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Welcome to think it be the podcast. I'm Kelly Hatfield.

Hey. And I'm John Michell. So today, Kelly, our topic is

aging, and the benefits of aging.

So I'd like your observations, what are you in your late 20s?

Early 30s?

Ever Told you, you're my favorite person?

Oh, you can't be over the what? 35?

I actually have a big birthday coming up. I will be 50 in June.

Are you serious? Yeah. So are you serious? I am stop.

Man, I'll tell you well, you know, you know what, what 50

meant to me. So I'm, I'm curious to see what 50 All mean to you,

but that this is perfect. So in two months, you're going to be

50. So just explain to our audience, your take on Aging,

the process the benefits? Just your observations about it?

Well, I love it. I am so excited. Well, first of all, I

think you're aging. I mean, what's the alternative? Yeah,

no, kid, okay. So I'm gonna always have that framework

around this that I'm lucky to see another year, and I'm

excited about what the next one is going to bring. And so I love

the wisdom that comes along with it, I love the

how you really get to know but like, by now with all of the

experiences that you've had, and the the trials and the

tribulations, and there's just things that you know, now that

you didn't know, then, you know, what I mean, and a competence

that comes with that, you know, I remember being in my 30s You

know, even as I turned 40, and in my early 40s,

you know, still, you know, kind of trying to figure out who you

are

caring too much about what other people think or about where

should I be, as opposed to where I am, you know, the kinds of

things so I just love the confidence, and the wisdom that

comes along with aging. The other thing too, for me is that

it really is just like, I feel better than I did in my 30s from

my physical, you know, I really take care of myself, my health

is a priority. And, and so it's just a, a number, I feel more

alive, vibrant and have more energy than I did in my 30s. So,

yeah, you, you know, I think you hit on a couple of things that

are great, you know, the wisdom and the confidence. And, you

know, I don't know what made me do this. But, you know, one

night, a week or so ago, ginger and I were having a talk and

I've been I just been reflecting back on, on my life. And

you know, I could see where I took a jump it just in, in how I

played the game of life as as an example, when I was when I met

ginger when I was you know, 52 I think or so, maybe 53 She

observed that every one small, it wouldn't happen all the time,

obviously, but but it would happen sometimes. Where I get

mad about something, and I would have a pretty foul mouth, you

know, I'd throw F bombs around. And and she pointed that out to

me. And I'm like, well, that's not how I was raised. You know,

I was I was went to Jesuit High School that there's no, that's

not a classy way to be. And, and so I immediately stopped it and

and she is surprised or because you know, just from that

recognition of it, I could stop it. And you know, I and you may

not even know this about me. You know there were three things

that happen

And in my 40s, that were pretty devastating. The first one is my

best friend died. And I found it. Oh, no, I didn't, which,

which was, you know, he died in a hot tub. And it was. And he

was, you know, a interestingly, two or three months before that

we both told each other, we loved each other, which guys

usually don't do that. No, but, but that shows you and so it was

obviously devastating. Then the second thing that happened, like

a year or two later, the US government accused me of

something I didn't do, you know, I owned a bank and my

authorities and they accused me of something that I flat didn't

do. And they were trying to put me in jail. And it was an ugly

situation and, and got really ugly. And but ultimately, I

could prove I was innocent, and they dropped the charges.

But very, very difficult. Period. And then the third thing

was I was in a in a business I really hated. And so those three

things as I'm rolling into my 50s, she, you know, probably

were the foundation for a lot of F bombs, you know, just to

inclination to F bombs. Well, yeah, there's a lot of anger.

There's a lot of anger there and right with the situations. Yeah,

right. Right. And, and, and, you know, but as once ginger pointed

that out to me, I'm like, Well, that didn't serve me. There's

no, that's not really who I am. That's embarrassing that I'm not

more articulate. Sure, I understand getting mad. I, by my

nature, probably have a strong temper. But you know, I'm going

to stop and and so I did stop it immediately. And, and she was

surprised that that just that, you know, being able to stop it

was possible. And and then, you know, I noticed, what was the

other one that I I noticed? Oh, I would every once awhile, get

mad out loud, like, I don't know, I bet everybody's like

this, especially around technology. You know, if there's

something technology that goes wrong, sometimes I, I would want

to take my computer and throw it in the lake. Not that didn't

happen a lot. But I'd be very vocal without using F bombs

about my anchor. And then I'm like, what, what good is that?

