The Prosperous Human Podcast
This podcast is dedicated to helping all humans find a prosperous life. The host Jim Johnson has been using his "Prosperity Protocol" for more than a decade to find balance and fulfillment in a chaotic ever changing world. Guests on the show will be focused on the 7 pillars of the "Prosperity Protocol", Work Fulfillment, Time & Financial Security, Community, Health & Performance, Leadership, Creativity & Curiosity, Spiritual Growth & Development. They will share life experience, practical application, and data backed research to help you find that prosperous life you have been searching for...
The Prosperous Human Podcast
Why Community is ACTUALLY Important - Matt Behrens
Learn to fight the social isolation and build fulfilling relationships.
⚡️ Get the guide + the Prosperity Fundamentals course for FREE in the pH community: https://www.skool.com/ph7/about
In this heartfelt episode of the Prosperous Human Podcast, host Jim Johnson dives into an in-depth conversation with Matt Behrens, CEO of C3 Group. Matt emphasizes the importance of passion, integrity, and commitment in one's work and life. He shares his personal journey to self-discovery and deep focus.
The episode explores pivotal topics such as the importance of curiosity, vulnerability, and genuine connections in both personal and professional spheres. Matt also recounts a powerful and emotional story about his parents' relationship transformation thanks to open communication and curiosity.
---
00:00 Introduction: Finding Passion and Integrity
01:09 The Prosperous Human Podcast Begins
01:28 Jim Johnson's Journey to True Prosperity
03:15 Introducing Matt Barron: Family, Relationships, and Community
04:13 Matt Barron's Leadership and Business Challenges
05:33 Navigating Personal and Professional Growth
08:42 The Importance of Vulnerability and Authenticity
15:34 Reconnecting and Redefining Leadership
18:30 Creating a Passion-Driven Life
40:17 Building a Community of Trust and Curiosity
49:50 The Importance of Belonging and Reaching Out
50:26 Personal Reflections on Mental Health
51:36 The Power of Community and Connection
53:40 Exploring the Blue Zones
56:54 The Impact of Isolation and Technology
01:02:57 The Role of Vulnerability and Trust
01:15:52 A Personal Story of Family and Connection
01:28:39 Final Thoughts and Call to Action
⚡️ Get the guide + The Prosperity Fundamentals course for FREE in the pH community: https://www.skool.com/ph7/about
I've got to have a passion behind what I'm doing because if those aren't connected, I can't be in integrity with myself and I'm not serving the people around me the right way because I'm not fully in it. I'm not committed to it. I don't have the courage to step forward and have the confidence to be able to create capabilities and just like what, what comes so naturally to you that you would do it for free and you think that everybody around you does the same thing. So it's so natural to you and for me. That is what lit me off on a journey. So I did like 30 days of deep work on that, trying to figure out what that was. I wanted Note to self: The harder the challenge, the simpler the solution needs to be: 1. Identify what you want 2. Connect it to actions 3. Amplify through deep focus Don’t over complicate it.Matt Behrens To empower somebody to achieve. I wanted to bring whatever resources I could, ask key questions and understand like what I could do to impact that person. And it wasn't necessarily from like, It was like, I just wanted to help in any way I possibly could.
Jim Johnson:Hi, and welcome to the Prosperous Human Podcast. I'm your host, Jim Johnson, the Good Life Coach. And that's what I'm here to do, is to help other people find what truly living the good life looks like. This idea of living a prosperous and fulfilled life. You see, 20 years ago, I was an absolute wreck, the most selfish human being, and able to achieve what the outside world looked at as success, only to find out that I'd been chasing all the wrong things, that it wasn't some kind of finish line and enjoyment and everything was going to be gray. As a matter of fact, I felt very empty, which put me on a journey to find out what true prosperity really looked like. And through 10 years of research and study, I was able to find what I call the seven elements of a prosperous life. And living those elements and being able to put my finger on those elements has helped me to live a life where I don't feel a whole lot of pain. I get to live in this thing we like to call the sweet spot here at Prosperous Human. There's no such thing as true work life balance, but there is a place called the sweet spot. We want to help walk you along on this journey together through this podcast as we learn more about the seven elements of a prosperous life, the concept of orbital thinking, which started it all, which radically goes counter to traditional thinking and may open your mind to why you continue to go down the wrong path and end up at a brick wall. Stopping you from living this life that you really thought you were going to get to. And finally, the litmus test. This test that says I am either living in the sweet spot or not. We're excited to walk along with you. We're going to have amazing guests. You're going to see me sharing my own journey with you and giving you some insights along the way. So sit back, Relax, take out a pen, take some notes, and we'll see you on the inside, the inside of a good life. And I couldn't think of anybody better. For this particular topic, as we were going through what these options were and Matt Barron's to come on and talk about family relationships and community. So Matt, welcome aboard. I had a hard time. Like, I don't know how to introduce you now because you were CEO of C3 group, but I don't think so anymore, but you still. Own it, right? Is that the way it works?
Matt Behrens:Yeah. Yeah. So I, uh, I still own C3, uh, I'm a hundred percent owner of the business. I'm a CEO and a COO. I joined this last year in 2023. I kind of through the journey that I was going on, uh, I just kind of made sense to do it. Um, and yeah, so it's, it's actually been headed by Luke Myers now. Phenomenal CEO. I've been with C3 for about 12 years, uh, doing really great things there, really carrying forward the mission as far as doing the right things all the time. Uh, I mean, Calvin White's our COO, so got an amazing staff there and, uh, couldn't be more proud of what they're doing.
Jim Johnson:And, and so what are you up to now? Like, are we doing something else? Is there something new on the horizon? What's going on?
Matt Behrens:Yeah, man. So that's been a journey. Um, it's actually interesting. You kind of bring all of that stuff up because there's always gaps. And I think you identified a lot of different things in here that I was just kind of reflecting, uh, backstage on everything you were talking about here. Uh, including just kind of the lost relationships and things like that, especially through COVID. And we've all been through so much different experience and trauma and everything going on over the last couple of years. And I think it's easy to lose sight of some of this. It's easy to. Kind of isolate yourselves from other people and. Uh, but when you start, like, it takes realizing that you need a change, right? And it takes realizing that, okay, I'm off on a couple of these things. I'm not in integrity with myself and relationships with family or the people around me or spiritual growth or whatever. We, we, we tend to like lose some of those habits along the way. And then something usually hits like it did for me. And I realized like, all right, I'm going to cross roads and that crossroads led Really interesting directions for me in 2023. So we'll take it from there.
Jim Johnson:Yeah. I mean, we shared before the show here, um, it was one of the things, this particular topic, if I hadn't identified it before, I would have had a hard time putting my finger on what was happening with me over the last. I don't know, three or four years, I moved to a different city. Uh, I immediately tore my Achilles. So I went on my own version of, uh, quarantine for a while and then COVID right behind that. And then a lot of things happened with our business, with growth. And, and I was, I knew something was, I mean, I couldn't really figure out what it was. And then I realized I didn't really connect with my community here. I hadn't joined a church really, uh, one that I had felt comfortable with. I didn't really have any friends. I live in the biggest neighborhood in the Hill Country. It's eight miles by eight miles. There's 2000 houses in this neighborhood and I don't know anybody. It was like, I didn't have any friends. I mean, I met a couple, you know, at a thing here and there, but no real connection. Nobody that I could say, Hey man, you want to come over and have a barbecue? Maybe have a beer, hang out, talk. And, uh, so I w I was missing that stuff in my world and in our industry, you know, we run a, you know, into each other at events or that type of stuff, but there's, there's no real, Hey, connection of like friends to just go hang out together unless you live somewhere near each other.
Matt Behrens:Yeah. And the events go away too, right? Like I saw you at 20 year Achilles in January and then March we hit a total of 21 or 2020. Not all the conferences go by the wayside. Everybody kind of loses touch. Not necessarily like it was more of the face to face. Like that's just, it was gone overnight.
Jim Johnson:Yeah. So, uh, why don't you share, you said something happened in 2023. What's going on?
Matt Behrens:Well, I wouldn't, it's even before that probably.
Jim Johnson:Start from the beginning. Well, that's a great place to start.
