Lori: Hello and welcome to Fine Is a 4-Letter Word. My guest today is Gary Frey. Gary, welcome to the show.
Gary: Hey Lori, it's good to be on here with you. Thank you for having me.
Lori: Absolutely, we were just laughing because before when I hit record, there's a five second countdown timer. And I like to inspire my guests to run the Jeopardy music in their head. It feels like there should be Jeopardy music, but there isn't and it makes us laugh. So, Gary, let's start out with a little bit of background on you. What were the values and beliefs that you were raised with that contributed to you becoming who you are?
Gary: Man, that is a long question and even longer answer. But I'll try to be super succinct. You know, my parents did not raise me as a perfectionist. I just came out as one. I don't know why. Honestly, I don't. wish, and they wished I wouldn't have been that way either, I think, because it's very tormenting.
But as an oldest child, and then my only other sibling, my sister who's four years younger, so that was enough difference where she got two fathers, me and our dad. So, just over responsible, over whatever. And they would always say, go easy on yourself. But unless I was straight A's and if I wasn't the top of the class, then I was failing.
And so, yeah, know, Fine Is a 4-Letter Word, that was my life. A lot of, you know, like on the outside, you know, I even got teased as a kid, probably in sixth grade. They called me Mr. Perfect. And it killed me to hear that because I was the last one to be picked on the softball team or kickball or whatever like.
I ended up becoming a swimmer. That was one thing where I could excel, but balls and hand-eye coordination, that wasn't me. And so that's kind of a tough place to be in a little railroad town in Kansas. We didn't have a swim meet until I was a freshman in high school or a swim team. So I always felt less than, but yet on the outside people would go, you got it together.
Ironically, I really started feeling that way at about 10. And that's what's really, I find fascinating. That's in 1972. So that's when I was 10 years old. These two female psychologists and psychiatrists, I think they were psychologists, they found this common trait among high achieving female clients of theirs.
And they were plagued by these thoughts of being less than, not being good enough. They just got lucky if they had any success. They were in way over their heads. They had to hide certain things because if they exposed their frailty and weakness, they would be rejected by others. And it's called imposter syndrome. I'm like, you know, I get into my 50s and I'm like, hey, I could relate to that.
Lori: Was there something that happened when you were about 10 years old? Was there an event or an experience that triggered this or it was always there and it...
Gary: No, there really wasn't. Probably it was earlier than that and probably when I was around eight years old, I had a very stern and very difficult, very German grandmother. And she, I never felt like she liked me or us at all. And I hated German food.
So I got spankings every time we had borscht, which was at least twice a week, it seemed like. And so, and she only spoke German with my grandfather in our presence. So there was just always this feeling of rejection and she would come in and stay with us during the day while we were at school. So she'd be home and we'd walk home from school and she'd have food for us.
Hopefully it wasn't borscht or it meant a spanking and my dad to come home and he was a principal. My mom was a nurse. So I don't know. I mean, I really don't know. But my grandmother had a stroke at age when I was age eight and for a couple of years and I don't even have this in my book, but I thought I killed her. I thought I thought I was the cause of her death.
I, I found out that grandma died and it wasn't that we were close, but like, that's a weird concept as a child. like what happened? And they're like, well, she had a stroke and I'm like, well, what causes that? Well, you know, if they're really stressed out or whatever, well, she locked me out of the house and she'd locked me out more than once because I was playing the TV loud or something like that. Right. You know, I don't know.
You know, for a couple of years, I just would lay in bed thinking, I killed my grandma, you know? And so finally I asked, yeah, that's pretty heavy, you know? And finally I asked my parents, I got the gumption to ask them and they're like, my gosh, no, you know? And I said, well, I turned on the TV loud and you know, she locked me out of the house. And they're like, no, you know?
She had had high blood pressure and whatever else anyway. But yeah, as a little eight year old kid, and even 10 year old, you don't know. So maybe that contributed to it, I don't know. I really don't.
Lori: But the lesson in this, the key takeaway in this part is you had the courage, and that's what's on your shirt, so people who are listening aren't seeing this, but if you watch the YouTube version, you'll see that Gary is wearing a shirt that says courage. Having the courage to ask your parents, because some children would have just carried that forever and never asked and never gotten clarification, and the whole point here is that even when you're afraid, ask the question and get clarification, right?
Gary: Yes, yes. Yeah, that's exactly right. Anytime I talk about imposter syndrome and about my book called Silence the Imposter, and I never thought, hey, I'm going to go write a book, especially on that. I thought if I ever write a book, it's going to be called Sleeping with a Rhino. And it was about when I caught my partner embezzling money. That was terrifying. Yeah, that was terrifying.
