The Grit Factor Podcast w/ Karl Jacobi

TGFP_Ep30_Audio

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 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 you in the face with a two by four since that 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 Karl dot com. Now that's Karl with a K. Now let's get to work. All right. Welcome back to another episode. Today I am joined by a guest who is a true badass in her own right. And I'm about to tell you why. So hold on to your seatbelts. She's a stand up comedian, former Gerber baby model, an emotional intelligence expert, CEO of select sales department. Mom empty nester, owner of speakeasy in Aurora, Colorado. Author of two books, This Shift Challenging the Truce, Sabotage, Success and Are You Open to Four words that Transformed sales in just about everything else? Creator of the work show experience, co-host of the Smarter Sales Show podcast. Touring performer of Optimistic Personality Disorder, a one woman comedy show that has play stages from the Moab to Cape Coral. Now, as if all of that wasn't enough, she's the most decorated sales speaker most of you have never heard of, and the woman who turned a bracket diagnosis, a divorce, and single parenthood chapter into a sold out theater show. Merritt Khan, my friend. Welcome to the show. I'm super excited for this. Wow, Carl, that might have been my favorite intro of all time, except I should probably update my bio. You know, I never actually published that second book that are you open to? I, um, so I need to freshen up my bio. I wrote it. It exists. So that's true. I just, uh, we just never got that onto the shelves. Um, I just got sidetracked with, uh, you know, being a playwright and, uh, and that really captured my, my attention, so I never did the book. Sorry. No, it's all good. It's all good. Maybe I should have had my team reach out for, uh, do some more research, but nonetheless, I mean, still, that is a very stout resume, right? That. Okay, so, you know, it's one book still. You know, how many people don't even publish one book? Like, uh, I just literally turn in my book to the publisher today as we speak, so. Oh, congratulations. Thank you. I appreciate it. So I'm pretty stoked about it. Pretty excited. You know, my palms are kind of sweaty and so forth. So I'm sure you know that that F1. Yes I do, but I am super excited for this because my. When my team initially reached out to you, you know the working title was. Sometimes the only way through is to laugh it out, right? Um, and looking at your bio and everything, you just have this comedic aura about you. And even in a groom, like, yeah, we're going to have a good time. You know, we're going to have a good conversation here. There's always a lot of pressure when I'm introduced as a professional stand up comedian, I'm like, oh, funny. Oh, I gotta be funny. You know what? Just being natural and being authentic, that's, you know, sometimes we just have the humor there, right? And just have a good time, no agenda, uh, and just be ourselves. Right? And, um, so I have no doubts but merit, you know, because of the amount of time we have, um, you know, take me back, you know, before select, you know, all of this, you know, things you have accomplished before the book, before the stage, you know, the youngest general sales manager for startup radio station, which I forgot about that. Um, you know, the third biggest, you know, market in the country. Paint me a picture. What was the version of you? You know, what did she think she was building at that point in time? Oh, these are big questions, Karl. Starting with big questions. Um, you know, I, I, I think I always wanted to make a difference for people. Maybe not. You know, as a young girl, I think, you know, well, my hobbies included anything that you could wear a short skirt for. So baton twirling, cheerleading, ice skating, tennis, like those were the things I enjoyed. I don't know what it is about the short skirt. It's a good look for me. So that's sort of how I picked my, my, uh, my sport hobbies. Um, but I, I always liked that, you know, entertainment. So if you think about it, even those sports that I picked, you know, I wasn't I wasn't playing, you know, softball and soccer. I was doing things that were like deliberately about entertaining the crowd, um, and inspiring and motivating. And so even as a young girl, that was what I loved. And I, I was in all the school shows and all of that kind of thing. Like, um, I, I organized clubs, I had a little club, uh, as a, as a young girl, it was called the Greatest gals. And the reason for that we had a banner, we had jackets with greatest gals on them. I mean, it was a whole thing, but I wanted to be in a parade. And, um, we had this big parade coming through our town. I grew up in White Plains, New York, and, um, you know, my, my dad called up and found out like, how do you, how do you get to perform in the parade and march in the parade and have to be a club. So okay, let's start a club And that's kind of how I thought like, oh, that doesn't exist. Well, let's do it. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So I just, and I think being an entrepreneur really fed that. And now that I look back at my life, everything that I've done is really compounded to make me successful in the thing that I have loved more than anything. And, and found that it gives me a chance to make a difference more than any other place that I've, I've landed in my life. So understanding sales and marketing, being a salesperson and a sales manager and running a sales training company and, um, and then the emotional intelligence to deepen my understanding about people. So all of the things just kind of led to, okay, well, now you're a playwright, you're doing a one woman comedy show and you're touring the country. But really the show is to make a difference for people in the audience. And for some people, the difference is an evening of laughter and forget their own lives, right? Yes. You know, that's a great difference to make. But for other people, it's it's the show makes such a difference because people resonate with it, people from all walks of life, and they connect with it in ways that keynote speaking and sales training and all the other things just, you know, was kind of giving me a taste of, but not quite the impact that I have now. Yeah, man, thanks for sharing. It gives you gives us a great perspective. Yeah, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this because you alluded to something here that, you know, going forward, a lot of the things that we go through doesn't make sense, right? In the individual seasons chapters that we go through, for