Oh good a, you bloody champions. Welcome to another installment of you Know What with you know Who? Tiffany and Cook sitting over there like like she just got back from some kind of outdoor adventure, which I think is the case?
Is that the case?
That's the case?
Cracking still wearing your outdoor baseball cap? What's going on?
Well? I thought we might have like the line across my head if I take it off. Now we're all morning.
Where'd you go?
I went to the thousand steps again, hanging out with a bit of nature.
And who do you go there with?
By myself?
Wow?
Yeah, look at you getting your bloody your nature girl vibe going.
I should get my calf down in the mail this week? I think, do you.
Take do you take the wonder dog?
No?
You know how to take dogs?
There? Hmm, it's sad. Well, well that's okay, just you and you and God and nature.
That's it.
Whoever got whoever your God is? Joel Sardi, Hi, good morning. Did you go to the thousands? You go on thousand stairs this morning?
Mate?
I The last time I went to a thousand steps was probably more than ten years ago, So yeah, I didn't do the thousand steps this morning, I've I've done probably a few less steps than everybody here on the call.
Yeah.
Probably not because you're lazy, just because you know, these days, stepping is not really a forte let's be honest.
No more of a more, more of a roller than a step of these days.
Yes, and it's not like, yeah, not like the thousands steps are particularly wheelchair friendly.
Yeah. No, last I checked, they weren't accessible.
Oh how are you?
Yeah, I'm really good. A lot of changed since we spoke last. I think I saw you last in October? Was it, no, November?
No, we saw each other earlier this year. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah that was that was not that long ago.
But yeah, but we didn't really get to check much because we were at an event and we're all talking, Yeah, have you joined a cult? Because your hair is very short? You look like a Buddhist or some kind of you know, what's going on? And it's if you are a Buddhist, well done?
What's going on with the hair? Beautiful?
I was told by a four or three year old daughter that it's probably time for a change because my hair was as long as hers. And that was all the advice or the feedback. I needed Harps and TIP. So that day I went to the barber and he shaved it off.
And look at you. I'll tell you what. You'll never go back. I used to have long hair. But my hair looks My hair looks fucking terrible long Yours look good. Mine looks like some kind of shrub, some ugly shrub. Ergo the perpetual short hair. What's what's going on? Like what you said, A lot's happened. What's happened?
Yeah, Well, since I met you guys, to you guys last I was made redundant from my last job along with the whole team. There was no performance INDICADI was more so a finance repercussion and it sent me on the path of unemployment with a mortgage and a family to support. So it was a really stressful time and one I've never been put in before. And just the way the world works, Harps and TIF, it's quite interesting.
I was approached by someone at the Department of Veteran Affairs and asked for some input and they said, would you like to join the team, And I said absolutely, because I've wanted to work in veteran welfare and improving the lives of people who have experienced adversity or hardship. It's funny, you know. I went at the time and needed at most, so I reached out and said, come
and join us. So I'm now turning a bit months into a new role with the Department of Veteran Affairs, working with veterans and their families who are you could say, catastrophically injured and affected. Yeah, and putting toga there's some framework to assist them.
Wow, congratulations mate, that's amazing.
Thank you.
Tell us a little bit about like.
Because obviously that's you know, it's in the wheelhouse, but it's a different role, and it's a different organization and it's working with a different group of people.
How do you learn how to do that job?
Like, do they go, well, mate, we're going to train you four weeks and then cut your loose or how.
Does it work?
Well, that's the interesting thing, Harps. I joined a team when there wasn't really a job description for me, So my left and right of arc hadn't really been defined,
and my job description wasn't there. So I really didn't completely understand what my day to day looked like until I sort of did my for lack of a better word, apprenticeship in your public service, understanding who does what and what teams have responsibility for what, and then understanding there were some gaps in capability and sort of pitching that to some of the people at the team, and that was where they said, Yep, let's jumped down, let's jump
into that. And again, you know, I'm starting from scratch. I've never been a project manage lead before, but here i am. Yeah, I'm doing a lot of Courserra, a lot of YouTube, a lot of LinkedIn.
On the go.
Yeah.
