Episode 31 from The Grit Theory.

Today we have a heart-to-heart discussion that will affect how the Grit Theory continues its journey.

Highlights include:

-Conviction Over Comfort.

-Pursuing your ideal.

-Becoming better men.

-Change happens, how do you adapt?

-A new future.

-The journey continues.

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Also, check out Be Relentless: If the obstacle is the way, then we must be waymakers HERE.

Do you want to learn more? Check out:

The Book: Be Relentless: If the obstacle is the way, then we must be WayMakers.

The Podcast: “Be Relentless Podcast”

The Fuel: Sisu Stamina, Performance Evolved

Linktree: Here.

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Episode Transcript

00;00;00;01 – 00;00;02;07

Aaron

We’re going to do a little bit of a wrap this morning.

00;00;02;18 – 00;00;09;24

Jon

Yeah, we’re just going to free flow. Yeah, it’s funny, we almost didn’t record because our conversation has been pretty passionate, pretty targeted.

00;00;10;15 – 00;00;11;07

Aaron

I tell you, it’s a.

00;00;11;07 – 00;00;11;27

Jon

Pretty fast.

00;00;11;27 – 00;00;33;23

Aaron

Pace in the off air stuff, so it’s certainly gritty. That’s why we started the podcast. Really, Because really, boy, that that got really real. I don’t know, like one of my pepys. John I’m sure yours is too. I can, I can, I can only guess is is when you go to places where you’re known and you get in, there’s a rhythm of, Hey, how are you?

00;00;33;23 – 00;01;01;03

Aaron

Fine. Good. Hey, how are you? Fine. Good. I had a buddy who who tested this theory years ago. He told me he said he had so sick of that. And he every single person that asked him that question, he says terrible, suicidal. I just kept upping the ante like, you know, no one stopped like her, you know, And that that concerns me that we’re not even willing to have a decent, gritty conversation like.

00;01;01;03 – 00;01;11;26

Jon

Imagine just a stranger asks you, Hey, how are you doing in your responses? I kept up on my suicidal ideation and how are you? And like you just say, with a dead straight face. Okay.

00;01;12;29 – 00;01;13;08

Aaron

Well.

00;01;14;02 – 00;01;14;27

Jon

I love what you’re talking.

00;01;14;28 – 00;01;32;21

Aaron

We don’t we don’t want to have those conversations like we just had a pretty hairy one this morning. And it’s for those of us in, like, our ideal audience right now are those who want to have those discussions or have had those. Yeah. And have success failure. I don’t care what I but have been willing to have them.

00;01;32;25 – 00;01;50;15

Jon

Well, we we’ve started the show on the premise of a journey, right? I don’t know. Think about it. Maybe it’s worth reading that as part of this. If you think it’s on target for some of what we’re talking. Yeah, go ahead. You think so? Okay, Jay, just remember, the show’s not free, So if you get encouraged or anything, please pay it forward and share it.

00;01;51;25 – 00;02;10;02

Jon

That’s all we ask. And it would be greatly appreciated because we want to continue this journey. And thank you so much for the feedback, right, that we get all the time from those who are listening. So that is wonderful. But, you know, I’ve been flying back and forth on a different bio, you know, for the podcast. Now we drafted something.

00;02;10;02 – 00;02;29;21

Jon

We read it for the first time a few seconds ago. Not sure if will go with it, but it’s kind of timely and then we’ll jump into the conversation. You just mentioned. So the theory focuses on the narrow path that leads to success, peace, joy and resilience. By stewarding pain well, we are able to take ownership of our lives and forge a better future.

00;02;30;08 – 00;02;45;07

Jon

Join us in the discussion as we continue the journey yet. And today the journey’s continuing. And the reason this conversation was Harry this morning is because life is real. It is. And challenges abound.

00;02;45;18 – 00;02;46;06

Aaron

Right?

00;02;46;06 – 00;02;48;12

Jon

And you have some things. You get a handle.

00;02;48;19 – 00;02;49;18

Aaron

Yeah, I do.

00;02;50;00 – 00;03;05;22

Jon

And you’re going to handle it. And what that means for us is that some of our episodes will be with just me and some have both of us, and that’s what the future is going to look like for a little bit. Right? And that’s okay.

00;03;05;29 – 00;03;29;13

Aaron

And I appreciate that too. We we’re our discussion that we’ve had, I’ll tell you this is that we were we certainly were not prescribed that which we were not willing to to have or to to take ourselves the medicine we would take ourselves. And I’ll say there’s like there’s conversations you have like, because because life happens and you go, Can I going to make some hard decisions?

00;03;29;13 – 00;03;53;11

Aaron

But what, what, what I’m choosing not to do what I wouldn’t want. John to choose for himself or any of our listeners to choose for themselves is like this quiet isolation, carry on and is be kind of dying and not dealing with it. So. So it’s been like, all right, here’s here’s what it is. And we talk through that and being ambiguous just like that to protect relationships.

00;03;53;11 – 00;03;53;25

Jon

Yeah and he.

00;03;53;25 – 00;04;10;13

Aaron

Shared but I would say more that the higher flying issue is like if there’s something that has been there’s something ongoing and you got to deal with it, you got to talk to a friend and then and then have the real conversation. And I wouldn’t placate it. Like that’s certainly not what happened. It was not.

00;04;10;18 – 00;04;11;18

Jon

There’s no application.

00;04;12;02 – 00;04;33;01

Aaron

There is no it was not a sugarcoated like there’s a lot of honesty this morning. There was. But I would say I would say it carefully thought out honesty. It wasn’t you didn’t you didn’t like, you know, full bore. I think you really stopped and paused, prayed and like this is I think what a friend should say. Some of it some of it is not reactive.

00;04;33;01 – 00;04;45;05

Aaron

And what I want to say for me, but also some of it is like, I need to say this for the person, which I really appreciate that you do, because that’s equally hard. I have to say these words. I have to not be silent in these words too.

