Episode 184: Spencer Jones - CEO of Jonesin’ for

Hello, and welcome to the Kosh, the People's Podcast.

I'm your host, Timber Smith, and the Kosh is a podcast that spotlights people who've had an association with the Kosh in the surrounding Fox Cities region.

Kosh listeners, how are we doing?

It is another fabulous weekend morning.

Yeah, it is.

Well, here's what I'm going to tell you.

We are definitely, you know, I always like to give you a little update on what's going on outside so you can put this and put it, put this in the frame of things.

Wind is evil.

The wind is evil.

So I took Bosco to podcast Dog to the Corner to go do his potty duties and that wind was evil.

Looks nice.

Not nice is wrong.

That's all I'm saying.

So you already know my relationship with with the winner.

I am a true Wisconsinite, but it don't mean I got to like it.

That is just the facts of it.

All right.

Oh, before we go too far, Kosh listeners, let me just give you a reminder.

The Kosh is sponsored by my little business called Timber ties.

That's right, Timber has a business and we have distinguished, elegant looking wooden bow ties.

If you would like a nice distinguished look, something that stands out in a crowd, something that is a true conversational piece.

If, and I promise you this, if you rock a Timber tie and they are special, they are beautiful, you can't help but to have people walk up to you and be like, is that a wooden bow tie?

Oh my God, that's smooth because it is.

And you can check out what we have to offer at Timber Dash Ties dot com.

Once again, that is timber-ties.com.

OK, now for the conversation.

So I'm pretty, I'm pretty excited about this conversation.

I have seen this person all over social media in all sorts of ways.

There's an energy behind them and but I've never had the opportunity to sit down with them and have a one-on-one personal conversation.

So I am super excited to see where today's episode goes.

But I will say this, from the minute they they came to the studio, walked up the driveway and walked in the house, it was all positivity.

It was all positivity, which says to you, it's going to be a fire episode.

You already know how we're about to get down here on the cash.

So without any further ado, here we go.

Once again, we're still working on a new soundboard, y'all.

This week's guest is Spencer Jones.

Hey, Spencer was good.

Hey man, life is freaking amazing.

That's what's good today, and I'm pumped to be here with you.

Awesome.

Hey, I'm pumped to have you here.

I'm excited to have this conversation with you and to share it with the The Kosh listeners.

Yeah, right back at you.

It's the wind as you mentioned earlier, it is brutal at times.

It just cuts right through.

So I, I totally get that and relate to it and let let's warm it up.

Let's warm up the the weather a little bit through this conversation.

Oh, absolutely.

I do have a philosophy about it.

And my philosophy is this.

I think, you know, when people talked about what global warming was going to be and stuff like that, I and I think everybody thought about temperature, like everything was about the temperature.

But I don't know if you've noticed this, but over the last several years I swear our winds have really picked up. 100% my wife and I talk about that often how how the winds, I mean, we, you know, we got winds when we were younger here living in Wisconsin.

I live and grew up here but not like the thirty 40-50 mile an hour winds that happened multiple times a year.

Maybe once a year before, but now it's almost every month or something.

Right.

It's crazy.

And it's really just switched up the game.

Yeah.

So I just don't think we knew what global warming was going to look like.

I think everybody took it as some type of temperature change, but it's actually, I think these winds are a reflection of some of our climate change that's happening. 100% I I agree because it's all, everything's connected.

Facts.

Facts.

All right.

Well, let's get ready to jump in.

Spencer, can you tell us a little something about yourself in your connection to the cash in the surrounding 5 Cities region?

Yeah.

So I grew up in Hilbert, Wisconsin, so not too far from here, other side of Lake Winnebago.

And it's it was an interesting journey for me.

So I went to college here.

I finished up into the seven-year route, UW Fox Valley when that was a two year campus, and then Stevens Point and finished up four years here at UW Oshkosh for music education.

Then I taught in a public school, a rural public school locally, and then a private school All in all for nine years total before I retired from teaching and became a full time entrepreneur, which I've always been an entrepreneur, you know, snow shoveling and piano studio, stuff like that.

So yeah, but everything based here in Wisconsin, especially the Fox Valley area, and that's where we live now.

We live up in Neenah.

OK, I didn't know you were an educator.

Yeah, yeah, nine years.

Middle school and high school choir.

Some of my favorite favorite ages.

Oh, not the middle school.

Yeah, there's you have to, you have to be made different for middle schoolers.

I'm just saying, look, we those that know, know.

Well, yeah, my wife is a fourth grade teacher.

She's been doing that for 13 years and loves it.

But for me, I mean, I taught little kids when I needed to for student teaching and that, that was fun.

But man, something about middle schoolers, their sass and stuff, and they're figuring out who they are.

It's just they're fun, but you have to be built different.

You have to be ready for sarcasm and dish it back at them.

And then high school, you get to go deeper with the sarcasm, which is even more fun.

How was it being a music teacher?

Because I think it's, I think it's one of those things like a music teacher to me is also one of those people like, I think they're one of the coolest people in the building, right?

And, and I'm just saying like there's coaches, there's music teachers.

And the reason I say that is, OK, people that don't like, like let's say playing their instrument, don't hold it against the music teacher, right?

And the things that need music teachers do you tangibly, usually at least once or twice a year, get to see the fruits of the labor?

100%.

So tell as opposed.

To English or math.

Nothing against those, obviously.

We need all of it, absolutely, but the the choral program and the music program in general, band, choir, theater, things like that.

The arts are right secondary to sports generally for what the public sees of what the school produces, right?

You get the sports team, so you see the games and the results there.

But then the arts are the secondary.

So for me, I loved it.

I love being a choir director to work with the students and help them realize what they can achieve right as a community, but also step into their light and express themselves through music and know, oh, it's OK.

And again, rural school at times and kids who are like, I'm, I'm not a singer.

I don't do this stuff to really find family.

And the biggest thing that really resonated with me throughout the years of teaching was to create a safe place for my students so that if their home life was crap or they're struggling at home or struggling at school, they could come into our classroom and know it's safe and know that, hey, I got to be me.

I get to vent.

And I mean, I've had students share some deep, heavy things that they're struggling with or going through that, you know, they didn't feel comfortable telling the counselor or other things.

And you know, I shared it with whoever I needed to share with if that was fitting.

But often times it was just a safe place for them to be.

And that was been was one of the most amazing things about teaching Harper is all the the politics and all the things that happened in all organizations sadly overpowered the the impact with the students for me over the years.

So and I felt a shift like I felt my calling was starting to move.

So as much as I miss working with students, I don't miss the other, the BS side of it.

It's complicated.

It is.

I mean, any system is complicated, but our educational systems super complicated and even more complicated when it comes to financing them. 100% that was always a interesting thing, finding the finances and and we did a bunch of things.

We traveled all over the country with our kids for competitions and experiences, but and having to fundraise or find the funds to do different things for them was always an interesting.

I wouldn't say battle 'cause it wasn't necessarily always a battle, but it was a it was interesting.

You didn't do the candy bar fundraiser, did you, 'cause you know that.

That's the one that always seems like when back in my day, when you had music students that were fundraising things, it was always the candy bar fundraiser.

And you know what?

Those candy bars were fire.

They were so good, so good, and I know exactly which ones you're talking about too.

And yeah, growing up we had those fundraisers, but for me, we did different ones just to mix it up because other sports teams or other groups were doing it.

One school, all groups and organizations could fundraise whenever.

The other one, you had to follow a certain schedule with it and you can only have one.

So we had to make sure that that was a really, really good one for that.

And so we always tried differentiating.

So we we did different things, different fundraisers and events like we did.

What was it?

It was like a game show theme, right?

So like Family Feud, but students versus staff and things along those lines.

Yeah.

And I got to be the host of that, which was a blast and just so much fun just having different fundraisers.

I always like Thinking of the Box.

We did a fundraiser when Katrina hit, we did a fundraiser for them and we got approval for that.

So we put on a whole, like a choir concerts and brought in auction items and stuff from the local community.

But that was a whole choir thing that we were able to do and raise.

I don't think we raised about $10,000 for them, something like that.

Oh, that's no joke.

Yeah, right.

It was.

It's pretty cool that we were able to give back to the community in the world.

So you, you mentioned education, but then your entrepreneurial spirit took over.

What made the pivot happen?

What, what, what was that thing that said, all right, because I'm not going to lie, I don't know many teachers.

I think, well, what I'm going to say is that back in the day, I don't know many teachers who didn't just go through it and retire out as a teacher, right?

