If you're like me, you've learned that.
Grit, tenacity, and persistence are the cornerstones of success.
And they are. But what if I told you that there's an equally important, though often overlooked, strength?
It's a skill that doesn't shout quite.
As loudly as perseverance, but requires just as much courage, wisdom, and, yes, grit. Today, we'll explore how recognizing when to quit can lead us to a more.
Fulfilling path, sometimes even accelerating our journey towards those very goals we're so passionately chasing.
I'm Joe. My pal over there is Kurt, and we are dudes in progress.
Hello, Kurt.
Hey, Joe.
What's going on, my friend?
Why are you laughing?
I'm laughing because you play music in the background that kind of get us going, right? You know, you hear the. We hear the opening music, and I can't hear the music on my side. We're using your system here to record, and I can't hear the music on my side. So to let me know. To let me know, uh, the music was over. There was this overly dramatic point, like, you're a music director or a producer working the board. Okay, Joe, it's your turn.
You know, it's so funny is I've been doing this ten years now, podcasting. Coming up. I think Monday or Tuesday is my.
Ten year anniversary, my podcast that I started. And I can't tell you how many.
Problems I've been having lately. I am experimenting with different things, which is a good thing.
But I have no idea why my rodecaster pro won't play my music off my computer to you and this platform.
It is odd, isn't it?
I don't even know where to start.
But anyways, just anyone who's starting a podcast, just know.
Even us experienced podcasters come across interesting dilemmas all the time.
I see the frustrations you're going through, Kurt. I'm watching you kind of go through these new technical issues that you didn't experience before, and sometimes I think you're.
Just going to quit.
Sometimes you just got a fisher cut bait, dude.
Quitting is an interesting subject, right? Grit, tenacity, and persistence. We always talk about those things as the cornerstones of success. The. The foundation to getting things done is, as our friend David Allen says, sometimes you got to know when it's time.
To throw in the towel.
And sometimes you have to know that it's.
It's honorable to do that. In fact, many times, the most productive.
Thing you can do, the most beneficial thing you can do for you, for your life, for your business is know when to quit. They don't say quit anymore.
Do you know what word they use now?
Pivot.
Yeah, we're going to pivot.
That's a better, yeah, because who wants to be a quitter?
I don't want to be a quitter.
Right?
I don't like to quit at all.
I'm pretty tenacious. We're just pivoting and that's good. I like the, I like the mindset shift, and we'll talk a little bit about the mindset shift and understanding the.
Stigma a little bit behind quitting.
And we'll, we'll just have an open conversation like we typically do. We have some notes here, but we'll see where that takes us.
But I do have to ask you.
Have you ever had a time in your life when quitting seemed like the.
Best option or maybe the right thing for you to do?
Yeah.
And I think of career things, and maybe you and I have talked about this.
There's a couple really key points in my career where I quit, and they're hard, especially when you're comfortable with something.
I worked for a company for twelve and a half years out of college.
Knew so many people, so many relationships.
I met my wife through this company, lots of great friends. But the career part was not going in the direction that I wanted it to.
And I was starting to get frustrated. But I had a couple of headhunters contact me at a time when the.
Technology I was working with was getting pretty popular in the early two thousands.
And at first I said, no, I'm.
Going to keep going.
I'm not going to quit where I'm at. I'm going to continue.
Sometimes it's better to stay where you.
Are and just improve the situation.
I've always had that feeling too, because starting over can be difficult.
It's scary. And it ended up being Joe, the best move, for sure.
There's so many reasons why it was the best move.
It was scary and it was a.
Difficult thing for me to do. My kids were young, so first of.
All, I got a 25% increase in my pay. And also I was there for a month and I always wanted to go.
To a conference, a technical conference, and.
There was one very famous called Lotus Fear down at Disney World. And they asked in a meeting if.
There was anyone who would like to go because they had an extra ticket. First month I was there.
Interesting.
Which started my family trips down to.
Disney World and the beginning of my podcast and all those. So many things that started out of that. I got a sign on bonus.
Well, it was a stay on bonus.
That's what it was. The technology. And things were so hot in the.
