Welcome back to another episode of the Genius Podcast.

My name is Karen Doyle, your host and founder of The Genius Project, an

initiative for Catholic women designed to resource and support you towards

growth in all areas of your life, personal, spiritual, and professional.

We seek to do this through the Catholic Women's Masterclass, the Genius podcast,

which you're listening to, as well as our Catholic coaching programs for women

and other online books and resources.

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Ladies, over the last few weeks we have been.

I guess following the breadcrumbs, as I like to say, we say that in business, but

following the moves of the Holy Spirit.

And I really believe that the spirit is inviting us as women to

tap into and unearth our unique God-given potential and gifts.

And it's in finding and discovering what those gifts are that we discover

our mission, our purpose, and what our personal vocation is, where we are

being called to serve and to contribute with our gifts and into the lives of.

Those around us.

So to take this conversation further, we are incredibly blessed today

to have Andreas Vidmar joining us.

Andreas is the founder and director of the coco Center for Principled

Entrepreneurship at the Catholic University of America, where he loves

to teach and mentor students towards.

Their true calling.

Previously, Andreas helped lead high tech companies bringing more than 100 leading

edge technology products to market.

He also led several organizations focused on enterprise solutions to poverty.

Most interestingly, he is a former member of the Swiss Guard serving under Pope

John Paul ii, and he is the author of the book, the Pope and the c e o, which

describes the 10 lessons that he learned.

From the late hope about leadership, and importantly, the centrality

of the human person in work.

Andrea's biggest accomplishment in life is building a great marriage together

with his wife Michelle, and his biggest joy is seeing the character of their

teenage son Eli, develop and Grow.

Andrea's has a passion for helping professionals of all ages to find deeper

meaning in their work and sustainable success in principled entrepreneurship.

Ladies, this conversation with Andreas is, Seriously, one that

you are not going to want to miss.

So I really encourage you to carve out the time and space to maybe take

some notes and to really listen to what he's sharing in this week's

episode of The Genius Podcast.

Enjoy.

Well, Andres, welcome to the Genius Podcast.

You're in one of the, the v i p group of three men who've had the, um, the

privilege of being on this podcast.

So welcome.

You're joining us all the way from just outside of Washington, DC Thanks.

Thanks for having me.

I feel very privileged.

Not only.

I, one of three men, but I'm on the Genius podcast, so that's, that's an achieve.

Oh, well, look, thank you so much.

I know you and I connected, I, I tracked you down on Instagram recently, but I

actually came across you to begin with reading your book, the Pope and the c e o.

And this was a beautiful read.

I know that you've been a guest on my husband's podcast as well, and,

and he connected with that book, I think when it first came out,

but I'm a little slow to catch up, so I'm a few years behind him in.

Connecting.

But it, look, it was a, a beautiful book and you've had such an incredible

sort of journey in your life.

I guess working, you had the privilege of serving blessed Pope John Paul II in the

Swiss Guard, which is I, I just cannot imagine the honor and that experience.

But before we dive into that, could you share a little bit

about yourself with our listeners?

Your background, what you're doing now?

Yeah.

Um, so right now I'm, I'm here in Washington, DC um, I teach at the Catholic

University of America in the business school, the British School of Business.

And I started an entrepreneurship center here called the Ciocca Center

for Principal Entrepreneurship.

And, but I'm, I'm not an academic.

I don't have a doctorate.

I'm a practitioner, so I have, I'm a lifelong entrepreneur.

Um, as you say, I was in the Swiss guards many, many years ago as a

young man, but came to America and.

I was very blessed with a career in high tech software building

companies, forming, you know, growing and helping to grow companies.

And so on.

This twist and turn way, I found my way to appreciate more and more.

I mean, my, my initial kind of, you could say reversion, but I grew up

as a cultural Catholic, more or less.

Sure.

But then when went into the Swiss Guards, which is a foreign legion,

I wasn't, I didn't do this.

Most of the Swiss Guard don't do this for religious purpose or or religious reasons.

They do this because it's cool to be a bodyguard and it's

sort of a military thing to do.

And, and that's why I did it.

I didn't know what else to do and that I thought it was cool to be a bodyguard.

And then, but then I met John Paul second and if changed my life and I

found through him, I found Jesus Christ and I, I became a practicing Catholic.

Wow.

And then, but then, you know, it's like one step forward, two steps

back through my whole career.

I.

It took me a long time to integrate what he taught mm-hmm.

Into my work, you know, to bring this from Sunday to Monday through Saturday and, and

to, to really make my work, my prayer, my business, my prayer and, and do all that.

And that's something that I eventually wrote this book about.

And then that book led to the invitation by this university for me to help them.

Build a business school and, and that's what I've been

doing for the last 10 years.

Fantastic.

What an experience.

What a journey.

Indeed.

Praise God.

I, I feel, I, I feel very blessed.

Yes.

And I think what you are, what you mentioned there is just that you

went into the Swiss Guard not really knowing what you wanted to do.

And I find it amazing how we can have a plan for our life and then

we can start off on that plan.

But then God has other ideas and, and kind of, we have these different paths that

sometimes we might think are obstacles or disappointments, but can actually lead to.

I guess our true vocation, a mission.

One of the reasons why I left Switzerland was actually because I

pretty much failed at everything.

I, I was horrible in school.

I, I have adhd, I, I I, when I was 20, but before I went into the Swiss

guards, I'm, I'm not kidding you, I think I read two books in my life.

Really?

I grew up in a village of 400 people in, in the mountains.

I was more outdoors.

I was a physical kid.

Yeah.

And.

So I came there with very little self-esteem.

You know, the, usually the tough guys are the ones with the low self-esteem, so

they make up with it with the toughness and yes, and that was me pretty much.

Okay.

And so that's something that John Paul saw right away.

Now the way this works with God's providence, I think it was c k Chesterton

who wrote in, I think it's the idea in the Ilian, but it doesn't really

matter, but basically, What we do is we collaborate with God in a way, and even

when we collaborate and make choices, God is like creating a symphony around us.

