Behind the Bluff
Uncover best practices to participate in life on your terms. Every week, hosts Jeff Ford and Kendra Till guide listeners with short conversations on trending wellness topics and share interviews with passionate wellness professionals, our private club leaders, and additional subject matter experts offering valuable tips. Each episode conclusion includes Healthy Momentum, five minutes of inspiration to help you reflect and live differently. Subscribe now and discover the keys to living your greatest active lifestyle.
Behind the Bluff
Develop These 5 Character Traits Now, And Experience Lifelong Success | Craig Hysell
This episode explores the transformative journey of Craig Hysell, from navigating bankruptcy to achieving personal and professional fulfillment as a firefighter and coach. We discuss how embracing discomfort, cultivating self-awareness, and fostering community can lead to lasting wellness and meaningful connections.
• Craig's evolution from adversity to success
• The significance of community in wellness
• Managing emotions: the anger-focus connection
• The essential role of self-awareness in personal growth
• Aligning values with actions for impact
• Strategies for stepping outside of comfort zones
• Embracing imperfection and continuous improvement
Are you ready to live an active lifestyle? Welcome to Behind the Bluff, where we believe every moment of your life is an opportunity to pursue wellness on your terms. I'm your host, jeff Ford, and today I am joined with Craig Heisel, founder of Craig Heisel Coaching. Craig went bankrupt in 2008, started a fantastic gym called Conviction Training Facility in the spring of 2010, and he fulfilled his dream of joining the fire service in 2017. In 2018, craig sold Conviction Training Facility to one of the outstanding coaches and he started coaching fitness and wellness solely online. Craig is also a mentor to me. Hands down, he's added so much to my life and, not to mention, he is also the author of Chop Wood Carry Water 10 Character Traits that Lead to Lifelong Success. Today, we're going to talk about how to live with less fear, more strength, less anger, more focus and less pain. More satisfaction, craig, welcome to the show.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Jeffrey. It's a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 1:That's a great intro man. Well, you have done a lot in your career and I know you've personally helped me develop as a human being, and I'm excited that our topic is about how to live your best life, how to be a human and get the most out of life. A never-ending process yes, yes, it is never-ending. And before we dive in, craig, I'd love for you to add more detail to your background.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that was a great intro. I'm also a dad, I'm married, I have. Our daughter is 15 and a half and our son was a COVID surprise. So our son, dax, is a four, so he was born in 2020, november 2020.
Speaker 2:So we had a little blessing during all that and, um, you know, I got my start, uh, fitness wise, just um, I'm going to be 50 in a couple um weeks. To give people perspective how old I am, uh, I started just, I didn't like being skinny when I was young, so I started lifting weights in the garage with the old fashioned weeder set when I was like 10 or 11 and just never stopped. And always, that was always an anchor point was the fitness part. So, and yeah, went bankrupt, just made some bad real estate investments right before the crash with, uh, some drinking buddies, so I recommend never doing that. Uh, and I was fronting all the money for that. Um, uh, so it had a rebound.
Speaker 2:Um, went back to my anchor point fitness stumbled into, uh, crossfit conviction training facility was CrossFit based, as you well know Now your listeners do as well and we kind of just built a business with some amazing people. We always had a great staff, man, we just had so many wonderful people. The people that came to that were just hungry to learn. Crossfit was new. When we started, there were 2,000 affiliates. When I sold it, there were over 14,000. So we were just crazy.
Speaker 1:right there, in the beginning, you were. You were the infancy functional movement, performed at high intensity, yeah.
Speaker 2:We were just in some weird spaces, you know, literally like we were on the Hilton head and we were behind. It was a grocery store at the time, then became Graco and stuff like it was just always like kind of strange space. Nobody knew what to do with us.
Speaker 1:We made a lot of noise, you know. What I remember most is you always evolved the program. It grew quickly and the people that came to the gym and kind of began to understood the philosophy behind it really bought in. I think that's why you're going to add a lot to our conversation today of just how to look at life differently.
Speaker 2:People came in with an open mind because it was new and then, because they got results because it was new, then they'd listen more and then when they stopped having pain, started gaining more strength and more fitness, then you started to see that whole wellness component come and lives improved. And I got to marry some of the staff. Uh you know, you're that's correct.
Speaker 1:Craig did officiate uh, lindsay and I's wedding Yep, and those folks have there was a few of those, thankfully.
Speaker 2:I'm very grateful for that, and they have children now and I always looked at that like people. Um, you know, a lot of people met there and have kids now and a lot of people were going through some hard things in their life and that didn't replace it, but it helped them deal with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was a place we could go to in that sense of community. That's what we see so much here at Palmetto Bluff is trying to cultivate that sense of community, and I mean you're a shining example of someone who did that in the works of a local gym, bringing people together yeah, you can't underestimate the power of a community doing good things and then doing good things with each other.