00;04;45;07 – 00;05;07;20

Jon

Well, yeah, and I fully agree with you. The details for why you need to step away are no one’s business. But I think there’s so much value in what and in the second or third order effects of a conversation to share. And I can’t help but think like since we made the decision a couple episodes ago in the War on Lies and Despair, yeah, a lot of our principles have been tested.

00;05;09;01 – 00;05;25;11

Jon

Like they’re really being tested, man. And like, in a big way, like, you know, beloved family dog gets killed walking through that as a family. Well, how are you going to do? You can still show up and there’s, you know, that pain and that loss. Yeah, we are right. And we demonstrated that.

00;05;25;13 – 00;05;29;13

Aaron

Careful what you declare. I mean, that’s crazy. It’s it will be tested. Correct.

00;05;29;13 – 00;05;50;23

Jon

And now we’re talking about these other things. And so like you’re putting in your decision to need to step away partially for a bit is putting into practice the principles we talk about on the show. Right. My response and now our response is putting into practice these principles. So it’s like, hey, if you want to judge a tree by what it produces, it’s a fruit tree.

00;05;50;23 – 00;06;05;26

Jon

You can judge it by the fruit bats on the tree, right? You want to see what’s on it? Well, right here in the last couple of weeks, we are putting into practice the principles we’re talking about in pursuing this journey. Agree. And that’s where I love. They join us in the discussion as we continue the journey, because that’s what this is.

00;06;06;08 – 00;06;29;00

Aaron

Wow. I love that introspection to sometimes it is amazing when you when you’re pursued in truth and what is right and then you go, Wait a minute, I got to work on that. Yeah. So that or I could I could be better here. Like, you know, it’s sort of like once you begin a journey, we, we use the gym analogy a lot, sort of like I didn’t realize how out of shape I was.

00;06;29;00 – 00;06;51;27

Aaron

I didn’t realize how far I’m how far I have allowed myself to get until until I started the journey and go, wow. And then what’s kind of cool, There’s a confidence in that sort of like, Well, I’ve actually made some steps in the right direction to the point where now I can be creative and go, Hey, what else can we do?

00;06;51;27 – 00;06;56;25

Aaron

What else can we challenge? Because I want more. I want I want to walk even narrower path.

00;06;57;19 – 00;07;22;25

Jon

Yeah. And what the the value of the narrow path that we’re talking about and there’s some connotations to this term. So I want to talk about why we did it. But I think we live I don’t think it’s hard to assume we live in a world that enjoys luxury and comfort, right? So to choose to embrace hard things head on is a much less common choice and much less traveled and therefore a narrow path.

00;07;22;29 – 00;07;23;07

Jon

Right?

00;07;23;08 – 00;07;36;19

Aaron

We we live in a world now. I say more than ever, we have more choices than ever. I think freedom has been blurred because we conflate it with how many choices we have. Yeah, and choices does not mean freedom.

00;07;37;04 – 00;08;01;25

Jon

And with that right, I was thinking about this the other day because, you know, my big goal in life is obtaining greater levels of freedom for my family, myself, and then my community. Right? You have to have a cup. You have to have abundance overflowing from your self to be able to give influence. Right. So right. I want freedom in my life so that I can provide freedom, you know, financially time, all these different aspects for my family.

00;08;02;09 – 00;08;11;17

Jon

Because once I’ve done that, now I have all this abundance that I can continue to pour more lavishly out on my community and my, my fellow man. Right? So like, that’s my goal.

00;08;11;17 – 00;08;17;16

Aaron

That sounds like a lot of our guests that we talked to. It’s amazing how the next thing they do is want to influence other people.

00;08;17;24 – 00;08;34;16

Jon

And as soon as you take care of your responsibilities and you have that freedom, like what are you going to do if you if you pursue comfort, you’re just going to pursue comfort. But if you’re pursuing that hard decisions and facing difficult head on, you can be like, Well, I’m not going to just sit back. I have this gift that I want to pour out.

00;08;34;26 – 00;09;04;04

Jon

So you kind of do that. But but the tie in, I was like, okay, so freedom. This. And that’s like, freedom is unity, right? We’ve been talking a lot about divisiveness and division and fighting over silly things versus unity and the power that comes from learning to respect your neighbor. Right? Your neighbor is not your enemy. Right. And I was thinking about that is like, oh, my goodness, freedom is the greatest agent of unity and mutual respect for another human being that is out there because division creates slavery.

00;09;04;09 – 00;09;34;28

Jon

Right? It binds you because if I’m a foregone I don’t like Chevy’s if I’m a white guy and don’t like another race or whatever, like I’m binding myself. Yeah. To be not unfree. And that is a cancer and that is why I love my fellow man and work to better understand them. Now, if you’re opposed to that, then we will have issue because I’m an agent for perpetuating as we are you greater levels of unity and strength and freedom for people to be able to engage in brighter lives.

00;09;35;00 – 00;10;09;26

Aaron

Right, Right. Yeah. We’ve we’ve oversimplified things that we we should just to be critical of what we should be spending our time with the narrow path. That’s what we’re talking about. It’s it sounds like, oh, that sounds like less freedom. No, freedom comes from the train being on the tracks. That’s it. I mean, you can you can have all the decision and power all you want, but if it’s not in the right direction, where you’re where it’s supposed to be, what’s healthy and strong for your future, you’re not you’re not free.

00;10;09;26 – 00;10;33;27

Aaron

You’re in slavery. And you may have sense that. You may have sense that because you haven’t say something head on in your life that you are absolutely shackled by it. And and there’s something so much greater on the other side of you getting the shackles off, doing the work to get that out of your life to or or even or even start putting on the thing that’s that’s healthier.

