Hello and welcome back to another episode of Upfront and Undivided with Luke and Dean'na. Hi. Hey babe. How's it going? I'm good. You did kick my chair. I was like, all right, we're in that kind of mood. All right, cool. I didn't mean to. No, it's fine. It's the part of the 5'4 of me that just sits, again, if anybody wants to, like we need to take a picture or something, I swing my feet as we talk. And I don't reach the floor flat-footed.
And it doesn't help that this was your chair before you got your new chair. True. And you never shrunk it down. I won't be able to reach anything. I won't be able to reach the mic. Everything is set. Yes. Except we had to readjust a little bit. A little bit. Because we had... Because for your latest podcast episode... Yeah. We had five women in here. Yes. Plus you. Yes. And you were on the little balance ball, which was so sweet. I was waiting for it to pop, I gotta be honest.
I feel like I'm too heavy for that tiny little balance ball chair. You know? I mean, it like half-deflated when I sat down on it. I really hope this thing doesn't pop. So I was still putting a lot of weight on my feet while sitting on it. So you were doing some serious core situation. I was. Like, last thing we need is for me to be the quiet sound guy on your podcast while you're talking to these women and to serious topic and all this and all of a sudden like...
Popping of a ball and me tumbling over and collapsing. Yeah. And half of the room going, are you okay? Right. And the other half laughing. Yes. At least. You're okay. Okay, I'm gonna laugh now. Right. It's like some laugh automatically, some go, oh my gosh, you okay? And then you have the ones that are, are you okay? Oh my gosh, that was funny. And then you laugh. That would be me. That's okay. But no, it's good. So I had to readjust a little bit, but I think it's fine. Am I good? I think so.
Good. Good. So we are nine days into the new year. Yes. We had a snow day. The kid did, well, yeah. You got to have at least part of one, but it was for... I was gonna say mine wasn't because of snow. Mine was because I got to go to the VA. Yeah. And get drained of blood. Yes. Because that's what you do periodically. Yeah. Because every, once every three months they take, I figured it out, they take 500 grams of blood. They don't do it by volume. They do it by weight.
Right. And I think that's what she was telling Sebastian today. Because Sebastian and I got to come with you today and meet your fun people. And you got to not watch. I did not watch. And she was, I don't know if she does the whole sticking the way that she does the sticking, but I think she was very kind to me because we did kind of allude that I am not... Yeah. You're not a fan of watching. I am not a fan of this. People get stabbed, yeah.
And Sebastian's all like hovering over you like, dude, what's going on? This is epic. Yeah. This is so cool. But yeah, she was very quick and easy and simple. And I was for the most part okay until she started moving your little needle thing around. And then you start moving your tube around that was, and so you could pump your... Yeah. So it goes faster, yeah. ...your fist for your blood. It was... It was... Yeah. No. Yeah. No. No. No. No. Phlebotomy would not be something I would be good at.
I could, no. No. I'm good. And she... Yeah, no. I'm just going to say no. Like, no. Yeah. Like I would go into greater detail, but no, thank you. No. And then... And then to see her like, you know, she's done. And she clears out the tube thingy. And then she just picks up this 500 gram bag of blood and throws it in the trash. Throws it away. And I'm just dumbfounded. I could sit here and joke that my blood is trash, but... Your blood is not trash.
So what, for our listeners, the people that don't know... For our listeners, yes. ...the condition, we don't say that you... We don't claim that you have a kind of scenario, but it is something that is genetically... Yeah. ...you're genetically dispositioned. Yeah. Yeah. I have been diagnosed with hereditary hemochromatosis. So basically, the condition is my body doesn't always communicate well to dump excess iron out of my blood. Yeah. Yeah. So like normal scenario, you eat food like we all do.
And let's say your body says, I need 15 grams of iron today. Yeah. Well, as your body digests, it holds on to the 15 grams of iron or whatever. I'm making up numbers and measurements. And your body says, okay, this is how much iron we need for the day, and we will just get rid of the rest of it. My body, and then I also found out both my parents as well have this, our bodies don't have that mechanism, that communication mechanism. So it's like whatever we ingest iron-wise just stays.
And if the iron in your blood stays too high for too long, it can start to affect some of your internal organs and just it'll like liver and then eventually like heart and brain and stuff like that. It'll just like hold and store all this excess iron. Yeah. And they've found that the most efficient way of treating a person is they call it, the fancy word is therapeutic phlebotomy.
So basically the way to treat this is every so often you go and they drain blood out of you and they consider it too high of iron so they don't do anything with it. And they just, they literally drain me and throw it away. Which is insane. Yeah. Because it's like we were talking to her today, your person, Jamie. And one of my best friends. Our best friends. Our best friends. Yeah, it is. Oh, see this is one of those rare occasions you and I actually do share a best friend, which is really sweet.
