Episode 27-How to Build a BOLD and fulfilled life with Jason Dell

00:01
Hi, welcome to the While You Walk podcast where you do the walking and we do the talking. Today, I'm here with Jason Dell, busy people. Do you ever get in trouble while trying to navigate through complex emotional life decisions and family situations?

00:17
Have you ever found yourself in a challenging situation where people's needs are intense and emotions are running high? Jason Dell has been a part of some major decisions. He's the owner of Custom Home of a Custom Home Building Company in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

00:32
He's a divorced father of two teenagers and an active member of the local community and Jason has a growth mindset. He's on a journey to get better every day. His Custom Building Company, build with passion, build bold.

00:46
I was looking at his website. It's a beautiful website. It's in the show notes. Definitely check it out. Some of these custom homes are beautiful. The videos are beautiful. The website's beautiful. You can tell there's an attention to detail here.

00:59
That is really good. Jason, how are you doing, man? Welcome to the podcast. I'm doing wonderful. Thank you, Matt. I appreciate that intro. I definitely sounded better than I sometimes feel about myself, so thank you for boosting me up in the beginning here, but I appreciate the comments about my company.

01:17
Obviously, bold construction is my passion. It is what I get up for every day along with my kids and family. It's what I put a majority of my daily time into, so I really appreciate you saying good things about us.

01:31
Our website certainly presents the story of what we are doing and what we tell and promise to our clients, so thank you for sharing with that. With that, can you tell us what attracted you into that career?

01:46
What's the current service? What separates it from other people? Who do you work with? What kind of problems do you solve? That's a lot. What originally brought me into the career was basically a lot of work.

01:59
It's a lot of work. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of work. love for real estate. You know, I'm the guy that's, you know, he's on vacation. And I'm looking at property instead of enjoying the beach, right?

02:09
I'm looking around seeing how they build this, how they build that. And I've always been that way. Even in a previous career where I was, you know, using my degree and as an electrical engineer, I was always looking at property when I drove around and check things out.

02:24
So got the opportunity with my best friend from preschool, quite honestly, to go into business. He was living down in Chapel Hill, I was in the busy world at DC at the time. And he said, well, we always talked about, you know, getting together and running a business together.

02:41
He said, Hey, we got an opportunity down here, come on down. Here's what we can do. You know, I've been in the corporate world for five years and basically hit the top of where I could be in the current role.

02:53
And I was I was done with that. I was done with the traffic of DC. So I came down to beautiful. Chapel Hill, North Carolina and joined his business. And 21 years later, here we are. It's been a heck of a ride.

03:08
You know, as you mentioned, we're a custom home and renovation company. You know, we deal in the high end stuff. These are, you know, these are dream homes. These are what clients will call forever homes.

03:22
Our average, I just looked at our 2023 numbers. Our average project was over $2 million. So these are big, fancy, nice homes in the Chapel Hill area and surrounding. So the problem that we solve is, you know, we give our clients the opportunity to build their dream forever homes in an efficient timeline.

03:45
We're a company of 18 people now. We're able to build 10 to 12 custom homes a year of that scale. You know, our typical competition's a one -man show and, you know, they can build a couple of homes a year but they're really not allowing, you know, the efficiencies of, you know, a semi, you know, pulling on some of the production minds that we can, you know, gain the efficiencies and build more homes in the same amount of time.

04:14
So it's great. Yeah, and you know, I sort of, I've seen this kind of structure of a business model where you really work with the high end people that can afford a lot. And that's sort of where you get the money.

04:27
And then you spend your time and your energy on people that really, really need your help with charities and other situations that have needs. Can you tell me about the Bold Foundation? You're a board member of the Bold Foundation.

04:41
You also work with Habitat for Humanity. And generally, what's attractive and fulfilling about working with these nonprofits? Yeah, I mean, so that's something that Chris and I realized over time, you know, your point is that yes, we're working with people with high net worth, you know, We're building houses that, you know, top 1% of people can afford.

05:03
What are we doing to give back? And, you know, Chris and I have always felt the desire and the need and the requirement, quite honestly, to give back. We've both been serving on not -for -profit boards, you know, for decades, and really feel that that is part of our mission.

05:22
We instill that in our team. We have probably once a month, we're doing a volunteer project for a community, not -for -profit community in general. So, you know, I think I just saw it on our calendar.

05:39
We have Ronald McDonald House volunteer day coming up in I think next month. On top of that, a few years back, we decided to develop our own not -for -profit. So the Bold Foundation is a charity and we focus.

05:57
hyper local on the kids in our immediate community that are underserved. And our goal is to support them and take care of them so they can, you know, have all the school supplies they need. So they're not behind, they can have, you know, one of the big things we do is Christmas cheer event where we're providing Christmas presents for the local kids that wouldn't necessarily have a great Christmas without it.

06:30
And it's really fulfilling. Our team, you know, the construction team, the real estate team, they get behind it and it's just an overall great experience. And it's something that, again, it's part of our culture.

06:44
And to get to be there and to see it and, you know, give these kids safer places to live, access to nutrition, these memorable Christmas activities, character building activities. How do you feel after you spend a day doing that and, you know, seeing the difference you're making?

07:05
Well, I mean, it's if you're being honest, it's somewhat selfish, right? Because you feel so good when it's done, you know, it's, but it's feels so good when it's done because you're seeing the smiles on faces, you're seeing, you know, the parents come in to pick up the gifts and just how grateful they are that they're able to use these gifts to supplement what they can provide and truly make, you know,

07:34
the child's Christmas or holiday amazing. So selfishly, it feels great, but it feels great because it's something great for others. Yeah. And I think, you know, being a team member of the construction company, getting to be a part of that, that contribution to the community, I mean, that's an attractive thing that I think people want to be involved with.

07:57
magnetic. It's you know, it's beautiful. Definitely, definitely. Yeah, I mean, we always do like around the room as we call them at the office. And, you know, oftentimes it's what's your favorite? What's your favorite thing we did this year?