Matt Behrens:So I was born December 7th, 1987. No, we're not going to go back that far. Um, no. So in 2020, um, you know, like there was just this shift. Like, I, I think I had always seen everything going on with, you know, social media and the facades people put on. And you go to conferences and like, I'm a lover of people. Like, I love being around people. I'm probably more of an introvert than an extrovert, right? But you get to the conferences and the people that you know, like, you want to pour into so many people. But when you start gaining like, uh, hang on just a sec. It's been a, I've had a, I've had a, I've had a journey. Um, we all have stories for Kevin. Um, I don't want to take it down to like talking points and things like that. Right. So I prefer vulnerability, man. I I've had a lot of deaths. I've had business that upended, but going into 2020 best year ever, like we had the best revenue in 2020 COVID we didn't even see, like it wasn't an issue until about nine months later. And coincidentally, I ended up buying a partner out at C3. Uh, Mike was the 50, 50 owner of the business. And we didn't necessarily agree with the direction that we wanted it to go. And so I'm coming off of this high in 2020, nine months after I see you. And I remember speaking at the start of the new era, um, kind of connecting with you in January, everything, uh, kind of falls apart from the world. I'm still riding a high to the great revenue and things like the family was doing great. Um, the partnership started slowing down a little bit and we were just going different directions. So I ended up doing a bio with him, um, late 2020 thinking the world like. Cool. I I've got full control over this thing. It's incredibly excited to lead this amazing team of people into really what I wasn't scared that first time in months ago, it was quarter one of 2021 that was the issue we go from record revenue to like It was, it was a complete slowdown quarter four of 20, the core system shut down cases, dead stop claims. Stop getting paid business stops coming in. And it was just like, we fell off a cliff like that. And you think that you're tight with the people around you, you've got a tight circle. And the funny thing about revenue is when you're, when revenue is really tight, like, or when it's going up, it ties a lot of the issues that are actually happening inside of the business. And, uh, those just expose themselves in like a really hard way. And so you start turning through people. And as much as you love people, right? Like there's still an accountability, there's still actions, there's still results that have to happen. And then you start making decisions out of just like fear and scarcity and like, okay, no, this got real now. And then you start losing people around you. And so it's just, it was a journey for a couple of years of just like things crumbling down that you just never thought would. I don't, I don't really know how to put it any other way. And that's a catalyst. So it's like, Yeah,
Jim Johnson:we, to be honest with you, we went through some of that last year, uh, where we were ramping coaches on because we had a pretty strong demand for what we, what we do, and that demand wasn't quite what we thought it was going to be and we, we had to, like, make some decisions, fortunately, most of those worked out for everybody quite well, but there was still this thing of like, that didn't go quite the way I thought it was going to go and, It's, it's interesting when you're in relationship with somebody, you're tight. We did, we did some things whenever, um, for first off, we're totally remote. No single person works in the office of another person, even my wife and I, she works out of the house. I work here. It's better for our relationship. Um, so we're all remote to each other. We had to put some things in place to, um, keep that camaraderie aspect of things going. Like every Friday, we have Friday wrap. Uh, we have a fun channel on our slack so we can have a bit of humor and enjoyment in what we do. It's probably the most. Yeah. Um, posted in channel in our slack and it was all stuff that we had to do, um, purposely to keep that camaraderie that you might actually have in an office. It's still not quite the same. It's always awesome to be together because there's depth there that you don't get. Um, and in that type of environment, were you guys running into any of that kind of stuff or was it just, Hey, the world kind of shut down for you and shut the business down that caused revenues to Get fractured, we still need the results to pay all that overhead. And so there were some tough decisions that had to be made.
Matt Behrens:Yeah, well, I mean, it's a little bit of both, right? So pre COVID, we were all pretty much all in Colorado. Like, we had a couple people. Mike was out in North Carolina. We had some kind of a round. But we were, for the vast majority, in person. We saw each other a couple times a week in the office. COVID hits, and that kind of changes. And then it's like, then you realize, Wait, I can do this from anywhere. I don't need to stay in Colorado. Zoom's like, you have the Zoom revolution, right? It just happens. So things start going a little bit more virtual. So I realized, okay, I can pick up employees in other states. We can start scaling this really. That's a facade though, right? Like, I think it was an excuse of something's not working. Let's use this new tool. Let's start spreading out more, but then you lose that culture because it's like that in person culture versus a virtual world, totally different.
Jim Johnson:It's a challenge to say the least. I mean, we, we deal with it. There's nine, nine of us here. And to keep that culture has been the biggest challenge of everything that we do.
Matt Behrens:Yeah, I want to like, it's just, we've got more tools to connect and yet we're not connecting right at the end of the day. And like, I mean, we, we talked about it on a pre show and obviously in some of the, uh, uh, intro and everything like. We're just down the street from each other, relatively, and we haven't talked in a couple of years like that. That saddens me and I think kind of through those couple of years of just some of the relationships and stuff that you end up thinking you have, um, or that you did have, like, I, I personally made the mistake of the CEO of like. We tend to focus on action and results, right? Like that's just that those are the things that we can see. But when people are operating inside of like scarcity mode, and there's no abundance, and there's a lot of fear in the world, like how people think and how they feel has a huge impact on the actions that they're actually creating. To get that result. So we sit here and it's like, all right, action, result, action, result. Those are the things I can see. Those are the external components, but there's so much more of the internal side that I just, I wasn't aware of, I didn't really like, I didn't place the importance I probably should have on it and it's only like the last six months and I'm starting to realize it. Okay. People like need that place to be seen and heard and build that community and have a sense of like belonging in what they're doing and that fulfillment. There's a whole internal dialogue that's going on, even inside of our own heads and CEOs.
Jim Johnson:Yeah, that's, it's, it's interesting that you bring that up. Cause I think that's, it's almost two sides of a coin. Um, that, that I think all human beings are after this idea that they're valuable, like being like somebody recognizing that we have value, then on the other side that we belong, like we belong in this place because if I, if I wasn't here, I wouldn't be supported number one, number two, if I wasn't here, we wouldn't be doing this amazing thing that we're doing. Um, you know, a lot of people liken it to like a family. And sometimes. That doesn't work. And sometimes that does, if you grew up in a dysfunctional family, that's not such a great analogy, but if you grew up in a tight family, like my wife's family was That's a whole different dynamic than the family I grew up in, which we weren't all that tight. Um, how do you guys, what, what's been the big epiphany for you?
Matt Behrens:Man, um, I think like there's just, there's a lot of givers and like, I think the world has givers and takers, right? And You don't really know who that is until you get into battle with them, but you also can't guess the intent. And I think that you get, you get caught up in realizing, like, you almost assess somebody as a taker, when really, they just didn't have proper expectations. You're not communicating right with them. It could be one of the best friends in the world, or it could be your wife, or it could be your kids. But unless that connection is there, it leaves, like, it opens it up to interpretation. Stop interpreting it. Just ask. Have a conversation. Ask a question. Be curious. I think the more you can have that curiosity thing, and that was something, I don't remember if you said pre show or during, that's just like, that sense of curiosity, if you lose that, you become disconnected. And if you don't, if you stop having those conversations, all you're doing is isolating yourself and the own thought patterns that you have. And that's a massive problem.
Jim Johnson:Yeah. It was before the show and it was why I started the show. I mean, I'm naturally curious and I like to learn and I went, Hey, how about I do a podcast where I can learn from a bunch of people that are way smarter and way better than I am. And, uh, it's been awesome. Like it is one of the few ways where I can connect with people that I highly value for a extended period of time and, and learn from them. Because in most cases, and I would bet that this is probably the case for you as well. Um, we tend to be pouring out. Especially whenever you've gained some experience, you've done well in business, um, people perceive you as successful, whether you are or not,
Matt Behrens:or whether you feel like it or not.
Jim Johnson:Yeah. Or whether you feel like it or not. Um, you, you're in this constant mode of being in, pouring out all the time without having anybody pour into you. And that's been a big concept for me here lately. And whenever I'm looking at these seven things, I'm like, where am I, you know, being poured into or pouring out of, because you can get sucked down in a battery pretty quickly when it comes to community, family relationships. What do you, what do you think is important about those conversations? Cause you, that was really very insightful by you, by the way, I don't think there's as much conversation as there needs to be between partners in a marriage. Uh, family, you know, kids and parents, um, uh, business partners, uh, people that work in your work environment. I don't, I don't see as many genuine conversations. They tend to be very surface. Like, how are you doing today? I'm doing great. And that's like the end of it. Right. How do you see that?