She's one of the best. And so she has to go in and get iron infusions. And I was like, for God's sake, can we just hook her up to you and just move it on over? That would be legit. She would take your blood. She would have no problem. She would be like, yeah, I'll take my brother's blood. Come on, let's go. Yeah, they don't do that. Just frustrating. It's literally like, it works out to like, it's roughly a pint of blood that they take out of me and they literally just unhook me.
Like they take the needle out of my arm with the little bag and they just literally walk over the trash can and throw it away. So for all of our science geeks and all of our people out there that are like in this space of what, you know, I'm in the space of, all right, father, like seriously, there's got to be something to that. Something that we can, something like wasting blood like that just does not seem right. It's not tainted. You're not.
I mean, I'm in the camp of, I laugh about it because it feels like it's the modern equivalent of leeching, using leeches. Yeah, it really is. That's what they do. Like, hey, you have bad blood. We're going to drain it and throw it away. Like, I don't really have bad blood, but okay. Yeah. It's just too much of something in your body that needs to come out so that way you can be healthy and function. That's right. And function without any problems. Yes. So yeah.
I don't know why we went into all of that, but I started it. I know. I don't know why I started it. Did I start it? I think because, oh, because we said I went to the VA. That's right. We had a snow day. Yeah, it snowed a lot. But I went, I took part of a day so I could go to the VA. And our beautiful girl was going to go to work today and the roads this morning when she was going to leave were terrible. Mostly just in our neighborhood.
Yeah. I mean, I looked online and the main roads outside of our neighborhood were good. Yeah. Decent-ish. But yeah. But to find out that like on 70 on Kansas side, like a lot of it was completely shut down. But we're going to just rejoice in the fact that she got to be home. Sebastian got to be home. I got to be home. You and I shoveled the driveway in the back and we have had our workout for the day. Yes. And it's all good. It is all good. It is all good.
So what are we going to talk about today, babe? So today you mostly brought this up, you know, because last episode we talked about New Year, I knew you and, you know, and how it's not just, you know, resolutions or setting goals and stuff like that for 2024. But you know, again, remembering that everything is new and we can go to God and say, I want to restart. I want to restart. I want to start this over. I want to, you know, because his mercies are new every morning, every day.
And so today is just kind of a check in of how are we doing? How are you guys doing? Yeah. And, you know, here it is, the second week of January for those listening. It's like I don't want to say live because this isn't live and this isn't streaming. But for the people that listen near to the time within a week or two of us making the episode live online. Yeah. So you know, but it is it's it's you know, how are you all doing now that it's, you know, the second week of 2024?
Yeah. You know, are you are you keeping up with what you said you wanted to focus on this year? You know, what are you focusing on this year? Is it productive? Is it going to be productive? Right. You know, we've got friends that are looking to to start new endeavors. We've got friends that are looking to build on to things that started, you know, last year or the year before. And they just want to, you know, keep building and growing and doing more and more. Right.
You know, again, you know, not just not just our friends that are looking to to start new things and grow and do more. But I know with us, you know, with the projects that we've got going on and the things that we've got going on, it's you know, how are we doing? Are you know, I know like one of the things right now we're talking.
One of the things that we want to focus on and do a better job of is keeping up with a good schedule of recording episodes so that we can, you know, make them available every Tuesday. Right. You know, but and not just making sure that we sit down and record on time, but also it's like we know ahead of time and kind of do a better job of planning our episodes of this is what we're going to talk about. Oh, hey.
And you know, in two weeks, we're going to have an episode on this and hey, in three weeks, we're going to have an episode on this. So we're going to invite this guest. Yeah. Because I know we've had some guests in the past and I know that we would enjoy having more guests. Absolutely. And you know, and then it's also, you know, keeping up with In the Real, your podcast.
You're doing an amazing job and I want to get with mine and the Equip Man and do a better job of keeping up and being current and relevant with that. So I believe. Can I tell you? Yeah. I think one of the things that I want to do is I want to do a check in on today. I was actually reading an article and this article is actually from James Bullock and it's this young man, I was going to say young man. Well, he's younger than we are. He is a friend of yours. He helped train you.
He did the Highland games with you. He has MMA, all of these things. He's very disciplined in a lot of things. And his latest thing was choosing your circle, the impact of people on your journey. And I was like, I've decided that when you're surrounding yourself with people in a capacity and they hold you accountable and a lot of times people are like, oh, well, they're constantly telling you, hey, or asking you, hey, are you, you know, some people like that. Some people don't.
But the thing is, is ultimately you are accountable regardless if you feel like you like that word or not. Right. You're accountable to family. You're accountable to friends. You're accountable to yourself, to your job, to different things, right. Different avenues. And he was basically in his article talking about just the dangers of negative company. I'm going to hit some of the highlights, identifying and distancing from toxic relationships, surrounding ourselves with positivity and support.