example, with you, you did so many different things in that moment. It may not have made sense. Fast forward ten, fifteen years, right into who you're doing. You know who the person you are today. But looking back, it all perfectly lines up, right? All the dots are just perfectly connected. Yeah. And I am often reminded, especially as you're talking about this, I'm often reminded of that, you know, don't worry. Don't worry about trying to connect all the dots forward, you know, because it will never connect. You know, you just kind of look backwards and connect. Try to connect dots that way. Yeah. I couldn't agree more. I mean, you know, sometimes you I've always been a really good goal setter in my life. And so I pick the, the object of my focus. And along the way, you know, a funny thing happens and it's like, you know, I the, the first time I took a stand up comedy class was in twenty fourteen. And I, um, I had, I had no aspirations of being a professional stand up comedian. Like that was not what I was going to do, I was on a path and I was kicking ass and I was a keynote speaker. And that was really my that was my business, my livelihood. And I loved it. Um, and the purpose of taking the stand up class was to be funnier in my keynotes. Mhm. And then I did seven minutes of original stand up comedy for three hundred people on my very first time on, on a stand up stage. And I left the stage and I was like, oh my God, what? What was that? What happened? Like something just happened in my body. I just, I am this is otherworldly. And, and I, I still don't know that I, I mean, I love the standup that I do, but it's my show that is really where my heart is. And I could never have predicted that like that wasn't that was never going to be a goal. So it's, but it's the dots getting connected along the way like you're talking about, that kind of creates this new opening for which you're perfectly suited to. But you didn't set out to. Yeah, that's one hundred percent correct. Yeah. As you're talking about your journey, emotional intelligence, and, you know, all the things that you've accomplished and speaker and all these different things. Yeah, it definitely makes sense. And all the work that you're doing now, right. But, you know, so you spent your twenties and 30s, you know, learn how to, to read a room, right? Um, especially as it comes to emotional intelligence. And that's something I've been, especially in my season of life, I've been really interested in learning more about is emotional intelligence, especially in today's times. Um, we've got, you know, more than enough distractions and more enough things to point out our, you know, pulling our focus. Mhm. Um, for you reading a bio, reading the room, um, reading the deal. Right. Walked me into the version of your life right before everything you thought you understood. Uh, you know, getting started was, you know, was getting tested, right? What did the picture look like from the outside? Uh, and what was already off underneath? Or did you feel that at all? Uh, I absolutely felt that. And I, I dive deep into the experiences in my, in my show as well. And I think this is why it resonates with people because what you would have seen from me in my twenties and 30s, and if I'm honest, even today, uh, fifties, um, you don't look a day over twenty. I'll just say this. Thank you, best friend. Um, biologically, I'm only forty six, so there you go. That's what my bloodwork said anyway. Nice. I, uh, but I do think I'm one of those people that is, is one of those. I'm just one of those happy people, you know, you see me out in the world and you go, gosh, she must live a really great life. She's always smiling, she's always joking. She's finding light around her, um, like that. She's a happy person. And I honestly, I think it comes from too many happy meals as a kid, you know, like, you know, maybe not enough happily married meals, you know, no tall, rich and famous meals, but a lot of happy meals. Like I've had too many happy meals, but it went here, not here. And false hope is kind of where the diet of, of champions. Um, but I, I deliberately cultivated that, you know, and, and my social media, right. You will see and there's times I do get very vulnerable in my show and, uh, and, and I have my vulnerable moments on social media, but for the most part, I carefully curate the persona that you will see. And I do that because I, I think that that serves everyone right. It's, um, you know, but it doesn't mean I'm not having bad days. It doesn't mean I'm not crying on the floor after a bad breakup. It doesn't mean I don't, you know, have concerns about money or, you know, my kid graduating from college and is he going to get a great job? And you know, who's hiring kids who are great at video games? Like, I don't know where to send him. Um, you know, so it doesn't mean I don't have concerns. It just means that I've, I've learned that I can hold more when I feel lighter and I feel lighter when I'm laughing. So what I've come to understand about life for me and something that resonates with my audience is that laughter lightens the load you hold. Right. We're all holding things. Yes. Oh yes you can. If you can find the funny, you can actually hold more. Because every little thing that you're holding feels a little lighter. Does that make sense? Yes. This is so good, I. I agree. Real quick, before we keep rolling, maybe life hit you hard. Business fell apart. Career isn't working out. Relationship ended. Health took a dive. And now you're standing in the rubble. Trying to figure out what the next move even looks like. Or maybe nothing blew up at all. On paper, you're winning. Sure, but on the inside, something's off. If you're not in crisis, you're at a crossroads. And the playbook that built the life you have is not the playbook that builds the one you want. Either way, you're stuck. Not broken. Stuck between who you were and who you're becoming. Most self-help just piles more weight on the load you're already carrying. I do not want to do that. I put together a free video series called the Grit Code Exposed, and I want to invite you to check it out. Seven short videos. That's it. The five laws that change everything for me in every client I coach. The same five that every person who's ever come back from the fire has walked through where they had a name for it or not. No fluff, no ninety minute webinar, no bait, just the free video series. You can start it tonight. Grab it at grit. Code exposed dot com. One more time. Grit code Exposed dot com. It's free. You don't need any more hustle. You need the next version. And this is how you find it. 