The Grit Factor Podcast w/ Karl Jacobi

TGFP Audio 15

00:00:00 Speaker: Average is the enemy of greatness. Comfort is the enemy of growth. Welcome to the Grit Factor podcast, where we strip away the highlight reel and get into the darkness beneath it. The real stories, the real battles, and the battle plans used to conquer them. I'm your host, Carl Jacobi, combat vet, entrepreneur, resilience and performance coach, keynote speaker, husband and father. I've built, scaled, and exited multiple companies totaling over forty million in revenue. But here's what that highlight reel doesn't show you. Life has been smacking me in the face with a two by four since I was just five years old. Broken home, constant chaos. No playbook. No safety net. Just grit. And if you're anything like me, you know you've got another level in you, in your business, your career, your faith, your leadership. You're just not sure how to get there. That's exactly why we're here. Be sure to follow me for more great content and check out my website. Success with Carl dot com. Now that's Carl with a K. Now let's get to work. Trevor my dude, welcome to the show, man. Man, I cannot wait to get jammin with you as usual. Thanks, brother. Hey, it's been a long time. No see. Right? You know, we've known each other. We just grow more and more closer together. But let me paint the picture of who this amazing person is that's sitting in front of me. Because, you know, a lot of people are going to listen to this or watching this, and they're like, who is this dude that Carl's got on now? Right? You know, so let me paint the picture of the amazing individual that said, yes, I'll raise my hand and join this because it takes a lot of courage to come on to a podcast or any platform for that nature to share your heart and to share who you are, and not to share the highlight reel, but share the story. So let me, let me brief the audience and who we have and who we get the honor to hear from today. Trevor Neal is an amazing entrepreneur, uh, an operator that has spent years in e-commerce business and other businesses, if I remember correctly, scaling them and building them and your, your e-commerce business, you scale to now, you know, hit the million dollar milestone in a year, which, by the way, congratulations again, because that is no easy feat. And obviously that is not a place to stop, right? We're going to keep scaling from there. Um, you've got, you know, successful Airbnb business. You're a A speaker. You're an author, is working on your first book that you know, as you're sharing this with me in your in the green room before we hit the record. You know, really hit me because you're, you're diving into your story of where God's like, knock, knock, knock. You're ready to listen to me now after bringing to your knees, which we're going to dive into. So you know, Trevor, again, man, thank you for joining me on this podcast. Thank you for rising. You're raising your hand because, you know, obviously your story didn't start here, right? So let's get into the hard stuff. Give me the honest ninety to one hundred and twenty second spiel. The version who you are right now, who are you? What are you building and what are what is your main mission right now? Oh, geez. So I should have told, you know, long complicated questions because I have had a concussion in the past, so I might end up talking about dogs on surfboards. Okay, so real fast who I am. When I, when I, when I start these speaking seminars or whatever, I say, hi, my name is Trevor Neal and I'm a failure. So I am a failure and I fail every day. I micro fail, I don't macro fail. Or is that twisted around? So in twenty eighteen, you know, I started a supplement company. Private label failed miserably. Uh, long story short, from twenty eighteen to about twenty twenty, I tried everything under the sun as far as ecommerce, drop shipping, dunkaroos stores, you name it. You know, if there was an influencer out there, I did it. I tried it, and I failed at it. But one thing that really describes me, uh, my M.O. is I don't give up on myself, so love it. I figure if there's a nineteen year old shithead out there doing it and it's successful doing it, how I can be doing it, too, and being successful at it. So multiple times, multiple failures, which led to. You know, I used to work with brands and businesses, getting them on Amazon and e-commerce. And, um, built my own successful private label business. And we recently, just last month hit. Uh, one point two million. Yeah. Nice. That's awesome. Man. One point two million. That is, that is not a, you know, a faint of heart number to hit, right? And sometimes we just, we just take that for granted that, uh. Oh, okay. Cool. Million dollars. But. Let's save that in a moment because a million dollars, I know for a lot of people that's listening right now seems out of reach for them, right? In any business that they're in, you know, it seems like a million dollars in revenue is out of reach. And they're probably listening to you right now. Like, man, it must be nice. I wish it was me. I wish I, you know, I wish I was able to hit those numbers right. So I know for a fact, because I know I've seen your journey. You and I have had a lot of cool conversations and, you know, tough conversations. You know, uh, some things that we've both been going through, you know, but, uh, that being said, the hard stuff, let's, let's dive into this man because, you know, in your guest intake and I, I, I know this personally, but I want, I want you to share this with the audience. But you know, these, these highlight reels that you share with us, right? The one point five or the one point two million success story that you that you've built and continuing to build the book that you're writing on that you're going to, you know, share with the world, which I cannot wait for, you know, the fire that I've seen come out of you and not just, you know, in general, but when you, when I give you the opportunity to speak in, in our, in our group, our private group, you know, I've heard feedback like, man, he's got me fired up, man. I can't wait to to go through some. Brick walls and you know, and uh, so you have this fire in you, but let's now go into the dungeon. Let's now actually uncover this because you're here because, well, you said I'm not going to quit, right? If some shit hits you easy called it, which I love. Um, had can do it. I can too. Right. But let's dive into the dungeon a little bit because in your intake, you mentioned, you know, family death and your business declining all at the same time. So dive into that. Give us some details. I want you to be very specific. I want you to paint the picture to the person that's listening right now. Um, you know, that's listening to your story. I want you to be vivid and give the details of the losses that occurred, everything that happened to you. Uh, yeah. So, um, let's just, let's just dive right into it in twenty twenty five. And by May of twenty twenty five, I was ready to ball it up and throw it in a trash can. Because besides, besides the Eagles winning the Super Bowl, that was the only highlight of twenty twenty five for me. So and it really started January first, New