Matt Behrens:I think people ultimately are, you have to have like, so you've got to like Patrick Lynch, right? You, you're aware of his stuff, the trust triangle, right? Or the trust pyramid. So like that base layer of trust, you have to have that established to be able to have healthy conflict, and it's not just conflict. It's healthy conflict. It's a conflict is good. You can't move to commitment and then accountability and then results unless you have trust. And I don't think a lot of people like. People are afraid to be vulnerable. People are afraid of what other people are going to think of them. I've got this thought, I'm going to like, keep it in my head, and I'm going to suffer with it, because I'm afraid of the transparency level, like, is somebody going to perceive me as weak? You know, and especially as a leader. I is leaders. We sit here just like I'm supposed to be the strong one. I'm supposed to be pouring into other people. I'm supposed to be some people don't like maybe take that too far. It can be self effacing. Other people just probably don't do it enough. But I think if you're going to be a servant driven leader, there's adding value is actually going to pour into their people. You've got to ask the questions. You can't be afraid of, like, opening up to them because ultimately, that's how you lead. You have to be vulnerable first. If you want that back in return, you've got to show it. And I think at times like we, we got to be strong. We're men, we can't show our emotions. I'm an emotional guy. Like I'll probably cry during this interview. We'll see. I don't, I don't think it's a negative. I think the world around us says it is, but the more like you start diving into this topic and realizing, man. I'm having more raw, vulnerable conversations now than I've ever had in my entire life, and I feel more fulfilled doing it, and I've got better relationships because I'm doing it, and the people around me, I, remind me a story about my parents. I had something go on with them this fall, but um, the more vulnerable and transparent you can be, that's how you establish the trust, and people are just afraid of that, so then trust just doesn't happen. It's just, that's where the surface level stuff comes from.
Jim Johnson:Well, the more vulnerable you are, um, and that's something that's kind of earned over time. Right? Like, you don't, you don't start there in most cases, although I have no problem telling people what my failings are because they're, there's a list a mile long and take a whole podcast to man, I, I could be a better leader. I could be a better communicator. I can be better at a million different things. I could be a better husband. I could be a better father. I think about those things all the time. Um, and I think we sit there and we, we, you know, in our quiet time, we kind of think about those things. But we don't ever talk to anybody about those things. And you might find out that when you talk about that to somebody else, they're kind of thinking the same thing and feeling the same things. I think we all feel like we fall short, but for some reason or another, and I know where mine comes from, mine comes from, um, I'm from the deep South, a military family, strong, you never cry, you never show weakness, you never, any of that kind of stuff. And, um, and I was always kind of an emotional kid. Like I was like, I wore my emotions on my sleeve and it was something that was almost beat out of me for lack of a better term. And now as I've gotten older, I thought that's what the world expected of me. And then I got a little older and I went, wait a minute, why am I letting the world tell me who I should be? And so when I have those conversations with people and talk to people, like I'm talking with you right now, that vulnerability starts to lead to truth. And when you know that somebody's true, that's when you truly have relationship, like they're ride or die at that point, they're, they're going to be there. Whether I actually saw this from a really good friend of mine, I won't mention any names, but he was a pastor of a very, very large church. I mean, he was on top of the world and, um, had an extramarital situation and everything came crashing down and everybody. Everybody left him with three people. That was it. He, that was how he knew who his friends were. He, he never knew until then, which means he wasn't having those conversations. He wasn't having that relationship and I don't want to be in a situation where something that bad happens for me to figure out who my true friends are.
Matt Behrens:Yeah.
Jim Johnson:Have you ever experienced anything like that?
Matt Behrens:Man, and not to that extent, I think the closest that I would have is like the very close situation we had a C3 going under, right? Like, we had transitions in leadership like crazy. We had a lot of people come and go. Frankly, it was probably a place some people didn't want to work because of that focus on revenue, profit. Like, we gotta, we gotta, it's the fear based decisions. But you don't know that stuff until you're in battle with somebody like. I had some great people in those moments too, that came to like, we're going to defend this to the death. I had great people that I thought were dear friends that just picked up and left. That's a, that's a really difficult thing to get over.
Jim Johnson:Yeah, everything, everybody's great friends when things are great. It's who's the great friends when things aren't. Um, and that's, that's been one of those tough things. Like, I admit it, I don't know if I have a close friend. Like that one person that you just know would always know, I've got four buddies that I grew up with and we've been buddies ever since seventh grade and I would like to believe if something horrible happened, one of those guys would like do whatever because I know I have and a couple of the others have in one of the other guy's situations, but I don't know for sure, right? And it's not, we're just, we've grown apart. We've got our different paths and stuff like that. Although we still communicate, we're not. We all live very far apart from each other and so, you know, that's one of those things. I feel like I'm missing in my world and I'm being intentional about it right now. I've been like looking for those type of people to be in my life that I can be vulnerable with and they can pour into me as much as I pour into them. Um, did you find some of that as you were going through this? Like, Hey, I'm lacking in those areas.
Matt Behrens:I did 100%. I feel the same way. Like, but I think You know, if you're a believer, right, um, I, I think we're, the world is almost designed that way. It makes you feel isolated and alone like that. I think when you start realizing the people that are around you and the people that you are actually affecting, I think there's a lot of people that are closer than you probably think that would do anything for you. The story you're telling yourself on the inside is I'm lonely. It's lonely at the top. It's hard being a CEO. Everybody's feeling that way. So is that just a design? Is it just a story that I'm telling myself? Is it a way for me to keep isolated and keep that light right here and not let us explode open with what we want to say? And the voice that we're supposed to have and living out the purpose that we know is there because I like you're, you're deep, you're, you're very deep. You've got a lot to say, Jim, and I think like
Jim Johnson:most people, you got too much to say,
Matt Behrens:I mean, you, you were, um, you gave me a neat intro, just like. At the beginning of this, uh, on just the respect level you have for me, I've got the same for you, and I think a lot of people do probably have both of us. I think there's certain people in this industry that stand out that people want to hear more from. And yet we're the ones that are kind of like, I don't have friends. I, um, I could be a better leader. I could be this. I, I wish I was doing different things with the family. So a couple of years ago, there was a book by the name of Dr. Benjamin Hardy and Dan Sullivan called the gap in the game. Um, yeah, it talks a lot about that with the comparison, right? Like we've got this ideal picture of what we want life to be like, or where we want to go. Some of us are better at defining what we don't want than what we do want. But at the end of the day, like, look how far you've come. Look behind you and realize, hey, I made it 85 percent of the way that the issue with the ideal is we're always looking into the future. Something else we want. That's never going to change. So you've got to be happy with where you are right now and the relationships and the people you have in your life right now that have been put there for a specific reason that you can impact.
Jim Johnson:It's funny you say that, like my best friend in the world is my wife. I would, I would rather spend time with her than anybody else on the planet. And as long as she's there, I'm good. And I've, and I've not, it's not like I feel like I haven't gotten to where I want to be or that I'm even Uber lonely or anything like that. It's just. It would be cool to have the guy friend, right? Like that dude that just you hang out with and you got to, and there is some of this thing, like you look around and you see social media, what all that stuff is, and all these people hanging out together and doing their stuff together. And each time somebody approaches for something like that. There's this guard up like, and they really want to be my friend and that kind of stuff. Or they really just want something. And there's, there's a pretty good BS meter for that kind of stuff. Right. Um, what, what is it that's helped you gain some peace with that stuff?
Matt Behrens:Um, I think the biggest thing, like I had to. I had to just choose to be happy. Um, I think it's really easy to get into this like depression and anxiety and fear and worry and all of these like really low levels of emotional. And I think like everybody wants. Love, joy, peace, right? That's a conscious choice, and I think if you can approach every single day with a choice of I'm going to live today and love, joy, and peace, I'm going to invest in the people around me, I'm going to have hard conversations with my wife, and I'm going to devote and invest time in that. And I'm going to do the same thing with my business relationships, my friendships, but I have to be the same version of me to every one of those groups. If I can't be my authentic self, something's not working. One of those groups of people, I can't be a different person to every single one of those groups. I've got to be me. And I think in the past, like I've, I've probably not been as authentic as I thought I was. And then you realize, like, I'm not, I'm, I'm being torn in so many directions because I can't be myself. I just, I just want to be, and I can choose that.
Jim Johnson:Yeah. It's, it's kind of hard as a leader to, um, be who you are. If what, who you are, isn't what people perceive as a leader. Like I'm a bit silly, to be honest with you. I have a tendency to like, if I'm, if I'm genuinely being me, I'm kind of being silly all the time with my kids and my family and jokes and stuff like that. It's just who I am. Um, I get to do some of that on this. So I laugh and joke and all that good stuff, but not all the way, right? Like there's like, there's a point where you get overboard, like with my kids. You know, um, there's a big thing with me where I, I play Billy Bob and I've actually thought about doing this as like a piece of content being Billy Bob contractor and the pro contractor and having like the two sides of the coin. And, uh, they, every time I do it with them, they laugh, it's fun and all that other good stuff. But man, would somebody really see me as a leader? If I actually do that kind of stuff, that type of thing. And I, but I enjoy it, have fun with it. I think other people that are, you know, engaging with me have a fun time with it to right time and right place, I guess, for some of that stuff to what is it that you have found because you said you've been on a journey for a while, but over the last six months, it's been starting to get clear and clear and clear. What is it that you've found that's creating, has your group gotten bigger or smaller? Are you creating deeper connections with people? What does that look like?
