You're listening to the Uncommon Life Podcast. Whether you're a startup or you've been in business for 10 years, this show is for you. Each week, you'll get mentored by business leaders who deliver valuable strategies, tactics and tips on how you can pursue your passion without compromise. We’ll show you how to achieve balance while sticking to your core values, so you can have an uncommon life.
Now, here's your host, Jimmy Fullerton.
Jimmy: Okay, so this is the first podcast that I've done since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic that has swept across the land, so we do talk about that and how it has impacted us, and some things that we've done to try to stay positive in a time when it just seems like there's so much darkness and negativity, and uncertainty, and people are panicking and hoarding. And we're trying to talk about giving and trying to stay positive, and some things we're doing there.
We also talk about morning rituals, the importance of those to get your mindset right. We go into some different … off to some bunny trails here, but we talk about the cold plunge, what that's about, some books that have impacted us.
So, anyway, good stuff. It’s a lot of fun. I think you will get a lot out of it. Anyway, this is Part 2.
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Jason: I guess when you're in it, you feel like you're by yourself and then no one knows how you feel. But it's just not the case, you know? I'll tell you, the biggest thing that I learned was a year after. It was Valentine's Day of 2012 and I'm feeling very sorry for myself, just to say what it is, what I've been through.
Everything was about me, and not even me. Me and my family went through so much as well. They all loved her and they were taking care of me. And here I was, the guy that was supposed to be laughing and get everybody rolling, and I can't get out of bed in the morning. And everybody was going through it. It wasn't just me. I was being very selfish at the time and not realizing it.
But man, I got in the van, my Ride on Bikes van, a little Sprinter, and we had my dog, Coby, I had at the time, a German shepherd, and my bicycle. And I called my mom, my uncle and my brother, my younger brother, and told them, “Guys, I'm turning my phone off for a little while. I'm fine. I’ve just got to get away from here. I can't hear the people whispering in the back anymore. I can't be at work anymore. I don't know, man. I’ve just got to get away from here and get my head straight.” And I drove away.
I didn't know where I was going. Honestly, I had zero plans. I ended up in Savannah that night. But the second day, I went to Charleston, South Carolina. I had a great-uncle Pete. He was 88 at the time. And I went and knocked on his door, and the reason I want to talk to Great-Uncle Pete is Uncle Pete had lost all three of his children at three different times. Can you imagine, man?
Jimmy: Oh my God. Three? He lost three kids?
Jason: Three kids, three different situations. And he had a granddaughter and, man, he was one of the most joyful people I'd ever met in my life and it had dawned on me, he's got something figured out. I'm going to go talk to him.
So, I went and knocked on the door and he was surprised to see [03:00.0] me. I said, “Can I take you to lunch?” He said, “Sure. And what in the world?”
I took him out to lunch and I said, “Uncle Pete, man, you've been through so much worse than me. Yeah, I can't get out of bed in the morning and you live this joyful life, man. Can you please help me? I don't understand.”
And he was a Navy guy, retired Navy guy. He said, “Son, life can be a box of cherries as long as you can pass the seeds.” I was like, That is disgusting, you know?
And we talked for a while and nothing really came out of it. But then he got a little aggressive with me and he said, “Son, let me tell you something. You're supposed to be the one that's keeping this family together. That's your job. And all this moping around and crying and stuff that you're doing right now, you are hurting your uncle and your brother, and your mom. Get it together.”
Man, if anybody else in the world would have said that to me, there would’ve been a physical fight on their hands. It would have been, because in my mind I was thinking, Do you know what I've been through? But I realized who I was talking to. I can't say that. This man has been through 10 times worse than I've ever been through. And I was angry, man, but I didn't say anything. I took him back to this house and gave him a hug, and I went on about my business.
It took him dying a couple of years later to realize what he was doing, because when I came home from that trip, I was gone two weeks and I'd thought about what he had said to me, and I started faking it. No one saw me cry again. I even started trying to go on dates and stuff against everything in my heart that I wanted to do because I didn't want to hurt my mom and my uncle, and my brother. It wasn't what I wanted to do. It was important to me. So, I just tried faking it and, man, I'd be damn if it didn't start getting a little better. The waves got a little further apart of the depression and being dark, and what I learned--
Jimmy: Ah, so you were faking it, which most people attribute to something negative, but in this case, sometimes you know that saying you fake it till you make it. Sometimes you act. You can't just live life and let your feelings dictate how you live your life. Sometimes you’ve got to act a certain way and your feelings will line up with what your actions are saying to your body. So that's the way I've always interpreted “fake it till you make it.” Is that kind of what you're talking about here?