Nowadays, you know, since COVID, I know more teachers who pivoted out and might even went to the private sector, corporate, whatever it might have looked like, right?

Because there is, there's more challenges, it seems like what, what helped you pivot?

What?

What?

What was the deciding factor?

Yeah, great question.

When I started teaching in 2011, the burnout rate for teachers was three years, right?

The average turn around for new teachers.

What?

Three years, yeah, it just absolutely wild.

And then as I progressed, by the time I was done after nine years of teaching, it was under a year like teachers were not new.

Teachers were not staying in positions for even a full school year.

That's crazy.

Yeah, just absolutely wild to to see.

So something's in that system's broken and and obviously there's some that are I heard my wife is still teaching and loves it, but it's all about that culture and the team and the place to do that.

So to actually answer your question of what shifted pivoted for me, I've been an entrepreneur my whole life, as I said, different businesses and I thought, well, OK, I'll put on the hat and be this teacher and and fit this mold.

But after three years and I'm like, I love this, but this isn't this isn't the long term thing.

I don't know what that is yet, but let's start experimenting having side gigs and so we can go more into this now or later.

It's up to you.

But for me, the pivotal point was I hit my rock bottom.

I was suicidal, hated who I'd become.

I was leading with ego so much and I came crashing down and as there has to be something else and another way.

So that's what we figured out and I was already doing different coaching and and things along the side for a couple years, But it was that that was a really pivotal moment saying, all right, I need to follow my heart.

I'm doing a disservice to my students.

I'm still great teacher in my opinion, not to boast or have an ego, but I'm a great teacher.

But I'm not as good as I was in year 1, two or three or four because at year 8 or 9, I'm like, my heart's not in it as much and I know it's not in it.

So while I'm still good, I'm not as good as I once was and I'm doing a disservice.

Let's get a teacher and hear who can, who is fired up and that that is their passion.

That's that's really aware.

Took many years.

Took many years and I feel like we may be talking more on the personal side during your topic of the week.

So I'm going to go and ask about your journey to entrepreneurship.

What were some of those side hustles you started off with that kind of lets you know like that you enjoyed the idea of owning your own business or making your own money in that type of way?

So it started a set of grew up in, grew up in Hilbert or just outside, about a mile outside and.

How many people live in Hilbert?

Oh, I mean, it was a thriving metropolis at the time of 1300, people.

I was going to say like Hilbert's one of those places like I think I've seen it on a sign, but I'm not sure where I saw the sign you.

You blink and miss it, right?

Like there's not even a stoplight in Hilbert.

I think they're up to 1600 now.

It's just a huge metropolis, but so we grew up outside in the country and my mom owned a couple businesses when I was growing up, so I saw her have that entrepreneurial spirit to a degree, but I didn't think about it.

I didn't know what that term was or anything.

I sold pumpkins growing up when I I wanted my own money before I could work.

So I was like 11 and 12.

I started a snow shoveling and lawn mowing business where I went to people's homes and mowed the lawns and all that stuff.

My parents charged me gas right to try me to the places to do it but made money doing that way.

Then I started working in a restaurant when I was 14 as a cook and did all all that stuff bartender and I got sick of, of working for other people at that time.

I'm like, well, I'm in college at this point.

Let's start my own business of playing of teaching piano lessons.

I'm, I've had multiple years in it of piano.

I'm in college for music education.

I can do this.

And so I grew a piano studio to over 30 students while going to school full time, church musician, all those different things.

So it just kind of became second nature.

So when I was teaching, I'm like, OK, I'll, I'll phase out those side hustles and different things and just be a teacher and do those things and went all in and then felt that itch like something else.

And so for me, some of those journeys where I, I gained weight during college and when I first started teaching and I wanted to lose it, I wasn't happy with the way I looked and felt.

So I started doing those at home workout programs, you know, P90X and such.

Listen, I got a story about P90X.

Very good and bad.

And I ended up enjoying it and did it multiple times and different things and I lost a bunch of weight, but people got me into it were like, hey, you're really good.

Have you thought about being a coach?

And I'm like, no, but I'm, I'm open.

Let's, let's talk about it.

And so then I started coaching people with fitness, which led them to mindset and personal growth and development.

And so then I started coaching people fitness and then mindset as I've learned and grew and worked on myself.

And that was the idea until I hit my rock bottom.

Even doing all the personal growth, I still hit my rock bottom.

And then that shifted.

I retired from teaching and we created the business that we have today, which is helping leaders reduce overwhelming stress and avoiding burning out.

That is needed right now.

Yeah.

I mean, that is that sounds like something that's pretty important.

But I find coaching to be so interesting because I don't know what creates the confidence to feel that you're able to coach others to like that they'll that you have good enough guidance and that you can build the type of rapport and trust need it to get people to trust your coaching and do the things that you're suggesting.

Imposter syndrome is a real thing.

Facts.

Right, like.

Facts.

Oh yeah, I could do this, but who am I to be doing this?

I don't have the certification and people get certified and, and all those beautiful things.

For me specifically, teaching was one of the big fact checks for me.

Hey, look, I'm teaching kids.

Yes, I'm teaching them music, but I'm also coaching them with mindset with how they handle things, with how, how they're working on solo ensemble music and handling life stuff because they trust me.

So they come to me.

All teachers are coaches to a degree.

And so, OK, as I'm coaching people with health and fitness, OK, I got to learn the the category and the terms and the stuff.

And personally for me, the big thing is I don't want to just read a book and share.

There's so many coaches out there.

The coaching space is saturated in many ways with people who like, OK, I've read the book now I'm just going to teach it, but they don't have life experience behind it.

And so intellectual knowledge is great, but applied knowledge is even better, in my opinion.

So I'd much rather work with people and not I vet all my coaches that I have for myself.

Did you do this stuff?

What does that look like?

How does that grown for you?

And so for me, I want to make sure I know myself.

I, I don't necessarily care about the certifications you have.

I want to make sure how, what's your life experience like with that and what, how have you learned and grown from that?

Because that's what's going to transfer over to me.

And so for me, that imposter syndrome, getting over that was OK.

Look at my previous successes as small as they were in different avenues, right?

Even with business, who am I to be running a business, to be an entrepreneur?

Well, I sold pumpkins.

Someone paid me for a pumpkin.

I grew great.

Well, well, that I did that, that great.

I'm an entrepreneur there.

And then, oh, this business, this business or hey, I coach this person in this.

And then I helped him with this and I saw that progress, this progress, OK, I can do it here and I have this life experience.

And then start small, right?

Start small and build it up and build your conference as you grow.

It doesn't, it's like you wake up overnight.

If you wake up overnight and have a confidence, it's probably ego as opposed to all right, I've built this up over time and I see this confidence.

There's a through line that's been building up over over my lifetime.

I love the correlation you made from teacher to coach because you're right, and when you're teaching there's all sorts of stuff I'm sure you have to coach your students through so they can be the best student they can be because life is still happening to them while they're in the school trying to get an education.

Right, Well, they're trying to get education or that's what they're told their need to do and whether they want to be there or not then, right.

And then and you just think of you said teachers earlier go into different careers, right?

Maybe not entrepreneurs, but they work for different organizations whenever out of education.

And so, well, think of all the things you learn in the classroom as a teacher, OK, you got classroom management, you got conflict resolution.

You have just management and styles and lessons planning and, and looking at all these different things, coaching being one of them.

So, oh, if I look at it like I had 40 people in my choir one point and there's times I had like 200 kids on stage.

Great.

If I had 200 people in front of me on stage that are directing, that are eyeballs on me doing the stuff I need to do well, I need to know how to manage that.

And help them do what I need to do.

But they're all individuals.

So how can we coach them and guide them and support them to do XYZ so we can get this finished product, whatever that product is, a concert, a piece of a proposal, a project, whatever that is executed in the way that's going to be beneficial for everyone.

It's all coaching.

It's all, it's all the same stuff, but we just put different labels behind it.

So we don't think that we are those things or we don't identify with those labels because we labeled it something different.

But yet they share so many of the same traits.

Not all of them, but a lot of the same traits.

Spencer, so far we've talked about teaching and your coaching business and how you made that pivot, but you haven't mentioned the name of the coaching business.

So let's let's, what is it?

Let's talk about it.

So our business is called Jones in four, like you're Jones in four positivity, you want it, you're craving it.

So that's the name of the business.