And then we come in and we make the wrong tone, right?

Mm-hmm.

And we like coming in and I come in and say, I'm gonna leave my country.

I'm gonna go do this.

And in a way, I'm, I'm doing it halfway, more than half.

Not for God.

And then instead of God, you know, this is like the prodigal son kind of picture.

Instead of God saying, oh, you not even, you should, you know you, I'm

gonna exclude your, because it of course disrupts the symphony that God is playing.

Instead of excluding me with that, or excluding you or or anybody with that,

what God does is God expands the symphony.

Until your tone fits.

You see what I mean?

That's beautiful.

It's like that's my whole life story, that at all these places when I failed

and at one and didn't measure up and I had a low self-esteem and all that.

God would use this and expand the th the symphony until it fit into the great

orchestra that God is like playing.

The, the, this music of my life.

The music of your life.

The music of, of, of salvation history.

That is a really beautiful analogy.

I love that.

I have never heard that before actually, but it's, it's quite beautiful.

It was my, it was my son who told me about it.

Rose because we homeschooled our son for the entirety of his education and,

and he's very much into Chesterton and Tolkien and things like that.

And he read that and comes to me and says, this is the most beautiful.

And I said, yeah, this isn't be the most beautiful thing.

It's amazing.

You mentioned that you're homeschool your son.

We, we homeschool our eldest daughter as well.

And um, I think what you'd pick up on something there is quite beautiful is

our school system just dumbs down a lot of the beauty, the truth, beauty and

goodness really of what the church offers.

Yeah.

And what's available to us to flourish.

And I know our eldest daughter, her world has just opened up in

terms of what she's learning.

And similar to you, she comes to us every day and I've learnt this

and I've learned this and yeah.

Beautiful joy that's opened up inside of her.

And, and I think what I see in her is these seeds of vocation beginning Yeah.

To emerge, which is, is really beautiful to witness.

You know, one of the things, and I I, I'm just putting this together now

as we're talking, is one of the key things that John Paul would tell me

that would just like blow me away is to say, I cannot wait to see the great

things you're gonna do with your life.

And I'm like, Are you talking to me like I, I'll absolutely have

absolutely no capacity to do this, but he says, oh, yes, you do.

God is giving you all these gifts and everything, and I want you to not be

afraid, like put out into the deep go.

Don't be afraid.

Go.

What we're doing in our school system today is we're actually not

holding the kids up to a stand.

We have no confidence in them, and we have no hopes in them.

We, they're not saying, oh, I can't wait to see the great things

you're gonna do with your life.

We basically put the students in a performance like in a, in a box.

That they have to do a certain conformity, conformance, or performance,

but we are not in awakening in them and seeing in them the person

that God has made them to be.

And this, it's almost like this blossoming coming out that they learn

the love of learning and the love of the desire for God to then reach for

that excellence that God made them for.

We are suffocating that with a school system that ha, that leaves no room

for, for personal vocation in this, which is as different as, as, as

many, as as people that we have.

Yes, absolutely.

I remember my daughter came to me a couple of years ago.

She said, mum, if I stay in this school, I'm going to end up really dumb.

She said, because we just, we do nothing like girls are online

shopping, everyone's on social media.

And she said, I actually want to learn.

I thought my husband and I said, well, What can we do?

Like you, you have to listen to that and, and I think for us, our

daughter, one of her charisms will be, and one of her gifts is this

passion for truth and for knowledge.

So I say to her, I can't wait to see what you are going to do with your

life, cuz I see those gifts emerging.

And this week I was walking with my son, he's only 14 and he's sort

of starting to talk about electives and what he might do with his life.

And he said, well, Someone said to him, you should do this, this, and this.

And I, I opened up his world with a whole different, I guess, what do you call it?

A, a table or a, a platter of, yeah, what can you do?

Like what is possible, and let's have a look at what your innate gifts are.

Let's check out your strengths and, and let's help you identify those so

that you can make good choices that will lead you towards the vocation.

God's chosen for you.

And I.

I love that.

This, this is exactly what I'm teaching in my course here at the Catholic University.

So I have one course, the intro course to business.

It's called The Vocation of Business, and it's based on, on,

on my book to Pope and the ceo.

Yes.

And in it, I'm, I'm basically approaching life from that.

I mean, there's three levels of vocation.

There's the universal vocation, which we all have, go back, go to

God, and, and, and go to heaven and, and adore and praise God forever.

So, but then there's the primary vocation, which is our way.

Of life.

So are, do we are, are we called to be married or religious or priest or single?

And that's, and and I go with the students through this, but then we

have a secondary vocation, which, which is what do you do every day?

Right?

Yeah.

And that's your, yeah.

That's, that's your work.

And what we need to do is to find through the gifts that God gives us,

and I specifically work on the secondary vocation, so I'll talk about the

others, but that's, Different classes.

I'm talking about the work vocation.

You say, the first thing I need you to do is to meet yourself,

to learn to ask like your family.

And so what do you think?

I have like a gift.

Gong gives you gifts.

That's why they're called gifts, right?

Talents and is like gift.

And so what I do is work with the students, with every student

in my class, work to help you do an inventory of your gifts.

And these are external gifts.

I'm six nine.

I'm a tall, big guy.

But there's, that's one gift, right?

And say, now how can I use this gift to help others, right?

So there's two things I want to teach you.

I want to help you figure out what your gifts are.

And for that, I'm gonna, I have a whole program to help you with that, and

then to turn around and then use these gifts and say, how may I help you?

That's the core question of business.

If I can help you with my gifts.

Creating value for you, which value is another word for profit.

If I can help you profitably with my gifts, I, we have a business, right?

And then, and then when we have a business that becomes our, our

profession, our career, our industry.

And that's what the student, uh, learns throughout the school.

That's why I start with every student individually a, a business in, in class.

I don't let them collaborate with each other.

