From Rescue Streamers to Resilient Hearts: A Scientist’s Guide to Surviving Life

Scientist and inventor Dr. Rob Yonover joins to talk about survival — in science, business, and love. From creating a military rescue device to caring for his paralyzed wife for 19 years, Rob’s story is one of resourcefulness, resilience, and heart. A grounded conversation about chaos, clarity, and how to keep going when life doesn’t play fair.

SeeRescueStreamer.com Facebook, Instagram: RobYonover LinkedIn DrRobertYonover Amazon books: Caregiver’s Survival Guide, Hardcoe Health, Hardcore Inventing, Brainstorm Islands (children’s book)

Dr Rob Yonover
===

Speaker 3: [00:00:00] Hey, I'm Dr. Rob Yer. I'm a scientist and inventor from Honolulu, Hawaii. I invented the military approved and adopted sea rescue streamer to locate you when you're lost at sea.

And it's used all over the world and it's saved lives and in the survival world. I also had a big challenge in that my wife became paralyzed from MS when our kids were four and seven. We had to live with that and struggle through the business. So there's always been this back and forth of minding the shop, minding the front end, the back end, and all ends.

And it's been quite a challenge and I learned a lot, and I love sharing some of those lessons with people. 

Speaker 2: How old are your kids now? 

Speaker 3: They're 35 and 32. So this is a long journey. This was from seven to four. My wife passed 10 years ago. 9, 10 years ago. It was beautiful.

She made it 19 years in a wheelchair, paralyzed. Yet she was part of our [00:01:00] family in all ways, and our kids made it to 25 and 22. So they really got to know their mother and she was part of everything. And I was really proud of that because she lived many years past what people thought she would live.

And also she was totally interactive. She never lost any sanity or. And any sort of presence. And that was great. And I think it really helps now that my kids are older 'cause they have a much stable, much more stable environment where, it's sad when you lose a parent, but at least you've got to know your parent and they were full-blown adults and they're even more full-blown adults now.

Speaker 2: Okay. And you said you invented something? 

Speaker 3: Yes. It's called the Sea Rescue Streamer. When you're lost at sea or in the mountains, they have smoke signals, flares, sea eye marker. Even your phone or GPSE per it all gets you to the area but they can't see you. And the smoke flare and sea dye goes [00:02:00] away quickly.

I invented a long piece of orange plastic and I patented struts in it. So there's spreader bars, it's like a centipede so it doesn't twist up and curl up. It gives you a 25 or 40 foot long orange tail. So when they fly over you or drive a boat by, or a plane by you, or hike by you, they see this orange piece of plastic that leads right to you.

And as the Navy called it in their first approval, it's the only passive and continuous signaling device. Passive, you don't have to do anything. Once you put it out continuous, it stays out. You go to sleep, it's still working for you. And also from the military perspective, it's discretionary. So if the enemy comes around, you can pull it back in.

Very hard to do with smoke or sea D, you can't pull a flare back in. And that's really, so it's redeployable and that was really useful and it's been a crazy ride and it's been approved now by militaries all over the world. Our military uses it all, all [00:03:00] over. It saved four lives, at least that we know about.

I was thanked by those people, which was really great. That was better than all the money by far. It's now on SpaceX, under the ass of every astronaut. It's on fighter jets. It's really cool to have such a low tech, simple piece of technology on such high tech equipment and also there to protect lives, which is really my theme.

I like to, as a scientist, I like to attack problems that matter. I was in academia, I worked on volcanoes, submarine volcanoes, off Galapagos. I got to go down on an Alvin Submersible, a little submarine. It was awesome. But in academia, you're just pushing to get papers published and, which is great.

Basic science needs to be done. But I felt like I wanted to do something that was more impactful and in parallel, I have to take care of my wife, which is even more impactful and keeping the family together. But to save something, to invent something that actually saves lives and contributes to people's welfare was really [00:04:00] meaningful.

It is the ultimate for me, and applied science, and I was trained to think as a scientist. So I attack all problems that way. I attack 'em and do my testing, do my research, retest, reformulate, and keep iterating till you get to the ultimate solution, ideally. 

Speaker 2: How did, the things happening with your wife and family affect you mentally?

Speaker 3: My wife and I had a beautiful love affair. We were friends first. I knew her sister in high school. I knew who she was. She was dating my roommate in college. And we became friends for years before we ever started dating, which really, if you could do that, I advise anyone in a relationship to do that first.

So we were really tight friends and ultimately we got together years later, three or four years later. And so the foundation was so strong. We had it made. We were like the golden couple really. She was incredible masters in social work. She helped abuse kids and abused [00:05:00] women and set up shelters, did great things.

And I got an offer to come to Hawaii and get my PhD working on Submarine Volcano. And she said, let's do it, but I'm not going without being married. She didn't want me to find a girlfriend here or something, which I would never have done. So we got married and left here and we were on our honeymoon never since we, we drove across the country from Florida, shipped a car and got to Hawaii.

And that was 41 years ago. And we just had this incredible relationship. And then she was training for a marathon and she started limping a little, her leg was dragging, and that was the first sign. And then that led to MRIs and that led to limping cane using a cane, a walker, and then a wheelchair. All within about a year.

And that was just unbelievably shocking. But the truth is, when we first diagnosed, the thing we both said when we looked at each other is at least it's not our [00:06:00] kids. Our kids are four and seven and it's really, I think, harder for me if I had a sick child. She was 37. We were 37 and we already had this incredible life already with the children and the travel and achievement and family, everything.

And we lived in paradise really. So it was just like, it was just a big penalty challenge that we had to confront. There was just no, I guess most people take off and run and I think that I took it on. Of course, we were in love. I wasn't gonna bail on her. I wasn't gonna bail on the kids and whatever it took.

That was my attitude. And that's just the way it went. It was hard. It was really hard. There were so many aspects of it being hard. These are two people that are. Excuse to everything going their way and achieving everything. And this is one thing we couldn't outwork, outthink.

This was just an illness and it was just really tough. So there's the mental aspect, the physical aspect, the social aspect, the [00:07:00] child rearing aspect, the monetary aspect. There were so many aspects to that. That's why most people, illness breaks 'em up. That's number one thing to break people up is money.

And if you have an illness that's directly related to money. So it was all of a sudden she was earning a good salary of the MSW and from making like 50 grand, she went to spend like 150 grand. It was unbelievable turnaround. So we were battling like bankruptcy and all that for all those years.

And then again, trying to keep some semblance of normalcy for the kids and for us to keep tight as a relationship. And we really, we wavered, of course it was hard, but the foundation and that's where. Being friends first for all those years really helped us because we could argue, discuss, debate, and get, get down and deep into problems without the found, without the foundation being rattled too much.

And that really helped. We just, it's almost it's aa [00:08:00] thing, not that we're an AA or anything, but that one, one day at a time, right? So every day there was a new challenge, whether it was physical, mental, social, financial, child rearing, all that. And it's not just one every day there was a conglomerate collaboration of all those sometimes.

