm going to make 200 grand this year. And you got your brain saying, no, you're not, dude. All your deals are falling apart. [00:42:37] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:42:37] Speaker A: You're like, you're a liar. [00:42:38] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:42:39] Speaker A: So before I go and I do all the positive stuff, I first have to get the negative stuff out. So no one's teaching this on journal. But I'll tell you What? It's a game changer on journal. Is that the first thing you do when you grab your journal in the morning before you do all the positive gratitude and all that stuff is you say what negative thoughts are there, and then you just do that same process I just described out here. [00:43:00] Speaker B: That's an interesting exercise. I've never heard anyone talk about that. I did. There's a book that I read that I really like, and he talks about taking your negative thoughts, and he gives an example in the book of throwing them off the side of the ship. And that's kind of what I feel like. That's a great exercise right there. But that's not writing it out. And I feel like writing it out is a better exercise. [00:43:23] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Writing out the negative thought gets it. I picture it. I like that visualization. Throwing it off the side of the ship. I picture taking the negativity out of me and putting it on the paper. [00:43:35] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:43:36] Speaker A: So it's like I'm getting. Same idea. I'm getting the negativity out so it won't keep bouncing around in there. But then I'm reframing it with what's a different way to look at this? And then I'm asking, what action can I take from it? And as soon as we start to do these steps, dude, there's no more negativity. It all goes away. We become so happy. If all you're doing, if you're listening to the show, is tomorrow deciding to get your negative thoughts out and then figuring out what action you could take to make your life better, you will have the happiest life moving forward. Just do that every day. [00:44:07] Speaker B: Love it. All right, I got two more questions. One is, so we didn't really get into it. I talked about it, but you've given some practical advice on how to deal with some of this. What about the other things that you can do in your life? How much does that affect, let's say, what you eat, how much you sleep, you know, sunlight, whatever you want to call it, how much are those habits going to impact your good mood? I feel like it has a lot to do with it, but I. I'm just curious. [00:44:36] Speaker A: You so much, of course, you know. [00:44:39] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:44:39] Speaker A: You know, from your life experience. So here's. Here's a really interesting idea. Sometimes you're in a bad mood because you're tired. [00:44:49] Speaker B: Sure. [00:44:51] Speaker A: And you're overworked and you haven't rested. Another way of looking at this is maybe you're tired because you haven't, like, watered your garden and tended to your garden in a beautiful way. Like, if we keep throwing garbage on top of our garden, it's not going to grow right. You know, we need the right fertilizer and the right soil and sunlight and water. Our body's our garden. So if we take care of it, always, always, always. High energy equals high mood. Low energy is going to equal low mood. So if I find myself spiraling in a negative mood, it's usually late at night when I've had a big day. [00:45:30] Speaker B: Makes sense. [00:45:31] Speaker A: And I'll say to my wife, we shouldn't talk. Like, just last night. My wife is wonderful, dude. She's awesome. She's usually in a really, really positive mood. It's just who she is. But last night, she lost her light. And I was like, I wanted to run the San Francisco marathon. And I was like, hey, I've been thinking about doing this marathon. And she's like. She's like, we can't go to San Francisco. Like, we got this. I'm like, oh, I'm sorry, Katie. Let's talk about this tomorrow over a cup of coffee. And she was like, okay, cool. And we talked. And then because I knew you're a. [00:46:08] Speaker B: Smart guy, I'd have probably been like, yeah, I knew. [00:46:11] Speaker A: She was just. She was just exhausted. [00:46:14] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:46:15] Speaker A: And that she couldn't see possibilities or like, it wasn't going to be a productive conversation. She was just in a negative headspace. Not because she's a negative person or anything wrong. She was just tired. [00:46:24] Speaker B: Nobody's perfect. [00:46:25] Speaker A: Yeah, right. Like, when I'm tired, I would, you know, I'll say, hey, we should probably talk about this in the morning. And I'll be. I'll be a really positive person about it. [00:46:34] Speaker B: That's funny. And my second question is, I'm big on. I. I struggle, if I'm being honest. I struggle with. We call it. I call it energy sucking vampires. Someone that I work with says this all the time. And I love the saying, but it's like, what's your advice for people to protect their real estate of their brain from other negative individuals? I'm big on just avoiding. Like, if I know someone's negative, I just do what I have to do to eliminate them from an option of, like, running into them or whatever. But what's your advice on that? [00:47:11] Speaker A: Yeah, that's great. That's a great idea. They're out there, right? They're out there and there's too much science that proves we are who we spend time with. [00:47:26] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:47:27] Speaker A: And if we're In a space with somebody who's really negative, it does affect us. Just like if we're in a space with Frank Curta, it lifts us up. Like your energy and your vibe is so powerful that people in your orbit feel good around you. There are people that I run into that I feel good around and I just want to spend more and more time with them. Like we can see it with our kids. I'm like, hey, that friend, that one. You end up not feeling really good when you hang around them. Can you see that? And like, oh, this friend. This morning my wife gets a text. Our kids had a teacher workday and one of our favorite friends, moms texts and said, hey, could Catty come hang out today? Harper had a cheerleading clinic and something else. She was supposed to get her haircut. My wife canceled the haircut, canceled the cheerleading clinic and said, yep, Harper would love to hang out because we want to foster this relationship with this really bright light of a human being and my daughter, because that's a person that's going to lift her up. We're the same way as our kids. So yeah, that energy sucking vampire. It's not going to do you good to just be in their orbit. One of the things I love to tell people is if you let your light go out, you're out of service. So people that take your light from you take your ability to lift up the world. And that's not helping the world. That's not helping them and it's not helping the world. [00:48:57] Speaker B: Great way to put it. Great way to put it. Awesome. Any parting thoughts? Anything you want the audience to know or anyone to know that obviously you've got a book that should be on everybody's list to read. Is there anything else that you think someone that we didn't talk about that is important for people to understand? [00:49:24] Speaker A: Yeah, I think that the most important thing to understand is that you're doing it right. There's nothing wrong. Your path has been perfect. I feel like your life path and everyone in it and every experience you've ever had is your perfect curriculum. It's exactly what you need for what you need to learn right now. And that everyone you know is also doing it right. So the idea of judging yourself as wrong or bad is not helpful. It's going to be really hurtful. And the idea of judging anyone else on their perfect path for them and their curriculum is not helpful for them or for you. It's really hurtful. However, we see other people's how we see ourselves. So if we see other people and say, oh, they're effing up or they're messing up or they're doing it wrong. It's really a reflection that we don't think we're enough or we're doing it good enough. So this is the best view to adopt, is that I'm doing it right. I'm doing my best. I'm learning and growing the way I'm supposed to, and everyone else is, too, and there's nothing wrong. [00:50:24] Speaker B: Love that. Great place to finish, Matt. Thank you, sir. I appreciate it. [00:50:30] Speaker A: Frank, man, thank you so much for having me on. I'm looking forward to hanging out more. [00:50:34] Speaker B: Sounds good, man. I feel the same way. All right, everybody. We'll catch everybody on the next episode. Thanks again, Matt.