And we started a full time like I've again coaching people for many years, Jones in to get fit originally and then over we started mindset.

And then when we shifted in 2020 to doing this full time and more burnout, mindset, positivity things along those lines, we just said, all right, let's call it Jones and four.

And we grew it to this global company, which has been really, really exciting.

OK, that is exciting.

Yeah.

And and that's pretty cool.

It's fun now we we've hosted events like we do a lot of virtual stuff, but we hosted events all over the world.

Y'all can't see it because you're listening to this, but I'm my hoodie that I'm wearing at the moment is filled with patches and so the patches are from all the different events.

We we've LED so one day events to seven day retreats in Romania, Philippines to I don't know, we've to one day event in London and so and all over the US.

Oh.

Wow.

Yeah, so fun, fun, fun stuff.

OK, that's, that's wild.

Actually, that's crazy coming from Hilbert.

Yeah, right.

Little Hilbert also doing events all over the world.

It's fun.

That's that's pretty sweet.

OK, well I want to dig into this more, but I have a feeling we're going to cover a lot of this during topic, so I'm going to ask instead, if you weren't doing what you're doing right now, what would you like to be doing?

It's a tough one.

So I love, love, love what I'm doing.

Honestly, I would probably be a performer like as in I would be on stage playing piano, like doing piano performance around the world probably.

I'm not sure.

I don't know.

That's a tricky one, but that's that's one of my passions.

One of the side businesses I started before as we were growing was kayak fishing.

It's one of my passions what love getting out on the water, chasing fish out of a plastic kayak and.

Yeah, I might have to veto that one, man, that that that kayak is way too small to be fishing.

Not at all.

What if you catch the big one?

Great.

Then they pull you around.

I caught I chase sailfish out of my kayak in the Atlantic.

Didn't catch 1, which is a bummer, but I had chased one that was fun.

I got I caught and landed a 7 foot 4 inch sturgeon out in Idaho.

It was a 20 minute fight, quote UN quote.

It was pulling me up river and all these things.

I was basically a big bobber at that point.

But so much fun.

And now, you know, locally, you know, you catch bass and Pike and, and different things, but just so much fun.

And yeah, I, I stand up in them and everything and what?

So yeah.

And I traveled the country.

We had a miniseries we did stuff with and I, I was creating that into a full business where I was doing reviews and all that till I almost burnt out from that.

And you know, that's all these things we learned along this journey.

All right.

There's lots of fun stories and rabbit holes we can go down.

Oh yeah, Well, you know, I, I'm just going to say like that whole kayak fishing thing, it is highly impressive.

But I am not about that life.

Just give me a nice pier and a launch here.

I'll I'll just keep it on land.

Hey, that works too.

You know, it's, it's safer that way too.

You're not rocking and rolling.

Oh yeah.

But if you ever want to go, let me know.

Oh yeah, yeah, that call won't be coming, but you can come join me sitting on on the pier.

How about that?

Hey that works for me too.

You know.

OK, well, you know what?

I think this is the perfect time for us to get ready for.

All right, gosh listeners, you know when you hear that sound, it is time for the topic of the week.

And the topic of the week is chosen by our guests 99.9% of the time.

And guess what?

This week's not going to be any different.

So, Spencer, what is our topic of the week?

Now, we were talking about this beforehand and I said burnout because it's one of the things I'm really passionate about is because I burnt out, hit rock bottom, all those things.

But maybe we can have fun, we can talk kayak fishing, make that the topic of the week.

Which one?

Which one?

OK, we won't deter what we said earlier.

We'll go with burnout, I suppose.

If you don't talk kayak fishing, folks, reach out.

I'll be happy to have a have a chat about that.

Alright, I do.

I do believe there's some following out there for kayak fishing.

Yeah, somebody.

There's a group of people out there who are thinking, Oh yeah, I'm about that life.

It's a major industry.

It's it's growing in the industry, which is pretty amazing.

Yeah, I'm, I'm gonna tell you how you should go kayak fishing with Spencer, but then just stop and meet Timber on the pier.

I'll have a cooler and a lawn chair and you can come join me.

See, now there's there's a beautiful day.

You come go kayak fishing with us or with me and then we go to the pier, you know, and, and he'll have his podcast set up and we get a podcast interview on the pier, watching the sunset, enjoying a drink of choice and having a good day.

That sounds like a beautiful day.

That sounds like something that is anti burnout.

Agreed one. 100% You see what I did there?

Love it.

All right, so let's talk about burnout because I think it's something so prevalent right now.

And I think in a way, like some people may be in it and they won't admit it to themselves that they're in it. 100%.

Or maybe they don't have the privilege to quit being in it.

I could see that to a degree.

I, I would say that's how they feel, right, Right.

They feel that they don't have the option to, to get out of it.

I, I love that she said that, you know, some people you might not see that they're in it or, or that and it's very, it's interesting.

So we've done a lot of market research over the last six years of how people look at burnout.

So for me, my burnout came from, I was chasing and leading life with ego, right?

Trying to prove myself to the world and all that and doing all the different things, trying to people please and, and to this event and that event just so I could feed my ego.

And my ego wanted to be served in the sense I wanted money and I wanted notoriety.

I wanted people to know who I was anywhere I went.

And while teaching wasn't going to get me money, at least not not as much as I was hoping for.

And so OK, hopefully side businesses did, they didn't, but whatever.

But then teaching could get me notoriety to a degree, right?

And so, OK, well, let let me be known as this person.

And so I was chasing, chasing, chasing that.

And I just, I kept thinking I was invincible right at that ego saying, well, I got this, I got this.

And so I made, you know, life, you make decisions, life checks you at times.

And I'm like, but I'm Spencer, I got this.

And then I made some really stupid decisions and I hit my rock bottom.

But at the time, for me, that was suicidal.

I hated who I'd become, who I was portraying out to the world.

And as a matter of fact, I didn't know who Spencer was.

Like, do I like chocolate cake?

I don't know.

Do you like chocolate cake?

Then I like it.

Do you like this TV show?

Then I like it.

So I had to figure out who Spencer was for for some time and really learn to love him.

Saying all that and tying this back into Burnout, I didn't know that.

That's what part of Burnout was, a version of it, I think a burnout being someone who is like incapable of moving, right?

They're just so exhausted and drained that they're just, they can't think, they can't do anything.

Yes, that's burnout.

That's a version of burnout.

But there's actually different layers of it and different levels of burning out.

And I've met people who said I burnt out earlier this year.

You know, when we were talking in December, I burnt out, you know, in February, then I took some time off, I came back, I burned out again.

Like, yeah, because you're not not adjusting things.

And we'll get into this even more.

But what I've realized is people don't one-on-one, they know what burnout is or they, I have an idea of what burnout is, but they don't relate to it.

Like when I say it burned out, unless you've really hit that rock bottom point or you've really hit that struggle phase, you're not going to relate saying, oh, I burnt out.

That's always like, I'll let somebody else that's that's somebody else.

That's not me, but what does it look like for you?

So when in this market research, I'll talk to, when we talk to companies because we help leaders and their teams as a company, I'll say burnout because that resonates with them.

And they'll they'll say, OK, Yep, this makes sense.

And then I'll go into the language that people actually experience as individuals.

If I'm talking with individual entrepreneurs or, or people who want to join our things, I don't say burnout usually because that doesn't resonate there.

It's somebody else's thing.

Well, what do you experience?

Well, you experience a lot of mental noise that overwhelm that, that feeling like you can't think straight.

You feel like you have 1000 tabs going on at once.

And these open loops just keep happening and over and going over and over and over again.

It feels like you can never settle down, get quiet.

Your brain is always on in the middle of the night.

You feel exhausted.

You just want to be a couch potato once you get home because you are mentally, physically just exhausted and fried.

That's starting the burnout, right?

So there's different levels of that and that is burnout, just different phases and levels of until you hit that point when you're in your start getting sick, you start getting sick more and more often.

These are all warning signs on the dashboard Until you hit that part where you are mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically drained and fatigued that you can't move.

Your brain doesn't think it's just like an empty space.

You're exhausted.

And then and then from there, if you just still don't take care of it, you just keep pushing through and you're like, OK, I'll take a little break or whatever.

Then you keep pushing, you're going to end up in the hospital.

And I've known people who end up in the hospital for days and weeks trying recovering from burnout because they were so physically drained.

That and some of them don't come out of the hospital as in they die from just pushing so hard.

And so it's become my life mission.

Well, my life's mission is to help a billion people step into the light and shine.

