Hello, this is Corey. Before we get started, I want to share with you a new thing I'm doing for the Cincinnati business leaders. In January of this year, I launched a prioritized leader academy and brought together eight different business leaders and owners. And we meet once a month as well as have coaching in between our different sessions. So basically it's a mastermind, but we've added strong content incorporated faith into the piece. And so it has gone so well that in October, we are launching our second cohort. So if you are a business leader or a business owner, and you are looking for community, you were looking for coaching, you were looking for additional content to help push you forward. Then reach out. Love to give you more information. What this looks like. You can email me@coreyatcoreymcarlson.com. Or go ahead and give me a call 7 2 0 3 0 1 8 3 7 7. And this is for any Cincinnati business owner or leader who is looking to grow over this next 12 month period.
Welcome to the win at home first podcast. I'm your host, Cory Carlson. This podcast is where we talk about how successful business leaders win, not only at work, but also at home. On this podcast, we will go behind the scenes with great leaders to hear stories of how they win. Thank you for listening and on to today's episode.
(01:30): Hello, this is Corey today's episode, Brian tome, who is the founding and senior pastor of crossroads is a great podcast. The only complaint I have is too short. I had a list of questions. I want to talk to him cause I always loved his opinion. As I've learned a lot from him in the 10 years, I've lived here in Cincinnati, but some of the stuff we did dive into is just so good. We talk about comparison, the battle that we all face, the comparison, and even himself as he has a very fast growing church. Sometimes it's the fastest growing in the country. Other times it may not be. We talk about ambition and what that looks like to go after we talk about the importance of dating your wife, but also having adventure in doing fun things. We talk about what it looks like to lead your kids well at home. And you may be surprised by his answers. I know just hearing him talk, gave me a little bit of grace of the times I stumble in my own home. It's a awesome episode. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoy the conversation on to today's episode.
(02:34): Hello, this is Corey Carlson. You're listening to win a home first podcast. Today is a special opportunity because the tables are turned literally a year ago. I was on Brian tomes podcast and it was a great conversation and I always want to have him on my podcast. Went home first to ask him some questions because I am Brian. I've watched you for, I've lived here for 10 years. I've been a part of the church for the 10 years. And in that I'm very grateful for crossroads grateful for you. I think of the things that crossroads is open the door. My life, there was a trip Nicaragua with my daughter. It's my small groups have been a part of it. It has been volunteer opportunities for my family, but another big part of it was a leadership program that crossroads had. I got to participate in and then that opened up the doors. Now what I do now, executive coaching, speaking, and writing, but all became from crossroads. And what you helped start 25 years ago, as well as learning from you really daily from your spiritual journal that you put in place. Some of the media, people who actually read
(03:37): That I read and I love it and I can even share another later date, how I use it and follow to help me just grow. But thanks for being on the podcast, Corey, you've been a core guy around here and just to been always a positive, impactful person whenever I seen you. So I'm honored to be here with you and you're listening. Awesome. Well, thank you. So, Brian, what is that key trait for leaders to win at work and at home?
(04:02): I think if you asked me that question two years ago, I'd probably give you a different answer. I think two years ago, I probably would have told you vision something like vision, knowing where you're going, knowing the person you want to be before God staying true to his truth. I would've said those. And I think that all those things are true, but I actually think these days, those are sort of table stakes, like to be a leader, just to get in the game. You've got to have vision just to get in the game as a leader in your home or your business, you've got to have core convictions that you won't, you won't bend on, right? And people don't respect you if you don't have those either. But band the way I look at it right now, I think the element of resiliency is right up there.
(04:58): And the thing that I'm most most thinking about these days and the thing I see people struggling with and people are tired. They're worn out. They're beat down. If we talk about in the business world, 40% of everybody who's in the business world or has a job saying, they're looking to change that this year in my line of work. I think that statistic those who are senior pastor, I think it was 28%. And I think that just speaks to how weary we are and how just the uncertainty or even hate those words. Right? So timely. How often have we said uncertainty in the last two years that we've rarely said that before I just warn everybody down and we're just not doing well. And the people we're leading are not doing well. And that brings with it a lot of difficult dynamics.