Lori: Yeah, we're going to get to that in a minute.
Gary: But I thought that's what my book is going to be if I ever write one, but that wasn't the case. The issue was, is I realized many, many people in coaching, CEOs, really kind of starting in 98 and on where I kind of got drug into it. This was a common theme among many of these CEOs, most of them.
That dropped their guard with me or that I even may not have been coaching, I was just walking alongside or even I worked for, they were plagued by these same thoughts of, know, people just knew what, you know, this or that, or they would just compare. They think everybody else has it together, but they don't. Right. And that was me. Like comparison and it kills gratitude. That's for dog unsure. But this whole thing of courage.
Weapon number three is shine a light on it. It seems extremely masochistic to drag out of the shadows the stuff that you've been keeping in the shadows that you've been working really hard to make sure nobody knows about. But how liberating it is when you just boom, expose it. Because guess what? Everybody else goes, you too? You know, like, it's just amazing.
Lori: Yeah. And right. And when you shine a light on that monster, it shrinks and disappears. And a lot of my guests have talked about that and having had these secrets in the closet for years and how liberating it is to let it go. You have this perfectionism. I think this is something too that comes perhaps with being the oldest because I have faced that as well.
That even if your parents aren't putting that pressure on you, we take it on ourselves for some reason. Yeah, so then as you got older and got into a career, how did that perfectionism affect your ability to build a career and did it affect what happened, and I'll let you tell the story, in 1994 that you just alluded to?
Gary: Yeah. Yeah. yeah, well, perfectionism is a great tool until it's not. mean, until it cuts you. It's a two-edged sword. It's great to wield it because it will get you somewhere, but it'll cut you. And that's what happened.
So kind of step one was I was in college and I was in a fraternity. I got recruited into this fraternity that was number one in academics and also in athletics. Well, I was a swimmer and I was a state swimmer and I was, you know, a very good academic student and I was on an academic scholarship to Kansas State called the Putnam Scholar. Well, so that, you know, I'm in this group.
But they're a bunch of rich kids and I'm from a little railroad town and we were very middle class, right? So comparison is already working very hard and moving. And I'm like, I can't compete with these guys. I don't know anything about it. So that was kind of one thing. Well, then after my sophomore year, I had a full time job offer.
After an internship that summer, I was working three jobs, but one of them was an internship that I needed to do before my senior year, but I did it my sophomore year. And I had to do a portfolio review and my advisor said, I've never told anybody that she had been, she'd worked for Hallmark. And I was a graphic design major. She said, Gary, you got to take the job.
You know, this is 1982 and it's the highest unemployment since the Great Depression. She said, I can't get grads placed and you're working for a really talented designer in this world. All you got is your book and you're building your book fast and under a great place. Well, that was death to my parents.
You know, my dad was just shy of his Ph.D. He just hadn't written his dissertation. That was the only thing that held him back. And my mom was an RN who had finished her four year degree and I'm the oldest kid and I'm gonna be the first one to not go to college. that's not a hallmark that you really wanna be known for. No, and then I got married, not because I had to, because I wanted to at age 21, and my wife was 19 at the time, right? So, and we're still married.
Lori: Guess it worked. I guess that was a hallmark story.
Gary: Yeah, but the crazy thing is that became an albatross around my neck because every job I had after that was bachelor's required and master's preferred. well, and being an SVP at Bank of America, I think I was the only one that was a college dropout that I knew of.
But everybody was circumventing the HR process to get me in. Well, and so I'm a designer. I get asked to do my first turnaround when I was 28. Didn't know what we were doing, but we did it. We turned it like it was just common sense to me. Stuff that my partner who was 20 years older than me, also a Kansas State, but he was Kansas State grad.
He just needed some like, well, this seems basic, know, but it wasn't basic to him evidently. And we turned it. But so I'm in my world. I'm like, OK, I can hide behind my portfolio. I can hide behind this until I discover that he's got his hands in the cookie jar twice without letting me know about it. So like. boy.
And there were some things with our BICELL agreement and the key man insurance that I found out that were put me in jeopardy, like put me in danger in case this guy went rogue and crazy. And so I had to leave my own firm. I had to leave my own city of Wichita, Kansas because I either have to destroy him or I destroy my name. That was clearly the choice I had before me. And I did not want to destroy him and I didn't want to destroy my name. So we started all over again in Charlotte, North Carolina in 1994.