But that's recognizing, hey, I love me for me.

I'm going to take care of me.

I'm not going to burnout.

Let me recognize these warning signs so that we could turn it around before I I hit that state, before I end up in the hospital, before I end up being completely fatigued.

And if you've hit that before, let's let's help you not hit that again.

How do, Well, maybe we should, you know, we've used the term a lot right now.

How do you define burnout particularly or define it for the work that you do?

Because it's that we, we talked about signs of burnout, right?

Or things that things that are burnout and maybe we don't term it that.

How do you define it?

For me, burnout is you are either physically, emotionally exhaust, spiritually exhausted, trained where you just, you just want to be a lump right where you're just can't think, can't do anything.

That's full on burnout mode.

It can also look like go back to kayak fishing for a moment.

I was building this business and growing it and I took something I was passionate about and kept going, kept pushing harder till that became a job and it wasn't passionate and then I started resenting doing it.

I had a friend who is into kayak fishing and shore fishing as well and he was pushing even harder than I was with it.

He burned out in it in the sense that he one day sold everything, never went fishing again because he's like, I'm done.

Like it was a complete or just right off of like I'm done with this.

This is horrible.

I'm never doing this again.

I think that's, I think that resonates.

I think that resonates.

I think the point in which it you push to the point or you're, you're at a point that the switch flips and resentment is created.

I think that there is a pretty relatable definition.

I agree.

And oftentimes you are aware of that resentment starting to creep in because you're not necessarily wake up all of one day and are resentful.

It builds up over time.

So if you can catch that early on, you can you can change it.

I saw it with my friend in kayak fishing and I started feeling it, you know, oh God, this is getting to be a job.

I'm not enjoying this.

I have to do this that the other thing I have to edit all these videos and such like I'm not enjoying this, but I have to do it.

I feel like I have to fulfill my commitments.

Hold on.

I'm I'm on a fast train to to burnout land here and I'm not interested in that.

So thankfully I ended before and I phase that out before I hit full on burnout.

So I did not end up selling it.

I took a lot of time off and I didn't go nearly as much kayak fishing.

That is the next year, but I still do it now and I've done more of it because I didn't allow myself to hit that phase.

So along this journey, what have you learned that you've been able to incorporate into your coaching that you have found to be the most effective in helping people navigate their burnout?

Great question.

This ties into so much for me, the biggest, the biggest, biggest, biggest thing.

And I can get on the soapbox and talk about this, but it's the fact that we're taught these different tips and hacks and strategies, but none of them that I've found over the years actually address the, the root issue of it.

And that's your internal operating system.

The example of you've probably heard this before of you can't pour from an empty cup, right?

So fill your cup.

Great.

It's a, it's a great analogy.

But here's the thing.

So people hear then they're like, OK, I'm going to fill my cup.

I'm going to take a week off.

I'm going to do whatever.

And you know, take this time for me, great.

Go go kayak fishing or whatever it is.

Great.

Go do those things.

Beautiful.

But if you're pouring into a cup that's full of holes, AKA these leaks, these energy vampires leaks and drains that aren't allowing you to fill it up, well then you're just pouring into a cup and it's just leaking right away.

It's like I poured coffee into a cup that's full holes and also, and I have no coffee left.

I might feel for a moment, oh, I feel good, I feel refreshed.

But then a day later, a week later, maybe a month at most, I feel like crap again because you're not actually dealing with the root issue.

And so that's the biggest thing that people need to know is I have nothing against tips and hacks and strategies.

I still teach them to a degree, but I make sure I clearly identify them that these are just tips and hacks that are part of it, but it's not the full thing.

You have to go after the root cause, your internal operating system and it, you know, the holes that are in your cup are no fault of your own, but they're your responsibility if you want to change and turn that around.

So that's the been the biggest thing and it it drives me absolutely crazy.

I'm getting on my soapbox for a moment, but it drives me crazy that people say that these tips and hacks are the this is going to change it all.

And that's just absolute bull.

So I would think before you get ready to coach someone, right, to make them, to make them even get to the point of being coachable, there needs to be some self-assessment, right?

You got to come to some realization about some things.

You got to admit to yourself that you're in a burnout place to a certain extent.

Agree.

How do you tell people or what kind of advice do you give people for their self evaluation to actually make that self analysis of where they are AT and if they need coaching and guidance?

I mean, you need to become problem aware for anything, right?

Awareness is always that first step.

If you're not aware, you can't do anything about it.

There's 33A's as it were, a, a, A, it's awareness.

Let me gain awareness of this issue.

And I'm not talking just burnout.

This is everything in life awareness.

The second A is acceptance.

Do you accept that that is a thing in your life or not?

Because if you don't accept it, then whatever, you're not going to do anything about it.

So awareness, acceptance followed by action.

So what's the action you're going to take to solve that thing that that you're now aware of?

And maybe it's I, I agree with this.

I feel good about this action I'm doing and I'm aware of it.

So I'm going to keep doing it.

Great.

That that's a choice.

Or maybe you want to change it.

Great.

So then you take the action and change it.

If you're not problem aware, if I'm not aware that I'm struggling, that I'm burning out, that, you know, losing weight, if I'm not aware that I'm overweight, that I don't feel good, healthy my body, then I'm not going to do anything about it cuz I don't know that's an issue.

So to help people to answer your question exactly, to help people recognize this, we got to give them the tools to become aware.

We have to give them a dashboard, as it were to say, hold on.

This is a sign of this.

Oh, this is a sign of this.

Because generally the people we work with, they know whether they feel at points, I, I feel a lot of mental overwhelm.

I'm constantly thinking my brain doesn't shut off, I'm not tired.

All those things I said earlier, right, Those are warning lights are warning signs on your dashboard and people experiencing, but they don't necessarily relate it to burnout or to this thing.

They just think, well, this is what life is.

This is how these are what being an adult is and having these things are.

And that's, I mean, sadly it's a common thing, but doesn't have to be that way.

So making people problem aware and recognizing because they're already aware of that problem, but they're not relating it to the root cause.

OK, if that answers it.

I think so.

OK, I went on tangent there for a moment.

I think I had to get answered it.

Oh no, no, no, no.

Hey look, there are no wrong answers, you know.

So what are and and without?

You know, because you are in the business of coaching.

You know, what are some of the low hanging fruit things that you suggest to people to start their journey pivoting to a better place?

Yeah, one of the things we, I teach and when I, when I speak on stages and do this, this is one of the things that I share almost every time if it fits, and that is I call it an A daily energy audit.

And there's four steps, a bonus 5th step.

So if you're listening to this and you're able to write it down, write it down.

It's super easy.

You could do this in 30 seconds.

It's going to take me a little bit longer to explain it, but it's not complicated.

So the first step is you pause.

So you just pause what you're doing, right, instead of racing around, just pause for a brief moment.

Great.

Then you scan.

That's Step 2.

You scan, you scan your mind, body and heart.

Is your mind racing or is it calm?

Is my body tense or is it relaxed?

It how's my heart?

What, what feelings and emotions am I having?

So you scan the third step is you label and you label.

If you were to, to combine all those things, your heart, your body, your mind, and you were to give it a number, let's say one through 10, right?

Or pick any range you like, one being, let's say exhausted, 10 being energized.

Where are you on that scale?

So now you're labeling it right?

You're putting it on a metric.

Great.

So let's say you're at a four for out of one through 10.

Great.

You're at a four, no judgement.

But then what's one small action you could take?

That's the, the 4th step is action.

What's one small action you can do to shift that number from A4 to A5?

You're not trying to go like A4 to A10.

You're not trying to do something huge, just one small action to shift that number to improve you to have a little more positive energy or whatever that is.

And that could be as simple as I'm getting up and stretching, I'm having a conversation, I'm going out for a walk, I'm maybe I need to complete this task.

Great.

Whatever that thing is.

And what I've seen over and over and over again in the countless times I've shared this with audiences around the world, because I stay at those conferences and events and see them later that day and next day, depending they have these positive changes.

And it's not necessarily a huge shift.

AI was at a four and now I'm at A5 and guess what?

The next day, hey, I'm at A7 today because I'm taking these small steps.

So you pause, you scan, you label and then action.

The bonus 5th step is do the thing.

Don't just say you're going to do it, but actually take action on that thing.

Do whatever that action is and you'll start to see positive progress, right?

Incrementally slow but slow but steady.

You're going to see this positive change and benefit in your life because what are we doing right?