Matt Behrens:Yeah, for sure. Well, so that's really broad. Um, back in April, I ran into Reggie Brock. He was out here and he just said he stayed at my house and just had him over. Man, something's missing.
Jim Johnson:He can mess you up in about an hour.
Matt Behrens:Dude, completely. Uh, and he did and it really like launched a journey for me, but I was, so back in March when he decided to leave the company he was at and start his whole journey on coaching and mentoring and all of that, right? So we ended up hiring him at C3 to come in and do a bunch of the leadership training and stuff and That helped tremendously, like, cause he, he's all about that as far as the team help, but what's not seen, like, how do we come together as one group moving forward going the same direction? And so he did some tremendous stuff for me at C3, but I was sitting here feeling like I'm not the leader I need to be or want to be. It wasn't a scarcity thing. It was just like something's missing. I don't, I don't know if it was the last couple of years. There's me second guessing myself. I don't know if it's a confidence issue. Like, what is this hole that I'm feeling? They told me it's like, you got to let your voice out. Like, you got to stop covering it. People need what you have to say. You need to get out there and just say it and like, okay, well, that's great. But how do I, how, how do I, how do I do this? And I think, uh, I was also working. Um, I've been working with strategic coach and actually been already, uh, he had a platinum program. So I've been doing a lot of, like, the tools and the mindset work and stuff like that. Like, I strongly believe you have to be okay. Anti fragile mobility, like there's so much you have to deal with, uh, that mindset piece of it is, is key. But, um, kind of in the process of that, I'm like, all right, who am I? What do I actually like doing? Because the things that I'm, I'm realizing kind of through that, I've got to love what I'm doing every single day, every aspect of it, I've got to have a passion behind what I'm doing, because if those aren't connected, I can't be in integrity with myself, and I'm not serving the people around me the right way, because I'm not fully in it, I'm not committed to it, I don't have the courage to step forth and have the confidence to be able to create capabilities and just like, I'm So, back in, let's see, this is June, I ended up taking about 40 days off. I took a little sabbatical, went to Colorado, did some travel. And, um, there was a workbook that I went through called Unique Ability. And, so it's really designed to, like, get you to understand what makes you tick, what makes you you, what makes you, like, What, what comes so naturally to you that you would do it for free and you think that everybody around you does the same thing because it's so natural to you and for me that, that is what lit me off on a journey. So I did like 30 days of deep work on that trying to figure out what that was and it turned out for me, I love the one on one conversations where I felt like I had something to bring and I could pour out into another person and help them. Like I wanted to empower somebody to achieve. I wanted to bring whatever resources I could, ask key questions and understand like what I could do to impact that person. And it wasn't necessarily from like a results basis or an actions basis. It was like, I just wanted to help in any way I possibly could. So it was kind of a broad thing. And so I'm like, it was, I want to empower people to achieve through genuine resourcefulness. That's kind of what came out. I interviewed like 18 different people, sent them emails asking them like, What am I good at? What attracts you to me? Like why are, why are, why do we have a relationship? And the feedback was almost completely unanimous on that they loved the connection one-on-one, having a conversation, feeling like there was this genuine want to help them. And so I kind of sat with that for a little bit and I'm like, I can't do that at C3. I have this massive vision for the business. I know where it can go. I think we're a guiding light inside of the industry in a lot of ways, just with the way that we do things versus other competitors or whatever. Um, but it didn't like, it didn't ignite the passion for me anymore. And so I remember sitting there. I'm like, well, what do I do? I don't want to sell it. I see a vision for it that they can go really big and so I ended up like within a week or two time period of finding out I don't have a passion for this. Um, I had gone to lose and I'm like, look, you're the same Colby as I am. I knew he's a quick start. He's wired hardwired as a CEO. I knew he had a massive vision, loved the business. He has a huge passion for C3. I'm like, you're the guy. And it was as simple as saying. My identity is not wrapped up in C3 anymore. My identity is wrapped up in truly wanting to impact other people and doing that on a much broader scale. And that kind of started the journey of, okay, I'm going to open up. I'm going to be myself. I'm going to figure out what I do best. And I'm going to, I'm going to live in a passionate filled day every single day of the rest of my life, because that's all I want to do forever. And so that was up until about July. So, um, since then I, I had reconnected with Reggie again. I hadn't talked to him for about, I guess, two months, like the one on one. And I was kind of walking them through kind of my journey through that time. And I'm like, all right, man. What you're doing, I'm actually really into, like, I, I see passion there for me, too. How do we put something together where we can solve issues, but we also bring this kind of, like, team health component in, although he, he doesn't really like it when you say he does team health because it's not really what he's about, but, um, we just started going back and forth and we realized, like, we both want to serve people. We both see so much influence that we both had just with the voices that we had. And it's not like, I don't, we're not doing stuff just purely in this industry anymore. Like, it's out and about, uh, from other stuff as well. But, just like, people are thinking about this the wrong way. People are constantly thinking about action, result, action, result, action, result. And nobody's getting this piece of thinking and feeling and like really diving deep into the culture. What actually matters to generate a better outcome and a different action. And so really, that's where we're diving in right now. We created an entire company. That all we're doing is diving in to get the information that people are not willing to talk about. We're getting them more vulnerable, more transparent and changing the way they think and they feel to be able to generate better actions and achieve better results. That's kind of the realm we're playing in right now. It's just, it's a blast.
Jim Johnson:That's pretty cool. I did get a chance to talk to Reggie. I reached out to him because I hadn't talked to him in a while either. I just wanted to catch up with him. He was sharing with me what you guys are up to. And, and I loved it because, um, and the way I perceived it was individual health that creates team performance. Like we we're digging into each person and, and getting to who they really are so that that team can perform well and perform healthily together and. I love what you guys are about because it's creating a community. It really is a community that truly trusts each other because there's this lack of trust. There's all this, you know, uh, there tends to be some bagbiting. There tends to be some ladder jumping. There tends to be all that kind of stuff. Hey, I'm not going to be forthright with all the information because that might hurt my career path and propel somebody else's and, and digging into all that stuff and really realizing that's not the case. That's not really what's happening. Have you guys run into that kind of stuff as you dug into these things?
Matt Behrens:Yeah, I mean, like a big piece of it is if I'm going to go on that journey of figuring out what I'm passionate about, and I want to only do that, every one of the employees should be in the same boat. And if everybody's bringing their best, and everybody's in their unique ability, and everybody's doing passionate work, like, you're all scaling in the same direction, but it'll like, you have to define what you want. And there are definitely people that are just like. Not into this. I don't want to change. I don't want to grow. I'm happy with where things are like change is difficult, but also changes needed
Jim Johnson:and I think like it's just beautiful.
Matt Behrens:Say that again.
Jim Johnson:People are scared to change.
Matt Behrens:Yeah, it's change. It causes deep work. Like you're asking yourself questions you've never pondered before and you're getting some scary answers out of it that I think some people just don't want to necessarily hear. And so like that journey is hard, but like if you're a leader of a company and change, like typically change for a visionary CEO, it's pretty easy. Some of the deep work personally is hard, but we see change all the time. So it's like you kind of adapt to it.
Jim Johnson:We thrive off of it.
Matt Behrens:Maybe a little bit, like there's some, there's some chaos there that we probably generate behind us. Just, uh, if you want to know more about that, read the book, Elon Musk. Yeah, okay, yeah. Right, um, but yeah, like people that are not comfortable with that level of change, like if they don't want to change at all, man, like they're probably completely unhappy. You want the other person to be completely them, completely happy. I don't like seeing people just like it completely in depression and worry. And just like, I don't like seeing people hurting. I want to solve that.
Jim Johnson:Oh man. The, the, the thing that strikes me when you say that, that they're plodding along each day or just surviving. I don't want to see that, that, that man, that frustrates me more than anything. I don't know how many times I've walked into a room. And asked, so, so why do you exist? What's your purpose? What are you trying to accomplish in life? And not gotten any answers back. Nobody's thought about that or put any deep work into that kind of concept before, which boggles my mind. Cause that's like the only thing I think about it seems like, and I've always been that way, a very, like, I, my thing is I don't look at it as changing. I look at it as evolving. I'm evolving every day. Every day I'm evolving and I'm going to walk into today and I'm going to be just a little bit different than I was the day before. That doesn't mean I'm going to be better, doesn't mean I'm going to be worse, just means I'm going to be different. And that different person that's gaining experience, gaining knowledge, gaining understanding, gaining depth, at some point, Is going to be somewhat valuable, I hope. Um, and, and not necessarily financially. That's not the point. Just valuable to other human beings is, is the goal. Um, I, I have this beef that if I'm consistent and disciplined on evolving every day, that that My future self is going to be very thankful to the discipline self today. The one that's doing that hard work. And I think some people are just scared of that hard work or either, either that, or they're complacent with where they, where they sit today.