Early two thousands when they had that year 2000 problem. I got a bonus, like, in the.
Spring of that year. I never got any bonuses when I was at the other company.
And to add all that together and.
The thing I was doing exactly what I wanted to do. The team I worked with was the.
Best team I ever worked with.
The first three years there was just amazing. It was, like I said, the best group of people. Great manager, my favorite manager of all time.
And to add all that to six months after I left my company, the team I was working with was asked.
To join the hire the company that owned us and go move to Charlotte, North Carolina.
I never would have moved when the kids. I mean, how many I could just.
Go on, you know, on and on. What a great move it was.
And it was a tough, tough move.
And you know what made the change for me, which was interesting. I was so scared to do this.
Change because of the technology.
I would have been sort of alone.
I felt, too, but. And I would have been a lead.
Person in the technology.
I said to my wife, I don't.
Know what to do.
They.
This is the offer. She goes, ask them for 10,000 more.
I went, you know what?
That's what I'm going to do. And you know what?
They said?
Yes.
Awesome.
So now, okay, I guess I'm.
I guess I'm leaving.
I quit.
I know I've not talked about this.
On this show, uh, but I'm pretty.
Sure you and I have talked about it in the past, Kurt.
Uh, in my twenties, I owned a bar, like, you know, a bar and grill where you go and get drinks and eat. Right, right.
Have we talked about that before?
Yes.
I know this.
Okay, so a lot of detail, but.
I remember us well.
I won't go into all the gory details here, but. But the idea was I provided the.
Funding, and a friend of mine, a.
Very good friend at the time, he.
Was to provide sweat equity, and his.
Job was to manage the bar and take care of things, and and I would oversee, you know, some of the numbers and the processes that we're using.
And some of the marketing, but we.
Would be equal partners. I feel like we had a pretty solid plan. A solid, as solid of a plan is somebody in their early twenties can come up with. Right, for a bar.
My gosh, from day one, I realized, man, I don't belong in this business.
Really.
Everything from employees stealing you blind to dealing with a liquor license. And he wasn't coming through on his end of the deal. We had to deal with entertainment and.
Bands and all that stuff, right?
We had all this stuff that.
A lot of moving parts.
And we provided breakfast because of a contract that we had with a local.
Hotel for breakfast for their.
And I bought. I bought into that. I knew that. I knew from. From the previous owner. I knew that that was a part of the package, but we had to.
Provide that and set up food contracts and.
And delivery and all this other stuff.
The money, just the.
Even though we had a really good.
Clientele and we were busy, the margins were terrible, just terrible.
We just weren't making any money.
And then I put a little more.
Money into it, and I'd put a little more money into it.
And I realized after six months that.
Despite this dream of owning this bar and grill and building this. This brand and having a nice little.
Neighborhood pub and maybe a two or three as we grew, it's not for me. And it was a real ego boost.
When I bought the bar.
And it was a real ego hit when I realized, I can't do this.
Wow.
And I've never lost so much money in such a short period of time.
In my life, even to now.
Is it because you thought going to.
A bar and enjoying yourself was the same as owning the bar?
That's funny that you say that, because that was a part of it. I had such a. Such a happy emotional connection to this bar because it was a bar that I went to and it was a bar that I frequented at the time. There was such a happy connection. I thought, how could this possibly fail?
Look how happy people are here, you know?
But there's so. There was so much more to it.
And I had to.
Quite honestly, there were some humbling thoughts that I had to or some humbling realizations.
Number one, I didn't have enough.
I wasn't.
I don't want to say I wasn't smart enough at the time, but I just didn't have what it took to.
To run this bar. There was too much going on in my life. And I'll just say this.
I. I didn't have the wisdom and.
Experience that I needed to have. And I realized that. I said, man, I'm just not smart enough to do this. I don't have the wisdom and experience to do that. Isn't it funny that I had the wisdom to know that I didn't have the wisdom?
That's true. And I'm guessing you never worked at a restaurant or bar before either, I.
Bet I worked at a restaurant, but not at this level. I worked. I was a server at a restaurant. I knew how to take care of people. I knew hospitality.