Year's, uh, and I shared this a while ago. I actually met a TikTok video of it and it went viral. Is I had a friend in the army who did the, um, the terrorist attacks in New Orleans and not Christmas, um, New Year's, New Year's Day. Yeah, I remember that. So I personally knew him. We, we hung out together in the army in a school. Uh, we were together for twenty eight weeks. And I think the last time I talked to him was around twenty eighteen, and he just veered off, you know, somewhere and I found out about it. You know, go figure. Scrolling on TikTok and I seen his face and I knew he was in real estate. So I figured, oh, you know, his real estate business is doing well. You know, good on him. So I started to see it more and more videos about him like, Holy shit, man, this is this is shit. Yeah. My friend. And yeah, and I was just here, actually, I was sitting in that back chair and I was just like trying to process this. And my wife came to me one night and she's like, hey, I know it's bothering you. Why don't you just make a video about it? Hey, go figure, make a TikTok about it and tell who the real sham was. So I pulled out my old, uh, acus the dress blues, um, just to prove that, you know, I was with them with the signal patch on it, and I just made this video just telling them, you know, we were friends and this is not who he was. And it went viral. And I ended up being on Inside Edition. Uh, I had. Yeah. Go figure. Uh, and I had news reporters at my house. I had all the major media's just blowing up my phone like the New York Times, the Washington Post, and I tell you what, it just mentally drained me. I can imagine, like, I can't understand how people can be rich and famous. Uh, because just, uh, it was a lot for me mentally. And so, you know, that happened. And then I was getting a lot of criticism online. People were calling me a terrorist and why didn't you stop him? And, you know, a bunch of fucking keyboard warriors right here. So, um, yeah. And then probably two weeks later, I ended up losing my job, So. But not but but I want to clarify this. This wasn't connection because of of this. All right. So I just want to let the audience know that's listening right now. Well, yeah, he lost his job because of X, Y, and Z. No, no, no, this was a separated, isolated incident where you lost your job. Yeah. It was just new administration came in, just made some cuts. And unfortunately, you know, I was cut. So, you know, and and before I had my business, you know, it was running successfully. I wasn't really dialed into it as I, as I am now, I was probably about eighty percent. So I'm like, okay, you know, this is it. And, uh, you know, my dad was on a decline. So, uh, I ended up, which was actually a blessing in disguise because I was able to go to South Carolina and, you know, take care of my dad. So this was right now we're in the beginning of February of last year. And then that's when he he decided to go on hospice because he just couldn't take his, his chemo pills anymore. And they were actually just making them more sicker and, you know, just more worse. And his quality of life just, just absolutely sucked. And we, we already went through it with my mom and he's just like, you know, I'm not doing this. So I took him to Florence, took him to the cancer doctor in Florence, which is like forty miles away from Sumter, South Carolina. And. Sorry, like throughout this throughout this hour together, I'll probably my, my throat's going to be all good, man. Take your time, brother. Just breathe and. Yeah, man, it's good. It's all good. So. And one thing about my dad, he always. He always kept his, um, uh, his humor. So we're in the doctor's office and you know he's going to tell the doctor, you know, I don't want any more cancer pills. And, you know, I want to go on hospice. And the doctor's like, well, do you have a reason why? And my dad goes, well, I'm thinking about having more children. Oh my gosh. You know, I felt two emotions at once. I laughed and then I was so sad. And they just like, I can't really explain it, but you know, that was him. And he just kept a positive, positive attitude even till, you know, days before he died. I had, you know, he was at that time, he was in a hospital bed, you know, in the living room. And at that time, I didn't know what what I was going to do with the house, where I was going to keep it. So, so I was bringing real realtors in for, you know, their evaluation, their opinion. And I was watching them, obviously. I was like, dad, I want to have this realtor come in. Are you okay? For like ten minutes, he's like, yeah, do you want me to hold a flower? You know, when I come in. It's just it's just stuff like that. And, um, he went on hospice and, you know, me and his girlfriend at the time were, were taking care of him, and he ended up passing, uh, coming up on a year, April eighteenth. And then two weeks later, um, my grandfather passed away and that sucked because I, I haven't even, I haven't saw my grandfather in four years, but by the grace of God, family was able to bring my grandfather down, um, for my dad's last weekend. And my dad was cognitive and he was talking. So I'm really, really thankful that not only I got to see my grandfather, but, you know, my dad as well. And we just had a nice family filled, you know, weekend. And two weeks later, you know, my, my grandfather passed. And then at that time, I was still going back and forth from South Carolina, you know, trying to fix up the garage, trying to patch up my business. And I think it was April May. Yeah, it was just after he passed in April. So we're sitting around the May time frame, and I went from six figure months down to about twenty five thousand dollars in sales. Wow. And I was literally I was calling up loan places. Yeah, I was trying to get money, man. And I was struggling because this is, this is my income now. And I'll never forget I'm calling these loan places and Sellar fi and you name it, I called on it. Called everywhere. And they're all looking at data. Obviously they're like, well, how come your sales dip down from March to now? I was like, well, they don't give a fuck about this. No, you know, they don't care about my dad. That's frustrating. They want their money back. Yeah. And I was literally calling everyone for three or four days straight and nothing. I absolutely got nothing. So I'll never forget. I was standing in the kitchen. This is May time frame after my dad passed. I was just all alone in the mess of the house and I had my my hand in my pocket. You know, my phone was there and I was looking at my dad's ashes and I was like, dad, I just need some money. As soon as I said money, an email came through. Wow. It was a line of credit for it wasn't much money. It was nineteen grand from a company that I have never even heard of. Oh, okay. Wow. And, Carl, I fucking hustled the fuck out of that nineteen grand. And, man, I with that nineteen grand, I was able to get my business back up to six figures, and I was able to patchwork the back garage, which is now an Airbnb. Nice. And, and I, and I always harp on this book. One of my favorite books is God Wings, where nothing is a coincidence. You know, it is simply a divine