Matt Behrens:Well, I think they're complacent in the day to day. They do the same thing every single day, chances are they hate half of it, if not more than that, maybe 80 percent of it, and they're not letting the future pull them forward, they're letting the past dictate who they are right now, and that's a problem, like, I think for a CEO or a visionary, like, we're constantly looking forward, we're saying Three years out, ten years out, ideally, right? Like, we're not sitting typically an effective CEO is not sitting in the day to day, like, looking right now, problem right in front of me, we've got people to figure that stuff out. Our staff doesn't have, like, some of them aren't wired for it. But other ones, like, they think that they're supposed to be in this little box, and I'm not supposed to speak out, but that doesn't help anything. And, like, if they're, they're just, if we're not encouraging our people to step out, speak when they see something, giving them a safe place to actually have the conversation that matter, we're missing out on an entire level. Of data and intelligence as a business that we, we have no ideas even existing because we haven't opened up the space for them to share it. We haven't shown them what we want the best for them.
Jim Johnson:I borrowed a core value from one of my really good friends Um, he's not in our industry, but he asked me to coach his business and we were working on his core values And he came up with them and about two months down the road, he calls me back. He was super excited. He's like, man, I nixed one of them and this is our core value. Cause I've really been thinking about it. And he said it was competitive curiosity. That was their core value. I'm like, dude, that would tell me more. He explained to me, like any person that comes to my business and involved in my company needs to be competitively, not just curious, but obsessive about it. Like so much so that they want to make things better. I went, I'm stealing that one from you. And so I've been, I've been incorporating that into our own business. This idea of curiosity, being like obsessive about it and going to the end of the discussion on it, like not just stopping somewhere along the way, like, Hey, if that thing's really good, let's go ahead and dig into it and see what it is. It's been pretty awesome to go down that road. Unfortunately, I've got a team of folks that are already kind of wired that way, and now just bringing it out. They're like, Oh, man, now I have, I opened up the box. They thought they were in, um, so in your, so you guys have started working with a few companies on this and, and, and this is about relationship, right? Like this whole conversation, this relationship between the business and the people, like that's, that's always this hard, right? Almost impossible thing for people to get solved. It seems like for me, the biggest companies are the ones that solve it. It seems like they're the ones that connect the, the, the human to the, the business aspect of things. As you guys have done this, what are some of the biggest things that you've noticed?
Matt Behrens:Um, I think it's flexing that muscle of vulnerability. I just don't think most people do that enough. I think the bigger companies do a fairly good job of like, it's an issue there too though, Jem. Like I think probably one of the biggest things that I've seen is like somebody that well, let me let me back up I want to explain kind of what what this is So we've got a tool called collective and it's a daily feedback tool. And so we're generating like hey What is the biggest win that you have? What's the biggest threat that you're facing other as a team? personally As a business, whatever that may be What's the biggest opportunity? What's the biggest learning lesson that you have today? And we think that people need to be learning every day. And what's the biggest result you want to generate for tomorrow? And then we're having them rate the day like, hey, rank your day one through five, rank your team health one through five, and rank your mental health one through five. And we're seeing people that are like, there are four or five daily, and then they drop down to a two. Something happened to them that they're not telling other people. Like, traditionally As a leader, like, you'd have no idea, you'd sense something is off, maybe that strings out the two or three or four bad days, but like, I kind of equate it this way, and I've got personal experiences, I had, uh, my, my sister in law, um, committed suicide two, about two years ago.
Jim Johnson:I'm sorry to hear that
Matt Behrens:every mental health crisis, every suicide, everything like that starts with 1 bad day and that 1 bad day goes to 2 bad days and it goes to a week, goes to a month, goes to a year, however long that ends up lasting. But if we can catch that stuff on day 1. We need to be on the lookout for that. And so if somebody has a bad day, we're not asking, hey, what's going on? I think sometimes we get caught up in, oh, there's business personal, I gotta separate this out, like they might be dealing with something at home. But what's happening at home is a direct reflection of the results you're getting and the actions that they're taking. So if we're not stepping in and we're not asking, They don't feel like they belong. They're not, like, they're not going to share anything with you. If you give them the freedom to be able to share, hey, I'm not having a great day, you reach out to them. Man, I'm just glad somebody called me. I'm glad somebody realized I was having a bad day and asked.
Jim Johnson:Yeah, we don't know, right? Like, we, we might know something's off. Some people hide it really, really well. Um, but we don't know I've, I've had people that I know quite well that have taken their lives and I'm like, man, I would have just known, right? Like if I went in, like I would have called, I would, I would have been there. I would have like, dude. Just tell me like you got somebody you can lean on and you didn't even think to call me almost kind of mad at him a little bit. Um, and I've been more intentional about that, um, lately to have my beacon on for it, where somebody might be having a bad day and I, and I, and nobody's like noticing. Um, that's pretty cool that you guys are doing that. That's, uh, that's an interesting. I didn't realize that it went to that level.
Matt Behrens:Yeah, well, and so two things on that. So Nathan, uh, with Nathan, uh,
Jim Johnson:Our guy Nathan here.
Matt Behrens:How do you pronounce his last name?
Jim Johnson:Thibodeau. Thibodeau,
Matt Behrens:okay. It's like the city of Louisiana. Yeah. You know, like Nathan called me probably a year and a half. I hadn't talked to him for a couple months. He just called me to ask how I was doing. And I'm like, dude, awesome. Like that stuff makes you feel incredibly special and just connects you at a deeper level. And then your brain goes like, how do I expand that? Because people like they are alone. Like you wouldn't have all these mental health epidemics. I think that's truly the pandemic of what COVID even turned into. We've got all these ways to connect, but nobody's connecting. We've got all of these people around us. You've got new communities, you've got zoom, you've got social media, you've got all these ways to keep in touch with people, and yet people are still just. I'm alone. I have nobody around me. I got nobody.
Jim Johnson:I call it a thin ice society. We all, we all know a bunch of people and we know a bunch of things about a bunch of people.
Matt Behrens:We
Jim Johnson:don't know any depth about anybody. And they don't know any depth about us. They don't know the real, who we are. They see a facsimile of who we are in the real world versus, and for those of you that don't know what a facsimile is, back in the day we used to send faxes. It was a representation of What that thing was, but not the real thing. Um, I think there's a lot of that in the world. As a matter of fact, I just read a study the other day that Gen Y, which I guess is the youngest workforce generation right now, is the most alone generation of all time. In a, in a technologically connected world, like it's never been before. That's to me, like disheartening. Uh, it's pretty sad, really. Um, I'm, I miss the days of watching kids outside playing baseball together. Um, you know, girls out, uh, doing whatever girls do together. Cause I didn't play with them. I played with the guys. Uh, but like that camaraderie that you had, that community that you had. And what sent me down this whole road in the very first place was, um, I was just looking, I was over on that, um, physical well being and, and performance thing. And, um, I started doing research about, you know, being as healthy as possible, living a long time as I started learning about the, the blue zones. Have you ever done your search in the blue zones?
Matt Behrens:No.
Jim Johnson:So there's five or seven blue zones, uh, in the world where they have the highest per capita of centurions in the world. And, um, they, they, they've done a lot of studies on it for quite a while now. And they, they thought it was like their diets, like what they ate. But then as they did more studies, they're like, no, wait, this blue zone eats this stuff. And this blue zone eats this stuff. They're, they're, they're different things. Um, but, uh, what's similar about them and they started to realize some similarities and then they did more studies, more studies. What they found is it was a combination of And one of the biggest factors was community. They were all small, none of them were very big, they kind of knew each other, the community relied on each other, everybody kind of played their role in the community, some people gardened, some people fished, some people did the doctor and medicine thing. And, uh, it's actually been one of those passions for me to study and learn more about. And I actually, at some point, I'm going to go spend six months on the island of Okinawa and one of those blue zone communities and just hang out because I want to see what it's like, but the pace was slower. There was no hurry to anything that they did. They always knew what was going on in the community. Their food was from sources that were organically sourced. In other words, it was as close to the source. You, they grew their own food.