00;10;33;29 – 00;10;56;13

Aaron

The habits, the rhythms, the relationships you’re supposed to have. Those brings so much freedom. And if you’ve experienced that or are experiencing that, you’ll know you. You will say, I am free because you’ll know, you know they’re there. The choices that you have are actually greater than those who think they have more choices, but they really don’t.

00;10;56;13 – 00;11;17;21

Jon

Me and so, so many good directions to go. You know, I think one of the things that is hard right now is that there’s such a perversion in lie about what is good and what’s not or what’s important, what’s not. Right. We’ve inverted the system so that things that shouldn’t cause great conflict are the all important things, right?

00;11;18;02 – 00;11;40;04

Jon

Like we’re going backwards on how people look at like, you know, all this. We’re all tribal by nature, but we’re going backwards and claiming tribalism again, right? Like, you know, based on race or sexuality or whatever it is, and we’re inverting it. What should matter is we are all free and afforded great opportunity and we want to protect that for each other despite our disagreements.

00;11;40;04 – 00;11;44;01

Jon

Right. And so we flipped it. Well, no, I care more about the fact that I like this thing. And you.

00;11;44;01 – 00;11;44;27

Aaron

Don’t write.

00;11;45;04 – 00;11;47;25

Jon

In that. That’s a that’s a lie. And I think we’re putting that to death.

00;11;48;02 – 00;11;52;21

Aaron

So the identity that we are guarding choice over the pursuit.

00;11;53;00 – 00;11;53;11

Jon

Yeah.

00;11;53;21 – 00;11;54;26

Aaron

That that’s what’s so crazy.

00;11;54;29 – 00;11;56;15

Jon

That perfectly said yeah.

00;11;56;21 – 00;12;00;08

Aaron

The preference has trumped what we’re trying to go.

00;12;00;13 – 00;12;07;11

Jon

Well life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Yes. Happiness is not guaranteed. No pursuit of it. No. And that’s the beauty.

00;12;07;28 – 00;12;38;27

Aaron

And success in the business world that I’ve heard. The the quote is the success. That success is rented and rent is due every day. And it’s just that in happiness is the same thing. Happiness isn’t something like you achieve. You don’t summit something and go done and anyone who’s ever accomplished anything, any anybody who’s won something they’ve really tried to accomplish, that’s that’s a nice thing.

00;12;38;27 – 00;13;02;25

Aaron

It’s a nice shot in the arm. But but the joy is in the journey, not in the summiting. And so happiness is a thing that’s it’s pursued. It’s simultaneous, sleep, achieve. You have it and you’re pursuing it. It’s this weird relationship. Yeah. If you camp on happiness, then you’ll find it’s like sand in your fingers. But happiness is pursued.

00;13;02;25 – 00;13;22;04

Aaron

But. But it’s it. There’s sacrifice to get it. And that is the hard part. That’s. That’s the not good news for some people. So we’re we’re we’re training kind of a rhythm of hey, just get used to the fact that it is difficult to get happiness, but you get happiness. Mm hmm. I got good news. You get a happiness, bad news.

00;13;22;04 – 00;13;25;21

Aaron

It’s difficult to get it. That’s life. Yeah.

00;13;26;02 – 00;13;47;18

Jon

And I’m just going to send it. It is life and it’s choice, right? Well, I fully believe that as human beings, we’re the. The masters of our fate and captains of our soul. You. I had a mentor who really disagreed with me when I said that. I didn’t make that up. That’s a good old statement. I can’t remember who coined it, but I disagreed.

00;13;47;18 – 00;14;06;23

Jon

He’s like, now, as Christians, you know, God is our master. And I’ve thought a lot about it because I and I realized I don’t think he’s wrong and I don’t think I’m wrong. I am the master of my fate and capital of my soul, but I’ve chosen as a Christian to give that to my king. And now I follow him, right?

00;14;06;23 – 00;14;31;22

Jon

So now I’ve taken I’ve put down my captain ship and picked up stewardship. Right. I’ve traded that in in trading that I experienced much greater freedom in my life. Right. In in the same way you know, Jocko willing talks about discipline equals freedom, right? Well, when I discipline myself and I’m clear on what I stand for, it frees me from being torn apart by all the things that were ambiguous before.

00;14;31;22 – 00;14;47;17

Jon

Right? So there is freedom in that, in peace. And the reason I share that is because I’m going to be a little bit more vulnerable if that wasn’t vulnerable enough. But this morning when you sent me a message, let me know what you’re thinking, right? We’ve been going through these battles together right in our separate lives, encouraging each other.

00;14;48;00 – 00;15;04;15

Jon

And when you shared with me what you’re thinking, I was out on my run in. I got get punched, right? Because I was afraid that that might be necessary. It made me scared for the future look like it made me sick to my stomach. It made me raging mad. Right. Because that that emotions is always going to show up.

00;15;05;06 – 00;15;10;14

Aaron

You’re speaking it. People like people have these feelings. Yeah, Come on. Let’s be honest, right?

00;15;10;22 – 00;15;11;06

Jon

Yeah.

00;15;11;07 – 00;15;12;12

Aaron

I’m sure you go through.

00;15;12;13 – 00;15;14;08

Jon

If you don’t feel this good for you.

00;15;14;20 – 00;15;17;13

Aaron

Maybe you’re dead. I don’t know. Like, it’s just being alive.

00;15;17;22 – 00;15;35;14

Jon

Yeah. So, like, all this emotions going on, like the uncertainty and all this stuff and, like, the feeling of, like, abandonment and betrayal and all this crap, and I’m just like, man, this really sucks, right? And then and then I had asked because, like, well, let’s pause. There’s a lot of emotion going on right now. Let’s, let’s look at some things.

00;15;36;05 – 00;15;53;02

Jon

Let’s look at some truth. What do you stand for? What what do you stand for in your relationship with your buddy Erin? Right. I said, well, we’re we’re on this journey called the grit theory to face hard things head on. And it’s like, okay, so what does that mean? What are the second or third implications of that? And I was like, well, we now have a discussion as well.