Right.
Cause I'd worked as a teenager both.
As a server in a restaurant and a hotel, so I knew about hospitality.
It was just a big disaster.
A huge disaster. And I remember saying, I'm done.
I remember that moment.
I was sitting in my little apartment on the east side of Cincinnati, and.
I thought, this is over.
I'm in over my head.
Way in over my head.
Right.
I quit the dream.
I quit the process. I didn't necessarily have to quit the. The friendship that I had with the. This, because he was part of the problem, quite honestly.
You didn't have to have that conversation.
He fell in love with being a bar owner.
Right. Yeah. The.
The title of bar owner, not actually doing the work.
Right.
So he loved, you know, hey, drinks are on me and that kind of thing, you know?
Yeah.
And you didn't have the bar rescue guy from tv to say, sure, needed that.
And did you sell it all right.
I wanted to take you to get.
You did. Okay.
But it was a definite quit. It was a hard quit. It wasn't even a phase out.
I shut the doors that day.
Yeah. That's good. Yeah.
I think entrepreneurship is definitely one of those things.
You don't know what you're getting yourself into all the way until you're doing it.
There's a stigma around quitting. The traditional narratives often paint quitting as. As failure or lack of perseverance or lack of grit. But if. If there's strategic thought behind it and you.
And you quit strategically, it can be.
A real positive step towards aligning more closely with your values and goals and your. In fact, your own personal well being.
Yeah.
And unless you quit sometimes you can't discover those things.
You can't discover what's really important to.
You and what your. What your true values are in life and what you want for your own personal well being because you're caught up in this mess. Right? You're caught up in this. In this situation that you don't want to be and you don't know how to get out of because your ego's in the way. You're worried about your reputation.
You're worried about even maybe income or.
A complete change in the way you do life, you're worried about all those things.
But sometimes quitting, if you're. If you're able to set aside all of that ego and all of that worry.
Quitting can be that huge step towards, like I said, aligning yourself closely with your own values and whatever goals you might have and even taking care of yourself better.
But I don't want to deny the benefits and honor of, of those, of.
Those things like grit and tenacity and persistence and perseverance, because those are all very important. Yeah, we have, we have to give.
Them their appropriate position in their appropriate.
Place, but we have to think about.
When is it time to quit.
It's a fine line.
It can be. I mean, some things are easier than others.
Some you, you really decide really quickly. I was thinking your, your, whatever success means to you is always a jagged edge.
I mean, you go in one direction and you may, in your case, maybe it took a little longer to figure out that was the wrong direction.
I can remember I was interviewing for.
Sales jobs because my degree was in marketing. And when your degree is in marketing.
From college, one of the first things.
You'Re going to probably learn is you.
May be applying for sales jobs. And I can remember going through very far into an interview process, getting down.
To very close to the edge. They did a lot of personality tests.
And they finally said they didn't think I was sales material.
And I agreed.
I even did, even later on, I.
Can remember when home delivery of food.
Was coming out, frozen foods, I think it was at the time. I went on sales calls into people's.
Homes and I think I did that maybe one day.
This is not for me. I am not cut out.
It was a horrible in home meeting. And I went, yeah, forget this.
Right?
I even did insurance sales. I know you did some of that.
I went into one of those sales programs, or at least I interviewed for it.
And again, it was a hard no. Pretty quick.
Yeah.
When I think back, I have quit a lot. I've tried of a lot and I've quit a lot.
Right.
If, if you're not doing the same thing that you did when you're in.
Your twenties, then you've quit something. Right?
For sure.
Either you quit or you were forced to quit, whatever it might be. But I've quit a lot because I've.
Tried a lot of things. I mean, when I think about my.
Entrepreneurial experience, there was the, I was a bar owner.
I owned an insurance agency. I owned a group of coupon magazines and display ad magazines that mailed on the east side of Cincinnati.
Cincinnati, man, I've done, I swung the.
Bat out a lot of things.
Right.
And so I've had to quit a lot of things, too. But that gave me.
But quitting gave me the experience and the knowledge and the. The personal. The personal reflection that I needed to.
