Gratitude in Action: Transforming Lives with Oliver Marcelle

[00:00:00] Being thankful is not always experienced as a natural state of existence. We must work at it with akin to the type of strength training for the heart. Larissa Gomez. In our everyday lives, finding gratitude is like taking a meaningful journey to know ourselves better. Larissa Gomez compares it to a tough workout for our feelings, showing how much effort it takes to develop thankfulness.

Just as athletes train hard to make their muscles stronger, being grateful needs steady dedication and practice. In a busy world full of challenges, spotting things to appreciate becomes a choice we actively make in the middle of life's busyness. It's in the complex world that practicing gratitude becomes really important, acting as a guide through life's ups and downs, helping us see the beauty within our experiences.

I invite you to join us on this special Thanksgiving edition of the Fallible Man podcast as we explore practicing gratitude, even when it's difficult with our special guest Oliver Marcell.[00:01:00]

Here's the million dollar question. How do men like us reach our full potential? Growing to the men we dream of being while taking care of our responsibilities, working, being good husbands, fathers, and still take care of ourselves. Well, that's the big question. In this podcast, we'll help you answer those questions and more.

My name is Brent and welcome to the Fallible Man Podcast.

Welcome to the Fallible Man Podcast, your home for all things man, husband, and father. Big shout out to Fallible Nation and a warm welcome to our first time listeners. My name is Brent and today I'm honored and excited to have my dear friend, author, speaker, and co host of the relationship trade secret podcast, Oliver Marcel on the show, Oliver, welcome back to the Fallible Man podcast.

Thank you, my brother. It's good to be back. This is awesome. I'm excited, man. Now we changed things up a little bit. How are you on your trivia? Ah, [00:02:00] listen, let's, let's see. Let's see. All right. I thought it would be apropos to have. Thanksgiving trivia. I just do one question, but I got three, three different multiple choice questions for you.

Well, so I see how you go to, all right, here we go. All right, here we go. All right. Since this is the Thanksgiving edition, we're having Thanksgiving questions. So we'll see not only how to trivia is, but history. What is the percentage of Americans eating Turkey for Thanksgiving? Is it a 66%? B, 76%, C, 86%, or D, 96%?

Hmm. What was, what was, what was A? 66%. I think that might be low. Let's, uh, let's go with... Because there's a lot of vegans these days. Let's go with B. B? 76%. All right. Now, how long is the Macy's [00:03:00] Thanksgiving Parade route? Is it half a mile, a mile and a half, two and a half miles, or three and a half miles? I used to know this.

I actually went to the Macy's Day Parade once. Yeah? I was just thinking, it's like, I haven't watched it on TV in several years. Do they still do it? I think they still do it, yeah. Do you still get up every year and watch it? It is, man, how long is that street? I can't remember. Let's go with, it might be three and a half, but I don't know, let's go with B.

Okay. And then the third Thanksgiving question, when was the first Mason's Thanksgiving parade? 1914. 1924. 1934. 1944. Yeah. That, uh, that's a, this is a super Say, say it, say it one more time. What, what are the choices? 19 14, 19 24, 19 34, or 1944. I'm gonna go with 1934. [00:04:00] Alright. Now you guys playing at home, you know the rules.

Don't cheat. Don't. Breakthrough don't jump ahead. Don't freeze. Don't look it up on your phone. Make your guesses. Write it down. Save it for the end of the show. Please don't write it down. If you're driving, that's a bad idea. Now, Oliver, you've been on the show before, but just for any of our new listeners, take a minute and tell us who today is Oliver Marcell.

Who today is Oliver Marcell. I love that you put that word today in there. So who am I today? I am a husband and a father and a grandfather who is learning and I used to say learning late in life, but I've taken that late in life off of off of that statement. I'm learning how to become a better person.

I'm learning more about myself and my approach to life. And I'm learning more about how to [00:05:00] embrace the journey that I'm on. That's who I am today, um, that funnels into what I do, which is, uh, an author speaking in the relationship building and men's enrichment spaces and that learning that I'm going through that process of self discovery that is continuing to happen in my life is giving me fuel in the way of Uh, helping others to thrive in their relationships and helping men to win in every area of their lives.

So that's who I am today. I'm just, I'm that guy, man, that regular guy who is just learning more and more about himself as these days go by. And I'm just flipping that immediately into serving others. Oliver, if you could have any superpower, what would it be and why?

Um,[00:06:00]

wow. So I'm, I'm going to go with, uh, it's a toss up, but I'm going to go with

being invisible, being invisible. And, and the reason why I would love to be invisible is I believe that there are some, some things in life that. I don't know. I, I feel like there's some things, scenarios in life that if I could step outside of it, but still be present somehow that maybe the trajectory of those scenarios, I don't know.

I know that's very broad, but I, you know, I just feel like the ability to, to step outside of a scenario for me would be, and still be present somehow, I think would be an awesome experience. If you could learn and master any skill. Instantly, what would it be and why?[00:07:00]

Um, speaking another language I would imagine is a skill, right? Yeah, yeah. That, that's, that's, if I could do that instantly, I'm going with that. I'm going with that because I would love to be able to insert myself into other cultures, other ethnicities, other countries, other spaces, and just touch down. And immediately hit the ground running in terms of being immersed in that.

What purchase of a hundred dollars or less you made in the last year that's had the biggest impact on your life?

Let me think about that.

Um, dollars or less. That's a good question, bro. I've gotten a couple books that have been, that have been great. Um, my wife and [00:08:00] I, um, had, had an experience, if you want to call it that, where we, we went off and, um, When it went out for a 24 hour, um, that was very impactful, uh, because we experiences. And so to be able to actually do something cool like that, that was good.

So I'll go with those two. There's a couple of books that have been very instrumental and, and that, that experience, it just popped into my head. So it must be significant. The 24 hour date. Okay. 24 hour date. You have to give us a breakdown. What is this 24 hour date? So for the 24 hour date, what we did was, uh, I was able to find a, uh, very inexpensive.

I got a deal actually through, uh, I forgot it was like some coupon or something I had, but I got a great deal on a hotel room for one night and it was a really nice room, but it was really inexpensive. So what we did was we spent the [00:09:00] whole day together. So starting in the morning, we, uh, drove out. It was about an hour and change from where we are.

So drove out to that area, hung out for the day, had, you know, a good meal for breakfast, hung out for lunch and went and got some, there's some cupcakes that my wife loves in this particular place where we were. So we went and got the cupcakes, went and got some food, checked into the hotel room, stayed there over overnight.

Next morning, did the same thing again. So I went out and had breakfast somewhere. Came back closer to our home had lunch. And by that time we had gone through 24 hours. Okay Managed to do that all in a hundred bucks. I did Wow Okay. Now I'm really impressed. I didn't well, you know what I so to be fair if you count gas Okay.

Now we'll skip over gas and I probably went over The fact that you got those meals and stuff in there [00:10:00] along with the, yeah, that's, that's impressive. We did, we did, we did some, we, we, we have, uh, we've gotten good at, I guess you could say, figuring out where the deals are and, and attempting to create experiences on using very little.