And it got to the point where it is just like having a kid. You have your first baby and the kid's screaming and crying and you just look and there's poop everywhere the first couple nights and weeks, and you're just laughing going, it can't get any worse. It's just, it becomes comical till you get older kids and you realize.

Small kids, small problems, right? It definitely gets worse, but in that moment you think it can't get worse. And that's the way we were with her in her wheelchair. We're like, Jesus, this is just beyond bad, but just kinda try to make light of it. Try to enjoy the parts we had and we had such a great connection and we knew, we knew how to have fun still.

And we knew our bond was so strong. We would, for instance, we would go, [00:09:00] people would ask us to go out with 'em, go club stupid. Someone asked us to go clubbing or, to a disco or, dancing. And would, they don't realize they're sweet people. The way people react to it, that's a whole nother thing you have to deal with.

'cause people don't know what to do and some run when they see you, some are overly compassionate, overly attentive, or just missing the bigger picture or it is just so awkward. And the sympathy that drove her crazy in the last couple years. She was sick of it. She was sick of people pitying her, so they'd invite us to go to dancing and we just strategized as me as a scientist. She was creative. So I remember we, we, our whole strategy in social settings like that was to get there early. She was beautiful. She never really lost her looks, and that's the thing you couldn't tell she was paralyzed.

So the one giveaway was the wheelchair. So we used to go always get there early, whether it was a house party or a club or a restaurant, and I would [00:10:00] bring her a camping chair for her, usually 'cause that was the most comfortable for her. Or pick the best chair where we were going, put her in the chair and then hide the wheelchair.

We, that was our move. And we left. Whether we left on time or late, it didn't matter. We didn't care how people saw us leaving. She didn't wanna be seen. She wanted to be spoke to a regular adult. And people, because you're in a wheelchair, they assumed. Her mind didn't work, her mind never lost a step.

And that, that, and they would ask me like, does she want to eat that? I go ask her. Don't ask me. So we'd go to the disco, we sit and I put her in a booth, hanging out, drinking, and it was and then everyone went up and dancing. She goes, oh, you wanna just make out, because that's what everyone is here for.

So you know that. So we just start making out in the booth. Stuff like that, you just make light of the scenario you're in. And, that was another good sidebar is fortunately our connection, our physical connection and sex life stayed vibrant. Till the end, it was had to be more creative.

It's, again, she didn't move so much, so I had to [00:11:00] move for her. And, you just gotta be creative. I don't wanna go into too much detail, but 

Speaker 2: Please don't. 

Speaker 3: Yeah. So it was just, it's just, I don't know. It's hard to explain. Looking back on it, it's unbelievable. But when you're in it, it's like being in a hurricane in a boat.

You don't just give up, you just keep dealing. Oh, there are the lines out. You gotta get the line, there's water in the back, you gotta bail. It's just emergency mode. You put your mind in mode and you deal and you try to laugh through it. You get through it.

And the other thing that was really tough was I couldn't do it 24 hours a day. So we would hire helpers and we couldn't really afford professional helpers 'cause that was like a whole overhead and agency. So we would go to Craigslist and hire people and, Ugh, that was so painful. I mean it was I estimated 19 years.

I had 183 people through my house, which was for a private person like myself, that was one of the worst things. That's [00:12:00] 

Speaker 2: insane. Yeah, 

Speaker 3: it was insane. And we did a good one, then they'd leave. We don't we'd always have to have a couple backups because someone would flake out on us when I had a meeting and then they didn't show.

And there were things where she didn't want them to do it. We used to have big arguments like, if I'm working at a home office, if I'm working, don't call me to do it when we're paying this person to help you. She says, yeah, but you do it better. I go, I know, but it doesn't matter. So there were, that was a whole nother secondary of challenges.

So dealing with the people was hard. It was just, it's just I started taking it on as a big challenge really. And just not even, it was just like second nature. There was like, no way you throw any of this stuff at me, I'm gonna find, and we are gonna find a way to get through it, period. As dark as it gets.

And also be cognizant of the fact that you're raising children that are watching you do this. Watching you fight through this [00:13:00] battle, through this love each other, hate each other sometimes. All that. And that's why we didn't wanna shield them completely, but a little, that it was hard enough, their mom's in a wheelchair.

So that was a bummer. I think we effectively shield them enough where they had relationships with their mother, and it was like we had a lot of bedroom at the end. The last half of it when she was really and more, not really bedridden, but in her room more, she didn't want to come downstairs because it just was easier.

So we would have bedroom parties, so there were dinner parties, or we'd always celebrate together wherever we could be. That was the party. And, and just as a side note, she was a big athlete, so she pointed out to me that these Japanese people had invented a peddling machine that goes under your desk and you plug it in and it pedals your feet for you, which to me is ridiculous for someone that's able bodied, but okay.

So I bought one. I put her in her camping chair. She wore Crocs, and I locked them into the foot pedals. [00:14:00] Then I took her two knees and I tied them into the camping chair like stirrups and turned this thing on. And all day she pedaled and she did it for years. And I burned out like fif. We burn out like 15 of those machines and calculated.

She had circled the earth a couple times, by, she didn't go anywhere, and then she would look at her legs moving, going, oh, psychologically I'm not as para, I'm not paralyzed. I am, but at least my legs are moving. It prevents atrophy. And it also just, it just was a good, it was a good thing.

It was a good, like she was running, her big thing was running or walking or exercising, StairMaster. She loved all that. So this was a way of her doing it, and that was one of our good creative solutions for what we had on our plate, and. The same like with the kids. We were just incorporating them.

My son used to pop wheelies and they played in the wheelchair. My son, they both got good at riding the wheelchair when she was [00:15:00] sitting in her chair or anywhere. The wheelchair's just sitting there. So the wheelchair became, we didn't forbid it don't touch the wheelchair, so the kid kids used to pop wheelies and go backwards in it, they didn't kill themselves, but, it was just, that was what's at hand.

You deal with what's at hand. And ironically, because I'm a survival, I invent a bunch of survival gear, but it's ironic that I got challenged with a survival challenge and inventing the solution to living and even thriving through that is probably my best invention because that's really what it was.

You take what's at what's at hand. And in the military they teach you the number one survival, what the number one survival tool is across anything. The greatest. It's your brain. That's it. So you and then I've read a bunch of these survival stories and they're all the same.

You got, I got a butter knife, a piece of string, and I'm on a raft. How can I catch a fish with that? I gotta make a spear, everything is working with the bare minimum. And I grew up, [00:16:00] my mother and father, my mother was like an artist. And my father was he was like a tinkerer. He was a small business guy, but he was very much into building his own stuff and reclamation.

He was from the Depression. So he loved to not waste anything. And whatever we had, you made it. So I grew up with rigging stuff, is how we used to call it. And I still live by that. And my saying is function over form. I don't care if it's pre pretty, does it work? And I I had a friend that used to come over and.

