Beyond the Island: Strategies to Break Out of Solopreneurship as a Coach

0:01 Welcome to The Coaching Equation, brought to you by Empire Partners and hosted by Ryan Lang and Brooke Bishop. Our mission is to help you build a profitable and impactful coaching business by cutting through the noise and all the expert advice to deliver tried and true actionable insights that you can deploy in your business today. Each week, we bring on expert guests, unveil cutting-edge tactics and strategies, and share the secrets and stories that we've gathered from working with the most successful coaching companies on earth. Welcome back to Coaching Equation Podcast. I'm your host, Ryan Lang, CEO and co-founder of Empire Partners, alongside my co-founder and co-host, Brooke Bishop.

0:47 What's up, man? What's up? What's up? This is going to be a dangerous one. I know. It is a party in the house today. This is a really special episode because we have the opportunity to bring in our three incredible coaches, Chad, Andrew, and Melissa, to join us today. Welcome, guys. Awesome. I'm glad to be here. Good to see everybody. Before we kind of dive in on the topic today, since this is your first introduction on the podcast, I'd love if you guys would take just a brief second to please introduce yourselves and give the audience a little bit of a sense for who you are and why the hell they should pay attention to you. I'll just dive in. First time listener, first time caller, really excited to be here.

1:32 So Chad E. Cooper, I've been an executive coach for, I think, 18, 19 years. And I've had the fortunate privilege of working from everyday, awesome entrepreneurs like myself to billionaires, professional athletes, Olympians. And one of the things that I specialize in is helping them in their transition from their career to the next identity. And so I've had the privilege of being able to help people so that they do that gracefully and powerfully. And we place in the spiritual piece that's most often missing in their lives. Awesome. Melissa, we're going to sandwich the beautiful woman in the room.

2:16 Don't let these two crazy guys. Well, one, it's a pleasure to be here. Nothing makes my heart happier than to work with these beautiful guys that are sitting here on the screen. I've had the pleasure of being a coach now for over 25 years. I've had the opportunity to work with two of the top coaching companies in the world. And I've had the pleasure of working with thousands of clients from top CEOs, epic world leaders to homeless people and everything in between. And so part of the beauty of what we learned as coaches together is how to coach anyone, anywhere, anytime. And I adhere to that. And I love the coaching space. For me, it's a beautiful opportunity to help move people out of suffering and challenges and to create a life they want to live in.

3:00 So it's my wheelhouse. I'm happy to be here. Love it. Awesome. And then there's me. Oh, then there's you. Yeah. No, I take up the rear. I'm here just for accents, just to bring some diversity, you know, and some culture and to transition you guys over to drinking tea. That's not going to happen. That's it. That's it. You established that a long time ago. Yeah, my name is Andrew Devlin. I've got 30 plus thousand hours of one-on-one coaching. I've been... In the coaching world for over 16 years. Left England because it rains a lot. And I realized there's other places in the world that it doesn't rain all the time.

3:41 So traveled around the world for about six years, teaching windsurfing and sailing and kayaking. And ended up working for the cruise lines. Met a cute girl in Alaska. She lived in Colorado. And I did not know how to function as a husband. And that led me to hiring my first coach. And I needed to work through a lot of my baggage. And I doubled my income in the first year working with a coach. I became the dad and the husband that I had always wanted to be. And that really set me on a course of helping people grow big business, but without sacrificing their health, without sacrificing their relationships, without sacrificing their kids. And so as that windsurf instructor, when the tide comes in, all boats should rise unless you've got some holes in it.

4:26 And so my real passion is really getting into the things that you want to be to leave a legacy rather than just like, oh, yeah, 10x my income, but destroyed everything else around me. And I had a heart aneurysm and it's not worth it. So I've had the fortune of coaching some really high level people, but it all comes back down to family, self-worth. Winning all areas of life at the same time. You do not have to trash one area in order to make another area grow. So, yeah, we're excited to be here.

5:06 Excited to add some value to your listeners today. Right on. Thank you guys for that. As you can see, I mean, everybody's got such a really cool, diverse background. The Common Threaded team, though, a whole lot of hours coaching high performers. So the thing that I wanted to kind of get into today, we have the gift and the opportunity to actually coach coaches. And it's something that everybody that's here is passionate about. We all, as coaches ourselves, we all love and believe in the coaching industry as truly the change maker in the world in a lot of ways and cases.

5:46 And it's definitely a calling for all of us to be able to do this because of the fact that we know that if the coaches that are capable of helping others make the change and the shift in their lives and their businesses and their health, etc., if they're not winning, their clients can't win. And there are people out there that are hoping and praying for them that aren't winning and aren't finding them. One of the things that I think is something that all of us have seen at some level, and maybe even all of us have done at some point or another, which is falling into the trap of operating out on that island as a coach and as a result, finding ourselves in a bit of a state of incongruence in terms of what we ask our clients to do and what we're actually showing up and doing every day.