But the benefit I have Craig and Tiff is the fact that I've been in the position where I'm going to be working. I've been in the position where catastrophically injured, where my family was affected, where we didn't know where to turn to for help. Yeah, So that lived experience is critical and that's what I'll be leaning on. But the major difference in what my role is now, it's quite it's strategic as opposed to the operational role I've
been in with my previous job. So as opposed to seeing the outcomes, I'm not sure if I'll see that yet because I'm building the program.
Yeah, I love that what you said about lived experience, because I was thinking, when someone comes knocking on the metaphoric door to talk to someone and you're not coming from a theoretical or an academic place or a you know, of course you need knowledge and skills and you know, awareness around what to do and strategies and tools and resources.
And all of that.
But at the same time, you know, they meet you and they go, oh wow, you understand, like you experientially understand, if not exactly what we're going through, a version of what we're going through.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And I'll never understand what you're going through Craig let alone the veterans who are going through families. But the fact that I've got my injury in my experience gives me a little bit of credibility. And for those out there that aren't aware, you know, people love to throw shade at DVA and so they're not doing a good enough job. But I think a lot of those people haven't really said, you know what, I'll put my hand and I'll join the team and I'll try
and improve the processes. So that's something I want to do. I am doing. I want to improve the rhetoric or improve the narrative around DVA and injecting people who lived experience, who have served into the department, I think is a really good start. Without long own trumpet.
Yeah, I mean I think that every organization needs to be you know, it's hard because it is an organization, not an individual. But if there's such a thing as organizational self awareness, I think all organizations need it, you know, where we can say yeah, we do some things well, some things we could do better. You know, we're not perfect. We're working stuff out, and everything is you know, there is no perfect system, there is no perfect model. Yeah,
that's great, mate, that's great. So how does it work?
Do you like?
Where are you right now? I can see Dennis Rodman Jersey behind you. Are you at home or at work? Or do you go?
Do you work or do you do it from home? What's the practical?
The beautiful part of the public service is the flexibility and the hybrid environment that I've rolled into, not stepped into. So it's two days in the office, which is in CBD, and then three days from home. Yeah, and for someone like myself with disability, who sometimes my morning routine could take two and a half three hours. That flex really allows me to work from home on days where I need to and then go into the office when I can.
What's the what are the like in a perfect world? Is that hybrid the best fit for you? Because I would imagine going to work five days wouldn't be ideal, but always being at home wouldn't be ideal.
Ah, it's ideal in that I can also maintain sessions with my EP. So start early, so I start at seven, finish around eight thirty nine o'clock, and then do a full day of work and then go into the office the next day to then build the networks to then understand a little bit more about the going on internally. See, I'm no different to people that have no that don't have disability. That's crucial for a work life balance.
So when you say your EP some there's a percentage of people right now going what's an OPE? So you're talking about your excise physiologist. I'm guessing ye, So how long since your injury is it?
Now?
It was ten years in August this year.
I won't say happy birthday, that feels inappropriately. How how does your rehab and I guess your exercise programming in general how does that work now? Is it just now more where you've got to a point where trying to keep it, maintain it or is there still is the goal still improvement increased function?
Like what's the focus?
The focus for me now getting to the gym and exercising recovery isn't getting back to what it used to be in terms of before my injuries, just maintaining a level of health and strength. Over the past the past ten years, I've had a lot of learning about what my body's capability is because of my spinal cord injury. But my EP will work holistically on nutrition, on exercise, on wellness outside of the gym as well, and that would be three sessions a week, two hours a day.
And over the past ten years, my weights fluctuated from ninety five kilos down to what started at ninety five and then dropped down to sixty and then went back up to ninety five and then back down to sixty and understanding the body's limitations, and over the last I think ten months, I've stopped drinking alcohol and I haven't had a trip to hospital a bladder infection, and my strength, my AP's notice has gone through the roof so Craig,
you'd probably understand tip and for the exercise buffs bench press is a pretty good measure of strength. Then I started twelve kilos at the start of the year. I'm now at thirty five kilos.
That's amazing, mate, that's fucking wow.
That's I mean, that's one kilo away from triple you know, three hundred percent increase.
Yeah, and you know it's funny, there's no surprise. It's consistency and nutrition.