Matt Behrens:Almost like the, is it the kibbutz or kibbutz, uh, in Israel? Like they've got all those little farming communities. And now I got,
Jim Johnson:now I gotta go look something else up. Like I'm, but I'm passionate about. And the reason I'm passionate about it, that I want to live for as long as I can live, it's because God gave me a gift of this life that I have, and I'm consistently becoming different each day and hopefully gaining something of value that I can share with others. I want to do that for as long as I can. I don't want to be selfish and die and not treat my body well and not treat my mental health well. Um, and I, and I now have grandkids, like that was something I never thought was going to happen. All my kids said they're never having kids and they all waited. She had hers when she was 33, 32. And now we got a second on the way, which is amazing. Um, I can't wait. That's in March. We're hoping and praying that my son just asked, just ask her. All right, like she's ready. You ready? Go. Um, because she's amazing. And maybe if he asks, you won't figure it out. And he sucks her in before she can figure it out. But she's, she's an awesome, awesome. addition to our family. And I want to be around for that stuff. I want to be around and I want to pass some of this knowledge along if I can and make their lives a little smoother and more peaceful and get them into community as well. Um, because I think that's what makes us strong. Uh, we're stronger together and when we isolate ourselves, um, all those dark things start talking to us, I think.
Matt Behrens:Oh, a hundred percent. It's just self isolation.
Jim Johnson:Yeah, and we're, and we're doing it to ourselves as much as anything else because we believe we can. Like, and it kind of feels good, I'm not going to lie. Like, there's a part of that I'm like, huh, I don't have to go all over the place and be at all these things and be around all these people. I can just do what I do from right here. And the reality of it is it's unhealthy for us.
Matt Behrens:Well, I think like that's the danger of like the metaverse and things like that, right? I mean, you, you look at, um, you look at cult followings like Tesla, you look at video games, you look at social media, you look at crypto communities, right? Like people are wanting to be a part of something. And so they pay towards things that are just most likely virtual in nature, or it's held together by a common thread or a common belief or a common material thing or. Whatever it is, but like, I mean, you mentioned Jen or generation Y here, um, being like the most disconnected of all of them. That's unfathomable to me. You look like, man, look at my daughter's phone. Right. And it's just friend after friend, after friend, after friend, after friend. And it's just like, you got 13 kids in a text group. I'm like, how are you lonely? But my kids are the same way. They're at home and she's like crying because they're lonely. This is, this is crazy and something has to be solved and I, like, I went out, um, I actually was out in, uh, uh, San Antonio at the JW. Um, and I just, I went out and I was like, I just want to do a strategy there. I'd never done one by myself. My wife was like, absolutely go like, come back Claire with clarity. And I left my phone in the hotel room and I went down and had lunch by myself. And I'm just journaling. I brought a book, no technology, like just disconnect from everything. And I'm like, I had some of the most profound moments I've ever had, just like getting away from everything else, all the distractions, and just sitting there and writing and reading and thinking, and just like, it was amazing. But I got done with lunch, and I head back over to my room, and I'm like, I'm just looking for somebody to say hi to. And everybody's just like, full family sitting there. A family of five, every single one of them is on a device. Every single one of them is on an iPad or something like not talking, not connecting. What could have been, what experiences could have happened there? Like what, what if that guy could have gotten off of his computer to pay attention to his kid
Jim Johnson:and all the worst about it, people like that hate me because I will disturb them. So like, you know, you're, you're in the airport and everybody's waiting for a flight. So they're at a restaurant or hang out at the bar or wherever they're at. Right. And I'm sitting there and I'm like, there's two people sitting on either side of me on their computer or on their phone or whatever. And like, Hey man, did you catch the game? I noticed you're wearing a Broncos, uh, outfit there. Are you Broncos fan? And I will just make them start talking. And funny enough, we hit it off, like things go well. We have a great conversation, really enjoy ourselves. I think we need to be more intentional about that kind of thing.
Matt Behrens:We've got to stop thinking that it's going to be a bother to somebody. You know, the same trip, I'm coming down the stairs and there's this, uh, they're probably in their 30s. They got their parents are two young kids. Their kids are probably, I don't know, three and five. And one of the three year olds, like, comes up on the wrong side of the stairs, whatever that means, in my side. And his mom just starts screaming at him. And I'm just like, He's fine. He didn't do anything wrong. He's just like, no bother whatsoever. But like, we're so worried that we're going to step on the toes of somebody else. Or what we're going to do is going to be an inconvenience to someone else. And it's just like, that's painful. Because for one thing, it's not true. I'm not, maybe there's some jerks, I need to get out of the way kid, but for the vast majority of people, I just don't think that's true.
Jim Johnson:And there's also, there's like two sides of that coin too. There's kind of a self absorbed person that's out there too. I don't know, like if you run into this, but walking into the grocery store and you're trying to like go down an aisle or something like that. They have the cart on one side of the aisle and they're standing on the other side of the aisle looking at the thing and it's like, you don't even exist.
Matt Behrens:Yeah. You're just standing there patiently like, can I get buy you cart?
Jim Johnson:How are you not, are you not self-aware enough to go, oh, let me let you buy. Or Can I move my cart outta the way? Or that type of, and and so I think that that kind of works both ways, right? Sure. Like being self-absorbed in my own world works on like, Hey, I don't want to talk to anybody, type of thing. So we just shut ourselves off. We got this bubble around us. Um, that's been one of the most frustrating things for me here in the last four or five years too, is just not being aware of the people that are around you. Um, I try to be, I like almost obsessive about it at this point. Like, Hey man, am I in your way? Can I open a door for you? Like that kind of stuff. Cause I want people to know, I know they exist because. When you start to discount the existence of another human being, it can go lots of bad ways. You talked about one of them was, um, suicide, homelessness. There's all these different things. And, um, and it's just so frustrating to me that we can't be more connected as human beings, more in community with each other.
Matt Behrens:Yeah, you, you mentioned something earlier as far as kind of like, and I probably went into a bad habit of this for a while too, was I made the excuse like every time I extend trust first, I get burned and I gotta wait and I need to. They need to prove trust to me before I'm going to extend it. And I, I think fundamentally, I think that's wrong. I think like if you're around the right people who can recognize the fact that I'm giving you this trust, but we can both agree, like, these are the expectations. This is what I need. I think we get. We get fearful of setting expectations. I think like, that isolation causes us to not want to step on toes, not want to hold accountable. But because of that, there's no expectation of the role. There's no clarity for them on what you expect out of them. And so I think you fundamentally just have this, like, this is not even a disagreement, this misunderstanding of what the intentions of each other are. They want to do a great job and you want to be there for them, but you don't hold them accountable. So they don't do a good job. Now you both are like missing expectations and now there's a major issue. You do get taken advantage of extending trust a hundred percent. Yeah. And
Jim Johnson:I want to give some clarity on what I meant by that. Like I trust people pretty much from the get go, um, until they prove otherwise, but with my vulnerability, so things that, um, feel I need to be somewhat protective of, I don't want to just throw those out, like from the snap, right? I need to, I need to trust that they are true with me too. Because you share something that you're vulnerable about that may not be something you want to share with the whole entire world because not everybody's comfortable with that. Just totally.
Matt Behrens:Okay.
Jim Johnson:All right. And the reality is, no matter how vulnerable we are, we never tell the truth. We, we, we, I, I would argue that with anybody on the planet, um, this whole idea of being authentic or genuine and stuff like that, we are to a certain level and some are more than others, but truly authentic with all those thoughts that are going on in our mind, it would just blurt them out to everybody. Man, I don't know if I believe that you are in that position.
Matt Behrens:Can you get there though?
Jim Johnson:I don't know. I think maybe, I don't, like, that would be
Matt Behrens:It's a practice thing, right? So like, it's interesting because if we stay isolated in our head, we're just regurgitating toxins. And so when somebody says, how are you doing? I'm telling myself that, or I don't want to go too in depth. So I'm just going to like, I'm going to avoid the hard conversation. To give you a talking point. That's just a facade when you're writing it down. And I think this is the effect of even journaling, right? Like if you keep it all up here, you're so jumbled up that you just like, I can't possibly let it all out. So I'm just going to give a little fake. I'm good. The more vulnerable you can be in writing and actually speaking it, I think that stuff just starts naturally coming out and then it's like, I don't care who you are. I'm going to tell you who I am. And I'm like, there, there are certain things that I think from a vulnerable or vulnerability standpoint, I'm not sure that I should have said that person, but it felt good. I think we want to have that genuineness, in practice it's a little bit different.
Jim Johnson:I wonder if we, if we don't want to be clean enough to be that authentic.
Matt Behrens:Well, you don't want to be judged.
Jim Johnson:Well, come on, everybody's got sinful thoughts in their head, right? Like we all do, we're human beings. Like that's not something I just really want to lead with, with everybody, right? Yeah. Um, and so. The, there's this feeling of, man, I would love to be as authentic and, and, um, out, out front with everybody that possibly can, as long as my closet was clean,
Matt Behrens:like I had a clean spot,
Jim Johnson:like, get that clean first, then I can be authentic. Um, and the reality is it's the dirty closet that we probably need to talk about.
Matt Behrens:100%. That's where accountability comes from.
Jim Johnson:Right.