I want, because I wanna show that I have had 1,200 students so far since I

started teaching, and I have never had a student who couldn't start a business.

Wow.

Because God gifts, gifts to people every, every day.

There's nobody without gifts.

That's right.

Absolutely.

And you know, as you're talking, I think the Holy Spirit is actually

doing something at the moment.

The Holy Spirit has a message, I think, especially for the women who

listen to the Genius podcast because the last two episodes that we've

recorded have been along similar lines.

Mm-hmm.

And, and I think that the Holy Spirit is wanting to awaken within women,

particularly their unique gifts.

And then where are they called to serve and contribute?

Yep.

Because, I mean, it's a principle of life, isn't it?

We reap what we sow, that when we are contributing, when we are seeking to be a

gift, that's actually where we find true happiness, fulfillment, and joy is indeed.

And I wanna say that this what I'm saying.

So work is primarily the question, how may I help you with my gifts?

Then?

Much most work done in the world really is actually not done for profit

because it's done for another reward.

One of the ways of, uh, of, of human interaction is to get a reward.

And the reward is love and service and holiness and all of that.

And that's a lot of us at home.

Like my, my wife and my, my mother-in-law just took care of my father-in-law who

passed away, you know, a year or two ago.

And that is, that was work.

Mm-hmm.

But the reward of that has to do with eternal life and,

and love and all of that.

Um, but in, but that doesn't mean somebody who does that

cannot move and move into the.

Business world of saying, how may I help you and add value for others?

Yes.

Maybe outside the family or so, and start to generate a return with them.

Mm-hmm.

That's, that's what I'm teaching.

That's, I, I do a little bit in this book.

I do much more of it in, in, in my new book.

But I think that's especially true for, you know, I often talk to women

who have used their, their genius.

You know, John Paul would love to call the, the, the feminine genius who educate

and bring up their children and to take care of people in the family to help maybe

run the husband's business and everything.

And now they're at the point of saying, okay, I'm now ready to do to

for the next chapter and do something.

That's when I do a lot of work in helping people.

How do you discern that?

How do you create a profitable venue without betting the farm?

How do you explore these talents and see what the market is?

Response to that can turn into a profitable, uh, revenue stream.

Yeah, absolutely.

And I think I, on the last podcast that I did with Renee Doyle, we spoke a little

bit around this idea that sometimes women get lost in and they kind of move

to the sidelines of their own life.

They think that they're just a mum or just raising the kids, which

is a sort of an illegal word.

I would say, yeah, there's no trust on that.

There is, that is the greatest task.

And I think in our culture, we need to remind women that they don't

necessarily have to be out producing and, and getting all the Instagram

likes and kicking big goals because you, let me just tell you something.

Let me just tell you something.

So if you are a mom listening to this and you think you trust brought

up one or two or three or more kids, The most stressful thing.

So I ran companies with thousands of employees.

I was in the military.

I was a bodyguard.

The most stressful thing I've ever done in my life is when my wife was

in the hospital and I had to take of a take care of a six months old.

I didn't eat, I didn't sleep, I didn't watch, I didn't know what was up or down,

and I can handle all these other things, but this, you couldn't handle that.

And I, I kissed her feet and I thank God when my wife came back.

Now you tell me you have nothing to offer.

I beg to differ.

Can you speak into that for a moment?

Because I, I, I really think it's a powerful message.

I don't, I believe as we're progressing in this culture, and, and I think throughout

Covid the last five years, different trends, ideologies have accelerated.

And I think there is a real devaluing of the gift and the value of femininity and

the gift and the value of motherhood.

And I'd love you to just speak into that.

To really affirm women and remind them of their value.

The biggest thing I, I want you to have confidence.

I want you to have confidence.

I keep saying this to my students as well.

Trust you are, you, are, you are, you are a daughter of God, like God made you with

all kinds of possibilities for the good.

Okay?

One gift that you, and, and of course every person has to be that

you have to discover the gifts for every person, and some we can say.

What John Paul would talk about the genius, uh, of women is that empathy.

Mm-hmm.

That you, you basically, and the reason why it takes, why I have such a horrible

time, I think with, with the six months old, is that everything is a crisis.

I have no anticipation because I don't know what's coming.

So I don't have the empathy to actually say, this is a sign of that to come.

I don't see it.

So think of what I said, the core sentence of business is, how may I help you?

Who can answer that better than a mother or a woman or a person with

strong empathy who sees the other person and they don't have to say a

word, you know exactly what they need.

That is, that is gold.

Okay.

That, I mean, this is like what, what product producers, product

creators, service providers want is the anticipation of the customer need.

Now you can say, well, I don't know about this product or that product.

That's a skill.

There's a difference.

You, you have talents and then the skill.

So the talent, I can't teach you the talent.

Either you have the talent or you don't.

It's like, I'm six foot nine, I'm not gonna be a horse jock, okay?

That I can't train myself into it.

But as a tall guy, you can teach me basketball, right?

So as a person of empathy, marketing and understanding how a product

works or how the market works is something that's a skill, not a talent.

Mm-hmm.

Talents you have, you discover skills, you learn, you acquire.

And then the third thing, you can really only teach three things.

You can teach, uh, the, uh, the, the skill, the knowledge.

And then the third thing is the character.

That is your values, your virtues.

Your what you, how you behave and what you desire ultimately.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

And those, those you have as a, you know, if you brought up a family and

you, you nurture the family, then that's, you're, you are good on that.

It's the, the middle piece that's missing and that's the skill.

But the skill is the easiest part of the equation.

Yes.

Basically a skill.

You only a.

Acquire through practice and my approach to these kind of things is

always to say, what's the next step?

Don't, don't go.

Don't get ahead of yourself.

Just say, I have an overall vision and my and your only decision, and

your only question is, what's the next small step I need to take?

Don't, we're not talking about five years from now, just take the next step.

And, and start to define the measurements.

I, I love to sort of work with God in a way of saying,

look, Lord, I'm gonna do this.