And that's booze is no good for you everyone, Sorry, you heard it here first. Hey, let's just pause this conversation momentarily, and just for the people who are meeting you today for the first time, can you just remind us what your injury is. Just it doesn't need to be well as much or as little as you want.
Yeah, yep. So I've got a spinal cord injury at the C five level, so I'm classed as a C five quadriplegic. So you'll you'll see I've got use of my arms, but not my fingers, not use of my tricep or my core or basically anything below my chest. And that was the result of a fall down some stairs ten years ago. So when Craig was referring to you know, happy birthday, the thirty first of August is my wheeliversary, inniversary, whatever you want to say, And yeah, that's that's where I'm at now.
Cool, Hey day you had I mentioned on the show tip and I did give and I just did a freestyle chat as we do because planning is overrated and we're both lazy.
So other than that, other than that, it's all gold. And we're talking about we're talking about gratitude.
And I was talking about my gratitude practices and you know which, as I said yesterday, it can be it can be a kind of a cheesy concept, I guess, but tell us about you and gratitude, like I was. My three things, which I'll say just quickly again, is one, every time I talk to my mom, I have overwhelming gratitude because one day she won't be there, right so right now she's still here, I can talk to her.
It's great.
Every time I get up out of the chair that I'm now in as I talk to you, just the fact that I can stand is fucking amazing, right, It's like, as you more than anyone knowing being able to walk down my stairs and walk up my stairs. Right, I have this little gratitude practice, especially having spent time with you and John, my friend who also.
Got blown up.
You know, it's just being able to walk upstairs is a privilege. But we don't have that sense because we met most of us have never lost it.
Right.
And then my last one is just being able to turn on tap. You know, I turn on a tap and cold water comes out, and more than a quarter of a million people in the world can't. Court of the population I should say, two point two billion people, not only do they not have taps, they don't even have any access to fresh, cold, drinking water. Right, So the amount of people who don't have a tap could
be half the population in the world. But you know, so we're talking about these little like what brings me back? Like what for me kind of grounds me, what gives me a healthy perspective that makes me realize sometimes I'm a privileged, entitled fuck what about her?
I am? You know, I don't want to be.
I don't mean to be, you know, but sometimes, you know, sometimes some of the shit that goes on in my mind, I go, I don't even fucking like me, and I am me, why am I thinking like this? You know, you know, Huck, So tell me about you.
Do you find it?
I'm sure the answer is no, But tell us about you and gratitude. How does that work?
Now?
Look, when you said the word perspective, Crea, you could have just finished everything you were saying there, because perspective is literally what I live by, Because you know, I may not be able to move ninety percent of my body or control it, but you know, my mind is active, it's healthy, functional. I've got two little girls. I've got a wife who we've been married for six years this year. So there's so much in my life that that is good. You know, I've got a good job, I've got a
great family around me. I may not be able to do things like you know, peace or shit or you know, all the other things that people do without, but you know what, I woke up this morning. I've got in the shower, my care, I got me dressed, and I went to had a coffee with my oldest daughter. I drove her down. Now, all of that doesn't happen without being grateful for what I do have. And there was a long time when I was injured where I was
looking at everything that I couldn't do every day? Why couldn't I?
Why me?
Were the questions, and it took a moment of realization to change the narrative of why me too? Why the fuck not me? Why can't I be happy? Why can't I be successful? Just because I'm a quadriplegic, Because I've got friends in my life that that won't be around for much longer because they've got brain cancer right now. Yes, there's the word perspective for you. Yes, my daughters don't
know me as any different. They just know me as dad, and they treat me no differently, CREATI and Tiff and your prime example is our youngest daughter Luna, who grabs a TV, runs away from me and hides behind the couch. She treats me no different, she just tells me. So that is my gratitude, those little moments. And I think everybody not I think everybody in your life. You could look around and they've all got some shit going on. Yeah, it's my injury and it's not really a problem for me.
I'll just I would use the biggest example we've got now, Elon Musk, maybe Lebron James, all these massive names with so much profile, money success. I bet you they're going to have their problems Monday through Friday or nine live. So just because they's someone we see on TV or picture anywhere externally in our lives doesn't mean that they've got their shit squared away and their lives are better
than ours. We've all with our own problems, so understanding that we've got good things in our lives and having gratitude for those is really important.