08:10
And, you know, nine times out of 10, it's it's the opportunities where we gave back where, you know, we as a company decided to take a Friday afternoon off and go and do something for somebody else. And that's, you know, that's when my team feels the most fulfilled.

08:26
Now they get fulfilled in their daily jobs. As I said, you know, we're building for amazing people. But you know, we get to know them very well. And it gives our team the drive to do that better. But ultimately, you know, giving back to those need has been has been the number one on many people's list throughout the years.

08:44
Yeah, it really seems like a very satisfying business and lifestyle structure. I've I've had the opportunity to work with lots of different business owners and like doctors and lawyers and stuff. And some of the happiest people are the business owners, but then like engineers and like builders, people that get to like envision a project and then see it come to life and like actually build something I find very satisfying.

09:08
And then obviously the charity works also very satisfying. Yeah, no, I mean, you hit that on the head that a lot of people come into the construction business is because they get to see nothing, piece of land.

09:22
And then they get to see the finished product, which is a beautiful, amazing house that is complete done and people have moved in. So they get, and then every day is different. I sometimes compare it to, this is a simple comparison, but one of my favorite things that tours at home is loading and unloading the dishwasher, right?

09:43
Because it is something that has a definite start and a definite finish. It's loaded, you hit the button, you start it up. When it's unloaded, everything's out of it and put away. It's not like cleaning the house, because guess what, cleaning the house, it always gets dirty again.

10:01
So construction is the same way. We get to see things from start to finish and get to celebrate on both ends of it. Yeah, awesome. I wanna start diving into some of your unique skills here. Okay. So what's one thing or something that someone with only your experience would know?

10:22
Yeah, what's something that, having done what you've done, lived the experiences you've lived, what's something only you would know with the insight that you've got dealing with people? Wow, that's a deep question.

10:35
Let me think about that. So, yeah, I think one thing that comes to mind is that running a successful small business is on one end, it's harder than you probably think of it. to begin with, when you get started, but then it's easier as you get into it because there are systems in place and, you know, one of the things that I found over time that worked for us was something called EOS, which is the Entrepreneurial Operating System and it's essentially a dumbed down version of big business systems that works for small businesses and it is something that I talk to people all the time.

11:30
In fact, I was in Ann Arbor, Michigan on a visit with our local Chamber of Commerce this past weekend and got to speak with a business owner there that was just embarking on the EOS journey and I totally geeked out on her and she probably was bored about me talking about it.

11:52
talk through the, you know, kind of the whole system and the visionary, the integrator, these are all EOS terms. And it's really something that if there's any small business owners out there that don't really have it under control, which we probably never do, EOS can help you get get better, get there.

12:12
So you know, what's kind of one thing that it, you know, systemized or helped you do better? Um, what forced us to have meetings. So at one point, we didn't believe in meetings or didn't feel they were necessary.

12:25
And in order to kind of bring everyone together, meetings are necessary, but also gave you gives you a structure for your meetings. So they're not, you know, just dragging on, they have an agenda, they have a start, they have a finish, you know, your goal is to rate them a 10.

12:41
So they're called level 10 meetings. And at the end of every meeting gets rated. It's really a great system to just bring efficiencies to meetings, you know, the goal of the meeting is to solve issues.

12:55
The goal of the meeting is to create to do's out of those issues, and follow up with them on the following week or the following cadence of the meeting schedule. So like, what's the meeting length that you kind of aim for?

13:10
So, ideally, they're, they're designed to be 90 minutes, which are typical leadership meeting would be 90 minutes, we, we usually set the department meetings to about 60 minutes. So it, you know, it's, it's modifiable, but, you know, 60 or 90 minutes is kind of the norm.

13:32
And you're solving issues, you're getting clear outcomes and clear working takeaways, and you're getting that one's feedback. I'm sure. Correct. No, it's, I mean, it's great. It's an open forum, you know, everyone feels safe there to, to share, you know, no, no question is a dumb question, and no issue is a dumb issue, bring it up, talk about it, we'll solve it and move on.

13:54
Awesome. Shifting gears. So a lot of my listeners are busy dads. You're a busy dad that comes from a complex place with a lot of success. Yes. Probably some learning experiences as we all do. What are what are one or two things or that you think can make someone's health or their relationship better inside of the house?

14:21
Um, well, so just background for your audience. I am a divorce dad of just over five years now. I have two kids who are now 14 and 16. Both are in high school now. And it's, you know, it's been a it's been a challenge.

14:41
I'll be honest, but we've got through it. We work through it. And you know, we're doing we're doing great. You know, I'm thriving. The kids are thriving. but yet it's busy, it's, you know, it's, there's a lot going on.

14:55
Each kid has different activities. I have, you know, a full work day and a staff and, you know, being a small business owner, the work day doesn't really never ends, as you know, until you call it at the end of the day.

15:09
You know, I think the best thing that has worked for me and my kids is kind of having an attitude of honesty and flexibility. So letting them know where I'm going to be, making sure I know where they're going to be during the day, you know, giving each other some leniency.

15:32
And if something doesn't go right, which it never does during the day, and there's a delay on my end, on their end, you know, with their mom, then, you know, let's be honest about it, let's be flexible.

15:47
And, you know, give each other a little bit of a grace period on anything. You know, in communicating things, the honesty, the flexibility, like being very like quick to say, hey, this changed, hey, this happened.

16:04
Right. And I think on the other side of that is, you know, if someone's going to criticize me when I'm honest with them, I'm less likely to stay honest with them. So how challenging has that been to, you know, to be able to hear the honesty from the other side?

16:25
My kids don't have any problem with it. They're very open. We have a great relationship. You know, we can, they're allowed to dig into their dad a little bit. They're allowed to give me a little bit of grief.

16:38
I allow that, you know, I welcome it because I want to hear what they're feeling. I don't want them to be holding it inside. So that's always interesting. And, you know, my daughter, she's, she's a firecracker.