Matt Behrens:Otherwise, we're just like left to our sinful nature, doing whatever we want and just, we're shoveling out the good stuff. But what are you struggling with? What lies are you believing? What are you, what's the story you're telling yourself that you don't want anybody to know? Those are interesting topics.
Jim Johnson:I would love to, to get into like really digging into how to solve some of those problems because Even sometimes if you know, it's, it's hard to, to like, Start the conversation like, Hey, I know that guy's having a bad day. Now I've got the data on it going and asking him about it. Do I make it worse? Or do I make it better? Like, do I even approach it? Cause I'm like, maybe I'm scared to hear what it is. He's having a bad day about, um, I think that's, I think that's a human being challenge that's going to be. difficult thing to fully rectify, but at least getting it more out in the open. I think you'll get us back to being healthier mentally than we were because there's more mental health issues today than there's ever been. What a great conversation.
Matt Behrens:That's the rub though, right? Like, I, I, people have so much to say. There is just this collective wisdom in people, but it doesn't come out unless a question is asked. And I think, like, we end up getting into conversations where it's just statements back and forth. Is there a question that's going to unlock that stuff?
Jim Johnson:Could this be, because I'm all about, like, treating the root, not the symptom, right? Like, hey, we'll get, could the root of it be We just don't want to take the time.
Matt Behrens:Well, I think it's, it's difficult personally.
Jim Johnson:Either we don't want to take the time or we don't have the time. Like the, and that could be either one or the other, but this man, if I asked that guy, this thing, this is going to now be a long conversation and we're going to get deep into something. Do I have the time for that? Cause I know that's a struggle for me, to be honest with you. Like, do I have the time? Yeah.
Matt Behrens:And I think the moment's got to be right, and they've got to feel psychological safety that they're like, I'm going to have this conversation with this guy. I better trust him.
Jim Johnson:But we've all got crap going on in the world, bro. I mean, how many times have you heard like, Hey man, how you doing? Oh man, I'm super busy.
Matt Behrens:Yeah. Yeah. That's not a badge of honor.
Jim Johnson:No, like I hate that. I, and I hate saying it and people will ask me and I do say it because I feel like I am very busy. It's actually one of those things I'm wondering if that's another, like a power of eight thing. Like maybe there's a thing, the unbusy thing. How do I do
Matt Behrens:that?
Jim Johnson:Yeah. It's just,
Matt Behrens:we're, we're taught, like that's my, that's my default is I, nobody's going to outwork me. And so when I can't control certain things in my personal life or things going on around or even in the business, like, you know, what, the 1 thing I can't control how hard I work, I'm gonna dive in and just get it done. But then you create the case, but I didn't get back to your, your other point job is like, unless somebody's going to take the time and ask me a question. I'm not even thinking about that stuff and that's the importance of having that accountability partner or a really good friend or a great community or a company that cares enough to actually have some of these conversations at the cultural change because like I'm not thinking about my most vulnerable issues. All the time. So I'm not going to say that we packed them
Jim Johnson:away in a closet somewhere.
Matt Behrens:Let me just spill it out right here. If a question is asked and they take the time to like actually have the curiosity to ask that. And I know they're coming from a place of like, I really genuinely want to know about you. I'm asking this question on a self serving way. But like, I want to know who you are, or what you're dealing with, or what lie you're believing, or whatever it is. I'm going to take the time to answer it, but it's not until the question is asked and somebody facilitates that conversation in a safe space that I even feel open to even having that conversation.
Jim Johnson:Hmm. I wonder what the world would be like if every time we had the thought cross our head of I wonder if I should call that guy. Yes. Because they've been through a rough patch. And they haven't told you they've been through a rough patch. You may have seen it from the outside. Or you may have noticed it through observation. And you think to yourself, they don't want to be bothered with it. Maybe they don't want to talk about it. Or maybe I don't want to have the conversation about it. Um, I wonder how many, I wonder if we would have actually made the call, how big of a difference that might have made.
Matt Behrens:Where is the urge to call that person from? Why did they even pop up in your mind?
Jim Johnson:I just had like 10 people pop up in my mind.
Matt Behrens:Call them.
Jim Johnson:I'm going to, you know,
Matt Behrens:that's the vision that I have. And that's what I went to Reggie with. It's like, what if we, what if we could be completely open and honest and create the space to not only write about what, like what's truly going on. But facilitate conversations and design questions around that data and then talk about it openly inside of the community. So not only are we sitting here like trying to transform these companies in the communities and being more vulnerable and open and honest, we're creating the space every week in a weekly gathering. Peer to peer with every company involved all going through that data and we're actually facilitating just and then breaking them out. They're going and having the conversations. I'm not even involved in the breakout rooms. It's just asking the hard question, giving them the space to have a conversation with it in a place that they know everybody is struggling with the same stuff. Because we all, so it takes just like, I don't, you don't need to be. Stage on a stage, like all you have to do is take the data that they're giving you and facilitate a conversation around it with a question. That's it.
Jim Johnson:Yeah, that's, it's a funny thing. I love that term. I might borrow that one from you. Sage on a stage. Um, I, I don't like see myself like you, we were talking about whenever we came on, like my job is to facilitate.
Matt Behrens:Yeah, I wasn't meaning you.
Jim Johnson:Yeah, no, like I, that's no, I didn't take it that way, but I think a lot of people, that's what they're looking for is the sage on a stage that solves their problem for them. And that's not really how problems get solved. You solve problems through facilitation conflict, really conflict resolution.
Matt Behrens:They want to be told what they can do better. They want to be told of different actions. They want to be told how to get different results.
Jim Johnson:But that knowledge does nothing with you, for you, without understanding and then discernment on what to do with it.
Matt Behrens:And what's causing the action to be taken in the first place.
Jim Johnson:Yeah, man. Awesome conversation. You've provoked a lot of things in me today, um, to say the least of where, most of them are where I can be better about thinking about other people. But, I brought it up, like, Okay, so I, I know I should call those people, but I also know that phone call is going to be a long call. It's not just going to be a short, quick thing. Um, and so where do I create time in this already time packed world that I have? And so I, I ran that route just so you know, like this is something that I kind of took about a 30 day break away from thing. I still did my work, but I still, I pulled away from a lot of stuff. And, um, What I came to realize is that I had put myself on this hamster wheel of like coaching all the time and not being able to create very often. And I wasn't leaving enough space where you actually brought it up the mental genius and creativity side of things you went and spent some time just writing and reading and like how profound that was for you and I wasn't creating that space. But now I realize I wasn't creating space for other people either. So I want to, I want to get that in my world and I'm going to, I'm going to make some of those phone calls. Um, I got, I got five listed right here right now. That, uh, I'm going to make over the next five days.
Matt Behrens:Can I share a story with you real quick?
Jim Johnson:Sure. We, we, we can't forget about the parents because you said don't, you said remind me about them.
Matt Behrens:That's where I was going to go actually. Okay, cool, good.
Jim Johnson:Perfect. It was
Matt Behrens:interesting. So, um, I always remember my mom telling me like, Cause she struggled with the same thing, you know, loneliness, like didn't have a friend. And this is, this would have been late nineties, early 2000, somewhere in there where like these conversations are going, like she had no connections. People wouldn't reach out. And that was always the complaint. Like, I feel alone. I don't have any friends. People aren't calling me. Like why, why can't people just call to check in, say hi. Like you're on a side on a line. Well, I remember telling my mom when I was like 12, like, why don't you just call them? You know, like I think there's a lesson there, but um,
Jim Johnson:I have, I have a question about that. Um, cause this is a struggle for me. What if you're the only one doing the calling? Like you call somebody seven times in a row, but they never call you. What, what's, what does that tell you?
Matt Behrens:Well, the other person's probably not actually interested in a relationship.
Jim Johnson:That is maybe the conclusion I've come to. I'm not sure. Um, uh, vulnerable thing, right? Uh,
Matt Behrens:what the flip side though? What if they're wishing you'd call them?
Jim Johnson:Well, I have like several times. So
Matt Behrens:what I think is funny is two people saying, I wish the other person would call me.
Jim Johnson:Oh yeah. Like that thing for sure. Right. I get that. And I, there's some areas where I could certainly be better on that part, but, um, complete vulnerability here. Um, my mom. Like, um, it was her and I, it was the two of us. We, we, we survived the world, right? And, um, she's one of those people I always have in my head. I need to call, I need to call, I need to call. And I did for the longest time, but I never got a call back ever. And there was never a, Hey Jim, how you doing? And I know where it comes from. I think that she thinks I'm too busy. She thinks I'm constantly going. Right. And I've been clear, like, mom, call me. Like, I will stop for you. There's not many people I'll stop for, but she does the
Matt Behrens:same thing.
