Built Through Resilience | Steve Gamlin | The Sean Trace Show

In this episode, I sit down with Steve Gamlin for a powerful conversation about resilience, self-kindness, gratitude, personal growth, mental health, and what it really takes to keep moving forward when life gets hard. 

We talk about grief, anxiety, emotional regulation, building healthy habits, overcoming self-doubt, and how small intentional choices can create real momentum during uncertain seasons. Steve shares how losing his wife, surviving years of hardship, and rebuilding through pain deepened his understanding of resilience, while I open up about growing my company, managing stress, practicing self-care, and learning how kindness toward myself has become essential to showing up well in business, fatherhood, and life. 

This episode is about mindset, healing, personal development, and the daily habits that help us stay grounded, hopeful, and strong even when we do not have everything figured out.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Resilience now means so much more than it ever did before in my life. You know, it's not just the one-off thing. It's it's this whole gang of things shaking that first hill of the roller coaster, trying to get the bolts to fall out. Now it's just it's come back from anything and everything no matter what, because I've got my goals, hopes, dreams, desired outcomes like everybody else has, or in my opinion, should have. So now it's no matter what throws uh life throws at me from any direction, overcome that. It's not just a little one-of-the-time speed bump anymore. It's it's life as a whole. And it some days it picks you up, some days it tries to knock you down, and some days it just ignores you. But uh, for me, it's just no matter what, it's a lot deeper than the definition used to be. I used to just think, oh, here's one little thing, and I overcame that. That's that's cute. But uh the past, you know, year plus have shown me that uh, man, resilience just it takes every bit of strength you have, but then you got to remember to stand on top of it and say, I got through that so I can get through this next thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:13

All right, welcome everybody back to the Sean Trace Show. I have an awesome repeat guest with me today, and would you like to tell people who you are and a little bit about what you do?

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Hey there, Sean. Thank you so much for having me back. My name is Steve Gamlin. I enjoy life as a keynote speaker, as a visualization strategist, and a learning program creator in the world of visualization and helping people see their best selves and then map out a plan to get there.

SPEAKER_00 1:37

I love that, man. You know, we we uh it's been a long time, and I've had some ups and downs since we last talked. There's been a lot of growth, a lot of growth that I had to go through, and not all of it was easy, man. It's like I I grew my company from two video editors to now I have 25, and that's a good thing, but it also is a lot on my plate. And, you know, um, I had to learn a lot of resilience and emotional uh regulation. Kind of work through some of that stress, but you know, it's been interesting because I know that you've been dealing with things in your life as well without getting into it. Like, how has resilience helped you in the last, you know, couple years or the last year?

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Yeah, it's been very difficult. Um, as we mentioned before, my wife Tina uh passed away in early December of 2024. So since then, my word has been resilience, which just means rising above no matter what. And some people say it's it's a pivot in your life. And I'm thinking, well, a pivot means you kind of stop and turn and go somewhere else. Resilience is you're you're in a small room and somebody has a Super Bowl and it's just bouncing in every different direction. And you just learn to just bounce off the walls a different way. And every day you wake up, there could be forces out there that are trying to knock you down, tear you down, screw you up, trip you up. But the resilient people, no matter what, they just wake up every single day and they say, you know what, I'm just gonna claw my way up one more step. Uh I always talk about life as like an old wooden roller coaster. So that first hill, you got to go click, click, click, click before you can enjoy the ride. Part of resilience is just not getting knocked all the way back down to the parking lot level. And just no matter what, every day, you just keep going, even if it's a slightly different direction or whatever life puts in front of you, you just go around it, over it, under it, or through it, and you just keep on clicking upward.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

Yeah, 100%, man. It is like that that roller coaster analogy is so spot on. And, you know, it's just like you don't want to go backwards, but you you if you can keep those little, that little momentum going in the right direction, you can get to really big, great places, but you gotta just keep putting one foot in front of the other. And, you know, for you, as you've encountered challenges before, um, has your definition of of resilience changed? It's gotten deeper.

SPEAKER_01 4:14

Uh, you know, I mean, back in the day, of course, everybody has things that happen to them in life. And I'm thinking, okay, here's this one thing. And, you know, I was resilient. I came back from that one thing. Well, over the past, well, seven years now, but in a span of about six years, I had four deaths, a pandemic that wiped out both my businesses, uh, two years of inhaling toxic black mold that impacted me uh mentally and physically for a while. And resilience now means so much more than it ever did before in my life. You know, it's not just the one-off thing, it's it's this whole gang of things shaking that first hill of the roller coaster, trying to get the bolts to fall out. Now it's just it's come back from anything and everything no matter what, because I've got my goals, hopes, dreams, desired outcomes like everybody else has, or in my opinion, should have. So now it's no matter what throws uh life throws at me from any direction, overcome that. It's not just a little one-of-the-time speed bump anymore. It's it's life as a whole. And it some days it picks you up, some days it tries to knock you down, and some days it just ignores you. But uh, for me, it's just no matter what, it's a lot deeper than the definition used to be. I used to just think, oh, here's one little thing, and I overcame that. That's that's cute. But uh the past, you know, year plus have shown me that uh man, resilience just it takes every bit of strength you have, but then you got to remember to stand on top of it and say, I got through that, so I can get through this next thing.