6:40 So, Brooke... How can we kind of lead into the conversation around this? Because this is something you and I talk about fairly frequently, just in terms of some of the people that we know that are great friends, but in some cases still kind of operating out on that island and not necessarily doing the things that they would turn around and ask their clients to do. Coaching is such an interesting industry because you look at somebody who's a personal trainer. If they don't work out... They're probably gonna have a hard time keeping clients. And so in the world of coaching, I mean, how many times have we met people that are quote unquote coaches, but they themselves have never been coached or they're not being coached or they don't have that support mechanism that's there.

7:20 And it creates this massive incongruence in terms of within their system. And then they figure out, I mean, how many times have we had somebody who in a sales conversation, they go, well, who's your coach? And so there's this, it's just an interesting space where there's a lot of coaches who don't have coaches and they haven't even been coached or they're not congruent. They're not aligned in that way. And there's some really important pieces that I think come with that. And I know Melissa, who's also my mother, by the way, so it's weird for me to say, Melissa, I'm like, wait. It's weird hearing you say it now. My mother, mom, Andrew and Chad, like you guys got to meet in the coaching space and in the community of things in a training like zone.

8:01 So I'd actually love to hear from you guys just like a why you ended up going that route and how that affected you, but also what that was like when you left and that experience as well. So I don't know who wants to take that baton first, but. We don't understand the question. Next question, please. I think one of the most beautiful things about my coaching journey is that I had the opportunity to start within a company where I was surrounded by other coaches. And the philosophy of the first company that I worked for was that you had to have a coach. And you had to learn how to be a client in order to be able to connect with your clients and understand and appreciate their world.

8:42 And so that's where I started. That's the only way I know how to connect and how I learned to coach. And then when we got to Tone, that's where I met these guys was at Tony Robbins and It was a fireball of energy, of input, of clients, of chaos. It was just everything in one big container. And I can't fathom doing that alone. We leaned on each other so often in our trainings, in our coaching calls, in our accountability buddies, and just in our lives. I mean, I've known these guys. I've known Chad 15 plus years now. I've known Andrew a little less than that. And we're still as close, I believe, as we were then.

9:22 I could call them at any time, day or night, and they would be there for me. In an autonomous world that we live in, and especially for coaches, I don't think it's feasible to do that alone effectively for lengths of time. We're not designed to be that way. So as a coach, I would not want to do it without my team with me, my support group. Yeah, I'm going to second that. It's so easy to become an island. And I got a lesson from a pine tree. which is, you know, there's my book title. No. Um, I remember I got this pine tree. I got it on a trailer. I remember that the tree place said, how are you going to get off the trailer? And I was like, don't worry about it. I un-pulled the pin. I launched that tree off the back of the trailer and I deadlifted it and I threw it in the hole and, you know, put the soil on it.

10:09 I got the drip line. I watered it and the tree died. And my wife was like, why do you think the tree died? I said, I don't know. It's so weird. She goes, could it be that you catapulted it off the trailer and then dropped it and dropped it and dropped it. And I remember going, and this is a stage in my life. She goes, why didn't you ask for help? Yep. And I said, because I could do it on my own. And she goes, but the tree died. And I think that's, that's one of the factors of being a coach. Can I do it on my own? Yes, The coaches that remain on their own, they'll deliver for the clients, but their whole life ends up crumbling.

10:52 They become more and more introverted and they've spent all their energy on the clients and they don't go out into the world. And I've met coaches that we've all known years later and it's like they've become hermits. Yeah. And my heart breaks for them because I'm just like, right, you've got so much to give, but because you don't have anybody pouring into you, you're just pouring out your clients. And you become this empty vessel. And ultimately, I see people becoming bitter. Yep, I agree. And this is not a solo sport, guys. If you're trying to do this on your own and you want to make this a career long term, you will crumble, crash, and burn unless you've got your people around you where you can be poured into as well.

11:34 Great. had that visual of the, like the oxygen masks falling out of the sky. And it's like, so many coaches are screaming for air because they haven't put on their own mask. But yeah, don't, don't roll your eyes, Brooke. Cause we're just going to come out of the gate with a quote. All right. Um, here he goes, you know, man. Yeah. So, you know, when, when we look at it from a psychology standpoint, which I have a degree in, and I look at Erickson said patients are patients in therapy because they're out of congruence with their subconscious mind. And I would say, let me translate that to coaching is we lie to ourselves. right? I'm a liar. And I need somebody that can call me out.

12:15 And I remember a long time ago, I already had my own boutique coaching practice before I came into Robbins. And somewhere along the lines, the organization said, hey, coaches, you're going to have to sell and do re-enrolls. And I was like, I don't do re-enrolls. That's not part of the job description. I coach. And my coach, by the name of Brooke Bishop at the time, said, hey, brother, Well, who enrolls people there? And I was like, you mother, well played, sir. Right? So I was lying to myself in this identity. I was out of congruence that I don't sell. I'm not in sale. And I'm not.