Put me off into another direction.
Yeah.
And without taking a step back and.
Saying, should I be doing this and.
Be willing to take the risk. Interesting, the way of putting it right.
Take the risk of quitting, because we.
Always look at it in the inverse. Right. We always think that it's risky to take a. To go do something different.
It's also a risk to quit because of the.
The unknown, what's a lot, what's on that other side. But there are certainly. There are certainly some signs that we have knowing when it's time to quit. When is it time to quit?
I have four things here that I.
That I talk.
That.
That I'd like to talk about when it's time to quit. Misalignment with.
With core values diminishing returns, opportunity cost.
An impact on well being. And when I think about every time.
That I've quit all four of these.
I checked all four of these boxes. Didn't even know I was checking these.
Boxes, but I was checking all four of these boxes.
So let's talk about misalignment with core values.
Cardiff, if a pursuit that you're on.
If something that you're looking towards is fundamentally at odds with your core values.
And principles, it's time to reconsider.
Yeah.
And I would say if you're being.
Trained as a salesperson, they're asking you to be less than truthful. I might have a problem.
I'm a salesperson.
I know.
You can be a salesperson and still be honest.
I am one.
There you go.
But you could be interviewing for a.
Position where you notice the culture is not truthful, or.
They lie and cheat to get ahead.
I would have a problem with that.
Yeah, I do, too. But I want to be careful to. To say that it doesn't necessarily have.
To be something immoral.
Somebody have.
Can have different core values and principles, and both are highly moral core values and principles. It's just not yours. You know, you're. You may. You may have. Have some principles about interacting with people at a certain. Certain level of intimacy, or you may have a principle, a core value of entering somebody's space.
Right.
And so when you're trying to sell.
Meat off the back of a truck and you have to go into their.
House and you're in their space and.
They'Re in your space, and there's a certain level of intimacy that you're not comfortable with. That's not necessarily bad one way or the other, but it's against your core values and principles. It made you uncomfortable. It's at odds with who you are.
Yeah.
And sometimes we don't know that. You know, some.
Some things we go into, and it's clearly illegal.
Right. You know, if somebody comes to you with a drug running opportunity, that's clearly illegal. Right.
Can you drive this truck? What's in it?
Right.
And when you start to feel that core voice, that. That. That still voice inside of you that.
Is telling you, I'm not sure I'm comfortable with this.
Right.
You should probably listen to that.
There's also benefit to grit and tenacity and person and perseverance and. And reflecting on that and saying, is this something I really. Is this a lesson I need to learn? Is this a skill that I need to have?
If it is, push through? Right.
Be tenacious. But if it's going against your core values and principles and you start to recognize that as time goes and you're.
Just uncomfortable with it, that's.
That's a red flag.
Yeah.
I think one of the ones for me is, am I enjoying doing this.
Thing that I'm going to be doing.
Especially when it comes to career wise?
And a little.
Another little example that I was tenacious at, and I didn't quit right away, which is a good thing, was when.
I was learning the Microsoft sharepoint technology.
I went to this training, but it.
Was more advanced than I was ready for. I mean, I was coming in from.
Pretty much square one, and I looked at this training.
It was paid for by my company.
I spent two days, at least, in this training, and I was really not.
Feeling comfortable with it right away.
But fortunately, I continued, and I found.
A path in that technology that was right for me.
It's really a broad technology, too. And so I was able to find a place that I felt really comfortable in, but I.
Because I was tenacious about it and stuck with it.
I didn't quit after that one bad example or experience.
And I think, you know, when something is misaligned with your core values, I think you know that. I think, you know, deep down. And I also think, you know, pretty quickly, uh, in. In the experience, like, again, your meat selling experience, that probably went against something that you were very uncomfortable with and was part of your core values, and you may not even be able to.
Identify those core values immediately, but when.
You reflect on it, you could probably.
Say, yeah, that went against my.
That went against my core values rejection.
I don't like rejection. Joe, you know that sales can. You gotta be comfortable with being rejected a lot, I think.
Yeah, there's a mindset to it. There's a mindset to understanding what rejection.