00;15;53;02 – 00;16;04;19

Jon

What are the two things that matter most to you? And after I thought through it as a because I had to let go of the emotion for a little bit, I’m going have to deal with emotion cycles, right? I know it’s going to come back up. I’m going to have to really, really sit for me to give it to the Almighty.

00;16;04;20 – 00;16;23;09

Jon

Right. But and then between us, it’s like, well, what are the two things I need to do to to continue forward with confidence? Mm hmm. And I was like, one, I need to make sure that when we’re done with our conversation, that you leave it fortified knowing that we’re standing closer than ever before because I’m with you and your fight.

00;16;23;11 – 00;16;51;14

Jon

Right? Right. And not allow this to become something that’s divisive in our relationship as friends and partners, but something that unites us more greatly. Because what you’re fighting for, I’m fighting for and there’s this really fun anti for still cracks me up episode It’s called like a cultivating loyalty or loyalty for success or something like that. He released a like yesterday which won’t help since this podcast will go live a couple of weeks after we record, but you’ll find it.

00;16;51;14 – 00;17;10;27

Jon

And he’s just digging in on how loyalty shouldn’t be based on time. It should be based on who is helping you further yourself and you’re helping them, right? It’s a mutual give and take towards the ideal of who you want to become. Mm hmm. Right. And I was thinking about, like, what am I loyal to you for the convenience, or am I loyal to you?

00;17;10;27 – 00;17;31;07

Jon

Because I want to see what can happen in your life, and I want the best for you. And I was like, Well, it’s definitely that and that, you know, all those thoughts help me change the key is like, I don’t trust my emotions right now, but what I do trust is my convictions to you as a friend. And I’m going to act in those convictions and pursue that with you.

00;17;31;19 – 00;17;34;27

Jon

And they’re really good, you know. And what do you think?

00;17;34;27 – 00;17;53;03

Aaron

I think of I think of it reminds me of a pilot, a pilot training. I know this is kind of random, but pilots have to part of their training is they have to fly blind. Hmm. And what that means is that they have to they do it. They call it a I think they call it instrument training, something like that.

00;17;53;03 – 00;18;16;06

Aaron

I’m a this is not my world, so please forgive me. But what it is what it is, is they have to be able to fly using only their instruments. So what does that why do they do that? Well, because sometimes sight is is the enemy. Hmm. Um, planes have flown into mountains because people don’t trust their instruments. They go, Oh, no, I don’t see a mountain.

00;18;16;06 – 00;18;33;21

Aaron

I don’t see a mountain. And boom, it happens. The instruments are always right. Convictions are the instruments right. The convictions are saying this is. This is where we’re going. This is why we’re doing it. But I’m looking all around and all I see, that’s not the way. Let me just let me let me just take control here. Like.

00;18;33;21 – 00;18;48;27

Aaron

No, no, no. Stop it. Stop it. The instruments aren’t broken. Yeah, convictions are wrong. You get a whole nother set of problems, but which need to be dealt with. But most remote. Just trust your conviction.

00;18;48;27 – 00;19;04;14

Jon

Yeah. What I’m thinking about when you say that, and we’ve talked a lot about, like, that ideal you pursue kind of becomes like a compass. You know? Yeah. So it’s like, do I need to head north? Okay, I know this is a good compass. I need head north, but it doesn’t look right. Well, I’m going to trust the compass, Right?

00;19;04;14 – 00;19;22;05

Jon

That’s my instrument. The same with fire. It’s like no trust on whatever tells you you’re altitude. Trust that you’re kind of low and pull up. It doesn’t matter what you can see. It’s fair. Be higher than lower. In my mind, I don’t know. It’s not my world. Even like mountains are lower, the sky high, there’s less things to hit you well.

00;19;22;11 – 00;19;27;10

Jon

So I’m going to trust that and push in the direction I think it should go until I can see again.

00;19;27;19 – 00;19;34;18

Aaron

And it’s a fight. And again. It’s a fight in you. Yeah. Like I don’t believe this at all. Yeah, I don’t think this is right.

00;19;34;18 – 00;19;36;13

Jon

I feel like I’m going south, but it says north.

00;19;36;13 – 00;19;45;22

Aaron

And then all of a sudden you break the clouds and go, Whoa, I was, I was that. That would have been a horrible tragedy had I just continue to do with what I just see. Yeah, this is what I know.

00;19;45;23 – 00;19;48;19

Jon

And how Power fiction. I love that metaphor. Thank you.

00;19;49;19 – 00;20;01;14

Aaron

Well, I think of it because you reminded me of a memory of. Of me questioning our friendship in a fun way. Right? And I don’t know when it.

00;20;01;14 – 00;20;03;20

Jon

Was question why you stick up with me all the time.

00;20;04;02 – 00;20;30;12

Aaron

It’s like we can be hard to be around on both sides, right? Depending on the day. But this particular day, I’m sure it was probably on one of those stupid winter runs we were doing and there was AC wind coming at us. Like we’ve talked about these things before, but it sucks every time. I can’t I can’t explain to you how much I don’t want to do a run when AC wind is coming in my face.

00;20;30;12 – 00;20;30;18

Aaron

Right.

00;20;30;21 – 00;20;31;09

Jon

Negative ten.

00;20;31;17 – 00;20;45;06

Aaron

Yeah, it’s it’s horrible. And so everything in me is saying, why am I doing this? Like, my feeling is saying, just go back, take a shower to take a hot shower like people sleep at this time. What the heck am I doing?

00;20;45;16 – 00;20;47;09

Jon

I’m not well and he’s not well.