12:56 I serve. And Brooke was like, dude, you serve your clients over here. Do you want to drop the limiting belief over there? And I went, yes. Yes, I did. And so we need that accountability to call ourselves out when our ego is getting in the way and creating these limiting beliefs that we can't see. There are blind spots, right? Right. Why do financial advisors have financial advisors? Because we are emotional and we trade on emotion when we shouldn't, right? Why do doctors have other physicians? Because they're biased. So we have a cognitive bias that we need people that say, oh, you're a professional. Oh, you treat this with delicate hands, but you're also willing to go into deep rapport to help me overcome and be able to then take that and serve other people.

13:44 Yeah, maybe I should have some of that in my own life. Agreed. I think that there's a myth too for us as coaches that no one's going to be able to coach me. I already know it. This is something that I come across a lot when I'm coaching clients. Oh, I already know that. And the minute that we hear that, the minute I hear that come out of their mouth, I know that somewhere in their orbit, they have a deficit they don't want to touch. They don't want to bring somebody into their orbit because they don't want someone else getting eyes on the deficits or the lack. And so they shortchange themselves by keeping everyone at bay. And there is always a way to learn from somebody else. And to Chad's point, we can't see our own blind spots and a jar can't read its own label.

14:28 I can't coach myself. So I need someone to give me honest feedback with someone that I trust and I have rapport with. Without that, I am not the best coach I can be for my clients. There will be a wall and a ceiling on my ability if I don't welcome somebody else into my conversation for my life. Yeah. And with that, Melissa, before you jump on that, Ryan, hey, my coach usually drinks heavily after a session with me, but that's a different matter. So does my guardian angel. Yeah. But what this is really about is that the lower mind gets involved with others and our higher mind becomes aligned with others. And this is an opportunity for us to get aligned with our higher self.

15:10 And sometimes we need that hand to help us navigate through that. So don't go drop that tree by yourself. You need, you know, that's lower mind, Andrew. Good for the lower back though, you know. Indeed. Yeah. Don't bend and lift though. Okay. It's a hip hinge. Hip hinge. Really hip hinge is how that happens properly. You're going to, you're going to. Did anybody think you ever said pantry? Then you realized he said pine tree. I was like, pantry. I haven't understood a word he said yet. Really? I mean, I do have a pantry story, but that's for another podcast. So, Well, I love this.

15:53 One of the things I think that I would spotlight, and I don't know if you guys would agree, but, and I think this is case in point to a lot of professions by the way, but I see a lot with coaches, coaches coming into, they start their coaching business, whether they're coming from like a true, like I went through a certification and this is just what I wanted to do, or it was, I had an expertise and I decided to turn it into kind of a coaching type program, they get into the industry and usually they're looking for help and support and guidance heavily at the beginning. And one of those spaces for me that I see that's a mega danger zone, and this is coming from somebody who in my younger years used to do this kind of shit all the time.

16:40 You get in there and if you've got any aptitude whatsoever, you get a little bit of traction and then you go, I got this. Yep. I'm good. I got this. And what's fascinating about this, I'd love for you guys to reflect on this as well. What's fascinating to me about this is that the people that I know, forget coaches for a minute, but the people that I know that play the very highest levels in every area of life and business all have coaches and mentors. And in fact, the ones that I know that are the most successful, most of them have multiple coaches and mentors. And so how do we either A, avoid falling in the trap if we're not there yet, or somebody that's listening to this right now and they're like, oh, well, yeah, I do.

17:26 I got this. I know what I'm doing. I don't need that mindset shit. I don't need a mentor. Uh, how do we either a avoid it or B pull ourselves out of that? Because the truth is that the, you know, the, the, the five of us know you're never going to get as far as you could possibly get without the right support, without the right guides, without the right coaches and mentors. I mean, let's just start real quick with that, Ryan of why don't we just look at history? A president has a cabinet. right? Jesus had 12 apostles. We can go down the list of people that go surrounding myself with people that are smarter than me, that are going to hold me accountable.

18:10 King Arthur had the Knights of the Round Table. Okay. One was bad. Jesus had Jews. Okay. You got to find the one bad apple and kick them out. Okay. But with that- Do we get to vote on this right now? Because I don't know if the internet is going to go your way. Somebody's getting off the island. Yeah, phone a friend. Judas Cooper. We all know it's me. Don't hide it well. There's an important lesson. And because we have a history of sometimes screwing it up and being gluttonous is we kind of abuse the responsibility. There's a responsibility that we need to surround ourselves with people that we want to be more like, that we aspire to.