Cause we know what it's like. I'll be honest. You know, you, you're my brother. I can be transparent with you. We. We know what it's like to not necessarily have the amount of cash you'd like for a particular experience. So then we're good at being, getting creative, right? So where can we go, you know, breakfast might not be this whole like big, you know, uh, humongous breakfast buffet, right?

Breakfast might be, you know, coffee and a cheese danish. And we wanted to get the cupcakes, so we knew we had to do that. So we did the cupcakes and small little meal that went along with that. And then, you know, [00:11:00] just having fun, you know, you just, you, you find out how to have fun with that. So the room, what made it, what made it great is that the room now that I'm remembering now, now that I'm telling the story, the room actually, if I'm not mistaken, didn't cost us anything because of the way we got it.

I had a free room. That's what we did. So I get my rooms typically when I'm traveling through an app. And after you, after you, uh, booked a certain amount of rooms, you get a room free and that was what we used it for that. Now I'm remembering. That's why, that's why it didn't cost us that the room we paid nothing for because I used my free room for that.

Now, guys, if you want to learn more about how to do things like this, okay, you need to go check out Oliver and Anissa's channel and their podcasts. And they have very real conversations about these kinds of experiences with your spouse, making the most of every day, dating your spouse, spending time in the relationship with people who matter to you.

[00:12:00] Right? So if you want to dig into some insights. They, they've got the experience and they've got a great channel on this. Highly encourage you to go over and check that out. Oliver, what are you most proud of?

So, I, I'm gonna, there's a lot of things, but I'm gonna shine the spotlight on me for a second. The thing I'm most proud of, man, is the growth that has taken place over the last several, in, in, in me particularly. Um, I'm really proud of that because there are some things that, And, and, you know, I, I wrote a book about my experience in self discovery.

There's some things that I kind of ideologies that I really had held on tight to that I felt worked for me and just recognizing that growth needed to take place. And then actually. Stepping through that, that, that's something I'm really proud of. I'm a very different guy today than I was 10 years ago.[00:13:00]

What's one random fact that people don't know about you? This is always a question, difficult question for my guests. A lot of you guys live a very public life between, you know, social media and podcast or books or YouTube. You live very, very public lives. So what's the fact that random fact that people just don't know about you and you can mean anything like.

I don't, I don't eat peas. Mmm, okay. Uh, like, of all the things I was doing in an elimination diet, like, peas give me horrible gas. Hmm. I had no idea until, like, I cut everything outta my diet for about a month and started back up and I started adding things in, right? The elimination style. And it's like, wait, what?

this is the only vegetable I ever liked as a kid. And right now I gotta get rid. I gotta get rid of it. It hurt so bad. Um, man, something that people don't know about me. Um. At first I, at first I was going to say that I'm, uh, that I'm a [00:14:00] musician, but I think a lot of people know that by now. Um, I would say that something that people probably don't know about is that I have, um, I've done, I've done some, some really interesting jobs in life.

Right? So. Um, I've been a janitor and I've been a, uh, I've been a runner for an auto broker. Like I've had some really like, like what even is that kind of job? What is that? But yeah, I think I've, I've had some, I've had some interesting, um, some interesting jobs in life. One thing that, uh, a lot of people may not know is that at one point in my life, I was considering, uh, becoming a, a pastor.

What [00:15:00] is one thing that everyone should know about you before we dig into the point of today's show man something? Everybody should know about me is that I am I am passionate about seeing relationships thrive I mean that I didn't know how deep that passion was within me, but man, you, I'm a quiet guy by nature, which is another thing that a lot of people who see me publicly probably don't know or even believe, but I am a, I am a, a very much an introvert and very quiet, but you get me talking about ways to improve and to supplement in a way that causes your relationship to thrive, man.

Talk you into, I'll talk you into next year doing that. So, yeah, that's something I want people to know. I, I want to see your relationships thrive and I'll do whatever it takes to help. Now guys, like I [00:16:00] said, if you've been around the channel a long time. You may have met Oliver before he's been on the show, uh, in different capacities.

Him and his wife, Denise, have both been on the show, both a live stream and with a podcast, we've done a couple episodes together in the past. Uh, Oliver has been a regular speaker at my men's conference. And I want to take a few minutes for all of you who are newer to the show to get a chance to get to know who Oliver is.

Uh, and you will find out as the show goes on, why this man just. We're we're tight. This is my brother from another mother. This is a guy I spent hours on the phone with and we just text back and forth. Uh, I've had a lot of people I've gotten to meet from this job that Oliver has just become one of my best friends in this, and he has a lot to offer you guys in the show today, so I wanted you to see who he is before we move into this part of the show and then come being part of the show, we're gonna talk about gratitude and appreciation when life is tough.

That's hard for anybody, right? Yeah. And that's one of the most important times [00:17:00] to practice gratitude. So we're going to roll our sponsor and we will be right back with more from Oliver and myself. Now, before we go any further, I wanted to share with you guys, I don't always tell you how much I. Love doing my podcast.

Like I passionately love what I'm doing. And one of the things that makes my life better as a podcaster is to work with a company like grow your show. Grow your show is a one stop podcast. Do it all. Now I use grow your show for my marketing, but grow your show is literally a one stop shop. You can record your episode and just drop it off with them.

And they take it from there. It's amazing. If you are interested in picking up podcasting as a hobby, or maybe you're looking to expand your business and use podcasting that aspect, talk to my friends over at grow your show. Adam will take care of you. I guarantee it. I trust him. He's my friend. He's my business.

Colleague and I wouldn't trust anybody else with my show guys. Welcome back in the first part of the show. We spent some time just getting to know who Oliver is. If you didn't know him, if you're used to Oliver, then you're just [00:18:00] having fun. Anyway, in this part of the show, we're going to dig into gratitude and appreciation when it's tough, because let's face it.

We all have difficult times. All of us have ups and downs. That's reality. Anybody who's saying anything different is trying to sell you something. Because that's just part of life, but gratitude is a vibrant practice. No matter what's going on in your life, there's never a bad time to gratitude. Or let me rephrase that.

There's never a bad time to be grateful, right? There's never a time where that's detrimental to your life. And in the worst times, some of the times that you actually need gratitude the most. So Oliver, from your perspective, why do you think it's harder to stay in a gratitude mindset or to practice gratitude when things are more difficult in life?

Cause a lot of people shy away from it. It's like prayer, right? We'll shy [00:19:00] away from it in the hard times. Yeah, it's, I think there, there are many reasons I'm going to use myself. So for those of you who don't know me, excuse me, I am pretty transparent about my own experience. So I'm gonna use myself to answer this question.

For me often, the, the hard times, the negative things, the things that I don't want to happen, the mishaps, whatever you want to call them. sometimes tend to overshadow the things that I'm grateful for. And so for me, I often now start to shift my energy to figuring out how I'm going to solve this problem, or how am I going to make it over this, this hump, or, or even just wallowing in the, you know, why is this happening right now?

This is the most terrible time that this could be. You know, and I kind of, See my energy [00:20:00] shifting away from looking for the areas and spaces that I can be grateful for and now shifting my energy, just living in that space. And that's what happens for me quite often. I know personally, like, so this year for the last year, some of my listeners now, if you listen regularly, if you don't last year, I actually come from the IT space after a decade in the IT space.