Jason: This part of it where I learned at my Uncle Pete's funeral, I went. I was sitting there, listening at the funeral and I realized what he did. He brain-injured me. He knew that I would do anything for my Uncle Buddy, my mom and my brother. Anything in the world. I wouldn't do it for myself. He knew my soul. He knew that I would do anything for them.
And I realized what the reason he was joyful was for his granddaughter and his wife. He couldn't say that to me, so he didn't want to be aggressive with me and tell me that. He probably cried when I left the building. He didn't want to do that, but he knew that I would do anything for them and that's what happened. Man, I came back and I faked it for them, and that's the reason I was able to, I would never say move on, but it was a reason to adapt better, you know?
Jimmy: So, that was kind of a pivot point for you in your life.
Jason: It was a big point in my life right then. And losing someone like this, it was it really hard that first year, man, of thinking like I didn't want [06:00.0] someone to see me smile or laugh because I felt like it would look like that I was over it or that I had moved on, or I didn't want somebody to send me on a date because I was afraid of …
And what I've learned at this point, if the people that really care about you want you happy, then they're the ones that really matter. And the others, there's going to be haters no matter what, and especially the more popular you get or whatever, there's going to be more and more haters, and those are the people that don't matter, let's be honest about it. And that was a big, big turning point for me as well.
And you never get over something like that. It's just like right now, man, if you lost your right arm, your arm is gone. You never get over that, ever. You learn to live with it.
Jimmy: Life is altered for good.
Jason: You adapt. You're going to live on. You're going to be fine, but you're going to learn to live with it. But you're never going to forget that you don't have a right arm. You’ve just got to change things. And, for me, that was what losing Natalie was like.
Jimmy: That's a good point. You adjusted mentally and you took some positive steps. I think that's also important, to kind of figure out a way to get some positive momentum going in your life when you're in your darkest spot like that. So it's also great and necessary to have people, like you did, that he might've been harsh with you, but he did it out of love.
Jason: That’s right.
Jimmy: And ultimately that helped lift you up out of that dark place you were in.
Jason: I'm so grateful for that in the end.
Jimmy: Right now, what currently gives you the most joy and satisfaction? I think I know the answer to this question, but what currently gives you the most fulfillment?
Jason: My entire life I feel like is based around helping others and sharing my life experiences like we're doing today, and sharing and helping others with everything that I've learned, good and bad. You know what I mean? I've made some really dumb choices. I've made some bad decisions. I've had some failures in my life. I have obviously made mistakes in relationships with my friends and whatever, all the things we all do, and taking that and not just letting it go away.
Because this is my thing, jimmy. If I don't tell these stories and people don't benefit from the stuff, then all my pain happened in vain. My wife's life was lost in vain. All my family and all her family, and all of our friends, all the pain we went through, it was just wasted.
Dude, that's not an option for me, man. It was too important and it was too hard. And, no, I'm not pretending that I'll get over it, man. I still have down days. It still hits me right between the eyes sometimes, still at this point, nine years later. So, for me it's sharing these life experiences, telling you the baseball story and going through that, and telling you those dark moments that I've had, because I want people to benefit from it. It's super important.
I heard a podcast the other day and it was saying being generous with your scars. Man, what a great analogy. That's what you're doing. You’ve got to be generous. You’ve got to share those. And I think it's really important because I hope, you never know, man, what we're talking about right now affects one person in a positive way, one person. It would mean what you're doing with the podcast in general, if you affect one person, that's worth all your time and effort.
Jimmy: Yeah, it is, absolutely [09:00.2], and I think when you look at it the way you're talking about it, letting your scars help other people, that changed your whole perspective on life. When you're going through something, you look at it differently. It's like I may be going through a tough time, but I can use this to help somebody at some point. When you get that mindset, it changes your life. People don't really understand that. But when you look at life that way, your life is forever altered for the better.
Jason: I was giving a speech in 2014 and it was the Servant Leadership Program. It was Georgia Tech, Emory, Columbus State, Valdosta State, and I think Arnold maybe was what it was, but it was a small group. It was 60 kids. They were all really, really advanced, Servant Leadership scholarship kind of thing, and I was shown a video.