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 the conversation. Now let's go back to a statement you made just previously. Right? You said this, you know, in passing, I don't think you really took note of this or even audience for that matter, but I did. Is your blood work? Said you're you're forty six, right? Uh, you've achieved level forty six, right. And so you, you kind of gave it away. And I know better. I never ask a woman her age. Um, I was raised politely. Uh, I'll tell you. I'm proud of it. Like, I'm, I'm actually fifty six, but according to function health, uh, I my blood work says no way. Yes. Yeah. I don't believe it. I'm sorry. I'm gonna have to ask for your birth certificate. But, you know, those are so audience. If you're if you're listening, just imagine this is a truly magnificent younger look woman here that I have the honor of sitting here with, uh, those of you who are watching, obviously you see exactly what I see here. But isn't it true, though, that if we laugh more and experience more joy, happiness, it can actually, you know, make us not just feel, but actually appear younger, right? Because of the stress markers, because of the amount of stress and cortisol that we hold in our bodies. Right? So I mean, that's a valid point that you just articulated there. I don't think you really realize that, but the amount of joy, the amount of laughter, not just because, not because of you haven't had any adversities, you've had your fair share share of them, right? But in spite of that, you chose no, you decided that this was the path you're going to lead. You're going to choose, You decide to inspire others for laughter, you inspire others that in spite of whatever their fires are, that they too can laugh in the moment of things. Because there is this video. I don't know if you've seen this is this, uh oh, I can't even remember his name now. He was on a diary CEO not too long ago. Um, he was talking about how life should be a video game. Video game, meaning we should be having fun going after the one important thing, right? And just have fun because people often look back, you know, in their final breaths, like, man, I should have had more fun, right? Yeah. Think about it. Like we don't lay, you know, people don't like, man, I wish I took life more seriously. Yeah, nobody's nobody's saying that. No, no, no. You know, and if if I may, I even look back like, man, you know, my kids are over there. So like, yeah, he he's certainly, but, uh, I often take myself way too seriously. I take life way too seriously because I'm chasing all of these different goals that you're talking about. At the end of the day, this is all a game, right? We should have fun, you know, laugh and be around people who make us laugh like you. You know, uh, this has been such a very, you know, such a great conversation. Only, what, twenty minutes in? Uh, I feel ten years, ten years younger. Oh. I'm gonna be a toddler by the time I get off this. I love it. That's awesome. Talk to Merritt. She'll make you look ten years younger, I love that. I'm the fountain of youth. Apparently, I shut up my pricing. Yeah, you should have that power. Um, you know, if I can just jump in on that, um, I think the thing that I I've done a good job of learning how to do. And it didn't I don't know that it came naturally. I think I was probably, you know, if you talked to my my friends from my youth and, you know, college and such, they would tell you, oh, yeah, Merritt's always been kind of funny. Um, I, I think I would have that, that image, but when I studied stand up comedy, I actually learned how to think like a comedian. And that was a total game changer. At that time, my marriage was falling apart. It was falling apart before that. Um, and I, I've always been a good journal writer, so I'm very introspective and I'll write, you know, not just about like, oh, what did you eat for dinner today? You know, I just like, I observe, I've always been an observer of my myself. And so I would write about like, what happened and, you know, how did I feel about things? And what did I learn? And who am I being in that situation that that happened or that I had that reaction. So I was just always been a reflective person. And when I learned how to think like a comedian, I started asking questions like where I was observing what I was observing. And so, you know, there's some comedians that make a lot of money out of like, what's the deal with old people driving out of the driveway? You know, like, you know, you can make a living like that, apparently. Um, yeah, I've seen a few of those. Yeah. But my brand of comedy, um, what I was taught by my first coach was to observe why something got my attention. And there's a lot of humor that lives in that space. So I would ask myself, like, what's embarrassing about this? What's unusual about this? What's ridiculous about this? And, um, and that's how I came upon the name of my show, which is optimistic personality disorder because I was writing in my journal. This was as I was going through my divorce and, and I literally wrote like, you know, we had a difficult marriage, but I'm really hopeful. I really think we're going to get this through this divorce and be friends. And all of a sudden the words like, jumped off the page and I'm like, am I nuts? Like, I must be insane. Like, we didn't get along when we loved each other. Like, there's no way this divorce process is going to go well. And so I was like, I think I'm the one with the problem. I think I have optimistic personality disorder, and all of a sudden my whole life made sense. I was like, you know, which, you know, going back to your, um, discussion on emotional intelligence, like I am literally literally trained in emotional intelligence, like certified well-trained. I've done hundreds, if not a thousand or so emotional intelligence assessments for business leaders and sales professionals and entrepreneurs. And that's really my niche with that. And so I will I know what all these things mean, and I know my own wiring, and I know I'm over the top optimistic and I have a very low sense of reality check. That is a very, uh, dangerous imbalance. And so I've worked very hard in my life to get those, those attributes more in line with each other so that I can see a good positive outcome that's leading with my optimism. I'm always going to be that girl. But I'm also saying like, well, what aren't I seeing? What, what are the obstacles that could, you know, come up and, and bite me in the butt? Like I need to be aware of the reality. Um, but I do want to be a little bit more tip the scales in the favor of optimism. Because if I don't see something working out, like I'm not even going to be in action. And so I