And so some of the accountability steps that he talked about was self-reflection. So start by evaluating your current relationships. So we're basically doing a check-in. This is where we're at. Okay, I could do better here. I need to do, okay, I seem to be on target here. Set boundaries. Learn to set boundaries with negative individuals or just kind of push it out of the way. Seek positive associations.
So if somebody's not speaking into your dream or somebody's not speaking into the goals in your life, they become a sabotage almost. It's basically, and nine out of 10 times, it's not so much that they're trying to sabotage you. It's just you're convicting something inside of them. And that means they're seeing you change.
So that means that they're at a crossroad now and that gives them motivation to either change or it pushes them away and repels them because they're like, I don't want to change, right. Create empathy, so try to understand the perspectives of others. Positive reinforcement. Kind of said that already, right? Just be somebody. Let people know when they've had a positive impact on you. So this year, I think I'm always really good about encouraging people and speaking. You are, yeah.
I have no problem speaking up. Our beautiful girl, she's kind of very much in that same vein. Complete strangers, we will compliment complete strangers and it's so cool to watch people's faces, right? But just be a positive person, right? And then personal growth activities, engage in activities that promote personal growth, workshops, seminars, group activities, things like that.
When you're trying to meet these goals, when you're doing a check in with yourself, hey, is there something that could help me motivate, help motivate me more? I think of one of my really great friends, Aubrey, hey Aubrey, she was in a kind of, again, becoming in a dark space, right? She's a mom of these amazing girls, amazing wife, amazing business person with her husband. All of these things, but she was starting to kind of just go into a shell.
She ended up finding a group that she could start working out with and really just connecting in that kind of capacity. And then number seven, regular check ins, right? So cause the people around you continually assess if your relationships are growing positively or if they need reevaluation. Now again, this is talking about the people around you, your relationships, but this is everyday life. Is this benefiting me or is this actually something that like drags me down?
Is this something that's causing? And then like, was it two, three days ago, I get a text message from our sweet, sweet Natalie Weidman and she just wrote a book and we will be planning, we're planning on having her and her husband on here eventually one day. But she wrote a book on grieving and just allowing the Holy Spirit and God just to walk you through grief. And she out of the blue, hey girl, you've been on my mind for however many days now.
You've considered maybe starting to write a book. And so when you have those kinds of moments and those kinds of encounters with people in your life that say, hey, tapping you on the shoulder, have you considered, have you considered, you know, I think that that's part of some of the check-in and I think that's one of those things where God just kind of reassuring you and reminding you of, hey, you are on the right path and I will use other people to speak into that space for you.
Yeah. And when stuff like that happens, I especially laugh because I know that, I mean, I know that the conversation that we've had and the things that you've said and I know that it is on your heart to write a book or write a devotional or write, you know, put, actually put pen to paper and get your thoughts and ideas out there more than just talking.
You know, I mean, I know that one of those ideas is for you and I to take some of the things that we've talked about on this podcast and put them in paper. Yeah. I mean, I even had a crazy idea of how to even publish the book, but I don't even know if that would be possible because I, because it'd just be wacky and crazy. I'm excited. Yeah. I mean, I've told it to you before and every now and then it's still in my mind, but it's like in my mind, we would call it, he said, she said.
I think it's still one of the best ideas. It is. The concepts is awesome. And we would either like for every chapter, you know, do like your thought process on that idea and then mine, you know, go chapter by chapter, or if we could do it, it would be really cool to do every chapter, say from like your point of view. And then start at the back of the book, do it from my point of view.
So it's like page one, like the first page would be chapter one from your point of view, but the last page would be the start of chapter one from my point of view. And it's like, start from the beginning for the, she says, start from the back for the, he said, and we'll meet in the middle. And so it's like, again, I don't know if that would be possible. I think anything is possible. Yeah. I mean, it's 2024. It's true. Especially with all the ideas of self publishing and stuff like that.
I mean, the fact that if we wanted to, we could, you know, buy a camera or two and we could literally live stream us talking to the internet. And I think that that's one, obviously one of the goals. I say obviously that is, I believe that that is one of our goals for this coming year. So it's one of those where it's, it's even if so far listeners in my mind, I'm like, even if you're like, well, I, I haven't really gotten into a space, right?
Like there's still stuff that all these loose ends from last year that I still need to accomplish, you know, or I don't have any really big, fresh ideas or whatever, you know, kind of scenario and it's, it's funny because I know a lot of times at the beginning of the year, people say, you know, like, I want a word, I need a word, you know, like, Hey, it's this year, this year's strength or this year's persevere, what, you know, kind of situation.
And I know that I'd already said it, but it is worth repeating because I think too many times we get caught up in the one word or we get caught up in the one phrase. And then we, we miss the journey. We miss the process, right? Or we'll get so inundated with how we think that needs to look as opposed to, again, remember what I told you, what, when I was praying that day and just said, you know, God, what does this look like?