Do you know what and you know, this is part from learning from

Trevor Moe had the mental coach at Alabama that what you say out

loud is 10 times more powerful than, than what you think I'm

like, all I'm doing is is giving 10 times the energy to whatever

I'm upset about. I'm like, this makes no sense. And and, you

know, I saw that I was able to

immediately stop that. It just didn't make sense. And so the

point of those two stories is i i As I look back on my life, I

can actually see where I was one way and became more enlightened.

And I changed

it Can you can you think of things like in your life where

you've you saw something and you you evolve to a higher level?

Yeah, I mean, I think absolutely. One of the things

for me that many people listening can relate to?

Probably, probably a lot of women would be my guess is this

tendency to people, please.

You know, and so it was just part of my family dynamic.

Growing up, I kept getting into my 20s, my 30s I stayed at a

company that I shouldn't have stayed out as long as I did 14

years out of a sense of a false sense of loyalty and wanting to

please the owner, you know, and it all worked out the time.

Exactly. It was supposed to, but you know, I think that tendency

to,

to,

not at all costs, but to make everybody happy and to try to

make it okay for everybody and just how exhausting that is. And

in an effort to do that you, you put yourself nowhere on your

list. You're right. You know, we've talked about this before,

too when it comes to business or I'm saying yes to the wrong

things. I'm saying yes to everything I'm you know, burning

out running myself into the ground because of this, this

tendency that I have to try to make people happy, you know, and

it wasn't even to like me, it was more of just It's my nature

to like fix things. You know, it was the family dynamic that I

grew up in was just like if I can make this okay for

everybody, then maybe we'll get through it, you know, right. And

so that was a

Hard pattern for me to break and so boundaries. Right? Um, you

know, so going from not having any boundaries to setting

boundaries is a huge thing for me in my 30s and, and especially

the end of my 30s and, you know, 40 moving into my early 40s

Understanding that, oh, you know what I mean, it's so important,

I've got to start setting some boundaries around this, you

know, both professionally and personally, or, I'm, I'm never

going to be, you know, happy to the extent that I can be,

you know, so that definitely was one of the things for me was

that people pleasing nature and just understanding that.

And I know, this sounds cynical to, you know, but like, here we

go.

Get ready.

But I mean, it goes back to what your your, you know, that whole

idea when I was talking about being a little about being

judged, you're not talked about that before, people aren't

thinking about you at all, you know, that center stage

syndrome, you know,

where you think, you know, people are, they don't? If

you're not, if you say no, they're going to move on to the

next person who will say yes, you know, what I mean, like, so

just understanding the extent to which that, you know, saying no,

doesn't mean.

So, anyway, that was a big one for me where my behavior

shifted, you know, definitely. And then the other thing that

comes to with just confidence really quick, and that. So once

you've gone through, like having started, you know, multiple

businesses, having multiple businesses in operation now

making it through the highs, the lows, this roller coaster of

entrepreneurship and business ownership. One thing that as I

knew, as I come into this next, were this confidence, like, I'll

bet on me any day of the week. You know what I mean? Like, if

I, so knowing that, so just that confidence that comes with

having gone through all of that, and being able to reflect on it

to say,

I made it through that, or, man, here's how I would have

navigated that a little bit differently if I had that to do

over again, so that I'm carrying the lessons with me. So it's

just a different way of looking at.

There isn't that apprehension, like wondering if you can do

something or like, I know I can, and I prove it over and over

again, you know what I mean? Right, right. You know, I think

you're right. And, you know, the, this idea of operating in

life with confidence is, is so tied to what other people think,

because if you're really focused on what other people think, or

put too much weight on it, it detracts from your confidence,

because you're always judging what are other people thinking

about what I'm saying or doing. And, like you say, this is so

true, they're not thinking about you, you think they're thinking

about you, but they're not thinking about you. And, and I

saw in my 50s, how much fun life was when, when I operated at a

higher level of confidence. Of course, I was driven by our 12

minute day technique I was, you know, just was that level of

control I had over and have over my life was so immensely more.

