00:00:08 Sana: Welcome to the Mindful Living Show listeners, I am Shannon. As you all know, this is the space, the podcast where we talk, we ask, we try to explore deeper questions in a slower way about how to actually live. And, you know, often listeners, we, we encounter this question, you know, sometimes in our lives. I mean, we can call it like a midlife crisis or sometimes the, the perks or the experiences of adulting or just, you know, kind of just trying to survive through that. And most of us, you know, usually we learn very early how to be useful, how to be reliable, how to answer the email, hit the number, hold the family, hold everything together. You know, just keep it running. We get good at it. So good, so good that we sometimes look up at fifty or sixty or seventy, and we realize the life that we build is full of everyone we love and everything we worked for. But somewhere along the way, we forgot to ask whether any of it actually brought us joy. not happiness. Joy because joy is something quieter. It's slower. It's closer to the bone. And that's what today's conversation is about. How to find your way back to that joy. And to help me with this, I'm joined by someone. So let me share about about him with all of you listeners. Uh, my guest calls life led joy or life led living to joy led living and what, thirty years across business, real estate, architecture, and entrepreneurship taught him about what we really come here for. He is the author of the number one best international best seller, finding Joy, Journey of You in the motivational, self-help, and Personal Transformation. And after, as I mentioned, three decades in there, he now spends his life helping people shift from running their lives to actually inhabiting them through mindset, identity, purpose, and alignment. So. Listeners, let's welcome our honorable guest, Ted Kopko. Ted, welcome to the show. As always, it's a joy. Yeah.

00:02:34 Ted Kopecko: Shawna, it's a pleasure and it's an honor being here. So thank you.

00:02:40 Sana: Thank you. Thank you so much, Ted. we have, discussed this with a very different context on one of our other podcast. This podcast. And, that's, that's what the beauty of this is. I mean, the topic itself. It doesn't need any kind of specific category or theme or. Aspect of your life, whether it's that experiencing joy in your work or in your living, the way you think, the way you do. I think it finds its place in everything, in everywhere, in everything that we do.

00:03:16 Ted Kopecko: Well, the context of the book and I and let me kind of go back just quickly here. Yeah. The book is, um, the book is, is actually written by a human me today. Most books coming out are AI generated, but finding Joy journey of you took about three years to write. And as a reflection of the experiences that that not just I led, but what I saw in the businesses I had with the employees I had, what made people successful in their life, what made people work their lives, you know? Um, and joy is kind of a culmination of those thirty years. And, and the book is not about me. It's, really an introspection book about each of our lives. And wherever you're at in your journey in life, because Joy stands for the acronym is journey of U J o I. So, um, our joy is the journey that we live through and eventually what our destination is. Um, and you said it really well on, on the intro, you know, most of us are reactive to our surroundings. Most of us are life led, uh, because of various factors, primarily what we were taught when we were young and how, how did that goes? Those programs that were downloaded to us on our cerebral hard drive. How did that affect our life? And, and What type of mind did it imprint upon us? Most of it is been a very fixed mindset. And that's why you, you know, are our early years were somewhat indoctrinating us into a industrial work society. You know, there's nothing wrong with a job. But at the end of the day, you're at the end of the day, that type of existence leads people to an end of life regret. And so what finding joy does, it makes it, it allows us to stop for a second, reassess where we're at, and then determine if we want to change that trajectory to find greater purpose, raise the value of our time, create more freedom in our life. That's a lot.

00:06:09 Sana: It's a lot. But it absolutely. No, no, and not at all. I, I, I believe that we, we desperately need this, especially in today's, uh, times. But that also makes me wonder, that, not, not everything is in our control. Um, some of the circumstances and situations are not, uh, at least, you know, sometimes dictated by what decisions we make, but sometimes it's just how, you know, the life is. And it feels like, you know, we somehow have to find our way out through that. So in such scenarios, you know, in such circumstances, how do we make sense of finding, you know, some sense of joy in that? I'm not talking about happiness, you know, because joy and happiness are very different things. You know, they're different kind of emotions, but joy is something which you actually feel at a very, uh, deeper level of your existence. So how do we make this relevant in today's era? Or maybe it doesn't need any relevance. It's just it's just there.