Yeah, I love that. As you were talking, then I wrote down. I wrote down on my ever present pad that I have in front of me when I talk to people. I wrote life situation versus life experience. Right, So there's the situation that we're in and then there's the experience that we are having. And for the most part, our experience is a byproduct of our thinking and our emotions.
You know, like you are in a situation.
I mean this with respect, and I talk about not your family, kid's job, but in terms of being in a wheelchair and being C five quandity. Like you, you are in a reality, a physiological reality that nobody wants. Nobody wants, right, that's part of your life situation. But in the middle of that thing, that nobody wants. There's every chance that you're happier than a lot of our listeners who don't have that. Now, by the way, listeners,
I love you. I'm not throwing you under the bus, but I'm just thinking, like when we when we look at somebody's just practical reality, their life, situation, circumstance, environment, and then we look at the experience, which is an internal thing, not an external thing, but that internal experience in the middle of that practical, observable reality, what's the link, what's the relationship? Either of you two feel free to
jump in, but what comes to mind with that? Like when you think about some people in great situations are having bad experiences and some people in terrible situations are typically having much better experiences. It's you know, for me, there's a lot of that is about our ability to consciously create our version of reality.
I think the link the link there is the perspective perhaps over time we become numb to certain experiences or memories, so therefore we forget what things used to be, and we really don't compare to what we used to have. We just compare it to the now. And I guess that's the perspective part you know in terms of what was it the internal experience versus the internal situation?
Well, I was just saying your life experience, like you how you experience life now? You know all the internal stuff, feelings, thoughts, ideas, emotions, joy, pleasure, fun, pain versus situation. And like you said, Lebron James and Elon Musk, from the outside looking in, you would both say, depending on the metrics that were used, they are wildly successful. Therefore they're probably really fucking happy. Well, statistically they might be less happy than the average person who knows.
I feel like like in Joel's situation, the idea of it is what it is now. I talked about with Captain Charlie Plumb when he was imprisoned for six years in the Hanoi Hilton, and the fact that they didn't come out with PTSD because it was the worst it could possibly be and it stayed there. So this no rise and fall of expectations, Like Joel isn't suffering from
a physical disease where he's deteriorating. In somebody who might have a disease like that, like say maybe MS or something where their function is declining, whereas Joel's at a baseline.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Have either of you read Man Search for Meaning Victor Frankel.
A long time ago? Yeah?
Yeah, so you love that mate.
It's about a psychiatrist in the Second World War who was in prisoner of war, a prisoner of war camp in Germany, a Jewish psychiatrist, and essentially he was like, they can take everything, but they can't take my mind, you know, and like they can for me. The way that I read it, which is just my interpretation, was very much they can control my situation and my environment and my circumstance, but they can't control me because I'm not my situation or environment or circumstance.
I'm not that.
I'm something separate. I'm not even my body, you know. And there's that beautiful like, oh yeah, I'm not my body, I'm not my environment, I'm not my bank balance, I'm not my wheelchair, I'm not my situation. I'm not what other people fucking think me and who I am at my core. No one can take that, doesn't matter what goes on around me.
It rings a bell and I do remember that was his coping mechanism. Yes, have you finished your PhD? At Halts?
Oh no, from on the way for a while. I'm not the fastest, but it's only I say only, but it's five years, so I would I don't know like I think i'll be. I'm handing, so I've done without boring my listeners again. But so all of the work that I have to do in terms of running studies, collecting data, doing my own research, all that is done passing what's called all of my academic hurdle or requirements, which is going in front of a board. You've got
to do that four times. That's been done and passed. So now I'm at what's called the write up stage where i'm writing up. So I'm writing what's called a systematic literature review, which is about a fourteen month process.
So if you do a search.
On how long does it take to write a systematic literature review for a PhD, it says fourteen months full time. That's if you're doing nothing else, right, So that's if it's your job. So I've been working on that for about a year. And I'm also writing to what's called empirical papers, which are papers off the research. So the research that I did on metaaccuracy and metaperception, you know how other people see us.