(05:48): So from a resiliency standpoint, what are you doing? You in Libby's from a marriage standpoint to recharge, to, to withstand some of the difficulties out there. We've fortunately found a number of hobbies or pastimes that I'm very thankful for because I've had a lot of where I've had some hobbies, pastimes, riding motorcycles, I've taken up hunting, which are really good and restorative, but they don't include her. So now we've started in this thing called overlanding, which is when we go and camp and we have a rooftop tent and the top of our vehicle and we explore places and hike and cook out in the middle of the wild and all that stuff. And that's been something that her and I can do together. And it means there's something else we can talk about, not just talk about your day, but talk about what kind of gear do we need. Where's our next spot going to be? Who's going to go with us. What do we need to pack? I mean, it's brought a lot about a lot of life-giving conversation for us.
(06:47): It isn't, you know, the difficult stuff and just the difficult stuff. And then I think the other thing that we've been able to do is we're talking more about how we're doing as individuals, probably more so than we ever have in our marriage. Maybe that's because there's more stress points, stress cracks in our life and conversations like how was your day today? That's, that's fine. But it's the conversation underneath that, that we're having more often things along the lines of, you know, this event didn't go as well as it should have. I heard so-and-so is leaving the church or this awful thing has happened. There's a lot of awful difficult things are happening and it's not just sharing the stats about that or the facts about it. It's then following up with, and that makes me feel vulnerable. It makes me feel like I'm not doing a good job as a leader.
(07:45): It makes me wonder how much longer I can keep doing this. It makes me consider how important the family is versus other people who are thought were so, so important. And compared to family, they're not that important because my family is never going to leave me. My family always believes in me, it leads to confessing, just awful, dark thoughts. You never thought that you would have had, you know, before two years ago and that's taken our relationship to a new level. And I think that's one of the blessings of, you know, the times that we're living in right now, if we can do that as couples talk about things that are very uncomfortable to talk about and confess things. And by confess, I'm not talking about confessing that, you know, you did porn or confessing that you lied and that's fine to do that. I'm talking about the stuff that's more intangible. Like I feel more vulnerable than normal or yeah. Some of the stuff I talked about that that's, that's been a rich part of conversation. How do we encourage
(08:45): Guys specifically since they're usually closed off work was fine today to do it early in their marriage and get started. Now, what are some of the things that you would advise men to, to start being more open?
(09:00): Well, these stats are out there and I'm not going to quote them exactly. But I think we all know the heart behind it is true. You know, women have however many tens of thousands of words they want to use a day. Men have. I think it's like half of that. So women are much more communicative creatures and want to talk men for us. By the time we're done with our Workday, like we've used up our words, right? It's all done. It is done. And when I go home, I don't really want to relive it. It's a discipline to relive it. And to use words that you don't want to use, it's on par with the discipline to go run or to work out. I, I still to this day, I never, I never want to work out. I'm glad I did when I was out when it was over, but I never go into a wanting to, it's just a pure gut-check.
(09:46): And I find with my wife, oftentimes going into these conversations, I don't want to do it because it's going to take energy, but it's a pure gut check of, we've got to do this to be healthy. I've got to do this to be healthy with my spouse and that mental shift I'm doing better at these days than I would have three decades ago. So I'd say if you're younger in your marriage, you do yourself a real favor to learn those muscles and learn how to find that energy. When you're early in your marriage than try to teach a old dog new tricks, once you're decades in it's difficult. I think that's maybe why I'm seeing more and more couples filming in the towel who were way, way further in, you know, the divorce thing is still rocking and rolling and, and it seems like it used to be just people who were stuck in thought they made a bad decision, five years in, but I'm seeing more and more folks who are now decades in. And I think it relates to, they just, they just don't have the energy to overcome all the years of bad habits. And if you're younger, you can save yourself a lot of energy by creating those good habits. Now,
(10:59): I have a lot of clients that are empty nesters and they are nervous about what's to happen either. They're going to be an empty nest in a couple years or just it happen. There's even a trendy name. When you talk about the great resignation of people leaving. Well, now there's a trendy name of divorce, the great divorce where people are starting to get divorced when they are empty nesters. And so would your recommendation be to start getting involved in activities and do an adventure together as well as the communication?