know that intellectually, but it's it is a disorder for me. I don't I don't necessarily view it as I mean, I hear what you're saying, right? I mean, it's a label in my opinion. But, you know, I don't see that as a disorder per se. I see it more as a superpower. Right? Mhm. Um, especially in the world that we live in, there is so much negativity, so much of just, you know, we're not going to go there, but you turn on social media, the news or whatever, you know, and we're inundated with whatever, you know, you know, some type of propaganda. But you, in my opinion and my belief you actually have a superpower because we do need to be more optimistic, right? We do need to be, and I'm not saying we always need to, you know, to be optimistic in such a way. We ignore reality. I'm just saying we always need to be optimistic in the. And act as though everything will work out right. Because in the end, guess what? Everything will work out. You know, it may not be in the outcome that you desired. It may not be in the outcome that you initially had prayed for or thought of or whatever. But in the end, everything will work out. Um, I think a lot of times it works out better than the smaller version that you had. Right, exactly. I can remember being nineteen years old. I went to a Tony Robbins event, walked on hot coals, you know, did the whole thing. Wow. Yeah, I was huge. I still am a huge Tony Robbins fan. And I just thought, like, that's what I want. Like I and the radio station, by the way, where I was the general sales manager. So I, I had this vision of like, I want to be the female, much tinier version of Tony Robbins. I'm like five foot nothing. And he's, he's just a giant man. He is. And then, you know, fast forward, I became the youngest general sales manager of a radio station in Chicago. But not just any station. A station that was literally called Personal Achievement Radio. And it was a brand new concept in radio at the time. And we played a hit idea like a music station plays a hit song. So we played back in the day tapes like from Nightingale-conant, you know, all the motivational stuff. And we played a lot of Tony Robbins. Well, then we did this live event with Tony Robbins. So now I'm meeting him this picture together and nice, you know, so it's like, and I could see it was like, well, I, you know, he could do that and I could do this and I'm on the path and I know all these people. We had a show with Les Brown and you know, I like I was meeting all these heroes of mine. Yeah. Amazing guy. And so, you know, I was like, I saw myself making a difference with people. I saw myself on stages speaking and because of the sales training business I got, I had that opportunity and that platform and I was teaching. And so that led to and then I did the, the stand up thing. But all of that to do this one woman show like, and never in a million years would have seen that for myself. It was so much bigger of a vision than I had the opportunity to even dream of. And now I wonder. I sit here and I'm like, okay, well, now I'm touring a one woman show I'm performing in, you know, for sold out theaters for people who, by the way, have never heard of me and never heard of this show. And they buy a ticket. Like, I don't know, like, just because the tagline is cool, tagline is get a great hook. It's if a Ted talk and a tequila shot had a baby, it would be this show. It's a great it's a great hook. That is, I'm sold. Yeah. And people buy tickets to the show and I'm. And at the end of the show, I always do this talkback with the audience and I just tell them like, I'm really inspired by you because every single person in this room today bought a ticket to something that they'd never heard of. Like, why did you do that? Like, you know, you had lots of other options for your entertainment dollar. And I'm just blown away. But I feel and I've had people say, you know, they just felt drawn to it and they didn't know why they were there. But at the end of the show, they're like, oh, that was so relatable. And that was my life. And, and I get it. And I could never have imagined like, I couldn't set a goal for that. But my little comedy show has made way more of an impact. I shouldn't say this. If anybody still wants to hire me as a keynoter for sales programs still available. But, you know, like I think that makes you more marketable. By the way, comedy show is getting much more of a reaction than any keynote I have ever done for a business conference, which is it just blows me away. Well, that makes sense, right? Because in a business environment, you're expected to behave a certain way, right? You're expected to project a certain way. And thus, you know, response is going to be pretty much atypical, right? But in comedy, you're expecting to show up to get a laugh. You're showing up to get a show, right. So that makes perfect sense. Completely different venues. And I honestly there, I think there's enough and I think we're both in the same boat because I'm trying to launch my speaking career as we're talking about this, but I think we need more laughter. I think we do need more platforms for laughter, for comedy, or just comedy in general, right? That is relatable, especially in today's times when there is just so much going on that we do need some type of release, some type of outlet, um, with no, uh, you know, um, Uh, worries essentially, I guess what I'm saying. Right. Um, so that makes perfect sense. You know, um, you do have a gift. I can just feel like a sense that I need to, you know, travel up to Denver just to go buy a show. Yes. Well, I, I, I take the show on the road. I'll come to where you are. You go get me a theater. I'll, I'll be in Sarasota, Florida. Ah, okay. Yeah. I go to Florida a couple times a year. My mom lives down there. So nice. Nice. Heck, yeah. Well that's great. Well, let's, let's dive in deep a little bit because, you know, we cover so much ground in how life has built you to giving you the talents and gave you the kind of like the yellow brick road, right? The Oz territory. Um, one of the things we didn't really dive into much is to the story of some of the adversities and hardships that really, uh, in a lot of ways formed the person who you are today, right? Because we often look at the highlight reel success stories and, you know, the person that's laughing here, it's like, well, you know, that must be nice. It must have been an easy road or whatever the perception is, right? But if anybody paid attention to my into my introduction, I briefly mentioned you carry the bracket gene, right? You had this diagnosis, which is pretty much like a huge indicator for breast cancer, right? Yeah. Um, amongst other