If you go back to the 3A's, you're becoming aware, then you have to accept it and then you're going to take an action.

That's all this is.

It's just putting it into an audits as a scary term for many people.

But if you just do this daily energy audit and you do it once a day or 2 * 3 times a day, but even if you just did it once a day, man, that ripple effect and the compounding effect of that, it's going to be huge.

So I'm thinking Kosh listeners are listening right now and somebody's saying, man, this Spencer, this I'm interested.

This sounds like I'm AI might be about this life.

So let's say somebody from the Kosh contacts you.

What does that look like?

What is what is what happens?

What happens if they're like, look, Spencer, I just listened to this episode.

I I resonated with a lot of the things you were saying.

What happens next?

What do we do?

Yeah.

And then let's finish that off with how can people reach out to Jones and Four?

Yeah, thank you.

Thank you for asking.

So if this resonates with you, reach out to me and let's have a conversation, whether that's on a phone call, whether it's a virtual call or if you're in the Kasha area, let's go out for coffee, let's chat and we can make that happen.

There's lots of ways of what this could look like.

So first of all, it's a conversation and just say, hey, where are you at?

Like, and it's just a fun, easy conversation.

But we try to be real and just see and see, OK, what's going on in your life?

What's going to benefit from for you and help you on that journey?

Where are you going?

And maybe it's working with us.

If it is, great.

And then we'll share those steps with you.

If not right, I, we, I have other contacts and other people we can help and refer you to or whatever.

It's all about helping you be at your best, whether it's working with us or not.

I'm not here to sell you and working with us unless it truly fits and supports.

But let's say it does fit to work with us, right?

We have a couple different things.

We have, you know, a free Facebook group called the Energy Hub.

Come join it if you're interested.

We have an online Academy with 100 plus courses or training so you can get a free access and get over a dozen of those.

But then we also we do some one-on-one coaching.

But generally what we offer is this 6 week boot camp for individuals to go through and they learn 22 of the frameworks to master their internal operating system.

We call it your energy sovereignty, the FALSA energy sovereignty pathway.

And so they can do the boot camp and then we have a 12 month program.

And so we help individuals go through this program and support system through the 12 month 1.

You have one-on-one coaching opportunities, access to the whole Academy of 100 plus courses, trainings or summit, blah, blah, blah.

These other things.

I'm not here to pitch you on all that, but but that's individuals.

If companies are interested in working with us, we do this thing called the 90 day Sprint, which essentially it's a five day challenge to help their teams gain some awareness and also see some positive momentum, but also get gaining like, oh, here's where your team is doing really well, here's where they're struggling.

And now you have clarity of that for us and for the team.

And then they go into the six week boot camp followed by 4 weeks of a integration reminders period, stuff like that.

And then they can also do the 12 month program if they're interested.

But again, like that's, that's how we work.

But maybe you you don't resonate with us, or you'd rather do more one-on-one work or something great.

We may or may not be.

We have code do that for you.

And if they don't work, great, then we'll connect you to somebody else who does, or do our best to at least.

I'm glad you brought up the the business slash corporate setting because I'm also thinking someone might be listening out there and saying this is something we need for our team.

And I'm going to assume, because it sounds like it, you might do a little keynoting too.

Yes, Sir.

Right, all right, so.

Many times.

So go on and give us those contact info.

How do people reach out?

How do people find you?

Yeah.

So if you are interested, I mean, you could probably Google Spencer Jones and Jones and Ford.

I'll pop up and go to our website, probably be the easiest way, which is we are joneson4.com and yeah, we are Jones and Ford.

That'll be other.

I'll give that to Timber so he can add the links and all that stuff if you're interested.

But yeah, check that stuff out.

You can see our corporate offerings, individual stuff, when our next boot camps are.

All those good things are on the website there and you can reach out.

Or I mean, honestly, if you want to, you know, on social media, look at Spencer Jones or at Jones and four.

You know, I would love it if you sent me and Timber a message and saying, hey, this was a nugget I got out of this podcast and just let me know because I love hearing it.

And I would just love to say, hey, that's awesome.

Thank you for listening and have a little just way to say thank you.

So if you're interested in doing that, reach out or check out my website, my emails, all that stuff is on there as well.

All right, awesome.

And Kosh listeners, you most definitely know if you're listening and and you got something to say or you want me to share it on, please do Just go ahead and e-mail us at askthekosh@gmail.com onceagainthatisaskthekosh@gmail.com and I will get it to Spencer and let him know.

Well, Spencer, before we wrap up this segment, I just like to ask one last question and it goes something I like this.

Is there anything else that you would like to share with the Kosh listeners that maybe we didn't ask a question about any any Nuggets there that you do you'd like to share at this time?

I'll share this and I might share it again at the end if it fits, because this is something that I felt I, well, I know I needed to hear back when I was really in the dark place.

And that is you, as in everybody listening.

You are amazing that you are worthy, that you are enough just the way you are.

You don't have to do anything or change anything or prove anything to anyone, not even yourself.

Because you are amazing, worthy, and enough.

No matter where you are in life's journey, no matter how good or how rough life is, no matter the job, the titles, I don't care.

You are just by being here, by being alive, you are amazing, worthy and enough.

Facts.

I love that.

Thank you, thank you.

It's something I needed to learn and hear and believe, sit with at that time.

OK.

Well, Spencer, at this time we are going to move to our next segment and our next segment is called The Soapbox.

And the Soapbox is an opportunity for our guests to get on their soapbox and talk about anything they want that they feel really passionate about right now at this time.

So what's on your mind?

I, I would say I alluded to this earlier, but I didn't allude to it.

I was, I was on it right, right from the get go thinking about burnout and that stuff.

It's tips and hacks, not just burnout.

So but I'll, I'll start there and then I'll, I'll go off for a little bit that people share, and I'm nothing against people who share tips, hacks and strategies.

Again, I do it as well.

But we have to know and you have to know that those are just tips of the iceberg.

They're just little sections of it that they're not going to be the end all be all one stop solution.

It's not like you take this pill and all of a sudden you lose X amount of weight or whatever.

It's not this, you take this, you do this one little thing and your life is going to instantly be better.

Even with the daily energy audit.

It's a tip, it's a strategy.

That's all it is and you have to implement.

You have to take action.

Will you see improvement?

Yes.

I guarantee you will see action and and benefit from it.

But is it going to take you from, you know, A1 to A10 right away?

No, it's going to take you to 1:00 to 2:00 and then over time it'll get you to the 10, but you still have to do more.

So the my soapbox thing and focus is for at least right now is don't buy into all the hype of these tips and hacks and strategies, whether it's mindset, whether it's weight loss, whether it's a home improvement, I don't care what that is.

You're smart.

You, you know, these things once you when you get that feeling in your stomach, the, the ick and you're just like, something's off here.

Trust your gut, even heck, I mean, I'll show you all the stuff we've done and all that stuff.

But if you're like Spencer just doesn't resonate with me that that just doesn't fit, then don't, don't work with us.

Don't do these things.

And that goes for everything and anybody.

If I'm looking at a roofing contractor and you know, to replace the roof of my house, if I get a ick feeling about them, guess what?

I'm not going to hire them right, even if they're the cheapest or even if they're whatever best reviewed.

I have something, something just feels off.

I'm going to listen and trust that.

And so many people try to to bully you, to force you to and use this fun, fancy language to convince you otherwise.

Oh, that this this quick fix is going to solve everything for you.

Well, it's, it might help one thing, but what is it masking and, or does it not actually do what they say they're going to do?

Or is it just a small fix and small help, which it can be?

I'm not saying that they're bad, but they might just do a small thing as opposed to the stuff.

So like, yes, over six weeks, you'll learn the frameworks of tools.

Just use our stuff as an example because I'll, I'll, I'll pick on my own.

So over six weeks of our boot camp, you learn 22 frameworks and tools.

That's what you learn, the frameworks and tools and you customize it for you, but they're just frameworks and tools.

They won't do anything unless you do the work for it and help.

You know, we're there to guide you and support you and stuff, but it's all on you to, to do it.

I can't change your life for you.

That's on you.

We'll help and guide and support you, but that's all it is, right?

And so if you just took one of those things that we did and you know, there's 4 levels to our energy sovereignty pathway.

If you just focus on, hey, I'm going to do this one third level thing, which is alignment.

If you're just focusing on alignment and you're not dealing with all these other things, the the other 3 categories and you're missing out right then, then it's not going to be a full thing.