18:57 Not people that are going to just affirm us and tell us, oh, you're all that and you're okay, right? We need to have a group of people that there's a two-part process to that, Ryan. One is that when you look at Napoleon Hill who created the true mastermind. He said there's two requirements and most of them are missing the second. One, you have to be willing to empty your cup to what you think you know. The second, you have to come and have something to contribute in return, right? So with those two things, it makes for a great ingredients. By itself, no, it's not going to turn out so well. I love that. Really well said. Something else too to that, Ryan, I think when you were bringing that up, I've gone through this both ways.

19:42 We can go far when we're alone, but we go faster when we're together. And something that I've learned is that the autonomy of working at home alone, of being on my client calls alone, yeah, I can do it day in and day out. But there's going to be a stagnation. There's going to be a tipping point where I'm going to tap out on some of the things I know just by the nature of attrition and how long I've been in my relationships with my clients. If I welcome other people, a solid community that can have my back, that is going ahead of me to learn and bring in tech or bring in new levels of learning, then my journey goes further faster. And so I like to be smart when I work.

20:22 I'd rather do less and achieve more. And so for me, the way to do that is to do it with community that I can do together. And then it's also vibration. My vibration trains to the vibration around me. And so if I'm by myself, I can navigate that for a while. And I do pretty good at that. But if I have a bad day, if I get sick, if I have a hard client, then my vibration drops to the energy of the lowest common denominator in my space. If I don't have a group to help pull me up, I can stay there for long periods of time. And that's why I see people get out of coaching is they never figure this out. And then they feel like they're losing. And they have no one to reflect back that they're winning. So to me, it's just a huge gift to have the right community.

21:06 Otherwise, it makes it so much harder. Yeah. Yeah, I want to piggyback on that. So I've always been involved with mountain biking, and I thought I was pretty good. The people I'd ride with, I was the first up, and I was the first down. And then I read Darren Hardy's book, The Compound Effect, and it was like, hey, you're the average of the five closest people. And I went, oh, I'm at the top of that. So I found the best mountain biker I could find. And I said, could you do me one favor? Could I just ride with you one time? And we got to the top of the mountain. He said, I said, pedal as much as you want. And this guy said, I won't pedal. See if you can keep up. And he destroyed me. And I got to the bottom of the parking lot and I've got a big smile on my face.

21:47 I remember him saying, why are you so happy? I said, I've never been beat that bad. And I was like, please tell me what I was doing wrong. And he said, I don't even know where to start. He said, I would recommend you go hire this coach and he will train you. He trains Olympic And I was like, okay, so which class should I go in? He said the beginner class. And this guy said, I raced for 20 years and I took his beginner class. He said, I learned more in his beginner class than I did in 20 years of racing. Wow. So I took the class in Boulder, Colorado and I was like, oh, I'm crap.

22:27 I am crap. And I started doing what the coach told me to do and my mountain biking got worse. And I was like, oh, this sucks. This doesn't work for me. And I went, wait, wait, he trains professionals. And so I hired him one-on-one and we went to this track and he said, all right, Andrew, I want you to get lower on the bike. And I was like, okay. And I came down again. He's like, lower on the bike. And I said, how many inches? He said, two feet. I want your upper body two feet. I want your chin on the handlebars. And I was like, I'm going to lose my teeth. And he said, the problem is, he said, when you're riding, he said, you're letting the trail move the bike. He said, you move the bike, not the trail.

23:08 And it was a great metaphor for life. And I remember I started doing what he was doing. And for the mountain bikers, cyclists out there, there's a term called a KOM, king of the mountain. It's the fastest person that's ever gone down that trail. When I first did it without his coaching, I could do it in four and a half minutes. I did his training for a year, and I did it in one minute and 26 seconds. Holy shit. I felt slow doing it his way. But what was interesting, my mountain bike buddies all stopped riding with me. And they said, are you doping? And I was like, yeah, I'm doping guys to beat you on a Saturday. That's exactly why I'm doing it.

23:48 And I said, no, I said, I did the coach's course. And I said, and I've improved from there. And they said, well, we did the coach's course as well, but we never improved. I said, I do his drills twice a day. How often do you do the drills? when we did his course. Wow. And I said, that's the difference. So it was interesting. I lost my peer group by leveling up. And I thought, I want to be around people that cheer me on. And I love the concept of balcony people and basement people. I want people in my life that are looking down from the balcony from one level up and say, Andrew, here's my hand. Do you want to come up? And I'm like, yes. And then I want to look down to the next balcony and see the people that are there who want to come up.

24:33 But what I don't want to be is people that just want to hang out in the basement and have company. I want to help people level up. And there's always somebody above me ready to level me up. And I might kick butt in this area of coaching, but maybe my follow-up sucks. Maybe my branding's not on point. Maybe my networking, my reach outs. And so what I found is so many coaches focus on one element, and that's the skill set of coaching. But that's a one-legged table. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's like, what I find is if I can get around other people, I need to be around people that outperform me. I love being around those people, but they don't outperform me in every level.