things, you had to do, uh, a preventive mastectomy. Um, you know, that's not a small decision for, for a woman, right? No. Um, walk us through how you got there. You know, who weighed in what, who did, who did not, you know, uh, walk us through that moment, if you don't mind. Like, what led to that? Um, so, uh, normally when a woman goes to a doctor's appointment and you do the health intake, they'll ask, you know, any history of breast cancer in your family. And the original, the thinking was that it was always passed down from your mother. Really it was. That was the conventional wisdom. And so you never really thought about like, who's on your dad's side? Um, and so I always answered that question throughout my life up until I was forty years old with like, there is no breast cancer or ovarian cancer in my family. Well, I think my grandmother died of ovarian cancer, but it was my dad's mom. And that's how I answered the question. Well, I, I just didn't know. And one day my, um, my aunt called me, um, so my dad is the oldest of eight of, sorry, of four boys and his mother, my grandmother was the oldest of eight. And in her generation, all so three, three women and five men in her generation, all three women died of breast or ovarian cancer, and all five of the men lived a very long time. But all I don't quote me. I feel like all of them at some point got prostate cancer, you know, but maybe not. But all of them who had daughters, there was some breast cancer in that. So that would have been in my dad's generation and I was the oldest in the next generation. So there's there's this long history and there's breast and ovarian cancer riddled, riddled all over the family tree on my dad's side. And it was my aunt who's married to my dad's brother who called and said, I think you should get this test I've been hearing about, and I'd never heard of it. And I was like, okay. And so I went, um, and I got the test and it turned out that I was positive. So when you are, when somebody in your family that has breast or ovarian cancer. It is. There are some other factors to think about, but it may make sense to get a BRCA test, um, on that person who was diagnosed because they have a fifty. If they do test positive for BRCA one or two, then there's a fifty fifty percent chance that they pass that down to their children, whether it's male or female. So obviously, you know, my, my grandmother, we don't know because the test didn't exist before she died. Right. She died like fifty years ago. Um, but my dad was positive, so he had a fifty fifty chance of passing on to me. I'm positive I have a fifty fifty chance of passing it on to my son. Um, he he twenty two. We haven't had him tested yet, but, you know, it's just we're just looking, we're just kind of, you know, monitoring things. It's not, it doesn't affect men as deeply as women. But yeah, so that's a little bit of how I, how I found out about it. But I was forty years old. I had a, uh, how old was my kid? Um, he was five years old at the time. And I thought, you know, I, I, I figured I could live with a few less parts. I just didn't want to miss out on living. And that's right. That's one of the lines in my show. And it's a beautiful moment when I'm sharing the story and, um, and then I follow that up with some humor. That's one thing in this conversation I can count on is humor. And I think this has probably been one of the most enjoyable conversations I've had. Real quick, before you go, if you're still with me this deep into the episode, something didn't hit you. Maybe it was the guest. Maybe it was one line. Either way, you're still here. And that feeling in your chest right now. That's the signal. Most people get a signal like that and do absolutely nothing with it. They close the app. Life rushes back in. The moment's gone. Six months later, there are the exact same spot. I don't want that for you. So I put something together. I want to invite you to check out a free video series called the Grit Code Exposed. Seven short videos. The five laws. I walk every client through. The same ones that rebuilt me when everything else fell apart. And if you listen closely today, you heard them running underneath the entire conversation because everyone who's come back from the fire walks through these five laws. Some find them on their own, some get help, but the laws don't change. Free video series. You can start it tonight. No fluff. No ninety minute webinar, just the series. If you're going to do something with what you heard today, do this before life talks you out of it. Go to grit Code Exposed dot com one more time, grit Code exposed dot com. And hey, before I let you go, thank you for riding with me this long. It means a lot more than you know. Thank you. You know, um, you know, because especially right now, you know, some things that, you know, I've got so much going on in my personal life, business life and so forth. You know, it's nice to have a conversation and just have have a good laugh, right? And not, not surface level, like a deep gut, like laugh. Right. Um, and, uh, so this has been, yeah, of course, this has been such a great conversation. Well, we'll get you in my, uh, my virtual class, I teach a class called how to Think Like or Think Like a comedian. And it's actually, I actually just want to like, do stand up. It's for everybody who just wants to think a little funnier. Did you I'm sorry. What were you saying? No, that's perfect, because I actually have them written down. Think like a comedian. Um, you know, that was one of the things I took away for for, you know, every every person I talked to. I like to extract, you know, wisdom and nuggets like, man, what, what, what makes this person so unique? And what does this person want through the fires and what some of the tactics they use? And, and, uh, so one of the things I pulled out of this was, you know, think like a comedian, right? I don't think I've actually no, I've never heard that from anybody from anywhere. It was to think like a comedian. It's so counterintuitive, but it makes sense. Yeah, one hundred percent makes sense, you know? But yeah, it's a, it's a good way to go through life. And it is a program I do for businesses and conferences. And, but, um, you know, for people that are in my audiences at my show, I just, you know, like this is, this is how you, this is the access so that you could take your life story and rewrite some of the challenging parts through the lens of comedy. But first, you just have to learn how to think like a comedian. And then once you learn it, you'll never you can't unlearn it. You can't unsee it. It's everywhere. You know, like comedy's everywhere. And if you think about, you