I'm gonna pull on this, and if you want me to do this, then

put, put a fish on the end.

Put a fish on the end of that line.

And I, I'm gonna pull on this line and this line and this line.

That's my way of discernment, but I have to do the next step and the next, and

the next, which is to pull on the line.

And that's a very basic form of discernment.

Well, you pray through it, but it's a very basic form of discernment,

which our commitment is action.

That we act upon our insights and to act upon the talents that God gave

you, that you don't go bury them, that you actually trade with them.

Mm-hmm.

And that's, I, I think what we're called to do.

Absolutely.

And to be good stewards, like I think you said that first

step is that self-awareness, like understanding yourself.

That's sort of what I was teaching my son.

I'm like, what brings you life?

What brings you joy?

What are you good at?

So it's that self-awareness and then it's, it's sort of stewarding and identifying

the gifts a and then upskilling.

So that you can serve.

Yeah, because I think, you know, a gift is very much like a

plant that we have to water it.

We have to cultivate yeah, the soil and provide the conditions

so that it can grow and flourish.

And I think sometimes we forget that we, we think that God will just

drop a facts from heaven telling us what to do, but we forget this

cooperative and that co-creative aspect.

Do you know that I don't teach, it's not exactly true, but in general

I do not teach business plans.

Because I want to teach business dues.

D don't, I'm I, I want you to have a, a, a general idea of what you're gonna do.

But you know, you know, as well as, I, I mean, you guys have,

have started several businesses.

The first thing that's gonna change is the business plan, and the reality looks

very different than the business plan.

My goal, In working with students is to say, let's find the first customer.

Let's go ask the first person, how may I help you?

And then do something profitably.

Once you, that's an immediate market validation.

It also gives you a immediate revenue, and B, it gives you immediate feedback on

That's so helpful on so many levels, and that's what I mean by fishing right away.

I put the line in the water right away.

Your goal is not to create a business plan.

Your goal is to get the first customer.

And that can, and there there's this idea.

That's this guy, Kevin Kelly.

It it, it applies to this small startup, I would say.

I, I teach this method called Lean Startup and okay.

People always think that I need to have this huge business and I need to

be, whatever you call it in Australia, we, Walmart or Amazon or something.

No, no, no.

You don't need to be Bill Gates.

I don't know Bill Gates.

All you need is if you have a small business where you have a

call to action and there's maybe.

A thousand people somehow involved in what you're doing.

You're done.

All you need is a thousand customers and you're done.

That's a much more manageable, and, and once you get one and then

two, and then three, and then at a hundred, you're already at 10%.

Yes.

Imagine.

Think about it that way.

And who would be that first one?

That's why I would, the time, instead of into a business plan, I, I invest

into the first profitable customer.

And, and it's take, like taking that first step and meeting that

first person, uh, coming to mind as a woman here in Australia.

Her name's Janet Smith and she had this beautiful idea.

So it might not even be a business idea.

It might be a ministry idea.

It might be just something that you might.

Want to start up in your little, yeah.

Your local community where you are.

But I remember this woman, Janet, she came to me.

She had this idea of creating a forum where women could come and do craft,

but they would have a speaker and they would be renewed in their faith.

And that's now called the makers table.

And she runs these all over the place now.

But she started small.

So she has, I think, Six or seven children.

So, you know, I have friends with many kids and they've been able

to start up incredible ventures.

Exactly.

I'm not, I'm not enamored with the greatest dreams or

aspirations in that sense.

What I'm enamored with is to find, is to create value in everyday life.

I'll give you a couple of examples that just come to mind.

I have, I have a friend who literally started his company.

He studied philosophy.

And, and then was it like in social work and then eventually the only

thing he started to do is to say, I'm gonna introduce people to each other.

Yes.

And he just lived on, I mean, he, he, it, it was no money in

the beginning, so, Where he said, you need to meet that person.

And of course he had this slant towards business of saying, you guys

should do business together and you people should do business together.

And let me get this and introduce this person.

They should, they're looking to buy this.

They should go there today.

He has hundreds of people working for him.

And he, he, he eventually moved into a software development where he started

to develop products for other people.

And all he started with is to connect people.

It's, how may I help you?

I can, oh, you need you, you know, when I hear your story, you

need to meet that, that person.

This is somebody who.

If your talent is that you know people and you understand, you know,

you can understand different kind of people, then that's a talent

and that's a valuable talent.

You can bring it across.

I, I have a friend where, where she basically had, she

just has this artistic talent.

She's a strong introvert, wouldn't want to speak to a crowd

of her life, depended on it.

Okay, sure.

But the sense of beauty and the sense of.

Like most greeting cards and things like that.

And, and designs were just either not of good quality or not wholesome.

And so she started to make her own, she did like wedding invitations and she did

greeting cards and stuff, and, and, and she started to sell them, but it, it grew.

And so her husband eventually joined her and they, and today they have

this, I mean, the US market is of course also very large, but they

have this large paper company.

Where they, uh, where they produce beautiful designs,

and she still does that.

She still does her designs, and that's, that's her gift, like

her sense of beauty and goodness.

Of saying people want to give cards and invitations to each other that are

wholesome and beautiful and beautiful.

That's right.

Yes.

And so, I mean, and so that, so you can have a hundred different stories.

One of the things that John Paul did that I often try to do that, so if

you, if you are listening and you have an idea, he would ha he had

a desk in the chapel, uh, right.

Write a small writing disc.

And he would always have these yellow notepads, you know, with the white,

with the red lines and the yellow.

Yes.

And.

He would go into the chapel and sit and start to write his plan, like

his encyclicals, his, you know, the big, the big movements of his papacy.

And he would basically go in there and say, Lord, here I am.

I wanna do your will now.

Would be a good way, now would be a really good time to inspire me.

You know, I'm coming to you, you're, you're the chairman of the

board of my, of what I do here.

And I, and, and, and in adoration first, and then, and then write and pray.