(11:26): And the adventure doesn't have to be the stuff we're doing, going out in the middle of nowhere. But if, but it's gotta be something where you and your spouse are in it together, and you're thinking about it, the adventure of going to your kid's soccer games, isn't gonna do it. It may do it for 15 years while they're in the house. But when they leave, when the kids are gone and you don't have soccer games, then where do you go from there? You got to try finding something. This could be a part of your marriage, long longterm. And if that thing changes, that's okay too, but you got to have something that's outside of the kids.
(12:01): Nope. Well, today I was looking forward to a lot of different questions. Kind of hit a bunch of different topics that I've always wondered what, you know, how you would respond, how you'd handle it. I'm curious for you sure. Hobby adventure thing you do with your spouse. That is in kid-centric. Yeah.
(12:16): So I mean, we, obviously, we got three kids right. In the thick of it and you know, nine, 13 and 17. So there are those activities. And so we has became mandatory for us as a date night, you know, try and do date night once a week, where we get together and we hang out, we talk and that's, you know, super critical for us. There's, you know, there's been some other things, but one of the things like that, you'll do talking about a venture with your guys. And now the trips, the Overlander that you're doing, there's times I'll walk away and I've got guys in my age that are w you know, we're kind of frustrated. Like I want to go do that, but I can't, I got these young kids. And so at for a while, I would have a guilt or a frustration after hearing about your great week long trips.
(12:55): I'm like, I can't do this. I only have X amount of weeks in corporate America. But what I was able to do is piece it and say, you know what, I'm going to go do on a, go on a guys' camping trip for one weekend. Yeah. That's it huge. And so that's been a big piece that Holly and I have done is we've done some getaways. I get my guy trips and she gets her lady trips. And so those pieces that we've done, so we come back and what I have found in our marriage, and I know it would be true for you as well. We both come back from our trips together, our trips individually, with our cuffs being full and ready to give more to the marriage because we're excited. We don't feel drained.
(13:31): And you've got something else to talk about and share. I saw this thing, I did that thing. You're, you're, you're developing yourself. And when two people are developing themselves, sometimes in separate environments, just not always separate environment, but for that weekend, when they come back together, they got something else to give the other person. It's a big deal. Yeah. I'm in a unique spot. I'm in my prime income earning years. All my kids are out of the house had been for a while. They're all married. All my college bills are done. You know, all, all that stuff is, is over. So, you know, Libby and I are able to do more expensive, longer lasting things now that we could've never done 15 years ago, but I'll tell you this. If we could have been more serious about this 15 years ago, with the things you're talking about, that would be massive. Even if the adventure is every night before we go to bed, we're going to walk for a mile and talk. Yeah. That's, that could be a big deal. Even if, as you just mentioned, we're going to go and we're going to camp one night and we're going to take really great steaks and we're going to cook them on the grill and we're going to have 10, six, you know, I, gosh, that could be a totally new, fresh thing.
(14:46): Thank you very much for listening to today's episode. I hope you're enjoying it so far before we go back to the rest of this episode. I want to share with you my book when at home first, some of you have read it. So thank you very much for others of you. You have not. And I encourage, if you're looking for a resource to help you with these times of your work is now in your home and your home is now in your work. And what this looks like. This book is being helpful to many leaders like you whores magazine said it was one of seven books. Everyone on your team should read in the book is broken up into four different sections to help you versus about you. Understand who you are. The second is marriage in ideas and tips to help with your marriage. Third is parenting and then last is work. So these four different sections to help you recalibrate during this time and to help move forward. So if you are needing additional resource, I encourage you to check out my book went home. First. It is available on Amazon, as well as audible and so on to the rest of the episode. Thank you very much.