Is and what you're, what's being rejected.
That you're not personally being rejected unless you're, of course, trying to, you know.
Sell yourself, you know, and that's probably.
Illegal, but you're not personally being rejected. You know, there's a, there's timing and there's situations and there's mindset on the other person. So that rejection thing is kind of overblown.
I'm not willing to learn.
In sales. People think they're being personally rejected, and they're hardly ever, ever being personally.
Yeah, I get that.
Yeah. Yeah.
There's also the idea of diminishing returns.
That's when you realize that your efforts.
Are no longer moving closer to who you want to be on the, on the broad scale of life. You find yourself in this job or in this career or in this relationship, because there's lots of things that we.
Can quit, and this is very similar.
This dovetails very well into our discussion about saying no. When I think about saying no, I.
Think about saying no in instances and.
Opportunities and things like that. Something that is being brought to you. Right, right. When you quit, it's something that you're already engaged in and involved in and that you have to say, I'm done with this. But when you're in this situation and you're facing diminishing returns, meaning your efforts no longer move you closer to what your goals are, and you're no longer seeing any real benefit to your life. A lot of times, that's income, income wise, I mean, I've met a lot of salespeople who are just not good salespeople if they don't have it in.
Them, but they have this idea about.
Being persistent in tenacious, this kind of lie that we've been sold, that persistence and tenacity are the, are the end all be all, right, great. The end all be all. And you got, if you don't have that, you've got nothing. And that's a lie that we've, we've bought into. As important as those things are, tenacity and personal perseverance and persistence, it's a lie that we've bought into that. It's the end all, be all. And you see this a lot in sales. I'm glad you brought up sales, because somebody can be just not a very good salesperson. It's just, there's something, there's an it factor that they're missing. There's something there that's, that's their miss that they're missing. But they continue to do it. They continue to do it. And I'm like, and a lot of, a lot of sales are commissioned sales, which means if you don't sell, you don't make money.
Right.
I've seen people nearly starve.
And it's.
Not bringing you closer to what you want in life. And you have to recognize that and you have to have that conversation with.
Yourself to say, I wanted this to work out so badly, it's. But it's just not. It's time to quit this.
I'm just not getting the returns that I need from this. And that can be a wide and varied. Right. It can be income, it can be relationship, it can be whatever it might be.
Yeah.
My example of that, as you're explaining this, reminds me of my first trial in my twenties into the entrepreneurial space, which was Amway. I probably never took, we never had a conversation.
Of course I got involved with Amway.
Yeah. Early on.
My uncle, my uncle was the one.
Who brought it to me, and he.
Had a good friend that they were aligned with.
And I really enjoyed the people, I.
Enjoyed all the meetings and the entrepreneurial spirit of it all. And I did believe in the platform at the time. But in trying, I mean, trying again, the rejection piece and also reaching out.
To friends was uncomfortable.
But also, I think what really, when.
You talk about the diminishing return, I.
Lost faith that other people would ever.
Say yes to this.
Like, it just inherently turned people off for a lot of, there was a lot of reasons why, but I didn't think I could get over that no matter what I did.
Yeah, I have a couple friends.
One of them, I'll just name him right here. His name is Rick Haggar, who is extremely successful in multilevel marketing or network marketing. Now, he's been with probably a dozen different companies. Right.
Okay.
He's kind of done it over and over and over again, but extremely successful in multi level marketing. And I know a couple other people, but Rick is a great guy. I've known him for a long time and we connect every once in a while. But I agree with you on the whole idea of multi level marketing. There are diminishing returns, and that's a perfect example of when it's time to quit.
Right.
Man, I keep buying this. I keep buying this product or I keep making my list of friends and, and I'm just not getting any kind of traction. I'm putting 12 hours a day into this. I'm, I'm having weekend and evening parties or whatever it might be. I mean, list, list the types of companies. I mean, there's Mary Kay and Avon and Amway and all the, all the nutritional type of companies that all kind of have the same basic platform.
And I've seen people go absolutely broke.
I've seen people honestly nearly lose their.
Relationships, their marriage because of not realizing.