And he's like, you start every day with gratitude and then, and then you just follow my lead. And it's like in, in, on this journey, even with cancer and all the things every day, waking up saying, how would you like to proceed today? Because you're, regardless if something is still kind of half baked or if something hasn't, you know, like here's Natalie going like, girls, you guys got thoughts. And I said, like, we got like all these thoughts. We got a couple of thoughts.
It's just, how do you even begin? And I remember with the podcast, you know, cause we're on, what'd you say? 92? This is episode 92. 92, right? Like you and I've been sitting on this for years and thinking that we had to have this completely polished and everything perfect. And it's like the Holy Spirit, the whole time kicking our chairs, kind of like I kicked yours earlier and just saying, just do it. Just follow my lead. Trust me.
And you know, I, and we don't say that per se for everything cause there does need to be, you know, like a process. You need to have a plan. A plan is always a good thing. We had a plan. We had some really good foundational thoughts. It's just, how would you like to proceed? What does that even look like? Because it's going to look different from other podcasts.
And again, they're, you know, with the plan comes preparation, you know, because if we had just, if we had just randomly started talking, you know, we hit record, we started talking, didn't have any conversations beforehand and we just put that out there, you know, our episodes and our thoughts would not, probably wouldn't make sense. I mean, they probably eventually would, but it's one of those things, you know, it's like the whole, what is it?
If you give like, put a thousand monkeys at typewriters, eventually they'll come out with the works of Shakespeare, but it's like, you know, how much, how much of a mess is it going to be before even, you know, the randomness of that even happening. Right.
You know, so, so of course there needs to be, you know, if you're going to do something, you know, again, there needs to be that preparation, there needs to be that it's like, I don't, I don't want to say calling, you know, but there's, there's gotta be something in there of, you know, either God saying, Hey, I think this would be a good idea or, or you saying, you know, I see a need, fill a need, see a need, fill a need type thing.
Or you know, I think that, you know, I know some things about this topic and I want to get my voice out there to help people in case, just in case there's somebody out there that's like, I have a question about this, but I don't know who to talk to. Right.
You know, it's, it's almost like one of those things that, you know, you don't realize that there are other people that need help or need, not so much need help, but it's like there's at times where if you're going through something, you're so focused on what you're going through that you're convinced that you're the only person that's ever dealt with this issue in the history of mankind. And all of a sudden, you know, somebody else speaks up and like, Oh yeah, I've, I'm dealing with that.
Oh man, I thought I was the only one. Cool. We can deal with this together. Right. You know, it's like that time that I remember we were working with the Marrieds group and you know, we split the guys and the girls up and you know, we're sitting there. I'm of course with the guys and like something came up in the group and we're all sitting in like a, like a circle ish shape.
And it's like somebody brought up something and then slowly like almost like one by one almost around the circle, like almost everybody was like, Oh yeah, I've dealt with that or I'm going through that myself. Yeah. And then I remember this light bulb that came on in the group of all these guys that are like, Oh my gosh, I thought it was the only one I thought it was, I thought it was alone. I thought there was no way I could get help with this.
Yeah. And to see not only everybody speaking up and admitting that they were going through this, but almost like the unity of we can, we can get through this together because I know we've got each other.
You know, I almost wanted to, I almost said the whole military thing of like the shared misery and it's like, it's not shared misery, you know, that's something else, you know, but it is, it's, it's something about a shared experience where you can come together and say, I know I've dealt with that or I am dealing with that. You know, it's like, you know, again, it's, it's, it's the whole, if you want to see an improvement in your life, you find somebody that is good at that.
Yes. Yeah. And you go, you, you, you look to them for mentorship, for advice, for ideas. You know, we've heard it before and I think we've said it at least once or twice, but if you have a struggling marriage, don't go and talk to somebody that's got a struggling marriage because they're going to, they're going to put you, they're going to, they're going to point you in the wrong direction. Right.
Well, if you, if you, if you are struggling in your marriage and you start talking to somebody that's, that's been a serial divorcee, they're going to tell you that spouses are like tissues and you can just toss one away and go find a new one. Yeah. You know, and that's not, that's not good. That is not kingdom. That's not good at all. So yeah, but you want, you want to surround yourself with people that might have been in that space with you, but have made it to the other side.
Right. And I know that that's been some of the, um, the things that we've been, I think so for our check-in, right. Um, I think that that's one of the things that we are in the process of doing right now. We, we have, um, genuinely we've got friends around us.
Um, and man, I'll tell you what, your community and your circle, it's everything you, you have people that either a, know, uh, the dreams that are inside of you and they know, um, the calling that God's got on your life or B you've got friends kind of like, you know, here's Natalie. She doesn't really know X, Y, Z about, like we have a relationship. She's my friend, but like, this isn't something she really knows.