00;20;47;18 – 00;21;07;13

Aaron

Well, I here. But what, what drives you to that? It’s your conviction. I told myself that I want to challenge myself. I’m going to use physical challenge so that I could have a stronger mental health. Let’s say. I don’t know exactly what we did. I know there was some conviction that got me through the window, but it was something to that effect.

00;21;07;24 – 00;21;32;24

Aaron

I’m really challenging it. So if I quit on that, I quit on my conviction, which I said was important when there was no end, and it’s still important when there is wind. So I’m going to continue going because the wind that my comfort in the wind is less important than what I’m trying to achieve. Hmm. So that reminded me of that because you, we, we joke about that, but about oh, we question the friendship.

00;21;32;24 – 00;21;48;11

Aaron

But and it’s ha ha, that’s funny. But I wouldn’t quit on the friendship B because it’s not, it’s not against my conviction. It’s against my comfort. Yeah. And that’s a very different decision you got to make.

00;21;48;28 – 00;21;52;19

Jon

Not against your conviction, but against your comfort, Right? Oh, man.

00;21;52;20 – 00;22;05;13

Aaron

Have you quit on our friendship because of comfort? I mean, I really. I’m just looking back at one man. I had friends that make it uncomfortable. Why did they make you uncomfortable? Was it based on your convictions or was based on your comfort?

00;22;05;20 – 00;22;24;25

Jon

And it’s such a taboo. That’s a good litmus test. Because think about this. There are times that you should speak because of your conviction, but your comfort will keep you silent. Correct? There are times that you should not speak because of your conviction, but your comfort will make you speak. Oh, that’s good. It goes both ways. Agreed. Right.

00;22;25;02 – 00;22;48;17

Jon

Agreed. And that’s where discipline and self-awareness is important. And like the great litmus test, we’ve talked about this a lot. When you walk away from something, if it bothers you or eats at you, you missed, right? So if it’s at you once you’re out of the situation, that’s don’t bury that, acknowledge it and resolve yourself to act differently in the next opportunity.

00;22;49;00 – 00;23;10;21

Aaron

So it’s it’s sort of the on a much more important level broccoli in the teeth of a friend and you’re not willing to say it and I would you know because why don’t you want to say someone has broccoli in their teeth because it’s uncomfortable. But Conviction says, I told him I’d tell him if there was something I see in his teeth.

00;23;10;25 – 00;23;35;17

Aaron

Right There isn’t. By the way, right now. You’re great. I know. I mean, talking about it right away, you’re like, wait a second. But like, what a great friend that, like, goes, Hey, dude, Right there. Yeah, that’s uncomfortable in the moment. Over time, while he is watching out for me. Those are good friends. That’s a much small that’s a small example of someday I’m going to need someone to say, Dude, you don’t really have broccoli in your teeth like you’re dying.

00;23;35;24 – 00;23;37;06

Aaron

Yeah, and I got to tell you.

00;23;37;07 – 00;23;55;16

Jon

Critical failure, you’re screwed this up, right? That takes courage. It’s funny because you need to get to the point where you can help your fellow stranger write funny story. I’ll keep it really short. I was going through a series of job interviews, is exiting the service and there is one panel interview with five people from the sales company as a sales position.

00;23;55;26 – 00;24;17;10

Jon

And it was, I think, the vice president of the company. And like for higher ups, like so it was like four levels of who my leadership would be. And then to Pierce essentially or like or something that the vice presidents flies down. We’re on suits. The vice presidents flies down when you shake hands. And the beginning of the interview, I notice it and I’m like, I’m looking around.

00;24;17;10 – 00;24;36;15

Jon

I’m like, did you have like four people here who know you and work with you and guarantee you they’ve noticed and no one saying it. So you have all these guys panel interviews coming through and they’re not saying anything. So we go through the interview and we shake hands. At the end of the conversation, I hold onto his hand for a second longer and kind of lean images.

00;24;36;19 – 00;24;55;15

Jon

Had you seen your fly’s down? Thank you for the opportunity to interview for this position. And he he like he’s like what? He looks down and you could tell he he was grateful that he learned, but he was disappointed in his team because he looked around. He’s like, none of you told me was the first thing he said.

00;24;55;27 – 00;25;11;13

Jon

And he put it up and, you know, he was embarrassed. But he’s like, thank you for telling me. And it was funny because, you know, I didn’t end up working with him. But is that just reminding me that have the conviction to do what’s right, even if it could, you know, even if it’s a small thing? That’s a great.

00;25;11;13 – 00;25;13;09

Aaron

Example. That’s a great example.

00;25;13;09 – 00;25;13;19

Jon

You know.

00;25;14;08 – 00;25;35;11

Aaron

Comfort. It’s amazing how often comfort dictates our decisions of our convictions. And I don’t want to, you know, having a discussion like we had this morning or with anybody, when you go in this this is me. This is something for me personally. But it could another day. It could be, Hey, Giant talked about something you are doing.

00;25;35;11 – 00;25;36;01

Jon

Oh, heck yeah.

00;25;36;02 – 00;25;42;24

Aaron

And I would say cultivate that with broccoli. You know, that’s practice.

00;25;42;24 – 00;25;43;12

Jon

Yeah.

00;25;43;12 – 00;26;06;08

Aaron

Zippers are practice. That’s, you know, who cares if, you know, going to die of a zippers down or you have broccoli teeth. But you could die if you’re dealing with addiction or you’re dealing with being a jerk at the workplace, you could there could be major consequences if you’re if you’re failing as a parent, if you’re if you’re.

00;26;06;22 – 00;26;09;03

Jon

You have two beers and you drive and it’s affecting you.

00;26;09;05 – 00;26;16;01

Aaron

Correct? Yeah. You’re closing your eyes to a cancer in your life that’s killing you. Yeah. And you got to deal with it. Yeah.

