Nancy Koehn was on track for an administrative leadership role at Harvard Business School, where she taught the history of leadership to the world’s best and brightest. But a series of personal crucibles — the death of her father, a divorce that came without warning and decimated her finances, a cancer diagnosis — caused the floorboards of her personal and professional lives to crumble beneath her. Her career aspirations drydocked, her sleep interrupted nightly at 1 or 2 a.m., she sought solace in the love of her intellectual life: history. When she picked up a book on Abraham Lincoln to help pass the agitated hours, she discovered in the trials of the 16th president that there was not only a way through her setbacks but a way beyond them. In this interview with BEYOND THE CRUCIBLE host and Crucible Leadership founder Warwick Fairfax, Koehn explains how her search for lighthouses of hope in the lives of great leaders who were dented by crucible experiences helped her find healing through FORGED IN CRISIS, her best-selling book about their trials and triumphs. Host and guest take a deep-dive look at the incredible story and important leadership lessons of British polar explorer Ernest Shackleton — a conversation they conclude in next week’s episode.
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Transcript
Gary S:
Welcome everybody to Beyond the Crucible. I’m Gary Schneeberger, the cohost of the show and the communications director for Crucible Leadership. And you have happened upon a podcast, hopefully subscribed to a podcast that deals in crucible experiences. Those are those moments in life that really can change the trajectory of your life. They can be painful, they often are quite painful, they can be failures, they can be setbacks, but what they have in common is they are things that can kind of knock us off balance a little bit, and that we have to recover from. And focusing on crucible experiences here at Beyond the Crucible is the title of the podcast, is to help you the listener get beyond the crucible.
Gary S:
Many times we do that by interviewing guests who’ve had powerful crucible experiences themselves and have bounced back from those experiences to live a life of significance. And today, we have a slightly different, a slightly more in-depth guest that we will tell you about in just a minute. But first, I want to welcome the architect of Crucible Leadership and the host of the show Warwick Fairfax. Warwick, I know that you are personally excited about our guest today.
Warwick F:
Absolutely, Gary, very excited to have Nancy here, and it should be a fantastic discussion.
Gary S:
The Nancy to whom Warwick referred is Nancy Koehn, a historian at the Harvard Business School, where she holds the James E. Robison chair of Business Administration. Koehn’s research focuses on crisis leadership and how leaders and their teams rise to the challenges of high stakes situations. Her recent book, Forged in Crisis: The Power of Courageous Leadership in Turbulent Times spotlights how five of history’s greatest leaders successfully navigated crises, and what we can each learn from their experiences.
Warwick F:
Well, thank you. Nancy, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I love what you do in focusing on leadership and in particular, how organizational leaders today can learn from some of the great leaders in history. And you have this remarkable book, Forged in Crisis, in which you have five very different leaders with five different stories but some commonalities in how they approached leadership from within and then without. I love that you teach this and you’re teaching it to MBA students at Harvard Business School. This obviously we discussed, I went there in the ’80s and have very fond memories of the class discussion.
Warwick F:
I also have an abiding interest in history. My dad and I, who grew up in a large family media business, one of the ways we communicated was through history. So I found this book fascinating. So Nancy, before we get into the book, tell me a little bit about yourself and what led you to write this book, because I know you have some personal history that led to this.
Nancy K:
I’m from a middle class family in the Middle West of America. And I went to Stanford as an undergraduate and then went to Harvard and just never left, got a PhD and a masters, a couple of masters, and then ended up at the Harvard Business School in my very late 20s. And as we now knowing how way leads on to way, I found myself recently tenured, this is now about, let’s see, 16 years ago. I’ve just recently tenured, very difficult journey, very important bridge for academics to cross over into lifelong job security and great academic possibility in terms of what you do.
Nancy K:
And then, two things, first thing is, I was writing a case, a Harvard Business School case we teach in these units of analysis, a strange product called the Harvard Business School case, which has a real-life piece of action, not usually a history case, but I’m a historian, so I write history cases that we then teach to MBAs and executives as a way of drawing out lessons or insights or watch outs or things that they can take unto themselves, absorb in order to make better decisions. Now, I was writing a case about Ernest Shackleton, and I was so caught up in the story and how this person just raised the level of his game so extraordinarily and so consistently over these two years that these men, he and his team, were stranded on the ice in the second decade of the 20th century.
Nancy K:
And then in the middle of that, and here gets to the root of your question, Gary, my life started falling apart very quickly and in very large, as Sylvia Plath would say, hunky blocks. In mid-2002, my father, who was 72 and spry and energetic, dropped dead. My mother, who had always been someone prone to depression, just kind of collapsed inward like a black hole in terms of her own sense of the world and her sense of her place in it. And then not many months, less than a couple of seasons after my father died and my mother’s life was turned inside out and I and my sister with it trying to care for her, and my brother, and my husband, who I had been married to for just about 15 years, one day said, “I don’t love you anymore. I’m leaving. I have a lawyer and we’re going to get all your Harvard retirement and all the money that you made,” because I was the only one who had worked full time during our marriage.
Nancy K:
And those floorboards caving in under me were even harder than my father’s because I loved him so much and I was so surprised. I lost a lot of weight. I kept on teaching at the Harvard Business School and my students were talking about making bets on how much weight I had lost week by week, and they were calling me the disappearing professor Koehn. And then not long after that, same, again, just a couple of seasons, I was diagnosed with pre-cancerous conditions. And not long after that, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, even though I had no risk factors.
Nancy K:
So the middle of this, there’s this torturous divorce going on because I don’t have any money other than my Harvard retirement, and trying to hold onto it in a no-fault divorce state, and then I got cancer again. And as all that happened. most of it happened in the span of three years, all of it happened in the span of about five. In the end, in the no-fault divorce, I lost most of my money, and then I had to figure out what to do. And my career at the Harvard Business School, which had this administrative upward trajectory, I was interested in administration, I wanted to be a contributor and a leader at the school, that immediately ended because I was sick. And cancer, “Oh, that’s serious.”
Nancy K:
My whole life was completely transformed and I went through just astounding self-questioning and grief and self-flagellation and the constant asking why, which is not the right question, but I didn’t know that at the time. And in the midst of all this, now to answer the question, this is all important to know. In the midst of the early parts of the crisis, right after my ex-husband had walked out, I couldn’t sleep. Everyone listening to this podcast who’s endured the crucible moment knows what I’m talking about. And so I would go to sleep and wake up at 1:00 AM or 2:00 AM. Well, there’s not much on television, you can’t really vacuum at 2:00 AM.
Nancy K:
And one night in the midst of the existential wanderings I was doing metaphorically, I picked up a book of Lincoln’s writings, Modern Library Edition of Lincoln’s writings. I never read much Lincoln, I was trained as a European historian. And I started reading Warwick at the very back of the book. So this would be the second inaugural, and that’s one speech after that and some memos and some letters, and reading backwards into time. And the more I read, the more I realized… This took about three days, I’m reading a couple hours each night. I remember sitting in bed, my Spaniels were on the bed, and I said, “You think you have problems, Ms. Nancy, Mr. Lincoln had it a lot worse.” And that was the beginning.
Nancy K:
So my quest, which I couldn’t see at the time, it was much more than historical, it was personal, was to find lighthouses, examples of individuals that had just so crushing calamity, crucibles, and then try and understand how they not only navigated through these extraordinary storms. They’re extraordinary, they’re inside and then they’re out, but there’s some… but the most powerful ones, the ones that involve the most suffering and the most change are inside. And I wanted to understand how these people, not only navigated the storms, but then in the process got better. And so that is where Forged In Crisis came from.
Warwick F:
Wow. So as you’re doing this, obviously you’re a historian, but it was part of like, “I’m going through this massive crisis.” Any one of these would derail many people. Most of it was unfair, whether it’s health, husband, father. Were you curious of, “How did these great leaders get through it because A, I would like from an academic point of view to know, but B, maybe that could help me too.” Was there a dual purpose behind the whole analysis and book?
Nancy K:
Completely. Completely. And I don’t think I really recognized the personal so obviously. I had been at Harvard Business School then for, what? I don’t know, 12, 13 years. I’m a very serious historian, I do my homework. I cut my teeth doing serious archival work on my previous two, three books, so I knew how to do the detective work. And I was just fascinated historically that people hadn’t been interested in these questions. No one asked like, “What will Shackleton’s interior life look like on the ice when the ship goes down?” Well, no one had asked, “How did Lincoln really manage this internally when his personal life was falling apart and he’s at the center of the civil war storm.”
Nancy K:
And then I started looking for other people like this and the same questions and this great personal again, largely being at the time, personal fuel, helping me move forward. So I was extra conscientious as a historian and as someone who was becoming so interested in leadership about doing my homework, because I was feeding off of what I was learning.
Warwick F:
Wow. So you had a powerful motivation and this is again, probably blindingly obvious, but as you were researching it and thinking about these great leaders, it probably took your mind off what you were going through and what for most normal people would be a combination of anger, bitterness, or to use a Lincoln word a little melancholy, perhaps that would be normal for most people. Did it take your mind off it as you were researching and-
Nancy K:
Yes and no, it’s like a toggle switch. You go, “Oh yeah. Like I could use that” or, “Oh yeah, that happened to me too, Mr. Lin… But here was something that happened to me early on. And I do think it was grace that happened. So this was early on in the beginning of this terrible years. You can’t say annus horribilis because I had so many years that were so awful so I can’t use the Queen’s expression for the Royal family. Anyway, I had this moment of grace and it was really early on, my ex-husband just walked out. And I remember him standing there by my car and I thought of Oprah Winfrey, who I had… Really didn’t know very much about. And I remember thinking to myself and I shook my hand at the sky a little bit like Scarlett O’Hara halfway through Gone with the Wind, Vivian Lee.
Nancy K:
And I said, “With God as my witness. I’m not going to get angry. I’m not going to be a victim. I’m going to make something good out of this. Even if I have no idea what.” And I returned to that over and over it was like a personal covenant. I didn’t have any idea I was going to try and get better. I didn’t have an idea what was going to happen in my life. I didn’t know how I was going to get through the next day, much less the next month. But I just knew that. And I kept coming back to that over and over and over again. And honestly it saved me. That was really… It was grace. I don’t think it was Nancy. It was really powerful.
Warwick F:
No, that is so big. And I want to get to these five leaders that you mention. When I think of some great leaders, obviously Lincoln is one, Churchill was another, they knew how to deal with bitterness. With Churchill, I mean, he had some challenges with Baldwin and obviously Neville Chamberlain. He disagreed with what he did, I remember there was one instance when I guess Clement Attlee as you know, won the 45 election and Churchill is thinking, “Hey, I saved Britain. This is the thanks I get, thank you so much.”
Warwick F:
And so then one of his buddies started laying into Clement Attlee and Churchill basically said, “Don’t you dare do that. The people voted for him.” So he disagreed with his policies, but he wasn’t bitter. And so I think of a Lincoln or a Churchill, they have many attributes, but the ability to not be bitter and to tackle the issues of the day, that seems to be a number of hallmarks of great leaders.
Nancy K:
I could not agree more. Lincoln says at one point in the war and at one of the nadirs of the Union Army’s fortunes, he says, “What I traffic in is too vast for malice.” And over and over you … We’re not Martin Luther King. There’s so many great leaders who understand this. You just can’t, you got to close that bitterness vitriolic eye for an eye door most of the time, because it won’t take you and the people that you influence because Churchill still exerted enormous influence. Even 45, it won’t take them… 95% of the time. It takes them nowhere good. Maybe 99% of the time, the emotional awareness and discipline Warwick to do that I think is one of the pillars of people who make themselves into great leaders.
Warwick F:
Absolutely. So one final comment before talking about the five, and then we’re going to focus on Shackleton. What I love about what you do, because I’m not a historian, I love history, but definitely not a historian. But when I read history, whether it’s Lincoln, Churchill… even my dad loved English history. So I was brought up on Wellington and Nelson as even though I’m Australian as Anglophiles, I guess are. And so when I read about them having gone to Harvard Business School and in my own little way, write and think about leadership, I read about people in history and think what are the key leadership attributes? What are the lessons today? Which I feel like that’s the lens you’re looking at. Because you teach at the Harvard Business School. And historians, they’re wonderful at what they do, but they don’t always look at it through a leadership lens because that’s not what they’re there for. They’re there to write a history and that’s fine, but you look at it through a different lens, which I think is amazing.
Warwick F:
So let’s talk about these five because they’re very different. I mean, Shackleton, Lincoln, Douglas, Bonhoeffer I’d heard of them, I must confess Rachel Carson in your book, I hadn’t, but her story is equally amazing.
Nancy K:
It’s unbelievable.
Warwick F:
So yeah, it’s a race against time to write Silent Spring as she was going through cancer. There are so many leaders, but why these five? Because it’s an interesting selection.
Gary S:
And I’m going to jump in for just a second to say these five leaders are profiled in Forged in Crisis. So here’s the book that that we’re talking about. Just want to make sure …
Nancy K:
Paperback and hardback. Audio and ebook.
Gary S:
So the five leaders that Warwick is speaking of are masterfully profiled in this book. Sorry. Yes.
Nancy K:
Thank you, Gary. I love you. So what’s interesting is that Churchill by the way, was on the cutting room floor. And there were a number of people that didn’t make the book that were close… because I probably had 12 that ended up as five. The book was… I originally going to write about seven and then it was, that was like was year 10. And I thought, God, I’m never going to finish. So it got a little bit, I’m a slow writer, I’m just a slow writer. I’m a careful writer. And I think I’m a better writer for being a careful writer in terms of reader, comprehension and these… but in any event, I think they chose me. Warwick I think they chose me.
Nancy K:
There was something early on about reading just a little bit, for example, of Carson’s story who about whom I knew almost nothing. Rachel Carson, the woman who more than any other single individual, just for listeners that don’t know her story really founded the modern environmental movement with it, just an extraordinary book, a path breaking book, a revolution making book, she published in 1962 called Silent Spring while she was battling metastasizing breast cancer. And so it was a race against time. But I didn’t know much about her. I remember my mother reading the book when I was a little girl and loving it, but I just read a little bit, I thought talk about unexpected calamity. Talk about the world caving in around you, talk about someone who’s going to access her courage and resilience and mission purposeful like worthy mission muscles. And I just … something I knew, I just knew.
Nancy K:
And so these people chose me and it wasn’t… the hard part was making it only five, but I needed to publish the book before I died. So I could have been at this for 20 years as it was, it was 15. So that’s really what happened. I got to know each of them incredibly well. And just one last thing, because I care so much about these people. I know them. Mr. Lincoln will always be Mr. Lincoln, not Abe, not Abraham. Rachel will always be Rachel, Dietrich is Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I think about them all the time. Because I spent a couple of years with each of them. There was a moment… whenever I’m at the edge of the cliff or however big the fall is I think about them and I take sustenance or I take a lesson from myself from one of these people. So they have made a major impact on my life.
Warwick F:
That’s amazing. I want to focus a bit on Ernest Shackleton because I’d heard of him and the whole polar exploration race. I know you talk about this, but for modern listeners, they may not be aware in the early 1900’s’ the whole polar race was a bit like, I guess the space race in the ’60s. And I guess it was an era of King and country and glory and Britain, Norway, and I guess US and some other folks, it was pre World War I, a very different era. So talk a bit about Ernest Shackleton and who he was and what made him tick. I know that the real story begins in 1914, but there’s a backdrop to who he was and Scott and that whole deal.
Nancy K:
So he was Irish born. Born in 1874 and his father wanted him to be a doctor. But from a young age, he loved the sea, even though he was born in County Kildare, North of Dublin. And he spent some time as a ship’s boy and then as an officer on the Merchant Marine, and then he gets a chance right after the turn of the century, this was the 1800’s into the 1900’s to join, what, as you were saying Warwick, was one of the ships from Britain racing, South against ships, from other countries and teams from other countries trying in what is called the heroic age of Antarctic exploration or polar exploration to be the first team to discover the South Pole for their country. That’s why it’s a lot like the space race, who we’ll get to the moon first, who will get the ship up for the man’s spacecraft first.
Nancy K:
And he does this, he tries this twice two different efforts in the first 10 years of the 20th century, learns a lot from a bad captain in the first expedition, a lot from a failed expedition that he captains between 1907 and 1909, and then comes home short of the pole, doesn’t get to the pole in either expedition and then comes home and the pole was actually discovered in 1911 by a Norwegian named Roald Amundsen in what today is still an unequaled feat of really a polar exploration on either end of the earth. Astounding story of really courageous leadership and very smart decision making and great bravery and team cohesion. And after the pole’s discovered Shackleton motivated, this is important, motivated by fame real narcissistic drive to do this for God, King and country and be the man, the man, who does it, gets a new idea.
Nancy K:
He’s like, “Well, the pole’s gone darn it. Didn’t get that. I need to do another first.” And he gets this idea beginning in, I think that’s really as early as late 1912, that he’ll be the first to lead an expedition that will sled across the entire Antarctic continent from one end from the South American end to the Australian end and cross literally the magnetic pole in the process, collect scientific samples, but be the first and they’ll do it for Britain. And that is the beginnings of this extraordinary story, a story of failed mission on the one hand, but the story of a different kind of even more important success that begins in 1914.
Warwick F:
I’m curious about his motivation. I mean, just reading your book. I mean, he starts out what, like at age 12 or something and by 16, I guess it is. And then by his early 20s he’s has he’s captain’s master or whatever it’s called. He’s really an adventurer, but the thing with Robert Falcon Scott, who is very prominent and famous and the Royal Geographical Society, some obviously it failed, but for some reason, I don’t know why Scott decides to blame everything on Shackleton, which would seem like unfair, grossly unfair. But that seemed to be, if it was that a bit of a turning point or like a motivation, it’s like this ax to grind or I’m going to prove them wrong, or what part did that lay in his whole motivation? Do you think the Scott episode?
Nancy K:
It’s a great question. So just for our listeners, Robert Falcon Scott this well known naval commander was the captain of the first expedition, the head of the first expedition Shackleton was on in the first five years of the 20th century. It fails miserably. The men don’t get along Shackleton and Scott particularly, like oil and water and the men almost die on the way home. They don’t get very far, as far as I get, they almost die trudging back to base camp. And when they get back to England, Scott publishes a memoir, a book about the expedition and a scathing, just scathing indictment of Shackleton. So Shackleton’s just beyond angry. Doesn’t respond publicly, but I think a great deal of what motivated him to try and do it again on his own terms was partly anger about what Scott had said, but even more important… This is important, what he had learned about bad leadership from Scott…
Nancy K:
So really an interesting lesson that several of the people in my book, at least as my editor said, “The fantastic five” learn is you can educate yourself about how to lead well by actually learning what doesn’t work, by people who are actually really lousy at leading. And there are plenty of those people and they’re textbooks too so to speak. And so Shackleton, I think part of his leadership is actually formed out of his reaction to all the things he sees Scott doing wrong. And that’s a very important influence on all the expeditions he will have after that, after that one with Scott.
Warwick F:
That is fascinating. It’s such a great point for listeners to understand is observing poor leadership can teach you a lot and it can help you understand, okay, when it’s my turn, I’m going to do it differently. And obviously Scott found his demise and was it, when was it like 1911, 12, somewhere in there when I don’t know that was poor planning, poor leadership, he got to the South Pole finding that Roald Amundsen had beat him anyway. Then he dies on the way back. But I don’t know. Do you have a view on that with just it’s another example of poor planning and the ultimate failure?