And you want somebody that speaks from a position that, that, that spirit led that as discernment that walks in wisdom, right. Um, and, and gleam from that, you know, and if, even if it's something that you say, well, that doesn't quite sound right, but I, I, I respect you and I respect our friendship and I was, you know what, I'm not going to completely throw that out.
I mean, unless it's absolutely asinine, but if that's a person of character, it's not going to be, um, I'm not saying that they're perfect. You don't have, you know, they may not hit the mark completely, but there might be some sort of truth in the midst of what they're saying. So maybe just ask the Holy spirit to start speaking to you, you know, find out what is it that I need to be doing right now? What is it?
You know, what do I need to do to help polish off, um, and polish my sword, polish, you know, my shovel, whatever tool it is that I need to use for the next leg of this journey, you know, start becoming somebody that's, that is intentional with your time.
Um, I know that, uh, you and I, we've, we've talked about this and I know that it sounds like we're kind of randomly pushing around on a whole bunch of things, but this is our check-in and some of the things that were, that we are working through ourselves. Um, so the, the, um, what is it paired that we do? Yeah. Paired app that we do every day. Um, it gives us a question a day.
And one of the questions recently was, um, just simply, you know, asking, just, it just, it hones into certain things of, of your life. It asks you questions, maybe has you tap into it, start thinking about things that maybe you didn't think about before, you know? And it's like, um, I know that one of the things was, uh, what would you like to, uh, do this year that you haven't been doing? And do you remember mine? I know, uh, I think both of ours was dates. Dates.
It was dates, but it was also, um, I had a second one. So I think both, both you and I had dates. I think I'm the only one that had a second one. And my second one was I will not be hitting snooze. I will, the moment my alarm goes off, I'm getting up. Have you noticed I've been getting up? You have. I have been getting up. And so, and then we had a date the other day. We did. It was so nice. It was. We both did not feel good after. No. But that's not here nor there. Correct.
We just, guys, we don't eat seafood. We indulge in something that we don't normally indulge in. Really rich seafood. And I think our seafood wanted to swim upstream, downstream, and sideways. It did not fare well, but we had a really nice time and we got a chance to kind of break away and just be together. So it's like, um, and, and then in the times, and I know that I want to say, you said this, and I don't know if you said it last week. If you did, I apologize.
But again, we're saying again, um, celebrate the attempts, right? So, um, even if you don't hit that 500 words or if you don't hit that million dollar mark or if you don't hit that whatever kind of, I'm going to become self-employed in 42 weeks. I don't, I'm throwing out randomness. I'm going to publish my first book in 18 months.
I mean, just, you know, even if you don't hit that, the fact that you're making, make the attempts, make the strides, take the ground and celebrate the fact that you're, you're pushing forward.
Yes. Um, I mean, I want to say, I want to say, I think it was Elon Musk, um, that said something kind of along those lines of, and if it wasn't him, it was somebody that level, but it was like, he said, you know, write down everything that's on your five year plan or 10 year plan, now see what you can accomplish in six months.
Go. Wow. And he's like, yes, at the end of that six months, you're not going to accomplish everything that was on your list for your five or 10 year plan, but sit there and think about what you will accomplish when you actually say, okay, instead of saying five years to accomplish this, I now have six months.
Wow. Um, you know, because I, I've, and I've heard other things about that and you know, there's, there's something about the psychology of, um, you know, if you say, I've got five years to do X, you will take five years to do that. It's something about when you give yourself a, a, a timeframe, your mind will like automatically say, well, I've got that much time, so I'm going to take that much time.
Wow. And if you say, I've got all this and I'm going to accomplish it in six months, six weeks, six days. Yeah. You know, again, you're probably not going to accomplish it, but think of all that you're going to get done towards those things. That's so good. By you pushing it, you know, again, it's, you know, if, if somebody, if you, again, it's the whole, I'm going to give myself the weekend to clean the house.
Yeah. You will take the weekend to clean the house because your brain will say, I've got the weekend. I'm going to take the weekend. Yeah. But if you say, I'm going to clean as much as I can for an hour, you will actually get more done in that hour than you did in the weekend. What was it that you said to, um, Alasia? So for this, this is a name randomly that nobody knows. So our sweet guy, our little guy, he, he does bass lessons and he actually got gifted a guitar just recently.
Thank you again, Amanda, for your, um, the generosity of your roommate. That was absolutely precious. Um, so there's a good chance he'll be doing that with guitar too. Maybe we'll, we'll see what happens. That is okay. And so, um, there is this absolutely precious young lady that, um, she is my voice just changed. Sorry. She is, um, probably Sebastian, one of Sebastian's like biggest fans.