know, I mean, some of my favorite comedians, uh, you know, I like, uh, Jim Gaffigan is a great example because, you know, that guy could come up with a Netflix special from a grocery store aisle. I mean, like, you know, comedy is everywhere, but it's how, you know, how many times have you walked past the aisle of Hot Pockets or M&Ms, you know, like he does, he does. He has amazing material on that. and most people are just walking by it. But if you learn how to think like a comedian, those things just pop off the shelf to you and you're like, oh, that's hilarious, but you just have to learn how to think like that. Yeah, it makes perfect sense. Makes perfect sense. Yeah, I definitely, you know, I hope everybody's listening to this and takes advantage of what you just, you know, briefly discussed here was that because, you know, I think the more we think like that, I think that just adds a season, a seasoning of humor into everything we do, right? So that we don't take ourselves too seriously. We don't take life too seriously, you know? But, uh, this has been an amazing conversation. And not just because of all the, you know, things you just talked about, but, you know, again, you know, when you hear about these conversations of all the things that you've accomplished, everything you've done, um, especially for you. You know, you've had some health setbacks actually, you know, quite a few health setbacks and this could have easily put you into a cycle of poor me. Right. Um, you know, think about, you know, all the things you've lost out on and things you probably never be able to have and so forth. But instead you chose to leverage that and your gifts, talents and so forth into a superpower to inspire others. And I gotta, I gotta say, I honor and respect you for that because that's not an easy thing to do. It's not an easy thing to take all of that stuff that you've been through, package it up, uh, in such a way that it helps other people make light of their own situation so they can carry more weight, right? Yeah. Um, I think there's, I mean, I appreciate that and I'm taking that in. I'm receiving your acknowledgement. Um, but, you know, I mean, the name of the podcast is grit factor and you are a, you know, there's no shortage of people you could talk to who have, you know, some grit and that have been through it. And I think that's probably, um, one of my favorite consequences, unintended consequences of, of performing the show. I get so vulnerable and so authentic about the ups and downs of my life story with my audiences. And there's humor throughout. Now it, it didn't always live like a humorous moment while I was living it, but right to take that step back and just go, all right, I'm gonna find the funny here. It may not be today, but I'll get there. Um, and, you know, like in my own personal life, literally, it was three weeks yesterday that I had a really bad breakup. Very, you know, like heartbreak, heartbreak, and, um, I'm still reeling from it, to be honest. But it was like, you know, I'm with this man for two years that I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with until I learned that he had an entire secret family. And I'm not a dumb woman. You know, it's like I missed all of that, like, for two years. Oh, man. Yeah. Like, we went the engagement ring shopping and, like, he had a wife already. So it was just the whole thing was just crazy. And it was like, all of a sudden I woke up in a Dateline episode and, you know, and so after I got up off the floor and stopped crying, I realized, okay, well, this made me instantly more relatable to people in my audiences because at some point I'm going to write some comedy about this. Um, you know, because not only was he betraying his wife with me, but he was betraying me with others. And so I was like, wow, I just, I just knocked out being cheated on and being the unintended other woman at the same time. Like, how relatable am I right? I got you, I've been there. Um, I didn't even know it, like I it's just so. But it's it's your. So to for me to be able to get to that point inside of three weeks. That's that's that's freaking remarkable. Now, it doesn't mean I've healed everything that I need to heal to, you know, emotionally move on from that experience. But I do really think that there's a healthy way to look at, um. Here's what I, I, I get, I, because I've done a deep dive into my own life, I have mapped out all the good and bad experience across my entire life. I literally have a poster. I could go get it. It's in my office. Um, but it literally like I have plotted the points and it's a visual display. It's, it's on paper, the highs and lows and what I, what I got from that experience. And and that's an exercise I do in, in my, um, sometimes it's a one day, sometimes it's a two day workshop, uh, is you get a chance to, to see your life, the ups and downs and what you, what you experience is, oh, I have bounced back after bad things like that thing that I thought was going to kill me in the moment didn't kill me, but it taught me something that made me stronger for that next moment. And so I know I'm being prepared to for whatever is next. Like my, my show currently ends. I do, uh, I break it up in decades. So it's really the first five decades of my life. But I'm fifty six. I'm technically in decade six, which I haven't written into the show yet. And it's funny because I didn't know what was holding me back from writing it until this breakup, and I realized I would have wrote the wrong show like I would have it would it wouldn't it wasn't finished like the story. And and I still think, you know, I've got four more years in this decade. So the decades not over. But I think there's, there's definitely some, some rewrites, you know, for the authenticity of the show that I couldn't have predicted. But it's really fascinating to me now because now I see that this decade is more like, like, um, I feel like the caterpillar, like this whole thing was just like coming together so that I could really do my best work in the world and connect with people. And so good no one really feel. So yeah, it makes perfect sense, you know, and I also believe that you're, you're going through this. I don't remember who it was I talked to not too long ago. We had this conversation similar, um, situation, not situation, but similar outcome, you know, is that we often go through these fires. Actually, not often we we go through these fires, these issues so that not for necessarily our own benefit. It's for people around us that need inspiration, hope and so forth, because there's probably another merit in the audience. It's, you know, going through that exact fire that