Jim Johnson:And so, but she doesn't call. And, uh, so when you said, maybe they don't want to be in a relationship with you, that hit me pretty hard. Like, maybe that could be true. I don't know if it is. I think it's more her, her internal going. I don't want to bother him. Um,
Matt Behrens:That's probably more likely with, yeah, I'm
Jim Johnson:going to guess that one. She doesn't hate me or anything. I know that much. Um, I can be annoying sometimes though. Um, so be
Matt Behrens:persistent. Yeah. So that was kind of a, a side note. What with, with, with my parents, I, back in, back in November, Um, it was right before Thanksgiving. Um, they, my, my mom and dad both came down here, uh, to Magnolia and they were here for like four days and I'm in the middle of this business launch. Like I'm busier than I probably should have took some time away, like just getting some, some time with them. Um, but it was like we played a lot of games, like didn't really have a lot of deep conversation. I could tell something was up. I'm like, not really sure what it is and I got on a call with Reggie, um, on a Wednesday. It was a Wednesday right before Thanksgiving and we're designing kind of our questions and everything for Friday. And, um, traditionally I go away from that. I do some more design, probably have another two or three hours of work. And I'm like, Reggie, can you handle this? It's my, my parents last day. Like I want to spend some time with them. He's like, yeah, absolutely. I got this. And I remember going out and my mom and dad were like sitting kind of separate. They were soaking up the sun back by the pool. And I went out there and I'm just like, just start talking. That's another doing. What's going on? Kind of quiet. Um, asked him if I could get him some coffee, made it came in and made a coffee. My mom comes in. She's like, we're we're just we're not doing well. They've been married for 37 years, something like that. And, uh, She's like, I need to come back and fly, they only had a couple hours left, she's like, I need to just come back down and fly and have some conversations, I'm like, what? What is going on here? And, I was like, I told my dad, so my son Kellen had a karate practice that day, and so my wife's about to take him, I was like, Dad, go with Charisse, get some time with Kellen, just go see him play karate, he's killing it and he's doing really well. Um, so he goes into that. I'm like, I sit down with my mom and she's like, we're, I just can't handle it. Like, we're not, we're not communicating. We're not talking. We have nothing in common. We're not like, it just, it, it feels dead. And, uh, we're, we're going to get separated. Nope. Uh, Okay. And before that, she prefaced, she's like, I need to tell you something, but I'm like terrified. And she's got tears just streaming down her face. And she's like, I'm terrified you're going to like be mad at me. I was like, what? What is it? What's going on? And so she tells me that and I'm like, okay. And I just started like, I asked questions for an hour. I didn't make a single statement. I didn't tell her anything. I didn't give her advice. I didn't give her a hug. It was just question because I wanted to just be curious in that moment about what was going on in her world because it sounded like nobody had asked her that and so she, her and I, I mean, cried quite a bit for like an hour and my dad gets home, uh, back from practice and I'm like, That one's one slide later, hour and a half, or uh, he had to leave in an hour and a half. You and I are grabbing lunch. And um, so I, I took him to lunch and I'm like, dad, what, like, what are your, what are your three priorities this next year? Like name a month. The first thing he said, I want a better relationship with your mom. What's, what's next? Well, financial security. Okay, what's next and I forget what the third one was and so he goes through these three and I start with the third one, which is clearly the less important of the three and just started asking questions about that question about the second one. I got back to my mom. And I spent the best lunch I've ever spent with my dad, who's traditionally like no tears, very stoic guy, um, doesn't have much to say, like he's the type of guy that always brings it back to how the Denver Broncos are playing or what the score of the game was, you know, like it's just a surface level sports thing. And I was asking him questions, and he had answers that were, that blew my mind. Like, I didn't even know that that type of thing was in him. Like, I didn't know he thought that way. He had
Jim Johnson:thought about it.
Matt Behrens:He was just dying for somebody to ask a question and be curious about what he had to say. I had the same experience with my mom. And so like that two, three hour period that I could have been doing something else entirely, I created the space to be able to have a conversation to just ask questions of them. And Jim, they call me, they call me 10 days later, it's 10 days later. And, um, I was, uh, for, for about eight days, I'm like, uh, sending my dad a text. I'm like, how are you going to show up today? Like, what, what, what are you going to focus on today? How, how can you be the husband you want to be? He asked me like for some accountability and stuff and I get a call from my mom 10 days later and she's like. I don't know what's happening, but like he found a counselor. He's like, we're crying. We're having three, four hour conversations. Like,
Jim Johnson:that's awesome.
Matt Behrens:I don't know. She's like, I think he loves me. And, um, it was within like three to four weeks, um, my parents are literally, they go from divorce conversations to literally like the best conversations they've had in their life and that's awesome at the high point of their marriage. I'm like, so where does this rate? My mom's like, I've never felt this way. We didn't have this type of conversation, like when we were dating and they are in like, completely in love with each other. And just like absolutely thriving because they're curious about each other and they have the strength to open up and be vulnerable and be transparent with each other and let each other in on what they were truly thinking and like ask questions of each other, truly wanting to know what the other person thought. I'm like, they're, they're on fire,
Jim Johnson:dude. That is an amazing, that might be the best story I've ever had on my podcast.
Matt Behrens:Those are the interactions that every single person can have. As long as we have, like, if we want to have some awareness, be curious.
Jim Johnson:Well, I think one thing was you had some awareness, right? I think some people are just oblivious to that. There's something going on. Like you were aware, like, this isn't the way they normally act. And a lot of people are
Matt Behrens:everywhere,
Jim Johnson:I know, and a lot of people would avoid it, though they would go. Yeah, I don't want to step on any toes. It seems like something's wrong. Maybe they had an argument. I don't really want to mess with any of that. Um, I think it's important to ask those questions. Um, I tend to be. Uncomfortably curious like that sometimes to
Matt Behrens:me. You're like, what's going on,
Jim Johnson:man? Uh, you, like I said, you provoked a lot of me today. I'm unbelievably grateful to have you on here talking about this particular subject. We actually touched on a few others, which is pretty cool. It's always awesome to connect with you. Um, I want to make that happen more and I've got
Matt Behrens:more stories. I got two more very vulnerable stories, but yeah, well,
Jim Johnson:maybe like, um, I'm actually considering a whole other like podcast thing on just this power of seven thing and talking with great people about that. Um, and I wouldn't hate just talking one on one with you. Um, because, you know, you're one of those people I, you, that is a thing about you, you gain trust quickly, um, as you, and I think that's because you actually care, you give a rep, um, I think most people are looking to see what they can take from people, and, uh, you're one of those, uh, those giver people, and I really appreciate that about you.
Matt Behrens:Thank you,
Jim Johnson:man, uh, we got to cut it off here, unfortunately, I, I feel like I could, like, go on forever, but I've been, my, my phone's over here with the, um, My better half going, Hey, um, we had something we're supposed to do at five. So, um, we're going to shut it down. I want to say thank you very much for getting out. Hey, if somebody wants to find out more about what you guys are doing with companies and how you're doing, is there a website? Is there a name? Like, I don't think I caught that. What was that? Yeah. So
Matt Behrens:we, we actually called the company that one company. So it's that one company. net. Um, it's kind of the landing page that we have. We're still building out the website stuff. It's kind of been, uh, taking a backseat, but, um, it's pretty easy to reach out to Reggie and I, um, Facebook, social media, LinkedIn. Yeah.
Jim Johnson:We'll put that in the show notes. Your, uh, your social media contact and stuff like that. Um, hopefully you'll come back at some point in the future. Uh, hang on for just a minute. I want to talk to you about something if you don't mind. And, uh, we will, uh, we'll, we'll go ahead and close out the show and we'll, we'll wrap up here and I'll get the details to you with what happens after the show. All right. Hey, thanks, Matt. Really appreciate it, man. Wow. All right. Um, let's see. I had a couple of tears in my eyes. Uh, that was an amazing story about Matt's parents. I wonder how many other parents out there would have possibly stayed together if their amazing son had asked some questions. Uh, just wow. That was, that was really provoking. Um, I would strongly suggest after this call or after this listening to this podcast today, if you were provoked by anything, maybe there's some people you should call and let them know they exist and that you're thinking about them or maybe even that you're worried about them or maybe that you just want to ask some questions and be curious about what's going on in their lives. Uh, make a list of those people and give them a call because I'm going to, that's what I was doing while I was writing. Um, if your mom or dad need to hear from you, give them a call, talk to them. More often than not, the thing that's sitting there waiting to be talked about, isn't talked about. Be the person that sparks that conversation. I hope you enjoyed the show today. I hope that you reach out to Matt Barron's or Reggie Brock on social media. You can find them. They're pretty easy. We'll put it in the show notes. I'm your host, Jim Johnson. Thanks for being here and we'll see you on our next episode.