So you do your research, you.
Get the data, you interpret the data, and then you write papers about that, and you've got to add, Like in a PhD, you've got to bring something new into the world in that area of research. You can't do what's been done, So you've got to build on the research. You've got to add to someone else's research, or you've got to open a new door and.
Go, oh, look what's in here, and so look at this.
So yeah, to answer your question, hopefully in six months, I'm done and dusted. But even then, when you hand everything in, it's not like they go thumbs up, well done, pad on the back. More than likely i'll get stuff sent back where they say you've got to fix this, change that, or address that.
So it's a bit of a too.
But I'm on the If it was the Melbourne Cup, which I do not like, but would be in the last fucking furlong or so, I would think, whatever a furlong is, yeah, beats me for your doc. Oh, when you can call me doc. Hopefully in about six months, I would hope. So what else is going on? How's the family? How old are the kids now?
So as may turns for tomorrow. She turns for tomorrow.
How do you spell may.
Me with a little s? Yeah?
All right, what a cool cute with the little thing go above the last e?
Yeah yeah. So from top right to bottom left?
What's the origin story of Esme? What? How did you? I mean, it's a very cute name. That's enough. It doesn't need to be a backstory. But is there a backstorre?
The origin goes My wife said what do you think of Esme? And I said, I love it? That's the origin?
Yeah, well that's good. That's all.
That's all you need. So tell me about as you as you step into this new role in your job and you're working alongside other people, are you being mentored and coached or is this largely you know, here's this space over here, Joel, go figure it out.
Yeah, I'm definitely being mentored, and I'm really grateful for that because the public service is so different to private sector. Coming from the tech startup where everything was go go, go, go go, it was a lot faster. However, where I am now it's it's understanding. You know, this morning I had to listen to estimate center estimates. I've never done that before. I had no idea what was happening, but there I was. So it's a really different landscape in
terms of what impacts my immediate job as well. But yeah, I've been mentored and guided and the first two and a half months, I say, it's like the apprenticeship. I've probably got a lot more to go on my apprenticeship in the public service.
Yeah, it's I feel like when you do the first.
I don't know, month two, three, ten, Like when I opened my first business. I was twenty six, and the idea of opening that business to the reality of what I had to do when the business was opened, I was completely unprepared, like I didn't have the skills because
I've never had my own business. And then all of a sudden, like I'm in meetings with lawyers, I'm in meetings with marketing people, or with my accountant or with and I'm having conversations that are just over my head because I don't I don't know the answers for a start, and then I don't have the language because I don't know,
especially when I'm talking to a lawyer. And even when I remember when I went looking for my first premises commercial premises to set up Australia's first personal training studio. And the guy said that I had no experience. I didn't own a house or I owned. I had no real estate. I'd never done anything like that. And the guy goes to me, what kind of lease are you looking at? This is for the thing? And I go
what kind are there? And he goes what I go, I don't know how to answer that question, Like I just look like a fucking idiot, But I thought, I can't make up an answer because I.
Don't, you know.
And what he was saying was how long do you want the lease to be? And do you want any options? Like a three year lease with two three year options do you want I didn't know that language. And he also said to me how many square feet are you looking at? You know, like back then it was feet not meters. And he goes how many square like what area square feet? And we're standing on Hampton Street and I said, see that silver Corolla down there, and he goes, yeah.
I go from me to the silver Corolla and across to that orange Cortina and back to that fucking white Commodore.
Like I literally just.
All I knew was in my head what it looked like, but I just translate that into some fucking formula or number, Like I knew what it looked like, but I couldn't quantify it, because I mean, now I can, But then I didn't know what two thousand square feet looked like. And He's like, he must have thought, this is the dumbest motherfucker I've ever.
Spoken, you know, But that's where you grow, right, That's where you grow.
Yeah, yeah, outside the comfort zone. I'm doing a lot of that at the moment, and imposter syndrome. I'm getting
a healthy dose of healthy dose of it. It wears off a little bit further into the role, but you know that those lessons you learn, like speaking to the real estate agent, understanding what square feed are Yeah, I'm getting little lessons like that every day, and I think it's best for me to sit back and listen as opposed to talking, which is what I was doing in my last job, because I was quite confident and competent, whereas I'm not saying I'm not competent here, but there's
not as much confidence as of yet.