you've been through, but they, they don't know how to move forward. Right. Um, they don't know, you know, they just don't know, you know, so to have you on stage to have you in whatever capacity to make light of it, but also to remind them, hey, remember that hardship you survived two years ago or four years ago or ten years ago? Yeah. This too shall pass. Right. And we often forget about that. Oh, absolutely. And I think, um, I think helping is healing. So when you're going through something, find someone else that you can be helpful to Two may not be the same exact situation, but it takes your mind away from what you're dealing with and it puts you in a service mindset to to be of value to someone else. And that that helps a lot. I, and it's such a serendipitous conversation. But yesterday morning, so today we're recording this on Monday afternoon. So yesterday morning, so Sunday morning, I get an email from a woman who was in my audience for my for optimistic personality disorder a week earlier. And she said, I just wanted to reach out to you. I, I was in your audience last week and I didn't know how badly I needed your show. Um, I am, I just got, I got married six months ago and my husband just kicked me out. He's leaving me and he is a narcissist. And I talk about my marriage to a narcissist and I, I really would, you know, I wanted to know if you. And she said, and I still love him and I want to I want this to work. And why won't he wake up and choose me and all this stuff? And I was wondering if you had any optimism or advice from me. And I just emailed back. I just said, call me. And I gave her my cell phone number. And we talked yesterday for over an hour, and I just poured into her and I listened to her and, and, you know, here's how we were connected. She bought a thirty dollars ticket to my comedy show and we had this connection. And then I woke up this morning and I emailed her, here's some, here's some resources, here's some things. And, and she just emailed me back before I jumped on the call. And, you know, she's like, got, you know, like, you are, you're, you're amazing. Like, you don't know me. You didn't have to do this. You gave me so generous with your time. And all I thought was, well, of course. Because healing. You're helping me. I shared with her my my recent stories, and I'm just like you. You don't know that helping you is helping me heal, too. And I think we forget about that. And, you know, it's just amazing the ways that we can connect with people and, and the grit that they can find in themselves when they witness it in you. That's so good. I agree wholeheartedly. I think the whole aura of the conversation in the last forty five, fifty minutes really encapsulates just in that, right? We sometimes get so wound up in our own fires and our own situations when if we can just take five minutes, ten minutes and look for somebody else, somebody else's problem, it takes the focus off of us, right? It takes the focus off of our own issues, our own situation, and that dopamine hit that we get off of inspiring somebody else, helping somebody else. It's enough to get us like, wait, shoot. I just came back ten minutes later and realized, man, here's the solution to the problem or what have you. Right. It just, I agree with you. It really does something to our brain. It's the hit of dopamine or serotonin that comes in our brain or, you know, whatever. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not a I love geeking out on this stuff, but I don't know enough. I don't know enough to nerd out reactions to all of it. Um, have you seen that movie? It's called heal. Yes. Yes. Amazon Prime. I watched it last night. I don't know how I missed it. It came out like ten years ago or something. It's been around for a while. I missed it until last night. Um, and it's just, it talks about that mind body spirit connection. And I think that's so important. Um, but, uh, but one of the moments in the movie, they were interviewing some research scientist and she was saying how certain things can reduce the stress that we feel on our body. And laughter was one of the things that she talked about. You know, there's, you know, there's EFT and there's, uh, you know, there's all these modalities you could do, but laughter popped up on the screen. And so I, I paused the movie and I took a screenshot and I thought, this is what I'm trying to do. I'm not suggesting that if you find a way to write a joke about your horrible relationship or your diagnosis, that all of a sudden the stress is just going to magically melt from your body like, come on. But what laughter can do, what I want my show to do and my workshops and my coaching to do is to, and even my comedy class is to just help you Loosen the grip on something. You are tightly wound around this awful thing, or this challenge or this setback. If you can just loosen the grip on that by just lightning up with a little laughter. What happens is you allow for all those other things to come into your awareness that really can help you move past it. So good. I agree. That's what I want. Laughter to do for people. Well, I think you're you're well on the road to to accomplishing that based on, you know, what I've already heard and just based on our own conversation, it's been such an amazing conversation. I know we could go on for hours, but unfortunately, neither one of us have the opportunity for that. Um thank you. You know, so much for coming in, sharing, you know, your light, sharing your, your laughter, sharing your story, a glimpse of it, you know? But, uh, but again, thank you for sharing all this. I pray and hope that this episode has found another merit or another coral that's needed your laughter that is going to run into your show and get a ticket and be impacted by your story because, uh, we need more of this, right? We need more laughter. We need more impact. We need this is what we need more of. Um, but that being said, people want to connect to your show. They want to learn more about you. They want to take this, uh, think like a comedian class because I'm definitely going to, you know, I'm definitely want to do this. Great. Where can they find out more about you? I would go to o p d show dot com or you could type it all out. Optimistic Personality disorder dot com will also get you there. Um, but there's everything that you want. You can learn about the show. There's a page for tickets, there's a page to learn about what I call the work show experience. So it's, it's a workshop and it's the show. Um, so it's, but it's this, this, this amazing experience. Um, and, uh, you, there's also a let's talk button on that page. So if you have a follow up question or