Nancy K:
Well, it was, he lost his life and all his crew mate, all his, all the teammates to the polar team that he goes out to the team for the pole that had gone with him. I do. And in fact, it was that reading so carefully about that expedition. It was a race in 1911 for your listeners, between Scott’s team, from Britain and Amundsen’s team from Norway, both men were actually starting from points, not that distant on the Australian side of the continent racing South and Amundsen’s team is just over and over by every metric such as success. And Scott’s expedition is a terrible failure ending in the most important loss of all, which is the lives of all the men that went to the pole with him. My work is incredibly influenced by a much greater scholar of polar exploration. A guy named Roland Huntford at the University of Cambridge, the world’s foremost expert on the subject.
Nancy K:
And there’s just no question in my mind. I think in his mind, in many scholars’ minds, that it was insecurity. It was poor planning. It was the inability that comes out of insecurity, not to make tough decisions that all good leaders have to make. Ultimately it was the inability to say no to some of his men. It was flying by the seat of his pants. Improvisation can be important, but this was really uncalled for improvisation that killed Scott and his men. So yes, the blame rests squarely at the feet of Robert Falcon Scott and his poor leadership.
Warwick F:
And you compare that with Amundsen and as you write maybe it was the Norwegian thing, but just the planning using cross country skis and sled dogs, which is probably more of a use for that in Norway than Britain, I think you write that he actually was ahead of schedule. Just something ridiculous.
Nancy K:
So, but the Amundsen story is an extraordinary, one of courageous leadership, careful planning team cohesion, a couple of things to keep in mind, just to seal this for you. The men, the Amundsen team make their way to the pole and back to base camp two weeks early. So that’s how fast they’re traveling. No one has ever come close to equaling this kind of feat with sled dogs and loaded sleds are getting lighter as they go. Secondly, the men gained weight on their way to the polar plateau to the pole and back. Because they were so well supplied and third, they had so many supplies coming home that as they got within a few days, sled ride from base camp threw all kinds of things, kerosene other supplies out to lighten their load. Some of those supplies were found 50 years later.
Gary S:
Wow.
Nancy K:
This is an astounding story of good leadership. There’s a book for your listeners that are getting hooked here called The Last Place On Earth by Roland Huntford, that you will not be able to put down. You won’t even look at Netflix for three days while you read this.
Warwick F:
That is great. So let’s talk about the 1914 expedition. And one of things that fascinated me was the way he recruited his crew. I mean, that, there’s a lot for modern leaders to understand. So tell the listeners a bit about his recruiting methods, which still to this day, people don’t tend to use, business school professors, such as yourself will tell leaders. This is how you need to recruit. And they’ll say, “Thank you,” and ignore you or ignore most people. But I digress. I’m sorry. Talk about his recuiting mechanisms.
Nancy K:
Well, they were unusual there, but they’re very relevant to turbulent times, which you might say, “We just have a wee little bit of here in the community,” and the way I would characterize what he did was to hire for attitude. And then tweak skill, develop, do some nurturing of certain skills, but hire for attitude. So Shackleton who incidentally, my friends had 5,000 applicants for about 27 spaces on his expedition team. He would ask everyone that came into his office in London to do a what today we call like a short audition, sing a song, do a dance, let’s have a little play acting here. And the idea that he was looking for was a healthy, pragmatic, optimist, not sugarcoating it, you’re going to the South pole, it’s dangerous.
Nancy K:
The stakes are always life and death. So it’s not sugarcoating. It’s not they’re all as well when all is not well, but it’s a pragmatic optimism and can do attitude. It is rumored. We don’t really… we can’t really corroborate this, but it makes a good story that he placed an ad in the London Times that read something like this, “Men wanted for hazardous journey, long days, long nights, cold days, danger all around, safe return uncertain, honor and glory in case of success.” So not really your typical monster.com Craigslist kind of ad. But what he’s doing here is literally trying to self-select, attract people who are ready for that kind of environment and who not only can get by, but in a sense, thrive are attracted to it. And that’s what he does.
Nancy K:
And I’ll tell you one last comment Warwick, I know this case, the story I thought I knew it well, and I work at the Harvard Business School. I spent a year researching it. Now. I feel like I know it like of the age spots on my hands. So I know it really well. And there’s not a time that I teach this case, that I don’t think that his hiring of these particular men with this particular set of attitudinal characteristics was so important. Not that, Shackleton’s leadership mattered a great deal. He had the right material and it’s incredibly important.
Warwick F:
Yeah. As you say, “Hire for attitude, train for skills.” So important. But so few leaders, even to this day, do that, they hire for qualifications. And I love the categories that you write that he had these three categories mad, hopeless, impossible. I just obviously it’s the possible, I just, he had a sense of humor, which I find very endearing. So talk about, so it’s 1914 and I love this, you write that the day that Britain declares war on Germany, he sets, we get the approval from King George, the fifth. It’s an amazing concurrence of events. So he sets forth. He goes to Argentina and then he reaches South Georgia islands. So pick up the story from there, he’s got his crew and it’s like late 1914. And he has, he has a big decision to make a momentous decision.
Nancy K:
Yep. So he and his now 27 men crew and some sled dogs, which they haven’t yet trained and a cat, a stowaway cat named Chippy set sail from South America and took their last port of call, which will be an island, south east of the tip of South America called South Georgia. There’s a whaling station there and it’s the last place they can take on supplies and post mail. And to get there in early December, 1914 and the whalers all say them, they’ve been out. They say, “You know, captain, the water South of here are just chockablock with icebergs. You’re going to hit pack ice. And you may get in trouble, really recommend your hole up for a while and hope some of this melts” and Shackleton who’s restless, he’s chasing fame and he’s out to do something that’s going to work this time and be the first isn’t really very patient.
Nancy K:
And so he makes a decision after a relatively short layover in South Georgia that he and his crew are going to go ahead and try and navigate their way through the ice down. Now, they’re a little bit South. They’re a little bit Northwest of where he wants to be. So they’re going to be heading Southwest and Northeast. And when getting Southwest and that’s in December of 1914 and they are by the third week in January, along the coast of Antarctica, they can see it. It’s 80 miles away. It’s in sight. Shackleton elects one night. This is the third week of January. He elects one night to say, “Let’s just instead of tucking in here and unloading, let’s just sail a little bit farther along the coast where they’re now heading West along the coast. I want to get the right place to make base camp.
Nancy K:
And in that decision, local decision to head South anyway, despite the warnings, and then in that tiny little decision to just sail a little bit further along, lies the fate of the expedition. Because one night the ice freezes around… these are huge bergs, freeze around the Endurance, which was the name of his ship. And it’s locked in an immovable, vice. They can’t blast themselves out. They can’t pick themselves out with shovels and pickaxes. They’re stuck. They can’t motor themselves out with diesel power that they’re stuck. And then they’re mostly floating aimlessly on the current.
Warwick F:
And they’re stuck for a very long time.
Nancy K:
Their stuck… that’s January 3rd week of January. They’re stuck for the rest of the month, February, March, April, May, June, July, August. In August the boat starts getting rammed terribly by just these broken burgs. And it starts to get damaged. It’s like the vice now is crushing the ship. And so Shackleton makes a decision right in very early September to abandon ship. He had been planning for it. He could tell the ship was going to get…
Warwick F:
By then it was hundreds of miles away from where he wanted to be. Because the ice flows are just moving. And so a lot of things to admire about Shackleton, but let’s look at those two decisions, the decision to go when everybody said, “You know, the ice is as bad as we’ve ever seen it, the floes are really far North.” And then the decision to not get into a little inlet and he wanted to go to Vahsel Bay, the original place. So what motivated that decision, is I think as you write, he didn’t really maybe write this down, but you have to think if he was the leader that he was, he realized in hindsight what a colossally bad decision, but what do you think motivated him to make either of those really cataclysmic decisions that were so fateful?
Nancy K:
So I’ve taught this case many, many times down to all kinds of groups around the world. And I think Shackleton was a man in a hurry, and that made him reckless. I don’t think there’s any way he gets a pass here. He made the wrong decision going South. They should have waited. That was a wrong decision. I don’t think the second decision, well, let’s say a little further along was of the same order of magnitude. But that first decision is a big deal. And it places him, it was a traffic accident. The cop would give him 90% of the blame for the accident. It places him, the ship getting stuck and what followed at his feet. And I think he knew that by the way, he never said anything about it. But I do think that part of what he was doing in the extraordinary leader that emerges out of this big mistake is partly owning the responsibility for something he realized he was a big part of. He was culpable of.
Gary S:
An Interesting couple of sentences, Nancy that you wrote in the book that talk about where Shackleton went from there. This is what you write, “His consistent ability to face forward was the thing that allowed him to become successful from that failure again and again, he refused to become mired in what had already happened. What had not worked, what had been missed, who was to blame for the most recent setback or disappointment.” That is a critical piece, not just for what happened to Shackleton and for our listeners who are trying to bounce back from their own crucibles.
Nancy K:
Absolutely. I just marvel at this… There’s a passage in Matthew, I think it, is where Jesus says the farmer that constantly looks backwards over the problems his plow has harvest no crops. And it’s a little bit of the same thing.
Nancy K:
When the stakes are high and there’s a lot to do in front of you. You just can’t keep looking back and scratching your head and pointing fingers and miring yourself in bitter accusations. Everything can’t be a tribunal of the past going forward. And so this was one of those instances, there many to come right on the ice where it’s like, “Okay, this happened when we need to learn from it. And then how do we literally turn ourselves around to look at the future and what we’re doing next? And that’s about self-discipline. So much of what I have learned about how these people did it has to do with self-regulation. And he did. And that really helped his men. Who, by the way, also made mistakes along the way, but he didn’t stop with a tribunal to prosecute and then punish someone.
Nancy K:
We moved forward, we learn from it and we move forward or think of Mandela, think of Nelson Mandela coming in to the presidency of the Republic of South Africa after 18 years, talk about a chance to get bitter and decades of apartheid to get bitter and basically saying, yes, we’re going to figure out a way to reconcile, but we’re not going to spend the next 10 years punishing all the folks that kept apartheid alive. Or Lincoln, “with malice toward none. With charity toward all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right.” So, and Lincoln’s plan for reconstruction still in its infant stages when he was assassinated in April, 1865 was not about tribunals and blame and looking backwards at this point that you’re both making Warwick and Gary is really important about leaders, particularly in crucibles and crisis. And for all the rest of us, we got to turn our necks and our bodies around or look forward.
Warwick F:
Absolutely. And I think I want to talk about how we move forward, but I think to me, there are… one lesson is even great leaders make colossal mistakes. I mean Shackleton made mistakes. I’m sure Lincoln, he had his challenges. Some people criticize him for moving a bit too slowly on emancipation. It was a challenging time. That’s a whole another discussion. It’s a very nuanced discussion. Churchill, I think he was on the right side of India, but on the wrong side… On the wrong side of India, excuse me, on the right side I think of Israel. And so there were times in which he made really colossally, stupid decisions as we all do. And so it’s easy to look back and say, “Well, yeah he was a bit bitter about the treatment he had from Scott. He missed being the first one on the South pole. So he does this, let’s cross the whole of the South pole,” from what you’ve written a number of folks said that seems challenging, like risky, insane, but we’re human. It’s like, “Gosh King, country, glory.”
Warwick F:
So even great leaders can make mistakes. But I think, and certainly in my own life, as listeners know, with growing in a large family media business and the whole $2 billion takeover that I launched literally months after I graduated from Harvard Business School, it’s like, “Was I not paying attention?” The education is fantastic, but at least for me, my emotions and my dad dying earlier that year. And just, there’s all sorts of emotions, which we don’t need to get into here. But I talked about in other podcasts, that cloud your judgment.
Warwick F:
And so I like to think of myself as a reasonably sane, intelligent person, but I look back and think, how could I have made such a colossally stupid decision, emotions get in the way we do. But I think where your focus is not so much on what was clearly a cataclysmically poor decision, it’s the miraculous way that he was able to move on. So there’s some great attributes of leadership, but most people don’t do this. Most people wallow in bitterness and anger. How did he move on? What about him enabled him to flip the switch saying, “Okay. That was, I’m responsible for getting my crew here, but time to move on.”
Gary S:
Well, how did he do that indeed? How did Ernest Shackleton completely leave behind the failures of his journey up until this point and move forward with a new journey, with a new mission after this? Stuck in the ice for months, knowing that it was in large part mistakes on his part that got him there, how was he able to take a breath, forget what went before and focus on a new journey ahead? And that will be what we discuss, what Warwick and Nancy Koehn talk about in great detail on the next episode of Beyond the Crucible. We’ve split this episode up like this into two parts, because there is such richness in the details of the story of what Shackleton after doing some things wrong, what Shackleton did right moving forward to get beyond his crucible and as an on ramp into what that discussion will be like next week, on Beyond the Crucible.
Gary S:
Here’s some analysis that Nancy Koehn offers in her book, Forged in Crisis in discussing some of the lessons that came from Ernest Shackleton’s experience, his failure and then the way he overcame that failure and move beyond that crucible. Here’s what Nancy writes in her book, “Shackleton jettisoned one objective to walk across the continent and embraced another to save his crew. This is an important lesson that all leaders operating in great turbulence must learn. How to let go of former goals and embrace new ones, even dramatically, different objectives as circumstances demand.”
Gary S:
Those are the insights that we’re going to hear next week on part two of our interview on Beyond the Crucible with Nancy Koehn. So until that time comes listeners, thank you so much for spending time with us. And please remember that your crucible experiences while very painful, while things that will knock you off the trajectory that you’re on just as they stopped Ernest Shackleton from pursuing his expedition for months stuck in the ice, trying to figure out how to move forward.
Gary S:
Those things while your circumstances will obviously be very different, those emotions and the things that you must do to overcome to move beyond those crucibles are things that are universal. That’s what we’ll talk about next week. But remember that those crucibles just as Shackleton discovered, those crucibles are not the end of your story. Those crucibles in fact can be, if you learn the lessons of them, if you apply the lessons of them, if you move forward one step at a time, those moments can become a new chapter in your story and a rewarding chapter in your story, perhaps the most rewarding chapter in your life story, because it leads at the end to a life of significance.
Life has not always been easy for Warwick Fairfax. That’s a statement many in his native Australia never would have associated with the fifth-generation heir to arguably the country’s most influential media empire. But then he launched a multi-billion-dollar takeover of the company that failed spectacularly — leaving him with regrets, self-doubt and uncertainty about his future. More than 30 years after the takeover fell apart, the founder of Crucible Leadership and host of BEYOND THE CRUCIBLE will speak in detail for the first time about what motivated his bid to assume control of the company and why he thinks it wasn’t successful in a book from Morgan James Publishing due to be released early next year. On this episode of the podcast, Fairfax discusses with co-host Gary Schneeberger why he initially didn’t want to write a book at all, why he changed his mind and what readers can expect when it hits stores. “It’s a collection of stories and parables about life and leadership — about me and my family, history’s greatest leaders and biblical and inspirational figures,” he explains. “If writing about my story can help people and give them hope, it’s worth going through the pain.”
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👉 Take the free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment to discover where you are on your journey of moving beyond your crucible and how to chart your personal course to a life of significance: https://beyondthecrucible.com/assessment/
Transcript
Gary S:
Welcome everybody to this episode of Beyond The Crucible. I’m Gary Schneeberger, the cohost of the podcast and the Communications Director for Crucible Leadership. And you have clicked play. Hopefully you clicked subscribe to a podcast that deals in crucible experiences, those events in life that can be extraordinarily painful. You know them when you experience them. They’re failures, they’re setbacks. There are things that maybe happen to you. There are things that maybe you do some things that bring those things on yourself, but the organizing characteristic that they all have is that your life is changed after them. The trajectory of your life can be shifted because of them and we talk about these experiences on Beyond The Crucible, not so that we can feel sorry for ourselves or wallow in them, but so that we can learn from them, so we can apply the lessons of them to live a life of significance, to point ourselves on a path to a life of significance.
Gary S:
And the host of the show and the architect, the creator of Crucible Leadership, the man who authored this idea of going from crucible to a life of significance is here with me now. And it’s Warwick Fairfax. Warwick, welcome.
Warwick F:
Great to be here, Gary, and very much looking forward to this.
Gary S:
Yes, this one is going to be a special one, listeners, because, and I will admit I have a flair for the dramatic and I’m also an old newspaper guy, so I love the idea of breaking news. I love being the first one to report news to you. So we have some news that we’re going to break here on Beyond The Crucible today about Warwick and about Crucible Leadership that is extraordinarily exciting. It’s both good news for Crucible Leadership and good news for Warwick. And Warwick, with that buildup, with that setup, tell the listeners just what the news is that we’re breaking today.
Warwick F:
Absolutely, Gary. Well, Crucible Leadership and I have a book publishing deal with Morgan James Publishing, which I am super excited about. It’s been a long journey, but this is a huge milestone for me and for Crucible Leadership.
Gary S:
Yeah. I mean, let’s stop here and make sure the listener heard that. There is a book now coming, authored by Warwick about Crucible Leadership. And we’ll talk here in detail about just what that book’s going to contain. Because I’ll let you in on a secret, I’ve read the manuscript and it’s good stuff. And when that comes out next year you will, listener, really understand some aspects of both Warwick’s story and Crucible Leadership that haven’t quite been elucidated in the way that there’ll be elucidated in the book. And I want to say one more thing before I turn it back over to Warwick and we start talking about the book, but he mentioned that the publisher that he signed with for this book is Morgan James Publishing. And I just want to read what their corporate motto is, so that you have an idea of the kind of book this will be, the kind of story this will tell, the kind of hope, I think, this will engender for you who read it.
Gary S:
This is Morgan James’s corporate promise, their corporate slogan. “To educate, encourage, inspire, and entertain.” And having read Warwick’s book, I can tell you it does all four of those things. So Warwick, how did this all begin? What made you decide to write a book in the first place?
Warwick F:
Well, the funny thing, Gary, is for many years writing a book about my story is the last thing that I wanted to do. I had no interest in writing a book. So you might ask, “Well, why is that?” So as listeners would know, I grew up in a 150-year-old family business started by my great-great-grandfather, John Fairfax, that grew to be this huge company with newspapers, TV stations, newsprint mills, magazines. It had thousands of employees and so it was a lot of pressure. A lot of expectations on me. I prepared my whole life to go into it. Certainly seen by my parents as the next generation. So I went to Oxford like my dad and some other relatives, worked on Wall Street, got an MBA at Harvard Business School. And in early ’87, my dad died. He was in his late eighties. There was turmoil within the company and, I guess, a different vision. The company wasn’t being well run, at least as far as I and my parents thought, so I launched this $2.25 billion takeover.
Gary S:
That is, listeners, I’d like to say to Warwick, that is billion with a B.
Warwick F:
Absolutely.
Gary S:
That is billion with a B.
Warwick F:
I’m afraid so. And so right from the beginning, things went wrong. Other family members sold out. There was the October ’87 stock market crash. And within three years the company went under. Australia suffered a big recession in late 1990. And so my dream of restoring the company, the ideals of the founder and have it being well-run was ended. And so the question some people would ask over the years, “Well, Warwick, why don’t you write your story?” The story of what at time was one of the biggest takeovers in Australian corporate history, of a organization that had the Australian equivalent to the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal. Iconic names, iconic mastheads. And that was the last thing I wanted to do because it was so painful. I mean, I am a person of faith.