For years I was fishing. One of my mental health thing was to get into nature. I'm a surfer and I fish in rough water and I would sell my fish. So it had a two-pronged solution. I would make money, I get mental health at the same time, get a reset, think through things. And my friend came over once early on and he goes, and this guy has a lot of money.

One of my friends is really successful. And he said, how have you ever bought one thing from the boat store for your boat? And I go, no, I make it all. He took it [00:17:00] like he was insulting me and I always took it as the highest compliment. So you see how the mindset is different. And that's still how I'm, I really, I don't really solving a problem the most basic, simplest way is the best way, but it may not be the prettiest, but functioning is critical.

So that's what we try to do all the time. 

Speaker 2: Being creative with. Your mental health, your business, whatever, with what you have is basically how we survive on this planet. 

Speaker 3: Exactly. We're all humans are inventors and survivalists really. And I always, I kind of critique people if they ask me, oh, I live in New York City, but I was a surfer and I worked nine to five.

I go, okay, where's the Locust local pool? Swimming pool? You gotta get up at six in the morning. I tell my son that he just had a baby, saw my grandfather, which is cool. And he's trying to slip surfing and I go, Hey man, the days of you surfing in the middle of the day are over. So she goes to school.

So you gotta [00:18:00] grab your window, which is five in the morning till eight in the morning while everyone's sleeping. You go surf, you come back, everyone's waking up groggy, and you're the hero. Same thing for my, a friend in New York. You go swimming after work or you walk for lunch, you do something that gets you into nature that resets your mind.

Because the harder challenge, the more relief you need. The more ways to get away from the, and even the way I attack problems is to focus on one, take a break, and then focus on another. Keep coming back to it with fresh eyes. There's a lot of value in that. And I think if you go back to some of the great writers, Emerson and Thoreau, they always talked about self-reliance.

That's one of the Emerson's great short stories or writings. And then on Walden Pond with Thoreau or Jack heading way, there's always nature. Nature's always where, to me, where all the answers are. And that's like the resetting of your [00:19:00] clock. Even just, and no matter what you should be, unless you're in prison, and even in prison, they let you go out for an hour.

So make the most of your time and nature. And also as couples have your own thing, right? Don't always do everything together. You have to be able to be, do your own thing, enjoy your own thing, respect your partner for doing their own thing, and then come back together. And that's, it's just, you gotta keep taking breaks.

And I think that the deeper the nature of the better for me, not everyone, and some people aren't comfortable with nature, but it could be very mild walk in the park, it doesn't matter. You gotta move your body and breathe fresh air and get your mind working. And I'm also a big proponent of fuel diet.

That's really, I'm an aging surfer and I surf really big waves on an north shore, and it's like. This is serious. I might die yet. I wanna keep doing this. And I wanna live long. I hate hospitals. I do living in doctors and hospitals with my [00:20:00] wife for years. I'm just the whole thing. So I'm doing everything I can to stay outta hospitals and to keep surfing, stay healthy, stay vibrant.

And that's why, I eat like a freak, but I love it. And everyone has to fashion their own thing on what they like, that's healthy. And then just respect the temples that are our bodies, and just kinda realize you need it for all this stuff we do. It's not just the passing fab.

It's a real challenge. 

Speaker 2: Yeah. I think my sister has like a date night, so her and her husband will go have a date night. Perfect. They have a family night where they either play games or watch movies with their son. He gets to pick, which they do, I'm guessing, 'cause from last night's comment.

But they also have an when needed, they have a night where her husband is a gamer. So like he has his night that he goes the game and then she has time that she can set aside to go do something 

Speaker 3: [00:21:00] very healthy sounding. That's excellent and that's the way it should be. Even my son and his, my daughter-in-law, as soon as they got pregnant, I said, you gotta have a standing date on Saturday night with a babysitter and they're doing it now.

And I, my wife and I did that when we had our first baby and it was unbelievably powerful because it not only gave us a break, but the most important thing is this, the triangle of family is the parents at the top. Everyone has it inverse now, where the kids, everything about the kids. No, the kids are the low people on a tow pole.

They're lucky they're not working in a salt mine somewhere, so for them they're not the boss. They don't drive the bus. 

And by and showing them that you have a relationship and they aspire to be adults. The adults go out on weekends at night and leave the kids with a babysitter.

That's such a powerful message. And it's just they need to aspire to be adults. So adults have to leave the, and stop trying to be friends with 'em. I don't, I don't care. One of my [00:22:00] nicknames for my cousins, his uncle punishment, I'm a hard ass on kids. But, I don't like kids. And you know what, they love me for that because I treat 'em like kids or like any adults, I don't baby talk 'em. And I say, if you don't do this is what's gonna happen. Or you're not coming with us. It's none of this negotiating. And I really feel bad for.

Kids and adults now because of the smartphone thing, which is just the worst invention ever. And when the Apple one phone came out I was the only one I think that said, this is horrible. When everyone said, how great smartphone for? I go, no, this is the worst invention ever. And sure enough, it's made people fatter, lazier, and dumber.

And that's all the apps. I'm almost embarrassed. And even like the Shark Tank thing, I got my technology on Shark Tank and all the inventions, or most of 'em are to make you fatter, lazier, and dumber. So you don't have to just lift the finger, push a button, food will be here, push a button, the ride will be here.

Push a button, they'll show you. The movie part's okay, but just the [00:23:00] scrolling and comparing yourself to others. You want to be a doer, you wanna be a watcher, and it's so dangerous for kids, especially young girls, because the body in his stuff and the bully. Boys too. It is just bad.

You just and you're not reading Thoreau and Emerson and you're, you're following some idiot pop star or entertainer that, okay, that's fine. But I tell people, I'm involved with social media. But the truth is, it's a product of how good your friends are. If you have friends that are really smart, interesting, that are posting smart, interesting things that are links to things you can read.

I judge people by, if your smartphone or iPad, if you use the sound, if you use social media with the sound off, I have a little more respect for you. That's 'cause that's the way I do it. So don't, if you send me a video, I'm not gonna watch it. If it has subtitles, I might read it. I don't wanna be, it's in invaded by that kind of music.

I wanna not music that noise. I [00:24:00] wanna read it, think about it, look at it. If it's something like in nature or some. Something that's interesting to see. Like Instagram started as it seemed to me, like artists showing their photography and now it's just face brag. Like Facebook, it's the whole, I'm doing something better than you and a lot half of it's bull anyway 'cause people are just lying.

And then I 

Speaker 2: think more than half of it, 

Speaker 3: All of it is and it's just, I always feel bad 'cause I'm a private person and I don't really wanna show people what I'm doing all the time, and part of it is I have to have a reputation. I work with the military.

I gotta be a little buttoned up. I wore a collar shirt. I dunno if you noticed that, but I didn't shave, so I usually shave with the military, but I figured this would be more fun. But the point is you have to have a front, and I don't wanna brag either. I know how that bothers me when people are bragging and put it in their face.