SPEAKER_00 5:49

I love that. I love that, you know, and it's like uh you know you were able to climb that last stair. So the stair in front of you is something that you sit there and look at and go, I think I can get through that as well. But you know, it's also about understanding. I I was talking to uh this one guy who's an awesome dude, a former Navy SEAL, Kevin Stark, and he said that now he helps men work with balance because he's like, it's not always about pushing out through. Sometimes it's about honoring your limits in a healthy way, too. You know, but how how do you think that people can find the balance between pushing through hard things and honoring when you need to take a step back and focus on self-care and your your real limits?

SPEAKER_01 6:31

Yeah, I actually had a great example just a couple days ago. Um, my longest running client, I just did my 18th annual event with them for their team, uh, visualization, vision boards, and talking about balance, which I also alternate the word integration, which means all of the different areas of your life. So some places you are going to have limitations. And one of the team members from the company said this year it's all gas, no breaks. And she's been going and going and going, and she is sick. She wore herself out, she got herself a cold, and I said, you know, it's the the phrases are cute, you know, all gas, no breaks, new year, new me, uh, you know, hustle and grind, hustle and grind, which is a phrase that I think hurts more than it helps for a lot of people.

SPEAKER_03 7:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

You've got to understand, just like your friend uh talks about balance, I talk about integration of all I use eight major areas of life: your physical health, your emotional well-being, your closest relationships, your core values, your faith, your connection to the world in real ways, and then your work and your money. We do have limitations. You know, we have to understand those that we may not be pushing to the limit that some other people are, but we have to understand we have our limits. You need a certain amount of sleep every night. You know, you can't just you can't just say new year, new me, and and act like you're gonna break all the rules, including what your mind, your body, your soul, and your heart can take. So you've got to understand, yeah, there are limits, but you know what? Be a badass to the best of your limits. And you're still gonna be ahead of where most of the world is at.

SPEAKER_00 8:06

Yeah, right. You're gonna be ahead of most of the you're gonna be ahead of the game if you can at least just be showing up. You know, it's like, um, what was it? Someone that uh was talking to me about creating new habits, and he said, You want to go to the gym, just get in your car. And you know, like, you know, you want to get in shape, just just get in there. If you start lifting, you're gonna be light years ahead of where most people are at. So just get in, show up, and do what you can. But, you know, I it it it it's it's easy to say, but you know, it you gotta do it. And sometimes we have to find ways to to figure out ways through it. I today had this interaction with uh a person. The guy pulled cut me off in traffic, and I looked over, and it were motorbikes here in Vietnam, uh, and I looked over the guy, I was grumpy, and I was like, about ready to say something sharply. And I looked down and he had this adorable little poodle that looked just like my daughter's poodle. And I was just like, all right, hold up. If this guy's got that dog, he's probably not a complete and total jackass. Um, you know, and one of the things too is like I had to sit there and find that kindness in myself. And, you know, we we react in ways of fear and anger and um just uncertainty. And sometimes that can come across in ways of cruelty, but kindness is kind of this antidote for that, you know, and and kindness is often framed as something we give others, but kindness, you know, when we practice it, you know, it if you can start practicing that kindness toward yourself, it's it's a powerful thing. This morning, I I've been taking better care of myself, but man, I've been achy and sore. And you know, and I was like, you know what? I never used to have this. And I was like trying to think about the times that I felt the best in life. And I recognized the time that I felt best, I was doing yoga four days a week for an hour a day. And I was limber and I felt good. And this morning I woke up. I had someone who was on my podcast, and they were like, they didn't tell me they had a hard out at like a certain time. And so I woke up super early and I had this hard out, and the person was gone, and I was like, Well, I've got 30 minutes until my daughter wakes up for school. Let's do some yoga. And I gave myself that practice, and it was kindness to myself. And when I was leaning in, I wasn't beating myself up into the pose. It was just this self-kindness. But like, I wanted to ask you like, what does practicing kindness toward yourself actually look like in in daily life and in your daily life?