Warwick F:
I, in my naivety, felt like maybe this was something that God wanted to resurrect in the image of the founder, who was also a person of great faith, which was a bit naive at the time and simplistic. And it was just… It caused friction with other family members. I didn’t do it, at least consciously, against other family members even though there was friction between some and my dad over the decades, but it was so painful that it’s like, “Why would I want to write a book about something that was so painful?”
Warwick F:
And the other thing is when you mostly write these sort of books, it’s a tell-all book in which you’re meant to diss and basically say, “Well, look at these other family members and look what they did to my dad and they’re this and they’re that,” and name names. The last thing I want to do is cause more pain within my family and books that say, basically, I was right, they were wrong, whining books, or as we say in Australia, whinging, which is almost worse than whining, it’s just typically boring, untrue and self-serving. And so it’s like it was A. It was painful and B. writing a tell-all book to cause more pain, I mean, that’s just not what I’m about. So, forget it. I wanted to move on with my life, not relive something that was so painful.
Gary S:
Right. And that does sound, in one sense, like it would be an easy decision for you to make. “I don’t want to write this book because it’s going to be painful and I’m not going to throw people under the bus and I’m not going to blame other people for some missteps that I took.” But in one sense, it had to have been not easy, too, because it’s true that pretty much everybody in Australia wanted to hear your side of the story or at least wanted you to talk about your side of the story. This was big headline-dominating news about the takeover. You did not do a lot of interviews in the press at that time. So it’s still safe to say today, it was safe in the late eighties, early nineties, it’s safe today, your side of the story is not really known in Australia. Is that fair?
Warwick F:
Absolutely. Yeah. It was not known. And it’s funny, growing up in a media business you’d think I’d be a bit more open to talking to the media, but even at the time during the takeover years, those three years, I gave no interviews, which in hindsight was obviously a very significant if not colossal mistake. Not talking to the media, whatever you may think of them, is rarely the right strategy. Figure out how to handle it well, and obviously, Gary, you’ve had a lot of experience in media. Not talking, they’ll just write whatever they want to write. So I remember there was a equivalent to the New York Times Sunday Magazine, a competitive newspaper, and the headline in the sunday magazine, I guess it was Saturday, that was when the big paper came out, the headline was Warwick Fairfax, The Man Behind the Mask. And all these people were trying to guess at who Warwick Fairfax was.
Warwick F:
Some people that they interviewed saying, “Warwick’s the most secretive, enigmatic person I’ve ever known. I don’t know what he is thinking.” Well, it’s because I didn’t really talk about it. I never really gave interviews. I’ve given a couple in more recent years, but I really have not got into any level of detail about why I did the takeover or what I was thinking. I’ve just been very, very, extremely careful even when I’ve talked to the media.
Gary S:
Right. And that’s a great set up, Warwick, for what this book, which is going to be called, we believe, Crucible Leadership, same as the brand, the same as your life practice is called. But this is a good point to pivot on that question of, yeah, it’s been more than 30 years. People have not heard your side of the story. You didn’t want to write the book that people wanted you to write, yet you’ve now written a book and it’s going to be published. What changed? What changed in your vision for what the book could be? And what was the impetus for that change from you from that switch going from, “I don’t want to write a book,” to, “Hmm. Maybe I’ll write a book?”
Warwick F:
That’s an interesting question. Really, the answer is in 2008, the pastor of the church we go to in Maryland, it’s a large-ish nondenominational church, and my pastor was giving a message on the life of David. He was King Saul’s right-hand man, a very successful commander, and as often happens when you’re super successful, your boss tend to get jealous. Well, back in those days, jealous meant he’d try and kill you, which typically doesn’t happen in the corporate world. But when you’re a king back in the day, the rules were a bit different. And so he was running away, hiding in some cave and feeling pretty sorry for himself. So my pastor wanted to give a message of a righteous man falsely persecuted. I said, “Well, that’s not really me. I mean, I brought a lot of pain on myself, a lot of missteps, but fine. If you want me to give a seven, 10 minute talk about my story and what I feel like I learned, and because it’s a church, what I feel like God was teaching me, I will.”
Warwick F:
And I’m not Mr. Public Speaker. I’m more of a shy, retiring person, my personality, but I guess I must have given it in a vulnerable, authentic, “Here’s the story and what I went through.” What was amazing to me is weeks, months after, people would come up to me and say, “You know what, Warwick? What you had to say really helped me.” And I’m thinking, “How could that help anybody?” I mean, I don’t know too many former media moguls in the congregation. It’s just a cross section of just regular folks from different jobs, different walks of life, different problems, different challenges, just like any group of people have.
Warwick F:
But somehow, I guess, by me sharing my story, which is failure on really quite an epic scale, larger than most people will fail on, and just being authentic and vulnerable about it, somehow that resonated with people. And so that was the big shift because I thought if by writing about my story, it can help people, now it’s worth going through the pain. And it was painful writing about these episodes. That’s pain worth going through. So that seven, 10 minute speech in church in 2008, that was a significant shift in my thinking.
Gary S:
And to hear you explain that the way that you explained it right now, and I hope you hear this, listeners, we’ve had 10, 15 guests who’ve been on this podcast and they’ve said versions of the exact same thing that Warwick just said. “If talking about my pain, if reliving my crucible experience and how I bounced back from that, if that can help somebody, then I’ll do it.” So the very same thing that has led guests of Beyond The Crucible to come into our little studio and have a chat, or our virtual studio and have a chat with us, is the very thing that led you to realize that this is something you want to set, at the time when you started it maybe typewriter to paper, but certainly a computer to a whatever it is that happens inside a computer. To gigabytes. Computer to gigabytes. It made you realize that you could type this story out and it would have an impact.
Warwick F:
Absolutely. And so really, that began a journey and I mean, we’re now 2020. That’s 12 years. That’s a long time. I mean, it took a long time and there was some reasons for that, but certainly one significant reason and we’ll get into this more in a bit, but the core of the book is really my story. And so when you’re writing about some of the dumbest, stupidest decisions you’ve made and writing about them in exhaustive detail, explaining what you did and what you were thinking, what you were not thinking and what you should have been thinking, I couldn’t write for more than maybe a couple hours a day, max. And then I needed a breather to recover from the experience and to get my equilibrium back before I went into the lion’s den again. So that was certainly one significant reason why it took so long, but I was committed to doing it because I felt like by talking about this, it could help people.
Gary S:
Right. And so that’s one part of the book. Unpack a little bit about it because one of the things that’s fascinating to me about the book is that you’ve got, there’s a little bit of personal memoir in it about your story as you’ve talked about, but there’s far more than that in there as well. There are other perspectives that you bring to the table. So explain to the listener what you try to bring to the book in terms of the content, and then how you think that content will help with the subject of what this podcast is about, helping them move beyond their crucibles and become crucible leaders themselves.
Warwick F:
It’s funny and we’ll get to this probably in a bit, but the whole concept of Crucible Leadership, it came out of the book, but I didn’t, when I started writing it, I didn’t have that notion. So often one lesson learned is when you have this vision, it may not be fully formed, but just take a few steps. I wrote a blog a while back now, something like vision and the fog or something to that effect. You might not have the total picture. If you have a sense that this is right, this is what you need to do and the vision will become clearer and clearer as you keep going down the path. So at the time, and I’ve always loved leadership, I’ve been a student of leadership. I’ve loved history, I’ve read about history, about great figures in impossible situations, whether it’s Lincoln or Churchill doing amazing things.
Warwick F:
And so what I wanted to do is write my story, but I wanted to do it through the lens of leadership and lessons learned. And so it’s really a series of parables, a series of stories, and it’s organized around key leadership principles. So there’s chapters on vision, shared vision, how you get a group of people on the same page, how you implement it, character. Obviously there’s a chapter on crucibles, even a chapter on faith, by which obviously my faith in Christ is the most important thing in my life. But truly I talk about faith in a general sense. What governing system of beliefs is the anchor of who you are as a person and a leader, whatever that might be. It could be a religion or some other way of thought. And so I’ve got all these chapters on different leadership themes, but then in each chapter I talk about my family, certainly a key part of my story.
Warwick F:
And typically it’s like, “This is what I did. Don’t do what I did. Instead, do the opposite. Do something else.” And so you see my story, it’s all laid out there, but you’ll see it through different lens. It’s like watching a movie and by looking at different camera angles, the story appears a bit different. So I’m writing about my life. It’s really that way. If I’m talking about my vision or what character traits are important to me or how I try to get people on the same page with my vision, which was obviously largely unsuccessful because I was a bit clueless. So that’s one part of one strand. But then I talk about my dad, who greatly influenced me. And then the founder of the media company, John Fairfax, who as good a businessman, wonderful dad, wonderful husband, elder at his church, person of great faith. I mean, an amazing person. You’ve got the Fairfax family strand.
Gary S:
Right. And he was your great-great-grandfather, so the listeners know. Yeah.
Warwick F:
Exactly right. So 150 years ago, I was fifth generation. A long time ago, so that you’ve got the Fairfax family strand. Then you have an historical strand. I’ve mentioned I’ve loved history. The way my dad and I communicated in some ways was history. He loved history and we would talk about that. He’d tell me these amazing stories of great leaders faced with incredible, impossible situations. So you’ll have that strand. You’ll hear stories from Lincoln, Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt.
Gary S:
Walt Disney is one of my favorite parts of the book. One of my favorite parts of the book.
Warwick F:
Walt Disney, exactly. Walt Disney. Gandhi. Some English heroes because my dad and I loved English history. Lord Horatio Nelson and Duke of Wellington. A collection of leaders, but all looking at it through a leadership lens. And typically historians write about history, which is appropriate, but I’m looking at it through what can we learn today as leaders, be it in a big organization or small, from these great figures in testing times? So that’s another strand. And the third strand is really the biblical inspirational strand. And so there you’ll hear stories of biblical figures such as David, Ruth, Samuel, Daniel, Joseph, as well as inspirational figures like Gandhi.
Gary S:
And Jesus. I mean, you talk about Jesus. He had great leadership abilities.
Warwick F:
And Jesus. Absolutely. And Jesus. Yeah. People think about how can we lead with the character of Jesus, but Jesus has something to teach us about organizational principles and how the faith was able to grow over the first few hundred years to a remarkable degree. What were some of those key leadership characteristics? So with the biblical inspirational strand, it doesn’t really matter whether you believe in the Bible or not. These are historical figures and what can we learn from them? So it’s really, when I think of those three strands, you’ve got the Fairfax family strand, the historical strand, the biblical inspirational strand, the book is largely a collection of stories and parables. Because I often think the best way to learn is through stories. And that’s really what this is, a collection of stories all around leadership.
Gary S:
I’m going to steal. Here’s the first preview of what’s in the book, listener. I’m going to read a paragraph from the introduction to the book to summarize what Warwick just talked about, about what the book is and isn’t. What it isn’t is, as Warwick has intimated, it’s not, “Here are the seven tips of all the things I did right that you should follow and then you’ll be perfect and successful like me.” It’s not that kind of book. It’s not a seven tips book. It’s a book of stories, as he said. But this is what he wrote. This is what Warwick wrote in the introduction to the book. “Crucible Leadership isn’t a one size fits all formula, but an extremely personal journey. So don’t expect a how to manual because that’s not my approach. Instead, I leverage the learning power of story and insightful questions to help leaders transform past trials and hard-won insights into a new, exciting, enriching, an uncompromised present and future.” That’s pretty inspiring. That makes me want to go grab the book right now.
Warwick F:
Yeah, I mean, to me, as I think about what’s different about this book is a lot of people write “10 steps to losing weight in two weeks,” or “the five ways to get into the C suite and be CEO. Here’s the five year plan.” And I mean, that’s definitely an approach, but I often think life is not simple. I mean, it took me years to get over my crucible experience, which we’ve talked about in other podcasts and blogs and what have you. Life is rarely linear. Three steps forward, maybe two steps back. And so I think it’s often better to talk in stories and principles and then the reader can apply them to their life. “Okay, so how does that apply to me? And I might be going at a different pace than others.”
Warwick F:
And so the other thing that’s really different is many leadership books talk about, “I was a successful CEO. Learn from me.” Or, “I’ve interviewed the top 10 CEOs in the last 10 years. What can we learn from them?” And that can be useful. Learning from people who’ve succeeded, that can be helpful. But this is more looking at it from another perspective which is, “I made some incredibly stupid mistakes. Okay, I was young, but they were stupid nonetheless. What can we learn from those stupid mistakes as well as leaders from history and from my family?” And so very few people write books about, “I was an idiot. Read this book and don’t make the mistakes I did.” That’s just not a popular genre for maybe somewhat obvious reasons. Who wants to write that book? I didn’t.
Gary S:
Yeah. True. True.
Warwick F:
But the only reason I did-
Warwick F:
Yeah. It was because if it’s going to help people and it’s like, maybe what helps me a bit is just my faith. My perspective is, because I believe God loves me unconditionally, I’m okay with telling people I was an idiot and made some colossally bad mistakes with significant consequences, both monetarily and my family. I mean, I’m certainly very comfortable now. Don’t have as much money as I could have. Money isn’t really that important to me, but still reliving all this and telling the world about how stupid you are, the fact that my faith is a definite help there, but still I’m human. It’s difficult, but that’s just not a normal genre. “Look at me. I was stupid. Read my book.” It’s just, people don’t write those books.
Gary S:
Right. Again, having read the manuscript, I’ll say you’re a little self-deprecating when you say, “I was stupid.” You made mistakes as you’ve acknowledged on every episode of Beyond The Crucible, but you also learned some things. You also learned and applied some things about transparency, about character, about helping others, living life on purpose and having that purpose be motivated by helping other people. And that’s been who we tried to bring in as guests for Beyond The Crucible because of your example. So you’re a little bit hard on yourself, I think, when you want to end your description of your story as, “I was stupid. Follow me.” No, it was, “I made a mistake. I learned from those mistakes.” You learned when you gave that speech to your church that people were moved by that. And I think you’ve found that since we started the podcast with people writing to you, emailing you and saying, “Wow, what you’re talking about’s really helped me.” That’s your hope for this book as well, right?
Warwick F:
Absolutely. And I mean, that is a fair point. That is well said. I mean really Crucible Leadership and the podcast Beyond The Crucible, it really grew out of the book because as I realized, I grew up with about as much money and power as you could have. We were old money. I get in all the exclusive clubs and all, very well respected in the community and the country. But I realized money, power, status, it doesn’t make you happy. It’s really significance. As we say in Crucible Leadership, living a life on purpose, dedicated to serving others, that’s really the secret to happiness. And that’s really what we advocate, espouse here, and that’s what the guests we’ve had on the podcast have really talked about. I mean, they really found from their crucibles, which is typically very different than mine but still unbelievably painful, that what really helped bring them back, in part, was living a life of significance. And so that’s the core theme of the podcast, the book and everything we do at Crucible Leadership is living a life of significance.
Gary S:
One of the things, if you’re listening to this podcast in audio only, listener, you’re not seeing Warwick as he’s talking. I am, because we’re recording this for YouTube. And I just got to tell you, Warwick, it’s really fun for me to see the joy in your face as you talk about this experience, as you talk about this quest that you’ve been on in some sense for 12 years, since you started writing the book, but even going back further, more than 30 years since the takeover bid. And I can see in the way that you talk about it, that you’re pleased, again, not because you’re getting a book published so much as you are getting a book published that you believe will help people with the same kinds of emotions that you went through when you had your crucible experience.
Warwick F:
Absolutely, Gary. I mean, when I think about it, really living a life of significance, that is one of the keys to coming back from a painful crucible experience, almost irrespective of what that is. Yes, there’s some soul work admitting failures, reconciliation, just, I mean, whatever the things are that you feel called to do. Maybe you were in the wrong position like I was. You needed more of a Rupert Murdoch take no prisoners or at least some kind of hard charging, decisive, executive. I am more a reflective adviser. It was a terrible fit. That’s many lessons learned I talk about in the book.
Warwick F:
But probably the biggest one is, as I began to do things that were within my gifting and focus on serving others, I have been over the years on two nonprofit boards, my church board, and previously being on my kids’ school board, and now with Crucible Leadership, I’ve done a lot of executive coaching with my blogs, writing, podcasts. All these things in different endeavors in which I’m endeavoring to help other people, as that’s happened, healing has happened bit by bit, layer by layer. Yeah. There’s always a scar. In your bad moments, you always remember.
Warwick F:
It’s, “Oh my gosh, why did I do that?” But living a life of significance, it’s almost the, I hate to use buzzwords, but like the secret sauce. The magic potion, if you will. I mean, it doesn’t solve everything. It doesn’t happen overnight, but in terms of making significant strides to getting over a really painful crucible experience, finding your life of significance is one of the key ways to moving forward and having a fulfilling, even joyful life.
Gary S:
We just had… As we’re recording this, we released a new episode of the podcast that’s available to all of you listeners with Cathleen Merkel. And one of the things that stuck out that Cathleen said in our interview with her was that you can be 80 or 90 and it’s not too late to live your life in the most contented way that you can. That’s her way of saying to live a life of significance. It’s never too late to begin that process of pointing your compass toward a life of significance and walking that out. And I think we’ve discovered that throughout what we’ve done so far, what we’re going to continue to do on Beyond The Crucible. But that’s the message of those stories that you talk about in your book, Beyond The Crucible.
Gary S:
It’s the story of your great-great-grandfather, John Fairfax. It’s the story of your father, Sir Warwick Fairfax. It’s your story. It’s the story of those historical and religious and inspirational figures you’re talking about. It’s never too late to turn what the world views as a failure, what maybe even you view as a failure, it’s never too late to turn that around, learn the lessons and point yourself towards significance.
Warwick F:
And that is so true because it’s easy to say, “Well, I’ve been thinking about writing a book since 2008. I could have started earlier, but obviously I didn’t because it was all too painful.” And it’s 30 years since the company went under. It left family control. It still exists as an entity, but it’s more than 30 years since I did the takeover. That’s a long time. But yet this is a dream come true to get a publishing deal with a company as well-respected and prestigious as Morgan James Publishing. But yeah, it is never too late. Doesn’t matter what age you are. You want to keep moving forward and living your life of significance to the best ability you can. So never say, “Oh, well, I’ve missed my time.” It doesn’t matter whether you’re 20, 30, 40, 50, 80, 90. It’s always easy to say, “Oh, it’s too late.” But it’s never too late. While we’re here, you always have that opportunity to live your best life in line with what you feel is your purpose.
Gary S:
Well, that is, I mean, that’s a very resonant point. And I think, as I like to say, there comes a time in every podcast when we have to land the plane. Maybe this time I’ll say we have to temporarily shelve the book. We’ll be back, listener. We’ll talk about this more often down the road. But before we go, Warwick, there’s a question and I haven’t previewed this question with you. I just want to get your reaction to this question. I want to see your reaction to this question when I ask you, and that’s this. “You’ve had books written about you and the takeover of Fairfax Media. Now you’re writing your own book. Now it’s going to be published. You’ve written your own book. Now it’s going to be published. Tell the listeners which one is more rewarding.”
Warwick F:
I tell you which one is more fun. It is not fun reading books about you. My least favorite book was written in the early nineties called The Man Who Couldn’t Wait. And the idea was if I’d only waited, I would’ve inherited enough shares to be in control of the company one day. And obviously, because there’s a grain of truth in that, that’s particularly painful, but yeah, reality is who knows? But certainly… And my book isn’t, “Look. So there. Here’s my story,” because I’m somewhat unsparing, but it’s a lot more rewarding to write a book about your story, than read other people’s versions and this isn’t it a “Look. So there. I told you so.” It’s quite the reverse, but yeah, it wasn’t easy, but yeah, it’s more fun to have a book. At least you’ve had a chance to express things your way rather than read some other book that’s, yeah, has a different agenda. Put it that way.