So I try to share stuff that's interesting or educational or enlightening. It's just, it is [00:25:00] just, it's really sad and I hope the future world, I always, when I give talks, I do a lot of outreach education to kids and, I go through this smartphone thing 'cause I really, they're the real problems and they're the ones that are really gonna be harmed by this.

So I always give 'em a big talk and they're like, oh my God, you must have the best smartphone. I go no, this is my phone. So I have a push button phone, it's like an old, I can't even get apps on that thing, which I love. When I leave the house or the office, I wanna look at people, I was taught, you look at people in the eyes, you talk, you shake their hand, you meet people, you look at nature, you experience things, you pay attention, you drive all that.

The phone's fine for what you need a text here and there, a phone call with headphones, but to have a color TV in your pocket. That's the problem. And even in my neighborhood, we always made fun of each other. And one of the kids we call TV Kevy, you know why we'd go to his house to [00:26:00] look, ask his play, and his mom would say, oh, he is watching tv.

And I'm like, okay. That wasn't a good look. That wasn't a good nickname. So how did 40, 50 years later, how is it okay, how's it okay to watch color TV all day? I just, I don't get that, in my generation, we did stuff and we talked about what we did. We played sports. We go in the ocean, we meet people, we go dating, dancing, whatever it was always an activity.

It was never passively just watching. Yeah. Late when we vent our back to our home, we'd watch a show or a movie, but it was never dominating our interaction. And you know what a circle of adults or kids looks like today at a table dinner or anywhere, everyone's looking at their phones. So I could rant endlessly and again, let the record show that rant started.

I think, I don't know when the first iPhone, but it was 2006 or 12 something. It was a long time ago and everyone made fun of me. Then my phone was even smaller candy bar. Then [00:27:00] the only reason I got this bigger phone was 'cause the 4G 3G 5G didn't work anymore. So I would still be on the old phone. It was just straight.

It's still the same text or phone. I'm an outlier and I'm a dying breed and I understand everyone laughs at me, but, and I also am a bit hypocritical 'cause I use an iPad and I scroll and I enjoy scrolling. But I'm already old. I've already done things. For me it's not that bad as a formative year teenager, college kid or young adult or middle-aged adult losing all this time.

If you, okay, if it's recreational, fine. If it's instructional fine, but if it's just an addiction and I know tech companies I've met a lot over the years, and the whole thing is addiction. They want you to keep scrolling, clicking, scrolling, clicking, buying, and luckily for us, with our kids, we miss that.

Our kids only had flip phones by high school, and then in [00:28:00] college I refused to buy them with smartphone. They bought 'em with their own money years later. Again, when they're adults, you can make your own mistakes. You're not making mistakes under my watch, so 

Speaker 2: not with my money. 

Speaker 3: Yeah. It's just go.

That's of course. And that's, we used to go, the kids would say, oh, I gotta go to a carnival. Gimme, can I get a hundred bucks? My friends are getting a hundred bucks. I go, what? Your friend, mother, and father must be rich. Here's 20 bucks. And thank. Thank me for giving you 20 bucks, to waste in a carnival or whatever it is.

Go out. And I think you also have to treat kids more like adults early so they have a chance to learn and make mistakes. I, every, a lot of these things I've profess have been overused and overdone now, but I don't care. It's still a great lesson. And I like to point out to people that when I was 16, no [00:29:00] phones and my parents used to really harp on respect, responsibility, resourcefulness, those, the three Rs.

I'm a big huge believer in that. Okay, so you respect other people, you're resourceful. When you have another, you have a problem and responsibility. And my parents' whole thing was responsibility. You show you have responsibility. You get more, show more, get more, show more, get more. I figured out early on I was a surfer, I was a pool boy.

My friends were derelicts. I really had some sketchy friends who I love still to this day, but they were not what my parents, they, my parents hated my friends really. But they trusted me 'cause I was responsible. So I used to, one summer I borrowed the, first of all, I would borrow the car. I grew up in Miami.

The waves were terrible, but there were waves three hours north at Sebastian Inland. So I would borrow the car and skip school. So I'm like [00:30:00] 15 or 16. I'd say, Hey, I come into my parents' room at night, go, Hey, I'm getting straight A's. There's gonna be waves tomorrow up there. There's hardly ever waves. Can I skip school and can I borrow the car?

And again, I got straight A's. I'm totally responsible. They taught us how to travel in cars. They said yes. So then I ratcheted up that summer and said. Hey, can I borrow the car? I'm gonna take a surf trip with my buddies. Oh yeah. Where are you going? This is Miami. We're going to New York. One of our friend's brother lives in New York and I had 'em.

They taught us to travel. We went through the station wagon all over the country. They said yes. So again, so all these parents that are freaked out about texting their kids all day at 16, no phones. My parents gave me the car with three of my friends. One OD one became a rock star. The only one living left is my good buddy still.

And he, he was, he Redshirted kindergarten, [00:31:00] so he was a year older than us. We were 14 and he had a car and a mustache already. These were all my parents' friends. My parents grew to love these kids. But the point is, it wasn't like I was asking 'em to go on a road trip with a bunch of road scholar, much of that pun but.

They said yes, and we did it. And we got all the way to New York. And my friend's brother wasn't there. We had no place to stay. We're 16 in New York a thousand miles away. But we were resourceful. We figured out a place, we figured things out and getting stuck in things, stuck in problems, failing at a young age, it's easy and you could get bailed out easier.

That's why I tell. And even my son, I was pretty loose with them again, with my wife's condition. I wanted them to have as normal a childhood as possible. So I let them not run amuck, but be more independent and responsible. So they would go out. I tell, okay, you gotta be home by midnight or something, but if you wanna stay out, text me.

Just tell me where you are, you're okay. That kind of [00:32:00] thing. And I think that led to between that and my wife's situation where I had to help her a lot. They did a lot for themselves. Which was a nice show of maturation. They were good kids. And then when my son got to college, he thanked me 'cause his roommate was like from a really overbearing, strict family.

And he went wild in college. He got kicked out. He just totally screwed up. And my father, who was more wild as a kid in high school, by design, I let them be a little wild. 'cause when you're wild, when you're wild in high school and you make a mistake, you can bail 'em out,

I could have backfired, but I just think kids that, again, we're, what are we trying to do?

We're trying to raise adults, not kids. 

Speaker 2: Okay. So do you have any final thoughts? 

Speaker 3: I think that when you're stuck in a problem, you gotta take a breath and reevaluate where you are [00:33:00] before you kinda. Freak out. And sometimes the best first move isn't the best move. So it's almost don't send that mean email you're gonna send.

So if you're stuck with a problem, try to take a break and think of it in a different context. And I'm big on writing notes. So you write things down and then you can really evaluate the decisions and say, okay, this sounds good, but this could have this repercussion and back and forth until you come in.

A decision, you don't hesitate too long. You be decisive. Ultimately, after you've waited it all out, get input. A lot of my parents, friends, professors, were great mentors to me and still are if they're around where I go to them for advice. So in this little period where I gotta make a decision, I wanna get some good perspective, then I make a decision.