16:49
She'll get fired up and, you know, know, say some things that she regrets and come back to come to me and apologize later. And it's always all good. And, you know, I, you know, keep my cool in most of those situations.

17:02
And then we get through it. And then my son, you know, we went through a tough period when we first I was first separated from his mom and we got through it. It was, you know, it was just both of us kind of he's doing doing really well got his driver's license, which has given him an extra leash of freedom.

17:32
And he's really enjoying that and kind of learning about himself, learning about life and those different things. It's fun. Can you tell us anything about your girlfriend and what she does and maybe what she's kind of kosher through this process?

17:44
Yeah, so that's great. So my girlfriend of almost five years now. Toby, she's amazing. She is an acupuncturist and Chinese herbal medicine practitioner, which before I met her, I really didn't really have a lot of exposure to it.

18:07
So she has kind of opened my mind into that world of Eastern medicine and has kind of accelerated my health journey with her knowledge, experience, and assistance. She is also a divorcee with two children and hers hasn't always been easy either.

18:33
So much that she has hired a divorce coach in the past to help her and has now become a divorce coach herself. So we've been very helpful to each other throughout the last five years and just kind of navigating kids, divorces, exes, all the different challenges.

18:56
She's been a great support system for me and hopefully she feels the same that I've been a great support system for her. But just seeing her step up and decide to help others has been awesome and she will be amazing as her business continues to grow and take off and she will help many, many others.

19:19
So I'm excited for her on that journey. Yeah, I'm actually looking forward to getting her on the podcast. Yeah, you definitely should. She would love it. So a lot of the stuff you do, I mean, you have to communicate pretty precisely with emotional stability and a good amount of focus.

19:39
It's a big project. These are important projects. You're just doing a lot. How do you maintain daily energy, daily focus, daily emotional stability? What are your... You know, go to is there. It's great that you asked that question.

19:57
I just got back from a trip. Like I mentioned it with the Chamber of Commerce was a great trip. You know, it was Sunday through Tuesday. We flew in late on Tuesday evening and, you know, being away two days and getting, you know, in a very elevated fun environment and getting back to the office and kind of looking at the email inbox and, you know, hearing about the issues of the last couple of days.

20:23
It's a little bit deflating. And so it was a challenge for me yesterday and I, you know, I was prepared for it. I knew it was coming. So my, you know, in those situations, it's like this, this will pass kind of belief.

20:39
And then I, you know, wake up this morning and I'm energized. I'm full of energy. I'm ready to go. But one of my go tos, which was your question is early morning workouts. So obviously you're in that business as well, but I found a men's group called F3 and we can dig into that if you want to, but it has been, you know, it's officially described as a men's leadership group, but it is a peer -led workout every morning,

21:09
5 .30, rain, shine, darkness, whatever we run into outside, we're doing it. And I found that that is the way to start my day. If I don't do that, I don't do any kind of exercise in the morning, then my state is not as good as it could been.

21:26
So getting up, doing that, doing hard things before anyone's awake, doing hard things before you come into the office and have to deal with other things that guess what? They're not as hard anymore because I just threw around a cinder block for 45 minutes and did a bunch of crazy exercises with it with a group of men supporting me.

21:47
So that's been, you know, for the past eight plus years has been a blessing if I were to describe it in any other way. Yeah, I could not underscore or highlight more the benefits of morning exercise and a morning workout.

22:06
Like even today, I was like, all right, we're going to do this podcast. We're actually doing this, we're recording this at 8am. And, you know, and I was like, all right, you know, I'm really going to get the heart rate up this morning, because I want to be here, I want to be focused, I want to be excited.

22:20
And, and my experience working with people is some guys or a lot of guys wake up every morning and don't work out, don't activate their nervous system, don't get their heart rate up, get their breath going.

22:32
And they kind of just mosey into the day. And then they, you know, 9am, the coffee kicks, and they finally get work done. The guys that work out in the morning, you know, now it's six, six, 30, seven o 'clock in the morning, you are focused, you are going, you are ready, you are what's next.

22:48
And the to do list just gets knocked out. And life just gets easy really really does mean you know anyone out there that hasn't implemented morning exercise routine, it's it's never too late, you know we've got guys working out with us there 75 years old that are retired but still need it still need to make it happen because it's nothing there's nothing like it in the morning.

23:10
Another thing is to actually recently here the office was called wellness walks so Christine who is our director of sales and she's amazing she she's she's the she's the energy of the office and you know we had a couple health scares recently in the office and you know we're here to support our team and what we had to do was wellness walks, it's easy it's 10 minutes.

23:32
We go down the street we do a loop we come back and I'll talk about work at all you know everyone welcome you know it's it's part of the day it's not frowned upon it's not cheating it's not not doing your job it is doing your job so that it's been really great and She's always she picks up like in the middle of something and just says, we need a state change.

23:54
And then we're out the door. And we'll we'll do a walk. And me being me, I brought my sandbag in. So I got a 40 pound sandbag. And I said, we're gonna do a walk. We're gonna, we're gonna get some weight.

24:06
We're gonna lose some weight around. So that's, that's been kind of fun. People get a kick out of that. And really interesting boundaries and rules. Like, you know, it's always okay. It's never cheating.

24:16
And you're not allowed to talk about work, or like, we need an energy shift. I mean, those are really, really good reasons and you know, rules and balance. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's, it's been ingrained in many of us to do that.

24:29
You know, Christine, for one, you know, Chris and I, you know, but it's never been something that we've kind of, we're not pushing it on the team. It's never been something that we necessarily openly welcomed, you know, had someone wanted to go for a walk.

24:43
All right, I do, you know, I do meeting walks all the time. It's, you know, it's not out of the question. But this, the new initiative has been pretty cool. And I think I think people are really enjoying it.

24:53
And it gives them a little bit of downtime and a little bit of energy to get back in and get things done. I know that we could go on about that. We could forever. Yep. All right, I got a tough question for you.