He would actually integrate Jesus into his, into his work.

That way that anything you read from John Paul the second is gonna be

started in front of the Eucharist.

So be like John Paul, take your pen and pad and go into, into your church

and go in front of my yellow note pad.

Go in front of the Eucharist and say, here I am, Lord.

Yeah, I'm, you know, I come to do your will.

I need to do your will.

Tell me That's right.

Tell me what that is, and then start to write and let your con don't,

don't look over your shoulder.

Let it go.

Let it go.

You're, you're with a loving God, with, with a father, with a brother who, who

loves you and just trust that process.

Yeah.

That's beautiful.

I, I think, um, I run a Catholic Women's Masterclass here and one of the modules

we talk about is really helping to unearth those hidden desires and the

dreams in women's hearts, because I think the greatest thing that women

need is to be given permission to dream.

Mm-hmm.

That life gets a little serious and a little heavy, and there's all of

the demands, but even in the midst of all of that, if you still have

a dream that you can just fan that flame that's, that brings this life.

And this joy to you, that even in the midst of the struggle and the hustle,

there's that little bit of life and, and so there is a real invitation for women.

I'd really encourage women listening just to do exactly what you're saying

to, to go before the Lord and say, what is the dream that you have

for me in this season of my life?

And then ta start to take little steps.

I think this week I've been trying to do a project for schools.

We, we have a business that does a lot of resource and

respectful relationship space.

And it's, it's hit roadblocks for about 12 months.

Yeah.

And on Monday I just said to God, right, if you want this to happen, you're gonna

have to open the doors because this is, yeah, just becoming too much hard work.

Do you know within, so I hadn't done it because I didn't have a

venue, I didn't have a videographer.

I didn't have a narrator.

Yeah.

I didn't have students.

Do you know, within 30 minutes of saying that prayer on Monday

morning this week, I had a venue.

We had a videographer, we had a narrator, and we had 10 students to

participate and we're filming tomorrow.

And so sometimes we just gotta beg God.

Exactly.

Sometimes we do, and sometimes it comes out this way or that way.

I, I have to say, I've had the situations where I was trying

to get back into an industry.

I, I just finished with one company and I, I went into this ven venture capital

firm, and I'm telling you, I tried everything under the sun to get back

into this industry and to do my next company it, and, The question is this.

Mm-hmm.

If I, what I wanna show is, is that this go, if there's no fish

on that line, I will move on.

And, and God has my commitment to say, I, you know, it's this radical

dependence on God to say, no fish, no go.

Right?

So, I am willing to change my course if the feedback, if the discernment

is that I should not do this.

It helps to have, especially in big things like this, where I'm.

In this industry, and it's, and I'm clearly seeing this is not going

anywhere to have a spiritual director, um, that, that is a solid, uh,

person and is trained in this, in the discernment and, and can guide you

that I had somebody guide me with that.

But that's in a way, you know, this change of, of career that I

had from, from high tech running high tech companies and and so on.

Yeah.

To, to now being a professor was a.

Was an experience like that, you know?

Mm-hmm.

This didn't just, uh, happen like that.

So I wanna show both sides that yes.

And maybe in the beginning you will have had had three of these fishing lines,

but there's nothing on it and I need you to move on and put another fish

and put another line in, you know, the neck as Jesus would say and keep going.

Yes.

Fantastic.

Well, look, can we change pace a little bit here?

Because I'd really love to hear about your experience, I guess, working

with John Paul ii and just, I know in your book you said he's perhaps the

most authentically human person Yeah.

You'd ever met.

I'm just interested in, I guess, what was that experience like for you and.

You'd said that it was because of him that you had this conversion back to the faith

and you became a practicing Catholic.

Yeah.

As opposed to a cultural Catholic.

What was, what were those interactions like and, and what

was that pivotal moment that really turned your heart towards Christ?

So the first interaction with him, and this how this whole came about, It is

this, it's, it is the starting point.

The starting point, and I touched on it before, is this insecure self that

I, um, and we, we all have that without God, that we don't know who we are.

We're trying to prove ourselves.

We know we're weak inside and we're looking, and I just, I was just

a confused kid and just was just putting this toughness outside.

I used my, my size to basically then just put on tough.

Okay.

And, uh, so that's how I show up down there.

So, But inside, God sort of prepped this in a way that my, my

first time going to work there.

Uh, you know, I went to a a, so I went to all the Swiss military and then a

recruit skill school in, in the Vatican.

And I started working right around Christmas and I knew that my family,

I'm the youngest of six kids, were celebrating Christmas and everything.

And I was so miserable and I so much regretted.

Entering there because there, I suddenly saw how tough it was.

Mm.

That I just wanted to go home, but I couldn't because I signed up.

I mean, and I'm now in this thing and, and I was a, a herding puppy, I'm telling you.

And I, and I was asked to go and serve right in front of his apartment,

but to me, that didn't really mean anything or I didn't really care.

And because I pretty much spent that whole evening crying.

Did you, because I just regretted.

Having, even throwing to guards and everything.

And then he comes out of that door and finds me there, basically crying

and he, IM, see he immediately looked through me and he said, look, I'm, I'm so

happy that you're here working with me.

You will see everything's gonna be fine, you.

And, and he basically embraced me and said that he was happy to be there,

that he will now go and pray for me.

And, and he went to celebrate Christmas mass, what it was.

I had this anger in me and this man comes to me and he wasn't the pope to me.

I didn't know what that meant.

Mm-hmm.

There is this human being come to me with these deep, clearly gray, gray

eyes embracing me and saying, I feel, I feel your anger, and I feel your pain.

I'm so sorry.

You'll see everything is gonna be okay.

Here's what I'm gonna do for you right now.

Not, you know, Andres, you should do this.

No.

Here's what I'm, I'm gonna do this right now for you.

I'm gonna go and I'm gonna pray and celebrate mass for you.

I, if he would've told me to pray, I wouldn't know how to pray.