I carried that albatross with me. I especially carried it with me when I had to leave my own industry where I had some proficiency. now all of a sudden, I'm at first one was first union. I'm in the middle of middle management as a VP there among warring factions and I'm having to get stuff done. you know, I don't even know how to type at that point. I'm doing Mavis Beacon teaches typing at night to deal with the 80 emails a day.
Lori: Didn't you have to take typing class in high school? Okay, we did.
Gary: No, I was a drummer and I'm like, hey, keep me in all the band and keep me in art and keep me in all those other things. And then I went to college my senior year. I had a couple of classes in high school that I had to take. That was it. But I was going to college and working for an architect. So I'm like, I don't got time for typing, you know, like that's for Deca and those people like, no, well, boy.
Lori: It's funny, it reminds me of a story because I remember being at dinner with my family, my stepfather, my mom, and I don't know, somehow the topic of typing came up and I didn't want to do typing class either, but I guess it was required because I remember saying, I don't need to know how to type, I'm going to have a secretary.
Gary: And I did until I went into corporate America, then I didn't.
Lori: Now we all need to type though. Yeah. you left and moved. How did you, like how did you, you left behind your whole career that you knew that was essentially your credibility.
And one question, did you ever think about going back to school to get your degree because that seems like something that you felt was important, not because you really needed it, you were still moving ahead in a career, but to satisfy your own self. And two, how did you choose to go into banking of all things? Because that's like virtually the opposite of creativity.
Gary: Oh my gosh. Yeah, it was death. know, those are, those are some great questions. so yeah, I didn't, I, I define myself by my creativity and all that stuff, but here's what the crazy thing is. The most creative people on the planet are some of the most insecure people I've ever met.
And because they're chasing awards, award shows, blah, blah. And I've seen it in every aspect of the arts. I've got family that are professional musicians in Nashville. Same thing, you know, because you're always comparing to the next person. There's always somebody better than you in this lick or that chop or whatever. And so that was definitely plaguing me. And to start all over again.
So I had forgiven hundreds of thousands of dollars of my partner and we came to Charlotte with very little, a couple thousand bucks. I had a few thousand bucks to my name, brought a $2 million account. It was British Aerospace to this guy to take equity in another smaller firm. And I really didn't want to do a small firm again, but my mentor was in New York City and also in a split time between Minneapolis and New York City, was the vice chairman and chief creative officer for Bozell Worldwide. And he was originally from Wichita.
And he took me under his wing and he's like, you need to be in New York. And I'm like, I'm terrified of New York. I can't imagine my two children and my wife stayed home with the children. So I was the breadwinner. I could not see them there. And I couldn't see us in Minneapolis because my wife had a medical condition at the time that she could not take the extreme cold.
So I did this thing called Thrive Wither and it's weapon number two in my book on what makes you come alive versus what makes you wither. Even at a young age, I knew that like my family was more important than my career. Proximity to beautiful like oceans and mountains was a dream because in Kansas, you're in the middle of barren wasteland. I mean farmland.
Lori: There's a reason they're called flyover states.
Gary: Yes, yes. And so there were number of things that serendipitously like led to this. And so I'm like, all right, I'm going all in on this. then six months into the gig, I signed, sealed and delivered this two million dollar account. And my partner says, today's your last day. I got what I need. And he owes me 30 grand at that time. He knew I was on my heels.
It was mean. mean, like it was very selfish, but man, and so it was a low point. know, mean, embezzlement was one thing that became another low point, like being unemployed in Charlotte.
Lori: And these were two different people. They were two different people? To clarify, yeah, okay.
Gary: Yeah, completely different. Yeah, they never knew each other. The one in Kansas was 20 years older than me, and the one here was about my age. And so it was very lonely and difficult time.
And, but I'm in Charlotte, North Carolina, and they were, and now it's a banking juggernaut, you know, and it was becoming that. And so it was either, and what I found, so when I started knocking on other doors, one, I made more, too much money for some of these other firms. If you're not the principal or you're not the owner. Second thing, and you know, they were all small firms, so they weren't interested in hiring.
The only other option was, and it was never even an option in my mind, but it was a conversation at the soccer field at Harris YMCA. This guy asked me, what do you do for a living? And I want to lie to him because I'm super embarrassed. But I tell him the truth. I mean, I felt lower than a snake's belly at the time. But I said, well, I'm unemployed. And he said, what's your background? I tell him.