I had just shaved my head. I used to have long hair and I lost a bet. My team, if they raised $10,000 for the local autism chapter, I would shave my head. That's what they wanted to do, and they raised right that 15,000. We made a video out of Incolr. It did an incredible job of doing this video. So, I opened the speech with this video. It made sense. It started with leadership, right? And I was telling them.
They asked me how the idea came up and I'm very open in speaking that you can raise your hand talk anytime. It was more like a conversation than just me standing up on a podium. They asked me how I got started and I was like, My wife and I, we started a program called Roll It Forward, and I was telling him this idea we had. We were helping young, underprivileged kids get on bicycles. It was me and Natalie working on that project.
Man, I'll never forget, a young guy on the front row, he raised his hand and I was like, Yeah, man, what's up? He was like, Where's your wife now? And I was like, Oh God. I had never talked about it in public. It had been three years. And I said, Well, that's a great question, and I sat there, man, it felt like for 20 minutes. It was probably 10 seconds. And I was like, So, my wife passed away in 2011.
And he stood up, man. He looked me in my soul. He goes, Man, how do you stand up there making us laugh like everything's good when you've been through something like that?
And the teacher in the back was like, Oh, you don't have to answer that. I was like, No, that's an adult question. I said, “Give me just a second. Let me come up with a good response,” and I told him the Uncle Pete story. I didn't know what else to do. And my whole speech just took a turn. I had an hour in front of them. This was 10 minutes into it.
Man, what happened when it was over with, I thought I bombed completely because I got way off track from what I'm supposed to be talking about, but, man, the kids lined up to talk to me, and they came and they told me their story and [crosstalk], man.
Jimmy: People love it when you're vulnerable.
Jason: That’s it.
Jimmy: I know that when … also, I have a small group of teenagers at Cascade Hills. I'm a small-group leader, and getting kids in the age range of 14 to 17 to open up is like pulling teeth.
Jason: Oh yeah, but it’s not cool, you know?
Jimmy: It's not. It's not. I was like that, too, but I know one day I opened up about something that I had been struggling with and was very vulnerable, and it really changed a lot when I did that. They started opening about stuff I'd never thought I'd get them to talk about. And people in general, whenever they know they're talking to somebody who's also [12:00.0] willing to expose some vulnerability, it helps them to trust you more, so that’s a big deal, too.
Jason: Yeah, man. This one kid, he told me that he got into a car accident and he killed his eight-year-old cousin in the car. It was his fault, and he felt like after hearing my story and seeing that I was, quote, “successful” in his mind on the other side of things, that he could do it, too.
And, man, that was what kind of lit my fire of like, I’ve got to share this story more so I can help people with this. Because I was keeping it to myself because I thought it was a downer and I thought I was going to be … It was just a dark thing. I didn't really want to visit it again, honestly. I just wanted to move on from the story. But, after that, I was so grateful for that question in the front. I don't know why I would’ve been doing what I'm doing now, if it wasn’t for that kid asking that question.
And, man, I don't know, it happens a lot. People, they reach out and they want to go have coffee, and it's not just kids either, man. I had to go speak at Boots to Business at Fort Benning. Here I am, a kid and their eyes, and these guys, these colonels, they have to go through this process of getting out of the military and they don't want to listen to me, a kid at the bike shop. But when I tell the story and they realize that I've dealt with real pain and real loss, man, now I'm having coffee with generals and colonels on the other side of things, and they realize they can relate and they appreciate that they can be successful after the pain as well.
Jimmy: It takes guts to be willing to put yourself out there like that. That’s the key, being willing to do that and having enough confidence or security in yourself, or just … I don't know.
Jason: The reason has to be great.
Jimmy: Yeah, it’s got to be bigger than it being just about you.
Jason: Exactly, that's it. That's the truth, yeah.
Jimmy: I did want to talk for a second about, right now, this is the first podcast I've done since this coronavirus pandemic has swept the nation and the world. I know there's a lot of darkness, a lot of uncertainty, a lot of worry, but I've also seen some positive stuff, too, from this. But I know having a business like you have a business, it has created a whole new set of challenges for people like us.
What are some things that you've done from a leadership standpoint to keep your team and yourself, I guess, first of all, yourself positive, and not get swept up in all this gloom and doom?
Jason: Yeah, so my girlfriend, Jordan, she's a nurse like I mentioned earlier and so kind of being on the frontline. Not kind of. She is the frontline. She is the soldier that is fighting this battle.