I took the last year off and just spent the year focused on trying to monetize this show. Uh, Fallible Nation is growing every day. We have a lot of listeners, a lot of downloads. I'm so grateful for all of you guys who share this show with your friends and your loved ones and y'all have everything to do with the growth of the show.

So the way podcasts make money makes money usually is with advertising, right? Advertising pays for shows. Just like television, just like radio advertising pays for shows, but we're very [00:21:00] selective as podcasters of who we work with because you trust us to not give you junk. So we're, we're very possessive and protective of our shows and.

Very protective about who we work with because of that. So for the last year, my wife and I chose to live off our savings and try and find sponsors for the show to where it was financially stable on his own. I can just focus on the show and this has not been a financially high year for us. Uh, money has gotten tighter and tighter.

I'm actually looking at going back to work right now. And so finance is a really. Difficult thing for a lot of men, like the minute we're not making X amount of money, whatever that number is in your head, we automatically considered ourselves failures. Right? Uh, part of the role most men have in families is as a provider.

And so you start to question your masculinity. You start to question your life choices. [00:22:00] And it's been really difficult to focus on the blessings as the bills have gotten higher and the bank accounts have gotten lower now, that's not to say that there haven't been a lot of blessings, but as that stress level from the financial situation has changed for me, it's been really hard to stop and appreciate.

Some of the incredible blessings that have happened in this last year. And I think it's, I think you're onto something with the whole energy shift that's been right because you only have so much energy as a personal trainer, as a coach in that aspect. I like to explain to my clients, if you take a gallon jug into the gym with you, you poke a hole in the bottom of it.

When you start. Once you're out, you're out, you only have so much put in at the gym and the bigger that [00:23:00] hole is, the faster that drains, right? It's the same thing in the rest of your life. You only have so much emotional and psychological energy to put out before you're just exhausted. And then here's what's the here's what's the crazy thing to using that same analogy is that even if you were to pour more into that bottle, because there's a hole in the bottom, you're just pouring in to for it to just Gus right back out.

And that happens to sometimes you're looking for, okay, I gotta, you know, I gotta hype myself up, I gotta psych myself out in order to get through this thing, but not Put the energy into looking for the blessing, but to have more capacity to deal with the hard time. Right. And so that, that, that ha that does happen quite often.

It does. Oh yeah. It's uh, and so I think, I think you're definitely on something with that. And I'd love to hear our listeners [00:24:00] feedback on, on those thoughts as well. It just seems the more you focus and we talk about perspective a lot here and gratitude is a perspective, right? Now it's a perspective, but it's also a discipline.

That's why I read the quote at the beginning of the show. If you guys don't remember that quote, let me read it again. It's being thankful is not always experienced as a natural state of existence. We must work at it akin to some, to a type of strength training for the heart. There is, it's not a natural state of being.

I mean, so you're a grandfather, right? I've got two girls, you've got grown kids and a grandchild. Now our little kids inherently generous early on. Little kids are not inherently generous. Are they inherently grateful? Are they inherently grateful? Um, [00:25:00] that's a good question actually. I'm trying to think now with my kids and my grandson.

Um,

I'd say yes to a degree. To a degree? Yeah. Um, now I can just be basing this off my experience and why I say to a degree because kids get excited about the stuff that excites them and they get really frustrated about the stuff that frustrates them. So it's, it's kind of like where you fall, right? So if, if I give, so my grandson in particular, he, man, if you, he, he likes donuts.

And so. He doesn't have donuts all the time. It's a really special kind of thing for him because he's only going to get him once in a blue moon. So if he gets the donut, then he's like over the moon. It's like he won the lottery, you know, when he's getting, when he's handed [00:26:00] this donut, where for us, that's like, listen, it's just a donut.

We're glad you're so happy, but we don't get it. Right. So, and that's why I said, that's why I said to a degree, because sometimes he doesn't get the donut for some reason. Unless they. He thought he was gonna get it man. It's been it's been it seems like a special day today So maybe I might get a donut and he's like so Pat, can we go to Dunkin Donuts?

And I'm like no not today It's like the world So it kind of depends but that's a great question I have to ponder on that about them being inherently grateful I know my children have had to be taught to say. Thank you And I know frequently they have to be reminded, reminded you, you're right. We're, we're big into please.

And thank yous here with our kids. Oh, in fact, my daughter called me out the other day. Cause I was like, I like snapped at her and just wait, like motion forward to give me something. She's like, can I [00:27:00] get a please? Wow. I was like,

called out. Yeah. And I was like, do I have to say it? She's like, well, you make us say it. I was like, You know what? That's a fair point there. Um, but that's a good point. You're right, right now. It doesn't mean that they didn't appreciate receiving it, but I've watched so many kids, right, that you have to.

Tell them to say thank you to somebody when somebody gives them something, but they'll be really excited about it. I mean, give it, getting it from them, right? But then they want to run off and play with it. They don't want to like stop and express any kind of gratitude. That's a great point, bro. And that speaks to something that we.

And I know we're going to talk, maybe talk about this later, but that definitely speaks to something from a very practical standpoint that we should be doing in terms of articulating it. [00:28:00] So that's why I'm wondering, is it an inherently natural state? Or is it purely a learn state or is there a little bit of both for some people?

Gratitude seems kind of easy, even at least in the easy times. Right. And then you have people who are on the flip side. Like I'm, uh, I compared it to prayer earlier. Right. I'm actually way better about praying when things are going well. And when things get hard, whereas a lot of people seem to pray better when things are hard and not as much when they get easy, right?

Um, and where, where I formed that habit, I have no idea. With gratitude, when things are going well, I'm the same way. I find it a lot easier to practice gratitude when things are going well. [00:29:00] I'm learning to. express gratitude and understand gratitude and practice my gratitude when things aren't, but for some reason it doesn't seem as hard to me now to experience gratitude.

When things are difficult as it used to be. Okay, but it's something I've tried to make a conscious practice out of in the last couple years I Interviewed a guy and I told you about the book Stephen Crane called wrote a book called I can appreciate that and it really at the time called me on the carpet about it because like do I stop to be appreciative when Life sucks.

Huh? Because he tells some stories. I have no idea how you practice gratitude in that moment when you're dealing with that. He's like, it was not easy. Yeah. And so [00:30:00] I've been trying to be more conscientious about it, but I know, like, we got people listening right now who are, they, they've got a dead end job.

They hate or they're unemployed, our money's tight, or they've had some health issues in the family, whether it's them or someone they care about, that's just weighing on them. Right? When life is difficult,

how do we. Focus on more gratitude. One idea that I, I, I was pondering was, you know, looking at moments of resilience and strength, right? So holding up under those pressures, I think is something we can reach for with gratitude. Okay. Right. When you're having to go through that situation, [00:31:00] because that situation is hard to go through.

Yeah, it's you got me thinking, man. That's why I'm not saying much, but you got me because here's the thing that this this conversation is so right on time because over the last, uh, I'd say maybe six months or so, everything that I've read, it's been with intention and it's been in. Under the vein of gratitude, because that's something that I have really, for this year, 2023, have really made a focal point in my own growth.

Because, like I said, I am very good for allowing the hard things to overshadow the things that I should, that I can be grateful for. And so I'm, I'm making a push. And so as you're thinking, I'm like, man, okay, I'm looking, I'm thinking back over this, the [00:32:00] acrobatic acrobatics that I've been doing over the last six months, you know, in, in, in this area.