SPEAKER_01 10:42

And that's a what a great example. And kindness towards yourself, so many people, that's it just sounds foreign to them. Like, what do you mean I'm supposed to be nice to myself? You think back to the old Saturday Night Live, that Stuart Smalley character, you know, the guy looking in the mirror saying, you know, I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like me. That's kind of a comedic example of it, but being kind to yourself is you know, you want to quick out. Pay attention for just one day, all the things you say to yourself, like your self-talk and your self-language. And when you look in the mirror, you just go, ugh. Be kind to yourself. I I've learned a couple of habits from Mel Robbins that are part of every single day. I get the five-second rule, which means when my alarm goes off at 5 05 a.m., I turn it off within five beeps. Feet on the floor within five, four, three, two, one seconds, in the bathroom mirror. First thing I say to myself, this is a great way to show kindness to yourself. I point at myself in the mirror and I just say, I love you because you're a good dude. And I tap my heart, I go with a big heart. And then I point up and I say, and you love your Tina. So today we're gonna make good decisions, we're gonna be nice to ourselves, and we're gonna honor her. That's nicer by 5.06 and a half a.m. than many people are to themselves all day. And I used to get up, look in the mirror, and just go, ugh, what the hell happened to you? You know, you used to be an athlete and now you're, you know, you're you're sore, you're achy. So, you know, I stretch every day now. I occasionally do a yoga class, but man, you just inspired me to do more of those. But I think people just right out of the gate, don't be a jerk to yourself. Some people are me are worse to themselves than they are to that person who cuts them off in traffic. Even if that person does have an adorable poodle in their lap on a, you know, on a motorbike. Just learn to be kinder to yourself, accept yourself as you are. And if there's something about yourself you don't like, just say, hey, you know what? I wasn't always like this. I used to be like this. So I can go back to that. Maybe if I'm just nicer to myself, I'll actually give myself a chance to make that change in my life. And you start to find out that the kinder you are to yourself, all of a sudden that level of energy is emanating from you every day in your conversations because you're not starting off in this self-deprecating minus sign place. You're you're coming from a plus sign and you're you're trailing plus signs behind you, I think, when you treat yourself well enough and that energy reaches other people. I love that, man.

SPEAKER_00 13:20

And uh I I love that people are able to make that change and able to identify that they've been stuck, that they've been in a place that's not that healthy, you know, because I I think that, you know, for me, I was working hard, started my business, or grew growing my business. And then suddenly I got to this point where I was like, man, I'm I'm you know, walking up the stairs and feeling gassed. I'm doing this stuff. So I got back into we tie. And one of the things that I'm really big on this right now, it came up in one of my other podcasts, and the three-part things that you have to do. And I think it was a financial podcast that came in because people were talking about, you know, you have these goals that you want to achieve, but you gotta have three things to really achieve that, you know, you're gonna have your goals and dreams, you've got to have your values, and you've got to have your habits, you know. And it's like if you don't have all three, it's kind of hard. If you have habits, but you don't really have the values or the goals, you know, you're not gonna get anywhere. You know, but if you have just one of those or two of those, it still doesn't build get you really to where you want to be without a little bit of luck, you know? But, you know, you can have all those things, but if you don't have that self-kindness and that self-care, you know, it's not that great, you know. And uh it's a me, it doesn't have to be a big thing. Like when I was, when my daughter goes to do martial arts class, I will run on the treadmill for about 10 minutes, then I hit the heavy bags for about 15 minutes, and then I'll do some light yoga for the rest of the class. And what happened, what I found was that those small intentional acts of kindness to myself created momentum during periods of uncertainty and transition. You know, I had these things that were going like my life's going crazy. I wake up today. I had my LinkedIn had 75 messages in it this morning from people that I had reached out to. And I'm just like, ah, that freaks me out, man. I'm I'm an introvert. And I know it doesn't seem like that in my podcast because I love conversations with people, but I'm a heck of an introvert. And it's like, and you know, it's a lot to get overwhelmed by. But when we can have those little acts of like self-care, and you know, one of the things for me that I know is a non-negotiable, I have to take a nap. And I'm my whole team, everyone on my staff naps from 12 to 1. We shut down the office, close down all the different rooms in the office, and we have places everyone curls up, and then after nap time, everyone gets in and productivity increases, everyone gets more done. But you know, we have that ritual that everyone follows, and and it's something that, you know, I see at the end of the day, people are able to pull it through the finish line in a much stronger way than if we just powered through the whole day. So it's really interesting like that. But like I want to ask you for from your experience, how can small intentional acts of kindness create momentum during periods of uncertainty or transition?