(15:53): So I want to talk about faith in the house, how you raise your kids. Cause tension that I will have in my own home is I lead a lot with faith. I talk about faith with clients, but I don't want to do so much all the time in the house. I pushed the kids away. Cause sometimes it's annoying. Dad wants to do a devotion or dad wants to pray for this. How did you lead your kids at home from a faith perspective? Because you're a pastor, obviously, you know, seven days a week, but there's some days you had to figure out, I gotta dial back a little bit. I'm are all three of my kids are going to not, I want to do anything with God and I'm going to do anything with me. So how did you bounce? Maybe it has something to do with ages their youngest years, their teenage years. What did that look like in your house?
(16:32): Well, I dunno if you'd like the answer or maybe you will like the answer cause you'll feel really good about yourself. You know? I never led Bible studies of my kids. I tried a few times and every time somebody cried, literally every time someone cried, you know, it was like, cause I didn't say the right thing or I was challenging somebody. And so when I hear women talk, my husband has to be the leader of the home. He's not being leader of the home. And I talked to them about what their expectations are. Like I said, I understand you're expecting your husband and do something I never did. And I'm a seminary graduate who is pretty darn good at teaching and pretty darn good at leading discussions. And I was ever able to figure that out or instigate that my house and I was still a leader in my home.
(17:19): Even there, the, the leader in the home. I'm not sure that I'm willing to tell myself I'm the leader in the home. I'm not sure I'm willing to say that I'm more important than my wife when it comes to creating the spiritual climate in the home. I know some would get really, really freaked out about that. You know, but when the Bible says, women are to submit to their, their, their husbands and husbands are to die for their wife. The F the first account before that is submit to one another. We can submit to one another because we're equals before each other. And so there is equal value to the spiritual climate that mom and dad can and should bring. Where I excelled was in the book of Deuteronomy, the great Shema, which talks about what's known in the, in the, in the Hebrew culture, you take the, the laws and you bind them around your forehead, bind them around your wrists.
(18:13): This is where we get the idea of phylacteries from, if you go over to Jerusalem, you'll still see Orthodox Jews walking around with little boxes on their foreheads. It's with scripture verses in there, they're putting the law of God on their mind. It says to do that and then says, talk about your children when you rise up. And when you sit down, when you walk, when you this, and, and what it's talking about is the overarching pattern of life. You need to be willing to build into your kids more so than, Hey, it's Sunday night. It's time for family devotions, which again, I am pro family devotions. I know people who've done them really well, and they've been a blessing. I just wasn't able to do, do those well. I wasn't able to pull it off, but what I did do is live a consistent life before your kids know Christ intimately and bring him up in conversation regularly.
(19:05): I never did a home Depot trip going to buy two by fours or whatever. Why I didn't grab a kid and say, come on. You're coming with me. I had my kids when I, well, my, my youngest daughter in home Depot with me not too long ago, and we're walking along and she pulled out her phone and was videotaping me walking along, like quickly through the Isles. And she was 20 something at that point 21, maybe something like that. She sent it to the, to all of our family, email chat or, or group text chat and said, just like old times, me trying to keep up with dad, going through home Depot, you know, cause I was where I was going. They were going to go and we'd have conversations, whatever it was, put them in a, in the cart at home Depot or a Kroger and, and do wheelies on the cart and push them faster than anybody should be pushing them.