intervention from either God or your loved ones from the other side. And you think about that for a minute. What are the odds that I'm looking at my dad's ashes and saying, I need some money? Yeah. And as soon as I said money, an email comes through from this lender I have never even heard of. And with my skills and, you know, skills and, uh, what's the other word I'm looking for anyway? We'll just go with skills. Skills and experience. skills and experience. There you go. And I was able just to hustle the fuck out of that nineteen thousand. That's awesome man. Well, let's let's go back to this period of time of loss because you I think you omitted one. Um, you know, because you just talked about losing your, your dad. Right? Then, you know, a very short period of time after that, you lost your grandfather, but it didn't stop there. Right? Because you it's going from, you know, um, a loss, then another loss, then another loss and another loss. But what was one other loss that you, you just you didn't mention? I don't think that was by design. But you lost somebody else. Yeah. It was, uh, it was my brother. So it was a month later, my brother. Um, yeah, I was just, I tell you, twenty twenty five, life was lifing for me and me and my brother. We. And kind of really nice. Hey, real quick, before we keep going, if you've been listening to this conversation and something hit a nerve, if something we talked about made you pause or you felt that little tug in your chest, like, man, that one was for me. I want you to lean into that for a second. Don't just brush it off. Because here's the thing. Conversations like this. Yes, they're great and I love doing this show, I really do. But if I'm being real with you, a conversation can only take you so far. At some point, you got to stop nodding along and actually do something with that feeling. So here's what I want you to do. I want to personally invite you to something we built called the Reforge Challenge. It's a live five day experience I created specifically for people like you, high performers who know they're capable of more. But something got knocked sideways and the old playbook just stopped working. Or maybe life smacked you in the face with a two by four that you just didn't see coming. Maybe the fire just dimmed and you can't figure out how to reignite it. Five days. Five real identity shifts. Live coaching, real community in the kind of honest conversations that actually move the needle. Not just another thing you consume and forget by Friday. Listen, you're not broken. You're just in between versions. And I love for you to come see what we've built. Head on over to the reforge challenge dot com again. Reforge challenge dot com. Check it out. See if it speaks to you. And if it does, I'll see you inside. All right, let's get back to it. I'm getting into his story. We used to be really, really tight. Yeah. And, you know, he did some things. He actually, you know, stole money from my mom. Stole money from my dad, and he was just. I hate to say it, but he was equivalent to a retarded child. so he always needed to be dependent on somebody. You know, when my mother passed away, he was like, okay, who's going to kind of take care of me? So he went from my mother to my aunt. My aunt passed away. So my aunt to my sister and my sister was stuck with them ever since. And he was just, you know, he had so much potential and he just, he was just a freaking loaf, you know? I still loved him. Yeah, of course I still prayed for him. I still pray for him to this day because, you know, with his actions, I don't know where the hell he's at. Yeah. I don't know if he's looking up or looking down. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's um, well it was still, you know, and, and when I got the news that he passed, I was just, I was, I was stunned. Sure. And I, I honestly, I, I didn't cry, I was just more like, and again, I hate to say this he was better off dead because you know, of his he he had cancer, he had diabetes. And just his quality of life was was absolute shit. Yeah. Well, you know, that makes sense, man. And I appreciate you sharing that, especially, you know, in the sense of this quality of life, right? You know, and dude. I, when you gave me this, right, I just realized, like you and I have known each other for a while and, you know, we've gotten closer and closer over the last year, but I honestly, I don't even think I really, truly grasped the timeline here until you just recently shared this, right? In the span of a year or less. I don't even think I'm really giving it the right context here or give it the right level of depth here. But you went from lost to lost to lost to lost to lost to lost, you know, and it bro, dude, like any person, myself included, we're probably looking at God right about now. And scream, what's next? Right? Um, or you know, your creator or universe or whatever. And I cringe when I say this because you never want to ask that. You never want to ask what's next, right? But when you do, that will cripple the average person. Like that would cripple a lot of people, let alone surviving another day. Right? So let's, let's talk about this for a little bit, if you don't mind, because the average person is probably listening right now. If, if, if they don't have a set of kleenexes, you know, um, I'm surprised because I, I'm, I'm fighting back some stuff right now because I could feel the emotion as you're talking about your dad and then just getting kicked in the nuts over and over and over again. Right. So when that foundation cracked for you, right, this foundation that you've known for so long in your business, in your career, in a career that you. You're a government employee, right? So you thought you're safe. You thought you were protected. You thought you just you were comfortable. But this foundation cracked both for you personally and in business and every aspect of that word. So with that, what was the first honest thing that you had to admit to yourself? Not to God, not to anyone else, but the person you see in the mirror. What was that one thing you said to yourself when you were alone? It's going to come out of a good time, man. It's it's, um. It's really hot. How do you refine gold? You know, you you melt it. you pressurize it or whatever? You do all these things to to make gold. And, you know, I just really had to trust the process. I knew God was callousing my mind, callousing my shoulders up for something bigger and better. And it's almost like the story of job, you know? You know, we all know the story of job where God took everything and he never cursed God. Yeah. But there was there was one time where I did curse God. You know, I, I sure I blamed God. You know, I blamed God when my mother died in twenty ten. And, you know, back in twenty ten, I knew of God, but I wasn't a follower. Knowing God and being a true follower or two different things. So, um, it was rough, man. She did not want to go and she had colon cancer and it spread all over. And, uh, you know, my brothers and sisters were there, but the majority of the time when it got really bad, it was just me and my dad. Me and my dad and a nurse taking care of her because they didn't they