SPEAKER_01 16:18

And there have been a lot of those over the past year. I mean, just being in limbo with a lot of things and just really being down some days and just sad. And what I found out, and somebody said, Steve, what do you do when you're down like that? I said, first thing I do is get the hell out of the house. I would drive into town. I mean, we live, you know, there's a grocery store like, you know, 10, 15 minutes from here. I'll go and I'll scan the parking lot for abandoned shopping carts. And then I just, as soon as I see one, I smile, I'll go, uh, shopping cart rodeo time. So I'm like rounding up these strays and I bring them back to the store. And if I see somebody that needs one, I'll offer it to them or I'll bring it back into the store. It's little things like that when I get to impact or create just a ripple of something. Uh, holding a door for people, picking up a pizza trash that somebody might have slipped or tripped on, um, waving to somebody, giving somebody a smile, paying somebody a compliment if I see somebody with a cool hat. And I'm an introvert as well. So this used to be really tough for me to do. I would just look at the person and say, that is the coolest hat I've seen all day. Me, I couldn't pull that off, but you, you rock with it. They smile, I smile, I gain a little more confidence. I feel better about myself because I impacted another person's life in a positive way. Whether or not they were aware, like rescuing a shopping cart on a windy day means somebody's car did not get dented because you took the time to put a plus sign out there, create a positive ripple in the universe. And the funniest time I ever had rescuing shopping carts was early in the morning. This is about eight years ago when I used to go to the gym near us. I work out pretty much at home now. But I was rescuing carts and leaving them in front of the businesses that they belong to. And somebody gets out of a car and she goes, So you're the one. I'm looking around, like, who the heck is talking to me? She goes, I I have to open the store every day. You're the guy who leaves the carts here, so I don't have to walk around the parking lot to get them. Thank you so much. You just made my day easier every time you do that. That's awesome. I was just getting extra steps in my workout, man. And just saw a potential to create a little simple act of kindness that cost me absolutely nothing. Matter of fact, it added to my steps every time I did it. So just look for little ways to leave a plus sign trailing behind it, because here's the best part. You own the factory. It's in your heart. You're never gonna run out. You create as many as you want. You're never gonna run out if you choose not to.

SPEAKER_00 18:50

Yeah. That's it, man. You just have to make the choices. It's yeah, uh, it's about the little choices that you you start stacking them up, and you know, you get those baby steps. What was it? That uh I love that movie with uh Bill Murray that you know he was talking about baby steps. I can't remember the name of the movie right now.

SPEAKER_01 19:10

But um What about Bob? What about Bob?

SPEAKER_00 19:14

With Richard Dreyfus great movie, Richard Dreyfus. Such a good movie. Oh man, it's like and you know, it's so annoying, but he like the baby steps and he baby steps all the way where it needs to be, and you get to someplace big if you're taking those baby steps. But you know, one of the things that I think that I have struggled with is, and I had to reframe it. Um, I had some clients come to me and they wanted to completely rework the videos we were doing for them, like completely. And, you know, I I always would guide, I've been the type of person like, why? Why do we got to change this? And you know, you you you have that moment where you just resent having to change. But then I sat there and I I started really following. I read this book, Radical Ownership by Jocko Willink. And I I would listen to his a couple talks when he was on, I think it was Rogan once, and he was like, so something goes bad, good. You know, learn to use it. You know, something happens, good. And and what I I sat there, I thought about it, I was like, I don't know if I can think good to everything, but I think what he's looking at is the concept of gratitude. You know, and gratitude is sometimes like misunderstood as like ignoring difficulty, you know, like I'm not gonna focus on that. I'm focusing on the positive. But like I find that gratitude is also an acceptance of the fact that we're even here right now. And we have the ability to do stuff. We have the ability to make a choice in this moment that other people don't do not, you know. Some people have a situation that they don't have the ability to make a change. Like right now, I have a business. I have a business that I'm growing. Am I threatened by changes in the market? Am I scared about this or that? Like, definitely. But I have gratitude that I'm even sitting here with the ability to be afraid, with the ability to be worry about changes. You know, it's like, and I think that at that point in time, you can sit there and go, you know, some people aren't even in that place. I wasn't in that place five years ago. One year ago, I was not where I'm at now. And so I think the beauty is that gratitude doesn't have to be this esoteric thing, but it's, you know, I want to ask, how do you practice gratitude in a way that feels honest and grounded?

SPEAKER_01 21:26

Yeah, it's something I've been doing now for over 15 years, and I'm very grateful for a dear friend of mine, a fellow speaker, who said this at an event that I was just sitting in the crowd for attending. He says, I put pen to paper every day and I write down three things I'm grateful for. And I kind of took it a little deeper to say three moments that I'm grateful for. Because some people, as you know, you go, what are you grateful for? They go, Oh, my house, my spouse, and my job. You see them a month later, what are you grateful for? Dude, I told you, my house, my spouse, my job. And you can already hear just in that 30 days' time, the person. A little less excited about it because it's almost like it's just repetition and you lose intensity. So what I do, what I've been doing now for over 15 years, I put pen to paper each morning, and we're talking about, I'd say good 95 to 96% of the mornings over the past 15 years. My three favorite moments from the previous day in less than a line each, because that's when people say, I don't have time for that. I timed my process one day. It took me 38 seconds. I did it on video in real time. I write down the date and I write down the word great stuff. And I write one, two, three, and in less than a line each, I describe as emotionally connected as I can my three favorite moments from the previous day. And matter of fact, yesterday I had to bring my truck in for oil change, tire rotation, and inspection. So I was at the dealership doing that. What was I grateful for? I was grateful that I brought one of my journals along and I wrote a chapter for my upcoming book talking about the Stephen Tina story, about the love that we shared and all the lessons from it. So I'm grateful that not only was my vehicle being taken care of, but I wrote part of the book. That was one of my gratitudes this morning. Another one was this little rock that I found in Tina's old car last night. I've seen the little envelope this thing was inside hundreds of times over the years. Last night I went out, it was quarter and nine, freezing cold, pitch black, got my spotlight of a flashlight, and I opened the glove box to get a piece of paper I needed, and there's this little envelope there. And for the first time ever I opened it up, it's a little rock that has the word love inscribed in it. I'm thankful for the love rock today. So it's the little things like that. If you start to write them down and be aware and just think about them and write them down in a way that you can reflect upon them later and tap back into those emotions, which I can do easily, you're gonna be standing on a pretty darn solid foundation of gratitude that's gonna help you get through each day. If you if you start your day by being fired up about something good that happened yesterday, even if it wasn't a good day, there's a couple little flecks of gold in there somewhere. Look for them and you're gonna find out that that might salvage your morning and actually make today a pretty darn good day. Right.