But, you know,

I, it's always amazing to me relative to aging, is why do we

really have to get older to learn these things. I mean,

that's the natural effect of aging. But, you know, I look at

so many, so many of the things sort of the lessons that that I

have learned in my life, that people could have sat me down

and said at

25 or 30, and said, Now, John, here's about 10 or 15 lessons,

get these things. I mean, friggin get them,

so that you don't have to go through all the things that I

went through. And you know, maybe as I talked about this,

this is what, enthuses me about the new course I'm creating at

the University of Texas

to go even deeper than then they could be it but you know, but I

just see that oftentimes you tell people these lessons and it

goes in one ear and out the other, you know, I mean, what do

you think about that? I think I 100% get where you're coming

from but like this goes back to what we've been talking about to

like the people you surround yourself with are like I didn't

grow up around people who could sit me down and tell me the top

10 lessons in life to that wasn't my reality. I had a

couple of really a great, great teachers. You know what

I mean, in high school, right? There's some great coaches in

soccer, but nobody, not a mentor, you know, until I was in

my 30s, you know, that sat down and said, hey, you know, these

are the things that you really want to focus on in life, the

whole idea of focusing on the things that move the needle and

having clarity and all of those things, that wasn't part they

didn't teach that in school. Right. And then I wasn't around

that, you know, in my career, my company didn't offer that, you

know, so and so the importance of having a mentor, and if not

personnel, and I think, to your point, having been introduced to

it in a class, at that age, I mean, we I'd say this all the

time, man, I wish I would have been introduced to your method,

you know, 20 years earlier, I imagine where things would be

now and, and, you know, so I think it's fantastic, that

you're putting a curriculum together for, you know, for

young adults, to carry with them into their life? Well, you know,

it's, it's interesting. So as I develop this new course, here's,

there's four components to it. Leadership of self, which, which

means having that mindset, you can accomplish anything you set

your mind to, it's also personal responsibility, which means

never letting yourself be a victim, and always owning your

results. And if you don't like the results, you're getting

changing your behaviors, then it's teaching them what I call

six high performance, skills that like, like you just said,

if I'd learned them at 50, I made it 20 instead of 50, what a

difference that would have made. And then the fourth component is

mentoring. And as you're talking, I'm like,

I want you to mentor some of my students, you know, of course,

this will be down the road, but you would be so good to do it.

And I because I want to get successful people, once I get

them through my class, I'm going to mentor them, and I want to

stay in touch with them. But I need, you know, people have the

right mindset and the right level of success to mentor them.

It's just like, you know, this, just for our audience, we had a

couple of years ago, you came to my class in Austin. And and you

hired one of the students. Yeah, as a as an intern. Right. And

she was so blown away by the experience of being around you

that, you know, we need to replicate that. I guess it's the

bottom line. Well, I, I love it. And it was so funny, I said, I

say to everybody about that experience, and about doing

think about with your, you know, the college program over the

summer is, like, I have so much hope for the future when I meet

with those young people, because they you know, these young

adults who are just starting and are fulfilled with, you know,

there's this. I don't know what the

narrative out there around our young, young adults and the

different generation, it's like, no, there are there are future

and I'm very optimistic based on these wonderful young adults

that are coming out of University of Texas. And yeah, I

just been blown away by them. So that's something I would love to

be involved in, you know that? Well, you know, our, the the

motto at the University of Texas is What starts here changes the

world. This has been the motto for like, forever, and they used

to have when Walter Cronkite was alive, he went to the University

of Texas, you can hear Walter Cronkite saying that. And so

it's pretty cool. But but you know, on this thing with aging

to this past year, I don't know how it happened. But we had all

freshmen in our class, as opposed to

primarily juniors in in, in the prior years, that Bill and I

build the former Chancellor and I teach and what a difference,

you know, those those freshmen, they're like deer in the

headlights, you know, they're just glad to be away from mom

and dad. And of course, my big push is around leadership itself

and personal responsibility and, and for when you get out in the

real world, they're not worried about the real world. They're

four years away from the real world. And, you know, that's why

it's sort of evolved for me to go. I want to teach

basically, just seniors, maybe some juniors but primarily

seniors, and I only want to teach athletes

It's because the athletes are the highest achievers as a group

on on campus. And this is what our 12 minute day methodology is

clearly for high achievers. But you know, it's interesting that

relative to age, you know where they are, when they're what 18

versus when they are when they are 22. And as you'll see, when

you turn 50 is going to be powerful. Because you're and you

I, my prediction is, you won't think about it a lot until you

hit it. But then over the next three months, you're going to

reimagine your life. Promise and so that the lesson to our

audience I think, is

reimagine your life right now. Whatever your age are, don't

wait for that decade. Birthday. Does you think that's lesson?