It's like I'm repairing this part of the foundation but letting everything else crack.

And so yeah, my soapboxes don't always buy the tips and hacks and things along those lines.

They can help you, but they're not the end all be all.

Trust your gut.

OK, I.

Have more to say on that than I thought.

There you go.

Yeah, you, you, you had a soapbox moment.

Make no mistake.

OK.

Next segment.

The next segment is called 21 questions.

This is our opportunity where we ask you some questions, not 21 of them, but really quality questions that might solicit 21 answers because they are fire questions.

All right.

So, Spencer, you ready?

I am ready, Freddie all.

Right, fantastic.

First question, what motivates you?

What motivates me has been motivating me for as long as I can remember and especially teaching and doing this coaching business, this entrepreneurial business.

And that's the aha moment.

The moment when people go, oh, that light bulb goes on.

It makes sense.

Whether it's students with all we can sing this, we could do this as a group, the musical theory or oh, I am worthy, I am amazing, I am enough.

I'm capable.

I can do these things.

Freaking awesome.

What does success look like to you?

Success looks like positively impacting a person's life in one way, shape or form.

Could be one person.

My goal, my mission is to help a billion people step into their light and shine.

But even if I don't reach that number in my lifetime, if we've helped one person, we've been successful.

What irritates you?

People who try to fast talk you.

What worries you?

What?

Worries me.

Or what scares you?

What I take a little bit of time to think about that one.

What worries me or scares me is, is people not realizing how freaking powerful they really are and then using their power, their innate energy, their being for something that they haven't thought through.

And whether whether I agree with it or not, I don't care.

But just the fact that they're they're not thinking about what the that impact is and and choosing it was a really interesting answer.

What do you?

I, I didn't mean to say I said that.

I'm like, well that sounds really rude and cocky of me to say something like that.

Interesting, isn't?

I didn't think I'd answer it like that, so that's all I meant.

Oh, no, no, no.

It's your answer and it's your answer.

It's it's right because it's your answer.

I will say this, all these are all these answers are right now in my journey.

They could change tomorrow, they could change next year, depending on my how my journey goes and what I what I unveil, what I release and unveil.

Oh, that's fair.

What are you grateful for?

I'm incredibly grateful for my family, my wife, obviously, I imagine a lot of people say that.

You know what?

I'm incredibly grateful for her and the people who have believed in, supported into me.

I'm incredibly grateful for this human experience because the highs and lows it's, it's been amazing.

What do you want to be remembered for?

That I positively impacted a person's life and help them realize their full potential or their their light and to help them shine.

How do you define love?

Oh.

I can go a long time with this one.

I think love is everything.

Love is energy.

Love is the light.

In this world, it's there's two.

I'll try not to go too long.

Now you do.

Hey, look, there's you do what you got to do, Spencer, don't, don't try to shortchange the cash, listeners.

Now you go on and do what you got to do.

All right, buckle in.

We got we got 3 hours.

Oh, no.

OK, so love, what is love?

Love is to me everything.

And, and I've had people disagree and what I mean, everything as in, in my, I believe everything's energy, everything's a vibrational state.

And that's love.

Everything is up.

Now there's higher vibrational love of not just a romance, but the good, the positives, those vibrations.

Now there's negativity, but still love.

It's just a lower vibration of love.

And so I think everything's love.

Now my goal for me personally and with the people we try to help and serve is to help them raise that vibration so they go to a higher frequency of love.

One of our cornerstones, one of our of values for me personally and for Jones and Foer is to respond with love.

So that means how can I raise that person's vibration or raise that situation?

Maybe it's me not because I really want to say something cutting and mean back.

And so I don't say anything back.

I just bite my tongue and be like, OK, this is me.

Responding with love is not saying anything.

Other times it's let me say a kind word, do this kind of action or whatever that is, but I always respond with love.

So love is everything.

What is the most memorable life lesson you've learned from a parent, a guardian, or a mentor?

There's been so many lessons.

Some have been really positive lessons as in the stuff they did in a positive way that struck A chord with me, said I want to do this.

Other ones have been, sadly, I think it's probably true for a lot of people.

The the majority are the negative things, as in things like, oh, I'm not doing that.

I don't want that.

The biggest lesson is alignment.

Everything needs to be aligned and whether that's a person in our journey, in our life, that gut feeling, as I mentioned earlier, whether that's a choice and things that I'm doing.

But there needs to be alignment and knowing that sometimes people, places, things, organizations, groups or whatever might be aligned at one time, but then things grow and change and they change and we change.

And whatever that they might be aligned at one time and they might not always be aligned and that is OK.

And vice versa, they might not be aligned at one point, but at some point they might be.

And that's OK.

But everything, everything is alignment.

Yeah, that's the biggest lesson I have little the giraffes for throughout my home, one in my office and we have a bigger giraffe that my grandpa gave me.

But in any case, it's it's tied to a whole story of of alignment that now symbolizes alignment.

So when I see giraffes, it's always a reminder from the universe, from God, from whatever saying just make sure everything's aligned.

So let me set the tone and or the stage.

So you've been asked to keynote a conference of your peers, let's say a burnout individuals, people that coach, right?

But before you get out there and share all that good message you got, you got to set the tone in the room.

So you need that walkout song.

Spencer, what is that walkout song?

Daryl Hall and Oates.

Yep, Daryl Hall and John Oates.

Hall and Oates, you make my dreams come true that is, has been and will be for at least the foreseeable time, my walk out song.

But when I get because it's high energy, it's positive.

And you make my dreams come true.

As in you, you as an audience make my dreams come true by being able to do this.

But also hopefully I can help you.

But really, you make your own dreams come true.

That was fantastic.

That was fantastic that you had it pulled up on queue.

Yes.

And I love me some John Hall, some Hall of Notes.

So good.

Oh yeah, they were fantastic.

Yeah, love it.

OK, I'm, I'm feeling that.

All right, let me just go on in, OK.

Well, you've survived 21 questions.

Next segment.

Good, good job to everybody listening for surviving 21 questions.

You did take him down some journeys, we did.

We did.

Hey I have fun going down rabbit holes and journeys so I can.

There you go.

Next segment is called word association.

I'm going to say some words.

You're going to tell us what comes to your mind.

Do I have to be limited to one thing?

No.

Oh, thank God.

OK.

First of all, this is your episode.

I'm I'm, I'm just here for the ride, mate.

I'm Spencer, I'm here for the ride.

So this is your episode.

But we do have a tradition here on the Kash, a long standing tradition.

And it is this we have always started with the same word because it is the word of love.

It is the word of community, it is the word of family, and that word is food.

I love breaking bread with people.

Food, pizza, burgers, ice cream.

That's it, That's it.

Those are boom.

Yeah.

Love them.

All right, I was.

Afraid you have made me pick 1, so I'm glad it's my show.

I get to do all three.

No.

Well, I do get to come back and ask favorites.

Do we got favorites?

Because, you know, people want to know.

Inquiring minds want to know.

Especially the pizza thing is very controversial.

It is it is because.

People have very personal choices in their pizza, right?

But I think people might be the same way with the ice cream.

Yeah, it's, it's true.

So pizza for me.

I, I mean, I'm pretty open to most kinds of pizza, but you get like a stuffed crust, pepperoni, sausage, bacon pizza, you know, You know, not when I'm trying to be all healthy and stuff like that.

Freaking awesome.

Love it.

Ice cream.

I had an amazing ice cream in Los Angeles number of years ago and I thought I don't know if I would enjoy it.

Freaking loved it.

It was an Earl Grey ice cream.

What?

Yeah.

Like it tasted like Earl Grey but smooth creamy ice cream, Gelato, and.

So good, that actually is fascinating.

Yeah, and I realize they do, they do serve it like they'll ship it to you.

Haven't done that yet.

I've learned how to.

I've saw how to make my own.

Haven't done it yet, but that's on my short bucket list at some point.

Hot tailor beer.

Cocktail.

I'm a coffee person, so first and foremost I'll take coffee pretty much 24/7.

Love love love love of coffee.

If I was a cocktail or beer, it'd be a bourbon old fashioned.

What's our coffee of choice?

Do you have one of these bougie coffees you prefer?

I am really pretty flexible for whatever coffee it is.

Like I'm as long as it's good, as long as it's good coffee, as in not like it's not watered down, it's not burned.

I'm happy.

OK, yeah, straight coffee, caffeine.

Do you do it black or or do you put?

Yes and yes.

Yes and yes, all of it.