SPEAKER_00 24:14

Right. I love uh if you you have to dig deep. You have to look at everything. And if you can really look deep, you will find it. But like I think that one of the things for me that I have to do is I find my gratitude, I find the little moments that I can lean into. But like, again, like I talked about earlier, like the most important thing for me is habits. It's really trying to find those habits to keep there, habits to create gratitude, habits to get my wellness in place, habits to find purpose in a way, you know, because I think for resilience to make sense, you have to have your why. You have to have your your your um your ethos, your morals of like, you know, what make has meaning to you, you know, and the the values, I think is a better word. Because at the end of the day, you know, it's about finding your why. And like to wake up in the morning when you don't feel like waking up, you know, Mel Robbins, I love the 54321. You know, you get up, you do something, you know, and I also love Admiral Williams McRaven's make your bed. You know, you start off with the little things, you start off with those little things. And like for me, you know, I I Admiral William McRaven's stuff, I deal with anxiety constantly. I have a constant low-grade anxiety that I don't talk, I talk about it someone on this podcast, but I don't talk to my my daughter about it. I don't need her to know about that. My wife knows. Um, you know, I don't need my team to know. I I try to keep everyone's spirits up, but I have to be the one that keeps my spirit up. And I do that with, you know, meditation, prayer, uh, reading and yoga and going to the gym and then just working on deep breathing. But those little habits help keep my gratitude present. And even when feel life feels busy or overwhelming and the anxiety starts to climb, it it keeps those those little routines keep me, keep me in in the sane territory, you know, because otherwise it gets overwhelming real fast. What simple habits or things do you have that help you keep your life from getting overwhelming?

SPEAKER_01 26:25

Uh, one of them, and I weave a lot of humor into everything that I do. If it makes me laugh, it's gonna help me to stay on track. So whenever I drive past, uh, you know, and I and I do my best to eat healthy. I have a fresh fruit and vegetable smoothie every morning after my workout. Uh I still cook every single day for myself, whether it's salads or full-on meal that I'm cooking. So I make my decisions to stay healthy, even though it's so convenient to eat in unhealthy ways that I mean, gosh, there's so many drive-throughs and takeouts and DoorDash God, they'll bring the unhealthy food right to your house now. It's so easy to be bad. So I've developed this thing that I started years ago when I was going to the gym in town because there was a Dunkin' Donuts and a McDonald's right across the street from it. So every day when I was leaving the gym, I gave it when I call, and I'm not going to do it on camera, the McFinger. Every time I see a fast food place, I see all these cars, I go, I know you got to stay in business, but you can't have me. McFinger time. And I would do that and I would make myself laugh. And I would go home and have a, you know, a protein bar or a granola bar and make the smoothie and just make good choices. That doesn't mean I eat like a monk, but it just means every time I look down and I've I'm down about 35 pounds from where I started a few years ago. And I say, look, I could go enjoy all that, but I worked real hard and I've still got probably another 15, 20 pounds that I would like to lose easily. And I say, I want to make a decision today that's going to help me go click and not fall back down to the parking lot, you know, off the first hill of that roller coaster. So I've got all these little habits and these little reminders, and many of them are based in humor and they make me laugh and they get rid of those evil thoughts of, well, go just go order, you know, just a small thing of French fries. That can't hurt you. Yeah, it can. McFinger. I'm out of here. You know, I'm I'm uh I'm not even gonna get in the line. And and not judging anybody who does, but I I love myself more than that to let myself get back to an unhealthy place. Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_00 28:34

I love that that you're actually able to see that and know that. Because some people can't identify that, you know, they just like they go down there and get sucked into whatever it is that is their temptation point, you know, and and or the thing that is pulling them in the direction that they shouldn't be going. And, you know, I I love that you're able to see what it is that really brings you value and brings you wellness, you know, because it's like wellness can look so many different ways for so many different people. And, you know, but at the end of the day, are you able to like validate that space of just being healthy, wealthy, and wise, you know what I mean? And and so it's not always easy, you know. And I I I I'm trying to think about like I'm trying to say, like, I would love to say to people, yeah, man, it's an easy thing to do. But there are when you're driving out of there and you're sitting there, like, I'll give another example that I think is the the most difficult for me. When I take my daughter to the grocery store and we are checking out online, and then we get right to that checkout, and they've got all that shit that I don't want her eating, you know, and it's like at her height at her height on both sides. It's like a gauntlet of like junk food on both sides. And she's like, Daddy, that is. And I'm like, no, we're gonna get through this, you know, and you just gotta kind of level up, you know, and it ain't easy, you know, because you're sitting there going, God damn, man, whoever planned this out is admit like a genius, but I gotta be stronger than that.