I, I didn't pray.

And here I'm, I'm like saying this is very different.

This, this man approaches me in a totally different way.

And he saw, he saw my weakness, but he didn't exploit it, didn't,

didn't, didn't touch into it.

He, he basically acknowledged me and, and offered help doing something for me.

And, and from then on our.

Our conversation kind of, kind of, you know, continued every

time we saw each other as a guard.

You, you don't talk to the pope unless the pope talks to you, right?

I mean, just we're bodyguards, we're in the background.

And so, and it's not, we're not having this, these two hour conversations

or so, but it's like passing.

He stops, he says, how are we doing?

How are you feeling?

Better?

And eventually he of course takes his rosary and he says, look, I, I pray this.

This is my favorite prayer.

And he gives me the rosary.

Mm-hmm.

And I'm like, yeah, no, I'm not gonna pray the rosary, man.

He basically, what happened is, that's great.

He be, yeah.

He became such a, I, I tell you, he became, with his life, he

became such a role model for me.

He was a tough guy.

He would go swimming, he would go hiking and skiing.

We could hardly keep up with him.

Really?

And, and this was a 60 year old man, and we were 20.

Okay.

And I was pregnant.

Yeah.

And so he, to me, he was like, wow.

And, but then also he was jovial.

I saw him in the circus came and there were poetry readings and music.

And then, and then I saw him pray with this intensity.

And I saw somebody who knew who he was and he was happy.

And I'm like, that's what I want.

I want him.

And then when I approached him, he says, You don't want me, you want who?

I have Jesus here.

Yeah.

You want Jesus Christ.

And you can have him and I, and it was sort of a, a, a guide, you know,

he sort of guided me towards this.

And it was through prayer, through Mary and the Eucharist that he, and

there were people involved around him.

Um, That I became that, that this first infatuation and this first impression

just on him, you see this is I think how, how conversion happens that I

was so enamored with him and with his, what he stood for and how he loved me.

And then he switched that over to Christ.

And so he sort of took me, switched that over, and then that, um, blossomed

into my faith and, and I'm, I will be forever grateful to this man

because he didn't do this as the pope.

He did this as my coworker, as he would say as human.

Yes.

As a human being, you know, because of our work together.

Yeah.

And that is something all of us are called to do.

And, and it's exactly that model.

It goes all the way back to Paul.

Hall did that.

Exactly.

It was attempt making.

That's exactly what he did.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's just so beautiful.

So I have to ask you, do you pray the rosary every day now?

I do with some exceptions.

So now we also do it at, uh, with the family here.

Yes.

And I, I have to say like just right now, at the end of the

semester, it has suffered a bit, but it is a constant companion and.

I pray at least a bit of it every night in the guards.

I'm telling you, I, during my whole discernment process of staying

or leaving there, I probably paid prayed 10 rosaries a day.

Yeah.

And so I, I, I still have some in my tank, I think.

Yes.

Beautiful.

So tell me, um, share with me another moment, I guess, with John Paul ii.

Um, That really, I guess, ignited a passion for you.

You, you talk about in this book the Pope and the c e o and some of the leadership

lessons that you learned from him.

I'm interested in some of those leadership lessons and how they translate to women in

whatever season they find themselves in.

Because we are all called to be leaders.

We are all called to be bearers of Christ's image to every

single person that we encounter.

Can you highlight some of those leadership lessons and how they

might relate to women specifically?

Yeah.

One thing that just comes to my mind is when I, when I did the swearing

in, when I gave my oath that I would give my life for, for the Pope, uh,

the pope then invites your parents and there is a private audience and

you, and you know, this was like six, uh, it was four or five months after

we met birth, after I showed up.

And I just remember that transformation.

So I, I left as a kid in Switzerland.

I mean, I left at 19.

And it was, you know, I still lived at home, so I still have my parents

and, and I'm the youngest of, of six.

But then, but then I lived there in the Vatican and I, uh, and the parents arrived

of course, and they, they were not in a foreign environment and everything.

And then as we, we walk up this hall and the pope is at the end of the

wall, uh, of the hall and the long hall, and, and we walked towards him.

And I started to realize that, you know, I held my parents' hands many times.

But this time they held my hand.

It's just, it's this, it looks the same from the outside, but here they

hold my hand and I, I could feel it, and it, it was a cha It is my, my

entry into adulthood, in my opinion.

Mm-hmm.

And here I come in front of the Pope, and when I come, what he does

is he, he diffuses the tension.

And what he did is in, he says, oh, here's Andreas.

He's my, he's, and he goes to my dad, you know, he's my tallest.

And I can see where he got it from because my dad is, you know, I'm his size.

I'm two meters and three, so that's like six nine.

Wow.

And so he, so he diffuse the situation and this 10 situation, he diffuses it,

makes a joke, and then turns around and says to my mom, you know, and

Andreas is really one of my favorites because, and then he started to

tell her things that I actually did.

I appreciate so much how he does this.

And he was there at Christmas and he's, he's a tough guy

and he goes the extra mile.

I'm telling you, thank you for sending him here.

I'm so happy I have pictures of it.

My mother, right.

And everything.

Oh, that is so beautiful.

And John Paul, you know, hugs her and everything.

What this means to translate it, take the pope out of it in

terms of him being the pope.

Here's my manager.

Yes.

Think of it this way.

My, the, the CEO of my company, where I work, who, when my loved

ones and when my community comes, points out why I'm so good.

Doesn't just say platitudes, uh, that fit anybody, but he knows who I am.

Yes.

And he can tell you what exactly I did.

We go back to the empathy and the noticing.

This is exactly the path.

Most men don't know how to do this.

Mm-hmm.

So you have this gift of praise that do this for your kids.

Do this for the people you work with.

If you go out into the marketplace, do this notice and comment if you, this has

created eternal loyalty for me to this man in, in the workspace even, because

everybody wants to be seen like this.

And his trick was this.