All of it.

Yeah, as long as it's not like, crazy overly sweet, I'm good.

But I'll have black coffee or whatever I like.

Caramel lattes are my favorite.

Oh, if I had to pick, yeah.

I'm with you on that one.

I'll get down like that.

Shop local.

First thing that comes to mind if we're doing word association is just your local businesses and and small businesses.

If I were to pick some local ones off the top of my head, which is I'm guessing, which is that this is going, I would say I live in Neenah.

So I would say Lawless coffee and globe coffee coffee shop shocker.

And then I was like a coca coffee in the Appleton.

I like that.

Facts.

Yeah, SAP is really good.

Love, love a good SAP breakfast.

Oh my God, yes.

Yeah, right.

So SAP and Appleton, if you're listening, shout out.

That joins his fire.

So, so good.

Oh yeah, music.

First and foremost classic rock, any like Pink Floyd, Zeppelin being my 2 faves.

But then pretty much anything really goes.

Less so country or rap, but classical.

Love classical music.

It's fun.

I'll listen to my playlist.

You know the like me, whatever playlist, you know, it just randomly picks and it'll go from like a a box to a Led Zeppelin to maybe the 90s like Nirvana to Rachmaninoff and everything in between.

And it's fun.

Streaming.

Yes, I love, I don't know.

I love a lot of.

Variety of shows.

What are we currently streaming?

What are we currently Oh my God, what are we currently streaming at this point?

I love like Disney's like Imagineers and how they built their stuff of how just the business side of Disney and how Walt Disney built it and structured it and help people grow and and did that like leadership wise.

I find that extremely fascinating.

So I find that really interesting.

We did them.

I did The Mandalorian, which I really enjoyed.

Excited for the new session to come out.

New season and what are we streaming right now here?

I don't remember off the top of my head.

It's been been a little bit.

Last Word community.

Family, as in the Fox communities, a community together we get to grow stronger.

So let's help support each other.

We could have differing views and that, but let's let's be here to support love on another.

I think of disasters.

I don't know why I'm going on this rabbit hole, but like when disasters happen, sad, it sucks that when they happen, but everybody comes together and that doesn't matter.

Your political view, it doesn't matter.

All these different things, race, political views, I don't religious, it doesn't matter.

You're there to help and support and love one another and and you show up and that's freaking awesome.

And that's community.

Let's continue to build that.

And that's what I've tried to do with all being involved in the community is doing things like that.

Facts.

All right, You've survived word association.

Sweating here.

Yeah, well, you know.

We're, we're cruising along though we're making it happen.

So next segment, next segment is called Kosh Hidden Gems.

This is your opportunity to share a hidden gem with the Kosh listeners.

And so maybe the hidden gem is something that you don't think a lot of people know about and you want to share, turn them on to it.

Or maybe it's something everybody knows about, but there's details about it that you don't think people know.

Spencer, what's your hidden gem?

My hidden gem would be it's I've been thinking about this one.

It's split between 2:00 because I struggle picking one heck rot nature preserve because I'm a big person for being outdoors.

Let's get outside feel that.

Just get outside all the benefits you can research Heck Rot and then Boo Bolts are to Boo Bolts has been doing some amazing things of growing their programming and what they offer and to space Heck rot because for me, it's 10 minutes away and I just get to go be in nature and see it.

And it's I think it's a hidden gem that a lot of people know about.

They hear it, but they haven't been there.

And so get there and just experience it.

I agree.

And both of those are like fantastic and amazing.

And if you've never walked around them and just immersed yourself in it, it's pretty fabulous.

And if you are an organization and you need a place to meet and then maybe have a place for y'all for your team to connect in a different setting other than a conference room, it's a these are pretty fantastic options.

And and they're amazing to work with.

Both of them are like I know heck rot is doing author thing for my wife.

She's written a couple of children's books.

I've written six books working on my 7th and I was talking with the event manager person at Heck Rot about doing a like a book study type thing, like a four week book study of my latest book and the best view in the world.

And and like, let's do this because it's an outdoor type story and like, let's go have some fun conversations, a four week kind of book study thing.

And they were all in and game for it.

Haven't done it yet.

I need to get that on the schedule.

But but it's just so cool that they're open to doing those things.

So yeah, for your business, for your organization, your family, go to these places.

They're they're really, really cool.

OK, it is now time for my favorite part of the Kosh and that is story time.

And story time is an opportunity for our guests to share a story with the Kosh listeners.

The great thing about it, that story can be about absolutely anything.

So, Spencer, where are we going?

Oh man, my original thought for this segment was to share my burnout story, me hitting rock bottom.

But I already time chatted about that, so I'll share this fun story with you.

We'll do something different, OK?

My friend and I, Israel, we were going down to Florida to kayak fish.

This is when I was big doing that and we were starting my miniseries and all that and he had his own stuff.

He lived in Madison.

So I picked him up out of my Prius.

We tied 2 kayaks to the top, filled the back up and drove 24 hours straight just looping who's driving every gas fill up or so down to Florida, fish for sale, fish out of our kayak.

And so we get down there and get everything set up and organized and, you know, for filming part of this journey and doing all those different things.

Excuse me.

And so we, we did as much research as we could about how to fish for sailfish.

We've never, we've been on Lake MI multiple times, both of us, but we've never fished out in the Atlantic out of our kayaks.

And so we researched as much as we could to help us do this, but there wasn't a lot out there.

There was no books written about offshore fishing for sailfish.

So we watched videos, we read blogs and we were like looking like both of us were comparing notes about pictures and videos of what we saw in the background of what they were using, how they were doing it because no one truly explained it.

So we just did the best we could.

Great, accumulated it.

We talked about it, obviously talked about it a bunch before.

And then on the 24 hour drive, we talked a lot.

And then we get down there, get all set up and all right, do this stuff.

And I remember the ocean.

It was gentle, gentle waves.

And locals said that this is, Oh my gosh, this is such a calm day on the Atlantic.

And it's amazing.

We're both looking at each other, our butts puckered because we're like, if this was Michigan, we'd be like, yeah, no, we're good.

We're going home.

And and we're not adverse to crazy weather.

Like it's nothing new.

But that made us go, oh, this is, this is a whole new level of, of stuff.

But we did it.

We didn't flip our kayaks.

We got off offshore and we, we fished for sailfish and didn't get anything, No bites, nothing after, I don't know, 8 hours on the, on the water.

And so I remember the, the current is going about 5 miles an hour, which doesn't seem like a lot, right?

It's not fast in a car, 5 miles an hour.

But if you think, well, if I'm in my kayak and within one hour I could be 5 miles down the shore, Olson, that becomes a really long way.

And so we knew it was stronger whatever.

I had a paddle kayak at the time.

So we go out there and we're fishing and our plan was to ride the current for quarter mile, something like that and then paddle back up and then do that multiple times because that's what we saw people do, right.

And that's what we figured out was our strategy.

Great.

We go out there, the current pulling us back.

Great.

OK, it's time to to go up upstream, right?

And never go back up and paddle.

So, OK, so I'm paddling, paddling, paddling.

They're 20 minutes.

I'm looking and I have like a anchors, like a house, water tower, whatever on the shoreline.

I'm like, I don't seem to be making progress.

Like, OK, let's keep going.

Another 20 minutes.

Nope.

And and he looks at his GPS.

He had one on his kayak and he's like, yeah, we moved 5 feet and all and that 40 minutes of paddling.

OK, so I'm just, I'm a digging in the pedal.

I'm just going to go as hard as I can, right, Push harder, 10 minutes.

He's like, yeah, we made 15 feet of progress and I'm sweating and I'm just exhausted.

Thankfully, one of the locals came up to us and saw as we were cursing and swearing and all those other things trying to survive.

He said, you know, if you go closer to shore, and we both fished rivers multiple times, we said if you go closer to shore, the current, you know, we are in 100 feet of water.

If you go to 50 feet of water, the current cuts in half.

We're like, oh, and then so we went to about 25 feet of water and then we just smooth sailing all the way up.

But we were so exhausted by the time we called it a day and and stuff that we, we should have known, or maybe you should.

I don't, I don't like saying shoulds, but things we could have known that would have made all the difference.

But we didn't know.

And so we called it a day and then we were talking to people and our very unsuccessful day and we were about ready to call it.

We drove 24 hours.

We paid money to be in this tournament for fish for sail fish.

And we're just like, screw this.

There's much other fun language in there.

Screw this.