That they're, that they, that their returns are diminished and they're not, they don't recognize that it's time to quit.
Wow. Yeah. Yeah.
That's a good example.
But I don't want to. I don't want to, I don't want to necessarily degrade multi level marketing or network marketing because it has worked very well for some people, but sometimes the.
Math for the people on the lower levels just doesn't work.
Yeah. Yeah.
So there's diminishing returns, and then we have to think about opportunity cost.
If we, if we're still, if we're, if we're engaged in something that have.
Diminishing returns and doesn't meet our core values and it's not moving us forward in life, what else could we be.
Doing that would move us closer to.
The values that we want or the things that we want or the life that we want?
What are we missing out on now?
I don't believe in using the fear of missing out on everything. Fomo. Right. For everything.
But there are those opportunity costs that we're missing.
So if we're engaged in some activity, and we could. We've talked a lot about business here, but this can apply to many things. Like I said, it can, it can reply to relationships, it can apply to hobbies you're engaged in.
It could apply to an investment you're making. There comes a time to quit.
Part of the signs when it's time to quit is the opportunity cost. What activities are you missing out on.
By participating in this thing that's not giving you what you need?
Yeah, that's a great one, because you.
Could be doing something that aligns better that you enjoy more. That's definitely, it's the reason why you want to quit, because whatever you focus on takes up a lot of your time and you want to get the.
Most productivity out of your time. You want to be doing what you enjoy the most.
I think that's been a value I've.
Had my whole life.
I've felt that way. And I've preached it to my kids.
Do something you enjoy doing or don't do it.
Right.
There is that. There is that saying, if you love what you're doing, you'll never work a.
Day in your life.
I love that.
I love that philosophy.
I don't know who said it, but.
I love them for saying it.
Yeah. Sounds like a Henry Ford thing.
Yeah.
But you do have to think about the opportunity cost. What are you. By banging your head against the wall on this thing?
That's.
That is misaligned with your values, and you have diminishing returns.
What are you missing out on by.
Continuing to participate in this thing? And how much time value are you losing? What is the opportunity cost? Time and energy. Those things that you're missing out on will outweigh the potential benefits of this thing that you continue to participate in. Sometimes by looking at the opportunity cost.
You know, its time to quit.
I love looking back on this, Joe.
And use my original example of the.
Career change I made. The reason I left was I was.
Doing 50% of my time as project.
Management and 50% of my time of.
Application development, and I wanted to move in that application development space. And I hated all the project management.
Administrative work is what it was to me. It was non productive.
It just.
I was frustrated with it.
Boy, I remember looking back a few.
Months after doing the change and going.
I am so glad I made this change.
I was so grateful I was doing what I wanted to do with a great team. Even though it was kind of risky.
I was scared to do it.
But I end up making some really good pals and great working relationships that.
I've enjoyed to this day.
The next thing, and probably the most.
Important thing to look at the signs when it's time to quit is your. The impact on your well being. If whatever you're doing, whatever you're pursuing.
Is harming you physically, emotionally, or mentally.
You got to consider quitting, because it's not only hurting you emotionally and mentally, especially, it's hurting those around you. For sure, it's hurting those closest to you.
But even if it's not, if it's.
Hurting you, it's time to consider quitting.
Yeah, I think.
And my gosh, if all four. If you've checked all four of these.
Box boxes, get out.
Get out as soon as possible.
If it's misaligned with your core values and you.
You.
You're experiencing diminishing returns, and you realize that you could be doing something different and get a better return on your.
On your time or energy and your.
Physical, emotional and mental health is being impacted. I don't know what to tell you.
If you don't know, it's time to quit.
Or we could use the Monty Python quote, run away. Run away.
Yes, yes.
But it's difficult.
Quitting is difficult, Kurt, for sure. It is for me, because I pride myself, and I think you do, too.
In a certain level of tenacity.
For sure.
Certain level of stick to it ness.
Yeah, I pride myself in that. So when it's time to quit, boy, that's a bruise to my ego.