00;26;16;24 – 00;26;35;16

Jon

That’s so beautiful, because that does tie in. Why do these little fun stories matter? It’s because you and I have had the last 18 months specifically to hone each other’s relationship. When you meet up with someone at five in the morning, three times a week for 18 months. Right. You’re going to deal with different versions of that person.

00;26;36;04 – 00;26;36;18

Jon

All right.

00;26;36;22 – 00;26;50;21

Jon

You’re going to get the happy version. You’re going to get the exhausted. You’re going to get the freaking psychotic. Yep. And everything in between. And you’ve shown up to me dancing my way to the gate and you showed up to me looking at you with sidearm, waiting for you to open the gate.

00;26;50;27 – 00;26;51;27

Aaron

John had a bad day.

00;26;53;19 – 00;27;16;16

Jon

It’s kind of the indicator, right? But to your point, it’s all there’s honing, right? It’s showing up despite being in a bad mood. It’s doing all those things that has allowed us to build the capital and build the conviction to ignore the comfort in the pursuit of what’s better for us. Our friend in our relationship agreed.

00;27;16;16 – 00;27;19;26

Aaron

It’s too important. It’s too important. Yeah. Yeah.

00;27;20;16 – 00;27;42;02

Jon

I did. I already touch on. Yeah. I spoke about how in the Andy Forcillo episode, he’s talking about loyalty, cultivating success, and how you need to how you ought to, despite it being difficult, cultivate the relationships that help you grow and that you help them grow. Agreed over the timeliness, and that’s what we’re talking about here. The conviction for you to tell me, Hey, John, you’re broken here.

00;27;42;02 – 00;27;54;20

Jon

This is messed up, or hey, you need to be aware of this tells me that you value our friendship enough to be uncomfortable and risk lash back to provide me that valuable information.

00;27;54;20 – 00;28;14;26

Aaron

I got a funny, self-deprecating story that this happened last week, okay? And it had to do with John’s back. You remember what happened? You tell it, you showing me form. This is this is sort of why I’ve got so bad, because this should have been my pain. But John is like, Hey, you’re doing this. It was a I think it was a dead last year.

00;28;14;26 – 00;28;30;28

Aaron

And deadlifts are like one of those things. If you don’t do them right, you could really hurt yourself. So John stepped in and said, Hey, dude, this is what I’m seeing. Which way? By the way, every time you get corrected, Jim does not feel good. Maybe you’ve gotten accustomed to that. I’ve never got accustomed to it. That’s okay.

00;28;30;28 – 00;28;46;09

Aaron

It doesn’t have to feel good. I just have to take it, you know, graciously. I’m working on the gracious part, but it still feels bad like a man. I’ve been working at this for a long time, so he’s like, shows me the wrong way because he’s trying to explain to me, this is what this is what you’re doing.

00;28;46;09 – 00;29;09;01

Aaron

I’m like, Wait, like this. Like, No, no, not like that. Like, wait, am I doing so in frustration or at least a pursuit to make sure I understood what was going on? You mimicked exactly what I was doing in here, so those are brilliant about it. And then the next day we get together, you’re like, Yeah, my back sawn from last year.

00;29;09;11 – 00;29;28;22

Aaron

Oh, you mean doing it? Doing deadlifts the way I doing. You know, it’s like you took like you really did. You took my send upon yourself. This is should be how you’re feeling or because you corrected me the rest of the because that was like early on so and I continue to do that and I didn’t get hurt yeah probably because of your instruction.

00;29;29;10 – 00;29;35;29

Jon

Was nice because after that your sets absolutely looked great. Right? But it did the trick you did was I hurt myself? You were hurt.

00;29;36;07 – 00;29;37;13

Aaron

Let’s see. Yeah.

00;29;38;04 – 00;29;42;20

Aaron

That’s probably that probably stung all the more when you said, Oh, my backs are nothing. I feel. Great.

00;29;43;14 – 00;30;06;01

Jon

I was It’s funny because when you bring it back up, the hilarious ness of it and it wasn’t heavy at the time, which is why I figured I could I could do it. But now you got good form So important, right? Honing the habits to have strong convictions is so important because even when I went to teach what wrong was looking like, I stepped out of what was right in.

00;30;06;01 – 00;30;27;12

Jon

It hurt me. You know, I should have stripped that bar and done it more safely. But I was overconfident at the weight that was on there. It hurt myself. So I think one, it’s hilarious, too. There’s some value in that story. But but the good thing was I dropped weight. I recovered. You know, we kept going forward. Thankfully, it wasn’t a serious injury is just like a sprain.

00;30;27;12 – 00;30;29;11

Jon

But it benefited. It worked for you.

00;30;29;12 – 00;30;30;22

Aaron

You’re feeling better today, I assume?

00;30;31;06 – 00;30;44;26

Jon

Yeah. I’m yeah, yeah, I’m good. I’m good now. But it was like it just took like three days for it to kind of straighten itself out. And I had to do some, some care because it’s just straightening your lower back sex. But that is a Hillary story.

00;30;45;16 – 00;31;12;03

Aaron

And I got lower back. I did have before we started training more. But I that was that’s always been a weakness of mine. So I’m sure you were like, hold on a second. But it mattered. I mean, this is a metaphor, but I’ll say it before someone becomes a raging jerk. Mm mm. Focus on the form of, Hey, you know, I just noticed when you talk to people, you kind of you’ve maybe it’s like, hey, you know, you do, you know that you take over conversation and talk about only you the whole time.

00;31;12;10 – 00;31;33;09

Aaron

Do you know we had a meal and everyone was done eating but you because you were talking so much. I’m like, I need you to be self aware here, you know, because this grows into something that’s much more insidious in our life. It’s form. I’m focusing on your form. You don’t see it, but I want you to trust me and our friendship.

00;31;33;09 – 00;31;54;04

Aaron

There’s loyalty there, and then you can distress it is not going to fill you. In fact, that might be a good way to. I. It’s somebody the back to the broccoli, the tea. Somebody said, Hey, if I had broccoli, why would you tell me? And I said, Absolutely. He says, Hey, you got you got broccoli. And you said, What a fun way to talk.