I turned around that agency and he goes, well, hey, First Union is looking for somebody. I've been helping re-engineer their marketing department. They're looking for somebody just like you. And sure enough, three weeks later, I get hired by them, $10,000 signing bonus. It was like manna from heaven because I'd gone three months without any income. And we were on fumes. So that's what took me there. And then it only just exacerbated it because I'm with all these people and especially at Bank of America, they hire me to be this MacGyver.
It was a MacGyver role. That's why the MacGyver is on my title. I had to figure out why this big acquisition, it was the largest acquisition in history at the time of in banking, why it was upside down in the Midwest. And they're like, hey, you're from the Midwest. They targeted me. I didn't apply for a job. They pulled me into it. And I'm thinking, me, you know what?
But I was grateful for the job, but all of a sudden now I'm in this other world that I don't have any training on, but my instincts and my street smarts, guess, are taking me past where a lot of the guys with the Ivy League credentials were, because they're just thinking very linear, and I'm not.
Lori: Right. How did you learn to trust your instincts? You had them all the whole way. Everybody does. But you had to learn to trust them over what these guys with degrees had.
Gary: Yeah, that took a long time, but my mentor back in Kansas, my first mentor, not the one between New York and Minneapolis, I worked for kind of the hottest creative shop in town and I was the young buck. I was the youngest one there, but I was the one that was winning a lot of the awards. So, like, and he was much older than me. And he really, when I would second guess, he'd call it out and he's like, no trust, like your instincts are right. And so I learned to start paying more attention to that, but it's hard when it's going against conventional protocol within the big firms. You know, that's the deal.
Lori: Sure. Right, well they brought you in to do that and then they push back on you when you do that, right?
Gary: Well, in some places, yes, they do. But fortunately, I had the best boss I've ever had there. And she would routinely say, Gary, we have more confidence in you than you do.
And she made sure that I had access to the chairman of the bank, which she was one away from. my first day, she said, my job is to make sure that Humor Call knows who you are and your job is to make sure I know who your rising stars are. OK. I mean, I run through brick walls for that lady. You know, she she was tough. But fair and what a great mentor. mean, I genuinely love that lady.
She just retired a year ago or so. But amazing. It's amazing what leadership will do. So if you've had some good leaders around and you've been paying attention and then you've also had some bad ones, which I've had some bad ones too, you kind of start coalescing those things and shake out the stuff that was bad and try to focus on the stuff that was good.
Lori: Yeah, 100%. And you've mentioned several times in this conversation, the importance of mentors, the mentors that have influenced you in your life. And they are so important. I can look back in my life too, and see and name all the amazing mentors I've been fortunate enough to have. And they really make a difference.
Gary: Yes. Yeah, it's funny. So Ron Anderson, guy, Bozell, vice chairman, we were doing some television commercials up in Minneapolis when I was with First Union. And I called him and I said, hey, we're going to be in town. We're going to do some shooting there and then we're going to do post up in Toronto. Could I see you? And he said, yeah, I'd love that.
So he said, I'm in Minneapolis that when you're going to be there anyway, I'll take you by the agency and then I'll buy you dinner. I said, okay, that sounds great. And he took me very fancy place, very nice. And I don't come from that. I come from very humble means, right? And I'm like, and so I asked him, said, Ron, why are you being so kind to me? And he said, because Gary, somebody did it for me and my only request is that you do it for others. Pay it forward. I'll never forget that.
Lori: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I imagine you have followed through on that.
Gary: To the best of my ability, yeah. And it's the right thing to do, but it brings me so much joy. I think we were designed to be givers and not takers.
Lori: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And for that reason is not because you, because it brings us joy as much, if not more than the person we're helping.
Gary: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's kind of counterintuitive. It's like you sow a seed and then you get multiples of it back, but you don't sow for that reason. You do it because you know it's the right thing to do. And then, but if you're counting on like, well, I put this in, I deposited this with this one person.
I expect it to come back. It's quid pro quo and that's not how it works. You just gotta sew and scatter and where they germinate is where they germinate.
Lori: Right, you're doing it for the joy of scattering, not for the joy of the harvest, although that comes and we get to enjoy that as well. But yeah, I wanna ask you about the tools that you used to help you move beyond the imposter syndrome, because we had talked about some things that you said you do and concepts and actual practical things that you have done and I imagine are still doing, what are they?