So eventually they asked him, how do you, how come people feel?

Even if they're one person in a million people that saw you, they feel like you're

speaking to them and he's like, not me.

Here's what I do, but I know the trick.

You think it's, it's not me, but I think I know the trick Before I meet people, I

pray for the Holy Spirit and I say, Lord God, if you wouldn't love these people,

they would immediately cease to exist.

So you are loving them into existence, and here they are in front of me.

Give me your eyes.

Take away my prejudice.

Take away my bias.

Give me your eyes to see them with the love you see them.

Because if you wouldn't love them, they wouldn't exist.

Mm-hmm.

And then I enter the room, we can all do that.

They say that a prayer to the Holy Spirit is not refuse.

Mm-hmm.

And so what he does and what we are, are called to do is to see others with this

God, with ho, with God's hopeful gaze.

Right.

Love that.

The, the God that's willing to change the symphony is, is this God with the hopeful

gaze to us to see the glass half full.

That's his approach.

And I think that's a, that's actually a very feminine approach of being willing

to share the stage, of being willing to share, share, share it all, and, and being

able to point out the good in the other.

That's a beautiful practice.

Hone it and practice it.

And this comes around.

What goes around, comes around.

Yes it does.

That's beautiful.

I love that.

That hopeful gaze.

I know in, I think, I dunno whether it's love and responsibility

or theology of the body.

He talks about the piece of the interior gaze when we're gazing on one another in,

I guess romantic love that we wouldn't be seeking to take, but that piece

of the interior gaze that appreciates the essence of the other person.

Yeah.

But I love that phrase you've just said there.

Gaze upon another with that hopeful gaze of Christ.

Yeah.

It's beautiful.

It's, God is the absence of conflict.

Mm-hmm.

And so because God is not a loving person or a very nice, per God is

love, it's the absence of conflict.

What, what the, the destroyer, the, the tempter, the, the devil here

is constantly putting this, this division and this competition, and

this, you, you know, we all feel it.

This putting down, that's all, that's all from the devil.

That's, that's the destroyer and the tempter.

What we're looking for is this loving gaze, a loving, expecting, uh, in this,

in that hopeful gaze of saying, it's okay.

It's okay.

And then that is what creates this deep touch inside of people.

And I'm not saying that you should go into your.

You know, grocery store.

But if you have a grocery store at home and start to talk to people

about Jesus in that way right away, that's not what he does.

But that's not how he works.

I'm, I'm sure Paul didn't do it that way either.

Mm-hmm.

Just love them, you know what I mean?

That gaze just love them and they will turn to, in my entire time with John Paul,

he never told me what to do in that sense.

He gave me the rosary and says, even there, he says,

This is my favorite prayer.

Prayer.

Try it.

It's like an opening invitation.

Yeah, it's an invitation.

He's never ever told me what to do.

Even when I left, uh, he was sort of surprised that I was leaving and so on.

Um, and, and you know, God in this sense doesn't do that either.

That God gives us his free will and it's an invitation, but it's

this total absence of this kind of putting down, you know what I mean?

Yes.

Yes, and I think that's where, where we can practice what, what John Paul did.

This is why there were millions of people in a, in a place and they reacted to him.

They really reacted to the Holy Spirit.

Yes.

And he really did embody and carry the Holy Spirit in such a beautiful way.

I remember many years ago when I was in grade six, actually, my dad owned a

Christian bookshop here in our hometown, and one of the women was able to get

him a ticket when the Pope came to Canberra for a mass and it was in the

front row and his motorcade went past us and he just stopped and he just looked.

And it truly felt like he was gazing into your own spirit.

Exactly.

Your own souls.

That's the one I, you know, I've done so many years, so, so I, I was serving there,

I left in 89, so that was a long time ago.

Yes, yes.

You don't believe how many people I've met who have the very same impression

of John Paul, the very same experience as I had where I had him right in front

of me and they were one in a million.

And the exact same thing happens.

And this is exactly on the level.

This is the same experience.

And I think if you, if we can sum that up, it's really that what he

gives you is what Christ gives us.

And this deep longing is to be seen, known and loved for who we are.

Yeah.

Not what we do.

And I, I think that's, it's so important that firstly, and I'm say you're a man

and I'm a woman, but as women listening, but all human persons like, we have to sit

before the Lord and we have to receive.

From him, that identity and, and him hear him say to us, you are the beloved.

My favorite rests on you.

And only after we receive our identity Yeah.

Then can we receive our mission and, and our vocation.

It's, it's being before doing.

Yes, it is be first.

And that's be the beloved daughter.

Mm-hmm.

Be, you know, redeemed by Christ.

And then deduce what needs to be done afterward.

What does the person, what does the, the daughter of cry of God do?

What, what does she do?

But first B, right?

And I think that's something we need to translate into our business

world as well, to say first B.

And then do you basically, In a sense on the business side, you

have to fake it until you become it.

You make it.

I like that, but always do it, but always do it out of the being conviction.

Mm-hmm.

To say is what I want to be and who I want to be.

Is that a wholesome thing?

Yeah, that's, that's the discernment.

But then of course, you're not gonna know all the skills and everything right away.

That's the part of where we're, we're actually the.

The tempter is trying to tell us, well, you're not good at this.

That, see, there's that judgment again.

Mm-hmm.

So, no, you can run anything.

So it's first, determine the being.

Who do I want to be?

And then start to do, this is why I'm saying all you do right now is one action.

Just take the next step.

And if the next step is just to do some research, then let that be good enough.

And then let the next step, one step.

Don't, don't climb the whole mountain with one step.

Yes, absolutely.

And but I think one of the traps for many women is actually around this

area and mindset of perfectionism.

Yeah.

That we feel like we need to get all the things sorted out before we take action.

And I love this saying is just take imperfect action because in

taking those steps, it will become clear whether you keep going or

whether you need to change path.

Exactly.

But we are called, you know, Jonah Arks says, act and God will act.

And it's so important.