And I do, I do agree with you that they're there, the level of intention that it to redirect, if you will, your thought process in hard times, I think is a reason why. Some of us don't are not as grateful as we probably should is because we don't we don't we're not intentional in that area about redirect and and I've used myself for as an example.

Sometimes it's not so much about how you begin the process as long as you end up with gratitude and so sometimes for me, I get down on myself because my initial response to the [00:33:00] hard times was to send all my energy in that direction. Thank you. And then, so I just stay there. I'm like, well, I'm already, you know, it's like falling in a puddle.

You're like, well, I'm already muddy now. Let me just go ahead and just stay in here. But you have the opportunity to redirect as well. And I think that that is an important thing to remember too, that you can do that. You can redirect your thoughts, even if you start out a certain way, to something that will allow you to now be grateful.

Gone. I think that's where kind of where I was hitting it with that. Right. Is how often have you gotten through the day? Right, and you you're you're just tired. You're maybe maybe you work a physical job Maybe you don't but you're mentally and emotionally tired and all of you listening know the difference Okay, we all know like if [00:34:00] you go out and do a hard day's labor And get through successfully.

You actually can feel really good about that. A lot of times it's when it's emotionally and mentally exhausting for you because, uh, various stress points it's those, those are the really tired days, right? But if you're struggling with gratitude, cause. Life is not fun right now, right? Reach into the fact that you're resilient enough to have gotten through another day,

right? You have a choice every day to show up, right? You talked about you've been intentional about your reading. You've been intentional about some of the other things you're focusing on this year. You have the choice to show up. There are people who just quit. There are people who just give up. I'm not talking about a job or like there are people who just throw their hands up and like, You know what?

I'm done. Screw it. I don't care anymore. I'm not [00:35:00] going to push anymore. I'm not going to fight anymore. I'm not going to put in the effort. So even when it's hard to be grateful, because the situation is horrible, you don't have any money, you hate your job, you feel, you know, just disregarded. You're still holding your head up, right?

You, you still got something going, go dig into that resilience. This carried you through to this moment and think, Hey, you know what? At least I had that. That's good. That's good. I think too, man. I'm going to tell you something. I'm learning. I'm learning something about myself. I, I have not put as much value or maybe I should say, well, I could say it that way.

I haven't put as much value on some of the things that I should be grateful for. As I do the stuff that's happening in the hard [00:36:00] times. So let me explain that. So like, for example, let's say I want to be successful in some area of business. And let's say, here's a great example. Here's a great example. This is a real world example.

Want to do a group coaching experience, right? We did a group coaching cohort. It was phenomenal. Uh, had great fun with, with, with the couples, people walked away learning things, phenomenal experience, great testimonials, the whole nine we're like, all right, man, on the heels of that excitement, we're going to do another cohort, nobody signs up.

So now. I'm, I am not placing any emphasis on all the wonderful things that I just shared with you that happened because in my head, they're not as valuable as the fact that I'm not going to get any money from this thing because nobody signed up. And what I'm learning is that sometimes we [00:37:00] devalue things that we think are not as significant as the thing we're aiming for.

And so when the thing we're aiming for doesn't work, we spend all our energy obsessing over that or trying to figure out how to deal with that. When the fact that what you just said, the resilience that you made it through another day is just as valuable and just as important as if you made 1, 000 that day.

And a lot of people can't make that distinction. A lot of us, me included, can't make that distinction. Cause I'm like, I need that thousand dollars, bro. So, you just telling me, oh, well, you made it to the end of Friday, or you made it to the end of the week. Nah, that's not the same. You know, and for me, what I'm, what I'm learning to do is really be intentional about understanding that, that is [00:38:00] the same.

I did make it to a certain point. And that's a good, may not, it may not come with all the components that I would have wanted it to, but I did make it to that space or my family is well, or we had a great dinner last night or whatever, whatever those things are that we kind of sometimes tend to devalue, they are, they hold as much importance as the other things.

And so for me, I'm just saying for me, that has been helpful because. It helps me in my redirect. So if the week hasn't and here's a real world example. So as we're recording this day that we're recording this, no, yeah, the day that we're recording this, the night before I said to my wife, I didn't make the amount of money I was trying to make this week.

And I did have a moment where I was like [00:39:00] sitting in that emotion for a second. The very next thing I said to her was, but we made it to the end of the week and I'm gonna try. We're going to see what we do next week, right? So I've been doing little things like that, and that has been helping me to really kind of shift my thought process around what this looks like.

And so that, that's a big one for me, man, just putting the right amount of value on certain things I think is important. Sometimes there's things, and here's an easy way to say it. There's things that we sometimes take for granted and those things hold value. I think we, we live in such a culture these days with, and this isn't me bagging on social media, like I usually do.

Cause we all listen to the show. You know, I, I hate on social media a lot, but, and unfortunately it's a regular part of my life because of what I do. And it's like, uh, my friends are like, you know, the irony in that. Right. I was like, yeah, exactly. All right. Trust me. I [00:40:00] understand. But because of social media, I think the amount of people.

in the world who have learned to compare themselves to other people has increased, right? Used to when we were going through life, right? When you journeyed through life, you knew the people right around you, like immediately around you, your personal circles. So your family, maybe your church, your school, your community, right?

The people directly around you, sports teams, you were on the people at your work. These were, this was the world you interacted with. And so that was your comparison level. You heard about rich people. You heard about people who were doing extraordinary things, but you didn't see their lives and it wasn't Like the a, you know, the prime reel of everybody.

That's the, that's one of the things that kills me with social media, right? It's everybody puts their best moments on there. They don't put the screw ups [00:41:00] on there. They don't put the hard times on there. They don't put the down times on there. Right. I laugh because it's so the two commercials or the movies have gotten it really well on a couple of movies where like, you see the person like sprucing up their little place to make it look super and like, and they take all these stupid selfies and stuff like that and make it look like they're living a good life.

And they turn on the camera and the rest of their apartment is like just crap. It's trashed and they're, they're barely surviving. It's like, why are we posing? But I think that's one of the things that's Right. Uh, what's there's a famous quote. I'm going to misquote it. It's right. A comparison is the thief of joy.

Yep. Right. Something like that. Yep. I think that's one of the things that's actually impacted is it's something that the current generations in the last 30 years or 20 years really has had to deal with that wasn't as present in previous generations, [00:42:00] right? Uh, I'm a Gen X er and cell phones, like the first modern cell phones came into existence when I was.

18, I want to say, uh, like modern. I mean, there are bag phones, but you didn't send pictures with bag phones, right? The big brick phones look like military grade crap. You didn't send pictures on those. And there was no social media. There was no Facebook anything like that, no Snapchat. Um, so it's really only since the late nineties, like 2000 on that people have really had this both blessing and curse.

Of having global reach in the palm of their hand. And so you say we undervalue things, right? And part of that I think really comes from that comparison. Yep. I agree. Because we fill our brains with this [00:43:00] constant feed of how everybody's doing better than we are. And I think it cheapens the stuff that actually really matters.