Yeah. And she is, or she used to be over the, um, instructions or what it was, the lessons and stuff like that. So she used to be the lesson coordinator. Um, and now a very, very sweet, uh, other young lady, she's in there now. Um, but Alicia, uh, she reminds us a lot of our big brown eyed girl, right? And, um, she, uh, has this insatiable love of, of life and just wants to experience all the goodness and all of the creativity and all the awesomeness that it brings.
And so, um, she also, uh, told us how she went into, was it the Marines? She, she started with the Marines and then, um, just was like, I can't cut this. This isn't what I signed up for kind of situation. Um, but then in the midst of it, she's also said how, like, she almost has kind of like, um, just almost ADHD. Like she almost feels too scattered. Yeah. She feels, yeah. And you gave her probably the simplest, but most profound and effective way to help her hone in. What was that advice?
Cause I think that would be a really neat, um, check in kind of nugget to give to our people. I think it was, I mean, again, it was kind of along the lines of, of what I had just mentioned and, and I was said, you know, write down what you want to accomplish or, or what's on your schedule for the day, you know, because she's one of those people. She's like, I want to write, I want to sing, I want to do this. I want to do that. You know, she's got a lot of really great goals.
She's got a lot of things that she wants to work on. But she feels that she's almost too scattered throughout the day. And so I was like, we'll just write down and say, okay, for the next 15 minutes, I'm going to focus on this. And then your timer goes off, your timer goes off. And okay. I worked, I worked on this for 15 minutes. Okay. I'm going to take a break for X for however many minutes. And okay.
The next thing on my list, I'm going to spend 15 minutes writing, you know, and, and it doesn't have to be anything crazy. It doesn't have to be anything intense and serious, but it's, it's if you're feeling too scattered, you know, again, take that time to say, what are the things I want to work on? I'm going to give myself a timer and I'm going to say, okay, for the next 10, 15 minutes, I am just going to focus on this task.
Yeah. You know, so that way it's, it's, it's a limited amount of time. You don't have to, you know, nothing gets, it's not going to be too overwhelming. It's not going to be too intense, but you know, again, it's, it's, it's getting you into that habit of here's my time that I'm going to dedicate to this one thing. Yeah. Like all of a sudden I'm reminded of, I saw something, I saw a video again, working on habits and working on where your focus is and what's important.
And it was this gentleman that was talking, he's a, he was a trainer, like a personal trainer, physical, you know, workout physical trainer. And he said that he was working on somebody to get them in the habit of going to the gym and working out. And he said, you know, for the first, like, I almost want to say like five, six weeks, four, six weeks, something like that. He's like, I want you to go to the gym every day. You don't have to go in. I just want you to go to the gym every day.
Even if you sit in the parking lot for two, two, three, five minutes, I want you to go to the gym every day for the first like four to six weeks. And that way you build that habit of going to the gym. Yeah. He's like, and then after that, I want you to go into the gym for like 10, 15 minutes. Yeah. You know, and it's, it's, it's working on that.
So it's like, I now have this space, I'm now in this habit of going to the gym because they've, they found that a lot of people, it's, it's that initial, it's that initial getting over it barrier or obstacle that is really what's holding, what's holding people. It's holding themselves back.
Yeah. So it's, it's the, you know, like if I were to sit down and focus on the equipped man, you know, a lot of times if I want to self sabotage or get out of it, I will sit there and say, well, I've got other things that need my attention. I've got other things I need to focus on, you know, and so therefore it's like, well, it's fine for now. So I'll just kind of put it on the back burner. And it's like, so it's, it's that initial just getting to sit down and focus on that one task.
Yeah. You know, if it's, if we're going to focus on you putting pen to paper this year, it's, you know, we're going to set an alarm. Yeah. You know, every afternoon at 3 45, you're going to sit down for 15 minutes and you're going to write something. Yeah. You know, even it, it doesn't have to make sense. It doesn't have to be applicable to what you're eventually going to want to publish, but you're getting into the habit of every day I'm sitting down and I am focusing on this task.
Because that's what it, what needs to happen. You know, people say, you know, if you need to do that for the, for reading the Bible, if you need to do that for praying, do it, you know, if, if you're not in the habit of doing this every day, every other day, what have you, if, if it has to be something basic and simple and oh my gosh, I don't, you know, I, I feel like I'm being treated like a kid because I'm being told to sit down and read my Bible.
It's like, if that's what you need to get closer to father, to learn better about what's going on in the kingdom, then take that. Take the elementary steps. Take the simple steps. Take the simple, okay, I'm going to, I'm going to sit down. I'm reading. Yeah. I'm sitting down and I'm all by myself. God, I'm praying. I don't know what I'm praying, but I'm praying. Are you there?
Yeah. You know, and it is sometimes, you know, again, we have phones, we have egg timers, we have, you know, people have, they, they have really fancy timers of all this productivity. Yeah. And it's like, it's so easy. The steps, the, not the steps, but the tools are out there to set us up for success. But it's like, I know for me, I so often talk myself out of it because I'm so convinced that I don't have enough time.