But if you take a step back and you look at these four things and you're checking off these boxes, and if it's misaligned with your core values and you're experiencing diminishing returns, and you can see that there's other opportunities out there that you're losing out on, and it's impacting your health and your physical.
Emotional well being, it's time to quit.
I like having those.
You gave me a couple of things. I like the word pivot to it emotionally.
Helps me to make that change.
But I like having these checkboxes to decide and feel good about it because.
I'm not a quitter.
Quit.
I'm not a quitter.
Not a quitter. I'm a. I can pivot, right?
Yeah, that's right.
We're going to talk here in a second, very quickly, about how to quit strategically.
And using the word pivot is important. And I don't know of a better word than pivot.
So let's talk a little bit about how to quit strategically. First of all, you got to reflect on your.
Why?
Why are you doing this? Understand your motivations for quitting and understand these four. These four criteria for quitting or these checkboxes or these signs, and make sure.
That you are quitting for the right reasons.
Reflect on your why?
Why are you quitting?
Understand why you're quitting and be able.
To articulate it be able to articulate.
It to those around you, those closest to you, the people who you lean on for wisdom, the people who rely.
On you for support.
Because if there are people relying on.
You and you're quitting a job, especially.
You really have to give some thought.
Behind that for you.
You have to give some thought behind that. If you have a family and you're.
Quitting a job, there may be time.
To quit a job, even though you're. You're going into the great unknown because of. Because of those things that we talked about. But you really have to reflect on your why, because what you're doing is you're building your. You're building your foundation, you're building your argument, you're building your. Your table that will support the reasons that you're quitting.
So reflect on your why and change.
Your mindset about quitting. This is where the word pivot comes into. Quitting is not necessarily an end, but.
It'S indeed a pivot to new opportunities, new opportunities for learning and development and.
Moving your life forward.
I would view quitting as a proactive.
Activity, kind of an adaptation to the ever changing landscape of life, Kurt. And to move yourself forward. But you got to switch that mindset from.
From, oh, I'm not being.
I'm not being tenacious enough. I'm not. I don't have enough grit.
You have.
You have all of those things, but.
All you're doing is you're taking those.
Things and you're pivoting them to another opportunity.
Yeah. I think having a close friend like you, the relationship you and I have, we've.
I had these conversations on Saturdays.
I think our spouses are tremendously helpful in this. Like you mentioned, if it's, you know, an income you guys are relying on. But having that conversation, I don't know.
If I joked about it, but I.
Said, hey, I'm concerned about making this change.
She goes, well, ask them for 10,000 more. You know what?
I'm gonna do that.
I like that idea.
Let's see what happens.
I can live with that. If they say yes, I'm going. If they say no, I stay where I am.
If you quit, that doesn't mean you.
Have forsaken your grit, tenacity, and persistence. Right. And it doesn't mean that you've given up on those things or you no longer have those things. All you're doing is you're taking your grit and tenacity, and you're moving it in a different direction.
It does mean, too, you can always.
Go back to that place you worked once before.
Very good point.
If you didn't burn any bridges.
No, I have some experience with that. But also, you got to plan your next steps. Right.
Yeah.
I mean, reflect on your. Why change your mindset a little bit so you can get over the idea of quitting, but you got to make a plan. You got to say, okay, what is your very next action? And sometimes you can only go as far as you can see, and when you get there, you'll see further. Love that phrase. But that's so true. But you got to plan your next step, a couple steps.
You just can't go blindly into whatever.
The great unknown is after you quit.
Yeah, it's good to have a plan. I've never wanted to quit a job before I had another job.
Yeah, there's a value there, too.
There is a value there. Now, I know people who, who had.
To quit immediately because they were like.
On their last thread of sanity.
Yes.
And it really was part of that whole impact on well being portion that we talked about earlier.
Yeah, I can see that.
Where they have just. They've waited, frankly, they've waited too long.
Right.
They've waited too long to make this pivot. They've waited too long to quit, and now they're in a position where if they stay 1 second longer, they may literally lose their mind.
I had someone in that first job we worked in customer service. I can remember one very dramatic moment.
Where someone just walked out, screamed, yelled, had a moment in front of everyone and never came back.