You live with that decision. If that decision turned out to be wrong. You regroup and do it again. It's, nothing is the end of the [00:34:00] world. It's the whole life is a gray area. It's not black and white. And as you're going along, these setbacks sometimes are really positive. Really? You don't know it, it hurts the time, but you have to go through it to get to the other side.

And sometimes going through it makes you a better person. If we all have easy, non challenging lives, it would be very boring and people would've no backbone. We just turn to jelly, so it's no 

Speaker 5: Hey everyone. Thanks for sticking with us. Before we dive into our next topic, I just wanna take a quick moment to remind you two who like this video, subscribe to our channel and hit that notification bell. That way you'll always be the first to know when a new episode drops and we want to hear from you.

What topics are you most excited about? Drop your thoughts in. The comments below. Your feedback helps us create content that you love. We've got some exciting stuff coming your way, so don't miss out. Now let's switch gears and jump into our [00:35:00] next discussion. I.

Speaker 2: So how do you take things? With onboarding, with, just work in general, just all of it. How do you take it from chaos and. Streamline it, get it where it needs to be so that you can do better. 

Speaker 3: Okay. That, I mean does in science and innovation, one of the big things I've read about, and I know I've done it myself without knowing it, is when you have a problem you look broad at first, the first couple hours, minutes, days, whatever you have, you go really broad, what I was saying before.

You're looking at all the possibilities, then you focus. So it's a macro then micro approach. So chaos, okay, here's chaos. There's a million things going on, here are all the solutions. Don't look at just one, look at all of 'em. Pick the best one, and then focus hard on that one and go all in on that one, achieve that, move to the next one.

And that's where it's like my inbox. I don't want anything in [00:36:00] my inbox because it'll get outta control. That's. So I, and to a fault, it hurts me sometimes, but I don't care. I'd rather get back to that email. And that's another thing that bothers me about today's world.

People think it's okay not to return a call, email, text I was brought up is, that was very rude. And so I, and I know how you are, just the way we interacted. You're a professional. You expect professional people to show up on time and do what they say. So that's been a real hard lesson for me.

And I just realized not everyone's like that anymore, except that but that's where you just have to, for me, the inbox, keeping that clean, it's just also the same way. I wanna keep my mind a blank slate. Not like I'm, I have nothing to think about. But if I take all the inbox stuff away, for a creative person like myself, I want it to be blank so I can think of new things that pop into my head or a problem that's been nagging me, can come into the blank slate arena and I can attack it.

If [00:37:00] they're five inbox things killing me, I could never get the clarity. And that's where the nature zen, the reset helps me get that clarity. So ideally, clear your inbox, get into nature, get physical, and you'd be surprised. And even my father, he wasn't the water guy. I was, he loved the water, but he grew up in Chicago and he was afraid to go put his head under water.

The water was polluted back in the day. So he had a technique of swimming above the water. And he grew up in Miami and he'd swim but he wasn't like a surfer full on. And years later, I told him that's where I get my best ideas when I'm wet surfing, swimming, diving. And he goes, me too, but it's in the shower for me.

I don't know, there's something about getting wet to me is another deep nature. And it's also a luxury, you look at, most people in the world can't take hot showers. We're so lucky. We have a hot shower a day, and or five a day, whatever you wanna do. Or a cold shower or somewhere to [00:38:00] dip off a bath, whatever.

And there's something about getting wet. We're made of water. We live on a planet that's mostly water. It makes sense to me. But it was funny that he said that. And so there's all different levels of it. And I think that chaos to clarity, there's something in that. And I count water as nature, and, I try and I try to keep it simple, and it's and also people. Tell you who they are, right? If someone says, I'm gonna do this for you, and they don't do it, okay, I know who you are. Thank you for telling me. Again, it could be a painful lesson. Yep. But people tell you, and that's, it's give people a chance to show you who they are, but when they show you and tell you believe 

Speaker 4: it, believe 'em.

Yeah. It's not a one 

Speaker 3: off. Yeah. So it's been, it's hard because, I'm juggling about a lot of things all the time.

Speaker 2: So if you were onboarding somebody I think there are a couple of things to focus on to make it go from chaos to clarity. One, you need to know what they need to know to start off.

So that means they have to [00:39:00] talk to it to get that stuff started. They have to talk to HR to get all the paperwork started. Or accounting, whatever, whoever. And so you map out that process so that it is very clear and they can take that sheet of paper to each one of those different places and be like, okay, I'm supposed to be here for this information.

And then they get it. And then have somebody who has worked there, right? And who is not getting fired for this person to be hired? Do not do that with anybody. Exactly. 

Speaker: They're not 

Speaker 2: completely garbage situation to be in, but have that person be like a buddy. So like once they're into like Slack or whatever, chat they know that person is there to answer any questions they have. Exactly. 

Speaker 3: And they can trust them. They can be an asset instead of a competitor. 

Speaker 2: Yeah. 

And so that helps that person go, okay, everything's fine. But how do I start this thing? Or where do I start? What project am I working on?

That kind of thing. [00:40:00] So there is somebody who can answer the questions that works at the same time as they do, and in a similar way so that, the communication makes sense. You obviously aren't going to pay somebody in accounting with somebody in the secretary pool because that makes absolutely no sense.

Exactly. 

Speaker 3: No. And that whole mentoring is so critical in all of life because then you give people ownership. So if you're asking me to onboard a new employee and I'm a mid-level person, I'm honored to show them. And especially if it's not a competitive situation, that way you become more invested in the company because you feel some ownership to bring on board someone That makes complete sense.

And I think you're right on, on that one. 

Speaker 2: If the paperwork isn't necessary, it shouldn't be done at this point. If there is some kind of paperwork that you have that you want to be done, because there's a holiday in November, [00:41:00] 

Speaker: right? 

Speaker 2: This is what about to be March. There is no reason for that paperwork to be on somebody just starting now's board.

It doesn't need to be there, streamline the paperwork. They should not get a stack that is five mountains high. Yes. You need a W nine filled out. Yes. You need other information filled out for legal purposes. And that should not just be given to the person and expect them to understand. Especially if they are somebody younger, if this is their first job out of college, they might not know what a W nine is Exactly. They might not know how to fill that out and they need help. You can do that. 

Speaker 3: And plus just organizationally the way. You need to organize for them. And like a checkpoint where people that are highly organized can help people that have never been organized.

And by having a checkbox, each one, you gotta do these tasks. Just lay it out simply. And if they don't understand it, encourage them to [00:42:00] ask questions. And then I used to tell my kids without making 

Speaker 2: anybody feel stupid. 'cause that doesn't help anything. Tell 

Speaker 3: my kids, don't you know, they get frustrated with their teacher or their boss.

And I used to say, you know something, that's the way it is. You need to talk to your teacher. Don't talk to me. I'm not gonna talk to your teacher. This is your responsibility. Talk to your boss. Talk to your fellow workers, your fellow students. Learn what needs to be done. Show some initiative and you don't have to respond all the time.