00;31;54;09 – 00;31;55;07

Aaron

It was really brilliant.

00;31;55;09 – 00;31;57;00

Jon

Stick your toes into it. You know, it was.

00;31;57;00 – 00;32;02;20

Aaron

It was it. Would you do? That’s great. I just want to make sure you that was your value system. Good. I’m going to make sure you.

00;32;02;20 – 00;32;04;18

Jon

Know, I want to tell you. Okay. Have a good day.

00;32;04;18 – 00;32;06;22

Aaron

All right. And then he would just be like.

00;32;06;29 – 00;32;28;19

Jon

Hey, why is that coming up? You know what you talking about those caring deeply, right? Yeah. We live in a time I’ve heard a lot of people lately because of the political events and some of the craziness that’s going on and things affecting like personal freedoms and stuff like that which are wrong, right. Going on that people have started saying, I don’t care anymore, so I’m going to share what I think.

00;32;28;28 – 00;32;49;13

Jon

Right. And I have a critique of that. I think they’re right, but they’re wrong. They don’t care anymore about their comfort because they care so much that they’re going to share what they’re thinking. Right. And in the same way, we have to care deeply. And that’s why it’s like you mentioned, we have the loyalty. Yeah, we have loyalty forged from doing the hard things to make each other better and to make a relationship better.

00;32;49;25 – 00;33;10;09

Jon

We care deeply enough to say, I don’t care if it’s comfortable, I’m going to tell you this, and I’m going to even preface it with what my intent in sharing it is, right? Because I don’t trust that what I’ll say, because it’s a hard thing to say, will be heard correctly. So I’m going to say, Hey, my intent in sharing this is to build you up or to do this or that.

00;33;10;18 – 00;33;27;08

Jon

Here’s it. Here it is. And it’s like, okay, I now have that context and I need to sit on that and help me. Man. There’s so many times you and I talk and and there’s things where it’s like, okay, I don’t trust myself to respond to that. So let’s talk about I’ll revisit that with you later, you know?

00;33;27;09 – 00;33;30;15

Jon

Yeah. Because it’s like you can’t always. There’s temperance there.

00;33;30;24 – 00;33;44;23

Aaron

Yeah, well, you have a history of knowing exactly how you’ve done it wrong. And I know how I’ve done it wrong, and the listeners know how they’ve done it wrong. So do you think it’s going to change next time, or do you create tactics? Yeah.

00;33;45;02 – 00;34;02;29

Jon

And I appreciate it because when I messaged you this morning, they were good for the morning. You gave me the preface of like when you talk about the future looks right. I’m so grateful you did, because it gave me like 20 minutes to get myself in check so that I could file my convictions and not my emotions. Right.

00;34;03;06 – 00;34;29;21

Jon

Because you know your emotions or comfort, right? Depending on the moment will lead you into crazy situations. Right? Because it may feel good, may be comfortable for me to express outrage at something, but that’s a wrong bloody thing to do. And so it’s like you gave me. I really appreciate that warning because it gave me just enough time to really get myself in the right headspace to come in and say, How can I be loyal to my friend in the pursuit of our convictions?

00;34;30;04 – 00;34;30;23

Aaron

I appreciate.

00;34;30;23 – 00;34;31;19

Jon

That. You know, you know.

00;34;31;19 – 00;34;56;09

Aaron

What’s amazing about emotions to me, they are really inert. And we’ve talked a little bit about this before. Happiness is not good or bad because you can be because that’s a bad qualifier. I mean, a serial killer can be happy after he did his deed. You know, I appreciate that. Instead of taking rage, you just it’s a tool, right?

00;34;56;19 – 00;35;21;27

Aaron

So, like, to me, it’s like, okay, this is the emotion I’m feeling. So instead of like using the rage as a as a weapon for your because of emotion, for comfort or self-preservation like it was pause. And it’s like now the way you use the rage later to talk about something need to address for me. Yeah. Not something that was happening to you.

00;35;22;25 – 00;35;31;09

Aaron

That’s a very different that would change the political discussions we have today. If we started thinking about I’m mad because I. I want something for you.

00;35;32;05 – 00;35;55;17

Jon

So I just heard. I don’t remember the guy’s last name, but his. It’s Jason. And then he was on Ryan McClure’s show. Their most recent episode. Jason just wrote a book called Battle Cry. I have not read it, but I was listening to their conversation. He and he was talking about the difference between aggression and assertiveness in. And what you’re talking about here is like, I can easily be aggressive, right?

00;35;55;21 – 00;36;15;20

Jon

I can easily have ranted with my anger this morning, but instead what you’re talking about is I tempered it. We tempered these emotions, but then we used them as tools, right? Where they needed necessarily applied. So there was assertiveness, but not there, which is tempered emotion versus aggression, which would be like a tantrum.

00;36;15;29 – 00;36;20;28

Aaron

Yeah. Yeah. It has a negative connotation to it. Sure. Correct. Yeah. Yeah, I’m going to.

00;36;21;18 – 00;36;46;26

Jon

I think mine’s a little weak anyways. The so, so so with that. Right. Like you’re right, we were able to take these things in and there’s two things I referenced earlier because in the following of emotion I had just set them aside, frankly, it was too much. So it’s like, I’m going to set this aside and think, what is the try to identify, okay, kick in all this negative emotion out these things that are putting me into like a fight or flight mode.

00;36;47;07 – 00;37;03;28

Jon

I’m just going to think, what are the two things that I’m most concerned? Like, what are the root things I’m concerned about here? And the two things were, one, making sure that you and I walked away closer. Mm hmm. Right. And that this didn’t become a point of division for us. And I think we’ve accomplished that. And the second one was, hey, it’s.