25:06
All right. Is there anything you have changed your mind about in the last year or two years? Just, you know, you've shifted your thinking on some beliefs, some idea, anything? Let's see. I mean, I would say reading, if I were to pick something that I've changed my mind on.

25:39
I, and this hasn't necessarily been the past year, but I've definitely picked up reading, but you know, I always I still do it, you know, you're about Mark Cuban and Warren Buffett, they read like six hours a day.

25:54
I'm like, well, how do they read six hours a day if they're, you know, leading these giant multi, you know, billion dollar corporations and all this kind of stuff. And I always, you know, I always pass that off as either not actually doing it.

26:05
But you know, what I found is that you learn so much more reading than you do probably anything else except if you're actually experiencing and doing something, but you're learning, you know, they always say you're learning from a master of something that somebody that spent their whole life learning this is teaching it to you in 300 pages, it is a gift, and you should take it.

26:30
So I've definitely been upping my game on reading, you know, I've been expanding it, you know, I'm usually personal development, you know, you know, from Tony Robbins to, you know, atomic habits, that kind of stuff, but I've been expanding a little bit further out and more philosophy books and stuff like that, just, you know, how we think why we think what's what what our brain can do to us.

26:54
Can you give me a book that you read recently that kind of was exciting or new or fresh? Um, we're just the one that was I read the war of art by Steven Pressfield, which is a little bit I'm not an artist, at least I don't consider myself one.

27:16
So it was a little bit out of my necessary my, you know, my typical interest level, but I've always heard it was a great book for artists. And I actually bought it for my son who is an artist. And it's out on a shelf for eight months.

27:31
And, you know, I went down there and said, Hey, I'm going on vacation, I'm going to borrow this reading because yeah, no problem. And I read it was it was good. It was you know, it was about procrastination, quite honestly, is what I got out of it.

27:44
And, you know, as we know, the human condition is procrastination. And it was great kind of reading about it. And, you know, the other part, again, was just just do is really what it what I read, you're going to procrastinate, but if you just do, even if it's not your greatest doing, you're doing it.

28:05
And guess what? As you do it, it'll get better. Yeah, I read the book may have been 10 years ago, but I was on like that top stack top 10 top 20 all time. Yeah. And it mentioned a lot about resistance and how it's very natural for whatever you're supposed to be doing, whatever your passion or your purpose is between you and that there's always a thick layer of resistance.

28:30
It's about breaking through that resistance and putting in the time putting in the effort. But there was a quote, it was like amateurs wait for inspiration, professionals just show up every day and get the work done.

28:44
Yeah, right. Yeah, that's good. That's good point. Yeah, like just show up because you know show up. I think the artist mind has a tendency to go with their intuitive feelings and do what they want to do, but then the human logic starts to get tricky and avoid the things that are hard.

29:00
But once we get right through that resistance and aim right at it and fight that on the other end of that, and this is one of the last chapters in the book, he talks about how like magic kind of comes in where like beautiful intuitive things come through.

29:16
And that's where all the greatest stuff comes from. It's behind that resistance that we have to fight through. Yeah, that's true. And, you know, again, that's kind of my philosophy on, you know, the early morning workout, just go do it, you know, no, no one ever wants, you know, you're never that excited about it.

29:33
Like, oh, I gotta get up at 415 and, you know, get ready and then leave the door at 515 to get to the workout like that would I rather hit snooze yes but that's not going to make my day better. It's going to make my day a lot worse.

29:50
And just knowing that and getting through it and just doing it is just has been, yeah, it's, it's nothing like it. Um, this next question. So you've, you've led people you've, you've seen people's potential, you've seen them grow, you've seen them get stuck.

30:08
What do you think are some of the most common limiting beliefs that hold people back? I mean, I think if I were to narrow down to one, I think, and it might be human nature, just people don't have confidence in themselves, right?

30:30
It is, and I fall subject to it every morning when I get up, you know, you know, you don't have confidence that what you've done every day, what you've learned, what you've experienced, what, you know, what you're willing to try is going to get you to where you want to go.

30:49
So sometimes you are, you know, timid, and sometimes you're not willing to speak up. And I think, I think that is often what, what will hold people back, you know, and I have to consciously make an effort to break through that on a, on a daily basis.

31:10
And, you know, I guess part of that's leadership, right? You know, being able to step up, even if you're not 100% confident in yourself, and lead. So, you know, just thinking about this past trip with, you know, 60 people that went from Chapel Hill up to Ann Arbor.

31:31
And I was talking to one of my friends there. And she was like, what, what do you want to accomplish? And I'd written down like the goal is like, I want to, I want to talk to more people than I I've had in the past.

31:47
I want to be able to start the conversations. Um, and I'm great in a group of five to 10 people in a room. I can, I can do it. It's a group of 60 for some reason. I'm, I, I just, I can't do it too many people and I can't figure it out.

32:05
So my goal was, and I told her, I'm going to talk to more people. And so after every like event we went to, I reported back to her and say, Hey, you know, I talked to, you know, two new people. And it was, it was a pretty funny, uh, exchange, but it, you know, it set myself a goal and I accomplished it.

32:21
And again, it was confidence that I was missing and I knew it. So knowing that it, that you don't have confidence, but pushing through it is, is what many people I think need. One of our, uh, mutual friends, Marcus, he, um, had this quote he said once he said, uh, confidence is, um, keeping the promises you make to yourself, like I'm going to talk to more people, I'm going to get there.

32:48
And when you keep those promises to yourself, and you know, they should be easy and simple, like just show up, just talk to more people, or you know, just show up to work out and do something. Something I tell the guys in the morning, and my morning workout group, I'm never like tell them they're not working hard enough.

33:04
If they're there at 6am, and their heart rate gets elevated, they show it up. That's a win. There's going to be good days and bad days, but simply showing up, the attendance number is like the compliance number is the most important one showing up.