Gary: Every day, every day. Well, I wish that I would have learned these in online seminars or conferences, but I learned them all in crucibles, every one of them. So there's seven very simple things, and we talked about two of them, but the first one is just realize you're not alone. And it takes a little bit of courage to admit. I noticed that, because somebody was probing me when I was in Charlotte,
Why, you know, like what brought you to Charlotte? And I don't want to say, oh, partner embezzlement, because I'm embarrassed that this guy was pulling money right underneath my nose, not only once, but twice, you know, like super embarrassing. Like I'm, I'm an idiot. And so this guy keeps pushing me and pushing me and I'm like, all right, here's the deal. I tell him, goes, oh, you too. I'm like, really? He goes, oh yeah. You know, what?
So that's weapon number one. Weapon number two is this thing called Thrive Wither, which is a simple T-chart. Like spend time in what makes you come alive versus what makes you wither. Many times, and I've done this for years and years and years with other teams, many times our strengths are actually in our wither zones. Why is that? Because we're burned out on it or we were told you're good at this, so you need to do that, blah, blah, blah, blah.
But that's it. It's not strengths, weaknesses, it's thrive wither. How does that silence imposter syndrome? Well, when we're spending more time in our wither zones, and I'm not saying, hey, yeah, we all have to clean toilets and take out trash. But if you're spending too much time in the stuff that is not where you're in the zone, know, think about the times when you're in the zone, when life seems to be standing still and you're just so focused and somebody could be screaming your name and you don't hear them because you're just like that is it.
The imposter can't, like, it can't get through to you then. You're not thinking about it. You're not giving any comparison. Like, you're just in the flow. So that's number two. Number three is shine a light on it. That's, that's like really the most courageous one of all of these, but it's extremely liberating for me to ever even admit or talk about the fact that on my college dropout, that was like taboo.
I never lied on my resume, but you know, you could see Putnam Scholar, blah, blah, you know, last year, but you didn't know, I didn't have a four-year degree on there, right? So I was creative. But then when the banks go, wait, wait, wait, you know, we have to go this. And then all of a sudden it gets exposed. And I'm like, yeah. But they'd already pre-qualified me. I was just checking boxes by that point. you know, they wanted me. But if you're trying to get in, that's like, that's scary when you drag those things out of the shadows and then you find out, wait a minute, know, people are not going to turn feather you for that.
Lori: Yeah, I don't want you to go through all of them because I want people to get your book and read it. So I appreciate you sharing those first three. The other place I was going with this was that when we talked in the pre-show conversation, we talked about the place that gratitude has had in your life.
Gary: That's weapon number five. Gratitude Journal. And I learned that when all hell broke loose in 09 and our firm, I was in a private equity firm and I spent, like I lost all my money except for my house. $30 million worth of us got wiped out like overnight.
Lori: This is in addition to the other two's incidents. Separate, wow, okay. You have some kind of relationship with money.
Gary: Yeah, this one made the other ones look like child's play.
Man, I guess. mean, it has been incredible. And it was betrayal in every case by somebody I trusted. Every time. Now, yeah, 08/09 crash didn't help things. But what it did is it revealed the rocks underneath the surface that we couldn't see. That one was, that was the most horrific experience that I've been through.
You know, when you're having night terrors every night and you're. I literally I was having panic attacks and it seems like it's always two in the in the morning for some reason. But I was powerless against it. Gratitude was one of the things being intentional, like all of the stuff that we dealt with was scary. And it was terrifying and it was very threatening, but I had to still find something to be grateful for despite it.
Lori: Did you come to that conclusion that gratitude was the thing that you needed to lean into?
Gary: Well, it wasn't a direct route. Because of these night terrors and I'd wake up just in and then my heart rate would be at 140 beats a minute. I felt like somebody was choking me and my normal heart rate at that time was 39.
As an athlete, know, it's very low but then all of a sudden I'm at full workout time Like what's going on with this? And so I called two friends of mine one was in Charlotte and this was when I was in Ohio We'd moved to Ohio for 13 winters and we were five winters in at this point or seven winters in I Called these two friends that don't know each other one is in Idaho the other one was in Charlotte and I said I am I feel like a Raggedy Ann doll in the mouth of a Rottweiler. My stuffing is getting spewn all over the place and I'm powerless against this fear. comes in. And these were legitimate fears. Like we had invested in two Ponzies on top of things and the guys that I was on the phone with all the time were getting drug into federal pens. This is terrifying stuff.
I said, why? I said, I have been fasting. I've been praying. had people in this little village where we lived and they said, you look like you're going to die. And I'm like, if you only knew I wanted to die, you know, I wasn't going to kill myself, but I knew I was disappointed every day I woke up every day because it's like, all right, who's suing us now? You know, and literally that's what was happening.