Gary S:
Right. And the time is right for this for you in the sense that you have put some tread on your tires since that experience with the takeover and you’ve learned some things. And I think, I mean, is it fair to say had this book been published even five years ago, perhaps that was premature for what you understand now about how to bounce back from crucible experiences? Is that fair, that this is the time, this is the best time for this?
Warwick F:
Yeah. I mean, as a person of faith, I always believe that things happen when they’re meant to happen. I mean, you try your best to move things forward and all that. But yeah, I think this is the time. Certainly in the nineties, I was too shell shocked. I mean, I couldn’t have written a book or even begun to write a book. I didn’t really have enough perspective. 2008, by then life had started turning around for me and I had more perspective. But yeah, I mean, now’s the time. Certainly a couple of decades ago it wouldn’t have been. I couldn’t have written it. I would not have been at all ready to share my story. I mean, it was just about years in which it’s like, “Gosh, if I write the story, what will people think? Will I hurt people’s feelings? And what about this? What about that?” I mean, it’s almost hard for me to remember all of the things I was so fearful of, even back in the 2000s around the time I was thinking of writing the book. So yeah, now is the time.
Gary S:
All right. At that we will close the book for now. For sure, listener, we will continue to talk about this publishing journey that Warwick’s on now that he’s got a contract for it, now that there’s a publisher that we’re working with very closely, he’s working with very closely, Morgan James Publishing. This will be out next year. As soon as we know when that’s going to be, we’ll keep you updated. We’ll make sure you know, so until that time comes that we’re together again on Beyond The Crucible to talk about Crucible Leadership. And the book is called, by the way, Crucible Leadership: Embrace Your Trials to Lead a Life of Significance. That’s the working title right now. So we’re still early in the process, but we’ll keep you updated as we go along things about the book. If you have any questions about the book, visit us at crucibleleadership.com.
Gary S:
There’s a contact form on there. You can email us and we’ll pass those along to Warwick so that he can answer any questions you might have about the book and his experience or about Crucible Leadership. If you enjoyed what you’ve heard on this podcast, if you’re excited about the book and you’re excited about further podcasts where we have guests or Warwick and I are just talking about aspects of Crucible Leadership, we do ask that you would subscribe to the podcast so that you, one, that makes sure you never miss an episode and two, that allows us to get this kind of hope and healing that Warwick was talking about in his own experience, the same thing that he talked about to his church all those years ago, 12 years ago now, it will allow us to get these podcasts into more hands and help more people move beyond their crucible.
Gary S:
So until the next time that we’re together, do remember that Crucible Leaderships are painful. We don’t doubt that. We know that. Warwick has talked about his here today, but they do not have to be the end of your story. In fact, they can be, if you learn the lessons of them, you apply those lessons and you move forward with purpose, they can be the best part of your story. A new chapter, the best new chapter, because it leads at the end of the journey to a life of significance.
A crisis is the ultimate test of your leadership and your character, in particular in your ability to maintain the cohesion of your team. A crisis can be a bit like a centrifuge, which tends to push people away, and dissipate team unity. Whether the team drifts apart or comes together is largely dependent on you, the leader.
We are currently in a health and economic crisis with the coronavirus in much of the world. Additionally, in the U.S. and now in other countries, there are widespread protests over the brutal treatment of an African American man, George Floyd, who was killed while being arrested by police. Concerns about racial injustice is an issue that permeates not just cities and states, but also organizations.
Crises can cause division, be it on racial or ethnic lines, political philosophy or just on what is the best course of action. Some people on your team may believe they know what should be done, often with different plans than you, or they may be fearful and believe that the situation is hopeless.
The job of a leader is to bring calm and to keep the team united and moving forward. Let’s not dwell on the past and how we got here, unless it is germane to figuring out how to proceed. Instead, let’s focus on what we should do next. How can we stay together during this crisis and find our way out of here?
A great example of a leader bringing his team together in a crisis is Ernest Shackleton the British leader of a polar expedition to Antarctica more than 100 years ago. In 1915 Shackleton’s ship was trapped in pack ice. By November of that year, the ice was crushing the ship and the ship sank. Shackleton’s original mission had been to cross Antarctica. His new mission was the survival of his team.
What made moving on from the original mission hard was that Shackleton had gotten his team in this life-threatening mess due to some poor decision-making. He decided to sail south for Antarctica when he was advised that the ice floes were particularly widespread at the time, and to proceed would be very risky. How did Shackleton get his team home? We unpack his remarkable story of overcoming seemingly insurmountable crucibles in an upcoming two-part Beyond the Crucible podcast with Harvard Business School Professor Nancy Koehn, who wrote the book Forged in Crisis, in which Shackleton is one of the featured leaders.
In the current climate you are in, you might be struggling to keep your business afloat, or your restaurant open. Your crisis might not threaten your life or the life of your team as it did with Ernest Shackleton, but it might be very dire to you in different but very real ways.
How do you get your team through a crisis?
1. Take Responsibility
The crisis might be your fault or it may not be. You are the leader. You may feel calm or more likely you may feel terrified and out of your depth. While transparency is often a good thing, in this scenario you need to project calm and that there is a way out. You need to project the belief that survival for your organization and your team is not only possible, but that it will happen.
2. Maintain Inner Health
For you to be able to project the aura of calm, authoritative leadership, you have to do the inner work. In an earlier blog we spoke of how to maintain calm amid fear. We mentioned several tools, be it reflection (prayer or meditation for instance), a walk in nature, listening to music, spending time with loved ones. If you are fortunate enough to have mentors or trusted colleagues outside of your team, they can be a great source of encouragement.
3. Make a Positive Step Forward
Each day or at regular intervals, make one positive step forward. Each small win builds morale in the team. It makes the seemingly impossible, feel just a bit more possible. A series of small wins can add up to considerable progress. Like the flywheel, the more progress you make a bit at a time, can make the energy and enthusiasm of the team grow and can make the progress of the team grow.
4. Be the Engine of Hope
You have to believe! You have to make the team believe that survival and getting out of the mess you are in, is possible. Every day, you have to provide hope. You have to channel your inner Franklin Roosevelt or your inner Winston Churchill. During President Roosevelt’s inaugural address in 1933 in the depth of the Great Depression, he said that “the only thing we have to fear is… fear itself.” Prime Minister Churchill gave a speech to the British Parliament in June 1940, when Britain seemed to be virtually alone against the might of Nazi Germany that was preparing to invade Britain. In this speech, Churchill said, “We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.”
While few of us are facing crises at the levels Roosevelt or Churchill faced, and we might think we are not even close to being the kind of leader each of them was, look at what they did. At its heart, they gave their people, their teams, hope. That hope moved mountains. We need to be “dealers in hope,” as another famous leader, Napoleon Bonaparte, once said.
There are other important things you have to do to make a team successful in a crisis, that include good communication and ensuring that each team member knows their role. It is important to encourage the team daily, including conversations of hope and encouragement with each team member. You need to pay attention to team members that may be more difficult, be it because of skepticism about whether “survival” is possible or just because they may be difficult for some to get on with.
Always remember, in a crisis, team divisions are exacerbated. The management of the team, team communications, team member roles are definitely important. But the leadership of the team by you as the leader is paramount. Inspiring hope, even when you are filled with fear, and helping your team take one more step, are the keys to not just survival but to achieving success amidst almost certain defeat.
Reflection
Have you taken responsibility for the crisis you are in, and how are you moving beyond it?
What positive steps forward are you taking each day?
Are you the engine of hope for your team in the crisis, and if not, what ways can you show that not just survival but success is possible?
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and leave a comment at our YouTube channel and be sure subscribe and tell your friends and family about us.
Take the free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment to discover where you are on your journey of moving beyond your crucible and how to chart your personal course to a life of significance: https://beyondthecrucible.com/assessment/
Growing up in Communist East Germany, Cathleen Merkel was taught her value came from doing what others expected of her, working hard and not upsetting the established order of things. Then the Berlin Wall fell, and she grew from a girl into a woman with dreams and passions of living a free and successful life. There was just one problem: the goals she pursued professionally and personally dead-ended a couple of times and didn’t really fulfill her even when they were going well. So she took a deep look at herself, asked close friends to help her see where she’d veered off course and finally discovered who she really was and what vision she wanted to cast for her life. The result, she tells Crucible Leadership founder and BEYOND THE CRUCIBLE host Warwick Fairfax, is that she has found meaning and significance as a coach and mentor who helps high-achieving female leaders reinvent their lives and careers. She walks alongside them as they realize true joy is rooted not just in job description, but in total life satisfaction.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and leave a comment at our YouTube channel. And be sure subscribe and tell your friends and family about us.
👉 Take the free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment to discover where you are on your journey of moving beyond your crucible and how to chart your personal course to a life of significance: https://beyondthecrucible.com/assessment/
Transcript
Gary S:
Welcome everyone to Beyond the Crucible. I’m Gary Schneeberger, the cohost of the show and the communications director for Crucible leadership, and you have happened upon, you’ve clicked play on a podcast that deals in what we call crucible experiences. Those are the things that happen in life. Sometimes they happen to you. Sometimes there are things that for whatever reason have been caused in your life, and they are painful experiences. They are experiences that can change the trajectory of your life, can make you sometimes feel like you just don’t want to get out of bed, can make you feel sometimes like you want to bury your head in the sand. But we talk about those experiences not so we can wallow in them or not so we can even celebrate them per se. We talk about them to offer hope and healing that there’s another side to those experiences, and we interview guests like the guests that we’re going to interview today who have moved beyond those crucibles, hence the title of our show, to offer you insight from their experience of how you can do the same thing.
Gary S:
With me, as always, thankfully, is the architect of Crucible leadership and the host of the podcast, Warwick Fairfax. Warwick, it’s good to be together again.
Warwick F:
Absolutely, Gary. Great to be here.
Gary S:
So the guest I indicated we were going to be speaking with today is Cathleen Merkel. I’m going to tell you a little bit about Cathleen before we start asking her some questions. As a thought leader in the mindset and self-leadership space, Cathleen supports high-achieving but worn-out women create a more content and balanced life without sacrificing their hard-earned success. Cathleen focuses on women who lost their sense of purpose, who feel they’re running in a hamster wheel trying to please everyone but themselves. She helps you to turn your careers, your social connections and personal life around so that you will start feeling fulfilled and excited again about the days to come.
Gary S:
With over 15 years of experience in retail media and broadcasting, engineering, and property investment, geez, that’s an impressive resume, Cathleen has not only experienced the challenges and opportunities of being a female leader herself. She’s also been leading and supporting various leadership development initiatives within large, complex multinational matrix organizations. I feel very non-qualified to be here. Only by deeply experiencing her very personal life challenges, as she says, hitting a wall experiences, has Cathleen been able to redefine her own purpose, deciding to bring ease and content to as many women as possible on the planet. The best part about that whole bio I just read is she ended it with an exclamation point. She’s excited about what she does. She’s excited about how she’s bounced back from her crucible, and I’m looking forward to the conversation we’re going to have Warwick.
Warwick F:
Well thanks, Gary, and Cathleen, welcome. Wonderful to have you. I’d love to just start hearing a bit about your story as that led up to your crucible experience, but tell us a bit about Cathleen Merkel and your background, who you are and how that led to your crucible.
Cathleen M:
Cool. So first of all, thank you for having me and thank you for a very impressive introduction. It sounded a bit bigger than I still feel. So thanks, Gary.
Gary S:
You’re welcome.
Cathleen M:
Well, I am German born. I was born in East Germany actually in the early ’80s. I never really realized how much my childhood and the way I was raised has characterized my whole path. I never realized it until maybe five, six years ago. I had a very loving kind of childhood. I had fantastic parents, but they were very young when they had my sister and me. They were 19 when they had my sister, and then three years later, I was born. They were quite overwhelmed with us, I would say, being so young. But it was quite normal at the same time for Eastern German times.
Cathleen M:
What was also quite normal for the communist part of Germany was to be raised in a sense of be strong, show up at your best. So I still remember that my parents took us to a restaurant, and my mom would literally sit down with us before we go, how we should behave, and I was three years old and not to make any noise and not to do that and not to do X and not to do Y. It was really, really strict, and it was all about, how are we being perceived. It was not about just enjoy your childhood, be a child, you all be noisy from time to time. That was kind of the characteristic of my whole childhood, loving, but very, very strict, very this is what you should do. This is what I want you to do.
Cathleen M:
It kind of in reflection restricted me understanding who I really was because imagine you grew up that way, then you go to school, then you have a constant competition with your sister who’s better at school, then you have this constant expectation setting off this is how you need to deliver at school and when you come home from school, this is what I want you to do at home because we are working women. So you have to do housework as well and do it perfectly. There were just expectations all the time. I never felt fully enough. I constantly felt I need to ask for acknowledgement for recognition. It caused a lot of trouble at home. It caused me to become a real rebel. I was just really kind of becoming quite an angry child and frustrated child, but more, I kind of nurtured myself with this anger. I didn’t necessarily let it out, and I couldn’t wait for me to leave home.
Cathleen M:
I remember when I was 15, I was saying to my mom, “When I’m 16, can I go to England and become an au pair?” She literally stood in front of me crying, and she was like, “You can not do this, and you will never leave us, and this is not acceptable.” So it was always about us, us, us, but never about, “This is your path.” I don’t blame them. I understand now that this was the culture. This was how my parents were raised as well. It’s okay for me now. But it made me the person I was years ago, in particular, my early 20s when I started my career, and I noticed about myself that I was someone who was very black and white.
Cathleen M:
Someone who was very right or wrong, this is my way, this is how it should be. Someone who was constantly just running towards success, and success, I didn’t even know how to define it as success was literally you have a great job, you are independent, and you can put some money to the side so that at some point, you can buy a house or whatever it is. So I was literally just living along the lines of this life and this definition of success, not quite understanding what I missed out on. Just to dive into different experiences. In Australia, I mean, I just love that people go for a gap year after school, first of all and experience the world a little bit, and then we come back, and then we decide what we’re going to do.
Cathleen M:
I would have loved to do that, but I didn’t because I was just not the person who she could do it and that I really wanted it. I thought, “No, let’s go the safe path.” That’s what my parents taught me.” That really kind of build my path up until I would say my early 30s if not… Yeah, early 30s, 100% that I was that way. I remember that I became really, really brief, when in my mid-20s, I was in a very good role. I was in my first manager role, so looking after two big retail department stores, partnering some senior managers there, all of these things.
Cathleen M:
But at some point, a few things around me happened. First of all, I had a brilliant circle of friends and a lot of them were traveling or living abroad and just testing it. I had this moment of, “I need to go as well.” I just held it inside for years and years that I had to do it. The second thing was my relationship at this point of time, which was significant for me broke down. The third one was that the company changed leadership, changed the culture not in the better way, and at some point, I was indirectly made redundant.
Cathleen M:
So basically, they chose a path to transfer me to a different location I would never go to in order to present to me the choice of, do you want to stay, or do you want to leave, which really hit me, right? You have always been on a success path you have achieved and suddenly in your ’20s, you sit down, and you’re like, “What’s going on right now? This is massive failure. I can’t deal with this.” That was really tough for me, and it took me a few weeks to cry, to feel sorry for myself, to talk to people, all of these things of grieving you go through in certain situations of loss. It was, for me, a loss of the current life as I had lifted.
Cathleen M:
But then it didn’t take me long to follow my gut and to say, “Well, this is also an opportunity, and I’m a huge believer that if a door closes, another door has got to open. You just don’t know yet what the door is going to be.” I opened the door of traveling. So I took my backpack, and I traveled South Africa, and I traveled Ireland in particular. I’ve always had a love for the UK and Ireland, and I went onto this bus tour, and it still makes me smile so much because I went on my own. But on this bus tour, obviously, I met so many people, and a lot of your people were there, lots of Australians-
Warwick F:
Right, a lot of Australians.
Cathleen M:
… Kiwis, some Americans. I was definitely the only German there. That was just absolutely life-changing because I was surrounded by people who lived their lives, who just embraced every day. Don’t get me wrong, there was a lot of alcohol involved in those weeks as well. But we had so much fun together, and the most important thing was I suddenly could let loose. I could let my hair down because people were just people with each other. We accepted each other for who we were. There were no expectations of how you should be. Quite a few of the people, and still, I have a lot of friends from that bus tour now who I visit regularly. It’s just brilliant, but a lot of the people said to me, “You’ve got to do what you really want to do, and you are far too young to get stuck into a life that was designed by the people for you. That really stuck with me.
Warwick F:
I mean, that’s an interesting question. Well, I want to cycle back to growing up because that comment, you’ve got to do what you want to do, it’s like, that must have been a very alien concept. What do you mean, I have choice? I don’t understand that word. In a different way, I can relate growing up at a family business. So you mentioned growing up in East Germany. There was it sounded two different influences. Your parents were obviously very strict, had very high expectations. I mean, telling a young child, three years old, you got to be on your best behavior, I mean, they’re three year olds. Come on. Really? I mean, let a kid be a kid, at least at that age.
Warwick F:
But how much of the things that influenced you that helped you form who you were on that high achievement track. How much was the East German communist mindset? How much was your parents? Because it sounds like your parents also… I mean, how much was each influencing you if that makes sense?
Cathleen M:
So my parents have been influencing me up until a certain point, I would say until I left Germany or just a year before when I have learned this transition to change. Because I don’t think I would have achieved, and I would have been as ambitious as I was and still am without the way my parents raised me, to look forward, to make sure you are safe. They have never said you need to be a millionaire or anything like that. Quite the contrary. But they always wanted me to be safe, basically. That means you have to have a secure job and so on and so forth.
Cathleen M:
So I think that made me really successful. Also, they gave me a lot of values, right? Reliability, honesty, trust, community, which is really important to me, i.e., to really stick together, Particularly on my dad’s side, that’s something that’s very important to support each other, to be there for each other, regardless as to whether we go through good times or bad times. The value I discovered for myself, and that’s my strongest value still is freedom. Given that my parents grew up right in Eastern Germany when the wall was up, it was pretty great. They weren’t allowed to travel. My mom was allowed to travel to our Western family from time to time. But we as a family had to stay behind because the state would never let us go as a whole family. So it was always restricted. We were never allowed to go on nice holidays and so on. So they didn’t know anything else. But this restricted life.
Warwick F:
They probably grew up with fear. I mean, at least in the West, you hear about the East German police, the Stasi-
Cathleen M:
Stasi. Yeah.
Warwick F:
… I think they were called. I mean, it’s like, even though if you’re a regular person, why would they care about you? But probably just the fear of what might happen to friends and whispers and rumors. Did you feel that was somewhat of a fearful mindset that yes, be safe, work hard, but-
Cathleen M:
Yeah.
Warwick F:
Yeah. It sounds like the opposite of freedom. I don’t know how you would describe. How would you describe that kind of mentality that your parents especially grew up with and influenced you?
Cathleen M:
So it’s very different because my mom actually grew up in a very Western way. My grandpa was always in business. He owned his own business, and they had a lot of family in the West. So there was always this Western mentality, and she was the one who was allowed to travel from time to time to the family. My dad, however, he was spied on by the Stasi. We found out by reading files afterwards and listening to the tapes that were recorded about our family. He was spied on by his best friend who later hung himself. So there were some really challenging stories in the whole family.