you want to talk to me about sponsoring the show for your group or, um, having me do the perform the show or the think like a comedian program, um, at a conference or a women's group. They're amazing ways I can work with you. And, uh, that's a great way to just book some time on my calendar. Nice. Awesome. Thanks for sharing. We'll definitely be putting that all in the show notes and, and, uh, hopefully spreading that impact to, to more amazing people that need it. So. Well, awesome. As we wrap up, I've got some rapid fire questions for you. Uh. In this season of life, What does grit mean? Like for you? Mhm. Um, I feel like, uh, grit is eliminating the things that I, I, that no longer serve me. I've had to, you know, there's things that I've done that, you know, I thought I just had to do and it's grit to, to, to stop doing the things that aren't going to get me where I want to go now. And, and it's learning. I feel like I'm in a season of learning some new things. Like, yeah, I used to do this podcast with a, with a friend of mine, the smarter sales show. And it was great, but it's time that I, I should do my own podcast and, um, you know, there's just some really nitty gritty things to sink my teeth into and that's going to require me to learn some new skills, um, to, to really be bigger, be better for other people and the mission that I have. Nice. Love it. Love it. All right. Well, you're in the trenches. You're in the thick of it, right? You know, either in a moment or for a day or a week or you know, what you just described, you know, with this breakup, what is a quote or directive or even a scripture that you tell yourself to pull you out of the trenches or out of the thickness of the rumination we can typically go down into. Oh, I've got a lot of those. Um, the one that, uh, the one that comes to mind right now was a quote from a book I read when I was a little girl. My dad made a, a, uh, a plaque on my wall and it says it's V.C. Andrews. It was from like flowers in the attic, which is not a motivational book. It was kind of creepy, actually. Um, and I read it as a kid. It's like a young adult book, but the quote is everything can come to those who have the desire, the dedication, the determination, and the drive. And I've just always loved that. It's always stuck with me. Um, so I would say that the other, the other one that I remember, remind myself it's something that I have said in my show and I've said it to many people is, um, you know, we've all heard tragedy plus time equals comedy, but I've added that nobody said it had to take a long time. So find the funny as fast as possible. Is is something I live by. Find the funny as fast as possible. So much gold here. So much gold. That first quote reminded me. Or the read the book uh. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Yeah, I was gonna say of course. Right. Um, it's very similar directive, you know, talking about that so well. Awesome. This last question comes in two parts. Um, I always love to give my guests an opportunity to challenge my future guests with a question. Now the guest lineup is completely anonymous, and so far every question has landed perfectly. Um, so before, uh, I ask you for yours, Mark, uh, Schmidt, a previous guest, had this question for you again, for those who are listening. Oh my God. No, I'm just kidding. I don't know him. I'm like, dang it. Does somebody cheat? I just oh, man. Totally full on my plan here. Sorry. Schmidt. Say, okay, in those moments when you feel like quitting, what do you do to pick yourself up and keep going? Okay, well, uh, true to form, I, uh. Okay. Um, I, I have four pillars of life that I think you have to be really good in. This is one of the things I teach in my workshop. If you want life to turn out, you have to be good with, uh, good with your health, good with your money, good with people. And you have to know your bliss. You have to make time for your bliss. Mhm. So when, when things go awry, I, I look for one of those areas, but to pick myself up and get back in the game, I go to bliss. What makes me happy? So for me, it's I get myself out to a comedy show. I get myself around my girlfriends or my son who I, you know, who cracks me up every time. Um, I go for a walk outside, like I'm doing something that brings me joy. A spa treatment that always works, too. Um, but If I'm if I'm getting if I'm in the thick of it, I get right. I get as fast as possible. I get to something that gives me joy and then I'll deal with the rest of it. But first, like do something that I that lights me up. Nice. Thanks for sharing. That's pretty good. Health, money, people and bliss is what I capture as the four pillars. Yes. It's incredible. Thanks for sharing that. All right. So what would you love to challenge my next guest? What would be your question? Uh, I would, I would ask your next guest, um, when, when you are in a moment where that really calls for you to dig in and with grit, you know, do you do it from a serious perspective? Or is there some humor that makes that helps you out? Of course. Of course, I should not expect it otherwise. Right. That's a great question. That's a great question. Well, Mary, uh, thank you again for sharing this last hour with us. And again, I know we could go for on and on, you know, just talk about all the gems that you, you know, just revealing more gems and, uh, so thank you. I really appreciate you not just coming in here and allow us to talk about all the amazing things, but giving us a glimpse of what drives you, how you use humor to inspire others to help other people be lighter. Right? So thank you for, you know, coming in here and just sharing an hour with us. I really appreciate that. Well, I appreciate your questions, Carl, and the way you listened. And this was a great it was a great interview. I do a lot of podcasts. This was a lot of fun. So thank you. Awesome. I appreciate that. Feedback means a lot. All righty. Well, to those that are listening and watching, as you know, the gap between average and excellence is just action, even if it's imperfect, humorous action. Yes, it was an alignment of this episode. So don't just listen to merit. Please just take one thing she shared today and apply it with the next twenty four hours. Whether it's thinking like a comedian or talking about some of the pillars, please just put it to use within twenty four hours of listening. Be the reason someone doesn't quit today. Don't just keep this episode to yourself. Someone in your circle needs this. Send it to them. They need it. Merit. Again, thank you so much for stepping in. I really appreciate honor and respect to you for that. Thank you so much. Thank you. Absolutely.