didn't want to see that shit. And I seen shit that, you know, I, I really don't want to go into. And, you know, she suffered a lot and, you know, I, I blamed him, you know, why did you take my mom? Yeah. You know, broke the family apart. You know, my dad's drinking when, you know, he used to drink beer. Now I'm going to the house. I'm seeing fucking liquor bottles and all this, like, man, this is not him. Yeah. You know, at that time, I was stationed at Fort Jackson. So I was, you know, kind of going back and forth when I could just after her death. Just kind of, you know, be there for him. But he went out to fucking, you know, left field. You know, he couldn't. The bottle. The bottle was his answer. And and the bottle was my answer as well. You know, when I go back home and it's, it's kind of one of these weird things that, uh, um, you, you get a gift through a purpose or a gift through pain or you find your purpose in pain. Yeah. Uh, for I'd say close to a month, you know, I was drinking every night. And when I say every night, I was drinking throughout the night, you know? Wow. Yeah, I was drinking throughout the night, and I was hungover on the couch. And. And this went on for for weeks at a time because I wanted to fucking die. Yeah, I can imagine, man, that's a lot of pain to go through. You know, whether it be pain pills, alcohol. Yeah. You know, I wanted to fucking drink myself to death because, you know, visualizing the blood and, you know, everything we we went through, it fucking sucks. And and coming from me, you know, I'm a, I'm a combat veteran. I've been deployed seven times. So yeah, I've got to say that. Okay. I've seen it. Yeah. Okay. And I think that, you know, watching my mom go down and her dying just fucked me up more than, you know, Ranger, medic, school or working on the flight deck. Uh, but getting back to my point, you know, there's a, uh, I forget the acronym or the saying there's, uh, whatever. So when I, when I'm hungover and I'm on the couch, I ended up like watching a lot of Food Network, like, you know, Sonny Anderson. um, Paula Deen. Oh, now you're making me hungry. Yeah. So. So all these ladies. I lay on the couch. Hung over and I would just watch Food Network constantly and constantly and constantly. So I began cooking at night, you know, drinking and cooking. That's never a good mix. So I just need to, you know, I just really just needed an outlet there. And, uh, you know, that that was a gift that God probably a little bit instilled in me. Um, you know, during that, during that time, because a lot of people don't know this, I can throw down in the kitchen and it was due to that, you know, month. And I want to tell you another story too that I've only told one person is God actually came to me. Um, you know, one of those nights, I think I was in week two or week three. Whatever. Just drinking and cooking is baking cakes. So I was baking a carrot cake at the time, and I make a fucking hell of a carrot cake at your house tomorrow. Dude, I can throw it on a carrot cake. So you know, I'm. I'm drunk, I'm baking. There's shit all over the kitchen and we're at base housing at the time. And then when you kind of like sidestep from the kitchen and you look into the living room, our house was kind of like on a hill and fifty yards, and there was like a little window in the living room. I could see the playground. So I said a playground when I was probably like forty, fifty yards, maybe I was like two o'clock in the morning, I'm drunk cooking, whatever. I kind of look out the window and I see this black, shadowy figure, you know, sitting on the bench, and all of a sudden, you know, I got scared and I got curious at the same time. And I literally, I walked out, you know, gingerly out to the porch. And I still see this, this shadowy figure. And I start off the porch and I heard like a little crack, like someone stepped on a twig. And again, this is just complete silence. It's the end of January and it's it's cold and I'm in my underwear. Okay. Appreciate the visual. Yeah, so I just but, you know, I wasn't feeling anything. You know, I wasn't cold. I was just so focused on the shadowy figure. And I heard this crack and I looked over and it was a deer standing here, like, literally I could, I could walk out or I could almost touch them. Wow. So there was a deer right there and I happened to look to my right. There's another deer and there's another deer in front of me. I was just surrounded by deer and they were all looking at me. And the shadowy figure is gone. And all of a sudden I got this calmness running through me. And for probably, you know, me and the deer, we looked at each other for five seconds. 10s no more than 10s. And they all just split. And when they split, I just like, came back came the two. And all of a sudden I got cold. I'm like, Holy shit, I'm out here in my underwear. It's freezing. So I went back in and I woke my wife. I was like three o'clock in the morning. I'm like, hey, hey, hey, I saw God. I just saw God. She's like, what? Yeah, you got how loud you say that? You know, he's drunk. Yeah. He probably thought I was on crystal meth, right? Yeah. Wow. That's. But yeah, that's, uh. Right. Like, right after that, I started getting my shit together. Yeah. As far as like, getting my shit together, you know, I still drank, but you know, not to that extent because, you know, I. I wanted to die. Yeah. You know, there's no sugar coating it, man. It was it was a rough patch, but really what that did with me was built my resilience meter. Yeah. And that really that really helped me out with my dad in twenty twenty when he had his liver transplant. I was a sole caretaker of him. So we're talking about, you know, the cook, the Uber driver, um, everything, you know, the nurse, you know, I had a crash course in nursing probably in fifteen minutes, and I was in charge of all his pills. I was giving him shots because that's a that's a major surgery, you know, a liver transplant. Yeah. That is that's huge. And it was just three months. It was three months of that. And I and it's a shame because I still didn't really know who God was. I know of God, but I wasn't really reaching out for him. That's crazy man. That's that's that's a heck of a story to be sharing, man. Because especially in the timeline in which you shared it in a span or span of less than a year, again, you're going through all of this, right? You've, you've had losses after losses, after losses. And you, you just experience what you just described here, uh, presence, you know, by God or, you know, well, has to be God, right in your, in your mind. So yeah, walk us through a few moments, right? Because I want to go back for a second in this time that we were just you're, you're battling all of this, right? Because losing is someone, you know, especially people that you love, especially people you know, that you just described doesn't have a timeline, right? And you don't just move through it, you know? So what did that loss do to your ability to function as a businessman, as a leader, as a father, as a husband? Um, and in the middle of it, you know, walk us through that. I mean, how did, what did that loss do? Or loss is due to your ability in that