But I think this is really relevant, this conversation because everybody, like a lot of us, want to change something like, especially people who are listen to the show, they want to change something in their life. They want to adapt or do something different, or they do the same thing a better way, or be more effective or more efficient,
or learn more or grow more. But like for you right now, you're probably going to go through more of a growth spurt in inverted commas intellectually, emotionally, sociologically, you know, skill wise, more of a growth spurt in this six months than the last six years.
Maybe.
Yeah, I'd say so. I absolutely agree, and I'm really looking forward to it.
Yeah, And that's I mean, that's been willing to put ourselves in that situation. I guess do you remember, Tiff, when you started your podcast right like, how many episodes are you in now to yours? Are you about eight hundred or something?
Eight fifty something?
Yeah?
Yeah, But do you remember, like I remember jumping on and I had a running start because I've already done a few that were no good, and I've done radio, so at least I was used to talking. But what like when you look back now and you've done hundreds of episodes with me, so you've probably done I mean, you must be heading towards one and a half thousand episodes yourself all up?
What did you thinking? Back now?
What didn't you know and what skills didn't you have? And it doesn't need to be about podcasting everyone. We're just talking about taking us something that we're good at and getting good at it and developing it into a real thing in the world that works.
Like, what was a challenge for you?
Well, I didn't know what I didn't know, but what was What I've always talk about.
Is naivety was the gift for me.
So because I didn't know what I didn't know, I just got stuck into it and I didn't get held back by any rules that might that I might have perceived existed that I wasn't up to scratch with. I remember calling you maybe three months in and going, okay, so i've been doing this a bit now, and I want to get better, but I don't know what that means. I don't know what it looks like or feels like, and I don't know what I'm asking to get better at.
So you're the guru?
Can you make me better?
Definitely? I've been fucking masquerading as a guru. In fact, I never masqueraded as a guru.
But it is funny when you know, it's like sometimes I'm about four days ahead of someone else on the progression and they I'm like, mate, you know last Thursday I was you. I don't know.
I'm fucking making it up as I go.
So that imposter syndrome, Joel, and the kind of the feeling like a fraud is that is that more apparent now than it was in the last few years because you're in this new space. And also how do you deal with that because that's a scourge. I mean, everybody's got a version of that.
It's absolutely more prevalent now than it was in the past. Somebody told me once that all strangers know something you don't, and it's always stuck with me. So I just sit there and I think was as much as I don't know what they know and they don't know what I know, goes back to what you're saying, Tiff. You know you
don't know what you don't know. And I'll sit there in a meeting and listen to people speak about certain topics or certain projects are running, and there'll be a brain brain something will come out and I'll think we should consider this, we should consider that. But the other, the voice in my head saying, no, someone's already thought
of that, someone's already spoken it. But that naivete comes in, Tiff, I'll put my hand up and I'll make a comment and it's received well, and there's a little bit of imposter syndrome wearing enough with each little risk I take. And I think in a productive environment, people should be willing to and prepared to make mistakes and say almost the wrong thing, but not in terms of insulting others, because that in there, that is where the growth happens,
that's where we develop. I'm not to someone I haven't made some silly comments in the past, or asked some silly questions, or been asked questions when I wasn't concentrating and thrown out an absolutely ludicrous answer. But hey, there were again learnings.
I think that's one of the good things about having somebody who isn't part of the program, who gets brought in who like you, don't think like them. You don't have their background, their program, their conditioning, and they're not bad things that just you haven't been part of that. And then you come into a different space and environment with a different skill set and background and maybe you'll have an idea, maybe you'll see something they don't see. Maybe you'll bring a different energy.
Like I I met a lady the other day in the cafe who.
I don't know, she knows me, and she's she listens to the show, and she was a sweetheart, and she's like, you know what i'd love you to do? And I went what she goes, I'd love you to coach someone in real time on the show. And I'm like, all of a sudden, I just thought of fifty things that could go wrong with that, right, And I was kind of that would be a challenge, right, because you've got
to find that. But then later on I thought, like, the right person, the right way that could be, you know, And then I thought, do you know what?