SPEAKER_01 30:10

They know exactly what they're doing.

unknown 30:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:14

You know, and it's like it's interesting because there's a lot of people that that are might be listening to this going, yeah, great for you guys. You've got it figured out. And I'll I'm gonna tell people, first of all, I don't have it figured out, but I'm piecing it together one piece at a time. But you know, for someone who's like sitting there thinking, you know, I want to get my stuff figured out. Where should someone start if they feel stuck or life feels unclear? Where would you tell them to start putting their energy?

SPEAKER_01 30:40

First thing I ask everybody to do is put down their phone, turn off all things electronic, grab a pen and a notebook or a journal or a piece of paper or something. Just write down where your life is at right now, in in all the areas I mentioned, your physical health. If you're a numerical person, do it one to ten. If you're creative, descriptive like I am, write yourself a little paragraph, even or a couple of sentences. Where is your life right now? Because we get stuck in that I want more and I want better. But we're not describing, you know, some people say, Oh, I'm fat. Well, they might only be 10 pounds overweight, they might be 110 pounds overweight. So many people react. So I just suggest to people breathe and just write down where is your life right now? You might find out that maybe one or two areas of your life are way off the rails, and that's what's causing you discomfort, thinking your whole life is a mess. It may not be. It might just be a couple of decisions you got to make. You may be putting yourself out there in positions of temptation that are causing you stress and anxiety. And you realize, hey, maybe if I just don't go to these places or hang out with these certain people, but just take a snapshot of where your life is right now before you start saying, I want more and I want better. Where's your life right now? That's your point A. What you decide after that is your, you know, your point B and beyond. But not enough people look at their lives as exactly where they are right now. They overblow the bad stuff and they just think it's the worst. And then what do they do? They walk around saying, oh my gosh, how much worse can my life get? What else could possibly go wrong? Dude, you make the law of attraction in the universe giggle when you say that. Please stop that using those phrases. Right. Look at where your life is right now and where you want to go.

SPEAKER_00 32:31

And be like that's it. I I and I love the whole vision board thing that you you push because like I believe in that what you focus on is something that is what you're gonna attract. And if you are leaning in on things that you don't like, man, you are you are gonna be putting that in your head. Like I found that as I started growing, I had the wildest thing happen, and I don't know how to explain it. As I started making more money and I started building my business, one of the wildest things happened. I had food allergies for years, couldn't eat anything. And suddenly I started making more money. I started growing my business and my food allergies went away. I don't know how to explain that. Yeah, but yeah, and like I I, you know, I'm around, I studied medicine for a while and I talked to my doctor about it. And my doctor, first of all, was like, Sean, stress. And I was like, makes a lot of sense, man. And he's like, as you start stepping into a place where things are better, you start attracting a better space and your body starts relaxing and you start feeling like you deserve to eat more and try more and do more. And um, you know, it's really interesting because I think that we have to work how to one of the most important things that people can do is to figure out how to step beyond the box that you are growing in, beyond the box that your life is limited in. And, you know, whether you realize you're in a box or not, it's there. And, you know, what is it that's limiting you and holding you back? Maybe it's your self, you know, self-talk. Maybe it's the uh the way that you're beating yourself up for mistakes that you made in your past. You know, like, you know what, I could have been a better, da-da-da-da, could have been a better father, I could have been a better this, I could have been a better that. You know, I sit there and sometimes I think back about moments in my past that I wasn't the best. But then I sit there and go, you know what? I'm trying to be the best I can today. And if someone ever comes up to me and says, Sean, you know what? There was one girl in high school that I teased. I was horribly bullied, horribly bullied my freshman and sophomore years. And then my junior year, this girl came along and everyone was picking on her, and I picked on her too. It didn't bully, you know, not physically, but we teased her. And I look back and man, if I could ever find her again, I would apologize profusely and cry and say, you know what? Man, the hurt people hurt people. And, you know, and and just but I can't, I can't. I can't, I don't know where she's at. I don't even remember her name. But like the reality is, is like you can't go into that. But I can today sit there and go out and treat people well. When I work with my daughter and her classmates, I sit there and I'm all about treating each other with respect. We go to parent teacher meetings, I'm talking to the kids about bullying and how not to be a bully. And it's like something that, you know, it in teaching these kids to stand up for each other. We went to a team activity they had, they they were doing like a tug of war. And I was able to sit there and help coach the team. And they, they took it to fourth grade, took a class from a game from fifth grade. That's a big deal for that age, you know? And what I found was like, you know, we can't look back and change the past, but we can very much change our future and change the world around us. And but you just have to be you have to believe that you're able to do it and to step out of the box that you're stuck in.