We're just going to, we know you want to go out the second day, but I'm like, but I have sponsors paying me to be here.

I need to let's let's just be here another day and do this.

So we talked with locals, came up with a new strategy of how to fish for them, which little different than what we did before, but not a ton.

And so we went out the next day, followed that new strategy.

Now knowing how the currents work, now knowing you know these tips that people shared with us and we had so much fun on the water.

He caught an amber Jack.

I didn't catch anything, but I did have a shark bite my bait in half.

I'm like, this will make a fun live video, right?

I'll show that I paid the tax man, as it were, and the man in Gray suits shark eating yourself.

And so I'm like, okay, cool.

So I got the video set up.

It went live and I had the thing, the tip of the rod up the tip of the kayak and it was like 10 feet a liter.

So it's just hanging off the side of kayak.

And so I'm like, Oh my gosh, I'd pay the tax, but here I'll show you.

I was going to show them the half eaten fish.

Yeah, there is no fish left.

There was a half a hook left.

So it came like right by my kayak.

These black tip sharks came and bit my hook in half.

So I got to show that on this fun journey.

And so yeah, just a fun random story of going down their kayak fishing.

But the point of it is this this whole long story.

Here's the point that when we came back, we were driving back we're like we didn't know We we researched all that we could and did the best we could, but we didn't know until we got here and we know other people want to be fishing for off beyond the Breakers offshore out of kayaks.

Let's do this.

So that's I started my writing journey.

That was my first book is writing about that story and giving people the tips to take strategies to be able to do that and have a more successful and fun day on the water as opposed to our first day when we were ready to to call it quits.

So use those fun experiences in your life that might not have been so fun for you as learning experiences and use it all as learning experiences.

That's the point.

And if you could do it with a friend and person by your side, excuse me, by your side, that much better.

Very long and fun random story.

There you go, you.

Know I know it's a fishing story though, but most fishing stories end with some type of big fish he doesn't caught.

Yeah, yeah, You know, I have, I have a kayak fisherman and I had a mini series, but I had this curse about me and it's so funny.

I I fish with people who are amazing fishermen who catch fish all the time.

And every time I fish with them, they catch less fish.

I mean, we catch fish at times, but but they always seem to catch less fish around me, which is always interesting.

I'm like, I'm sorry I brought the curse, but we have we still have fun.

I'm gonna have to challenge that curse.

I'm gonna have to invite you to come sit on the bank with me right over here.

Let's do the fox and bring you got to bring your own lawn chair.

I can do that.

And you got to you got to bring some contributions to the cooler.

I can do that as well.

I'll bring the bait.

Perfect.

All right, now that's.

Hey, look who can be mad about a fantastic fishing story.

It was so much fun.

I had winter break from school.

It was February now, late January or February, early February here in Wisconsin, drove down to Florida when it was 77° feet in the sand in the salt water.

It was such an incredible trip and an experience.

I think the thing that stood out to me was the kayaks on top of the Prius.

We got so many fun looks, so many fun looks from people with the two kayaks strapped to the top going 24 hours and yeah, just so much fun.

That's wild, all right.

I've many other kayak fishing stories of at any time.

If you all ever want to chat, I can share kayaks being ripped off the top of the car from the wind in South Dakota and being pulled over and all the fun stuff.

Oh wow.

Like my drone having a mind of its own and disconnecting and then flying over the water and was going to land in the water.

It was.

I've had some fun experiences.

Oh yeah, there's lots of fun stories.

So if you're interested, let's go get a coffee.

I might take you up on that.

Or go fishing.

Three of us will fish, and I'll just bore you with fishing stories as we actually catch fish.

That is the goal.

That is the goal.

OK, well, that's fantastic.

And we're going to start wrapping up this episode.

All right.

So first of all, I want to say, Spencer, thank you for being a guest here on the Kosh and spending time with us.

But Kosh, listeners, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you for spending time with us.

Thank you for giving us your minds and ears.

Thank you for caring about another amazing, amazing community member here helping to make our community a better place.

I really like this conversation on burnout because burnout is real.

I think we all have it.

I think some of us are in denial or I think some of us know we're burnt out, but we don't know what to do with the burnout because the the responsibility factor of the things that you got to do don't seem to know how to manage it right, because you still got to do what you got to do to survive.

I just think this was a great conversation.

And also, if you don't know what to do, you now know there's coaching out there to help you navigate it.

So be sure to look into the podcast notes and see that we do have a Spencer out here, Jones and four that can help you navigate.

All right, so you already know we are trying to become the number one podcast in Wisconsin and I can't do without your help.

So what does that look like while you're listening here to the cash?

If you're thinking timber, we need new segments or I got some segment ideas, you should reach out to me and let me know that you're also probably out there listening and saying, yeah, you know what, I would make a fire guest on the Kosh or I know who would.

You can let us know that too.

And then what you got to do is you just e-mail us at at askthekosh@gmail.com.

Once again, that is askthekosh@gmail.com.

What you can also do is you can go to our website, whichisthekoshpodcast.com and also send a message through there.

The other thing is this, I think we have something pretty special here, but this podcast known as The Kosh and these amazing conversations that breakdown silos of us knowing our neighbors and knowing each other.

So help me spread the word about The Kosh here.

And the way you do that is called analytics.

So while you listen to the Kosh and you see an opportunity to give us a review, do it.

You see the opportunity to give us stars, give us 5.

Or you see that button that says subscribe, hit it.

These are all things that improve our analytics.

And the better our analytics are, the more people learn about this amazing podcast known as The Kosh.

OK, so we are on to the next thing here.

Well, you know what we are on to.

And let me just set this up right here.

That means it is shout out time.

So, Spencer, who you shout now?

Well, I'd love to shout out you for all the amazing work that you do and this podcast.

So thank you so much for putting this together, inviting me in all of this.

So thank you, thank you, thank you.

Also, I'd love to shout out Megan Mulholland.

Mulholland for connecting us through her Meet the Media event.

So shout out to Megan Heart of the Valley Chamber and that for organizing that incredible event.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Big shout out to Megan most definitely and her episode will be coming out soon.

By the time you guys hear this episode, her episode will definitely be out there, so check it out.

You know what, I usually have a whole lot of shout outs, but I think I'm going to keep it pretty simple over the last couple of episodes.

Today is the last day of Black History Month, so once again I want to send a shout out to all individuals, organizations, school, school systems or committees, whoever, who are putting on programming and educating Black history, bringing in speakers, whatever it is that you're doing, I just want to say thank you and I appreciate you.

Thank you for what you're doing.

And just a reminder that Black history is American history, in case you're confused.

Just like to put that reminder out there.

I want to send a special shout out there to my friend Fanny, who gave me some cool tickets to go attend Chinese New Year.

And that's part of what I'm going to be doing today.

We're going to go check out Chinese New Year, which is going to be fantastic.

And not only is it entertaining, but the food is fire.

So I'm all about that life right there.

And then the last shout out that I would like to give and you know, already know who the last shout out goes to.

The last shout out always goes to the wife, baby.

Thank you for continuing to let me do this podcast in the house.

I appreciate you and I love you.

All right, so last thing to do, Spencer, you got some multiple choice here, all right, an AB and AC.

So option A share some parting words of wisdom for the Kosh listener.

Option B Tell the Kosh listeners what would yourself today tell your 13 year old self?

An option C There's always an all of the above On any good multiple choice you can do both.

So how are we getting down?

How are we closing it out?

So good, we're going to close it out by doing see all of the above.

But all of the above is actually all one answer and that is this.

I said it earlier, what would I want to tell my 13 year old self?

What words of wisdom do I want to share with y'all?

It's that you are amazing, worthy, and enough.

I already said that, But life can convince you otherwise.

People might try to convince you otherwise, that you need to do something to show something, to prove who you are.

You're worth your value to the world.

And maybe you've conditioned, been conditioned and even believe that yourself.

And I'm here to tell you that that is false, that is not true, that you are amazing, worthy and enough.

But you have to believe it like me saying it, me telling you that I love you just the way you are.

And I do, I love you just the way you are, but that doesn't mean nearly as much as you loving you the way you are.

And so I would want to tell the 13 year old Spencer that.

And I want to tell the 13 year old you that.

I want to tell you who is listening to this today.

And I love you just the way that you are and that you are amazing, worthy, and enough.

Facts.

All right, Spencer, what you think?

I had an absolute blast.

Thank you so much for having me here.

This was so much fun.

It was fire.

It's the gosh.