Speaker 1:I mean, sometimes you get to, that's all life should be you know, and how you find that that's a journey, but yeah, yeah, tell us a little bit more about your experience in the fire department. You've been there quite a few years now yep, yep.
Speaker 2:So, coming on on on eight years, I I always wanted to join the fire department and then, during the recession, a lot, of, a lot of people went toward the fire service or um, first responder service in general, just trying to um, maybe, uh, it was either something they wanted to do or something they felt they had to do to help the family. So when I looked at that time, the, I think there was like 300 applicants or something and I I didn't get selected.
Speaker 1:On your first go. You didn't get selected.
Speaker 2:No I didn't get selected. So my third try. But so we started the gym and then I said, you know, when the gym finally got to where it was after, where I wanted to be, after like six or seven years, I said, okay, I'm going to go try. And I was going to try until I was 45 and I got hired on when I was 42. No, way.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, so, and it was fun being the old new guy and just having a lot of wisdom behind the learning curve helped me stay patient with it. And then, of course, I always tell people most of the time we see people on a bad day, sometimes we see people on the worst day and sometimes we're there for their last day, and how you process all that is pretty crazy.
Speaker 1:That's got to be challenging the scenes that you all go to, the work that you do every day. How do you go about processing that?
Speaker 2:Well, some, some things I'm still processing, processing some things. I'll probably never stop processing, but I think what, what? What the gym taught me and what workouts teach me is how to compartmentalize discomfort or struggle so you can deal with it at the appropriate time. So, and you know, sometimes I try not to bring it home. I don't talk about work at home, but when I do have a really bad shift or I don't have much sleep, I can see how impatient I am.
Speaker 1:How it impacts you personally.
Speaker 2:So now I just get ahead of that, I'll tell my wife, or I even tell the kids like, hey, I didn't get much sleep, or hey, it was kind of a rough shift. So please forgive me, and they do, as long as I get ahead of it, you know, and I'm not. But if, if I don't get ahead of it, they're like, well, what's wrong with you today?
Speaker 1:You know it sounds like openly communicating it and also being personally self-aware of how your job impacts you and how life impacts us. Right Right Is so huge in relationships yeah, Everywhere, all the time.
Speaker 2:So it's not just me as a fire. Anybody can practice that, and I think again, when you get ahead of it, people are more forgiving, more lenient and give you the benefit of the doubt. But if they don't know where you're coming from, you know there's, I'll get pushed back from and I deserve it, you know. I'll get pushed back from my family. And they're right, you know yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, it's good, good perspective for all of us, especially as we dive into this conversation today. Craig, tell us a little bit more about your coaching practice and your philosophies. I think when I think of you or I talk to other people even folks old guy you bring a lot to the table from a life perspective. So let's kind of anchor that in with what's your coaching practice all about? Who do you serve and what philosophies guide the people you serve?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So most of the people that I work with they're in a functional environment. So I work with a lot of firefighters and then I work with small business owners who are also fathers. So there's a lot of dynamic that goes to that and I think some people will. Sometimes they'll look at fitness in too big of a chunk. So the older I get, the more that I'm trying to compartmentalize. Again there's that word what's the main objective of why you're here? And then how can we get you here consistently? So that's a different. That doesn't mean every day for a lot of these people and certainly when I'm training my clients on a shift schedule, I get to see them twice a week. That's consistent for them. So I would say most of my philosophy comes around staying mobile All right, so you're able to get yourself generally in a lot of these positions and a lot of these. If you sit in a chair a lot you become wooden, like a chair is the devil right, yeah.
Speaker 2:Immobility Sentenced, right, but I'm not arguing that you should never sit in a chair. So it's, the more I get in this stuff, the more the one-on-one conversations have to take place, because there's no real blueprint other than you should be mobile, you should be strong, you should have I start going to that whole body fat percentage thing as how to gauge where you're at and you don't have to. You have a lot of tools here for your, for your members. Um, that's amazing, I don't I. I have pictures, I send them like this is what I have. This is what 20 body fat looks like, this is what 12.
Speaker 2:All this stuff you don't have have to be a Greek God statue or anything like that, but there are parameters for men and women that we should try to and that scale doesn't tell the truth so that I really people get weird with that thing. So I don't even use it anymore, like I don't like it.
Speaker 1:And it depends on how the client perceives that scale as well, everyone's a unique individual and the power you place on it is important yeah. Because I know you're a big let's. Let's feel the difference kind of guy yes. And I'm sure that's how you guide a lot of your folks these days. It's like how are you feeling after we've been working together for a consistent period of time?