33:18
Yeah, right. Yeah, I mean, and then another like confidence quote was the self belief, like people can't outperform the image that they have of themselves. So if they've created this false ceiling of that's impossible for me to do, and I can never get there, then they're never it is possible to get there.

33:40
But if they believe that I can speak effectively in front of 60 people, as soon as I just speak in front of 12 people, 20 people, you know, that I can get there have that belief, or I can get in great shape, or I could have this happy family life or whatever it is, they have to have that belief.

33:56
And sometimes we're limited by our image of ourselves and our possibility. Yeah, no, definitely. I mean, it's something I work with on with my daughter a lot. She's, she's an athlete, and a teenage girl.

34:08
And so she definitely runs into situations where she's lacking confidence. And you know, I instilled two things in her, you know, I try to, you know, push her to think, hey, you put in the work, you, you know, you're out there, you know, every morning shooting basketball hoops, you're running, you're doing all these things you put in the work, you have, you have a coach, private coach, you just need to go out there and be confident that the work you did is going to result in,

34:38
you know, good results. And you know, the other thing I tell her is, you know, you're not gonna You're not going to make every shot, so take that out of your head, but you're not going to make any shots if you don't try.

34:50
If you don't try that new move, you're not going to make any shots. The other thing I teach her is it's more of a showing her about what people think of her. And I'm like, okay, you're wearing like a different color sock, Tatum, you know, their name's Tatum.

35:07
And so that's not, no one's going to even notice that. No one's going to notice. Do you notice what, you know, the other team's sock color is? No, you don't. You're playing basketball. You know, so stop worrying about what other people think because for one, it's not worth your time.

35:24
For two, they're actually not even thinking about you. It's not, you know, they're, they're thinking about themselves and they're probably worried about the same thing you're worried about for them. So just kind of, kind of break through that.

35:34
And, you know, I was just, she's 14 years old, so it's going to take her some time. But hopefully this, the old man's lessons are going to stick with her and she'll figure it out one day. Well, and you know, and one year from now, even if someone notices her socks were different or if you even if sometimes we say something we shouldn't say one year from now, people are not going to remember things that are relatively insignificant,

35:54
they'll be completely forgotten. But we're sitting there feeling some sort of emotion or stress about it when it's not going to matter. I mean, it's, it's a it's the human condition and whether it's, you know, evolutionary and we're not that far removed from some other situation where it did matter it's it's so it's very interesting.

36:15
Yeah. So you were saying just to kind of summarize there. It was, um, show up, and then, you know, lower your expectations you keep showing up like you're not going to crush it every day but share with the work and practice put the time in.

36:29
And then you'll be all right. Don't don't stress too much about what other people think or you know, every detail of every mistake that you make. Yeah, that's interesting is that I had had that discussion with our friend Marcus recently it's like some mornings, I am just not that into my morning routine.

36:48
And, you know, the old me would believe that if you're not that into it you shouldn't do it because you're not, you know, you're not putting it in, you're not giving it 100% you're not doing it but in reality what I learned and relatively recently is that those are the mornings I needed the most when I'm not.

37:05
When I'm not that into it when I'm not that prepared to start my morning routine. That's why the routine is there because guess what that gives you that boost of energy of confidence of accomplishment every morning that you need.

37:22
So it's that's something I felt and understood recently I probably have known it or experienced it but I definitely just understood that recently so anyone out there that doesn't feel 100% sure of their morning routine just go do it because that's the important part.

37:42
And then that's kind of the difference between, you know, 10 workouts a month and 18 workouts a month. That's a difference between 120 workouts a year, and 200 workouts a year is how are the results going to compound differently?

37:58
And you know, I'm just right. Workout perspective, because that's no, I mean, it's a good point, you know, and then I'm not always, you know, my workouts in the morning, like this morning, I, you know, took a couple reps off a couple things, but, you know, it's better than not being there.

38:13
And, yeah, um, so you almost kind of mentioned this, but when I asked, have you ever broken through, because I find most people that I mean, I would consider you to be extremely successful with Thank you.

38:27
the things you're doing, the purpose you have in your life, and it seems well rounded and balanced, and to become that kind of person and have that kind of life, most people have had to break through a frustrating, challenging situation.

38:42
You know, what would you have to break through, you know, what kind of made you? I mean, the big ones, my marriage and resulting divorce, I guess that was a big breakthrough. It was a huge breakthrough.

38:59
You know, at some point, I felt trapped. And without getting into all the details, felt trapped for some time and didn't see a way out. And getting to the other side, and getting through kind of the transition period, just, you know, six months to a year, and just seeing that it's possible.

39:28
It's great. It's better. It's, you know, the kids are better. I'm better. X is better. You know, that was a huge breakthrough. And it was an unknown. And I didn't seek information from, you know, a master, someone that went through it before I started to go through it.

39:54
So I would, you know, while I was there, and, you know, things weren't going very well, if I had to do it all over again, I would kind of ask around, but, you know, I'll put guys all this, you know, guys don't like to talk to other guys about problems, you know, everything, everything's great, we're fine.

40:16
And I was definitely felt that way. I've put myself out there more. Two people that are in similar situations that I was, and I feel like I've I've been helpful and at least sharing experiences with friends, employees that are going through a similar situation.

40:36
So I'm, I'm giving back what I didn't seek right now with that. And, you know, even, you know, even some of my F3 group, there's a whole, uh, there's a whole group of guys that are in similar situations and they get together and talk about it.

40:50
So it's been an opportunity for them. But, uh, yeah, that, that was the biggest, biggest breakthrough of my life and changed it for the better and for the better for my children. So I've really been, I've been blessed again with that situation.

41:07
That's awesome. That's, you know, it sounds like a, like a tough bunch of years. And yeah, if anyone is in that situation, Jason is telling you, it's, it's possible to come out happy on the other side and everyone, everyone on the other side.

41:24
It's it's it's probable. Let's just not say it's possible. It's probable. It's just you're when you're in that situation. And you know, it's a daily struggle. You just you can't, you can't see it. You're, you're, you're just trapped in it.