25:14 There's always something that I can help them with and they can help me with. And that's what I love about being in community. It's like, we grow together. Like Melissa was saying, we can go fast on our own, but we're going to burn out, but we can go so much further when we're a collective of other people Wanting the best for others, not competing with them. You know, such a powerful testimonial and example, Andrew. And I think one of the things that bonds all of us together is at any moment, we might get a call of, hey, man, I need some perspective, right? I've known Melissa for a very long time. And then I got the pleasure to learn to meet Brooke, who has been there for me and vice versa.

25:57 Yeah. most recently, just this last week. And, you know, I had the opportunity where I was like, Hey, Andrew, give me some perspective on, you know, we have similar clients and what are your rates? How are you doing? Right. And what you just shared in that, Andrew is, is the ability to contribute and receive. And I think to be a master coach, you have to be able to, to understand, I mean, Melissa, how many times have I been humbled to And Andrew, what you did is you were willing to humble yourself, empty that cup. And man, that's a vulnerability. You better be surrounded by some awesome people that are there that you can trust and verify they're trustworthy. And it just reminds me of one of, I think my absolute favorite scene of maybe my all time favorite movie right now is Top Gun Maverick, where Iceman is talking to Maverick.

26:46 He says, you got to let him go. And Maverick has a tear in his eye and it just hits me every time he says, I don't know how. And we need those people in our life that go. but I do. I know how to help you. The answers are in there. I'm not going to give you the answer. The answers are in there, but I am there. Here's the rope, pull yourself out. So on the balcony is like, here's the rope and no, I'm never going to let go of that rope, but you have to pull yourself out. You're going to have to build a muscle. That is a proper coach, not one that's going to pull you out, but give you the resources and help you build the muscle. One of the things that came up for me when you were talking to Andrew is A quote, and I'll never forget it hearing Tony say it, is that, and I've heard a lot of people say it, but if you're the smartest person in the room, you need a new room.

27:37 And I think for us as coaches, as we reach certain levels and plateaus of success, we have to level up not just our tech and our content, but our peer group. And sometimes that's painful. Sometimes we have to leave people we love. And move to a group that's going to actually hold our feet to the fire and call us on our shit and be those people that we respect and we want to model after. And if we're not doing that, and if now we're the smartest person in the room, there's a tap out there. And so to me, I've always got to level up my peer group and the five people I spend most time with. And so for me, community is how I do that. And I love this quote. I heard this from a guy, you know, in his mid sixties, who's a expert.

28:21 He said, everyone calls me an expert. He said, X means old, spurt means to admit water. And he said, I don't want to be either of those. And he says, I want to be a student. There you go. And he says, I'm a lifelong learner. And I think so many times we realize like I've hit the mountaintop with my coaching ability. I can coach anybody. but everything else is a dumpster fire. Exactly. And you're just going, so I've been there when I'm just like, then I'll just focus on coaching and I can get all my worth from coaching rather than going, Andrew, you're in business. Like you've got all these other areas of your, of your life. And if you want to fully support your clients, you better be in business because you can't just like wait for that home run coaching call and just like, Oh yeah, no, but everything else is not working.

29:10 And so, One of the greatest things that I found is like, it's not natural to learn how to do a business. You cannot win long-term just being good at coaching. No, you can't. Yep. And you have to do all those elements to make it a real business and fully support your clients. And I think that's the thing. So many people, they focus on just this one aspect of the profession and they burn out and they're not making the money. I'm going to challenge you. It will affect your coaching. Because for me, when income's great, I have a lot less problems, which means I can be fully present, focusing with my clients.

29:53 But if I'm in the back of my mind, holy crap, credit card's due tomorrow. I need to get another client. I will not be as present as I'm capable of. I will not be as good as I'm capable of. And unfortunately, your skill set will not make you successful. It is how you run the business that's ultimately going to make or break your coaching business. It's really well said. Thank you for that reminder. I just said he made me a reminder to pay my credit card tomorrow. That's a good idea. I think one of the things that, the two things that I want to spotlight from everything that you guys just said that I think is really important for the listener to distill from all of this is number one, from five people who have done this at a really high level for a really long time, we'll all still continue to have coaches and contemporaries and mentors of our own.

30:43 First of all, if you're not showing up like the constant student, somebody's going to whip your ass. I'm just telling you right now, somebody's listening and I'm like the baddest MF-er in my space, blah, blah, blah. If you are not continuing to show up as the constant student, you're going to get whooped by somebody who is, period, end of story. And if you haven't yet hit that ceiling, it's not a matter of if, it's just a matter of when. There's a period of time that's going to come, right? And I say that coming from somebody who, again, earlier in my life, like I used to do this all the time. I'd just be like, you know, I'd rely on my God-given ability or the gift that God gave me to kind of pick things up pretty quickly.