00:07:18 Ted Kopecko: Well, I think what tends to happen is there comes a point in time in our life where we pretty much say to ourselves, enough is enough. You know, I'm not, I'm not getting I'm repeating the same day over and over and over. It's almost like Groundhog Day every day. Yeah. You know, and what tends to happen too, is I think we have to break this down in the beginning. And that beginning is what we were taught when we were young. You know, from the moment we were born, we were slapped on our butts by the doctor.

00:07:59 Speaker 3: Yeah, I have a negative.

00:08:01 Ted Kopecko: Experience just to start life. And that kind of set us in motion of the people we are today. I think most of us are are in the same boat. You know, we we maybe have different packaging and, you know, uh, different ethnic backgrounds and so forth. But at the end of the day, we're all human. We all live on playground earth together and we have the same hopes and, and the same potential dreams. And really what we want in our life is freedom in our life. You know, not to get over religious about this, but God never wanted us to work our life away. Now we're given so much time in our in our life. We don't know what that is. We talk about that a lot in finding Joy. Uh, the book and, you know, the essence of this. And when I go back and look at the successful people I've have in my life and the clients that I've had, what they have were able to do was connect the dots faster in our life. And what they were able to do was create more value for their time, faster than if we were just working our life away at a job. So the essence of finding joy is find a purpose that likes your fire. Okay. To raise the value of your time to become valuable. And that'll give you ultimate freedom in your life. Now through that, At. There's there's joy whenever we accomplish anything. I think most people will say to you, gosh, I really felt great about that.

00:10:03 Speaker 3: Yeah.

00:10:04 Ted Kopecko: You know, we're we're human beings that really strive to accomplish things in our life or we want to be. So what joy does is finding joy what it does, it Recalibrates our journey in this life let allows us to stop for a second and reassess where we're at.

00:10:26 Speaker 3: Um.

00:10:28 Sana: It's like a course correction. Ted.

00:10:30 Ted Kopecko: Yeah, exactly. You're, you know, uh, you're, you're, you're on the boat and you got the rudder. Most of us don't handle the rudder. You know, the steering mechanism on the boat.

00:10:46 Speaker 3: Mhm.

00:10:47 Ted Kopecko: We allow the boat to go wherever it's going to go. That's being Life led or job led. Job. And you know, you know what the acronym of a job is, don't you? The word job just over broke.

00:11:06 Sana: Oh my God. I didn't know that. Honestly, Ted. No, that that's horrible.

00:11:11 Ted Kopecko: I'm big on acronyms.

00:11:14 Speaker 3: So.

00:11:15 Ted Kopecko: You know, so and again, I, when I, when I guide people, when I talk to people and if you want to again, if you if your audience wants to get a hold of me or whatever, you can go to w w w dot finding joy dot gov and again, finding joy dot u s not dot com, but dot us. Guiding our own, our own boat and what, what, what most people do is we let life guide that for us and that direction. We don't know what that destination is going to be.

00:11:53 Sana: Exactly.

00:11:54 Ted Kopecko: We think what the destination is, right. And life will throw stuff in there for you, whether it's changes in your job, uh, going from one job to the next job to the next job. And you may be busy, but busy doesn't move your life forward. It just pays the bills at the end of the day. So, you know, if so, what we're looking for is a joy led. Life, which is more intentional about how you're leading your life versus having your job dictate what you do, dictate the amount of time off you have, dictate when you can go to lunch, you know, um, and dictate how much time you have and what we want to try to do, especially in finding joy, is to give us our time back. Now it takes work to do this, you know, but the work you're putting in is for yourself, not somebody else's business.