And both of these guys independently said, Gary, I said, here's the deal. They said, it's about surrender. I'm like, surrender? And they're like, yeah, can you trust God to deliver you? Can you trust Him even if He doesn't deliver you? Can you trust Him even if your worst fears come upon you? Oh, and those fears were real. I had two kids in college.
You know, there was no money. We needed 300 grand to go have the company go bankrupt. The board said, Gary, stay in the ring. 90 people gone, 11 offices shut down. The CEO, who I thought was one of my close friends, complete fraud. I mean, it was just like bang, bang, bang, bang. The hits just kept coming. But I wrestled for 48 hours of like…
Have you proven yourself to be true, God? You know, in my life, but more importantly throughout history, you know, like I need a bigger anchor than just in my experience. And because my prayer was, God, I know you can deliver me. Will you deliver me? Please deliver me. Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat millions of times a day. That's what was going through my mind. That was it. And both of them said wrong prayer.
Can you trust him even if he doesn't deliver you? That surrender, ooh boy. And then there was a pattern that I saw with King David. I mean, I've never been chased. I felt like I was being chased for my life, but not by my own son, not by a king I trusted where they're actually trying to kill you. And there was a pattern that I saw with him where he would kind of lay out his laments and then he would say…
But, and he would, he says, but I recall your goodness. And he would remember, it was like gratitude. He would remember these things and then he would give him thanks. And that's gratitude. And I'm like, all right, one thing, one thing a day. Is there one thing? Yeah, I'm glad that my wife and children are healthy. Okay, that's it. You know, next thing, at least I'm, you know.
I don't know how we're going to pay the mortgage, but I got heat in the middle of, you know, or I've got air conditioning and that was in the summer of 09. So like, thank you. those simple things. And now we're finding out, with neuroplasticity, wow, that has an incredible effect on our bodies and everything else. Right. But I didn't know, but I knew it liberated me. So that that's a big one. That'll probably save your life.
Lori: Yeah, thank you for sharing that. That was really a really powerful story and experience that you went through. We have, we can wrap it up right here. Cause I know we could keep going, but I do encourage my, anybody who's listening to chew into Gary's book and I'll have a link for that in the show notes.
Gary: Here's the book in case anybody's looking. Yeah.
Lori: Silence The Imposter. Yeah. But before we, before we sign off, what is the song you listen to when you need an extra boost of energy?
Gary: yeah, this is this one goes into the wayback machine in the late 70s and early 80s, but there's a guy named Matthew Ward. So my song is called Warrior. And my goodness.
And what's funny is like, so I listened to that a lot. I still work out with it a lot, you know, 40 years later plus, but.
We, I was raised a pacifist. I was raised as a pacifist. And I still don't like war, but we are in a war for our minds, for our hearts, for our children, for our country, for like, and it's not against people. It's against, yeah, principalities and powers. Yeah, I believe there are spiritual elements, but it's, there's a lot of crap in our mind as well. And we must take these thoughts captive. And I wish I knew way back then what I know now. Isn't that how life is?
Lori: Yeah, well, right, exactly. What's that saying that youth is wasted on the young or something? Like, what if I could take what I know now and go back 25, 35 years and who would I be then? But that's not how it works.
Gary: No, and I think part of it, part of the journey, I hate saying it, but we are refined in the crucibles of life. Gold is refined in fire, and I don't like fire any more than anybody else does, especially when it's burning me.
Lori: Right, right. And yet that's the only way we can become the next version of ourselves.
Gary: Yeah, yeah.
Lori: Gary, one last question. Where can people reach you if they want to continue a conversation with you?
Gary: It's probably easiest on LinkedIn and it's Gary Frey, F-R-E-Y. And then I'm the only non-CPA college dropout partner of a CPA firm called BGW. And that's a good place too, because I love connecting good people to good people. And I'm not trying to sell you on anything, but it's like, I love connecting good people to good people and good solutions in this city. I love Charlotte, North Carolina. 13 winters of gray skies in Cleveland away from Charlotte made me really love these blue skies even more.
Lori: Yes, and I love it here too, in the short time I've been here, love it. So thank you so much for joining me today. I will put links to your hype song in the show notes. I'll put links to your LinkedIn profile and any way that people can get in touch with you as well as to your book. Gary, thank you again for joining me today on Fine Is a 4-Letter Word.
Gary: Yes. Lori, thank you. It's been fun.