Right. You were saying, you know, making a thousand dollars versus just getting it through the week. I've lived both those lives. Joking about some of the jobs we've had. I've lived both those lives. I've had those weeks where it's like, and I, and I wish I could say they were hugely far apart from, you know, between decades of me living, but I've had weeks where it's just like, I got through the end of the week.

I was like, thank God I'm done. It's over. I survived. We'll, we'll regroup this weekend and start again next week. Right. And I've had other weeks where it's like. Uh, I didn't make mirror as much as I should have this week. What's going on? Right. And that was the stressor. And those, those moments aren't really far apart.

Those moments are [00:44:00] honestly paycheck to paycheck for most people, bro. They're not, listen, I'll be honest. I've lived both of those two weeks. You just described in the same month. I live both of them in the same period of time, man. So I, and you're right. And the social media piece is it's rough, man, because what social media is, has done, especially as of late is inundate us with what we should value.

And so it's telling us we should value these certain things. And so when I look at all these things that social media is putting out front that I should value. And then I look at what's in my backpack, and I don't have none of those things. Now all of a sudden, life is terrible for me, right? But then I have a whole bunch of other things now that I'm ignoring that are phenomenal [00:45:00] because I'm comparing what's in my bag to what's been held up as being the standard that you should be grateful for.

And nothing else matters at that point. And you're right, a lot of people... Are living their lives according to that rubric and it's, it is just disintegrating their gratitude. I'll give you guys a real life example of this because, you know, we try and be completely transparent here on the show. So I actually, I told you I've been trying to go back to work.

I actually took a job for a couple months. And ended up leaving that job, not because it's a horrible job I had. It was a good company. It was stuff I could believe in. Like it was, the problem was the time constraints, the lifestyle with it was an average, I worked 70 to 72 hours a week. Now I have officially been working for, I did the math the other day, 27 years.

Um, you [00:46:00] you're a little bit older than I am. I started working. And have been working since I was 16 years old every day, since I was 16 years old, my first year working a job, I worked Christmas day because I was a ranch hand and cattle. Don't stop eating just for Christmas. Right? Exactly. Right. So I've been working for 27 years and I worked a lot of years of 50, 60, 70 hour weeks to get to where I made enough money in my profession that I could work a 40 hour week.

And that was it, right? That was a huge, like, I felt like such an accomplishment when I hit that point in my life of, I actually made a decent enough living that I could work 40 hours a week and pay my bills without having to work 50, 60, 70 hours a week. But I'm at a point in my life with two younger children that a lot of the guys I worked with were all younger twenties and they're a great group of guys.

I got nothing but good thing to say about my co workers and the company [00:47:00] itself. Um, great group of guys, but most of them don't have families. Only two of them have kids. Or three of them have kids and two of those three have their kids. Part of the time, the only guy who's got his kids full time besides me has been doing it for so many years.

It's the lifestyle. His family's used to. And so it's, and he's also works way at the company. So he has a little more leeway in his time than I did, but it's like, okay, well, I'm missing out on my children's lives now and for me, right. Gratitude centers around my family in a big way. They, they are the thing I am most grateful for in my world.

Nothing, nothing is bigger. It's God and family. And honestly, like, I'm not going to lie. God, sometimes on that list. Hey, I hear, I understand. Right. [00:48:00] Um, and so not having that time and missing things they were doing was just, it was too much for me. So I had to go look for something else. Right now, was that ideal for our financial situation?

Probably not. I mean, we. You know, don't have the finances for me to not be working, but right. It was that prior, that priority shift in that perspective of what is valuable. And for me, what is valuable is being there to put those girls to bed every night and being, I was watching it. The moment that broke my heart, I was watching my daughter's soccer game on FaceTime.

Well, I was waiting for an appointment with the client to start 140 miles from home. I had not actually seen her play a single game because I was on the road working and I'm watching [00:49:00] via FaceTime waiting for an appointment that may or may not pan out. And it just, it broke my heart. I was like, no, no, I fought way too long to get here.

So right. I'm grateful at the moment while we, our money situation has not gotten better. I'm grateful that I'm there to put them to bed. Yeah. I'm grateful to be able to do songs and prayers in person instead of over the phone because that's something we do every night, right? One of the things that helps me with my gratitude is I'm a really big believer in everything has a season, right?

Uh, not, not even just like, I know there's like a Bible scripture that goes with that as well, but just after. 40 years of life. I know that everything happens in waves, right? Everything has a season. So things will [00:50:00] change right now. Money's a little tight. Things are a little rough and it's hard to be grateful sometimes when those bills are coming in.

We're heading towards the holidays, right? This is the silly season when people spend a lot of money. Exactly. And I got none, but I've got my girls, I've got my wife and that's the world to me. So I take a lot of comfort. One of the ways that helps me. Stay with a more gratitude focus is remembering that it's a season, not like a, you know, winter or spring, fall, but it's a season, right?

I've had really great years where we're doing really well financially and I was making good money and I didn't worry about things like this. So that helps me with my gratitude sometimes is remembering is like, okay, this will pass, right? We're going through a season right now, we'll get through it. And I really believe that [00:51:00] has definitely helped me, uh, as I've focused the last couple of years on trying to live more practical as far as my gratitude, like just stay focused, no matter what's going on, like, okay, well, God, you know what?

I'm grateful. I got through today. And I got through it with my family. Yep. And you speak to something that's really important and it's prior, what you prioritize and often what you prioritize is going to color the way you look at things from a, from a gratitude. You talked about being in a job. But sitting, waiting for a client, watching your daughter play on, on FaceTime, you're like, wait a minute, this, nah, they're my priority.

So if they're [00:52:00] my priority, it's going to be a little, I'm not gonna say it's easy, but at least you, because it's a priority, when you look at your priorities, you can then say, okay, you know what, I'm grateful for that. I'm grateful for family. That's a priority of mine. So I'm grateful for that. And does it make, does it cushion all the other things, you know, not necessarily, but it does at least help you to refocus when you need to.

And I think that's important for, for us to, to think about is that like nobody's, we're not asking anybody. To just be flipping about the stuff that's not going right in your life, right? I only know one person and if it used to, not, not used to, it frustrates me still to this day there. I only know one person who it does not matter [00:53:00] what is going on in life is going to say something positive and that's my mom.

And it used to bother me because I'm like, okay, you're not paying attention to what, like, I would like, I'd tell her, Hey, listen, you know, this and this and this and this is happening. This ain't happening. This is, you know, I'd be complaining to her and she would say something that would just make me angry.

I'm like, did you hear anything I just said? She's like, well, the Lord will provide. Were you listening? You know, like, you had those moments where like, were you listening to me? You know, and, and everybody can't do that. Like everybody, and I think that even takes time. Cause if, if I ask her, and if she's really honest with me, she's in her eighties now, she wasn't born that way, right?

Just like we talked about it earlier, you know, there's some level of learning that takes place too to get to that point. So we're not asking you flippant about what's going on in your life that you don't like, [00:54:00] but at the same time We still have to be intentional about one standing up the things we prioritize So what is important to you and I'm almost willing to bet that as you begin to Outline the things that are important to you.

You'll be able to find things that align to the to those priorities grateful for For example, family and kids and, you know, my grandson and the fact that my wife is still in my corner, even through the ups and downs. And there's so many things that because those people are my priority, there's so many things I can point to that I'm grateful for just within that vein of thing that I, that I prioritize.