41:37
And because you're in it, and not stepping out of it and looking at what what is possible. And you know, if it's guys, listen to guys, ask for help. Jason, a lot of the guests on this podcast I've had and I've gotten more lined up but like relationship therapists because guys need to hear this stuff because they have conversations.

41:58
Yeah. And on that note, you know, I, I saw a personal therapist, my wife and I ex wife and I saw a marriage counselor. So we seek help. I seek help in that manner. But I never seek a lack of a better term, a mentor that has gone through it.

42:16
Because I didn't, I was hoping not to have to go through it and feeling that it wasn't possible. It's very interesting. You're definitely in a in a weird place. When when you're put to that situation.

42:31
So making that decision making that transition when it seems necessary, you will probably be much happier after the transitions made. And you sort of I think that's good for guys to hear. Yeah, definitely.

42:46
It's such a hard decision. It is. I got a couple more questions here. So unique habits, unique routines that other people might find surprising high performance routines, anything unusual or different that you do that someone around you might do anything unique, any habits, any routines that high performers might adopt that others might find surprising.

43:19
Um, I don't know if it's necessarily going to be surprising and you know, cannot our world these days with what I like to call bro science and all the podcasts like yours out there helping people teaching people but you know I'll go back to the reading thing again you know I haven't completely killed my TV but I don't you know I grew up you know in the 80s and 90s I watched way too much TV you know when I was a kid and at some point you know actually after my divorce I didn't I didn't get cable service I didn't get direct TV you know we get the occasional streaming thing so we watch movies and stuff like that but I essentially essentially cut TV out I recently cut social media out just because it's a distraction and you know if I'm looking at my whoop it brings my stress up when I'm reading reading stuff It's also a time suck because you can just get into the death scroll and keep going.

44:26
So that's one of the things I've implemented. Meditation in the mornings again, that's a practice journaling. Another practice that I've implemented that has been extremely helpful. I even do goofy things like grounding where I go stand in the grass for a minute to get myself ready for the day.

44:48
I think there's a little bit of science on grounding. There's definitely science on grounding. But do my neighbors when they see me out in the grass in the dark, wonder what I'm doing, probably. What's interesting about the way you're answering this question is, it's not surprising to me at all.

45:05
Like you're describing is really fundamentally across the board, all the fundamentals just work. You don't need to do anything unique or different or surprising. Like social media, TV, workout, meditate, probably eat healthy, manage very healthy.

45:21
Yeah. So yeah, I mean, that's the fundamental that's been that's been my trick. I'm not necessarily the most successful person in the world. So, you know, there's probably other secrets out there. But I've been, you know, as I told you before, I've been I've been seeking those, you know, been trying to find them.

45:37
And I've been implementing the ones that I can and that I feel like will work. And I've been trying ones and passing them off that don't work for me. And which ones that did not work for you? Just out of curiosity?

45:49
Well, it's a good question. Um, I cold plunging kind of got it just got administratively difficult for me to do just I don't have a cold plunge, I should probably buy one. So I switched to cold showers, but I still do the you know, it's still the same idea, but just not as difficult to implement in my daily routine, you know, so from what I've gathered I'm about to, I'm going to move to a different state here in the next four months.

46:23
And I'm thinking about like, I'm probably just going to buy like a coffin shaped freezer. And I got a buddy he, he could afford it, whatever kind of cold plunge he wants. But this is what he did. And he just freezes the water puts a temperature thermometer in there and unplugs it.

46:41
Don't forget to unplug it. So you just get some chest freezer and just fills it up. Yeah, really. And what I found is, you know, like, like I've got a buddy who's like a real hard ass, like he hasn't showered with warm water in like two years.

46:57
You know, like, when I cold plunge, I'm not thinking like, you know, I'm trying to get mentally strong from this. That's not my job. When I cold plunge, I want the physiological benefits. I want the norepinephrine in my brain.

47:10
I want the inflammation out of my body. And I just want to nudge this system. I don't want to blast my hormones as much as I can. I don't want to. exhaust my mental willpower. So what I'll do is I'll put it on about 45 degrees.

47:23
Okay. I go to a local place here and they keep the thing at like 35 and it's just torch. It's complete torch. Yeah. 45 is uncomfortable but but you can grip it and you can sink into it more especially if you're not as conditioned.

47:38
And I only do three minutes and yeah, hot cold like that if you want it just feels good. It just doesn't feel like it's this crazy psychotic cold plunge. Alright, well you convinced me I need to go back to it because now I just I just realized that I'm I'm hiding from it but it you know actually I did it for January so I did a carnivore and cold plunge January and the carnivore was great.

48:05
That was you know I had never had as much all day energy as I did on on the carnivore diet. Yeah that that was exceptional and then I was cold plunging at the same time. So my mornings were getting kicked off really well.

48:21
Wait. Let's hang out. Let's hang out with the carnivore diet for a minute. Okay. How how rigid were you able to be with it? Extremely. Yeah. I mean I was you know give me a sample day's diet. Sardines big part of it you know really um eggs bacon.

48:47
Look I got some wild plant sardines right here. I have those in my uh office right right across the way. This wild plant version is the only version I'd eat the rest of them. Yeah. Yeah. No, you're right.

48:57
I uh I actually got banned from eating those in the office. I eat them outside on the bench because they smell too bad but they're just so good. So so those were big part of it. Uh you know just chicken.

49:09
You know I'd cook up just meat. I'd cook up chicken. I had a lot of um what I have was an elk. I had I love a lot of meat from a hunt that a friend of mine went on and I was access dear. If you've never had access, that is the best.

49:28
It tastes like beef, but it's a lot leaner and healthier for you. Ate a lot of that. Really, I read somewhere you could have a little bit of cheese, so I had some goat cheese. That was kind of like my dessert as I would go with some goat cheese, but I pretty much stuck 100% to, you know, beating a little bit of cheese.