Speaker 2:So if the scale doesn't change, but they're in a smaller pant size, right, but they didn't quote unquote lose weight. Well, you are winning because your body composition is changing the scales. So that scale is just uh, it's a tricky one. I almost like anymore. I call it a lie.
Speaker 2:Like and that's probably too extreme, but I still want people. I have to swing the pendulum so far because I don't want people paying attention to it all. I'm almost calling it a lie right now because it's just for most people it just doesn't make that big of a difference that we're trying to put on it. So I don't know if I answered your question, but if we can stay strong, we can stay mobile, mobile, um, if we can, a lot of these guys like look man, if you can go up downstairs without losing your breath, you know, if then you can start to get into hey, I want to go on a race, hey, I want because you're starting to great create small wins, yeah, so getting back to what a wind feels like and then expanding those winds for people, that's a really nuanced thing. So that's why I start doing a lot more personal stuff. You can, we can talk about it here and maybe people, we can generalize it, but a lot of times it doesn't make sense for somebody.
Speaker 2:They want to argue a semantic, or they have a very specific question about what, how to apply that to themselves yeah so and that those are really interesting places for me to start because I've done the group thing, group training, for so long and the articles and the podcasts and all that stuff like I really really liked the nuance.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you, you were someone who introduced podcasts to me early on. You're an avid reader, you're a writer, and I think what you said about individualizing these concepts to the person and once you're able to see what is of interest to them and how they're perceiving things, then you're able to guide them in the direction that they want to go Right, and that's the magic. Yeah, yeah, cause we can't fall into this place of thinking there is one way to do life, to do fitness, because that's that's just problematic and I feel like that's kind of where we get taken in this world today. Yeah, and then there.
Speaker 2:So to kind of feed on that too, that there are always. If you don't do that, they're always comparing themselves to either their past best self or someone else around them. I'm like that's not your life. You're you now. We need to start from there and then we need to get you to where you want to go. Yeah, right and so, but you didn't get to where you are overnight, right? So, like being generous with the timelines, them being kind to themselves and talking kindly with themselves. A lot of people are so mean to themselves they would never talk to anybody they love, like they talk to themselves. I'm like we got to get through that. So there's a lot of all of a sudden, we get a lot of the philosophy, the psychology, and then once that starts to take root, then they start to take off and that's a lot of fun to watch somebody do, and if you can help them facilitate that within themselves, that's a real honor. So, yeah, that jazzes me up, that still gets me excited.
Speaker 1:I can hear it, craig. What great perspective. Because that sends us right into applying this to life and kind of figuring out some of these concepts that could be valuable to listeners in not just looking at their fitness programs and how they go about them, but more so how they go about their life. Because, as someone who has changed worlds multiple times, like you have, and done things at the same time, I think you bring a lot of value to how people can look at things differently. So let's start very high level. Same time, I think you bring a lot of value to how people can look at things differently, no-transcript in themselves or adopt to create a meaningful life.
Speaker 2:So this is a great question. I think of it as a principle. You have to do the things that are making you better so you can be better for everyone else. So if you look at your value structure and your value structure isn't your words, it isn't some cool little phrase, it's what you're doing, that's what you value. So if you look at your value structure, isn't your words, it isn't some cool little phrase, it's what you're doing, that's what you value.
Speaker 2:So if you look at your value structure and then is that serving you and is that serving other people? And if it isn't, or it isn't doing it the way that you want it to, well, then you have to dig in and start to rearrange these things or eliminate something or add something, and then you have to practice this at a micro level so that you can have it when there's a macro experience. So what I mean by that is, let's say, a value word like integrity. If you're walking your dog and your dog poops and nobody's around and you don't pick it up, is that integrity? And if you can't do it there, when something major happens, because your values are nice things to say and do, but you can only test them under stress.
Speaker 2:You need trial, you need tribulation, you need discomfort, you need challenge. You maybe even need catastrophe to figure out who you really are when all of this stuff goes to hell in a handbasket, and then you can grow the confidence, you can grow the self-esteem and the self-awareness to really be an amazing person for yourself and for other people. It's amazing the kind of people who will start to come around you when you're working hard to share it with everyone else. Wow, to share it with everyone else. So if you start doing that in your life, wherever you start, and you apply that, then I feel like your values are going to grow from there.
Speaker 1:So it's less about the actual values and if you are executing on them in those smallest of moments, so that when those big moments come, when those catastrophes come, you're being true to how you want to live. And integrity is a great example, because that one will test you day in and day out. If integrity is a value of yours, you will be tested every single day. Yes, because the situations that people don't see are when you should be upholding your values the most.