They say you do. They say you need to do A, B, and C if you don't understand b. You don't have to make that point, right? Then privately you can ask your mentor, Hey, what does B mean and how do I go about doing this? And that i'm sure the mentor would be happy to hear that from you.

'cause you're paying attention and you were respectful enough to ask them the expert how to do this. Definitely.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Obviously like I said, you wanna have that partner so that they know where to communicate. Plus, if they're working in a team, make sure they know how to communicate in the [00:43:00] team chat, instead of just personally to one-on-one.

Make sure making sure that all of this stuff. Is there, most companies nowadays have an orientation process, right? I have been through an orientation process once or twice in my life, and I can tell you they usually have nothing to do with how any anything works. 

And that needs to be fixed because if you are hiring somebody and saying you're gonna get an orientation that will, bring you on board and tell you what you need to do and, start you off on a project, great.

And then they go into the orientation and they're watching sexual harassment videos. Which might be necessary nowadays, right? Sure. But that's not gonna help them start their first project or whatever it is that they're supposed to be doing. 

Speaker 3: So the whole, the mentorship is the place to get your true orientation.

Speaker 2: Yeah. 

Speaker 3: As you were saying. And I think, sure, there's sexual harassment. These are videos you need to watch first, but let's not call them [00:44:00] orientation as much as. Requirements. Just sit through this, then your mentor will show you all around. And again, like you said, pick a mentor that's no conflict of interest.

It's not who you're gonna replace. 'cause they'll be paranoid. I don't wanna tell him or her everything 'cause then they'll be better at it than me and then I won't have a job. 

Speaker 2: I's not even that, some companies will tell the person that they've been fired, but they're being expected to work at least two weeks to a month to close out their projects or whatever.

Oh. And while you're doing that, we have this person who's gonna take over your duties, so why don't you train that person. 

Speaker: Yeah. 

Speaker 2: That makes for an awful workplace for the person who is leaving. 

Speaker: Exactly. 

Speaker 2: And the person who is coming on board because neither one of them want to talk to each other actually, because the one who's coming in knows that this is a crap situation.

Speaker 3: Exactly. And what did they do to get laid off or fired? Are you gonna teach me the wrong way? 

No, that's a good one.

Speaker 2: I am a big [00:45:00] believer in say what you mean do what you say. Say what you mean that thing. You know what I mean? If you tell me you're gonna do something, you better do it or I'm going to lose trust with you.

Exactly. If you say something and you don't mean it, why do you, now in that vein. I have a thing where I get mouthy sometimes when I'm a little agitated. 

Speaker: Okay. 

Speaker 2: And I will, I'll say some stuff that I probably don't mean. Like I'm not gonna kill anybody. I'm not gonna punch anybody.

Be like, I wanna throat punch this person again, I'm not a violent person. You would not understand that if you were with me for a full day. 'cause I say some weird stuff. But saying the weird thing for me sometimes is the only way for me to let that little burst of anger go, oh, without making it bigger. 

Speaker 3: I absolutely, 

Speaker: I completely 

Speaker 2: understand that type of thing.

But if you lie to me even once, if you full on lie to me, even once you're done, [00:46:00] I have a pathological liar for his sister. I don't put up with that. I don't talk to her. What makes you think I'm gonna talk to you? 

Speaker 3: Yeah, no, it's a bad quality and I totally agree. Honesty is always the best. And and of course, full disclosure and what you just said is really interesting 'cause I've learned that in, in all my relationships.

Business professional marriage is if something bothers you, you gotta vent right away. And if the venting is some large yelling or arguing, so what? Still better than keeping it in and it becoming toxic and I think. We've lost sight of that because of all the rules that make people have lost their ability to be in relationships or casual or communicate.

This whole virtual world, you, if you're used to speaking your mind decisively, forcefully, when necessary to someone that's only been on Zoom chats their whole life, it's gonna be a problem. So that's part of the phone [00:47:00] issue. And you've got to learn social skills, right?

And social skills sometimes are dealing with uncomfortable situations. It's never, everything's on up smooth. 

Speaker 2: Mike Tyson said famously that people are getting too comfortable with saying things. 

And not getting punched in the face. 

Speaker: Exactly. '

Speaker 2: Because if you remember pretty much anybody, if you remember, if you were in high school and you told somebody.

That they were an ITT or something else, right? Yep. You were about to get hit. If that person didn't like what you were saying, if you weren't joking and that wasn't a friend, you're going down. 

Speaker 3: Exactly. And that's where this anonymity, the ability to post things without using your own, that really bothers me.

That's one of the big downfalls in this world of social media. They should make it, you gotta own it if you're gonna say something. And again, it's virtual, so it's not even that brave, but it's even less brave if you're hiding behind ball 32 X as your name, where you know [00:48:00] who are you. So it's like I totally agree.

And I think that we've lost that with the technology and yet people are thrust into the microcosm of a real company where you can't rely on social media skills. It's regular person to person stuff. Unfortunately is a lost art. And I, it's really a hopefully we'll get out of it.

'cause I think people are, it's like a pendulum. Yeah. It swings back and forth. We sw we swung way too far on this stuff. Yeah. And I think a lot of new parents get it and know it, but it is easy to just give the kid a phone and say, leave me alone. It's the cop out. It's the easy way.

And we would play videos for the kids. I understand that there's definitely value in being able to get people out of their mind. It's not in your face all the time, but the interaction in a company, on the streets, in the park, at school with your friends is priceless. And that's where it's gonna be harder and harder for people to manage [00:49:00] people because they don't have the skills and they're sensitive. And I,

Speaker 2: it's for me being transparent with the people I work with hey. I am. Me. I may some say something, but I'm not gonna do it. I will say the stupid thing. I will not do the stupid thing 'cause it is illegal and I don't want to go to jail. 

Speaker: Alright. Okay. 

Speaker 2: Simple as that. I will say the dumb thing because you don't tick me off and this is the only way I can express that because I'm not punching nobody. 

But that doesn't mean I don't feel like punching you in the face.

Exactly. They should happen. 

Speaker 3: They should respect your outburst. For what it is. Something made you so mad that you yelled, screamed, or Custer gave someone with some fake threat, whatever it was. It came from a place where wait, what caused that? Don't. I shouldn't do that again.

Yeah. I shouldn't make you that mad. Instead of worrying about the outbursts. The outbursts is healthy actually. Within reason.

Speaker 2: Yeah. I just, I believe in transparency between, [00:50:00] me and the people I work with, you and the company you work with, you and the people in your family. Everybody should be transparent.

You should know the people that you are working with. You should know, Hey Susan, down by the copier in cubicle two C, she doesn't like it if people come up behind her. So maybe we shouldn't do that. 

Speaker: Exactly. 

Speaker 2: I'm not saying you have to know every single detail about everybody's life.

Just the important things for in the situation you're in with them. Like I said, Susan down by the copier gets upset if you tap her on the back while she's got headphones on and is working and didn't know you were there. Sure. 

Speaker: That's scary. Yeah, of course. That's 

Speaker 2: a stupid thing to do with me.