31:26 And I'd go, okay, got it. I'm good. And inevitably, I'd find myself back on the ground looking up at somebody who just crushed me because they continued learning when I was like, nope, I'm good. And so I think it's continued to be the student. The other thing that I heard you guys say, which I think is really important, is a lot of times when even when we do decide, hey, I'm going to put myself in a community or I'm going to get some help from a coach or a mentor. I'm going to do both or I'm going to learn more about the things that I feel like I don't know enough about. So often, and I know we've all seen this, we watch people coming in looking to be the taker in the arrangement.

32:11 And don't get me wrong, we all want to be able to soak up, right, what we need. But by the same token, where this becomes very powerful and where I think you get the real thirst to continue doing this kind of work is when you show up not only going, well, these are the things that I really want to get out of it, but I am going to show up and give all of myself. And I think, you know, we just wrapped up our live event. We saw this time and time again at the event where not just you guys, but so many of our clients were really so giving of themselves to other people that needed it.

32:52 So I just wanted to spotlight those two things because I heard that in one way, shape, or form from all of you guys. I'm sorry, Melissa, you were just getting ready to dive into something. Well, I was just going to say that one of the things that I find so valuable is the concept that... We have to come to this, like Chad said earlier, we have to come with the empty cup. And the thing is, is that when I do that, when I come with the empty cup, it allows me to move into getting congruent with myself. If I come in thinking that I know everything, then what happens is I get out of balance and I lose congruency. And so for me, the reason I want to be in the space is it keeps me congruent. It keeps me... Another way to say this, I don't want to take diet advice from the fat guy.

33:36 And so if my life... If my life's a dumpster fire and I'm out there trying to coach my clients and I'm not getting any positive feedback on how to fix that, there will be a problem for me. Like you just said, someone's going to ask me a question or call me out and say, hey, I saw you were outraging on social media. You were hammered. What the hell? My coach doesn't do that. Thankfully, they don't see that anymore. But that part of my life has been put in check because I did need to get into alignment. If I'm going to be in this space, my world has to reflect what I'm bringing my clients to. And if I'm not in a good place with that and there's not somebody to reflect that back for me, it is very easy to slide into mediocrity in my own life while telling my clients to do something else.

34:21 And that's an energetic disconnect. And they feel it, they smell it, and they leave because of it. So it has to be in a sense of congruence. My life has to reflect what I'm bringing to my clients or it's not going to work for the long term. You're spot on with it. It's interesting that I'm stoked you brought this up because for us as a company, not that we core values, mission statements, so many companies have them and usually it falls on deaf ears, right? But for us, there's a reason our number one core value is congruent. Yeah. It's that we have to live what we teach. It's that we have to operate from a perspective of integrity because if we're not willing to do it, we can't ask our clients to do it. And if they're not willing to do the work, they're not going to be asking their clients.

35:01 It's a trickle down effect. And so for us, that's like, if you even ask me, what are your other core values? I'm like, I don't remember the other ones because that one's so important, right? Then I go back and I look at them. I go, oh yeah, those other ones are important too. But no, I love that you brought that up. And I think that's part of the magic of what I'm looking at the four of you on screen, Ryan included, right? The magic that's made you all so fricking good at what you do is you've done the work. You've been through the shit. You've had those challenges in life. You've had the coaching. You've gone through, I mean, not just the hours, because you guys have thousands and thousands of hours of coaching. Yeah. You could have just had thousands and thousands of hours of giving people shitty coaching, but you guys have done really amazing things with your clients as well as in your personal lives.

35:45 And I'm just beyond grateful for, you know, we mentioned our event this last week. I've had the pleasure of being at multitudes of events with all of you and just seeing how you've always shown up. There's no expectation other than I'm just going to go pour into people and we're just going to go light them up. And I know that you guys get fed from giving. So it's very, very cool to see how that plays. Can I just say in that, Brooke, I've come to a place in life where I just expect every single human being has one significant thing going on in their life at any given moment time. And the congruence is, okay, let's just hypothesize we all have something going on. If we aren't congruent, we don't have a coach to be able to help manage ourselves through that, then our head is not in the game for our client, right?

36:33 And I had a major league baseball player in the World Series, a pitcher. And they reached out there like, look, he's just not performing and he's in trouble here. And so what we found out was like he was physically taking the mound, but his head was back at home. Right. And so we all have those moments where we need somebody to be like, Are you going to get your head in the game? And the game of life is you're playing at the top level and the referee makes a bad call. Are you going to focus on the bad call or are you going to get your head back in the game? Because the rest of your team, your clients, your family, people are counting on you. So we need that space to be able to go and process that. Or in Andrew's case, he's going to process that to be able to work through that stuff.