49:50
So it's a little bit of cheese. It's 100% meat. Is there salt? Are there any condiments? Yeah, I think salt and pepper were allowed, or at least I allowed them. So I put salt and pepper on my eggs and obviously a lot of the cured meats are salted anyway.

50:07
So you get a lot of, you're going to get some spices with meat sticks and such. And I tried to stick to, you know, grass -fed. organic, as much as I could. I mean, obviously, the meat from the hunt was, was as organic as it can get.

50:25
So, yeah. Oh, so you're probably deeply in ketosis. And that's what gives you that steady, low inflammation. Yeah. Um, how much how'd your body composition change in January? I got, I got lean. And I got, you know, I mean, I lost some weight, but it wasn't like anything that I was worried about.

50:51
But I, you know, started to see my abs a little bit more and, you know, just felt tight. Yeah, it was, it was good. It's, you know, it's like, I mean, that's like one of the most challenging, restrictive discipline diets you can do.

51:08
Yeah. I think some some people have serious autoimmune conditions really benefit from it. And I think like a month like that, like you can really shred some fat, you can really probably good for maybe a month.

51:20
Probably not long term though, huh? Right. Well, that was my concern is like, you know, did I do did I do damage during that month? I don't think so. But I you know, I wasn't wasn't willing to go any further with it.

51:33
I mean, I eat a paleo to keto diet kind of somewhere in between that if that's even possible, someone's probably gonna tell me that that's doesn't even make any sense. But you know, healthy whole food diet is kind of what I go for heavy on protein, you know, and you know, I'm not afraid of I'm not afraid of fat.

51:54
Yeah, that's actually that's really close to where I'm at is that paleo keto. It's a lot of protein and it's like clean healthy fruits and vegetables and probably some clean slow digesting carbs. Very low on like chemicals very low on processed sugar, no bread.

52:10
Yeah. I'm mad. Yeah, I tried to cut I've been a pretzel fiend throughout my life. And that's been a tough challenge. So still if a bag shows up in my house, I somehow find a way to eat it or if I go to my sister's I know she has some I can't stay out of her pantry.

52:28
But yeah, I stay away from some bread, some breads, you know, occasionally, you know, corn, corn tortillas for tacos and stuff like that is, you know, heavy carbs that I do some rice on occasion. Yeah, I'll do some rice to it.

52:43
It feels clean. When you were doing that month. Did you notice? What did did you notice anything about your sleep? I'll be honest, I'm I've always been a good sleeper. So I didn't notice a terrible amount of difference.

53:05
Yeah, well, I was asking because I wanted to see if your response was gonna be someone in my mind. Okay. My experience is sometimes when I get deep into ketosis, it's as if my body recharges so quickly that like I feel like I'm so energized.

53:20
I just need less sleep. And I'm like, I should be getting more sleep. But I'll check my tracking device and I'll have the REM sleep and the deep sleep covered. But I do it in like five and a half, six hours.

53:30
And I just don't feel like I need any more. I feel like I'm just recovering so quickly. Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, I don't know if I had that same experience. I didn't, I wasn't tracking my sleep at the time necessarily.

53:44
But what I did notice is that every winter when it gets dark, I have, I'm forgetting the term of it, but basically some sort of depression, for lack of a better word, you know, where I can tell that because it's only dark eight hours a day, or only light out eight hours a day that I'm not getting enough light.

54:09
And it makes me kind of down. And 100% I did not have that when I was on keto in January, January, you know, kind of the worst month of the year for that. That was that was a definite. Which might push me into doing another cardboard January, just this coming year.

54:32
Yeah, but when the sun goes down, you're like, Oh, feel good this winter. Right? Exactly. Yeah. I'm thinking about buying one of these like expensive lights that gives you sunlight, even though it's not real, but it gives you the same feeling.

54:43
And you know, that was on my list for last year. And then I went to the Keto for about the Keto, but the carnivore in it, it worked. How much have you played with experimenting different doses of vitamin D3 and K2 for that period of time where you feel that depression kind of committed?

55:03
None. I mean, I take vitamin D K2, but I didn't really mess around with doses. I just took what the recommended dose was on whatever I was taking. and I can't say that that helps or hurt me. I've had a chance to work with a lot of people and test a lot of people's vitamin D levels and play with different supplements.

55:23
And the reference range is 30 to 100. So a doctor won't say anything if it's 31, but we're kind of emotionally optimized around 75, 80. It's hard to get toxic. So I've had people, a lot of people take 10 ,000 units a day, every day, 10 ,000 units, especially in the winter.

55:45
And that dosage, I've never seen somebody get high levels from that seemingly high dosage. Okay, I'll have to check my dosage because off the top of my head, I'm not gonna know exactly what I've been taking, but.

56:00
That's 10 ,000 a day. That's good to know. And then I'll even like, night before last, I was actually feeling kind of sick. And like, you know, I just had a weird day where like, I didn't have energy and I couldn't figure it out.

56:11
And I just assumed, all right, I might be getting sick here. So on those days, what I'll do is I'll take like 50 ,000 units, sometimes three days straight, if I'm definitely sick. And those mega doses of vitamin D just for a short period of time like that, when you're sick, really, I think have an impact.

56:27
Like resiliency. Okay, that's good to know. Alright, I got I got two more questions for you. Do you have time? Yeah, let's do it. Um, tell me about the power of coaching of getting a coach. How have you benefited from a coach, as much as you want to share about your experience working with a coach?

56:47
Um, well, I have had extreme benefit from using a coach. I think, you know, when you first thought about your guy, I don't need a coach, I got this under control. And then, you know, when I first signed up with a coach, you know, I was like, alright, this is, you know, it's going to be an accountability guy.

57:08
So he's gonna just, you know, make me do things and report back next week. And it is not that at all. It's, you know, it has been, you know, called a transformation, working with a coach, you know, he's helping me with work stuff with kids stuff with personal life stuff, you know, just basically being a well rounded, well put together person.