'cause that will get you hit. Not even on purpose. That's a reflective action and it's gonna happen. 

Speaker 3: Exactly. No, that's, you know what I, one of the things I relate to a lot in life is the trade show booth. Because you're encountering people you don't know. I'm trying to show them my [00:51:00] technology, it's a microcosm of a relationship plastered into a few seconds that could lead to a few minutes or a lifelong thing.

So that same thing, you have to read people and say, okay, this person has a problem with public, personal space. You could see people reacting. That's why I talk to people. It's ideally in person. Second is video and chat, and then phone and way down on the list is email or texting because that's one way.

And everything you're talking about is how two humans are interacting. You have to take social cues or someone that knows, that person advises you don't tap them on the shoulder from behind. So that's a social cue, social knowledge from someone else. You get it from being social, it's all about relationships and that skill. I didn't think we had to teach it before, but I think we do now, unfortunately. Because, and COVID just [00:52:00] through the whole thing, made it even worse. So Yeah. That made 

Speaker 2: it even worse for a lot of people. But it's interesting.

But for me so I've never worked in corporate. I couldn't even if I tried because I was the kid whose last name started with w in the back of the class, paying more attention to her classmates and what they were doing than what the teacher was doing or saying. 

Until they figured, hey, she's half blind.

Maybe we should put her up front where she can read the board maybe.

Speaker 3: That makes sense. 

Speaker 2: And then you still had teachers who were like, you're not messing up my seating chart. 

Speaker 3: No. People are so rigid. You gotta get let go of the rigidity sometimes. 

Speaker 2: Literally I feel pain. 

Speaker 3: I'm a y so I'm behind you.

Speaker 2: Yeah, that's rare. 

But somebody with big, my glasses used to be a lot thicker than they are now, but like somebody with big, thick glasses sitting at the back of the classroom in an English class. 

Speaker 3: That's hard is 

Speaker 2: just about the [00:53:00] stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life.

Speaker 3: My brother has bad eyesight and he was a y so I know that story and one of, one of my ears doesn't work so well.

So I know. It's what'd you say?

Speaker 2: So I believe in placing people where it will do them, the most good. So if I work with somebody, 

I have a girl that I can call on who will help me if I need it and I'll be able to pay her. But I'm not gonna ask her to answer my phone for me.

Sure. Because she's got two kids she's dealing with. That would be stupid. But at the same time, if I have something that is a monotonous task that I don't wanna do, where you just have to click the same three buttons for three hours, absolutely not gonna do that. It's, does that type of thing drives me absolutely nuts.

For her. She's oh, I don't mind it at all. I think it's fun. And I'm like, I don't know what's wrong with you, but here you go. You do this and I will forever appreciate it. You have to prioritize 

Speaker 3: your time. You have to value your time and know what you're good at. [00:54:00] And that's what you're saying.

And I totally agree with that, and that's why I always like to stay in a creative space and not get bogged down by busy work. And if I have it, I'll do it, but I do it hard and pay attention and get it done. Get it out of my inbox. 

Speaker 2: Yeah. See I go through my inbox multiple times a day and get things out of it.

I decided that I had to do that to be able to keep track of all the tasks that get emailed to me. Absolutely. So I keep that on point. The other side of that though is I have clients whose inboxes have 30,000 emails in them that they've never read. And I'm sitting there going, this is going to drive me nuts.

It's like letting, looking at somebody's home screen, the, their screen on their computer, their desktop, right? Yeah. Just a normal desktop. Mine has two rows of items on it, and that's it. I have multiple people that I work with who put all of [00:55:00] their files on the desktop. Oh my God.

And then wonder why the computer's slow. 

Speaker: Exactly. 

Speaker 2: And I'm like might have to do with the 30,000. How do you get this much stuff on a desktop? 

Speaker: No, it's

Speaker 2: For me, being organized with what I'm doing, being transparent with, saying what I mean, doing what I say, it has led to a lot of opportunities for me.

And I really think that if people do the same thing and they're transparent with the people and all of that kind of thing, that it will lead to opportunities for others as well. 

Speaker 3: Definitely. And we're supposed to get these messages in school, right? Do your work. It's time to do your homework, neaten up, clean up your desk.

It's all predicated on the training you had. And I think that there might be a hole in that training these days. And so I we're all told those lessons, whether we put them to use or not. And I learned early on that you put those practices to use, [00:56:00] it frees up your mind and your time for, when I'm a kid free play, I get, I would, I was the kid that did my homework right away.

And then this outta the house. I never really put stuff off because it was too much pressure and it might interfere with some good task, but people don't always get that lesson and I don't know. I think that, and I hate to say this, but maybe teachers need to be meaner. They're not, I used to fear some of my teachers and I didn't.

Now teachers are 

Speaker 2: best friends. 

Speaker 3: Yeah. And a lot of it's the parents' fault 'cause they keep coming in here and arguing for the kid. To me, the teacher's always right. And I've done enough teaching where I really appreciate when parents I've not been in that I'm more a college or a volunteer outreach.

I have to deal with parents. But to hear of these cases where the parents are taking on the teacher or the school no, your kid screwed up. Own it. The kid needs to learn how to own it and be fearful of consequences and. Yeah, a lot of my stuff was like competitive stuff. I, I [00:57:00] went to a very competitive public school system when, back in the day, so I wanted to beat the kid and get an A and also have fun.

To b that was the alternate, right? I didn't wanna be a bookworm per se, but I wanted to get A's and then also become, be surfer or play sports all day, so to do that, you gotta really apply yourself. And you also, I had one teacher that we, he taught us the multiplication table. Big strong guy, booming voice, and he'd throw a beanbag at you and go three times eight, and you have to catch it and throw it back with the answer.

And if you got it wrong, that means you screwed up and didn't study and work, and he'd yell at you and you couldn't do that today. But that guy taught me, I never got that wrong, right? It's okay, I'm learning the multiplication table because I don't want that guy throwing the beanbag at me. And not me not knowing.

And I think you have those tendencies like I do to be organized and on point and all that, but some people don't and they [00:58:00] need a little extra push, extra incentive, extra fear, whatever it is. And I think it, it's just the really saddest thing is the lack and loss of respect for teachers.

Really that's the hardest, most celebrated, it should be the most celebrated job in the world. And it is in certain cultures, but America, and even when I was teaching college, I had kids challenging me. You don't know what you're talking about. I'm like, look man I'm teaching this class.

It's a job. Yes. I'm not a, a mathematician, but I'm teaching you some math so I can make mistakes. Don't take me on personally. I'm trying to teach you if I do the best I can, that's all I can do. Ask me a question. We will explore it together if we have to. But this whole entitlement and. A lot of it comes from the culture and the family, bemoaning teachers and saying they're low level people. They're not, 

Speaker: they're really not. I had 

some [00:59:00] teachers who were the lowest form of life because of them being who they were. But I had some, I had some teachers that worked with me and realized that, that was a way better deal. Exactly. And would get more outta me.