time? It made me realize that, you know, number one, I, I definitely needed to trust in the man above. And number two, it made me realize that I need to shed this mask that I've been wearing and I'll. It was like a therapy session. You didn't know. Come on, man. Um, so I'll never forget that time that I first don the mask. It was November two thousand and five, and just a little bit before that, when I went in the Navy, I first checked on board the Kitty Hawk in June of two thousand and two. And I'll never forget this big Hispanic kid, Frank Hernandez. Me and Frank, we freaking hated each other. And he was more of the quote unquote salty dog. And I was, you know, fresh out of a school. So I don't know if he more hated me or the new people. But anyways, he would come the morning formation just looking like ass, you know, his uniform all wrinkled up and stains and whatever. And me and Frank, we ended up working together on the flight deck and back half fly three. And we've, you know, we. Oddly enough, we became great friends. And, you know, all this time Frank was like, oh, I just want to get out of the Navy. Uh. And I knew he was married as well. Um. And, um. So you're good, man. Take your time. And, you know, we just, uh, we just, you know. We had a really good friendship. And then I'll never forget when he left, uh, he's like, you know, I'm, I'm out of here, Neil. And, you know, he gave me a hug. He's like, alright, awesome. And then, um. And then, uh. It's all good, man. Take your time, dude. Yeah. Sorry. Are you good, man? Take your time. So, uh, it was November. We were on the flight deck. It was flight ops, and Frank had already left his two thousand and five. He left the beginning of. The beginning of two thousand and five or end of two thousand and four. And I'll never forget it was it was rainy. It was just shitty weather. We're prepping for flight ops. So I'm back aft, you know, just standing around watching the controlled chaos. Yeah. And one of my friends comes up the catwalk and he goes, hey, what happened to Frank? He's like, yeah, what's that retard up to? I go, he's like, man, he he shot himself. Oh, wow. And I was like, get the fuck out of here, man. Wow. He's like, no, he. Yeah, he shot himself. So let me tell you. You know, the flight ops is not going to stop for Frank Hernandez. No, no. Okay, so I that's when I discovered my mask. When I had to suck. Suck it up and drive on. You know, we're talking about sixteen hour days on the flight deck. One of the the most dangerous fucking places to work. Yeah, I remember I almost died twice in that motherfucker. Okay. And, and, and to have that and, you know, just process that literally, I, I, I shoved it down in there. Yeah. Understandable. And, uh, yeah, it's, uh, so that's when I learned to, to first, you know, put the mask on Escalon and I used that mask during my mother's death. You know, my my father's transplant, you know, multiple issues in my life. My father's death, my grandfather's death. My brother's death. So all this. I'm just taking it. Taking it, taking it. Suppressing it. Suppressing it. Yeah. Yeah. Suppressing it. So. And kind of going back to your question, is leaning on God and God's like, hey, you need to take this mask off and you need to just give it to me. And that's what I've been doing, especially this past year and a half where I'm living in the moment. I'm not thinking about yesterday. I'm not thinking about tomorrow. Yeah. And you know, and your famous quote be are where your feet are. So yeah. And I'm worried about today. Well, you know what I got going on and, you know, I have three things right here on my, my desk, two quotes, uh, short steps, long vision and compete. So short steps, long vision is no different than small goals to the big goal. And that's important to me because a lot of people, you know, they fall in love with the finish line and not the race. That's right. And that was my issue, uh, a long time ago where I wanted, you know, something like that. You know, I wanted the money in the bank where I didn't know about the process. Yeah. A lot of people don't really, you know, in order to get that finish line, I have to remember, remind myself, short steps always keep the vision in mind, but always take the short steps and compete. Who am I competing against? I'm competing against, you know, myself. And that's, that's the only person that's going to hold you back is yourself. Yeah. And then I also have a picture of me and my dad. That's I love it, man, that I keep in there. And then, uh, actually, my daughter gave me this a little Jesus statue. Awesome little Jesus figurine. So I keep those three. Every day when I'm working, I you know, besides the computer screen, I look down and I remind myself that's that's my grounding right there. You know, short on vision compete me and my dad and Jesus. That's that's my grandma. Yeah, man. Thank you so much for, you know, allowing us to see behind the scenes and see behind the mask because man. I just, I can't even fathom that. Right? And in today's culture, so many people are wearing a mask and they're afraid to, to put that mask down because they're afraid to, you know, of what people will think or say or do because they think they're, they're only one that's going through, you know, trials and tribulations and loss. And whether it's business, career, finances, health, personal losses and stuff of that nature, you know? So thanks again for, for allowing us to, to look behind the scenes, man, because that right there gives character to the person who you are today, right? That gives character to, you know, the highlight reels that you have today for your business, for, for this person that is rising up from the ashes to, to, to take stages, to take talks, to take, you know, to books and reading books to inspire other people. Hey, listen, you know, listen, shithead, you're, you're, you're not the only one, right, that's going through this mess and so going through this, right? Let's, let's talk about this resurrection. No, no pun intended. Or maybe a little bit pun intended here, right? But, you know, with all this loss that you entered, at some point, you had to stop trying to survive and start deciding, not choosing, but deciding, right? You because you couldn't rebuild without a foundation. So what was the first thing you had to put down as a cornerstone? I think you alluded to this a couple times, but what was that first thing you put down as a cornerstone? So you start climbing one step at a time, climbing back up to who you are today. Uh, first and foremost, and I always say, this is God, you know, I'm always putting God first. And I think us as a society, we have our priorities wrong. You know, a lot of people put family money and God. Well, guess what? When you run out of money or you have family issues, who you run into God and all of a sudden, you know, the pyramid rearranges. Yeah, that's a great perspective. Yeah. First and foremost, man, I'm always on God, you know, major decisions. Uh, what I do differently now, instead of pulling the trigger. I'll kind of step back. I'll pray about it. I'll think about it. You know, I'll talk to multiple people about it. Trustworthy people. Um, and then