Jimmy: By the way, all restaurants are close now, but most of them are anyway. I was going to say, if you ever see any healthcare workers in a restaurant, bomb dinner, lunch, wherever they're eating, bomb something, once they open up. Definitely do that.
Jason: Yeah, and shoot him a message, man, on social or whatever you can do. Just let them know you're thinking about them because they're in a real battle for their life literally right now that they're facing. And it's hard for us, I know, that we're having a social distance and staying at home, but imagine having to be in it and knowing that you're being exposed. It's not a question if you are or not. [15:00.0]
So, hearing what's going on with them and understanding this, we've gotten so efficient as a country that it's turned on us. We had enough beds for how many people we serve in our community. We had enough workforce, enough nurses to serve our community, and we've gotten so efficient. We have just enough supply.
Jimmy: A fragile supply chain as a result, so this is what has happened.
Jason: Yeah, all the way around, efficiency has bit us hard right now. I'm not trying to be a downer on it. I do feel like this at the beginning. I think we have more time. There are some estimates saying the peak is in June, so we’ve got some more time on it. I think it's a reality. I don't feel like I'm being a doomsday guy by any means. I feel like making sure right now, what we can do is to take it seriously.
Ride on Bikes, the business has just blown up since this has happened. I have a couple of my team members that have some underlying health issues. One of the reasons they're in cycling in the first place is to deal with those health issues, and against their wishes, we've asked them to kind of stay at home for now. We're still paying them the best we can and obviously all that is the same as long as we can. They want to be there. They want to serve the community as well, but this is the right thing to do for them.
And we’ve just gone over and beyond on the cleanliness part of it, more so than ever. We always disinfect helmets, for example. That's always been the case, but now we're disinfecting entire bicycles and repairs, and my team, we meet every day and we talk about the situation. I'm not making the decisions alone.
Jimmy: How long do y’all meet?
Jason: We meet every Friday morning religiously, always for an hour and a half, which everybody thinks is a long time. But, man, we have so much going on. I want to hear what they have to say about what they have, what they see in the marketplace and things that went right or wrong this week, and they have a voice in my company.
Jimmy: That’s great, man, getting that feedback from people that are right there in the middle of it and letting them feel free to express that.
Jason: Absolutely. I want everybody to have confidence. I don't care if you're … I have one 18-year-old that works for him. His voice is just as important as mine in those meetings. But now we're just kind of spending 15 minutes in the morning and 15 minutes in the evening every day and like, Hey, man, how are y'all feeling? They don't have to be at work.
And there was a moment where the team, at the last Friday morning meeting, they all kind of said, “Hey, man, I think we should shut down.” I was like, All right, let's do it. Let's just look at both sides of things now. I gave them the devil's advocate on both sides. At the end of it, they realized that we really are serving our community.
The mental health part of it is super important for people to get out and exercise. There are a lot of people that use a bicycle for commuting, how they're getting around, and what these kids are doing now. I mean, like with you, you have to be shut down, gathering, but a bicycle, you can stay in your distancing, and you can be outside and stay healthy. So, families are buying bikes and for the whole family.
Jimmy: It’s the perfect fit for your business.
Jason: It really is. And we have automatic doors. You don't touch the door coming in or out, so we think that's a big part, and limiting the amount of people in the store at one time. We do our online waivers via cell phone now, so you don't come in and touch anything in the store [18:00.1]. So, we've taken [steps]. We're wearing gloves. Mainly the gloves are more so to remind ourselves not to touch our faces because it's so common, man, because we’ve got …
Jimmy: I struggle with that.
Jason: I do, too. But you have big blue gloves on, you don’t …
Jimmy: Yeah.
Jason: As of today that we're actually recording this, we are shut down on a Monday, which I don't ever do, just to be able to rewrite my protocol and make sure I'm keeping my team and the community safe. It's super important.
Like I said, in Philadelphia, they just made bike shops essential business, and you've seen across the country that that's becoming a thing. They are making it essential business. So, now, at this point, we just have to make sure that we're being as safe as possible. And I am talking with the mayor's office. I'm not going against anyone. If he called me today and said, Jason, I need you to shut down, I would.
Jimmy: So what I'm hearing is I need to buy some stock and buy companies. That’s what I’m hearing.
Jason: Maybe so, yeah.
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Jimmy: I'm really big on this. I like to ask people this. But do you have a morning ritual or thing that kind of gets your mind in the right place? What do you do?