(19:51): And just, just, you know, just have fun with them, scare her a little bit. You know, those were bonding moments and we got to talk about things, whatever it was who got is what sexuality is about, how to pray, what integrity is. They see you getting, paying your bill, it's home Depot or wherever it is and everything is there. And you look at the receipt or you notice there's something in the cart that you can walk out with, but hasn't been paid for. And they see you pick it up and say, Hey, don't forget to charge me for that. I'm not, not sitting there that moment going, Hey, this is a teachable moment to let my kids see how I have integrity, but they're just naturally seeing that. And that has an impact on them. Someone said to me a long, long time ago is that kids may come in contact with all kinds of alternative worldviews that may rock and challenge their faith. But they'll never be able to explain a way, dad, if you walk humbly with your God and they see that you're a person of consistency, we have our problems. We have our shortcomings. We're not perfect. I'm not saying we've got to be a plus legalist here, but I'm saying as your kids see you walking humbling with your God and you do that with them wherever you are, you're spiritually forming them and your spiritual leading them.
(21:14): Yeah. I love that phrase where it's a, let your kids catch you praying just to catch you, praying, catch you doing something nice where it's the actions speak louder than words. That's a great, great word. So
(21:26): A couple other topics I want to hit on. Just kind of fast to just get your perspective. One is comparison. I myself can dabble with comparison with what our other coaches do. But I also, a lot of my clients are business owners and they're looking around at the size of another company. And they're seeing that. How have you dealt comparison, especially, I mean, even now as you get more and more in social media and you're out there and you're seeing exactly what everyone else is doing, how do you handle that with yourself to keep you grounded in both not how fast you're growing or maybe I'm not growing as fast as this individual? How do you handle comparison?
(22:00): Oh gosh, Corey, I don't know that I handled it all that well. It is a never ending thorn in my side. There's a publication that puts out the list of the fastest growing churches and the largest churches called outreach magazine. And we had a really good run at appearing at the top of those lists for a number of years. And then I decided like, we're not going to submit our numbers for this list. Again, it was helpful to look at those numbers and benchmark and learn things, seeing churches that are doing really great things saying, Hey, we need to call them up and learn from them. I'm not anti those lists. I think there's some good in it. But I recognize for me, it was starting to do more, more hurt to me than it was upside. I was starting to feel like I was corporate America trying to work on the numbers.
(22:52): So they look good when we turn them in. Instead of what's the longterm best choice for the church that could lead me to one decision. What's the thing that's going to help our numbers when we turn them in, that could leave me another decision. So we stopped participating in that because of that. And because it was a thorn in my flesh, I just was, I was getting too much joy and too much pain out of comparing myself and seeing somebody doing better or not as well as us. So we had to get out of that. And that, that thing doesn't end today, we all have an orphan heart. I haven't, I have a literal orphan heart cause I was, I was born at a very young age and then I was put up for adoption. I'm very thankful I was put up for adoption, but psychologists would say that there is a primal wound that happened to me when I am separated from the only person I knew in the womb.
(23:45): And that's caused me to be more sensitive to rejection than the average person it's caused me to compare myself to others, probably more than the average person, because in comparing myself to others, I'm feeling that I'm doing good or I'm not doing good. I'm using that as a constant bellwether for my identity because that's the orphan tendency. We're in it alone. Everyone's going to reject us. How do I, how do I justify and verify my existence, knowing this, if you will evil attack, it's on me knowing it and being able to name it is helped me greatly, but I'm not over it. I've got, I've still got to recognize it and call it out when it's unhealthy or when something's being lost on me. I think the most important thing is just to stay in the fight. You know, we talked about, or we, the book of Romans and I do the things I don't want to do.