so like, give an example, the, the loan, the nineteen thousand and which, which isn't a lot, you know, when you're running a six figure a month business. So yeah, okay. You know, what's a hot selling product? You know, what? Can I branch off this? And then not only that, I had to put money toward the garage as well. Fix that up for an Airbnb. Yeah. So it's really and a lot of ChatGPT, you know. Yeah. You're a huge advocate for AI. I know that for sure. I am AI saw a lot of, of my, uh, a lot of my flaws. What you have to be honest with yourself and a huge wall with me was cash flow money issue. Like, where's my bottleneck? Yeah. So I'm talking to AI. You know, as my smart best friend. As you should. And I'm like, give it to me straight. He's like, hey, this is your problem. You know, take some of the nineteen thousand. Allocate it here, there. And then just kind of give me a game plan there. Yeah. So that's what I did. You know, you have to again what? I fell in love with the race and not the finish. Yeah. One thing I want to extract from that, you know, because you're starting to, you know, let's dive into some tactics here because, um, that's really one of the, the other elements I want people to walk away from. This is not just hear about the highlight reel. And then of course, go into the dungeon where, you know, you, you had to go into this dark period of darkness, whether it was for, you know, years or decades or what have you, right. But, you know, I want to give some tactics here for folks that, you know, maybe, maybe there are some tremors right now that are They're listening to this. They're like, man, bro, I keep getting kicked in the nuts too. I don't know how to escape from this. Right? I don't know what to do. I don't know, you know? Blah blah blah. Right? It could be in their business or it could be in their finances, you know? So for the travelers out there that real quick before we keep going, if you've been listening to this conversation and something hit a nerve, if something we talked about made you pause, or you felt that little tug in your chest, like, man, that one was for me. I want you to lean into that for a second. Don't just brush it off. Because here's the thing. Conversations like this. Yes, they're great and I love doing this show, I really do. But if I'm being real with you, a conversation can only take you so far. At some point, you got to stop nodding along and actually do something with that feeling. So here's what I want you to do. I want to personally invite you to something we built called the Reforge Challenge. It's a live five day experience I created specifically for people like you, high performers who know they're capable of more. But something got knocked sideways and the old playbook just stopped working. Or maybe life smacked you in the face with a two by four that you just didn't see coming. Maybe the fire just dimmed and you can't figure out how to reignite it. Five days, five real identity shifts. Live coaching, real community in the kind of honest conversations that actually move the needle. Not just another thing you consume and forget by Friday. Listen, you're not broken. You're just in between versions. And I love for you to come see what we've built. Head on over to the reforge challenge dot com again. Reforge challenge comm. Check it out. See if it speaks to you. And if it does, I'll see you inside. All right, let's get back to it at our in that same battle that you're in. You know, the personal losses. Maybe they've got some really bad news that they just got, you know, slammed in the face with repetitively. Um, you know, so, you know, talk to this Trevor for a moment. You know, if you're coaching that Trevor, you know, what was the very first thing that you would want them to do? I mean, you say put God first and I agree wholeheartedly, but tactically, what does that mean? Can you be specific for a moment? Well, obviously, yes, put God first and tactically, don't give up on yourself, you know, and it really boils down to resilience. Resilience, um, separates the winners from the losers here. You know, resilience is whether you're going to stick your thumbs up your ass on the couch or you're going to get up and do it and do it and do it. So keep trucking on. Everybody has a plan. God has a specific path for you. What seemed like a closed door is really an open door, you know, and And even though it doesn't look like it, you know, this is I think of God as the director of our play. And like what you just said that. And it's a play that you don't really know the ending, but he's, he's literally just guiding you. So just kind of getting to the point. Don't be discouraged because it's a closed door. It could be, you know, a learning opportunity that you can take to the next. Agree, agree. Let me let me stop. Let me interrupt you for a second because we are starting to run close on time already. Again, because you and I have talked for hours, I feel like we could talk for more hours. But let me extract a tactic right here because you just mentioned something I really want people to grasp on this. You're talking about lessons learned, right? You know, and, you know, one of the lessons learned that you shared earlier is the lesson you learned the hard way was if something works, double down on it, right? So one thing I want you to be specific on. Give us an example. Uh, walk me through a very specific decision where you violated that rule and what did it cost you? You know, walk us very quickly, step by step if you can. Oh, it really cost me scalability. So I had one of my products was very successful, I think. Mhm. Instead of putting more money to that, why don't I create kind of like a couple spin offs? So that's when I went into sourcing mode and I, you know, got more products which were successful. But, you know, I was neglecting your, your honor roll student here. Yeah. And I was just, you know, feeding the feeding other ideas. So that's, that's what it looked like because hell, I could have been two point three, three point three now, if I were, if I would have hopped in my Delorean and told myself that don't we don't we all wish we could do that. But don't you believe though too, though you know, this is why we have to go through those failures, those failures, those mistakes, those, those, uh, the, the furnace so that we can learn these mistakes and develop character and develop empathy and not just empathy for yourself, but empathy for others that are also on the same path are also going through heartaches and in, in just trials and tribulations. Because I'm of the belief and I love to hear your take on this is, you know, the more we go through the fires, the more empathy and more. Yeah, just more empathy and, and sympathy we can have for other people because we start to realize the human experience there, right? We're all battling something we don't know about or don't know anything about, right? You know, for example, when you share this year of loss, like I knew of them, right. And you and I had a lot of intimate conversations about some of the things you're going through, but when you displayed it all out there just the way you did, it's like, Holy shit. You know, we are battling