And so that's important. I like that you said that that's all that I just said just now, I was kind of just preaching to me for a second, because that what you said is a great reminder in [00:55:00] terms of what you prioritize guys, we've been sitting here talking a little bit just about gratitude and appreciation when it's difficult and some of the things that kind of get us through and why it seems to be a struggle for a lot of us in the next part of the show, we're going to dive into some practices that you can implement in your life.

To help you build up that daily gratitude and that perspective, just some ideas. And not all of them are going to be perfect for you, but it's like anything else. Right? You pick and choose what you think you want to try and what will work for you. Oliver and I will share some of the things that we practice as well as just some general ideas of other people.

We know we're going to go to our sponsor and we'll be right back from where from all of them are. So how well do you sleep at night? Do you toss and turn and wake up more tired than when you went to bed? Sleep is commonly one of the critical elements people fall short on in their life. The quality of sleep you get directly affects your ability to control your weight, your ability to add muscle, your stress levels, [00:56:00] and your everyday job and life performance.

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Now let's go on to the show guys. Welcome back. In the last part of the show, we were talking about gratitude and appreciation when it's tough, because we all go through those seasons. But with us heading into this holiday season and especially right here before Thanksgiving on a day when we're supposed to focus on gratitude, I really wanted to spend some time talking about practical application, uh, inserting daily practices of gratitude in your life.

Because as we alluded to at the beginning of the show, it is a actual practice to do this, to work it into your life every single day. So Oliver and I are going to share some of our insights with you as [00:57:00] far as. Things that help us to practice our gratitude more often because we're not perfect at it, but we're certainly trying to live that in our lives.

I know I've had a lot of positive changes to my life since I've focused more on gratitude. I think Oliver will say the same thing. So we're going to offer you guys some possibilities, some suggestions for you to try to look at, see what works best for you. Because I promise once you start practicing gratitude on a regular basis, on a daily process, it will have nothing but positive benefits for your life.

Now Oliver, is there anything that you are trying since I know you've been on this journey lately? Is there anything that you are trying to implement in your life to make it more of a daily practice? Yeah, and, and we, we touched on it earlier and I'm, as I'm, as I'm talking about it, I'm trying to look, look it up right now.

But being, we talked about it when we talked about the kids and how you said you have to remind your kids to say thank you and to say please, [00:58:00] right? For me, I am, uh, working on being intentional about actually articulating my gratitude. And so what, what I did was I wrote out. A list of things and, and I'm looking for that list right now, but I wrote out a list of things and it basically in that list talks about all of the things that I'm grateful for, whether it be family or the fact that God will never leave me or forsaken, or he's not done with me or, and there's several things on the list, but what, and, and here I'm not perfect, let's be clear, I don't get, I don't say it every day, like the goal really is, But quite often, I'll sit here often at this desk that I'm sitting at right now and open that up and actually say them out loud.

And for me, just the, I don't know, [00:59:00] the cognitive experience of saying that out loud and then hearing it and then it being put into my mind and me visualizing it with my eyes and reading it, all of that motor skills that are involved in that tends to help redirect my, Thought process, my emotions, uh, redirect me psychologically into thinking a certain way.

And typically, I try to do that in the beginning of the day to kind of set the tone for the day. Now, there are times where I, I may sit here, things aren't working out, I feel like the world is crashing down, and it might be the middle of the day, I might pull that list out again. And then I have some other things too, um, you can't see off cameras.

I have stuff up on the walls. That I can, you know, look at and just kind of redirect my thoughts from a visual perspective. So that's something that I do. That's one thing that I do in terms of just trying to be intentional about. Articulating it, saying it out loud. [01:00:00] Okay. I, I tend to, one of the things I pride you daily, and I'm glad we're very clear about that here on the fallible man.

We are not perfect. We not at all, not at all, not at all. One of the ways I actually try and start my day is, uh, I, I am a believer. And so I try and start with prayer, right? But one of the things I'm very conscientious of when I'm praying is I start my prayer, just saying, thank you. Right. I go through and that's you're saying you articulate the things out loud.

That's where I articulate the things is. Before I don't ask God for things like my first prayer of the day, I don't ask God for things. I don't ask God to take care of sick friends or anything. Right? My first prayer of the day. I just start going down the list of everything I'm grateful for. And you don't [01:01:00] have to be a believer.

You don't have to pray. You can do it the way Oliver is talking about doing it. But that's exactly how I cry and start. And for me, it's in the shower. I know that's not a pretty picture for anybody who's seen me, but that's, that's, that's in the shower is I'll turn the shower on and I'll sit there and just pray and I'm articulating out loud.

You know, thank you for another day. Thank you for getting me through the night. Thank you for good sleep last night. Thank you for crappy sleep last night. Uh, because we got to appreciate the good and the bad, right? There's there's a reason it worked, you know, thank you for my daughters. Thank you for my wife, right?

I'm not and I go deeper than that. I don't want the general. Thank you for my daughters, right? But I thank God for what's going on in their lives. I thank God for what's going on with my wife and our relationship and That's where I articulate those things. So I do it in prayer you do [01:02:00] it out loud But that's where I think just starting that day and I think that's a big key to it for me is before the day has chance to set on.

Okay, guys, let me encourage you have a cell phone and technology dead time in the morning when you first get up. Don't immediately pick up your phone and start checking email or social media that will just destroy your day. Like there's actually proven psychological research on this already. 30 minutes to an hour every morning without touching your phone best, best start to the day.

Um, because there's so much negativity and all that, but starting that day, I know my day goes better when I start the day with gratitude and focusing on all of the blessings, all the wonderful things, all the things I appreciate. Right? I don't have a fancy house. I don't have a big, fancy, nice house or anything like that.

I'm not one of those YouTubers who [01:03:00] has the mansion or anything. YouTube has not found money wise for me. And so I have an 80 year old house that's beat up. I got things falling apart. I'm working on all the time, but I'm grateful. There's a roof over my head. I'm grateful. I told you before we started reeling that, you know, we've been sub freezing temperatures on and off for the last month already.

So I'm grateful that I have a warm place for my kids to lay their head, right? There are people who don't have it. So I think starting with that idea right at the beginning of my day really has a huge impact. On my perspective for the rest of the day, when I start that way, you ever been into journaling or your grad two journaler?

So I'm not a, I'm not a big journaler. Um, I journal in sporadic, right. Um, I'm doing more jotting things down the older I get, but it, but [01:04:00] it is sporadic, but I. I will say this though, that when I do put things down, I noticed that the way I process whatever that thing is that I'm writing about is different than if I just sit here and spin it around in my head.

I have noticed that. I had a digital one for a while, like I've never been good at like actually writing on journals. I've had so many of my guests over the years talk about, you know, Oh, journaling is so powerful. I'll try and I'll make it for like two days. I'm that way too. It's very sporadic. But I actually had a gratitude journal app on my phone for a while.

Okay. Um, I think it was back when I was on the Android instead of an iPhone. I'm sure there's one for iPhone, but literally it was just an app. And every night before I started winding down for the night, I went in there and I listed three things I was grateful for that day, right? Just a, just a [01:05:00] running list.