SPEAKER_01 36:07

Yeah. I I was stuck in a box of shyness and not good enough. I spent most of I'll be I'm turning 58 this year. I spent decades of my life not feeling good enough, smart enough, attractive enough, whatever, not deserving of things. And in my mid to late 30s, I was just thinking of something and I went, oh my gosh. Seventh grade spelling bee, 13 years old. Now I went to a junior high with one friend from sixth grade, but all the other students I knew went to a different school, and I went to a private school. So I didn't know anybody, so it was already uncomfortable because everybody else knew each other, in my opinion. And I got embarrassed in the seventh grade spelling bee. The teacher said, spell award. And I'm like, a wad? A W A D. And she said, No, and all the students laughed. And the the student after me, my friend Dominique, did the same thing I did. And then the third kid said, Sister Helen, could you say that in a sentence? And I'm like, oh. And she goes, Yes, this the student failed to win the spelling bee award because he spelled the word the word incorrectly. And I go, Oh my God, I get a 60-year-old Catholic nun with a wicked hard Boston accent. She meant a ward with an R in it. And I get so embarrassed. It's like I did literally. Bro, I stopped raising my hand in class at that moment. And I went from all A's up till then. I trailed. It was like it was like an old World War II movie where the plane gets shot and it trails smoke and oil and then a little fire and then it crashes. I got shot in seventh grade and I crashed my senior year in college. My grades just went decline, decline, decline until I graduated college by 62 1,000ths of a point. That moment I allowed, it's not her fault, it's my fault because I allowed it. I allowed that moment to cripple my confidence for almost 30 years. And I went, oh my gosh, is that really what I've allowed all these years to define me and to hold me back and keep me inside that box, like you said, self-limiting beliefs? Dude, come on. Now I can get on stage in front of a thousand people. No problem. You know why? Because I have so much love and compassion for the person who is sitting in that seat way in the back or way in the shadows, because that's where I used to sit. And I work damn hard to reach those people. Because those are my people. And show them that they can do it too. Get beyond what maybe maybe you had something, you know, dumb that happened or silly that happened, or you allowed it. Resilience, man. Right back to that word. Resilience. Overcome it. Recognize it. Give it a high five or poke it in the eye. Do a three sutures thing, do it. Whatever. Yeah. Grow.

SPEAKER_00 39:16

Yeah. I um, man, I love that. First of all, a wad is like absolutely hilarious because I grew up, I grew up, I was born, born outside Boston. And you know, the you know, I I love when I go back there and I hear people talking, you know, in the Boston accent. You know, and it's like I remember like I went to watch a movie. And back in the day, I was at college, and you know, I I you had to call in to listen to what movies were playing. I called in and like, this movie's rated ah.

SPEAKER_02 39:49

It's like this movie's rated A-H-H-H-H. I don't know what that means. It's rated ah. It's rated ah, movies rated ah for violence.