00:13:13 Sana: Absolutely, absolutely. I, I wholeheartedly agree, Ted. And, one particular question, uh, I, I think that your work really turns on, alongside, you know, the four words that you name, uh, mindset, purpose and alignment is identity. Because I think for a lot of people, especially people who have built something in the world over decades, like you have, um, the hardest part of the shift is not just a lifestyle change, but it's deeper than that. It's, it's letting go of who they thought they had to be in order to be valuable. You know, the builder, the provider or the strong one, the one has, uh, the one who has it all figured out, you know, everything together. So in your own journey, Ted, in the journeys you have watched up close, you mentioned about, you know, uh, people whom you have interacted with. Um, you realize that, you know, they could connect the dots, uh, a bit in advance. Um, what does it actually take for a person to release that identity they used to lead with and step into the one that's, you know, probably quietly been waiting underneath?

00:14:30 Ted Kopecko: Yeah. I can apply that to my own life. Um.

00:14:33 Speaker 3: Mhm.

00:14:35 Ted Kopecko: Pardon me. Um. When I first started out, um, I went to um, the School of Architecture and, uh, it took about ten years to get through it. Uh, very rigorous program. I went to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, which is one of the top rated top rated architectural schools in the nation in the US. Um, and when I finally got in, I went, okay. I made it. You know, what I actually was doing was actually, I think I was satisfying my parents, you know, more so than anything else. But I did get in. I was talented in a very creative way. Uh, God gave me those skill sets. Um, but when I got out, I had a very, very strong mom and she said to me, you're never going to work for anybody in your life. You're going to have your own. And that's actually what started finding joy. If I look back at the seedling of it all. But so when I got out of college, oh God, I can't go work for somebody. I'll disappoint mom. So I I'm joking around a little bit here.

00:15:57 Speaker 3: But yeah.

00:15:58 Ted Kopecko: So what I did was I, uh, I started my own practice and hired my own architects, even though I was not licensed at the time, I was able to do that. And by doing that, I grew a company up to about twenty architects. In that period of time. I became licensed myself. Um, and we were doing, oh my gosh, we were doing shopping centers, a lot of, uh, health care work, um, not hospital buildings, but a lot of interiors from owners to cafeterias, uh, you know, and a lot of, uh, industrial sized little sections in the, in my business. And I was thinking to myself, oh my gosh, I'm, if I just keep going this, if I keep just doing this, I will make it at the end of the day. Well, what happened was what I made was burnout.

00:16:54 Speaker 3: Mhm.

00:16:56 Ted Kopecko: Right. I worked so much that, yes, I was somewhat successful in architecture, but the cost of it was that I did not um. I didn't want to go forward with it. I didn't have any love for it. What I, what I turned out to be was a manager of a company, my own company. Granted. But, but at the end of the day, it didn't it didn't fulfill what I wanted to do.

00:17:28 Speaker 3: Mhm.

00:17:29 Ted Kopecko: And I think it's what your question was asked. Well, you get to a certain point that you say, okay, this is not working. You know, I can't go to the office every day and and resolve issues and problems. That's not making me fulfilled. That's not actually making me happy. Yes, we were doing a lot of stuff, but at what cost? You see, owning your own business. isn't exactly what is cut out. What it feels like or what it's cut out to be. What it is, is a job for yourself. And sometimes you're, you're the you're your own worst boss is you when you own your business because you apply to write too much for yourself. So what happened to me was I went, okay, this is not working. I need to readjust. I did, I became a commercial broker because I didn't have any employees. I had more free time. But at the end of the day, I and there was something else that was missing. And that was called fulfilling my value. And what I've done is I've created. Now real estate is still part of my real estate is still part of my, uh, my core businesses. But at the end of the day, what my core business really is today is allowing people to find their purpose, to create their value. MM. You know, so I think we're all people that want to help others. And that's the center around Joy. If you can find a purpose that will help others, your journey is going to be dictated by by your direction.

00:19:35 Sana: Absolutely. And it's not that, you know, uh, life will become all beautiful, you know, bed of roses and simple, but at least you will be at ease. Uh, you will be more, uh, mindful and intentional, uh, not reactive every time, you know, because life is unpredictable And in today's day and age, honestly, Ted, you know, we we are in some very interesting times of uncertainty. Um, I, you know, whenever I see this my inner self, it always gets nostalgic about the, the, you know, last few decades, you know, and I'm really fortunate enough that I was able to enjoy my time because honestly, when I look at the, at the younger generations, uh, now, um, I believe that maybe, you know, we can, we can do better in, in creating a better world for them where yes, uncertainties are, are there, but these are not like, you know, manufactured or, um, just some, some really unnecessary uncertainties.