So I had to end my day thinking about gratitude because yeah, I'm, I'm a technology nerd, so I love paper and pen. I actually like to write stuff, but. My handwriting is atrocious, and if I ever want to go back and read it, it doesn't. Um, my, my nine year old has better penmanship than I do. They, they tease me about it.

But we also, like, that practice of gratitude before bed, that was one of the things we've been trying to do with our girls for a while. We've kind of broken that cycle, and I need to get back into it with them. Was one of the things I was asked them every night before they went to bed was what's one thing that somebody did for you today?

What's one thing that you did for somebody today? And what's one thing you're grateful for? Nice, and that was the wind down questions before songs and prayers, right? Sometimes after songs prayers as I was putting them in bed To make sure that their head went to a very positive spot before they went to sleep.[01:06:00]

Yeah, that's good Right. So they weren't thinking about whatever movie we just watched our right day, their last thoughts were, Oh, so and so did this for me. And I did this and Oh, you know, actually getting that processing in their head before they went to, they slept better as kids. They slept better.

That's good. You're saying you listen. I hope that folk are. Take a note of this because you're, you're talking about really being intentional around the way of, uh, in, in the psychology behind it, right? Because starting your day out, setting the tone for your day. Is important. End year is important. And so you, you capping that starting with prayer ending with, you know, sometimes a gratitude journal or the songs and prayers and the, and the thought questions, you know, around what you're grateful for and what did you do for [01:07:00] somebody, what you're essentially doing now is setting.

A emotional and psychological tone for how you process your day. Now, does that mean the day is going to be phenomenal? It might not be phenomenal, but it's almost like you're setting yourself up for whatever happens during the day, right? So it's just like, okay, it's, it's, it's like taking an umbrella when you leave the house because it might rain, you're setting yourself up for whatever the day brings.

And I think that that's, I think that's phenomenal. I think that's very important. To do that. I also something I am learning to do is cherish the time that I get to spend. We talked about prioritizing, right? And you talked about family being a priority, you know, we're, we're big in that area as well.

Enjoying the time that we get to spend. [01:08:00] And because again, using myself as a, an example, there will be times where I'm hanging out with my family physically. But my head a million miles away, how are we going to do this? How are we going to be that? Oh, this person, man, this thing just fell through. Oh, I just looked at this email and that, right?

I was a million miles away. One thing I'm learning to do now is be in the moment. If I'm playing with my grandson, if we were on the round on the floor, like everything is right with the world in those moments, right? And that also helps to set the tone for how I approach whatever may come after, because there's, it's very difficult for me to just completely switch from the exuberance of rolling around on the floor with him.

to be in anger, [01:09:00] right? It's just tough to it's not a light switch. You just can't do it. I can't have time with him rolling around on the floor and then all of a sudden be angry, you know, so I take some of that from a psychological standpoint into whatever I have to come down here and do as well. So you know what's what's a really easy one.

Right. And we, and we touched on it earlier. I said, I'm very intentional about, you know, making sure my kids say please and thank you. Right. How often, like I told you, my kid called me out on how often as adults, how we stopped doing that. So to practice gratitude in your day, your life, be intentional about saying thank you at every opportunity, whether that's the barista you're getting your coffee from, or the coworker who grabbed whatever you printed off the, off the group printer and dropped it at your desk on the way by.

I mean, that, that's a little thing we don't even think about. Right. I don't know everybody who's got a mailroom, but I've had coworkers like pick [01:10:00] up something. I, I was in the middle of doing something. I printed something, totally forgot. I printed it. They walked by, dropped it on my desk. Like, Hey, I found this on the printer.

I was like, Oh, thank you. Right. Be intentional about using the term. Thank you. Actually physically expressing your gratitude or verbally expressing your gratitude whenever you have the opportunity. When the cashier gives you your change back. They're getting, they're just getting your attention back.

Right. They should. That's how it works. Say, thank you. When they greet you at the door, say, thank you. Right. It seems like a really little thing, but a lot of us as adults got out of this habit. And, and I know like everybody listening, their mom was like. Say, please. And thank you at some point in your childhood, your mom had told you to say, thank you, your daddy told you to say, thank you.

And somehow along the way, we just got out of that habit. We got out of that habit. Now we talked about [01:11:00] writing things down, right? So one of the first, the first Thanksgiving episode I ever did, uh, was with my friend, Sean, who's pastor. And Sean and his wife had this practice in their house. I never heard of anybody doing it.

It's very cool. And they took like a roll of butcher paper and they rolled out a floor to ceiling height piece of butcher paper. And put it on a blank wall in their kitchen and throughout the year, they would just walk by and write things they were grateful for on it. That's awesome. Instead of like actively journaling or having this little note, they wanted to see it and remember it.

So they actually put it by the back door into the garage. They walked in and out to get to their car all the time in the kitchen in a major room for their house. And him and his wife would just walk by, they kept markers by it, and they would write things they were grateful for. I like that. And when they filled that one up, they would tear off another one.

They keep that roll. And [01:12:00] at the end of the year, around Christmas time, they'd pull out all the rolls. For the year and just go back through them together as a couple. That's awesome. Sean, wherever you are, I might have to borrow that one. That's a really cool idea. That's a cool idea. Another one I've seen is a gratitude jar.

Have you heard of this idea? Yep. I've heard of that. Yep. Right. I've never, I've thought about implementing that, but I just don't have a place where I'm comfortable setting a big jar in my house. Um, I, I know my house with their, there are five of us here. My mom lives with us. There are five of us in what's essentially a three bedroom home.

So like there's, there's no extra space, but I love, I've seen that at people's homes where they have just a jar and they have papers by it and they write down things they're grateful for and throw it down and when they're having a bad day. Or when things seem rough, pull out those, they pull them out and read attitudes that [01:13:00] they've written down.

Right. So you don't have to like journal. You don't have to put it in your phone, right? There are, there are some really creative ways if you're trying to put something in your life. One of the things that if you've ever read James Clear, Atomic Habits is you'll find one of the big secrets to adding a new habit to your life, right?

We're talking about gratitude being a habit is to make it simple. And make it easy to get to right approachable, easy to reach, easy to do. That's one of the reasons I like Sean's idea of writing things on this big banner. If you have to sit down and dig into your phone, some of us at the end of the day are playing on our phones.

Other people are just like, I don't even want to see my phone past a certain time. Right. We know blue lights, not good for going to sleep, but having a place where it's easy and it's visible to you, you are visually [01:14:00] reminded. Makes it easier to ingrain new habit. I agree. So if gratitude is something you want to like start implementing in your life, if you want to be more focused on having more gratitude in your life, find simple things that are right there present in front of you, make it approachable.

Uh, he uses the example of the book about putting a pull up bar. Like one of those doorframe pull up bars in every time you walk by the door doing like two pull ups until he got stronger to do three pull ups and you do three ups, right? Because he wanted to incorporate more. One of the guys, one of the stories he tells in the book, it's the same idea, right?

If you want to practice gratitude as more of an action in your life, then you have to make it simple and you have to make it very present. In the middle of your life, right? You put it in the middle. Um, my friend Jerry was telling me [01:15:00] he read another book similar to the atomic habits and the guy was talking about the 22nd rule because he was trying to replace the habit of watching TV with reading more books.