00;37;03;28 – 00;37;23;08

Jon

I am your biggest fan in support of you saying no to things for things that you have to say yes to. Right? Because I need that to. And I was like, okay. So that the other piece of this is I need to continue saying yes to the grit theory and keeping our weekly episodes going while also saying yes to you, saying no to doing that.

00;37;23;08 – 00;37;41;25

Jon

And that was because we’re partners. A conversation we need to have. So as a cook, I can, no matter how much it sucks, be at peace with what happens if we walk away closer and we walk away in agreement that we continue recording? Even if I go solo hosting for some of the episodes and we’ve accomplished that. So it’s okay.

00;37;41;25 – 00;37;51;22

Jon

No matter what happens, we’re moving forward. Yep. And we’re doing what we need to do and it’s not fun and it’s hard and that’s life and get over it. And that is what we’re doing.

00;37;51;22 – 00;37;54;08

Jon

You know.

00;37;54;08 – 00;37;55;10

Jon

The things on a silver platter.

00;37;56;16 – 00;38;23;08

Aaron

It’s that’s how conviction can serve you. You know, when you go conviction over comfort, it’s amazing how the the narrative in your head changes. All right. This if I’m predicting conviction, there’s going to be one set of things I’ll do from protecting comfort. They’ll be a different set of things to do. And they used words like freedom. They said you felt like this when you when you when you allow yourself the freedom to do the hard thing.

00;38;23;08 – 00;38;48;20

Aaron

Yeah. Freedom to do the hard thing that feels like it’s like mutually exclusive terms, like binding up to to be on purpose together. But you say if I, if I allow freedom two to limit how I’m going to react. And I love freedom to point me towards conviction, you’re going to make just different little choice, different choices. Yeah, harder choices.

00;38;48;24 – 00;38;59;06

Aaron

Most of the time it’s maybe exponentially harder, but ultimately it leads to peace because like, right after discussions, like I, I feel peaceful about it.

00;38;59;06 – 00;39;00;09

Jon

I feel peaceful about it.

00;39;00;09 – 00;39;14;26

Aaron

Even even because you made the right choice based on your convictions. Now you can deal with whatever’s coming next. Adverse adversities, not even a not even a giant you’re worried about.

00;39;15;01 – 00;39;32;27

Jon

Well, what we could have had happen is created this monster that would torment both of us moving forward. But we killed all that. So we have peace in this because now you and I have different problems that ahead of us. You know, each of us have very different problem sets now that we get a face in approach. But we don’t have anything knocking at our backs.

00;39;33;05 – 00;39;54;06

Jon

Instead, we have the union of our relationship, of our friendship, strengthening us into this fight so that we can hopefully come back together unfettered and stronger. Exactly. Once we solve some of these things, you know, So it’s like it’s such a it’s such an interesting dynamic. There’s such an art to it. I love that we called it the grit theory early on, because it is a theory.

00;39;54;06 – 00;40;11;19

Jon

It’s an art, you know? Yeah. How do you face hard things Head on is not a science, you know, It’s very dynamic. It’s dynamic. Yeah. It the only scientific part of it is you choose to face them. Yeah. After that, it becomes art. Very squishy, very soft. So how does this work?

00;40;11;19 – 00;40;32;11

Aaron

Yeah. You’ve stepped into the like, it’s like a one on ten dodgeball with, like, a bunch of elementary kids. Yeah, Like, you just stepped in, like, okay, I’ve chosen to do this. I don’t know what’s coming at me win. Yeah, but I’m in it, and that’s. It feels that way. And then that means you’re in the right place. Yeah, Tell me it’s a good thing.

00;40;32;18 – 00;40;50;27

Jon

So looking at all this, right, we have we have a slight divergence from what we ideally want in the pursuit and so want is often a comfort to in the pursuit of what we need are convictions, right? We’re supporting each other despite there being pain in it. We’re supporting each other towards a conviction because that’s what loyalty is.

00;40;51;05 – 00;41;15;14

Jon

You build each other up and convictions so that you can become better people. Yes, right. Not just sit in what’s comfortable. And we’re continuing forward. So what that means for the future is we’re going to continue recording, we’re continue supporting each other, we’re going to continue to share and be vulnerable with people so that hopefully it’s encouraging to them and some of the dynamics will have different flavors to them and that’s life and we’ll make it work.

00;41;16;02 – 00;41;21;27

Aaron

I appreciate that we’re running to something so we don’t have to get into the practice of just running from things.

00;41;23;05 – 00;41;42;18

Jon

Yeah, and you just triggered tonight. I do really want to share the freedom piece right? Because we’re partners. There’s this moment when we were talking or as I came in, I want to free you from any feeling of obligation you have in our partnership. Right. And it’s kind of. This just jumped in my head. It’s like, if you love it, you’ll let it go.

00;41;42;22 – 00;42;04;09

Jon

I don’t really know, I suppose context, but. But it was kind of like, well, if you are falling, if we’re both falling or convictions here, which we are, I need to speak truth to the thing so that there’s no room for you to feel bad about you doing the right thing, the hard thing. And that’s where as I came in, as your partner, just like, be free, do what you need do, and we’ll figure it out.

00;42;04;21 – 00;42;27;14

Jon

You know? And I think the value in sharing that is it’s like how often can you choose to fire conviction but then completely discredit and poison it with a little bit of passive aggressiveness or contempt, you know? And that was kind of the turning key in my mind of, okay, there’s none of that because it’s like, Hey, I want the best for you to the point that I’m doing this and I’m reaffirming my friendship to you.

00;42;27;23 – 00;42;33;18

Jon

And in fact, I’ll go through the fire with you so that we can do you wife Well, yeah. And be this thing.

00;42;34;23 – 00;42;42;26

Aaron

That’s brilliant, man. What a what a great lesson on hard friendship. Hmm. And I appreciate that.