Jason: I have recently discovered yoga, which is interesting.
Jimmy: Yoga. As you get older you will appreciate that even more. Nothing makes you feel old like feeling stiff.
Jason: And I've got to tell you at this point and the last six months that I've been practicing, I still despise it while I'm doing it. I hate every second of it, man. None of it. It doesn't feel good to me while I'm doing. I don't like it. It's hard. My yoga instructor, I've been using Charlotte. She works at River Flow and she had the standup paddleboards still.
Jimmy: Yeah, I took my daughter there for the little. They had a thing for kids back then, two or three years ago. It was great. I loved what they did for her.
Jason: And she constantly, though, reminds me, Hey, McKenzie, shaking is good. I'm like, I'm doing a fantastic thing because I'm shaking, and I don't like it. But, man, afterwards the effects had been very good for me mentally and physically. I practice meditation as well 20 minutes a day.
Jimmy: For how long? Twenty minutes?
Jason: Yeah.
Jimmy: What kind of meditation do you do? They have different kinds that you can do, like one about being present or they have some where you just go blank. What kind do you do?
Jason: I use guided.
Jimmy: Guided meditation.
Jason: Yeah, so Headspace is the app.
Jimmy: Headspace. Yeah, I’ve heard of that.
Jason: It's $90 a year, which at first I was like, Good gracious, but, man, they give you 10 free days. I strongly suggest it, man, because they kind of helped me. [21:00.0] And I'm not pretending that I'm good at it. My mind goes a million miles an hour. It never ever shuts off, you know?
Jimmy: Yeah. What I've heard about that, I've read some stuff on this, too, because I'm also a believer in that. They say sometimes when you start out, when your mind is like that, this helps me sometimes. I don't do it as much as I should, but get a journal and just write down all those thoughts that are going in your brain. Put them down on paper sometimes. It will help kind of clear your brain out. It definitely helps. I wish I did it more, but I just don't always think about having all that near. But when I need it the most is when my brain is going a thousand miles an hour like it has been the last couple of weeks.
Jason: Yeah.
Jimmy: So, you do guided meditation and, yeah, I get the whole thing about your brain running around.
Jason: I mean, some days, the majority of the time, I feel like it wasn't a good session, but I'll tell you this. The days that I don't do it, it's obvious. I am better when I at least try it, at least when I take that second. Because, man, what we do right now in general as a society, we get up in the morning and we start looking at Facebook and the emails, and our world takes over, and all of a sudden we're serving everyone else. We're not taking care of ourselves.
And I feel like taking care of your mental stability, especially from the things that I've been through … I've watched mental health be a real big issue in my life, and if you don't take care of yourself mentally, you can't take care of anybody else, the mental and physical part of it. So, I think making sure that you're mentally and physically taking care of yourself every day, even if it's only 20 minutes long, physical and mental, it’s important.
Jimmy: Some people struggle with that so much, especially those that have a really servant-oriented heart, they feel if they take any time for themselves, they're being selfish. I know my wife struggles with that sometimes because she's very service oriented and sometimes I have to be proactive and help her to take time for herself. She needs it.
But I'm just wired that way, to make time for myself, and sometimes maybe it can be viewed as selfish, but I know that for me to be the best I can be, I need to do that. And the first hour of the day for me is the only hour I can control completely, so that's usually when I do most of it.
Jason: Same for me. It's always in the morning because my day gets … I'm a server in general. I just like to serve people and help. But like my mother, I can only imagine … I don't have children, but have to remind her, If you're going to be here for my kids and your grandkids, hopefully, one day, I hope that's in the plans, you’ve got to take care of yourself now to be able to serve everyone as well as you can.
It's just like Jordan as a nurse right now. You’ve got to take care of yourself first or you're not able to help more people in the future, and I think for that person that is such a servant like your wife, you’ve got to word it that way. If you're going to help more people, you have to take care of yourself now.
Jimmy: Exactly. It’s not selfish. It’s like taking care of your car.
Jason: Exactly. That's it, yeah.
Jimmy: So, what kind of books have had the most impact on you?
Jason: That's a great question, man. My favorite book is The Go-Giver.
Jimmy: The Go-Giver.
Jason: [24:00.0] Robert Burg. It's a fictional story and it's a very easy read. It makes you feel smart. It's like big print, seven-page chapters, so you feel like you did a lot in a day. And it's about servant leadership and the five laws of stratospheric success. For me, I buy in boxes of 50 and I give it away as fast as I can, and the only thing I ask is that people give it to another person. I feel like if we could, as a society, live the way this thing says, I feel like it would change things.