And so I sit down and I, and I spiral and I end up accomplishing nothing because I'm too focused on all the things that I need to accomplish that I don't put energy into any of them. And you probably just define the majority of the people. Absolutely. And, and that's why we want to kind of shed light on a lot of that. Yeah. So what would be some practical things that we can leave everybody with? I mean, outside of, of what you said, because I think, I mean, that's, that's huge.
What you just said, that's, I think that's huge. I know for our daughter just got herself a new Bible. Yep. And I guess technically we did. We got her a new Bible. It doesn't matter, but she came to us and said, I feel absolutely, this sounds really horrible, but this is what's happening to me right now. And I think I want to, I want to, I want to share this just simply because I think a lot of people think in this too, in this realm, mom, I, I, I need a Bible that has tabs that has what is it?
The highlighters and the things, and then I need a journal. And she says, it's not so much that I want to say, you know, she says, it sounds horrible, but it's like, okay, God, this isn't aesthetically pleasing to me. So I'm kind of bored and I don't really want to do this. Listen, guys, if you have to aesthetically get yourself together and start, if you are that person and you like the new Bible with the new pad of paper, or it may not, you may not have a problem with reading your Bible.
It might be just organizing things. If you need your own little journal, if you need, if you are a pen to paper kind of person, I am, I, I have a, we have a giant schedule calendar that I took so much time into making of all of our family in our house. And every month I find out everybody's schedules and I write down the things that are imperative that kind of all of us need to know. And then there's others that are like, but okay, so like you want to get fit.
Okay. Then we, we joke a little bit. Well, the girls and I did anyway. My Christmas was you got me new tennis shoes with a new gym bag with new workout gloves. Yeah. I was so excited when I figured out how to use them. And it's like, aesthetically, this is setting me up to succeed. Right? So whatever it is that you think you need to do to set yourself up to succeed, we're not saying go out and get all the latest gizmo gadgets. Right?
Cause like our podcast stuff at the very beginning, we had a tiny little, it's called a snowball microphone and it has the sweetest little emoji, winky face, and it's sitting right there. We love it. And, but that's what we started with. So even if you have to just start from, start from where you are, start from where you are. If you have the ability to go and it might take you a little bit extra time knowing that, Hey, I just put the time and the energy and the money into this.
If that helps motivate you by all means do that. If, if it's just, I need to do something, it doesn't matter. I need to do something different to get me out of the funk of whatever it is that I need to do then, then do that. Or if it's, I still have things tied loose ends that I didn't tie up from, you know, 2023. Hey, then find out if that's something that's still applicable for today. See if that's something that you still need to build on because we're not throwing away the podcast.
We're going to just build onto it. You know, you guys have heard kind of our thoughts Luke is wanting to do more as far as his podcast. I'm building mine. We together are wanting to do a devotional and a book based off of a lot of the, just our lives and some of the things that we've done. Luke also wants to start a men's ministry and do things more with men focused things on how to even be a man in the 21st century. Right.
So it's like, there's all these things that can seem to be so overwhelming. Do what our family says. Eat it like an elephant. Just go one step at a time so that way it doesn't overwhelm you and ask God how to proceed. Yeah. And something you said, I think bears kind of repeating or in my mind repeating, you know, because you were saying that, you know, if there's something left over from 23 that needs to be reevaluated or, you know, is this something that you need to go back and finish?
Or, you know, again, the whole, whatever you feel that you need to work on, you know, do the work, you know, start from where you are and, you know, start where you're at. And, you know, I remember when we first started this podcast, it was the, a lot of what we had heard was start before you're ready. Man, yeah. You know, but something in, when you were saying, you know, is there something in 23, from 23 that you need to reevaluate or go back and finish or whatnot.
Another bit of advice that I've heard and that I really hold onto is there's nothing wrong with looking at where you're at and evaluating it and realizing that you need to pivot. You know, because again, you're not starting over from scratch. You're starting over from experience.
And you know, if, like, if we decided that all of a sudden our podcast, we needed to kind of shift, you know, it's like, there's nothing in our podcast that is like heart and fast, set in stone other than we are going to do our best to always follow the Bible and be spirit-filled Christians and do what God has asked of us. Yeah. You know, but it's like, hey, I'm not crazy about the format. Okay, well, change the format. Hey, I'm not crazy about the music. Okay, change the music.
Yeah. You know, I don't like the intro. Okay, change the intro. You know, there's nothing wrong with shifting and changing and, you know, hey, I think we should have, you know, guests every week. Okay, do your best to have guests every week. Yeah. But again, there's nothing wrong with constantly reevaluating what's going on, what you're doing. Again, it's this check-in of how are you doing, you know, what's going on, how are you feeling?