Warwick F:
Oh my gosh.
Cathleen M:
My dad was really restricted, and he was threatened by the Stasi because he was very successful in sports, and he was even considered for the Olympic team. So therefore, they obviously wanted to make sure that he would never go with my mom to the West and all of these things. It was very, very restricted. So what I’ve never experienced, however, was fear necessarily. I don’t know if they simply hadn’t shown it or if they just didn’t have it. But what I noticed and still notice is a very, very restricted mindset.
Cathleen M:
So the best example is when I decided to leave Germany, and I moved to the UK. I gave up the flat, and my dad helped me renovating the flat to hand it over to the next tenant. He said to me, “I have absolutely no idea how you’re doing this. You just take challenges, and you go with the flow, and you go to the next stage in your life and take opportunities.” He still says to me jokingly from time to time, “I don’t know. Sometimes I wonder which family you’re really from,” because I am just so different, my approaching, I think.
Warwick F:
Right. You would understand this, but many listeners wouldn’t just because the wall came down in 89. That was an incredible time, and it’s a long time ago. I remember at the time I had a internship, if you will, at a newspaper actually in Chicago. I was in some editorial meetings. Every week, it was like, “Well, Poland, looks like something’s happening there and Czechoslovakia and Hungary.” It was just incredible. It’s just like, “How is this possible?”| It seemed like a miracle at the time. Then there was, gosh, German unification, is that going to happen? Because both East and West has to approve that. Some of the West were like, “Do we want our poor Eastern cousins coming? It’s all of the money will be sucked into the East.” People are human. I get that, all of that stuff, but that mentality that a lot of East Germans grew up with, that wouldn’t have just ended in 89.
Cathleen M:
No.
Warwick F:
You can’t change the way you think overnight. I’m sure it took years to say, “Is it okay to think for ourselves?” So that had you on a certain mindset, which you’ve talked about success and achievement, which is great. But it felt like freedom wasn’t a concept that evolved later. So talk about how you’re on this track of success and achievement, but then you’ve had a couple of challenges. You mentioned one. I guess you weren’t fired, but they’re kind of almost gave you an offer that you kind of really did want to refuse. It was like, some backwater, and if you had any self-respect, you wouldn’t take it. But talk about how your life changed from the achievement, be responsible to… Yeah, be achieve and be responsible, but a bit of freedom. Talk about how that shifted with some of those crucible experiences.
Cathleen M:
So crucible experiences always make me think. As Gary said before, and I hit a wall, and I hit a wall plenty of times in my life. Some were bigger, and some are smaller. The big walls make me think hugely, and they make me reflect, and they make me step back. Most importantly, what I realize in those situations is the wisdom I have around me. So the biggest influence for me are the people around me. So in those times that I mentioned before I moved to the UK, there’s one significant relationship I was in. He played a huge role in slowly but surely shifting my mindset towards I can make my own choices, and I started doing more of that.
Cathleen M:
The friends I was referring to who lived abroad, they certainly were an eye-opener for me, and I started traveling more, not necessarily always for weeks or months, but just short travels. I always met fantastic people, and I don’t know how it happens. They are still a part of my life. They contributed to the significant change, and they were eyeopening for me. I had just great conversations about what the world has got to offer, and I became more and more curious. So that is one part of him. The other part that happens to me is when I step back and I think about what was just happening, in particular, think about what was going on for me, and that’s also what I do with my clients to help them reflect on what’s happening in your life right now, not just in your career, for example.
Cathleen M:
So what is happening for me? How am I feeling? What does not make me happy? Because often those situations show me, “Hey, what are you doing here?” And really then to reflect on, “Okay, what is it I really want to do and to trust myself that I can make changes happen.” I am someone who absolutely believes you can be in your 80s and 90s. You can still make changes happen to live your most content life. So I moved obviously to the UK, and again, I was surrounded just by brilliant people and people who gave me a very open feedback. I remember in my second role in the UK, in a second organization, I was a manager at this time, but fairly senior manager working with quite some senior stakeholders as well.
Cathleen M:
I remembered that my manager at the time gave me planned feedback. She was far more German than I was, on a very, very regular basis. This feedback included things like, some people don’t dare to approach you. Right? I was, “Oh, yeah. That’s not what I want from anyone. Well, how can that be?” She said, “Well, you can come across quite strong, quite powerful. You have strong opinions, and it can be highly intimidating.” So I realized I was eating my life. I was a strong independent woman. I had experience in different organizations. So therefore, I was absolutely fine sharing those opinions. But my style was quite tough to do for people who were not German, to be quite frank because I was really so direct all the time and was so black and white and all of these things. That put people off.
Cathleen M:
So plus, the second piece was that throughout my childhood, and I said to you before, and I fed myself with anger and with frustration and a lot of sadness as well, when you’re constantly pray for acknowledgement, for recognition, for parents saying, “I’m just proud of you”, regardless, which I haven’t experienced until I was 23, I think. You start building a wall. I certainly did. I build a massive wall around me, and that wall was I didn’t really show who I really was, the real Cathy. Well, I had a strong divide between professional me and personal me. So at work I’m strong and blah, blah, blah and very professional and so on.
Cathleen M:
That really got in my way in particular in terms of leadership. So that doesn’t mean that I wasn’t successful. It doesn’t mean that people didn’t like work with me. But there were also people who said, no, I really don’t like that, and I’m not enjoying working with you, and sometimes I’m a bit scared.
Gary S:
This is a good time. I think to bring up something you and I talked before we began this recording, Cathleen, just a couple of weeks ago. One of the things that you said to me when we were talking about having you on the show was you expressed a little bit of surprise, especially when I told you about Warwick’s story, right? He did the takeover of the family media dynasty in the family for 150 years founded by his great, great grandfather. The takeover failed, lost $2.25 billion, I always like to say with a B. Your response to that was feeling like, “Wow, why would you want me on the show?”
Gary S:
What you just described, though, that emotion that you felt, the wall that you felt around you, the things that you’ve been talking about, I want listeners to focus on that because that’s why you’re on the show. We wanted you because your experience, it’s not so much about the details of your crucibles, whose crucible. It’s not sort of a game of who has the worst crucible. It’s the emotions attached to them. There are so many people listening right now who’ve had crucibles like yours who have not even failed at a job and been fired, but basically been made redundant, been sort of pushed aside for reasons they don’t quite understand.
Gary S:
There’ve been people who’ve been confronted with things about their performance or things about their personality that may be hard to take. Those kinds of emotions are the very things that our listeners are going through and your response to them are the very kinds of things that will help them get over that. I remember one of the things that you said about pursuing the jobs that you were pursuing and success wasn’t everything that you thought it was. Growing up in the environment that you grew up success was a great goal. You aimed at it because it was not something that was easily achieved in Communist Germany. But when you achieved it, and I think a lot of our listeners are there, and I think a lot of your clients are there, you reached for the brass ring and in some sense found that it was kind of lead. Is that fair?
Cathleen M:
Yeah, 100%. I’m really glad that you highlight the emotions because that is for me the most important piece of those moments as well. The emotions I realized in that moment and what I did with them and every crucible moment before me, every wall brought that out of me and dismantled that wall. But I couldn’t have done it alone, and that is the second piece I’m focusing on with my people now and with my clients, I call them my people. So I just love working with them and really being their support mechanism along their ways. But it is building those communities and realizing when you have some great inspirations around you and to really cherish those.
Cathleen M:
But in this moment, I particular spoke about when my boss at this time gave me feedback, I literally hit the wall. I thought about the expectations that other people had on me, how I should behave again. So something that came back from my childhood, how I should present myself in order for those people to feel more comfortable with me being still on a success path. Yeah? This is what you need to deliver and trying really to constantly keep everything in check and being a great leader. So that was big wall number two that hit me down.
Warwick F:
I mean, what’s interesting to me is there’s a couple challenges here. One is when your boss says, “You’re driven, you’re successful, that’s great, but you kind of put people off with the directness and are hard charging.” This is a woman boss, right? Yeah. So it wasn’t like, “Oh, she doesn’t get it.” It’s like, “Okay. Well, I don’t really have that line I can use because she’s where I am in a sense.” Then it’s like, “Gosh, I’ve failed. Right? I haven’t been what I need to be. I have fallen short of the mark. I need to work harder. I need to be more successful. I need to work harder at seeming… get the job done but in a way that helps people embrace it because if people don’t embrace it, stuff doesn’t get done, numbers fall, I’m not successful.”
Warwick F:
But there’s the broader one in which you came to see life isn’t all about just achievement, monetary success, career, position maybe with some of the influences on trips in Ireland and UK and elsewhere and community, you began to see, “Okay. Life is more than just about the brass ring and success.” You can be successful, and I think you’ve said elsewhere, have good health, friends, travel, family. So how did that shift for you? Because you were on that, I think you used the word hamster wheel of success. How did you kind of, as we say both and, right, be successful and actually enjoy life? Because it’s easy to be successful and really be miserable too.
Cathleen M:
Oh 100%, and I was. I was. It’s exactly what you said. You spoke for my soul basically, just this way of, “I need to work harder now because I need to meet those expectations as well.” That was exactly it, and I was in the hamster wheel, and I didn’t see any more what was going on in left and right. I was stuck, so to say. After work, I would go out with friends just to kind of get some distraction. But that was it. I didn’t live healthy. I didn’t really look after myself. I was just focused on delivering.
Cathleen M:
It literally hit me I was close to a burnout. So I was really exhausted. I found myself not being able to sleep anymore for months and months, and therefore, I didn’t necessarily deliver in my best way. Other people would still have said to me, you still go far beyond a hundred percent, but it wasn’t enough for me. So constantly beating myself up, having very toxic relationships, all of these things. I really hit that wall.
Cathleen M:
I remember that I asked my boss as to whether I can take some time off. She said to me, “You need to go home and sleep. You need to take distance from whatever is going on here.” She approved it, and I went traveling again. So I’m not saying, by the way, to your listeners, traveling is the solution for everything. It’s a nice to have. It’s a nice to have, and I’m very, very grateful for my experiences. But solo travels helped me reflect differently. They helped me to disconnect. So whatever the way for you is to disconnect from that situation, make most of it.
Cathleen M:
I went to Indonesia. In particular, I spent quite a bit of time in Bali and basically I Googled solo yoga holidays for women because I wanted to be safe, I wanted to become healthy again, feel good about myself and disconnect. I found this place that I visited since four times, I think, to get a top up because it’s just so beautiful. What I have experienced was I learned how to look after myself, but I only learned to do that because other people started looking after myself there. The people there are just devoted to pay attention to you to make sure you have the best time of your life.
Cathleen M:
I started nourishing my body and my soul again. I had life-coaching sessions. I had nutrition sessions, Ayurvedic. That sounded very German, Ayurvedic. Food and massages and all of these things, and I had a lot of meditation sessions and yoga. But the most important thing was I was surrounded by kindness, unconditional kindness, which I haven’t really received a lot, or I didn’t quite know what that was. I started simply being myself. I remember when I left after three and a half weeks there, one of the guests said to me, “My goodness, it’s beautiful to see the real you.” I was literally standing there in tears because I could feel those walls were gone. I was just feeling so amazing about myself.
Warwick F:
So did you feel like in that moment that for the first time, you met Cathleen Merkel?
Cathleen M:
Yes.
Warwick F:
That you didn’t really know who she was? “So this is who I am? Who knew? Maybe I can smile. Maybe I can forgive myself if I make a mistake.” It’s like-
Cathleen M:
Exactly.
Warwick F:
… that must have been a strange experience to meet yourself in a sense, the real you for the first time.
Cathleen M:
It was strange and beautiful. I actually got goosebumps listening to you describing me. It was just absolutely stunning, and I was crying because I was just so full of gratitude and joy about it. Suddenly, it felt like a rock fell off my shoulders, and it felt light and easy, and life started feeling just super easy. I remember coming back, and I went back to my job. There were two things that had completely changed. No, three actually. The first one was I was to me that I rediscovered there, and I attracted people, and I don’t mean no attraction in a romantic way, but people were more drawn to me, approaching me, and some of them said, “Who are you?” Who knew me before and who were good friends of mine. They took the Mickey out of me, and they noticed that there was a difference.
Cathleen M:
The second thing was I was completely focused on what’s right for me, what do I really want from life? That’s when my coaching education started and that’s when I decided to become a qualified coach and started this journey then. The third one was that the pressure was off. I approached the days with kindness, with openness, and with ease. I still did a good job. But because the way I went about it and that is, for me, pure leadership that comes from within, that comes from a position where you are at ease with yourself, where you’re good to other people and where you have empathy and pure listening skills, and you can just be present with others.
Cathleen M:
Suddenly, work turned out to be far more successful because I could have different levels of conversations, I could challenge differently, and I realized it’s not about having a massive to-do list to work on. It’s about how you are with other people and deliver with those people on the bigger goals.
Warwick F:
It’s interesting you’ve said some profound things I want the listeners to hear. I mean, just part of it was this voyage of self-discovery, just the incredible gift to have a community that loves and cares for you unconditionally. You didn’t have to do anything to earn their love or their friendship. Just being who you are is enough. If you make mistakes, we’re all human. Sometimes we’re impatient, say a cross word, and it’s part of being human. It’s okay. They forgive you, and you forgive them, and that is such a freeing thing, a community that just loves you for who you are.
Warwick F:
The second thing I think you said was amazing is you’re so focused on success. But by focusing less on the outcomes, caring for those around you, still having targets and goals you want to achieve, but by caring for those around you, who knew you became even more successful. By letting go, you soared even higher. I mean, it’s truly remarkable. Yeah. I mean, I want to switch gears here and talk about what you’re doing now, but there was a couple of epiphanies if you will, a couple of turning points, right? The community that loves you unconditionally and by letting go sort of open hands, empathizing with people, you became more successful. I mean, do you reflect back and say that was some remarkable learning that you went through, it’s a remarkable growth?
Cathleen M:
Yeah. Sometimes I still have situations when old Cathy and new Cathy come together, and I fall into old habits. But what’s really lovely now is I remember that letting go is the key. When I am kind of bound up about something or I try to put too much pressure on something, the moment is really beautiful when I’m able to step back because I now have a trigger. I realize inside of me when the moment has come, and I wait for a few days, and then things fall into place. It’s just absolutely brilliant. It’s got a lot to do with your mindset and obviously your self-belief and also realizing, hey, not everything necessarily goes in the direction that you had planned. Right? But that’s life, and that’s discovery as well. So yeah, 100% loads of epiphany moments that still accompany me every day.
Warwick F:
So talk a bit about what you’re doing now. Because what’s so exciting to me is often in crucibles, we go through something, and we want to help others, fellow travelers if you will, and which is a good metaphor to use since you love traveling. I get it. I kind of like traveling a bit myself. But I love the way that you’re using what you’ve been through to help others, and in particular, women business leaders because you understand that mindset of wanting to achieve and it’s still not easy for women business leaders, even in the 21st century. A lot of barriers and just preconceptions, and yes, be successful but yet be whole human beings with health and family and friends.
Warwick F:
There’s probably a lot of your people as you put it, your clients who you talk about, and it’s like, “Well, how do you do that Cathleen?” I mean, if I back off, it’s much harder for me than the guys I work with. I’m sure that you will hear that. I’m sure that’s true. So I can’t afford to back off. If I back off for a minute, I’m off the track. When I’m off the track, you’re permanently off-track. I’ll never be VP, senior VP, CEO, whatever. So when you work with these folks, how do you get them to change their mindset and be what for you is the real Cathleen? For them, it might be the real Mary, the real whoever it is. How do you get them to change the mindset, that you can be successful but yet be whole?
Cathleen M:
That’s a journey for everyone. So first of all, for me, it’s important that I don’t get them to change their mindset. They want to do that so that they come to me usually when there are at their own breaking point. So they realize something is completely off here right now. One of my clients, I’m not going to use any names obviously, but she came to me, and she said, “My whole life feels completely off. I gained more and more weight. I feel really uncomfortable in my own skin. I have hardly any time for my kids. I’m working 24/7, and actually, I don’t love the job.” But again, this is the habit we moved ourselves into, right? We run, we run, run, and we want to be successful at work because that gives us the quickest acknowledgement and reward. So therefore, we keep doing that.
Cathleen M:
What we started with is really to reflect up on the whole life and to say, “Okay, what are the areas that you feel really passionate about that work really well for you and that rock your boat basically.” But we also look at the areas where people or those women in particular are missing out, and they say, “This is not enough for me. I’m not putting enough effort into it,” or, “I’ve kind of totally forgotten about it.” And then really highlight the whole person here. So that’s something really important. I work with female leaders across industries and to run their own businesses or who work in organizations. All of them usually come to me with, “I need to do something about my career.” As soon as we look at the whole life because they are one person and not someone as I described before and who is different at work and different in their personal lives, then they realize, “Oh there’s more to it than my career. I lost purpose in my life, and I lost connection with myself.” So that is number one.
Cathleen M:
Number two is also that we remember a lot, who are you at your best? When did you enjoy yourself the most? So if you were your best friend, basically, what have you experienced at this time? Then I have massive aha moments in terms of, oh wow, that’s years ago. What was present in this time? What was different about your life? Then slowly but surely build a plan to say, “How can we get there again with the current circumstances?” What we do along the way is we talk a lot about mindset, about creating healthy habits. We talk a lot about boundaries.
Cathleen M:
So something that I have never understood until a few years ago that I’m now helping my clients with is to set healthy boundaries step by step. I’m not saying to a woman who worked 16 hours a day and who really struggles to switch off, now, please work seven and a half hours a day. It’s completely unrealistic. So we need to start somewhere and then slowly but surely kind of help them to step back from I’m only at work. That we can only do by exploring obviously the support network around them and to say, “Okay, who can help?” Or, “Is everything really as necessary and important as it seems to be? Where does this need for delivering in this area come from?” So needs are being explored and so on.
Cathleen M:
We are looking into the future where you build a really compelling vision. That’s the most important thing. Where are we heading towards? Who is the person that I want to be? Along that path, there are loads of tears, and there is a lot excitement at the same time because I’m helping out these women to dismantle the wall and to really break it down. I have cried a lot, and those tears were so healing and helpful, and it happens to those women as well. What is needed, however, is a lot of kindness. So my clients often say to me, “My goodness, you’re really direct and challenging, but you do it in such a kind and empathetic way.” So the kindness I received, I 100% give back.
Cathleen M:
I want them to feel non-judge because they are the biggest judges. So I don’t want to give at anything to, and I want to make them feel at ease. So the personality and the way I approach this is really important. I do that, and that’s the last piece, one-to-one, but I love working groups. So bringing different women from different backgrounds together and work with them as a community and build the community so that they know, A, I’m not alone, and B, I can get support literally by just looking around me and opening up more and talking about it. It’s okay.
Warwick F:
You know what? As you’re talking, there’s so much wisdom that you’re communicating. I almost feel like your role is you’re an advocate for these women leaders. You were there to try and help them be who they want to be. We often live our lives based on shoulds. “I should do this, I should do that.” But it’s like, “Well, but what do you want to do? Where were you most joyful in life?” It’s like, “Well, no, but I’m not allowed to be joyful.” That’s wrong. Okay? It’s about duty. It’s about obligation. It’s about performance. That’s what it’s about, which you obviously grew up in one sense and helping them say it’s okay to be your best self. It’s okay to do what you want to do. Life’s about choices.