something. We have no clue. You know, in the sense of the other person, right? So when we go through these, you know, you say, you know, I kind of wish I, you know, put myself Delorean and I, you know, I understand what you said there, but, um, I don't yes, I would love to have the pain saved, you know, you know, save myself the pain. But I also to like to think that I had to go through that, you know, I had to go through that, not necessarily just for my benefit, maybe for yours or anybody that's listening right now. So because they're going to be going through these trials and tribulations, they need a Trevor to show up for them, to give them fire, to give them strength, to give them courage, to give them the encouragement that they need to get through that period of time. Right. That's have been my belief. Um, you know, here lately is because we had to go through that, you know, and if correct me if I'm wrong, what I heard here is stay focused. Right. If something works, stay focused. Don't don't distract off the goal. You know the goal pasture here. You know, um, today, your non-negotiable is your relationship with God. And I love this because man, they cannot be just your, your, your emergency exit. That's got to be your, your constant go to, you know, but burnout still challenges you. So when the weight gets heavy, what does that look like for you? You know, what do you actually do to move through this burnout? Uh. Burnout. Well, I've been there before as you have. Yeah. You know, years ago when I had my own warehouse, I was wearing all the hats. You know, I was a prepper, I was a packer, I was a listing creator. I was doing everything and anything because let's, you know, an entrepreneur's business is his baby. And only he can run his baby, right? Yeah, I remember. So I've been down that road and how I obviously I don't have a warehouse anymore. Prep center. Um, really just sourcing out things. Um, and I've been, I've been doing that for a while now and just really getting out of the house, having extra curricular activities like I do jiu jitsu. I'm going to the gym. You know, I drop my son off at school, I pick him up. So it's just like even, even in this little office, I'm not confined and I'm able to take it up. And hey, if I want the day off, I'll take the day off, but I'm not going down that route. And another thing that I've changed as well is, you know, I have my, my business run like a well oiled machine for you and I caught myself slacking off a lot and I was like, man, this is just not. I want something more. It shouldn't be like this. So I started treating us that I'm not the boss, but God is the CEO. God is the CEO of not only my business, but my personal life as well. Your life? What would God want? Want me, you know, loafing off on the couch watching Netflix? Probably not. No, no. Because, you know, in the beginning, he implanted the seed in my head to have this successful business. Yeah, he put me on his path. So I'm just, you know, neglecting that if I'm loafing around. Well, and I don't want to be like that. Yeah, that's an excellent point, man. As we wrap up. Um, that's a good point to have or to make clear. And this is why you see a lot of people with a ton of money who are absolutely freaking miserable. I've been there right when I, when I exited my company, there was a period of time where I was just like, I feel empty. You know, I truly feel empty because I my life was in that. Right. And so too many people tie their identity to that season of life. And when that season is pulled out from underneath them, either by choice or not by choice, it throws them for a loop. They don't know how to associate their identity. They don't have anything that fulfills them. They don't have a purpose. Right. And so that was one thing I heard from you is, man, even when you are starting get when you start to be successful, when you start to get that momentum, you know, still chase something, chase purpose, chase something that fulfills you. Otherwise you're still going to be empty, you're still going to be miserable, you're still going to get burnout, right? Um, I love that you, you, you articulated this because I personally resonate with that in a big way. As we wrap up, I've got some rapid fire questions for you that I love to ask every guest. Um, it's kind of like a signature close, if you will. Some of which I gave you the heads up on already. Um, in this season of life, because grit can look different for every person and every, um, season in this season of, of this resurrection, this rebuild, this phoenix that rose from the ashes. What does grit look like for you? Give us a quick rundown in sixty 90s, man. Uh, grit. When someone tells me grit, I'm thinking of blue collar, hard working individual that built his business from scratch. Like whether it be in the warehouse or in your truck. Um, grit is just that the foundation of hard work and what presumed to be, you know, a beautiful business. That's what what grit means to me, which means that the hard, shitty starting point of your business. Gotcha. I appreciate you sharing that, ma'am. So it's mentioned. You know, I appreciate you mentioning about business and scaling and growing because you and I talked about this. There's always this constant adage about adding processes, systems, strategies, habits, beliefs, all these things, right? But growing also requires subtraction, right? Addition by subtraction. You probably have heard that. So what is one thing you're actively working on in order to level up? What is one thing you're that you're removing from your life? A point of friction, maybe something you had to unlearn or unbelieve? Yeah, I know that's not grammatically correct. Who cares? But something you had to remove from your life so that you can move forward. You can level up. Uh, definitely. It was probably a year and a half ago. Let's just say two years ago. My circle, you know, my my circle has gotten smaller and stronger. You know, I had to cut ties with not only friends, but family as well. Yeah. Because they serve no purpose to me. And, and I talked about this before. You think of a bucket of crabs. I call it the crab mentality, where if you have a bucket of crabs. Okay. And one, one crab tries to excel his life and get out of the bucket. What happens? The other crab pulls them back down. Yeah. So that's, you know, you if your circle doesn't want you to truly be better than than them, then you're not in the circle you're in. That's right, one hundred percent. I, I've said this numerous times, man, you're you're spot on. If your circle does not inspire you, you're not in a circle. You're in a cage one hundred percent dude. So glad you clarified the bucket of crabs, man. Um, not sitting on the dirty toilet. Or other things, right? Um, awesome. Last question is more of a two part question. One of you, I preface with this with you actually know two of the questions I apologize. Um, one, before I dive into my last question, um, this was off my notes. I don't know why I didn't make it to my notes. What is one quote or directive that you find yourself coaching yourself with when you experience, when you're in the trenches and you're in that dark moment or in that