37:18 The language, we say it right. We just perfected it. That's all. I love that. Actually, I think we destroyed it. We screwed it up. Along with the metric system. Love it. That's awesome. Go ahead, Melissa. Go ahead. Ask your question. You two are always on the same wavelength. They're both like- We are, man. No, you go. And go. We need a buzzer. That's right. I just think it's really cool that we have the ability to work out our process with our community. And one of the things I've learned the hard way is that if you don't have community, you have a tendency to work it out on your clients. And something I've learned is that that is the worst place to figure out your shit.

38:02 And so ironically, unless you have that one client, though, we've all had that one client. We always get that one client. And usually, ironically, if we're not working out our stuff on our own, the universe hounds us clients that are going to help us work it out with them. And so the amount of clients I've had going through the same thing I've been going through, it's almost universal. It always happens. Yeah. Yeah. But the thing that's really cool is when I work it out on my own and bring it to them. And that takes me to a quote that one of our friends made, and I've never forgotten it. Does the quality of my life inspire others to live theirs? And so how I model that for them is working it out. Like you said, we've done a lot of work.

38:42 We do the deep dives. We go into the dark. We pull out the shit and we handle it. But I need to do that so I can inspire my clients and hold space for them in the belief that they can do it too. If I haven't done that, I've got very little to stand on. Then it's just me talking. It's just white noise. But when I can say, I did this. I know it works. You need to do it too. That changes the game for them because now they can hold on to me while they're going through it too. By the way, can I just say, like hardest year of my life this last year. And what I realized is like, oh, I need to tell my clients. I'm like, no. And you know what I found out? They don't give a crap what's going on in our lives. Right.

39:23 But somebody does. And we need that space. And the fact that they have no idea is in that I've had my clients for 13 years and longer keep them going is like, oh, that means that we're actually doing the work, right? Because I'm not bringing it into that environment. And that's a professional. It is. Sorry, Ryan. Ryan. No, no, no, no, no. That's a brilliant point. And I think one of the things that I'd love to hear from you guys on as well is when we think about, and Andrew touched on this a minute ago, I think one of the traps that I see, at least in the coaching industry, as it relates to continued development and things of that nature, is a lot of times there are a lot of people who do reach a certain level of mastery in their coaching.

40:08 And it's the act of coaching and their process and their frameworks and the results that they're capable of getting. And one of the things that I find to be really interesting, you know, we were talking about at the event, the difference and the struggle for the coach of the employee mindset versus the CEO mindset. Yeah. And I think that when we talk about continued growth as a coach and the right community and the right mentors and all of those types of things, Andrew made a brilliant point in that, like, I can go out and become the best coach that I can possibly become. That's only ever going to take me so far. Yeah. If I don't have an understanding and people around me who are talking about running a business and understanding how to make sure that my profit margins are right and that are ideating on new marketing strategies and really buttoning up the sales process and understanding how operations should run at the end of the day.

41:08 I think that's one of those breaking points where you look at a coach who... if they just silo themselves on, I'm just going to get as good at coaching as I possibly can get, like you're destined to essentially never fulfill your potential. And you're also destined to miss out on impacting a whole lot of people. And after a while, you're going to be lucky if you can keep that boat afloat, if that's the one place that you're driving at. And I'd love for you guys to speak on that a little bit, because I think it is one of the biggest, I think it's one of the biggest barriers that coaches have is they just don't think of themselves that way. And I think in a lot of cases, because of that, they're not looking necessarily for those environments to put themselves in.

41:53 And quite frankly, up until now, I'm not sure there has been one. Yeah, like I remember this takes me back, but I saw this band when I was about 19 years old in this pub and they were world class. Absolutely phenomenal. Still one of the best bands I've ever seen in my life. And I went, how are they not famous? How are they? Like, they've got all the skill. Like, just, again, just incredible musicians. And then I thought, like, I'm a big Beatles fan. And the Beatles were obviously an incredible band. But they needed... a manager. They needed a promoter. Like we see this, you know, in the boxing world, Mike Tyson's obviously, you know, it was an incredibly skilled athlete, but they needed a Don King.

42:39 You know, there's always a different part of the business where you do need somebody to get the word out, to do the marketing, to do the branding. And I see so many coaches, they're trying to do it all themselves. And they burn out because there's always a part of business that you're not built for. And there's always a part of business that you are. And I think, you know, so many times it's like we judge ourselves that we're not the social media expert or we're not, you know, we're not good on camera or we're not. There's always an area that we hate ourselves. But it's like I call this my Tarzan, my Tarzan, you know, the jungle. Just in case the accent got in the way of that.