I thought?
This my ego and my fear and my insecurity. I thought, what if I do a bad job?
What if?
What if proper coaches listen? What if what if real coaches listen and they go, why the fuck is? Why did he do that? Why did he say? But then you know that was my own bullshit.
But have you pardon?
Have you found anybody to coach? No?
I haven't put it out there yet, but it would be. I mean, I think some people go, yeah, pick me, pick me, but I don't think most people would realize no, that is that that is perhaps not the prize you think it is. To be coached like that seems like, oh, I'll get a bit of airtime, I'll be.
On Craig show.
No, no, that's not. It's not a self promotion exercise. Like I actually genuinely want to open the door and coach someone.
And obviously it'd be pre.
Recorded, so if it ended up being a dog's breakfast, we'd been it, so there's no you know, or if the person went, fuck, I don't want that to go to air, that would be okay. Or if I went, look, that's probably not going to be great listening. Yeah, but just as a concept, like as in terms of someone coming into my space with a fresh idea, I thought, what do you think of that idea?
TIF I still don't know if that's good.
Orbout it, and I think Joel might be raising his hand, But I love it. I listened to shows where people are doing either live therapy or coaching, and that the benefit you get as a listener is astounding because you have to borrow the stories of others and see similarities, and there's something beautifully authentic about those sorts of honest, open, real conversations.
I think one of the challenges for me I'm thinking about it would be because whenever I like what I'm doing right now, what we're doing right now, we're in a conversation. But even though we're in a genuine, organic, unplanned, unscripted conversation, I always have audience awareness, you know, so I would want to do it where essentially I'm not at all at all thinking about which that's a challenge about the fact that thousands of people are going to
listen because I don't want to. I don't want how I would normally be or coach or connect. I don't want that to be influenced by my awareness that there's a big audience. So that might be something I need to figure out, But I don't know.
How does that come into play with your group coaching? Do you have a number of people in the room witnessing.
Oh yeah, interest I mean really that's that's a small group. So it's it's for me, it's more, you know, it's closer to one on one coaching than a podcast, which is thousands of listeners. But yeah, I'm I'm as raw and as open and as direct and as what's the word impactful as they will let me be. Like, there are people who on my in my current mentoring group a very vulnerable and very like they've opened the door
wide right. There's a few people who who the door is still shut and they're peeking through the keyhole.
And then there's a few.
Then there's a few who have opened the door about fucking three inches, but they've got the foot against the door, right, and all of that is okay, that's no judgment either way.
That's just.
And so you get people who like I even know and I'm you know, next week is week ten, So I've spent nine weeks with them. I've done one on a one on one with most of them, and I'm well aware of who even though I haven't met any of these people face to face.
Oh actually that's not true.
I've done a couple of face to face coachings, but most of them I don't know them other than through
the program. But I know them now well enough to know who I could ask a particular question that I could not ask another member of the group, you know, So I think there's and I mean this just comes back to you know, even even when we're talking before about what's happening in our external world and our internal world, and you know, you and I opened a pretty you and I on our chat yesterday, like I got quite
vulnerable and and I didn't. But I've cried about four times in the history of the show, and yesterday was fucking very close to number five.
Did you get that? Did you know? I was a bit emotional. Yes, But it's like I don't mind that. I don't mind that.
It's like if where I just end up is in tears and that's just organic, then I'm cool with it. I don't like that to me. That doesn't that's not an indictment on me. That's not a problem for me. I just tried be aware of being whatever the best version of me for the listeners is. But yeah, yeah, So well mate, it's going to be interesting to chat to you in a year to see what the progression has been.
Yeah. Well, look, I'd be happy to chat to you in a year from today.
Yeah.
Can I ask, just for the benefit of me and maybe the listeners, what were you doing before this job, Joel?
What was your role before, I was.
An account manager at a tech startup called the Field dot Jobs, and it was helping employers directly target people with disability to employ them into their business and for job seekers with disability to go on there and apply for jobs on a website that was accessible in terms of catering to their accessibility needs. And I absolutely loved every moment of it. It was purposeful and we could
see the impact it was having. And then moving on from that, there was a big, big transformation moving from there to Department of Veteran Affairs.