Speaker 2:What you do when nobody is looking is who you are at your core, right. And so if you're always doing the external things and putting on the quote unquote show, you're going to be empty because there's no foundation there when you start to get roughed up right, so you're going to fold. So reversing it and being figuring out who you are at your core and who you want to be at your core and working on that automatically will extend outward. So you don't even have to worry about the extrinsic stuff. All you have to do is the intrinsic work. So I think we get lost there a lot. I don't know why we get lost there a lot, because it's pretty straightforward.
Speaker 1:Humans are complicated people. You and I both are, so we get it, but life at its core is relatively simple.
Speaker 2:So it's kind of interesting. Yeah, yeah for sure. And one more thing, sorry you don't have to be perfect at this. I'm not perfect. I don't want to sound like I'm. I fail at this every single day, like a lot of people do. I have never met one perfect person. Maybe they're out there, I don't know. But just keep in mind that you're always trying to be a little bit better, always working towards something You're going to fail a test. You're going to get roughed up. You're going to do something.
Speaker 1:You're going to do something wrong. You're going to make a mistake and it's okay, yeah. Yeah something wrong. You're going to make a mistake and it's okay. Yeah, yeah, that's a. That's a great pause there, because our values are our foundation and the foundation isn't always solid. Storms come, things happen, and you're going to be tested every day. Don't expect to be perfect every single situation.
Speaker 2:Just try not to make the same mistake twice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, cause when we learn from our mistakes, that's what's allows us to serve more people and to do better the next time.
Speaker 2:That's all learning is Make a mistake and don't do it again.
Speaker 1:It's cool stuff, so let's get even more detailed here. I was doing a little further research on you and gosh. You have so many articles out there, craig. I had no idea where your writing spans, and we'll dig into your book a bit later. You had this phrase that came up in one of the articles and I thought it was interesting to discuss today.
Speaker 2:You wrote.
Speaker 1:There's no escaping work, unless you want the illusion of contentment.
Speaker 2:What do you mean by that? Yeah, so for me now maybe you can argue this a little bit and there are times you this a little bit. And there are times I have times when I am content. I do. I have times when I am with my family and I'm like this is peace and this is contentment and this is perfect. This moment Overall, if I, this is for me, this doesn't have to be for everybody. This doesn't have to be for everybody.
Speaker 2:If I am not working toward being a better person for my kids, for my spouse, for my teammates at work at the fire department, for my community that I've sworn to protect, like I am not being professional. People deserve more of me and I feel that Right. So I know when I'm sliding. So I know when I'm sliding, I know when I'm being lazy, I know when I'm not upholding those values. Right, if I'm working, and even though I'm missing, I know I'm doing the right thing. So what I mean by missing? If I do the work, or if I'm, let's say, I'm on a training op at the fire department and I don't do well, right, I can beat myself up for it, and sometimes I do, but then I go and make sure I don't make that mistake again.
Speaker 2:So, that under pressure at the time, the time that's really most needed. I won't do that again. So I did the right thing. I didn't do good at the training evolution, but then I went back and the work created more success. If you always are working to create more success, what will you find? You will find more success, and success gives you the confidence to start to relax, to start to look around, to start to be at peace.
Speaker 2:But it's never ending cycle. So you will have moments of contentment, but the more you sit there and if you're not working, your contentment will be a lie because you're not earning anything. So if you think being content is traveling and then you travel for a while and you don't produce anything, you don't share anything. If you just travel by yourself and never talk to anybody, right, are you going to be content? You didn't share anything. Part of being content is sharing things, impacting other people. So if you're working, you're impacting other people. So it's a cycle. So I think for me, you always need to be applying some sort of effort to get some sort of appreciation for the time when things are at peace.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's an excellent vantage point to contentment, because I feel like for so many of us we're always thinking about, there's going to be that day where I feel like everything is going in the exact direction I wanted to go. This feeling of absolute contentment and I've never heard anyone describe it, excuse me. In the same, in the context that you have is you're going to have these moments of contentment. But part of why you experience those moments is because you've made an impact. You've made a difference. You're continuing to work at living, and whether it's building relationships or the work that we do on a daily basis, that's what's actually bringing you the contentment that you seek.
Speaker 2:Yes, and if you don't move, if you don't share, if you don't move, if you don't move you, if you don't share, if you don't move, if you don't work, I don't know how you can create contentment. Cause you just, I mean to me, and maybe I'm overly harsh, but you're useless. You know, you're just a slug Like how? How can you be content you don't even know whatever it is? How do you know what contentment is? You know, you have to know both.