Jimmy: What's the underlying premise of The Go-Giver?
Jason: The gist of it is your value, how you determine your values, how many people you serve. And the fifth rule is very important for your wife and for my mother. It’s that, to be able to give, you have to learn to receive, so that's the end of it. Because serve, serve, serve, serve, but if you're told to exhale for the rest of your life, and this is an analogy, if I could exhale, it’s better for everyone. Eventually, you have to inhale or you're not going to exhale anymore, and that's the gist of it.
Jimmy: There's a balance. You've got to have that balance. For you to be the best you can be, you have that balance.
Jason: Right, so that's a very good one for me. Essentialism.
Jimmy: Yeah, you mentioned that one. I remember that. It's about simplicity.
Jason: Yeah. This is a Warren Buffett quote. The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no almost all the time.
Jimmy: Yeah, [crosstalk].
Jason: And that was such a hard thing, man, to wrap my head around because I'm just like, Yeah, what's the question? Yes. Give me the ball. That’s been my mentality. But you find yourself, you're actually just pissing everybody off because you're not helping anybody.
Jimmy: Juggling all these balls and you drop more than you can possibly juggle at one time.
Jason: Yeah.
Jimmy: Yeah, something I've learned over the last year really is that I've always been one of those kinds that whenever I'm driving … I have downtime where I'm like, if I'm driving, I need to be listening to something. I feel like I need to feed my brain, and what I've learned lately is that sometimes downtime is really the best thing you can do, because if you're always feeding your brain and don't give it some time to just rest, and process stuff and make connections, you can't really be a good problem solver. You can't really be creative. Your brain needs that downtown to be able to think. So, yeah, the light came on for me when I read that book, Stillness Is the Key, because it talks about that.
Jason: What a great book, man.
Jimmy: It is.
Jason: I just finished that one. I had no idea you were going to bring that up. I just finished it last week.
Jimmy: It was life-changing for me. It made me try to be intentional about building in white space into my schedule, not just feel like I have to fill every moment with something.
Jason: I love that book, too. They put in some real world situations. That's what it's really about. They talk about JFK’s decision and how he went about things.
Jimmy: Yeah, Bay of Pigs.
Jason: They painted the picture so well. I felt like I was in the office with him watching him. It was such a great book.
Jimmy: I know. The way he wrote that book, it really just puts you right there in the same [27:00.0] scene.
Jason: I'll tell you like on that note, man, the book before that one was a Sleep Smarter. I am not a sleep guy, man. I've always been that guy. I get up early, stay up late, just push harder, and the harder I pushed, the better it would get. I've never really taken sleep as a real benefit.
The reason I read this book, I saw an interview and this guy said that sleep is more important than diet and exercise for weight loss, and I was like, What the hell did he just say? I kind of laughed about it, and then, man, when I read this book … I've reread it now, my second time through. It's only on audible, so I listened to it, but, man, I've moved my cell phone. I'm in complete darkness now.
I've made some changes and the first week I lost eight pounds. Nothing else different, zero different. I just did the same lifestyle and same dye, all that stuff, but just getting in bed at the same time every week, moving my cell phone and being in the dark. Those were the only three things that changed. There were a lot of things he offered to change, but I really Recommend Sleep Smarter. It's a really good book.
Jimmy: I have to talk to you about that off the record.
Jason: And the thing is, just like you, man, I'm hearing you, the stuff you're reading, we're reading the same material and I never stop, man. I don't watch Junk TV, which I get in trouble for sometimes with my lady because she just wants to watch something that doesn't …
Jimmy: She wants to disconnect. I get that.
Jason: Yeah. Just last night, she was like, Can we please not watch the documentary? Because I just want to learn. I don't want to waste my time that I am awake, but I'm always trying to learn and I'll tell you what I've learned after the meditation part of it. I think we have a lot of the answers inside and we're always looking outside.
I heard a story the other day that said this guy, the power went out in his house, but he dropped his keys, so he was looking all over the house for the keys. Have you heard this story?
Jimmy: No.
Jason: He went into the living room looking for the keys, looking for the keys, but he looked outside and the street lights were still on. So, he goes out in the street and he's in the yard, and he's looking around for his keys. And his neighbor pulls up and he's like, Hey, man, what are you doing? He said, “I'm looking for my keys.”