(24:42): That's the apostle Paul. He wrote the majority of the new Testament. He may, he saw miracles regularly. They're happening through his life. And yet he said that it's because our sinful nature, whatever it is, it's like a warped piece of wood. And when Jesus comes into your life, if he comes into your life, the rule of sin is killed in your life. But it's like chopping off the head of a chicken it's dead, but it runs around and squawks and makes a lot of noise. We're like work pieces of woods. Jesus may straighten us, but there is still a bent to us to bend back that other way. And we've got to stay in the hands of Christ, feeling his pressure to keep us on the straight and narrow versus bending back to my previous warp drives and motives. So I'm not over that. I got to recognize it and I've got to repent of it. I've got to ask forgiveness for it. And I've got to, I've just gotta be on my point on my game. Cause it'll, it'll Jack me up at a moment's notice. Yeah.
(25:46): I love when you find truth and like even like non in secular places or business books like Jeff Bezos talks about in the everything store that his book where you can't feel 30% better about yourself when the stocks up 30%, because you, for sure don't want to feel 30% less when the stock is 30% less.
(26:04): I also love what he said in that book. When you know Amazon for years and years and years, they weren't turning a profit years. And years and years, everybody was saying, this is smoke and mirrors. This was before a time when there were viable, successful internet businesses. And they had thrown in on this. And for years and years and years and was hoping, hoping it would pay out. And one of the things he said is, Hey, it's not working yet. I love that line. It's not working yet. Now we know what Amazon's probably got to be the most profitable business in the history of the world right now, or at least right up there. But they went a long, long time without that at all. And we, and our lives and our family life and our business life, our financial life, our friendship life. We have to do the right things that we're convinced are going to work eventually, but they're not working yet.
(26:59): I'm going to place in my life quarry where life is complex enough where there's very few things I'm going to learn that I'm going to be able to turn a switch on and my life is going to be better immediately. You know, there there's early on in my spiritual formation. You know, there were some things like, oh wow, light bulb goes off, bam, oh, that's going to make a big difference right now you get to a place in your spiritual formation or the complexity of life where there's gonna be a lot longer lead time on these things. Like the thing we talked about earlier, having a hobby with your wife that could be a game changer with you. It could also lead to a crappy weekend. Cause you're going to have your first camping trip with your wife. You're find out why you both hate camping, where the mosquitoes are bugging or it rains or rains, or, or this is even more intimidating. You're with yourself, with each other, for a 24 hour straight period of time with nothing to do other than talk with one another. And you learned, we can't keep up a conversation with each other this long. We haven't built those muscles and it actually could get worse because now you feel like you're more of a loser. Keep doing it yet. Yet. There's a lag time between the right disciplines and the right results. I love that
(28:14): Yet. Even Paul talks about by one degree, you know, we're, we're getting closer to reveal in the glory of God where's that yet or not there yet, but, but let's keep doing it. Yes. Through all this intentionality, be better parents, better spouses, better leaders
(28:27): At work. And that's walking by faith. If there wasn't a yet, if there wasn't a delay period ruin me faith. I don't need any level of faith to understand one plus one equals two. I get that answer and it works for me immediately. But the things that God calls us to that are the big things. They're the important things. There's always a lag time. And that lag time is where faith resides. Faith has me do something where I know what's going to be a lag time. It's not gonna be immediate payoff. And the way I survive in that lifetime is saying, no, I have faith. I have faith that this will work. And if it doesn't work, I have faith that God still approves in me and he loves me. And my, and my life will still be fine. Even if this thing doesn't happen the way I'm working for it to happen.
(29:19): Brian, I could keep going, ask tons of questions. I love just learning from me. So thank you. What's the best way for the win home first listeners to follow you, Brian tome.com. And I also have my social media accounts, which are at Brian tones. Well, thank you very much for being on the podcast today. It's my Pleasure.
(29:40): I want to thank you. Listening to my podcasts. When at home first, I am so grateful to hear from listeners like you, that this content has been helpful. So now I would love for you to pay it forward. I want to get this message in the hands of more listeners. We need leaders to be winning both at home and at work, especially during this time. So please take a minute to share this episode with somebody you think would find value in it, as well as rate and subscribe as a thank you, please visit my website@coriumcarlson.com to download a free resource that people are finding value in. Thank you very much.
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