season or whatever, what is a directive that you, you coach yourself with or remind yourself of? I would have to go to, um, the owner's manual aka the Bible. Psalm forty six ten be still and know that I am God. And it it's basically just, Hey, be patient. Be patient. And that was an issue of mine. You know, years ago. What's next? What's next? All right, what do we got going on here? Where, you know, God will put you in a season like he's doing me now, like, hey, sit here and chill. Yeah, I got this. And a lot of people don't like that because they want to control what they can control. Guess what? You know, bigger and better matters are out of your hands. Yeah. Thanks for sharing it, man. That's a that's a great verse and a great phrase to be patient. One of my coaches loves to say aggressive patients, right? You know, be aggressive with the process, but be patient with the results. You know, um, I'm often reminded that. So thanks for sharing, man. All right. So this last question is a two part question. So last question. Um, you know, I briefed you this in the green room. Those are you that are listening for the first time. I love to ask my next quest, my next guest. What is one thing that you will love to ask this person? Now mind you, there is no knowledge of the lineup, right? It's completely anonymous and so far the question has landed perfectly. It's been perfect. So don't be that guy. Just screw it up. I'll try. I am usually that guy. So whenever something that can be, you know, thrown off, call me. Right. But what would you love to ask my next guest before you know, I'll ask you my next guests question or my last guest question. Um, so I always say your, your one point oh version is trying to negotiate with your two point oh version. So what's keeping you right now from being your two point oh version? It's really, you know, you have to look yourself in the mirror kind of question. Yeah. Like what is keeping you from achieving X or B or whatever it may be. Yeah. In looking at my guest lineup, that again, the perfect question is a great question for this next guest I can't share it with. Sorry, I just have to tune in. All right. So my previous guest had this question. He's a you know, the conversation was amazing. Those are that are watching or listening. You may have already heard this by now, but he's a, a CIA operative. Um, I was just blown away by the conversation, but he had this question for you again, completely anonymous. Didn't know who you were. What legacy do you think you would leave now and how do you want to improve that legacy as you move forward? What would you do for that? Or how would you do that? Oh geez. It's really a legacy to me is how you set the example. So yeah, me and not only my circle of friends, but predominantly my family. Yeah. So whether, you know, I'm involved in the church or hell, given a fucking five dollars to a homeless man. Yeah. You know, they see me, you know, bearing fruit. And, you know, not only that, but, you know, be just be the the version, be the man version of God that he wants you to be. So just really serve his purpose. And I don't know if that answered your question or not, but that's, that's really the legacy that I want to want to leave behind is, you know, hey, he was, you know, he gave yeah, you know, selfless service. And, you know, my kids will take that on with them. Love it man. That is very inspirational. And that's something here in this season I've gotten a lot more intentional. Is the legacy that we leave in that not just what we leave but how we live, right? Because it's not just what we leave behind, but it. to your point if how we live right. The example we set every single day right now. You know, how do we treat the cashier when we go cash out? She's having problems. Are we are we patient over her? Him or her? Or are we being an asshole? Right. Um, you know, I mean, that that's the that's the kind of legacy that we need to be looking at to now, not just the actual, like, you know, this statue, you know, this metaphorical statue that's, that's, you know, looking to be built. Trevor, my dude, thank you so much for not just giving us this polished speaker, which there was nothing polished about this conversation, which is absolutely perfect. Right? Because I didn't want this to be a polished, polished conversation. I want the real Trevor with minus the beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep to be removed or the screaming and yelling. Well, I did want that. Um, and the guys in our mastermind are probably like, man, I can't wait for this episode to come out right. But I do appreciate the the raw authenticity in this conversation. And I respect you for this because too much right now, especially in today's time, all we see is the highlight reels, the perfection reel. Um, so thank you so much for allowing us in, you know, a glimpse of all the losses you had and not just the losses, but how you came up for that, right? How you chose to rise up and still lead your family, lead your business and lead your life, man. So, man, I honor you for that. And thank you so much, dude, I appreciate you, you know, coming on here to share that. Thanks. Yeah, man. So for the person that is listening right now, who, who wants to follow you, that wants to maybe cheer you on, encourage you, support you, or maybe they want to learn more about this book that you have that's that you're writing on because I definitely, you know, want people to get their hands on that. Where can they find you? Yeah, well, you know, I'm not looking for any more friends, right? But. So the book I'm working on, I actually have two books. Uh, I published one, I was a children's book and I'm working on my other. Yeah. But where can I find you book. It's on Amazon. Uh, Charlie and Tai find God nearby. That's awesome. And it's just a, a nice little children's book that, you know, I wrote in the for the memory of my dad and my dad had a Weimaraner, uh, dog. So it's just a boy and his mom, they go, you know, looking for God around the park, around the neighborhood. So it's, it's nine bucks on Amazon and I'm not going to get rich off this. My, my sole purpose was to plant seeds, you know, and not only children's heads, but, you know, parents heads as well. Like, yeah, God is everywhere and God has done wonders for me. Awesome, man. Appreciate you sharing that. And guys, he's also on Instagram, Facebook. He didn't share that he's on. He's also on Tik Tok. I'll put all this on the on the show notes. He wanted to share a memory of his dad, which I love. So I'll be dropping all this in the show notes. Uh, so again, thank you so much for joining us guys. To those listening or watching, as you probably have heard numerous times from me, the gap between average and excellence is just merely action. Even imperfect action. Don't just listen to Trevor. I want you to take one thing from this conversation and use it today. Be the reason somebody doesn't quit today, right? Don't keep this to yourself. Share this. When someone in your circle because they need it in their life, send it to them. Trevor. Again, thank you for stepping in. Rina. It was an honor to have you today, my man. Thank you for having me. Yeah, man.