Yeah, I think absolutely. That's the lesson. It's never, you

know, now is the right time to reimagine your life. You know

what I mean? Not tomorrow, not 10 years from now, don't wait

for those big, you know, birthdays, now is the time and

I'm doing a lot of that right now, in a reflection. Okay, what

do I want this next season to look like? You know, so I'm,

I've been kind of knowing that this has been coming up working

on that a little bit and shaping that. And so yeah, you know, I

got a suggestion for you. I just started doing this. Two weeks.

And so I will see how it evolves. But it feels pretty

good. Where, you know, every day I exercise, and I get on the

treadmill at 530, and why it's the evening news. And after I

get off of it, now, I go, and I sit down. And I've usually,

maybe I've I've read the Wall Street Journal already. So I'm

thinking about what's going on in the world. And I've just

watched the news. And I'm, I'm sitting back, intentionally

thinking, what am What am I observing in life? What am I

observing in the world? What am I observing in my own life? What

am I learning? How am I growing? And you know, it's really

fascinating when you intentionally look at not just

what is happening, but what am I learning? What's, what's the

trends here? What do I think about my life? What What, what's

reality telling me is, am I going in the right direction or

not? Yo, I found it fascinating. I've done a lot of writing over

the last two weeks around that because every, every Sunday, I

try and write what I'm how I'm growing and learning, but it's a

fascinating process. Yep, I am, I am all for it. I love that.

And I'll give it a I'll let you know, I'll report back and let

you know how it goes. Well, you know, we're gonna charge your,

your path of turning 50 This will be good.

You know, I see that, that doing our podcast is so interesting,

because it it lets us both pontificate about life. Not that

anybody cares. But nevertheless, you know, we have to, we have to

take what's in our head and, and turn it into words to

communicate with each other. And there's, there's power in that.

But

I think I think the takeaway to all this is

aging is it the benefits are, are so great. And yes, some

things decline physically, but, but I'm sort of like you, you

know, I I feel sort of top of my game, both physically and

mentally. And you know, the power of aging is you just get

more confident you get you care less about what other people

think. You also see that 98% Of all the stuff that goes on

really doesn't matter. Right? You know, exactly. Yeah. And I

know when I had 175 employees and I bet you're the same way.

You know, I sort of learned that if you did the vast majority of

the things the average it really didn't matter. Although your own

pride wants to do them all. Well, the once you let go of

that and just focus on what moves the needle. You know,

that's that's what aging does for you is makes you forget all

this stuff that's immaterial and just focus on the stuff that

matters. It Real quick, John, I know we're wrapping it up but to

that point, the other thing that aging is the way you spend your

time, like the quality of my time the fact that it is more

and more precious, right means you're spending it. At least I

am have made a choice to spend it.

More plugged in more present

Even more, you know, so I'm squeezing, you know, as much as

much joy. And I mean, that's one of the things that I analyze my

day by when I'm reflecting on my day. It's like, did I laugh

enough today? Because I gotta change that. That's joy is one

of my, you know?

Oh, I know, I know, you know, you gotta laugh. Yeah, man, I'll

tell you. You know, I appreciate my relationship with my friend,

Bobby,

who I talked to every day, and I've known him for 40 years. And

the beauty of him is it every day, we, we belly laugh, and is

usually cutting each other down that creating the laughter. But

I don't know. And I see is as I get older,

how grateful I am for, you know, for my health for my friends,

including you. But you know, my really close friends. And

you know, and I was just watching this presentation on

frontline PBS Frontline about retirement and how people are

generally not prepared for retirement. And I'm so thankful

that, that that's not me. And

I just, you know, like you said at the start, as you get older,

you just get more grateful and what a great way to live being

more grateful. Yeah, yeah. And you don't have to, you know,

think of it you don't have to get out you can start being

grateful today. Start being grateful today. Everything today

because this is the this is all we're promised. Right? Right.

Well, you know, especially with our methodology, which is all

about creating, creating immense intention and clarity about your

life. Yes. Will you today, embrace being grateful? Embrace

focusing on what moves the needle embrace, not worrying

what other people think you know, and train your

subconscious mind for all that. When you do, boy, watch what

happens. Okay. Well, until next time, we'll see you.

Thanks for listening today. If you've had your own aha moment

from today's episode, send me or John an email. We'd love to

share your epiphany with our audience. So email us at

Kelly@thinkitbeit.com or John@thinkitibeit.com. In the