Speaker 1:You have to know effort to know peace. Ooh, that's good. Well, thank you for that sidebar. That had stopped me in my tracks when I was just preparing for today. Now let's go even deeper. I mean, I don't know if we can go deeper, but anger, it's a common emotion for all of us. I have periods of anger where I'm like why am I getting so angry? Like what is going on? And you describe it as having a relationship to someone's focus. So we have anger and then we have our focus. Can you go into depth of how those two are interrelated?
Speaker 2:Sure, so for me, anger is just merely an undesired outcome. Right so it didn't work out. Desired outcome right so it didn't work out. My reaction is, in this case, anger. Okay, why, well? Is my desire strong? Was the outcome unrealistic? Was the outcome codependent on other things? Where's my perspective at? Where's my timeline? At right, so, for instance, if I'm driving over here for this podcast podcast, and I left plenty early. So when I came up on the traffic for they're cutting trees down, I didn't get mad because I managed my timeline correctly.
Speaker 2:So, for me, if you're focusing on the things that you can control and letting go of the things you can't, I don't know what's going to be on the road. Yeah, I know I should probably leave 15 minutes earlier than I normally do to make sure that I'm here on time. So I did, okay. So when something bad happens or something gets in the way, I'm not mad. So, a lot of times, with high performers, or let's just say, people working out, either the desire for the outcome isn't realistic or the timeline is too tight. So, a lot of times, I want to lose 30 pounds in Six days. Yeah, you're like, what are you talking about? So you look at people like you're like, oh my gosh, why are?
Speaker 2:Most of the time when I'm angry it's coming from me, it's not the situation like, and then other times you should be angry about, I'm angry about human trafficking. It disgusts me, yeah. So my reaction to people who buy or sell adults is you should cut off their hands and their feet. My reaction to people who buy or sell children is you should be fed alive to a wild animal. That's my reaction. Right? That's not right. So my response is my response is a portion of the proceeds of my book go to Operation Underground Railroad. And my other response is there's the law. Let the law and the courts and the legal system and the prison system figure out what to do. Otherwise, I'm probably not much more. I'm probably not much better than they are right so you have to govern that right Now.
Speaker 2:If you told me a human trafficker was fed alive to a wild animal, I probably wouldn't feel bad either. You know what I mean. But again, there are things in life that you should be angry about, but you should always govern your response, and your reaction doesn't have to be a response.
Speaker 1:The reactions, and responses are what's most important. When you experience anger, you need to take the pause. So when.
Speaker 2:I'm so again, like when I come home from home, from work, right, and I didn't get any sleep. I'm like my son's four, right, he doesn't do anything on purpose, but he's four, he's all boy, he's a wild little animal I love what he's gonna do. He's gonna do what he's gonna do, and if it's and sometimes it's not the outcome I wanted, it's definitely not on the timeline. I want it because, geez, all I want to do is take a 20 minute nap, right but if I'm mad at him, and I can feel it, because he'll get mad at me back.
Speaker 2:So anger just begets more anger. But if I hey, buddy daddy's a little tired, give him a hug. Do you mind? If we sit for and watch this show for 20 minutes and then we'll go play on the playground? If I communicate this right, if I own where I'm coming from, I don't make him angry. I get snuggle time with my boy. He watches the show. Maybe I can get 10 to 15 minutes of shut eye and we're good to go. But if you're not owning your anger and it's everybody's you're always the finger pointing person, you're the victim. So if your focus is always the finger out, you better just turn it around. Turn the finger around and all of a sudden you're like oh geez, you know, 90% of this is my fault.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that hits you in your soul, your gut, when you have that realization.
Speaker 2:It's huge it's. You know we people use that game changer a lot. But if you're an angry person and you want, angry people are hurt, people right Agreed. And when you turn that around and you start owning, taking accountability for where you're hurt and trying to manage it or repair it again, you started controlling what you can control. You're not perfect, but you're starting to create these little micro-wins.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's a beautiful thing and it's fun. I wish I I lived off anger for a long time, so I have a good relationship with a bad you're very self-aware with that particular emotion. Yeah, with a bad emotion. So, um, or it doesn't have to be bad, but it's, it's poor, uh, if you don't govern it properly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Governing it. That's an excellent word and your uh examples reminded me of just just this past weekend. I did a race down in tybee island and the course was completely messed up. It was a 10k event. All 300 plus runners got lost. Some people ran seven miles, some ran 5.4 and a 10k is 6.2 miles and it's interesting.