Okay. We put like three books on this coffee table. He was reading. He put the batteries for his remote control in one room, the control in another room and the back panel for the control in another room, because if he came in and wanted to sit down and watch television, the books were right there in front of him, but he knew he had to get back up off the couch, the three different rooms and put it all back together and moved in the rooms like his family had permission to move it.

So we had to go in the rooms and look for these pieces for it. Right, right. So it took a minimum of 20 to 30 seconds. For him to go find that remote, put it together and turn on the television. And so for him, it became easy because I'm already on my butt on the couch and the book's right here, right? Let me go ahead and do it.

Yeah. It was that application and making it simple. [01:16:00] Um, that's good. I, I, I like, I like that. Make it simple. I love the quote that you used, 'cause the quote that you used, likened it to, uh, working out. Mm-Hmm. and like working out. If you want to see results, you have to be consistent. Also, like working out, probably gonna be a little bit tougher on day one than it is on day 101.

Right. And so. Just, just understanding that, Hey, this is a process. And in order for you to see results, you're going to have to be consistent. You're going to have to keep it simple as in a workout, right? On day one, we're not lifting. You know, 850 pounds because that's what we're not capable. We don't have the capacity to do that on day one.

So, same thing applies, right? If you're, if you're trying to create this pattern of [01:17:00] gratitude, like you said, making it simple, accessible, easy to grasp, being consistent with it, and understanding that the beginning of this may not look as wonderful as when you get a little bit further down the road. And so that, that's, that's important.

And here's a surprise bonus. For your relationships, whatever relationships, expressing gratitude regularly to the relationships you have.

How often do the people who have a regular relationship, whether you, whether that's a friend or a romantic relationship, spouse, your kids actually hear gratitude from your lips and in your actions to them, uh, we have a local Christian radio station that has, uh, I think it's, I think it's November. It's a random acts of kindness, November.

And it's [01:18:00] things like, Hey, pay, pay for the order for the person behind you. Now that can be a load of gun guys. Cause, uh, there's people who were like six cups of coffee at the drive thru. So don't be behind the guy who's getting coffee or in front of the guy who's getting coffee for his business or his company.

Cause that's right. But I've had this happen to me once, right? Just randomly someone paid for my meal. I was going through a drive thru and. While it made them feel good to do this, right? And I don't, I don't know who did it. But it made me reflect.

It's like, wow, that was just generous. Right? Like that brightened my day. And for a moment, there was just gratitude. It's like, wow, they didn't have to do that. Right. That's first, it [01:19:00] was a little weird. Then it was like. That was very cool, right? So you can pry random acts of kindness and it doesn't have to be total strangers.

I'm a big fan of those. Yeah, I like that. I like the random acts of kindness. I also like for, and this may not work for everybody, but some people will get into this. Gamify it. Really make it a point to not let anything get by. Like even the smallest things, right? So. You, you, uh, I don't know you, you, you come in, it's wet outside and you go into the store and you kind of slide a little bit, but you don't really fall like, Oh, man, I'm so grateful.

I didn't just fall and bust my head open just now. Just little things like gamifying, exactly. Just anything that you think, because here's the thing. There's often things going back to what we were saying in the beginning. [01:20:00] There's often things that we kind of dismiss and I don't even think sometimes we do it intentionally.

It's just, it slips by us because it's just not as prominent as maybe whatever the other things are that we're going through. But if you look back throughout your day, like, Oh yeah, you know what? I, um, I, I almost dropped this glass today and, or I dropped the glass and it didn't break, man. I'm grateful for that.

Cause that would have been a problem, right? You know, just little things. And as you kind of get. Because you're talking about right, keeping it simple, practical, something that you can grasp as you just get used to thinking that way. You could be eating a habit that allows you to think that way. So now you incorporate the small things and the big things.

Guys, we've got to land this planes. Cause it's going to EPSA is going to get really long. I have to put a timer on with, with Oliver cause him and I can go forever. We were on the phone for [01:21:00] almost three hours the other day. So I got to put a timer on when I do these with him, because we just have a lot of fun working together.

Now I know all of you are just dying to know the answer. So here's your Thanksgiving trivia. All right, let's see how we what percentage of Americans eating turkey are eating turkey for Thanksgiving. You guessed at 76 percent the answer is 86 percent Mmm, I am NOT part of that 86%. There is no turkey in my household.

Okay I worked on a live dock at a Turkey plant. Long story ending is I haven't been able to eat Turkey since. Yeah, trust me, you don't even have to tell me the story, just the fact that you worked there. I get it. , I get it. The Macy's Day Thanksgiving parade route. You guessed it's a mile and a half Answer is it is two and a half miles long.

Two and a half miles. Okay. I can even tell you the maximum blue size because I was looking things up for the show is uh, 70 feet. Hmm. And [01:22:00] Macy's Thanksgiving parade. Now, if you guys don't know what we're talking about, cause I'm asking about the Macy's day parade. You guessed it was started in 1934.

Congratulations. It actually started in 1934. Nice. I got one. You guys are not familiar with the Macy's Thanksgiving day parade. Like I said, I wasn't even sure they were still doing it honestly. Cause I just haven't had like, uh, cable television or something like that in years. So I remember as a kid getting up and growing up and watching it every Thanksgiving, I didn't know they still did it.

But if you guys don't know what we're talking about, turn on the Thanksgiving day parade happens every year. It's. Phenomenal. It's one of the biggest parades of the year. At least gigantic balloons and shows. It's very cool. They cover it really well. It used to be a major part of my Thanksgiving. So, you know, you guys go and check that out.

Oliver, if people want to find you, where's the best place to find you? People want to find me. If you're a social media person to handle is Denali LLC. D [01:23:00] E N. It's my wife's first three, that's my wife's name. Denise O L I. First three letters of my name, LLC Denali LLC is a handle on all social media. Um, and then Denali.

org www. denali. org is the website. Please come check us out, shoot us a message. We love to meet new people and have great conversations. So check us out guys. And if you're looking for great relationship insights and advice, uh, seriously, go, go check them out. Okay. 22 years. And Oliver's channel, him and Denise have great, great stuff that we still look at and enjoy that adds value to our marriage at 22 years, we know that part of marriage and part of the healthy relationship is continual work and they are a great source for that.

So go check that out. And see what he's got going on over there. And guys, as we wrap up the special Thanksgiving episode of the Fallible [01:24:00] Man Podcast, I hope our talk with Oliver has given you some good ideas about being more thankful every day, even when things are tough, because I know that everybody has struggles and this part of the year is hard for a lot of people.

Remember being grateful doesn't mean ignoring problems. It means finding strength in them, even when it's difficult. Let's aim to make gratitude a habit every day and it can change how we see things. So take a moment today, write down three things you're thankful for. After you listen to this show, no matter how small it, they, they don't have to be like earth shattering things, guys, there's a lot to be grateful for.

In your life and share them with someone else. Let's keep this grateful feeling going on. Not just during the holidays, but every day, have a happy Thanksgiving. Thanks for listening. And let's keep gratitude in our lives for Oliver, for myself. Better tomorrow because of what you do today. We'll see you on the next one.

This has been the Fallible Man Podcast. Your [01:25:00] home for everything, man, husband, and father. Be sure to subscribe so you don't miss a show. Head over to www.thefallibleman.com for more content and get your own Ible man here.