How many weeks were you in limbo and what was that like? What was that like? Dealing with the unknown?
Poor Craig. It was a daily challenge of I had done? What did I have written on my mirror? I think it was be present, Be present. It was on my mirror. And it was six weeks of unemployment until I found out I had a new job. So every morning I'd wake up, but the beauty was every day. I get to hang out with the girls every day. So there was one one moment where I took as May on my own for the first time in our relationship together
to the city. We had a day together of getting on the train and she had chocolate for breakfast, we had ice cream for lunch, and I just did whatever the fuck I could to spoil her because it was the first chance I got with her because I was unemployed. So all of those experiences that I was having were because I was unemployed. So I was really grateful to be unemployed at that stage. It was you know, it was tense. It was hard to be present. At the
same time, was understanding that I had to find a job. Yeah, it was a bit of a roller coaster each day, but there was I think better experiences than they were worse worse.
A part of me wants to tell you you're a ship father, and part of me wants to tell you you're.
The best dad ever.
I just want to know, next time you're going out and doing that, can I come dream?
Yeah, my wife was now with the ice cream breakfast and the chocolate breakfast.
That's because she's an actual fucking grown up. That's well, maybe maybe breakfast or lunch, but not both. Now, it's a good thing you've got a job and you're out of your wife's way because you and parenting.
I'm not sure I got asked today, Dad, when Are we going to go back to the big city again?
No time soon. Mom won't let me. Maybe if you're twenty.
First diabetes is crept into her life suddenly.
That's hilarious. Do you know what? I think we're going to wind up?
But you know what, and this is completely unhelpful, unhelpful, this doesn't What I am about to tell you doesn't help you at all. But I reckon you should study psychology. I reckon you'd be good at it. I just think you have you know, I know that's completely impractical. Maybe you could study part time. Do you ever think about not necessarily psyched, but studying anything.
I've got a semester into psychological science, rest my case. Yeah, I freaking loved it and I actually got really good grades. And then I got offered a job to be at the field and I put that on hold.
There you go.
No, if I had the capacity, crag. Everyone's got the same amount of time in the day that I do. But if I had more capacity, I would I will return to it.
You know what you need?
You need a voluntary research assistant, so we could get someone to help you with your just the practical shit. You can get those you know, it'd be good for you, be good to anyone.
Out there that would know how to support me. There I'll start tomorrow.
Yeah, I just think that you, apart from the fact that you know you're smart and you have a curious mind and you're fascinated with human behavior, I think because of your lived experience, on top of the knowledge, on top of the education and.
The training, you know it would be Yeah. I don't know.
That's I don't know why I think that, but that's and I probably shouldn't have said that mid fucking podcast. I probably should have told you that off there. It's probably totally inappropriate.
But there you go. Listeners, You're welcome.
You're on point, because you know I was half a halfway. I was an eighth of the way there.
Greg, Well, we'll see what happens. If people want to.
Get you, Joel, Barry, Evan, Brian SARTI to come and work with their organization and buy that. I mean, come and have a chat with them, inspire them, educate, inform them, be at a corporate be at a sporting a club, be at any other kind of organization. I've heard Joel speak multiple times. He's very good, and not just because he's a bloke in a wheelchair and a bit inspiring.
He's very good. He's a very good presenter. So if you want somebody like Joel to come and chat with your group, hit him up and how do they do that?
Thank you so much, Craig Joelsarty dot com and the details will be there.
Is that it.
You're the worst fucking self promoter of all time. Better at promoting I'm better at promoting you than you are.
Mate.
We appreciate you, We love your guards. Congrats on a new position. Onward and upward. Have a good day mate. We'll say goodbye affair of course, but for now, thanks a ben on the if you've got your pen up, do you want.
To say something?
Yes, if anyone wants to hear more about Joel Sadi's story that they haven't already heard prior to today episode one two five three titled when.
Life Gives You a Shit.
Sandwich, so you can hear more about his accident, recovery and all of that.
Yeah, that was a good chat. That was a good chat. Thank you, Tiff. That's why we have you, see you Tame