43:20 Tarzan. Oh, thank you. I wasn't sure where that was going, but now I said. He was English, but okay. He was English. Yeah. And so he's on the vine and that vine is good and it's strong, but it can only take him as far as it's capable of taking him. And at some point you have to let go of what's working to grab the next vine. And so many people are like, yeah, but this works for me. And I'm like, great, but it's going to pull you backwards. you have to be the greatest part about business is what everyone needs to master is letting go of the thing that got you where you're at and grabbing hold of the next vine that unknown and it may break and it may not be the vine that you thought but your great news is you can grab the next one and so being around a community they're like oh don't touch that vine you know it's like that's not the vine And even with you guys, one of the best things that I've learned from you guys is you had a list of tech, like what microphone, what camera, you know, what software.

44:21 And I went, I would have never put this list together because I would have got overwhelmed with the amount of choices. And if you don't know the right choice, you'll make no choice. Yep. So just getting around the right people that just go, oh, it's simple. I love hearing that. I'm like, simple for you, massively complicated for me. But then there's another area. I'm like, oh, that's simple. No, that's not simple. We work together as a community. And just having that list took off so much pressure. I'm like, oh, that's the cable. I didn't even know there was a cable for that, you know? And so it's great having other people swing through the jungle with you. Oh, I love that. At that crossroads, I'll make it real simple. Keep it real simple for our listeners is when you're at that crossroads, always ask the question, is it best for my business?

45:08 What's best for the business? Yes, you have a responsible for what's best for me. But if you want to be a professional that lasts in this career, what's best for the business? Yep. Well said. Melissa, any last words before we land this plane? I think that if there was anything I could say to the coaches out there to your audience, it's that if you currently do not have a community, if you do not have the right people in your orbit, or if there are not people ahead of you on the path pulling you along, then you're really missing out. And it's a decision you get to make. And by not choosing it, that's also a decision. So when you don't choose it, you get to live with the repercussions of that choice as well.

45:48 I think it's beautiful that there's places now here, especially at Empire, where you can choose and you get the best in the way of support and you get the best in the way of other CEOs together in a collective coming together to help lift each other up. To me, there's nothing more powerful. And I couldn't do this business as long as I have without it. So if you want to go long, you have to go together. So pick your together and make sure they're fun and they're irreverent and they're a blast and that they're better at things than you are. And to me, that's the only way to do this. Yeah. I remember John Maxwell seminar and a guy stood up and he's like, well, I'm a self-made man. And John, without missing a beat, said, I'm so sorry.

46:33 And the guy went, no, but I did it all on my own. He said, you chose the hardest, slowest path. You would have got so much further, so much easier if you got people around you. So you were not self-made. And that stuck to me for years. The other thing he always said is the higher up the leadership levels you go, the more you need to fly to be around friends. And I found that so true as well. So even being at the live event last week, it's like life giving because you're around friends, you're around all the people that are in the same battles, the same struggles and the same victories as you are. So it's so easy to become an island and it's so easy to try and do it on your own.

47:14 But I promise you, being around the right group of people, and this is why I love being here. You guys have got values. You've got ethics. You've got morals. And there's so many businesses out there that they just don't exist in those areas. And for me to link arms with people, I need to know them. I need to trust them. And I need to know that they've got my best interests at heart, not just the bottom line. Well said, my man. Go ahead, Chad. I have a parole hearing, so we've got to wrap this up. Yeah, Chaz just out of jail just for the day, you guys. We got a special – That's kind of all you guys have, so thank you.

47:57 Thank you. Incarceration coaching. That's right. You can do it from anywhere. Your one call for the day. Oh my God. Oh man. That's a one call close. All right, friends, man, this is really good. Thank you so much. You guys for, for spending some time with us today and Chad, Andrew, Melissa, love you guys. So grateful for you guys and the incredible, incredible part that you play here at empire and honor you guys for all the incredible work that you do and all that you bring to the table. And, and, Thank you for sharing your wisdom today.

48:37 This has been awesome. And this is something that we're going to do every so often is to bring you guys on and share kind of as a group with some of the bigger topics that we see are really important in the coaching industry right now. And with all that said, if any of this resonated with you and you're sitting there right now thinking to yourself, man, all right, you know what? They beat me into submission. I really feel like I do need a community and a little bit of help or something like that. Or you're just wondering even if this makes any sense in terms of the right fit, just send us, let's make it simple. Send us an email, support at empirepartners.io and just mention the podcast and that you're interested in learning more. And we'll reach out to you and do that.

49:19 And in the meantime, thank you for spending your time with us. That's not something that we take lightly. We're grateful for you and everything that you're doing in the world. And until next time, thank you for listening to the Coaching Equation Podcast. Take care. See you, everybody. Bye. Thank you for listening to this episode of The Coaching Equation. Please hit subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you got value out of this episode, we would be so grateful if you would share it out with a friend and leave us a review on iTunes or your favorite platform. To learn more about Empire Partners or to inquire about working with Ryan and Brooke, please visit www.empirepartners.io forward slash go.