Warwick F:
They might say, “You know what? When I was most joyful, I was helping with a local nonprofit, maybe a food pantry.” But it’s like, “Well, I can’t do that.” Well, the income might be a lot lower, but if that’s what you passionate about, is it really all about money? If that’s what you want to do, why is that wrong? Or, “Gee, maybe I’d like to teach.” Well, teachers make almost nothing. It’s like, well, that’s okay if that’s what you want to do. If you want to keep doing what you’re doing but think differently, great. But it sounds like you were really an advocate for women leaders be who they want to be and you help eradicate that awful word, should, an obligation. Does that make sense?
Cathleen M:
100%, yes. I really feel you get me and what I’m saying. So it makes 100% sense. One piece I want to add to that is now we have obviously the additional facet of a lot of women trying to get into more senior roles, and there’s obviously the topic around equality between male and female leaders. That’s absolutely important to talk about. But I spoke to a female leader, highly successful this morning, and she said, “Oh my God, it’s so nice to be in a position where I know I can be my most authentic self and actually be successful with it.” I thought I have to be really powerful and strong and almost male. This is something I wanted really be an ambassador for as well. Be you.
Warwick F:
What you’re saying, I think one of the most important things I think we’ve discussed is obviously, my upbringing is radically different growing up in a family media business. But the last thing I thought I could do is be me. I had to fill a role and be some Rupert Murdoch, take no prisoners executive, and I’m more of a reflective advisor, listener kind of person. It’s a terrible fit. But it’s just the more that we are us, the more successful we are. It’s a misnomer, at least from my perspective, that people in general, men and women want you to be a certain way. If you’re who you are, you’ll actually be more successful. You found that in your own life.
Warwick F:
So it’s like, stop trying to live up to male expectations, people expectations. Be who you are. Maybe I’m idealistic and optimistic, but I actually think if anything, you’ll be more successful if you’re authentic. Because when you’re authentic and vulnerable, it makes you approachable. If you’re approachable, you get on with people. If you get on with people, well, you have that successful team. Does that make sense?
Cathleen M:
Totally. Yeah.
Warwick F:
Being who you are doesn’t make you less successful. It’ll probably make you more successful. Take a risk. Be you, right? You probably tell every person you deal with, right? Be you. Take a risk. It might work. They just-
Cathleen M:
Yeah. My slogan is to be the real you. Yes.
Warwick F:
They just might like you. Right?
Cathleen M:
Exactly.
Gary S:
That is a great opportunity now. What was just shared between you guys is a great place for us to begin the process of landing the plane. We’re not going to land it yet. The fasten seatbelt, sign is on. But we’re starting to begin our descent. But one of the things I love about interviews that we do on this show is when… Because very few people have the experience that Warwick has had. But to have a guest on like you Cathleen who basically I was going to jump in and make the point that you made Warwick is that you didn’t feel like you could be you, right? From the moment you were born, literally, you were the heir apparent to the family media dynasty. You could not be you.
Gary S:
Cathleen, you felt that same sort of thing, and you certainly work with people who feel that same sort of thing in different ways. There are listeners out there who are in the same boat, who feel like they, male and female, they can’t be themselves. One of the things that you guys both talk about, and this is my favorite part of the show is when two people who haven’t met before, Warwick and the guest talk about the same things in the same ways without ever having compared notes. What you’re both describing is a life of significance. That’s what we call it in Crucible leadership.
Gary S:
What you are leading your clients to, Cathleen, is significance beyond job description, right? Life beyond job description. That’s where significance is found. Success can be found in job description in a certain sense. But significance and success is found in a life that extends beyond, not instead of job description, but beyond the job description. Is that right?
Cathleen M:
Loving this. I want to write that down. Yes.
Warwick F:
Yeah. I mean, yeah. Obviously, we talk a lot about significance here. Yeah. I mean, for much of my life, it was all about making sure that I fit a certain role and a bit like you. I worked very hard, got good grades in school, did my undergrad at Oxford, worked on Wall Street, then got a grad degree at Harvard business school. I mean, it’s check the box, be… Just do whatever it takes to fit the roles. I was gung ho on that.
Warwick F:
But realizing I grew up in a very wealthy background. As much status, prestige, and wealth, as I guess you could probably want. Maybe there’s never enough. We had a lot of all of the above. We were old money. But one of the things I’ve realized is success doesn’t satisfy. There’s always another rung. Even as a CEO, there’s always somebody that’s better, quicker, faster, got better numbers, got more market share, got more this, more that.
Warwick F:
It’s like an athlete. You’re never going to be the… It’d be one or two that might be the greatest of all time, whether it’s Roger Federer in tennis or whoever. But there aren’t too many that is going to say, “Yeah. I was the greatest of all time.” Really? Really? But what satisfies is significance, which to me is living a life on purpose and helping others. That’s exactly what you’re doing. You’re using your experience and your background to help other women leaders be their true selves, which I’m sure fills you with more joy than you could possibly describe.
Cathleen M:
100%.
Warwick F:
The act of helping people. That is a life of significance. You wake up every day thinking, “Who can I help today? What joy is going to come my way as I help unlock peoples’ inner potential in themselves.” Does that kind of resonate?
Cathleen M:
Yeah. Exactly. That’s exactly it. I fulfill my purpose by helping other people fulfill their purposes. But also, it’s just so hugely rewarding when you see people grow and develop and stepping out of their shoulds. As you know, right, it’s just beautiful, and suddenly, there’s a sense of calm inside of me that says, “This is all okay.” Now, realize that actually this morning, we are in the middle of the coronavirus outbreak, right? There’s quite a bit of crisis around us here. We are on proper lockdown. I hear a lot of panic, and I see a lot of panic and people become more and more nervous.
Cathleen M:
I realize in myself that I’m super calm and just like it’s going to be okay, and I’m focusing on all the good things, and that is, we can give back. We can support others. We can really help people reflect upon their lives because of the situation. If they haven’t done it before, this is now a massive opportunity to have your own breakthrough moments. That is just more valuable than any money in the bank account. That’s what makes my life now far more purposeful.
Warwick F:
Absolutely. A life on purpose focused on others. It brings such joy. As you say, when we’re all stuck at home and sheltering in place, this is a time of forced reflection. Like it or not, of, what is my life about? Yeah. Life on purpose focused on others, it’s really the secret to joy, and everybody wants joy and significance in life, right?
Cathleen M:
Yeah. I hope so.
Warwick F:
So yeah. Well, they may be don’t realize that. Maybe you didn’t realize it growing up. But there was an inner voice saying, “I want to be me. I want that joy of just freedom and helping others.” You have a wonderful journey, right? The wall loosely has broken down, but literally and figuratively, right?
Gary S:
I’m a smart enough communicator to know when kind of the last word has been spoken. That was a great last word talking, from where we started, about the communist Germany, a situation in the Berlin wall and now the other walls that have come down in your life and in the lives of your clients. I would be remiss as the runway comes into clearer focus if I did not let you, Cathleen, let our listeners know how they can get in touch with you so that they can engage you if they’re so inclined. So how can people find you?
Cathleen M:
Yeah, sure. So first of all, there’s the website, that’s cathleenmerkel.com. You find me on Instagram and Facebook under Cathleen Merkel and LinkedIn obviously as well. Join my Facebook group that’s called Legendary Leaders. That’s the community for females in leadership. It doesn’t have to be an organizational leadership role, but if you want to be a part of a great community, that’s the place. Last but not least, I’m a fellow podcaster too. So tune in. I hope my podcasts episodes really inspire you to live your best life and to liberate yourself from all the shoulds, and the name of it is Legendary Leaders.
Gary S:
I mean, I knew already that you were a podcaster. But if people are watching this on YouTube, you can tell that all of us are podcasters because we have these really big microphones. So it’s clearly we’re not… If we’re doing Zoom meetings in the midst of this pandemic, we all have big microphones that we’re just talking to our friends with because we have them. So I am going to land the plane at that point. One of the things I want to do for you, listeners is give you some takeaways of what Cathleen and Warwick have talked about today. I think they’re three really strong main points from Cathleen’s story that I think can benefit you in your own crucible experience.
Gary S:
The first is take time to heal after you’ve had a crucible. You can wait. You truly can wait to hop on the horse again. The main reason to wait is to heal and to make sure that’s the horse you want to ride. That’s Cathleen’s story. She waited, she didn’t go right back into the same thing she was going after, and take time to heal after your crucible. That’s the first point. The second point that was made throughout this conversation by both Warwick and Cathleen is to lean into the people around you after your crucible experience. They will give you hope. They will give you resilience. They will give you insight. The kinds of insight they will give you is not only insight into the things that you do well, but insight into those things that you might be able to work on so that you can do them well down the road even better than you’ve been doing them. That can make a huge impact in how you move as we call the show beyond your crucible experience.
Gary S:
The final point I want to make sure we hit and summarize for people because we talked about it in detail here is it’s okay. It’s okay, listener to reach for the brass ring. Absolutely, it’s okay. Warwick said many times he’s not anti-success. Cathleen, clearly not anti-success. She’s working with very successful clients. But when you reach for that brass ring, make sure it’s truly brass. Make sure it’s not lead. Make sure it’s not only focused on the monetary aspects of things or the professional aspects of things or the job description aspects of things. Make room, make opportunity to help other people and to find what Warwick calls a life of significance and what I can tell Cathleen agrees is a life of true significance.
Gary S:
That will wrap us up on this episode of Beyond the Crucible. Warwick and I would like to ask you listener to do a favor for us, and that is, on the podcast app that you’re listening to this right now, if you click subscribe, that will ensure a couple of things. One, it will ensure that you’ll never miss an episode of our podcast. You’ll never miss an episode of Beyond the Crucible. The second thing it will do, it will allow us to reach more people with truly inspiring stories like what Cathleen has shared here today.
Gary S:
I have to say to you, Cathleen, before we sign off that I’ve done this with Warwick now about 20 times we’ve done interviews with people. I have never seen him more relaxed or perhaps more inspired in the context of a conversation than he was here in talking with you, and that is a testament to both your experience and your story with the way you articulated and the hope you offer. You guys are singing from the exact same page of the song book when it comes to that. So thank you for that.
Gary S:
Listeners, thank you for spending this last hour with us. Remember, yes, crucible experiences come up in your life. Yes, they’re difficult. But they are not the end of your story, far from it. They can be as Cathleen described, as Warwick has described, and then they’re both living proof of this. Crucible experiences can be, if you learn the lessons of them, if you apply the lessons of them and you point yourself in a direction that allows you to move beyond them, they can be the start of an entirely new chapter in your life, an entirely… You can discover the true you as Cathleen did, the true Cathy, as she said. You can describe the true you or find the true you by pointing yourself toward a life of significance.
Tommy Breedlove isn’t one to make excuses. Yes, the physical and emotional violence he endured as a boy led him to become violent himself as a teen, landing him in jail for his 19th birthday. But when he was mentored by a fellow inmate and inspired to avoid another trip behind bars, he took responsibility for his recovery. He toiled at low-wage jobs by day and studied hard at night, landing a position at a prestigious financial services firm just three years later. And yet, while his career skyrocketed — promotions, pay raises, the respect of his bosses and envy of his colleagues — the bottom fell out of his life again at 36. Lying in a ditch, unsure how he got there literally and figuratively, he once again had to summon the strength and courage to bounce back. In the aftermath of this second setback, he tells Crucible Leadership founder and BEYOND THE CRUCIBLE host Warwick Fairfax, Breedlove decided to strip himself of all the identify-hiding masks he’d worn on his way up the corporate ladder — and discovered how to love himself and let others love who he really was. Those breakthroughs have led him to a rewarding career as a best-selling author and in-demand leadership coach and speaker, sharing with clients and audiences his hard-earned insights on discovering their life’s purpose and living legendary lives.
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👉 Take the free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment to discover where you are on your journey of moving beyond your crucible and how to chart your personal course to a life of significance: https://beyondthecrucible.com/assessment/
Transcript
Gary S:
Welcome, everyone, to Beyond the Crucible. I’m Gary Schneeberger here, the co-host of the show and the Communications Director for Crucible Leadership, and you have hit PLAY, you have, we hope, hit Subscribe to a podcast that talks about our crucible experiences. Those are those moments in life, those failures, setbacks, those painful things that can happen in our lives that can change the trajectory of our lives, can really lead us to places where we sometimes don’t feel like moving on. But what we talk about here, why we talk about them here, is to encourage you, listener, to move on, and we interview guests, who have done that very thing.
Gary S:
And with me, as always, is the architect of Crucible Leadership, Warwick Fairfax. Warwick, I predict we will have, and you’ll understand why I’m saying this, listener in a bit, I predict we’re going to have a legendary show today.
Warwick F:
Absolutely, Gary. Well said.
Gary S:
And the reason that I use legendary, listener, you’ll hear as I read the bio of our guest, Tommy, who has the coolest last name ever, Tommy Breedlove. Tommy Breedlove is a Wall Street Journal and USA Today best-selling author of the book, Legendary, and Atlanta-based business relationship and mindset coach, who is a regular featured keynote speaker at global events. Tommy started his 20-year corporate career at one of the largest financial consulting firms in the world and eventually became a shareholder, the international practice leader, and a member of the board of directors for one of the largest public accounting and financial firms in the Southeast US.
Gary S:
At the top of his career, Tommy experienced a transformational moment, inspiring him to walk away from the corporate world, to change his life, and follow his true calling. Tommy now serves clients and audiences everywhere by empowering them to build and live Legendary lives. He guides people to discover a life of significance. You’ve heard that before, listeners, here at Beyond the Crucible. He guides people to discover a life of significance while building a lasting legacy. The simple tools he shares shows them how to work in their zone of brilliance, obtain financial freedom, and live with meaning and balance. The goal is to help everybody to become the person they’ve always wanted to be.
Gary S:
When Tommy isn’t speaking or serving his clients, he enjoys traveling the world, hiking, and spending quality time with his wife and two dogs. And I will add, Tommy didn’t write this in his bio, but I will add that by the time our time is over today, listener, you will realize that Tommy Breedlove is a beautiful human.
Tommy B:
Oh, yes.
Warwick F:
Wow, thank you, Gary and Tommy. Awesome to have you. I just love the whole concept of Legendary leadership and helping people live lives of meaning and significance. I’d love to get into that here in a bit, but I like to start with your story, and in particular, I think you’ve had a couple of crucible experiences. Tell us a bit about Tommy Breedlove and who you were growing up and just some of those early experiences as they formed who you are, or who you were, anyway.
Tommy B:
I’d be happy to, Warwick and Gary, and it’s honor to be here. You guys are my people.
Warwick F:
Yeah, thank you.
Tommy B:
I could just tell you’re in my tribe the first time we spoke, so I’m super thankful and grateful to be here. And by the way, I’ve been asked this so many times lately, Breedlove, I was born with that name. It’s not a name that I came up with. It’s actually legitimate. I was born with it. But for some reason, I get asked that a lot, especially at the grocery store. “Is that your real name?” I’m like, “Yeah. I was born with that.” So thank you.
Tommy B:
So I’ll start at the beginning, Warwick. I grew up in humble beginnings in South Atlanta in the Southeast United States in the State of Georgia, and it was a good hard-working part of town, but not many people from that area went to college, graduated college, and would be what I’d call in the professional world. They were mostly mechanics, worked at the airlines, Coca-Cola, Ford Motor Company, and just good, solid, hard-working part of the world. And my mom and dad always wanted something more for me, and so I had incentive to be the first person to ever go to college and graduate college and to be a little bit more than what my family was before, just in the terms of financial and money success.
Tommy B:
Unfortunately, inside and out of this home, I grew up with a significant amount of abuse of all kinds and of violence. And so the worst thing that happens to a young child when they grow up in that particular, they never feel any safety inside or out of the home. Unfortunately, I became what I hated, and I became the violence. So instead of at 18 years old, me heading off to college to be the first person in my family to go into this new charted territory, I unfortunately committed a violent crime, was charge with two felonies, and looking at seven years in prison and thought my life was over.
Tommy B:
Fortunately, due to some luck and some good lawyering, it was dropped down to two heavy misdemeanors. I was sentenced to two years and ended up spending my 19th birthday incarcerated. So that’s the first crucible moment I had in my life, and I’ll go ahead and go to the second one, but I want to talk about a little bit about what it was like to be incarcerated. The most amazing thing happened to me there is an African-American gentleman stepped across racial lines, which is very unusual in an incarceration setting, stepped over the lines, he saw something in me, he loved me, he mentored me, he coached me, and he said, “You’re not going to end up like me, and you’re not going to end up in this revolving-door system.”
Tommy B:
And so it was the first strong male mentorship that really had appeared in my life, and because of his guidance, his grace, and his love, I picked myself up, dusted myself off, got out, and went to work, listen to this, for a nuclear waste container factory during the day. Very hard work for $6 an hour. Went to community college at night, ended back at the University of Georgia, and then I went from literally jail to Deloitte, which is one of the largest financial consulting and public accounting firms in the world, in three years just by hard work, not wanting to go back in that system, and getting rid of that violence out of my life.
Tommy B:
So let’s fast forward to crucible number two. So I was just going to be that guy that out-worked you. I came from a different part of the tracks. Here I am in the top of the game in one of the largest financial institutions in the world. So I was just going to out-work, out-hustle, and out-move people, and I did. So fast forward until I was 36 years old, I had moved on to a different firm, but there I was, corner office all of glass, fancy cuff links, nice car, you name it, power, prestige, money, what I thought was going to make me happy in life. And I’m not one of those people that don’t think money’s important. I think it’s very important, but for me, as a young man, I was living the life that wasn’t me. I was wearing all of these masks and armor, I was the tough guy, the cool guy, important guy, couldn’t-ask-for-help guy, couldn’t-show-weakness guy. And it was all because I didn’t deal with those wounds and demons and mistakes from my past.
Tommy B:
And so when the money, the title, the success, the next big paycheck, or the prestige, when that wouldn’t fill me up, I turned to everything else, all the darkness that you read about and see about in the Wolf of Wall Street and all these other horrible stories. And there I was at 36 years old almost at the top of my game in my career, and found myself laying in a ditch in Atlanta, Georgia, in downtown Atlanta, staring up at the blue sky, asking myself, “Why did I get here, who am I, and where am I going?” And just really, I don’t know if it was that little boy who never thought he had a chance, I don’t know if it was some divine power, but every fiber in my body says, “You’ve got to get up, and you’ve got to fix this.”
Tommy B:
And so that was crucible two at my moment. I get up, and I went, some people call it, well, the sexy word is a spiritual transformation. Really what it was was hitting rock bottom, and I decided to do something about it. Took massive action in my life, personally, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and eventually, the most amazing thing happens to me when I just became me, when I just became Tommy, and felt self-confidence, self-respect, unconditional love for myself. My marriage became the best that it had ever been, my network and friendships increased 10X, negative influences disappeared out of my life, and financially and business, I went from junior partner to senior partner, to board of directors, to running the international practice of this large firm. Literally 5X’ing my income in three years just by being a decent human being, living with significance and integrity.
Tommy B:
And at that point, all of these alpha men and women started reaching out to me from my network, and said, “Look, man. You didn’t give up your drive and ambition, but you seem more at peace, your relationship is the best it’s ever been, you seem more fulfilled. What drug are you taking, and how do I do that?” They thought there was just some quick easy fix. And by about the 20th person, I realized, “This is my calling. This is my career.”