Just to be taking those steps and, and moving the needle

forward in our life every day.

So I would say starting with prayer.

Yeah.

Even if it's, if you can't get an hour before the blessed sacrament, five minutes

with the word of God every morning.

Yeah.

Just starts more.

And this conscious, conscious dedication of, mm-hmm.

Of, of finding the connection or, or the goods you produce.

Truly good.

Are the services you provide, do they do, do these services truly serve.

And and ask yourself why?

How am I explaining that?

Like, why are they truly good and how do they truly serve?

That's something, that's another thing that John Paul used to love to say, is

that's something that you get to decide.

Mm-hmm.

That's the free will that I teach my students to say, you have to answer

or the goods you produce truly good.

Do the services you provide truly serve.

And they say, well, define good.

I'm saying you get to decide you, that's your responsibility.

Form yourself.

Read the Bible.

Are you gonna stand in front of God and say, I got it.

Okay, go ahead.

Yes.

Right.

But you get to decide and then, but you carry the consequences for it.

Mm-hmm.

And that's, that's a, that's a tall, or, but that's, That's this drama

of life, if you wish that we get, I mean we do this in relationships.

It's this a good relationship.

Well, you decide obviously, but you carry the consequences.

Yes, absolutely.

So just tell me in wrapping up, I guess, um, when you came to leave the Swiss

Guard, you said that he was surprised.

I'm interested.

Did you stay in touch?

Did you let him know the direction your life took after that moment?

Kind of.

Um, so I had the opportunities, uh, after when I got married, I went back

and I introduced my in-laws to him.

Um, yeah, so I would just, we, we, once you're a guard, you always

have access to some degree, um, you know, in the barracks, and

you of course, you know everybody.

So, I went back and I got into an audience just where there were other people.

But then of course he saw me and he came over and I, and I introduced

him to my, so he met my wife in Rome, but I met her in Rome.

And so he knew okay, that I, I had this girlfriend and I

left because of her to America.

But then I went back and I, I got married and I introduced my in-laws and

that was, you know, that was wonderful.

And then, and then the other thing I remember we went on

Michelle's 30th birthday when she turned 30 on that day, May 14th.

We went to Rome and we went to greet him and he wished her a happy

birthday on her 30th birthday.

Oh, beautiful.

And um, it was like 10 years after, after we left, or after she left.

And then I was there when he died.

Um, it's a long story.

We don't have time to go into it, but that's a story for another time.

But I happened to be there, uh, just arriving in Europe

right when he passed away.

And I, I was.

There within 24 hours of him dying, I, I was in front of him, so I remember

studying, writing one of my papers for, at the John Tu Institute that weekend.

Mm-hmm.

Um, and it just made that, that was a Saturday.

Yeah.

And it just made the experience of writing my essay just so

much more profound and deep.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That was, that was an experience.

Yeah.

Yes.

Wow.

Well, look, Andres, thank you so much.

Those, uh, could talk to you all day.

Actually, you're a person after my own heart.

Um, all of these topics around entrepreneurship and JP two, but

can you tell me just the titles of two of your books, and then where

could people find you or these books if they'd like to purchase them?

So, yeah, so the, so I have a website called Andreas.

Whitmer, uh, dot com, the US I can put that in the show notes.

Yeah.

And this is the fir the book I just finished.

The Art of Principled Entrepreneurship, that that's not quite as, as, as JP two.

Well, it has all the JP two theory in there.

True.

But, but it's a business book.

This is the book, the Pope and the CEO that I, that I wrote

about my experience and, and these business, these kinds of business.

Actually, this is one of the pictures.

Look, this is when I said goodbye to him.

Oh, wow.

You're so young.

I know.

That's what he said.

This is what, this is why he was surprised.

He's like, where are you going?

You just got here.

But to me, two years was an eternity.

And for him it was like he just, you just got here.

Where you going?

And um, and then I also, I'd love to share with everybody watching

this, um, the, the Gospel of Work is an eight part video series.

I just developed.

And I, I'll give you the link and we can maybe put that in there.

Yes, it's free.

You just register.

So, so we see how many people are seeing it and from where to get some indication,

but um, That is on scca center.com.

But well, I'll promote that because I, I think that's just fantastic cuz some

of our work that we do, especially for women, sometimes it's, it's hidden work.

It's unseen, it's difficult, it's monotonous.

But this theology of work, I mean, just to have that different mindset,

I think so much of the time, if we can shift our mindset Yeah.

It can change our whole experience.

Yeah.

I'd love to share all that with you.

I'm, I'm also doing, I mean, on social media, I.

Promote things on, on Facebook and uh, my favorite is really

LinkedIn because that's yes, sort of the most straightforward thing.

But I also do, you know, all the others.

I have a team who, who deals with that, so.

Fantastic.

Well, I'll put all of the links in the show notes.

Thank you so much for joining us, and God bless your beautiful work.

Thank you, Karen.

Well, I'm not sure about you, but that conversation was really insightful

and I took so much away from it, and I hope and pray that you did too.

If you'd like to find out more about his work, you can visit his website,

andrea slash vidmark.com, and I will place the link in the show notes.

Ladies, if you've liked this episode, can I ask you to do me a huge favor

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to discover what my unique gifts are.

I don't even know where I'm called to serve, let alone what my gifts are.

Then ladies, I'd love to invite you to come and join me in this next cohort

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In this masterclass, we take you through a four month journey of

restoration, renewal, and transformation.

And part of this towards the end is really doing an inventory.

And two of the modules at the end of this masterclass deal with exactly

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So ladies, if you would like to find out about that masterclass,

you can visit the website, the masterclass page, www.geniusproject.co.

Or you can send me an email, karen genius project.co, and I'd be very

happy to either jump on a call or to respond to your question.

This journey has been truly transformative for the women

who have gone through the mass.

To class, and I would love for you to join us in our July intake.

Until next week, ladies, have a beautiful week.

God bless you, and start discovering your gifts.