Speaker 1:What we've been talking about today is weaving together here because some people had the integrity to do 6.2 miles, because we have watches, we know how far we're running. Other people decide to finish and try to create the win, even, and they get explicitly angry at the race organizers who are running the race to benefit the YMCA in Tybee, and it's like this is where we are sometimes with our emotions. So you sharing just ways of practicing restraint and looking back at the self, I think it'd be powerful for all of us Because, like you said, we're not all going to be perfect. That anger is probably going to be let out sometimes, but the more we learn from it, the more we focus on living the life we want to live Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Benefit of the doubt is so helpful.
Speaker 1:Benefit of the doubt is huge. Yes, and that is very important from your perspective that you just shared about. When someone is angry, they are hurt, so let's give them benefit of the doubt. We don't know what they're going through and we've got to do that more with everybody we come in contact, yeah, yeah. So, gosh, we're going to shift gears here. I want to get to your book today and it's most likely goes more in depth into some of the conversations I'm sure we're sharing here. Your book talks about 10 character traits and these character traits fringe towards leadership. From the 10 traits, which three do you think are most important? You probably think they're all important, but from a lifelong success perspective, if we've got someone listening to this episode today and they want to adopt three traits, what would those three be?
Speaker 2:All right, so just a little context about the book. So I never attended it to be a book. I wrote it for my kids and the more people I told at the fire department because they always ask me what I'm doing you know cause I'd be up early in the morning. If we got up for a call, I'd just start writing.
Speaker 1:You're always working cause you're trying to find those moments of contentment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so so I wrote it for my kids and cause I thought you know, hey, if I get killed out here, you know I want them to have something they can fall back on that whatever they choose in life, they can still just be a good person, no matter what it is they're doing. So I chose character traits and I didn't write these. I didn't write the character traits in any order. The first one is self-awareness. In any order, the first one is self-awareness, and I don't think that you can evolve if you don't have self-awareness right. So I think that's why that one came out first, because you need that above all the others. Otherwise you can't evolve. You can't pick which ones Without self-awareness, you're kind of just, your character won't change. Which ones without self-awareness, you kind of just your character won't change Right, you're kind of just drifting. So they all are important.
Speaker 2:The ones that are important to me again, I'm turning 50 in a few weeks right now, and these are ones more toward the back of the book are patience and forgiveness. I have learned to be a lot more patient in how I apply my desired outcomes, because the big ones take more time and I have really started to learn how to. So I went, started going back to church about three years ago and I've really started to learn how to forgive other people, most importantly how to forgive myself, so I can forgive other people. And that frees up a lot of room to be more bold, more loving, more courageous, more giving. But if I had to whisper a fourth one, it's kind of a tie, so it's like four and five yeah, I have a time.
Speaker 1:I knew this would be a tough question for you kind of a tie between grit and discipline you can never give up.
Speaker 2:And if you want the big hard things, you have to have the discipline to go after those things with consistency. So if you're always waiting to feel like going to the gym, you're not going to go to the gym consistently. So just that little micro right there if you're always waiting to feel like having the important conversation, you're not going to have it right.
Speaker 2:Just thinking about it, right? So, grit, you can't ever give up. You can adapt to what's going on, you can change your mind, but you can never give up on trying to be a better human being or get what you want as your wants. Evolve you can. The people that quit lose. Everybody else is a winner. So you only lose if you quit. Um, no matter if you reached it or not, you became better. So you got to keep, you got to manage your framework. Yeah, great perspective, um, but yeah, I you know, right now, without self awareness, you're, you're not in the game.
Speaker 2:You're not in the game at all Patience and forgiveness go a long way in applying all this stuff to yourself and then grit and discipline or geez, like the foothold and the handhold on on making this stuff work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're the foothold and handhold to progress. Yeah, that's it Without them you're sinking, you're not going anywhere. Well, thanks for sharing at least five out of the 10 character traits. We'll leave listeners hanging. Where they can go purchase the book. It is available on Amazon.
Speaker 2:It is, it is.
Speaker 1:And, yeah, I just think you have a writing style, for maybe folks out there are familiar. That's similar to stoicism with Ryan Holiday. He's written some great books Ego is the enemy and, yeah, it's life shifting stuff that you write about and I'm glad we had the chance to dive into it today. Now, on Behind the Bluff, we like to get practical towards the end of our time, and what I would love to hear from you at this point is strategies and tactics to help listeners with not only living true to their values, but strategies and tactics for applying these different concepts that we've shared today.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So a great strategy would be you try uncomfortable things that you always like. If you want to control, if you want a better perspective, if you want more gratitude, if you want more forgiveness, if you want more wisdom, if you want more strength, you have to always expand your comfort zone and you don't have to take a broad leap outside of your comfort zone. You can stick one foot outside that line that makes you uncomfortable and explore that arena wherever that is. So a great way to think about discomfort is to address fear. What are you afraid of? And if you do the things you're afraid of, you control fear. And when you control fear, you're free, right. So every time that I go on a fire, when I'm going there, I'm afraid. There's fear, absolutely. And then I put my helmet on, I mask up and I click into my air and it's time to work, right. So and I learned that well, I should be aware of everything going on. It's not necessary that I should be afraid right now. So you start to learn how to navigate that. So, again, so doing uncomfortable things is a great strategy.