Speaker 3: Exactly. The patients, they show the good teachers. I don't know if I even have that. I did with my struggles, but to do it for random 20, 30 kids in your elementary, that is just so impressive to me. And so giving and so unselfish, it amazes me. 

Speaker 2: Yeah. That English teacher I was talking about, she was hated.

By all of the students. She was the one who she was close to retiring age. And she would take kids who were close to being valedictorian and if they got put in her class, she was start failing them. 

Speaker 3: Why? Just to fail them chip on her shoulder. She was frustrated. Yeah. That's a tough lesson.

First two 

Speaker 2: semesters I did all my work, [01:00:00] turned in all my assignments, and I was failing second two semesters. I was like, screw this. I'm not doing anything anymore. And I didn't do anything in the last two semesters. And I passed that class with a b 

Speaker 3: That's weird. 

Speaker 2: It was the stupidest class

Speaker 3: that's horrible.

Yeah. I'll tell you what, along those lines, I had an English class that changed my life. Freshman English, they forced us to read. Like the classic books and I didn't read that much. I was an action guy, so I always wanted to play. I would do my homework. My brother on the other hand he's read thousands and thousands of books.

He used to read a book a week. So I decided from that class and I was blown away by leading reading, like The Scarlet Letter and Hemingway and having the discussions. And I just decided, first of all, it was awesome just to get into your own mind and just to hear a story by reading it and have it pictured in your mind so much better than TV or video and to [01:01:00] get that lesson.

I took it as, okay, I'm not gonna ever read as many books as my brother. I'm an action guy, but I'm gonna read the classics. And so what I've done in my life is I've read all the classic books in literature. 'cause I figure if some book's been celebrated for hundreds or thousands of years, it's worth reading.

Versus, and it's okay if you read Pulp Fiction or romance novel, that's fine too. But for me, it got me on a path to be really selective of what I read. And it's been, it just, it made me fell in love with reading. I still don't read. I read all the time, but not books as much as I could. But it's really a life changer.

Speaker 2: I started reading the summer after sixth grade. We moved to Maryland a couple days before my either 12th or 13th birthday, I can't remember. And I had no friends, new to the school year. By the end of the beginning of the summer, I still [01:02:00] just didn't know anybody enough. And so my sister ended up with this box of books.

There were all these Harlequin romance novels that, didn't do anything but. They were great because they got me reading Exactly. Which nobody could have done before that box

Speaker 3: Exactly. That's 

Speaker 2: Before I started in, when I moved to the new school in May, March of the new school year of, in the middle of a school year.

Speaker: They had 

Speaker 2: to retest me again because I was on, I was in special ed because I had a learning disability and they tested me and I was at a first grade reading level. 

Speaker: What grade? So that was 

Speaker 2: first I was in sixth. 

Speaker: Oh, wow. Okay. 

Speaker 2: It was bad. 

Speaker 3: That's not good.

Speaker 2: I started reading that box of books.

And like seventh grade, I was known as the person who would pull out a book if I got bored. Wow. I didn't care if the teacher was in the middle of talking or not. If I was [01:03:00] bored, my book would come out and I would be reading it and not paying attention to anybody in that classroom. And I didn't care. 

Speaker 3: Wow.

Good and bad, but part 

Speaker 2: good and bad. The beginning, I walked into classes at the beginning of eighth grade and I was still in special ed. I was still doing all this stuff and I just went, if y'all don't test me and get me the heck outta here, I'm gonna shoot myself in the foot and I'm gonna fail, right?

This is stupid. I don't wanna be here anymore. Get me outta here. So I was retested before Christmas of eighth grade. And they came back with college level reading, college level comprehension. Wow, that's 

Speaker 3: fantastic. 

Speaker 2: So in 

there it is, there's, you're proof in the pudding. That's, yeah. The value of reading.

And like I said before about turn the sound off on your phone or iPad, if you're reading something, your mind is growing stronger. I don't care what you read. And even I have friends that wanna make, have arguments with me politically, whatever, and [01:04:00] I'm like, look, I don't talk to people unless they've read something.

What have you read if you're not reading out? I don't wanna talk to you about any opinion 'cause you have no opinion unless it's some direct adventure or direct experience that I need to learn about. So reading is everything and then it's just the way your mind tracks. And I, like I said, I think I made a good decision for myself because I didn't read that much, but I read really good stuff.

I read it critically, completely. Understood it, tested if I had to or if I was reading on my own. And that led to a lifelong reading. And I still read the paper today. To this day, I read every word. I love editorials. I love, I just love that kind of reading. And again, reading is freeform. You can read whatever you want, but just read.

Yeah. And that is another thing that's been lost and I, yeah. It's so weird that, sometimes I wish for electricity to go out for a while. Maybe schools would be better if they didn't have [01:05:00] electricity. How about that? I like to be 

Speaker 4: warm. 

Speaker 3: Oh yeah, that's true. You're in the north more.

But let's say the heater works and we don't wanna fire it with coal because that's bad for the environment. But let's say, and we don't wanna be nuclear, but let's say solar heating for the school, but just chalkboards books, lessons. Kids, it is like a, I think about this for parking lots too.

I have weird ideas of course. And maybe schools should be like parking lots, meaning no cars or technology or within a mile. I think at stores, same thing for people's health. You shouldn't be able to drive up to a store. You just have to park a half a mile away and it should be all grass and walkway.

So you build in your exercise to going to the store. In schools, your half a mile away is where you get into the grounds of the school. From that half a mile in, there's no electricity. So you have to read books, you have to talk to people, talk to teachers, go to the lesson. There's no distractions. And there, that [01:06:00] way the teachers can be respected and paid attention to, like they should be never gonna fly.

But it's a good idea. 

Speaker 2: It's a good thought experiment. Exactly. It's not gonna happen. So do you have any final thoughts? 

Speaker 3: I think you covered it. I really think we have, we're on the same kind of page with how we attack organizational, and again, coming down to just reading and respect.

And the other is the respect you have for other people leads you to have good relationships, which leads you to be, have good skills, good social skills and it's weird that social skills are so important, but they are across the board. It's not just for social, but for business, right? Or professional and what you talked about before of getting your, getting your little mentor, mentee, mentor mentoring program of how you get someone on board.

It's still very social, how I agree with you, I think it, it is [01:07:00] very much a social thing and I think it's, there should be removed any competitiveness, so you can be disarmed when you're social. That's, schools are still tough. Kids are tough on each other, but also life is tough.

That's why my kids, I used to sometimes root for them to have a bad experience in life or at school or work. So they have some challenge to work out. So it's the same way. Your teachers aren't all gonna be great. Your bosses aren't all gonna be great, but guess what? You gotta deal with them. You've got to learn how to deal with them and your colleagues.

And if your thing is to vent right then, which is the healthiest, but know it comes from a loving place. I'm venting because you did something or said something that frustrates me and I'm letting you know, and now we talk it out and we're done, we move forward. There's no pent up anxiety or resentment.

Think it's very healthy.