Tommy B:
So I decided to walk away from the game and do one-on-one business relationship and mindset coaching. I run retreats, I run Master Minds, I do a lot of public speaking. Eventually, the tools and systems that I found that changed my life, that I’ve seen change countless of others’, really from a state of making them the best human they could possible be, that’s how this book, Legendary, came to be. It’s a simple read with a lot of simple tools of how do we live our best life from purpose to time to mindset to unconditional love to financial confidence to intimate relationships with our significant others. It’s a simple playbook and tools and stories of how I did it and how countless of others have done it through this system.
Tommy B:
And so those were the two crucible moments in my life, and Warwick and Gary, I’ll let you take it from here.
Warwick F:
Wow. That is an amazing story. So our bounce back is often informed by the crucibles that you went through. Your second crucible was undoubtedly influenced by your first crucible. So talk about that. As you were growing up, you mentioned you suffered abuse. I think from what I understand, were you bullied at school? Some kids are captain of the football team, and others are picked on. Talk about who you were, because that probably influenced your self-image. Who were you as a kid growing up?
Tommy B:
Really good question. So it flipped. I went from being the skinniest, youngest kid in an all-boy neighborhood, usually between one and three years younger than everyone else, to a big alpha kid, because I became tough and cool. So I went from being this nerdy picked-on kid, and when we switched high schools, I became the cool kid. But I want to step back because the violence for me, there was a lot of bullying in my neighborhood, because it’s an all-boy neighborhood, good hard blue-collar part of the world. I would consider that more normal than not normal. I know that sounds probably weird in these times, but that’s just how we grew up as young men. We liked to beat each other up, and I happened to be the youngest skinniest. The problem was what was happening inside the home.
Tommy B:
There was a very close family member that I experienced every type of abuse you can imagine, and that was the part that was simply overcome. So because of that, I was able to become what I call like a chameleon. If I was around the cool kids, I could become the cool kid. If I was around the nerdy kids, I could become a nerdy kid. I could literally from a humor to a fun to, again, wearing all this armor just to survive, I became that kid, so I went from being the nerdy, picked-on kid in the neighborhood.
Tommy B:
That part of the world during that time, there was a lot of racial friction and violence as well, so I experienced that in and out of school, in the playgrounds, on the streets, and so that made it very difficult. And what I was told way later in life is I never felt this sense of safety. But I never dealt with those wounds and those insecurities and those fears that come up for you, and we have all them, we all have our mistakes, we all have our wounds, we’ve all had things done to us. Some more extreme than others, but there all very real, and they all change us.
Tommy B:
So fast forward to high school when I became the cool kid, and even at school, I probably look like I had it going on, but I started running with the wrong kids at night, more violent kids, more kids getting into alcohol and drugs. And then they started carrying guns, and then we were fighting. And I was very thankful that I committed that violent, I wasn’t thankful that I hurt someone, but I was very thankful that it happened when it happened, because it changed my life because I would’ve probably ended up in a ditch and dead if I would’ve kept running with the same crew that I was running with.
Warwick F:
So listening to your story, I just wonder who was a young Tommy Breedlove? I would imagine abuse just robs you of your soul, of who am I as a person. When you put on masks, sometimes it’s like, well, who was the real Tommy beneath the mask. Did you even know who you were as a young kid or as an adolescent?
Tommy B:
That’s a great question, and it’s interesting. I’m going to fast forward and then come back to the question. Once I hit college and into my professional financial consulting and public accounting career, it was like my childhood didn’t exist. I guess it was this unconscious mental block. It went away. I never talked about it, I never addressed it, I never talked about my childhood or the friends. And so it became this unconscious mental block or wall or armor, because I didn’t want to deal with that. I’m just moving forward now. And so as a young man, if I had to look back and take an educated guess is I became whatever I needed to become. And so there was no authenticity, there was no vulnerability.
Tommy B:
It’s interesting. I don’t know how everyone feels about this. My sister’s also had challenges throughout her life. It’s interesting how we’ve dealt with them. She simply is, in my opinion, in denial. She says those things didn’t exist, those didn’t happen, but if you look at the trend of our lives and how unproductive and the mistakes that we’ve made, they tend to, she experienced the same thing I did, but she just never chose to deal with them in the way that I dealt with them. And so for me, I think it was because I became whatever I needed to become, whether it was at home, whether it was on the street, whether it was at school. I just needed to fit in, and I needed to be liked, because I knew if I didn’t fit in and I wasn’t liked, the consequences were horrific if not severe.
Tommy B:
And I think, regardless of the type of abuse that you experience, I think the worst is what gets down in your soul, into your emotional, and when you start believing, and I’m going to say something pretty harsh here, so forgive your audience. I hope this doesn’t come across, but it’s true. When you’re told you’re a piece of shit as a young puppy, and you start believing it, there’s nothing more soul-sucking. So you do everything in your power with your mask and your armor to prove you’re not that. But deep down in your soul and spine, you do believe that’s who you are, and it creates a really tough thing to overcome when you at your core have been told and taught and it beat into you at a young age, it’s really hard to overcome that.
Gary S:
Is safe to say, Tommy, based on what you just said, that you don’t know who you really are, you’re wearing masks all the time. Is it safe to say that that guy who wore the cuff links, the cuff links in the corner office, that was part of a mask, that was a different mask?
Tommy B:
Totally. It was a mask. The jokes, the constant … I was still the kid in the locker room, how we talked to each other, how we treated each other, not asking for help. The fancy ties, the suits, the watches, the cars, it was all armor. It was all shiny things. It was literally that little boy, saying, “See me, hear me, love me. And I’m valuable, and I’m important. See? See how fancy I am? See how cool I am? See how big my office is? Oh, look. I have a TV hanging from the ceiling. Oh, look. Here’s my title.” And if I would’ve been someone who had a lot of self-confidence and self-respect, those things would’ve been like, “Hey, I earned these.” But for me, it was a mask. It was just simply tools to make me hopefully feel better. The problem is they would only make me feel better for a second.
Warwick F:
Sadly, some really important lessons. The tragedy is whether it’s the abuse of being told that you were worthless, it robs you of your soul, it robs you of your individuality. If somebody had said back then, “Who was the real Tommy?” You might’ve said, “I have no idea,” if you gave truth serum so that you didn’t just joke about and just fob it off or something. And for any individual to say they don’t know who they truly are, and that just robs you of your soul, of your individuality.
Warwick F:
Me, I obviously grew up radically different. As listeners will know, I grew up in a wealthy family media business in Australia, which couldn’t be more different. But yet, not quite the same as you. I’ve had close family members at times say, “Yep, you’re wonderful.” At other times, you’re kind of worthless, or somewhere along those lines, and certainly in that environment, who you are as an individual was irrelevant. It’s like, “Okay, there’s a goal. You have to run this 150 year old, several thousand person organization, and there’s a person you have to be. Therefore, equip yourself to be that person.” So what mask do you need?
Warwick F:
In my case, it was the corporate mask, so Oxford, Wall Street, Harvard Business School. Off you go. So what I wanted to do as an individual, which we’ll talk about later in terms of your passion and your design and your skills, totally irrelevant. So even though we couldn’t have grown up more different, that sense of “I don’t know who I am,” that is a terrible, terrible feeling. Obviously, I don’t know your family, but I think, at the risk of offering a value judgment, I think you’ve chosen the better course.
Tommy B:
Indeed.
Warwick F:
Even to other family members, because it’s easy to say, “I’m not going to deal with it.” If you don’t deal with it, it’s this chain around your neck your whole life. And so I’m sure it wasn’t easy to get through it, but I’m sure you have a much better idea now of who Tommy Breedlove is than you did when you were a kid.
Tommy B:
Yeah. Absolutely. And I want to say this, Warwick, and it’s interesting to say. The consequences were almost my life, twice, literally, whether it would’ve been in a jail cell, and who knows what happens to that, or a revolving-door system into the penal code, or just flat losing my life at 37. So it came with severe consequences. I think you brought up a good point. I don’t know how this happened, but I’m thankful it happened. It’s interesting the way you were growing up. Two things that have fallen in my lap. I have my general coaching mindset relationship, but I also have these niche practices that I don’t really advertise, because these people don’t like you to advertise this.
Tommy B:
Legacy wealth families, as well as celebrities and celebrity adolescent kids, have fallen in my lap, and it doesn’t mean that the pressures, the shadows that you have to live in, the almost unreal expectations and pressures from family that they put on themselves, and with those responsibilities and those pressures come real challenges, real insecurities, real fears, but we can’t ever let them see you sweat. And so I hear this on a regular basis is it doesn’t, and I want to say this for anyone for listening, it doesn’t matter where you come from or what your story is, we all have our story, we all have our wounds, we all have our mistakes, we all have our fears, and we all have our insecurities, and they’re all very real, they are all very relevant, and we can’t compare and compete ourselves to others, because our story is ours.
Tommy B:
And if you asked a million people to put their mistakes and tragedies and wounds into a pile and go pick them back up, pick up someone else’s, they won’t pick up someone else’s, because we know our wounds, right? But it doesn’t make them any less, it doesn’t make them any more unimportant, but I want people to hear this, too, is that you’re not alone. You’re not alone, you’re not alone in your fears, your insecurities, your wounds, and it’s never too late to stop living that story that we’ve been telling ourselves and start living our lives. So I do want to put some hope out there as well.
Warwick F:
No. I think that’s well said. I want to get to Legendary leadership here in a moment, but just to fast forward to the second crucible, there’s a lot of folks out there, a lot of listeners, that they want to be successful, and like you, there’s nothing wrong with being successful, but in part depends on how you define success. Nothing wrong with having money. Money brings freedom, it enables you to have nice vacations. I remember back when we could actually go outside our homes, because we’re living in the coronavirus world, at least as we’re recording this, a bit over a year ago, my daughter was working, I have three kids in their 20s, my daughter’s working in Australia. We’d gone back there for a lot of family gatherings. I didn’t want to go back again. So we figured out, “Why don’t we meet halfway.” So we had Christmas on the big island of Hawaii. It was fabulous.
Tommy B:
Fabulous.
Warwick F:
Not the cheapest place to go at Christmas, but it was worth it. And so I’m not against doing nice things, and money gives you that opportunity, so I think that’s great. But as you say, money in and of itself doesn’t satisfy. It gives you the opportunities to enjoy things and to help. So here you were, growing up in more of a blue-collar background. You’re working hard, you’ve gone through some tough times earlier, and you were making it, you were hitting every hurdle, you’re doing incredible things. The money, as you say, the shiny cuff links and everything, but yet, somehow, despite your meteoric rise, you felt hollow. So talk about that sense of hollowness, because a lot of people would say, “Tommy, you’ve made it. What’s there to be unhappy about? The nice car, the nice house. It’s all with the American Dream. What’s there to be unhappy about? How could anybody be dissatisfied with all of that?”
Tommy B:
Yeah. I think you make some really good points. I want to recap what you said, and so I think money is A, it’s important, especially for those of us who want to make massive positive impact in the world. The more money we have, the more impact we can make, and I think it’s super important. But it’s also a ridiculously powerful magnifying glass, and if you’re an insecure ass, it’s going to magnify that insecure ass-dom to a point that you wouldn’t believe it. But if you’re an amazing human being, who wants to be of service and make impact and employ people and grow a positive force and movement for good, it’ll do that. And so for me, because I was that little boy, and we all have our own demons.
Tommy B:
Here’s the thing about the shiny things. To me, life is about experiences, events, and the people you love, and more money will give you the freedom to experience more, to have more, and to do more. The shiny things, it doesn’t matter if it’s a fancy new Corvette or a Ferrari, or everything in between, that’s not going to fulfill you inside, because if you don’t have unconditional love and respect for yourself, and you’re struggling with your mindset, i.e., that inner voice that says, “What if they figure out I don’t know what I’m doing? What if they figure out I’m scared? What if they know my deepest, darkest desires?” We all have some level of that.
Tommy B:
And so regardless of the amount of money you make, you’ve got to have unconditional love and respect for yourself, you’ve got to do the work to build your mental, emotional, and spiritual fortress, not just your business and financial fortress. And so for me, I was missing all those pieces.
Warwick F:
As you were in that ditch.
Tommy B:
Yep. I was still that-
Warwick F:
That sense of unconditional love that gives you. I love how you put it. That self-love, that “I am worthy of being loved. I am worthy of being admired.” That wasn’t there, as you were sitting in the ditch.
Tommy B:
It didn’t exist, and my wife and I have talked about this subsequently is she was able to love me when I couldn’t love myself. I had zero self-respect and love for myself. I was never taught that, I didn’t know what that meant, I was incapable of receiving love, and so for me, it was just this little boy who didn’t feel valuable, who didn’t feel enough, who didn’t feel worthy, and who didn’t feel lovable. And it was up to me to rewire my heart, my brain, and my soul, so that I develop that self-confidence, to start mastering that mindset. And so that little boy still was just screaming in all the wrong ways, just trying to be the tough guy, cool guy, important guy, sexy guy, funny guy, whatever mask I wanted to wear, and it was never going to be enough, and that’s what put me in the ditch.
Warwick F:
It’s easy to say you believe in yourself, love yourself, give back to others, but how did you flip that switch, because that was years in the making, years of pain, trauma, abuse, maybe some mistakes. How did you change that mindset? Because that ditch seems like it was a pivotal moment in your life, maybe the pivotal moment. How did you flip that switch so you actually could think, “Maybe my wife loves me, and you know what? I’m worthy of her loving me, I’m worthy of family and friends admiring me.” How did you flip that switch?
Tommy B:
There is no switch is the honest answer. What I had a burning desire for at that time, staring at that blue sky, not knowing where my car was, why I was half-dressed, and what the hell just happened to me? What happened to me was this intense fear that A, I didn’t want to die, and B, I didn’t understand this, but there was this burning desire to just change. There was no switch of all of sudden developing self-respect and unconditional love. And I say this all the time, and I’ll tell you exactly how I did it. I say this all the time is we need to keep ourselves in physical shape, and we’ve got to do that. We go walk, we exercise, we lift weights, we play basketball, whatever we do, but you’re not going to stay in physical shape and/or get in shape if you don’t exercise those muscles every day.
Tommy B:
And so your heart muscles, your self-respect muscles, your mind muscles, they’re muscles as well, and you’ve got to nurture them, work on them, and flex them every single day so that you build that mental and emotional fortress so during times like we’re in right now, this COVID virus hit, or family does hit, or tragedy hits, or business failures hit that you will be ready, willing, and step in, and you’ll have the self-confidence and courage to lean in. And so it didn’t happen for me overnight, because I hadn’t flexed any of those muscles. I just had a fear and a burning desire to change. It looks like Gary’s dying to say something, so I want to stop.
Gary S:
I can sense the conversation’s about to turn to how you did indeed bounce back, and one of the things that was so beautiful for me in your book, and I’ll hold it up here for folks who are watching on YouTube, you can see it right there, was this idea, because it’s so simple and yet so powerful. And I think it probably, and I’d love to hear your reaction to it when I say it and ask you the question, is probably very instrumental in your bounce back from that ditch, and that’s the purpose formula that you draft in your book, right? How do we find our purpose? And this is the purpose, listeners, or the purpose formula that Tommy prescribes in his book, Legendary. Pretty simple. The purpose formula is “We love it” plus “We are talented at it” plus “The world needs it.” Add those three things together, and that equals our purpose. Even if you hadn’t made the formula in your head yet, how was coming to that realization instrumental in getting you figuratively and literally out of that ditch?
Tommy B:
For me, the truth and the transparent answer is I didn’t find my purpose for another three years. And thus, because my life transformed, I started developing my mind muscles, my heart muscles, etc. When I got to the top of the game and knew if I stayed in this world that I would have eight figures in the bank account when I retired, but I wouldn’t be happy and fulfilled, that’s why I knew I had to leave at the top of the game, because I was so conscious and so aware and had done so much work with coaches, mentors, myself, I knew that I wasn’t working in my purpose, and I would never be fulfilled or happy. That’s the moment that I knew that I’ve got to use my God given talents, all of these people were reaching out to me, these ambitious, driven professionals, “Hey, I don’t want to give up my ambition or drive, I want to be financially confident, but I want to have better relationships with my family and friends. I want to have a better network, I want to cultivate unconditional love, I want to be the master of my mindset.”
Tommy B:
So my purpose fell into my lap by doing all of these right things, but that’s the reason I left the financial world is because I knew it wasn’t my calling, I knew it’s starting to suck out my soul, and the money would never fulfill me and make me happy. So it took great courage and great fortitude to walk away from that kind of paycheck and distributions every month, but I knew I had to do it, because it was bigger than me, and I was going to use my God given talents in things I enjoy. I’m telling you when I’m talking on a podcast or on a stage or doing a retreat or doing one-on-one coaching, I am not more fulfilled. Time literally stops, because I love it. I love seeing people realize the best of themselves. And so I didn’t have that in the financial world, and there was no amount of money that was going to fulfill me.
Tommy B:
And so I didn’t find it until later, and here’s something I believe about purpose, and I want everyone to hear this. Every single human being on Earth has a purpose, and that purpose changes depending on the season of our lives. But everyone of us until our last breath on this beautiful planet has a purpose. It’s just for us, and it’s an art and science to find it, but the simple formula is this. You’re super good at it, and if you don’t know what you’re super good at, go ask your closest friends and network and family. They’ll tell you what you’re super good at. You enjoy doing it, and whatever you believe, the planet, your friends, your community, or whatever this world needs, you use those two things to go do something bigger than yourself to serve, for lack of a better word. That’s where you find fulfillment, and it can be inside of the career or outside of the career. So I just wanted to say that.
Tommy B:
I didn’t find my purpose in that ditch. I knew, however, I was meant for something great. I didn’t realize why I was still on this planet. All the things I had done and been through, I was like, “There’s no reason I’m still here, so I’ve got to trust that. So I’ve got to find it.” And so that was part of my journey.
Gary S:
And that’s not altogether different. In fact, it’s very similar to what Warwick talks about and Warwick’s own experience. I don’t want to tell your story, Warwick, you can tell it, but the idea that it can take a while. As you’re moving beyond your crucible, as you’re moving beyond those moments, it’s not instantaneous. You said it earlier in this discussion, Tommy. It’s not a switch that you can flip, necessarily, to move beyond those things that you’ve struggled with. It is a process.
Gary S:
Warwick talks about it in depth in the Crucible Leadership model, and it’s always exciting for me to come in and see two, I’m looking at two guys on the screen, who could not have more different backgrounds, and yet, and more different experiences, but the emotions of what you went through and the way that you, bit by bit, reclaimed your sense of purpose in both of your cases is inspirational, and I hope that’s what listeners get from this is that you don’t have to be Tommy and go through the things he went through, you don’t have to be Warwick and go through the things he went through. The emotions of how they processed what they went through, that’s the formula for getting you beyond. Sorry, Warwick, I cut you off.
Warwick F:
Yeah, yeah. No worries. It’s all good. I love what you’re talking about, Tommy. Just finding things that we love, that we’re talented at, and the world needs, I think that’s so true. And purpose, I think, really is, purpose is when it’s a God given purpose, a purpose from within you, it is very fulfilling, and it does bring joy. But I keep thinking about the Tommy in the ditch, and you made a decision. You didn’t really have all this figured out. I didn’t when I was trying to claw my way back. I didn’t have the whole Crucible Leadership model figured out. That kind of stuff comes afterwards as you look back, unfortunately. It’s good for other people. It doesn’t really help us at the time, but we make our way through and muddle through.