He’s said okay and he starts helping him. Finally, the neighbor says, “Where did you drop them man?”
He says, “Well, I dropped them in the house.”
He's like, Why are you looking at them from the yard?
He said, “Well, there's light out here.”
And the essence of the story, as dumb as that sounds, is I believe we have the answers inside, but we're always looking outside for the answers. And me and you, we're guilty. We're looking. We're reading. We're trying to learn and we were watching YouTube videos, and we're going to mentors, like Tony Robbins is mine. I'm going to Tony Robbins in July and I'm really excited about it, as long as everything clears up. But I'm looking. But I really believe we have the answers inside, and being quiet and being still is how we're going to find it.
Jimmy: And that is so contrary to society right now. Nobody wants to be still. So, because it's so hard, I think definitely there's some value in that. But I had to ask you about this since you mentioned Tony Robbins. He talks about this. This is something I originally started doing about five ago, the cold plunge thing that he does now. I'll do a cold plunge, but I was talking to somebody else about this in the interview last week, but it's like a cold shower is basically what it is. Have you ever done that?
Jason: Man, I just practiced this cold plunge with my adventure company. I had a group I took to Steamboat Springs [30:00.5] and we went from the 107-degree weather water and so a freezing river.
Jimmy: So, you did the real thing.
Jason: Did it, man. It was amazing.
Jimmy: How long were you in there?
Jason: I did 20 minutes.
Jimmy: Twenty minutes.
Jason: Yeah.
Jimmy: Okay.
Jason: There's a point when you get on the other side of it that it's very comforting. I don't know how to explain it to you and I can't tell you how great my sleep was that night.
Jimmy: I've just started doing the … I don't have the ice bath thing. I don't do that. But we have a large shower and I'll turn on both heads. There are two heads. And I'll do the regular hot shower, and at the end of it, I just turn on the cold.
Jason: So hard to do.
Jimmy: I'll stand away from it. It is because you feel that, ooh, it's cold.
Jason: It takes your breath.
Jimmy: Yeah, it does. And so, I was talking to this other guy about this, Jonathan Rivera. He actually has the podcast Factory and he was interviewing me the other day. We were talking about this because he's done it, too. He said he had to stop because he always made these little female noises kind of, and the first time I did it, I made a noise. I was like, Oh my God, I hope Jessica didn’t hear that. But now I've gotten to where I'll just kind of go, {panting}.
Jason: That’s it.
Jimmy: The thing I like about it, though, the reason why I think it's good for me to do it is it helps me. My body is freaking out. I'm trying to train my mind to calm down, to slow my breathing when all that chaos is going on, and I can do it. I've gotten where I can do it and I can get to a certain point where it doesn't bother me anymore. So, I'm going to keep doing it mainly because of that, but also I've noticed that it makes me … when I get out of the shower, I feel totally awake. Every fiber of my body is awake. It's different than when I get out normally.
Jason: Have you looked into Wim Hof at all?
Jimmy: No.
Jason: Wim Hof, that's a man's name. He is the master of what you're talking about right now. I mean, he heights Mount Everest in shorts and boots.
Jimmy: Oh yeah, I have heard about him.
Jason: The guy is amazing. He's a freak, I mean, let's be honest with you. But the mind control of cold, they have given him viruses. It's weird that we're talking about it now, but they've given that and he has mentally been able to beat it. He says his mind control is how he deals with it. I mean, it's amazing.
Jimmy: Yeah. To me that's part of the value of it, being able to control yourself when there's chaos breaking out, and I started doing it right when I went into this funk about what was going on with this virus. So, I figured, I'm going to try something different to kind of stimulate me a little bit and do a challenge. Just that kind of stuff is good for helping you stay positive when you're going through a really dark time.
Jason: I’ll tell you. Obviously I have a lot of stories. I don't know how we're doing on time right this second, but ...
Jimmy: Good. You're the longest one I’ve had thus far. That’s cool.
Jason: I'm a talker. I’m going to tell you. I’ll make it as quick as possible. In 2013, when we started Incolr, Jonathan Giles and myself, Nathan Crase, there’s a group of us, our first project was that we went to Haiti and we were working on World Water Relief [33:00.0]. It was a project. So, we were raising money.