57:35
And obviously, the more you build up the your personal life, your personal beliefs, your personal systems, the better you're going to perform wherever you want to be better. So to me, it's, you know, my goals are, you know, being a great dad and being great leader at the office.

57:56
And, you know, I've been, been very successful with that. and very happy with, you know, what my coach has provided for me. So anyone out there that doesn't have a coach that's thinking about it, give it a try.

58:08
It is, it's, it's transformational. You know, it's something you don't think you need until you get one and then you realize that you needed this all along. It's like, it's kind of like pouring gasoline on your fire and magnifying who you are, who you could be.

58:25
Right. No, it really is. You're right. And full disclosure, guys, me and Jason met because we have the same coach. His name is Mark. That's true. If you'd like to meet Marcus, he's, he's exceptional with a lot of experience.

58:40
And he actually taught me a lot about coaching, how to be a coach. And we all still work together. If you guys have any interest in that, definitely contact us. Yes, definitely. He's, he's a great coach, great leader, great friend.

58:55
So, all right. Last question. You've had a lot of experience with people building their dream homes, their customized dream homes. What have you learned working with these people, or I guess listeners might be people that want to build their own custom dream home?

59:19
What can you tell us about the big do's, the big don'ts, or what they could expect that process to be like? Oh, wow. Okay. So the custom building process, I will start with the bad part. It is not easy.

59:37
It is, you know, it is the first time this home has ever been designed and built. It is very emotional for the homeowners that are building the home. You know, often these homes are, as I mentioned earlier, their forever homes or their dream homes, you know, they've worked all of their life to be able to afford this and want it to be perfect.

01:00:04
There's no perfect. I will put that out there. Nothing's ever perfect. And, you know, with that, there is a lot of emotion involved in it. You know, they may have some date in their mind where they have to have the house done because it's so -and -so's birthday and they want to celebrate their birthday at the new house.

01:00:23
And so that puts a lot of pressure on us in meeting schedules. But it's an amazing experience. So we call it around here the exceptional building experience. That is our mission. We want to provide our clients with an exceptional building experience.

01:00:41
It's said multiple times a day. It's reminded of our team. And that is our focus. Obviously, we can build amazing homes. We can match the quality of anyone in the area, but we want our clients to really enjoy the process.

01:00:59
You know It's it can be a roller coaster throughout the process So we will never set the expectations that it's going to be easy the whole time We actually have a slide in our first presentation. That is a roller coaster so we can kind of give them the visual Often that has to do with progress, you know different stages of construction are faster than others.

01:01:22
So, you know, we can frame a Six thousand square foot house in six weeks and it goes from you know Basically flat foundation to a fully framed house and you know, people think the rest of the project's gonna go that long it's That's not how it happens It you know It takes a lot of time to get all the the mechanicals in the house wires pulled through it and all that before we can Move on to the next step.

01:01:48
So what's um, what's what's a time difference between like kind of just almost like a regular bill That's replicable versus the time it takes to build a custom home at that level We talk to people that kind of in the production world, some of them build houses in less than 100 days from start to finish.

01:02:10
A lot of them average in the 120 mark. Our houses take 12 months to build and sometimes if they're bigger and more intricate and have a lot more design details can take 18 to 24 months. It really depends on size, scope, and lead times on specific items.

01:02:33
We tell our clients, we're going to be part of your lives for three years from when we first meet to when we go through the design process to when we build the house. When you have your kind of unlimited warranty period for the first year and you have to really want to work with us and we have to really want to work with you and we have to have that agreement that we want you to have a great experience.

01:03:00
You want to have a great experience, but there's going to be some dips and we have to agree to get through those dips the best way we can. It's a blast. Like I said before, we get a team of 18 people that are doing this and we're able to serve more people as we have a large team and able to build more houses and able to put people in their dream homes.

01:03:26
I wouldn't trade it for anything. Yeah, you get to walk them through that house when it's complete and they get to see every detail that no one else has. It's customized just for them. Yeah, I'll tell you one experience recently that was just above and beyond.

01:03:42
We had a client that had been out of town for some time, probably three, four months hadn't seen the house, but they were coming back to see the house completed for the first time. They had us build the house, they had two designer furnished the house, and they were seeing this thing, this beautiful house for the first time.

01:04:05
It was a family of six, four kids, and the husband hired a bagpiper, I guess, to play as they drove up the driveway. So we got a bagpipe playing. We got clients seeing the house for the video. What's that video?

01:04:32
Oh, yeah. Yeah, it was beautiful. And it was just that's, that's why we do this. And that's, you know, that was certainly above and beyond. And we don't have a lot of bag pipers. Yet might be it might be a new thing.

01:04:45
But it was awesome. And they were, you know, these clients were amazing. They were extremely grateful for what we did. You know, extremely they're humble people, but this was their dream house. This is what they wanted for their family.

01:04:58
And it was it was a blast. You know, that's to recharge. You need one of those every once in a while recharge as to the why. Why do we do this? That's it. Awesome. Yeah, I think we have we just dropped a lot of info.

01:05:13
Jason, it was a complete honor to have you on here. You're even even cooler than I expected. If so custom dream homes, the website will be in the show notes and then the book foundation. Is there anything you want to share about the bold foundation if anyone's interested in that?

01:05:32
Alright, well, so the construction companies bold construction, Incorporated custom homes, renovations, build bold and see calm. The foundation is the bold foundation. You know, we serve the underserved and northern Chatham County Chapel Hill area.

01:05:53
And, you know, our goal is to give back to those that don't have much to build them up and give them the opportunities to, you know, move forward with their lives and give them the best chance to succeed.

01:06:07
It's yeah, we love it. Great. I think everyone deserves a clear path in life. That's true. Everyone needs an opportunity. It's out there. We just, you know, folks like us and you and we need to keep preaching that that can happen.

01:06:25
Well, Jason, thanks again. It was a complete honor. And all right, guys, I hope hope y 'all had a great walk. And we'll see you next time. Thank you, Matt. Appreciate it. Bye y 'all.