Speaker 2:Tactics hey, man, again, what are you afraid of? How come you're not going to the gym three times a week. Uh, what's your diet, where's your nutrition? At right, so it's really hard. It's really hard to have awesome things when you're not taking care of yourself. Right, so you can have them, but they're empty because they're just things you matter, matter. So how do we make you healthy, how do we make you well? Right, and most people don't even know what that baseline feels like. Most people are always, always, always, supplementing with something or hanging on to a vice, or not managing how they speak to the people they care about. So if you want to get to a pure baseline and then start from there, so again that starts. All this stuff starts with you.
Speaker 2:It doesn't start with anybody else, and that's why self-awareness is so important.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the T, the tactics here are addressing those lifestyle factors and those lifestyle routines that are standing in the way, right. It's almost like those things we think about stopping doing, or those things we think about stopping doing, or those things about we think about starting doing, that we just haven't followed through on, right? So it.
Speaker 2:So we were talking before the show. If you go work out every day and then every day at four o'clock you have a drink and then you have another drink and then you have another drink or even just one drink.
Speaker 2:What are we doing? Because? Are you trying to be healthy so you can drink, or are you trying to be healthy? To be healthy? I tell people all the time if you want to know who drank, if you want to know and this is no judgment, I'm not judging you If you want to know what a pure baseline is, stop drinking. And the pushback I get should tell everyone there. And I say the pushback you're giving me shows you your relationship with alcohol and that's a lot of times it's revealing to them. Like oh well, man, maybe this is a crutch or maybe this is an issue, or maybe this is a problem.
Speaker 1:It's interesting how certain behaviors get so tied to our identities.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, so I used to drink. I used to drink all the time. I don't drink at all and I can still go sing karaoke, I can still go dance, I can still, and I'm an introvert. So I drank to feel comfortable in crowds. But I'm with the people I care about and if I get a DUI I lose my job. And if I get a DUI or if I drive drunk, maybe I, because I see people get killed all the time by drunk drivers. So my perspective is totally different. Now I'm not again. I'm not judging you, but if you are going to look at a holistic approach, is everything you're doing trying to make you better so you can make everyone else around you better? And if it isn't, again, you do not have to be perfect. But if you're not playing that game, well, what are you doing?
Speaker 1:Yeah, how's the approach going to actually work? Yeah.
Speaker 2:And those are people that are depressed. They stop working toward being better. Right, I've done it all. You haven't done it all.
Speaker 1:There's so much to do. That's such a lot, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's all crap.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, thank you for the strategy, the tactics. I think it's great perspective. Regardless of the behavior that you might be trying to improve, we can apply this, this thought process, to it.
Speaker 2:Oh, and one more thing yeah, go for it. If you're going to do that, just be nice to yourself. Again, go back to kindness, go back to compassion. I'm not sitting here on a mountaintop telling you what to do. I'm not perfect. Again, I lose. I get beat. I don't lose, I get beat up every day because I make mistakes like everybody else, just be nice, like allow yourself to not have to be perfect, to keep trying to be better. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Allow yourself to not be perfect, so you can keep trying to get better.
Speaker 2:I love that.
Speaker 1:We are at that time of the end of our segment, craig, so we have a final question for all of our guests what does wellness mean to you? Yeah, wellness.
Speaker 2:So there's a bunch of dynamics that are involved in wellness and if you you read up on it, there's anywhere from seven to 15. Some people go even broader than that and wellness is always on a spectrum. We're kind of like in a binary age, like you're either well on a spectrum, we're kind of like in a binary age, like you're either well or you're not. So if you look up the dynamics of wellness, right, so let's just let's say, let's mention them. So let's just say there's physical, there's spiritual, there's emotional, there's intellectual, there's vocational, there's financial, there's environmental. And let's just say there's one more that I can't remember right now, but that would be eight, right, I can't remember.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the different dimensions.
Speaker 2:It's always different out there yeah.