Warwick F:
But part of it, I think, is you make a choice, and you made several choices. One was, “You know what? I know maybe I don’t like myself, I certainly don’t love myself, but I am going to work on that. For better or worse, I’m going to be the authentic Tommy Breedlove. So be it. Forget the mask. I’m done with the mask. I’m going to be myself, and I’m going to work on,” and I love that phrase you use, that of self-love. It’s like exercise. We all use different things. For me, faith is a huge deal, so just the thought that we’re all loved by God unconditionally. Over time, as I read, meditated, prayed, and fortunately, I’m sure, like you, I have a wife that loves me unconditionally. That was a huge help. But over time, it’s like, “I’m going to be the real me, and that’s it.” So that’s a choice, and just the sense of purpose of trying to do something that really makes the world a better place.
Warwick F:
So talk a bit about that, because to me, that was key for you. You made a choice, forget the mask, to be authentic, and in some ways, you wanted to do something that was purposeful. Does that feel true, that choice you made?
Tommy B:
So true, so true, and I’m going to talk a little bit before that and right at that moment. So there’s so many who keep saying, over and over again, that it’s the absolute most powerful thing, that maybe we’re going to say today is we, as human beings, like to feel like we’re in control, but we are in absolutely control of nothing with the exception of one thing, and it’s our choices. Including in those choices are our mindset and attitude, so choices, mindset, and attitudes. The rest we can influence, we can inspire, we can lead, and we can do the best we can, but at the end of the day, all we have in our control is our choices, mindset, and attitude.
Tommy B:
So pre-ditch, I was completely unconscious, I had the wall up, and the truth be told, this is kind of a cute story, is my wife and I were going through all of these wedding counselors, because we were trying to figure out why we were so unhappy and blah-blah-blah-blah. And so about the second or third visit of every single one of those counselors, the counselor would be like, “Heather, why don’t you stay home, and Tommy, we need you to come back.” At first, I thought they were going to say, “Hey, Heather’s the problem, and Tommy, you’ve got it all figured out.” But that’s not what they were saying. They were seeing this deep darkness, they were seeing this wall that I wasn’t even letting them penetrate. I was completely closed, I couldn’t feel, and so I was closed. I don’t know I had the ability to choose something different. That’s how closed I was.
Tommy B:
But one of those counselors said something to me that I’ll never forget. He says, “There’s a facility in Tennessee that can do more for you, Tommy, in seven days than I can do in 10 years.” And when I woke up in that ditch, I remembered that, and I made the choice to listen to a man who’s in this profession, go to this place in Tennessee where they cut me open for four days and 30 others. I knew I wasn’t alone, I could feel again. They let me know that “Hey, this is going to be okay,” and then they gave me three days of tools to put it all back together, and that was my catalyst to start participating in my own rescue, investing in myself, and making me and my mindset, my emotional, my spiritual, my physical life my number one priority so that I could serve others better.
Tommy B:
And so I finally knew I could choose, and the first choice I made was to listen to that guy, because I hadn’t listened to him for four years before, and say, “Hey, there’s something out there that can help me find who I am,” and it’s called the Living, I’m going to give them a prop, they give me nothing, it’s a Living Center Program in a place called Onsite Workshops outside of Nashville, Tennessee. And that seven-day program was the catalyst for me becoming the man, human, and person I am today.
Warwick F:
That’s awesome. I keep reflecting on that phrase, “Investing in yourself,” which sounds self-centered, but it’s really not. It’s in a sense, other-centered. I’m sure your wife and those who know you are very grateful that you’ve invested in yourself. It’s almost denying, as those negative voices never quite go away.
Tommy B:
Ever.
Warwick F:
It’s a bit like exercise. “Hey, I worked out in a gym yesterday. I’m good for the next six months.”
Tommy B:
Not at all.
Warwick F:
Life’s not like that. Same as spiritual and emotional, because there is the voice, that one that said, “Hey, Tommy. You’re worthless,” in a bad moment. That never goes away totally.
Tommy B:
And loud.
Warwick F:
It’s like, “Okay. I hear that voice. I’m not going to let you gain traction, okay?” Whether it’s yoga, meditation, prayer, whatever spiritual practices work for you, use that to help you realize that I believe every human being is perfectly and wonderfully made and loved by God or some spiritual force, however you look at it. Claim that truth, and that’s the internal. The external is just what you’ve done, which I love, is just this whole concept of purpose and significance, because I feel like as we’re able to contribute to the world, there’s a healing balm in that. As you’re helping others, you take your focus off yourself in terms of self-centeredness, and you do that, you help people all over the country, all the world.
Warwick F:
So talk a bit about how clearly you love Legendary leadership, and it feels like, I’m not saying that because, “Oh, you like it. You’ve written a book,” but it’s more there’s a sense of purpose, there’s a sense of excitement. I’m not just going to get this big paycheck and the corner office at the 50th floor of some big building. There’s nothing wrong with that, but you’re changing people’s lives. Right? It’s not about the speaking and endorsements. So talk about how you know who you are. I think to the best degree you can, you actually feel that you’re worth loving. Am I right?
Tommy B:
Indeed, indeed. 100% now. Still have bad days, though.
Warwick F:
Correct, but you’re focused on helping others. So talk about how Legendary leadership has transformed your life and transformed others’ lives, this mission you’re on.
Tommy B:
Yeah, absolutely. I can’t tell you … So when people usually … So one of the hardest investments we make, and I want to go back to something you said, is investing in yourself. It’s not selfish. There’s the great faith-based joke is the guy, the flood’s coming, and the guy’s sitting on top of his house. And then the boat comes by and says, “Jump in,” and he’s like, “No. I’m waiting for God to save me.” The helicopter comes in and says, “Jump in.” “No, I’m waiting for God to save me.” And then he drowns. “God, what happened?” He goes, “Well, I sent two things.” So you’ve got to participate in your own rescue, and I believe in order to be the best leader, husband, man, woman, family member that you can is it starts and ends with you. And so I’m very rigid.
Tommy B:
For me, living a life of significance and purpose and serving is about every day getting up, making sure I have my gratitude exercises, my physical exercises, my meditation, my daily readings, my prayers. I literally spend 90 minutes to two hours every day working on myself, my fortress, in order so I can serve and love people to my fullest. And some of the stuff I do is pretty heavy. I’m in the pain and purpose business. I carry the weights and burdens of pretty successful people but also help them find their purpose.
Tommy B:
And it’s interesting that you talk about serving and finding. It’s interesting. If you looked at my client base, I have everything from people just getting started in their life to as the wealthy as they come, and it’s interesting to see how similar people are. It’s no longer anecdotal. It’s statistical. And so it’s interesting. It doesn’t matter, sometimes, how much money they make, people are like, “I’m still not happy. I’m still not fulfilled. Why do I find myself looking at the stars at night?” And almost 100% of the people, whether it’s in a group setting or on a stage or one-on-one, almost 100% of us, and it’s almost statistical, we all struggle in our relationships with our family members, our significant others, and sometimes our friendships. It’s 100%, so we’re not alone.
Tommy B:
And so for me, building and living a Legendary life is doing the best we can every single day, and I’m going to give you some of the things that it includes, and these are things that I believe deep down inside. And this book is all about simple tactics, great stories, and easy, actionable things that you can do in the following categories. And to me, you can’t overwhelm yourself and start on all of them. You’ve got to start simple, dream big, start small, but just start daily exercising these different parts of your mind, heart, soul.
Tommy B:
And so for me, it begins and ends with purpose, is we’re all here for a reason. We’ve got to figure out what that reason is why. And to me, the only real asset we have in life that’s literally depreciating every day, that’s a business term, is our time. And so how do we reconquer our time, and how do we prioritize our time to do the best we can. I believe that financial freedom and confidence is as important as it can, especially in the Western world. It helps us make impact, it helps experience life, and it helps us have freedoms we wouldn’t have. Then it moves into how do we cultivate networks and leverage our friends, our family, our colleagues to surround ourselves with the best people possible, but also come from a place of service?
Tommy B:
And then it takes a dramatic turn. It takes a turn into, “Okay. Now, we need to start developing unconditional love and respect for ourselves,” but a lot of us alpha individuals have a real problem with receiving love and giving love. How do we that? How do we be a little more vulnerable? And then it talks about how do we have better intimacy with our friends, family, and significant others? How do we master, you talked about it, that critic that can get so freaking loud sometimes, and tell us we’re not good enough, and, “Hey, you are this bad person, and what if they figure …?” And so it takes a wholistic approach, and it talks about the power of choices, but to me, it’s a simple playbook on how to live the best life.
Tommy B:
And I’ll tell you why I chose Legendary. In a world of constant self-promotion, “See me, see me, see me. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn. I’m important. Here’s me getting out of the car. Here’s me getting out of a jet. Here’s me important. Look how pretty I am.” And we’re all guilty of it on some regard, right? But to me, Legendary is something that’s given to us by our communities, our societies, and our tribes. And you can either be a beautiful legend, and it doesn’t have anything to do with rich or fame, or you can be a horrible legend. And this playbook is all about when we leave this world, we take the U-Haul of stuff with us, and no one’s going to read our resume, but when we leave this world, we’re going to leave ourselves, our communities, and this planet a little bit better than we found it. And to me, that’s the journey, building and living a Legendary life choice.
Warwick F:
I think that is so true. As you’ve been talking about some of the … We all have pain, and some of the wealthy or Hollywood folks or different people. I grew up with that. For whatever reason, we were on the map with my parents, and my mother would throw incredible parties, so Hollywood people would come to Australia and stuff, and it’s like, “We’re used to good things in Hollywood, but the stuff that Lady Fairfax has in Sydney, it’s another level than we’re used to,” so that just tells you something. So there was legendary parties, to misuse your phrase.
Warwick F:
But yet, you can be really successful and famous and be empty. And to me, what fills the emptiness is yes, you’ve got to love yourself, and there’s that self-work you need to do, but you have to live a life on purpose, which to me in some way makes the world a better place. It could be through an invention, it could be through a non-profit, it could be in a corporate arena. That can have very diverse arenas, but when you’re living life on purpose, doing something, as you put it, that the world needs, which is other-focused, that gives even the wealthiest, most successful person, that can often be the most depressed person, meaning, as well as people on the other end of the economic spectrum. And it also feels like maybe I am worth loving in some weird way as I’m helping others. So that sense of other-focus, to me, it’s difficult have a sense of purpose which isn’t in some ways other-focused on some level. Does that make sense?
Tommy B:
100%. Couldn’t agree more. Gary, looks like you’ve got a question, brother.
Gary S:
Yeah, well, I have a thing I do in every podcast, Tommy, where I say it’s about time to land the plane. We’re not landing yet. The captain’s turned on the Fasten the Seatbelt sign, and the gear may be coming down, but I want to summarize for the listener here that is really, really interesting to me. Folks who’ve listened to this podcast since its inception know Warwick talks about the importance of living a life of significance. To hear you describe a Legendary life, there’s so much overlap there in the way that that comes together, and that’s one of the truly great things about being part of this podcast is to see people from different walks of life, who’ve arrived at the same place through different circumstances, to help people with that very thing.
Gary S:
Tommy, there was something today. It’s funny that you talked about Facebook. I sent you a Facebook friend request yesterday, and you were kind enough to say yes. And I saw a video you posted on Facebook today. It was just you, and you were so excited, and you’re like, “I just have to share this with everybody really quickly.” And you were actually there in your home studio with your good microphone, and you were just doing this short, it’s 15, 20 seconds long, but this is what you said. You quoted someone, but this is what you said, and I think it’s a great way to begin the process of hitting the runway. You said this, is a quote that you quoted. “I cannot do all the good the world needs. The world needs all the good I can do.” That, to me, summarizes Crucible Leadership and summarizes A Legendary Life. Is that fair?
Tommy B:
That is completely fair, and when I read that, it was part of my daily routine that I was just talking about that I read that, and I had this, “Oh, my God. That is genius.” “All the good that I can do.” It’s about something bigger than us, it’s about service, it’s about impact, it’s about significance, and what I like about it, I wish there was three million or billion other Tommys and Warwicks and Garys in the world, because we all are beating this drum of “We can do this. You can do this. We can overcome things, and you can actually be happy and successful.” And Warwick might be strawberry, and I might be chocolate, and you might be vanilla, and this person over here chocolate chip, but there’s a flavor for everyone. And find your flavor, find what voice resonates with you, find what message resonates with you, whether it’s books or podcasts or mentors or coaches or your tribe or your inner circle or your friends, find it and go chase it and take one small step. So I love that.
Tommy B:
And that quote, I can’t remember who said it. It was Janis something, and I just read it for the first time. It’s laying around in me somewhere, but I don’t want to go digging during the podcast. Let me show this. This is kind of crazy. There’s my daily readings. And so I just think this message, and candidly, if I’m going to be fully transparent, I’m angry. I’m angry that so many amazing, beautiful, ambitious, driven people who want to serve, they’re unhappy, they’re unfulfilled, they don’t know what they want to do. And I think, and I’m not one of those martyr/victim people, but I think we’ve done a piss poor job in our society of teaching people money, emotional health, mental health, and spiritual health. And it’s all a wholistic stew, and if we take one ingredient out of the stew, the stew doesn’t take good. You take salt out, the stew’s shitty. Forgive that word. The salt’s not so good, but you know what I’m saying?
Warwick F:
The stew?
Tommy B:
Yeah, the stew. The stew. And so I forget the word there, but what we want to do is there’s just baby steps that we can do, and it’ll be a little hard. If you’re not happy with where you are in life, just go find the nearest mirror, look in it, and just say, “I want to change,” and then take one small action. Pick up a book, listen to a podcast, just move.
Warwick F:
And you’re right. We don’t really teach it in schools or anywhere, I suppose, families, community groups, churches. I guess we could all do better, but getting to the point that you’re at, and I like to think I’m at, where you accept who you are, you believe that you were worth loving, you are contributing to society in a purposeful way, you have people that are for you, and they’re not for the mask version of Warwick or Tommy or Gary. They’re for the real version. When you’re your real self, and somebody says, “You know what? I like the real Tommy. The other Tommy was okay. This one’s better. It’s really you.”
Warwick F:
It’s quite something when the mask is down, and people love you for who you are, and you’re contributing to society. That, to me, is a Legendary life, a life on purpose, a life of significance. That is possible, it is mission-possible. Not mission impossible. It’s not an easy road to get to. It is possible, you’re an example of it, I’d to think in some small way I try to be, but being authentically you, in a way living on purpose and helping others, it is possible, it’s worth the effort, it’s worth getting out of the ditch.
Tommy B:
And the work never stops.
Warwick F:
It’s worth it. Exactly.
Gary S:
Yeah. I can see that-
Tommy B:
The work never stops. Yep.
Gary S:
No, I can see the guy in the ground with the flashlights doing this. So we’re getting to the point that we’re going to land, but I would be remiss after all of this great content, all of this great experience that you’ve shared with listeners, Tommy, if I didn’t give you the chance to tell people where they can find you, and not just you, but also choose goodness where you do a lot of your work from. So how can people connect with you, find your book, and learn more about how to live a Legendary life?
Tommy B:
Well, the book is everywhere, and I was going to say even in your airports or bookstores, but no one’s going to the bookstores or airports. So it’s all over Barnes & Noble, Amazon. You can get the book anywhere. Because of what’s happening in the world right now with COVID, if you go to TommyBreedlove.com/gifts, the first thing I give you is my purpose statement about here is my purpose right now during this season of my life, and the formula and a blank page for you to work your own, as well as my Legendary lifetime, what we talked about, my daily routine to help me be the best person possible, to hopefully build theirs. What we’ve added to that is the Financial Competence and Freedom chapter, as well as the Mastering the Mindset chapter for free, because I think there’s an undercurrent of fear, insecurity, “What am I going to with my money?” And so these two chapters are so vitally important, and I also share my story, so you get the preface as well.
Tommy B:
So if you go to TommyBreedlove.com/gifts, you can get two free chapters of my book, Legendary. I put so much content out there on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram, whatever your flavor is, it is all about us being a little bit better than what we are, hope, innovation, love, grace, and being more financially free. So @TommyBreedlove on Instagram. Of course, I’m on Facebook at Legendary Choice, which is under the Tommy Breedlove brand, and as well as on LinkedIn. I put stuff out there every day just to be inspirational. Know that you’re not alone, and know that you’re worthy enough and valuable, and we’re all in this together. And I think right now, we’re craving connection, and we’re craving vulnerability and authenticity more than we ever were, so let’s all give people the gift of going second, let’s be honest and vulnerable, and here’s to all of us, Crucible Leadership and building and living Legendary lives.
Gary S:
Fantastic. Let me, for your listeners, summarize some takeaways of this robust conversation that we’ve had today. One thing, I think, comes through loud and clear from Tommy’s story is that mentoring matters. You can find it anywhere. Tommy found it in jail. Not only did Tommy find it in jail, but he found it from an unlikely source in jail. So look around you, see the people that you admire, see the people who are doing things like you wish you were doing things, like you aspire to be doing things. And then ask for help, see if they will help you. Most people when asked to give some counsel, some advice, to pass along their wisdom, will jump at the chance. And having a mentor who will pour into your life in that way can make all the difference in the world. Tommy’s living proof of that.
Gary S:
The second takeaway, this is very powerful as Tommy and Warwick are talking about their crucible experiences and their bounce backs from those crucible experiences, is do not compare your crucible to other people’s crucibles. Your worst pain, your worst setback is just that, your worst pain and your worst setback. Tommy gave a great example of if we took all of our crucibles and threw them in a bucket, and then everybody went to pick them out, we wouldn’t pick out other people. We’d pick out our own, because that’s our worst pain. So that’s what you have to find your way back from is your worst pain. And to paraphrase the title of the podcast, that’s where moving beyond your crucible begins, by digging into your pain and learning the lessons of it.
Gary S:
And then the last thing that we can take away from this is find your purpose. Tommy has a great, great formula for how to do that. It is “We love it, we’re talented at it, the world needs it. That equals our purpose.” And the other important point there, both for Warwick and his life and Tommy and his life, is that it may not happen immediately. It probably won’t happen immediately after your crucible, but you do have a purpose. And even if it doesn’t happen immediately, keep after it, because the world needs your purpose, and the world needs you.
Gary S:
Thank you, listener, for spending time with us today on Beyond the Crucible. You can do us a little bit of a favor by on the app that you’re listening to right now, click Subscribe. That will ensure that you never miss conversations like this one we had with Tommy Breedlove today, and it’ll also help us make sure more people get a chance to hear the insights that Tommy has to offer on how to confront a crucible, learn from a crucible, and bounce back from a crucible. If you’d like to learn more about Crucible Leadership and the resources that we offer, you can visit us on the web at CrucibleLeadership.com.
Gary S:
So until the next time that we’re all together, thank you truly for joining us here on Beyond the Crucible, and I’m going to steal a word from Tommy and say, “You’re all beautiful humans,” and remember that your crucible experiences are not the end of your story. It wasn’t the end of Tommy’s story. You already know it’s not the end of Warwick’s story. It’s not the end of your story either. But you dig in, you learn the lessons from them, you apply those lessons, and you push yourself to live life on purpose, as Warwick says. It can be not the last chapter of your book. It can be the next chapter, the best chapter, because where it leads is to a life of significance.