The short version of it, we just went over there and we met some people. I met Samuel. He was 19. He lived in a 200-square-foot … I can't say home. It wasn't. It was a shack. No bathroom, kind of a tarp over it. And he was very happy. He was always happy. I couldn't understand, though, how they were so happy. They didn't have … They were dying, man. They didn't have clean water. They would die. If you could imagine me as thirsty as you could possibly be and then not having clean water, and if you drink it, you're going to die. And I met him.
We came back and we raised $34,000 for them, and I'll have to share the video with you. We served 2,500 kids for 10 years with clean water.
Jimmy: Wow.
Jason: But the reason I tell you that part of the story is to go back to what you just said about realizing what we have and that kind of thing. But I was having a, quote, “bad day” at Ride on Bikes one day. This was a couple of years after this, a year after I met Samuel. And I got in my Subaru and I drove to Publix, and I went grocery shopping.
Jimmy: Subaru.
Jason: Yeah, and I come back and I'm unloading into my condo on the river, and I had a Facebook phone call on my bad day and it was Samuel calling me for the first time ever. I'd never had a Facebook phone call at the time and I answered it. I was like, Samuel. He says, “Jason, how are you?”
I mean, it was like God tapping me in the head like, You idiot, what's wrong with you? And I paused and said, “Samuel, I'm doing really well. How are you?”
He said, “Life is so good. I was able to work an extra day at the hotel this week and my soccer team is winning.”
Jimmy: Gratitude. Gratitude. That's another thing, yeah. That's a great point you just made. Perspective, and then also the whole thing about getting into the practice of gratitude and being thankful about just the everyday things that you appreciate about life. Last evening, I got back from taking my mom some food in LaGrange and then I got back here, and got my daughter to the park and we just did …
It was hardly anybody there, just me and her. She saw a little dead frog on the side of the road and she made a little grave for it and buried it, not with her hands, but put some rocks over it. It was just nice. It was nice and pleasant outside, and we just walked, and she rode her bike and I jogged a little bit. I was thinking how much I enjoyed that moment, and when you start the practice of being thankful, when you get into the practice of doing that, it helps you appreciate those little moments that you take for granted and it makes life a lot better when you do that.
Jason: If you want to get out of a funk, you want to do that? Write thank you cards. Trust me, man.
Jimmy: Help somebody else.
Jason: Write a thank you card. When I get into it, I try to do one a week. It’s my goal every Friday morning to write one. I will tell you, I miss sometimes. Your life takes over. When I get into a funk, that is the first thing I go to. I start writing thank you notes to people and thanking them for things they have done for me or for my family or whatever, and it snaps me right out of it every time.
Jimmy: That’s the perfect antidote for depression, just try to help somebody else. That’s one thing I do try to [36:00.0] do. I have the same thing that happens with you. Sometimes life gets in the way, but I do love the card I did, but a lot of times, I'll just try to call somebody that I think might need some encouragement or appreciation or something like that.
Jason: And I've gotten so far away from the handwritten letter. I really try to do that. It’s hard to do because it takes more time, but I feel like it means more than it used to.
Jimmy: It does, because nobody does it.
Jason: Right.
Jimmy: Yeah. Is there anything else you'd like to add as we conclude?
Jason: I don't think so, man. I feel like I hope if you take anything from this, defining, whatever your definition of success is, whatever that is—it doesn't have to be financially. It could be, or helping people like mine is—and I'm figuring out that definition for me is where the adventure company has come from and where the public speaking has come from, because I feel like I can help people.
Jimmy: They're all tied in together.
Jason: That’s it. And figuring out that definition I think is super important. I have young people all the time. “And how did you know what you wanted to do?” And, again, it goes back to I just wanted to help people and this is my vehicle. So, finding out that definition and then focusing on that.
Jimmy: That's a good point. I hate to interrupt you, but, yeah, helping people and finding out the right vehicle to do that, that's something that I think makes life simpler if you look at it like that, because we're all here to help people.
Jason: And kind of back into it a little bit. This is my goal and that's what I do in business all the time. This is my goal. All right, let's back into it. How am I going to get there? How can I travel the world and share an experience with the people? We'll start an adventure company and let's do that, and take people surfing in Costa Rica, and let's go skydiving and let's go ride motorcycles across the country. Let's do these things and share these experiences, which is the most precious thing about experience, getting to share them, you know?
Jimmy: Yeah, experiences. This has been awesome, man. I really appreciate it.
Jason: Thanks for having me.
Jimmy: Thanks for taking some time to come here, man. With that, we will conclude.
Jason: Right on.
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