Speaker 2:So yeah, and they're all different, so no matter what article you read. So if you look at these different dimensions, if you go look this up and you land on how this stuff is categorized right In these dimensions, and then you grade yourself on these dimensions with a color code red light, yellow light or green light. Green light's awesome. Yellow light maybe I need some work. Red light this isn't working at all. Then you have to understand how all these interplay with life. So you could be a green light in your physical stuff and a red light in your spiritual stuff, because you have a yellow light in your vocational stuff and you're just feeling really, really, you're starting to lose interest in your job and wondering why you're doing what you're doing. So. Or you're a green light in financial, but you're a red light in mental excuse me, um, spiritual, emotional, uh, because you're, um, not doing anything physically right. So you, it's, it's not one thing, it's a bucket of things, it's all of it, and you don't have to be perfect. But if your wellness scale is drifting toward being not healthy, you need to start looking at these dimensions going. Okay, you have to pinpoint right, you have to pinpoint where you're doing. It's hard to do for yourself sometimes. Sometimes you have to talk it out. That's why people come see you guys, yeah, right, but if they look at this stuff and then you can get like, well, I don't have to be perfect in any of these categories Again, there's that word but as long as that needle is above 50%, I'm doing pretty good, right?
Speaker 2:Can I do better? Yep, If it starts getting below 50%, this needs an intervention because after it gets my experience, after it gets below the middle of that spectrum, you can jump right off the cliff because you're trending so far Like it's generally not a slow drift. Usually you are going to step off the cliff and you're going to be at the bottom of. You're going to be in the bottom 20, 30 percent, and it's really hard to dig yourself out. Momentum is going to go in the wrong direction, right, bottom 20, 30%, and it's really hard to dig yourself out. Momentum's going to go in the wrong direction, right. So you, once you start fading after that under that 50% mark, you gotta bring the needle back and you, hey, stay in it between 60 and 80% most of the time. Awesome, keeping that thing at 90% or above life is real, superhero that's amazing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, not easy to do.
Speaker 1:Right, but you can, yeah, so wellness is a spectrum. It's made up of a lot of different dimensions and it's something that we should keep our fingertips on. We should know where we're at with the descriptions that you've provided here Red light, yellow light, green light yeah, Just treat it like you're on the map of your life, the roads of your life.
Speaker 2:treat it as the lights when are you, and I think that's really easy for people to understand instead of all the categories. And then knowing that, something somewhere else can be impacting where that red light is. So just because you see the red light at the fitness doesn't mean that's the problem. It means other things could be contributed to it.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, yeah, well, thank you for the wellness definition. I think that'll hit home with many people tuning in today. Maybe this has been an absolutely fantastic time together. It's been a minute since we've gotten together, so I'm so pumped that.
Speaker 2:We got you in here and uh, yeah just very grateful for our relationship and yeah, this is wonderful Everything you built here. It's amazing. Yeah, your, your, your clients are lucky to have you.
Speaker 1:Our members are our team is, uh, very formidable. The the people we get to work with, people we get to serve, are pretty amazing here, fantastic.
Speaker 1:yeah, well, thanks, greg. Listeners, feel free to hang around with me for a few more minutes and we'll give you a smaller dose of healthy momentum for the rest of the week if this wasn't enough. Thanks everyone. What a conversation with Craig, did it strike you as deeply as it did for me? With Craig, did it strike you as deeply as it did for me? His philosophies are direct, which I sincerely appreciate, and they are relevant in such a distracting world, a world where it's a lot easier to be lazy versus fit, to live in pain versus satisfaction and to be angry versus focused. I'm personally so grateful for the impact that Craig made in my life and even today, he left us with a couple of life-shifting questions to think about. First, what are we doing right now to overcome the challenges we face? To overcome the challenges we face? And secondly, how can we get outside of our comfort zone so that we can live the life we're meant to live? Just like you, I get complacent in certain dimensions of my life, and I live in comfort.
Speaker 2:We all do.
Speaker 1:But living in comfort is like being nestled in a soft, warm blanket on a cozy winter day it's familiar, secure and relaxing. However, just like a blanket, staying there too long might make you miss the opportunity to experience the world outside of you. So for this week, let's work on eliminating fear as we think about the new actions we want to take in our lives. Let's stop focusing on worst-case scenarios and work on expanding our comfort zone. And work on expanding our comfort zone. Practically speak up when you'd prefer to stay quiet. Show others the talent you have but have been hiding, and grab the opportunity you're excited about. Your life. My life will start changing in ways that we never imagined.
Speaker 1:That is a wrap on this week's episode. We hope you enjoyed our time together and next week we have a former podcast guest coming back on, dr Katie Ryder Mundy. Her and Kendra are sitting down to discuss our most recent wellness talk that we did on site here at Palmetto Bluff. Until then, we hope you have a great week and remember to actively participate in life on your terms. Thank you.