SPEAKER_00 39:59

And I was just like, God damn, that's awesome. Um this movie's wicked, wicked, wicked, wicked, wicked rad, wicked awesome. You know, and I just like, oh yeah, that's awesome. But one of the things that that stands out is um, you know, we we all have those traumatic events, man. I I know I can remember one of the most traumatic events. It wasn't something that happened to me, but um, it was something that happened to my my uncle, who was my mom's youngest brother, who was only like a year older than me. We were playing, my grandpa had this big barn, right? Giant barn. We were up in New England and is in Vermont. And um we would go plant in the barn, but the barn had these weird things. Like they had a hay loft, and then below the hayloft, they had an area where the goats would live. And it was like actually well designed if I think about it. You have the hayloft there, and then there was this trapdoor that would open up so that you could push the hay down into where the goats were at so they could eat the hay. It was really, really efficient, so you don't have to carry it out and down because it's Vermont in the wintertime. It's cold, it's real cold, you know. Um, but we were up there with my uncle, who was again a year older than me, and he fell through the trapdoor. And we were like, ah, what to do? And he was fine, it wasn't very far, but we went down and we were like trying to pull him out. Poor man, he was so chubby, we couldn't pull him out. And he was like, waist was stuck in there. And he's like, ah, you know, and so and um, and then we just we didn't know what to do, man. And so we went down below. We were trying to push his feet up, and the goats were like butting us with their heads as we're trying to shove them up. And goats are jackasses. Like, I mean, I if you have never been around goats, goats, goats are assholes, you know? These are the big goats, too. They were not little goats. These were the big, I'm gonna mess you up, goats, not the cute little pygmy goats. These were the big goats with big horns and like ramming you. And we finally called my uncle out, my his older brother. We pulled him out. But you know, that like I never wanted to go near that barn again. And I finally got my confidence back. And we were, we we had motorcycles there too. And how I I'm gonna tell my cousin, I'm telling this story publicly, so everyone knows this. I wanted to ride this one motorcycle and um that that we had, and I was 10, but they were these like automatic, fully automatic motorcycles. So they were much safer, no clutch. It just was like in gear and out of gear, and it was the fat wheels, and so we had like he had a bunch of property, and we would go drive in the circles around the yard. And I didn't know how to start the bike. So my cousin Holly comes up, and I had put it, I had put it into gear, and I did not know that. And uh, and then Holly was like, Oh, well, I'll kickstart it for you. She kick starts it, bike takes off, flies up, scrapes the back of my grandpa's car, slams into the side of my grandpa's uh uh my uncle's car that had just been repainted. And like, and that the trauma of that event lasted for years. Holly and I were both terrified of like talking to my grandpa about that. But one of the things that when when I I talked, I went to see Holly recently, we were chatting about it, and she's like, I was sure it was like, I was like, Holly, you know I got you, like I got you in trouble on that one. That was all me. And she's like, no, no, no, I think it was me. But we were just laughing and joking about it, but like both of us still had the challenge of that, that fear, that worry, and the resiliences is like, even when stuff happens, you get up and go at it again, but you gotta have the kindness and you gotta work through all of it. But like you have to be gentle with yourself at the same time. These things that might seem trivial to you were traumatic events. And like what might seem like a traumatic event now might in 20 years seem trivial. But the reality is, is like when you're in this, whatever you're in, it is challenging and it is hard. And you have to work and continue making. Choices that steer you in the direction you want to be going. And we can't always see it. You can't always see that that event that's traumatic for you might have been one of the things that, you know, motivated you to become something else, you know. And, you know, I think that what was it? Steve Jobs had that great quote or speech that you can't connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking back. And I think that that's just so profoundly true. And if you can live intentionally and connect those dots as intentionally as you can, then it's a lot easier when you look back to say, you know what? Uh certainly there might be fate or something pulling us through those paths. But at the same time, maybe, maybe part of that is your choices, the choices you're making to get this, you know, this life, this better life.

SPEAKER_01 44:48

Yeah. And a big part of life is, and this is something I say to all my people and all my audiences when I'm on stage, I said, look, life is not about what you get, it's who you become along the way. So you have to know what all those dots are. You know, the dot may be a straight line, but the dot may go up and down and back and forth and all over the place. And that's okay too, because it can make a really cool picture. Or, in, you know, in case if you ever become a professional speaker, this is why I laugh when people ask me, hey Steve, how do you make up the stories you share on stage? And I just stare at them like a puppy and even tilt my head. If I could get a surgery to make one ear flop down at that moment, I would, because I think it would be a great moment. I just, I'm still connecting dots. I I've got hundreds, if not thousands, of stories I can tell about ways I've screwed up my life or ways I've improved my life and decisions and actions that followed them. And all these people that say, I wish I could get up on stage like you do. I said, Well, 22 years ago, I didn't think I could do it. So I went to Telestmasters and how to learn how to create presentations five to seven minutes at a time. And then I stuck them all together and I could do an hour. But you gotta give yourself the grace to say, okay, I want to go out and just for a couple of minutes, I want to be brave. I want to be strong, I want to be talented just for a couple of minutes. And then just stack those things up and keep going. And then say, all right, well, I did this much. I'm already halfway up the hill. I look over my shoulder, the parking lot's way back, getting closer to the top. What could I do today? What one little one percent more than yesterday can I do? What what next challenge can I give myself? Uh, do I do I wake up an hour earlier? Do I do yoga three days a week? Do I do goat yoga? But with the little cute goats, not the big angry ones like you guys had. What are you gonna do? Because you don't want to get to the end of your life and look back, sitting on your front porch, going, dang, I didn't try any of it. I never had the guts to go after it, and now look what I got a whole life of regret. Regret sucks.

unknown 46:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:55

And it sucks the life out of you, and it sucks the joy out of you. I I have very few regrets in my life. Um, I've jumped out of three perfectly good airplanes with two and a half perfectly packed parachutes. That th that last one was got a little sketchy. But I'm glad I did it. I'll do it again, probably for maybe this summer, or maybe I'll save it for my 60th. I'll jump out of another plane again. That'll be a blast. But there was a version of me as a kid who never would have dared to do it. And uh now I love it. If people want to find out more about you and what you do, where should they look? You can find me on Facebook and LinkedIn quite a bit. You just look up my name, Steve Gamlin, G A M L I N. And I do have a brand new website that's going to be launching soon. We're just getting a couple of the last few kinks out, and that's gonna be at Steve GamlinSpeaker.com.