There's nothing wrong with evaluating and pivoting if need be. Right. You know, let's say we wrote a book. We got five chapters deep and all of a sudden it's like, this isn't the book we should be writing. We should write something else. Yeah. Okay, those five chapters, they'll get put somewhere in a box because maybe we'll need to come back to that or we'll need to use some of that material again.
Yeah. But there's nothing wrong with saying, you know, that's not the direction this book needs to go. Let's redo some stuff. Yeah. And that's okay. Man. That's okay. You just set a lot of people free, babe. Yeah. No, genuinely. Yeah. You know, because it is, it's like, oh, I should have, I had to, well, I need to. And it's like, but do you?
Yeah. I mean, genuinely, like, there are some things that are legitimate that you go, yep, nope, I got to get my crap together and I need to figure this out and we need to get this done. And then there's other times where you're like, you know what, that was for last season and we're moving into a new season and let's figure out what the next, next plan of attack is. Let's do what we need to do.
Yeah. And learn from, learn from those mistakes, learn from not even the mistakes, but just learn from those spaces, right? There's two things that I had written down whenever our sweet friend had asked me if I was going to write a book. Yeah. I'm not going to say the first one, but I'll say the second one because I believe that it's a couple of them to what we just said. Did I say that right? Wow. Applicable. Applicable. Thank you, babe. Applicable. Thank you, babe.
So, um, the past is a place of reference, not residents. We need to learn from it, but not let it define our present or our future. I like that. So I would like to say that I did not completely write that. The first line actually, I got it from Mr. Bullock's, one of the things that he, one of his thoughts that he had said, but it was like, let me say it again. The past is a place of reference, not residents.
Okay. So if there are places in your life that you're standing back and saying, man, I was a bonehead that did not work out well, or man, this season really sucked. I did not, I didn't like anything that happened in the last three to six months of this last year and say, okay, don't take up residence there though. Things around you might've fallen apart. Plans may not have come through the way that you thought they were going to, but you are still here.
Yeah. And if I can chime in, even if it's something positive, don't take up residence there. I mean, how many times have we heard, don't live on yesterday's manna, don't live on yesterday's testimony. Come on. I mean, God did an amazing thing healing you of cancer. Yes. We recognize it. So many people around us recognize it. But if you spent the rest of your days focused on 2023, you being healed of cancer, as good as that is, you've just now taken up residence in your past.
And how can you grow if you're constantly living in your past and focused on what's behind you? Yeah. Shoot. We're supposed to use those moments, good, bad, and ugly, we're supposed to use those moments as springboards to take us to launch us into the next space. You know, we call them, you know, a lot of times people are like, it's a negative, this is a negative. And it's like, okay, where you might see a stumbling block, it's actually a stepping stone.
It's like we always say, we like to say, you know, like meet the Robinsons, right? Because we talked, we referenced that again last week. And it was just, it's one more way of finding out that, oh, this isn't going to work this way. Okay, cool. What's the next step? If this is what I'm supposed to be doing, then you know what, God, the answer's out there. I'm just going to trust, I'm going to trust you to show me where it is or how to find it. And it's like taking, it's just taking that time.
Be patient with yourself, guys. Be patient with yourself. We're having to be patient with ourselves. There's periods of times where we'll look at each other and it's like, it's okay, it's okay. It really is okay. Or dang it, nope, we said we were going to get better, we're going to do better, this is what we're going to do. We need to keep each other accountable. This is now let's go.
And so it's like evaluate, check in, check in with yourself, allow your life to be accountable to somebody that you trust, that has wisdom, that has understanding, somebody that is already moving maybe even in the direction that you want to go. Or they don't even have to be doing the same thing, but just somebody that you see that is intentional. And that isn't afraid to call you out. That isn't afraid to call you out. Yeah. And that you're okay with them calling you out. Correct.
It's got to be a two way street for sure. Yes. So I mean, that's it. It's kind of, it's kind of all I've got. I told everybody our plans. Yeah. They are in motion. Yes. You guys pray for us, please. Please. Please pray for us when you think of us and when you're hearing this, that God just gives us wisdom. Cause I don't know why all of a sudden I want to cry. Because I just, our heart's desires are just for people to be better.
For people to reach the full capacity of what it is that God has placed inside of each one of you. That is our heart's desire. That's why we do this. That's why we do it. We want y'all to be better. We desire for you guys to live long and prosper for your, for your future to be full of hope to know that God has got nothing but good for you plans to prosper you, not to harm you.
And, and so we're hoping that this randomness of check in, check in, check in, check in, this is what we're doing, helps you and that you guys got something out of this week. Yes. All right, guys, we will see you next week. Yes. Have the best week. Quote unquote, see. See, are we going to see you? Well, I'm just saying, cause they're not going to see us. We're not going to see them, but. Well, we still need to get that video. Such a tradition happening. That's on our list. We promise.
Yes. All right, guys, have the best week. See you next week.