00:20:53 Ted Kopecko: Well, you know, if you hit get on a. And this goes a lot deeper than just our short conversation.

00:21:01 Sana: Yeah.

00:21:02 Ted Kopecko: In the book finding Joy Journey of You, we really go into developing your value because I. I personally believe a happier world is where all of us can create value for each other and for ourselves, right? A happier world will lend to us better production, better understanding towards each other. Um, and the book actually goes into how does that happen? And there's four pillars of, or framework of joy. And that is your mindset, your identity, your time and your ultimate direction.

00:21:53 Speaker 4: Okay? Totally.

00:21:55 Ted Kopecko: Yeah.

00:21:56 Sana: I know, Ted. We are, uh, so we are nearing the minute mark, and I absolutely agree with you. Uh, these are such profound, topics and subtopics, and, it's about life. So thirty minutes is not at all, um, justified enough to talk about this, but still, I would want our mindful living listeners to continue this conversation along with you. so for them, once again, if you can share, what are the best ways to connect with you and also get a hold of your, finding joy or journey of your book.

00:22:29 Ted Kopecko: Well, let me end with, uh, part of this is the most important commodity we have is our time. And unfortunately, most of us spend almost like, and I use that word spend like spending money. We spend our time in a lot of ways, foolishly, and we waste a lot of time as we're going through life. So what I would say to your listeners and being mindful of living is be mindful of your time. We all have a in the book talks about this. We all have a, a time bank. And we're allotted so much time every day. We don't know how much when that's going to run out. So that's the problem. So and so how do you spend your time during your day? What I would suggest is what you want to do is, is develop the inner purpose that you know, you were born for and that that's the only thing that, that you know yourself. Um, and you have to develop that within yourself so that you can go out and provide that to others, provide that knowledge base, provide that value to others to help them grow in their life. Uh, so this is, this is a topic that is we're just touching the surface of it all because we're talking about human time. We're talking about human value and how, how we can create a happiness within our lives. And so what I would suggest for everybody to do is obviously go out and, uh, find, uh, find the book, finding Joy Journey of You. It is the number one international bestseller. You can get it at Barnes and Noble. Um, or you can go to our website w w w finding joy dot us and, uh, we can connect there. You can DM me. Uh, I am pretty much plastered all over, uh, all over the internet. So, uh, you can certainly, uh, just like you are. Shawna. Uh, so you can certainly go to LinkedIn, Facebook and look me up there too. And I would love to help you guys.

00:24:52 Sana: I, I bet I, I really, I really, really, really actually humbled and, uh, it's really inspiring the way that you closed this conversation. it may sometimes sound cliche or, coming from, you know, people would say, oh, now you've become an old person, but when you realize the value of time, then, you know, I don't think that, you know, there is no specific, there is any specific age to realize that value of time. So yes, it is the most essential commodity. And including my, including me, I believe we all should be mindfully spending our time. So thank you so much, Ted.

00:25:37 Ted Kopecko: For thank you. I really appreciate you and I appreciate your program and the value you're giving to others.

00:25:44 Sana: Thank you. Thank you so much. And to all the listeners. Yes, I'll have all the links mentioned in the show notes. So I invite all of you to check out Ted's book, The Journey of You finding Joy. And yes, you'll be able to find him everywhere. So to make that easier, once more step, I'll have all the links dropped in the show notes. And yes, wherever you are in your life, maybe in your kitchen, in your car, on the walk. Yes. Joy is not waiting at the end of your to do list. It is not on the other side of the next achievement, but it's already inside you. It's just patiently waiting for you to slow down enough to feel it. So with this, we conclude this episode of The Mindful Living. I am Sana and I'll catch you in the next episode. Thank you so much.

00:26:33 Ted Kopecko: Thank you.