Yeah. Yeah.
And I'll bet you that person, there were two things going on with that person.
I'll bet you that. That what they were doing was misaligned.
With their core values, for sure. Right.
Yeah.
And, and because of that, it was.
Having an impact on their well being.
Yeah.
It was a stressful state, a lot.
Of stress in that job and.
Yeah.
That can be, I think, of people.
That work long hours, too many hours. I mean that again, against my core values to help me raise my family.
I'm not going to miss, I know you have the same.
I'm not going to miss one of my kids ball games because somebody needs something at work.
You got to plan your next step. If you're, if you've, if you've reflected on the why and you understand your motivations, you, you've kind of switched your mindset to understand you're not quitting now.
You've planned your next step.
But before, as you go through all.
Of those, make sure you seek feedback.
Talk to the people that you respect. Don't go into this with isolation. Don't go into this by yourself. Bounce your ideas and bounce your thoughts off somebody that you respect, somebody that you admire, somebody that you, that will, has your best interest in, heart, that doesn't have ego invested in your failure. They have ego invested in your success. Find those people in your life that you can really talk to.
And as you quit, seek feedback. Seek wisdom from them.
Yeah.
It'll make you feel a lot better.
About the decision, too, again, make even better choices. Help you sort things out. It's always collaboration with someone else that you trust is always huge.
Absolutely.
So when is it time to quit, Kurt?
It's time to quit when it's when.
You'Re misaligned with your core values, when you have diminishing returns, when you realize that there are other opportunities out there that you could be participating in that would give, that were more aligned with who you are. And if it has an impact on.
Your well being, if you've checked all four of those boxes, it's a clear time to pivot. It's a clear time to quit.
Once you go into the quitting phase, reflect on why you're quitting. Reflect on the reasons that you've come to this decision, and that just helps you build up your. Build your case internally and build your case for those that are closest to you and those who are impacted by your pivot and talking about pivotal change your mindset. Realize that you are still a person of grit and determination and perseverance, and you're taking those. Those qualities and pivoting them to another, into another direction.
But as you go into that another direction, clearly plan your next steps. Put your plan together.
And once you have all this together, seek wisdom from somebody that loves you, somebody that has your best interest in mind.
And I think you'll find quitting or pivoting to be one of the best decisions you could make in your life.
Great advice, Joe.
Another Joe ism.
Yeah.
Let's wrap up right there.
Awesome job.
Fair enough.
Yes.
Great.
I'm more comfortable.
I gotta think of something to quit now. You got me thinking. Should I quit something right now?
Yeah.
We'll report back next week on what we quit.
Right?
You got a win for the week.
I did more work on my bathroom renovation.
I did some large amount of wall patching.
I ripped out a bunch of two.
By fours that were part of a closet that they built back in the.
Seventies for my laundry room.
I ripped that all out, and I.
Got it about 90% done.
I'm doing it this weekend and gonna have that finished probably in the next.
Few days, so I'm excited to. And we're getting really close to laying the floor.
Awesome.
Congratulations.
Our pal Clay said that, man, you're.
You're becoming quite the handyman.
I didn't disagree with him. I've got a little bit of confidence there now.
Absolutely.
I've got YouTube to help me.
My win for the week is I finally went to an orthopedist for my shoulder. I don't know if I told you about my shoulder or not, Curtis?
I don't think so.
I dinged my shoulder somehow, and it's been like this for about two months. I don't know. It's not. Somehow, that was not the right way to put it. I know how I did it, but it's embarrassing how I did it. I was reaching around to put my seatbelt on with my left hand, so I'm kind of crooking it back, right? Kind of hand back. And my. In my seat was further up than it normally was, so I had to push a little harder to grab, to grab my seatbelt with my left hand. So imagine. Imagine you're holding your.
Your.
Your left hand up with your.
With your hand pointing straight up and then pushing your shoulder back.
Yeah.
If you can. If you can get that visual.
Right?
Very awkward movement.
And I pushed it, and I felt this little zing in my shoulder, and I thought, ah, man, that hurt.
Yeah.
Oh, man, that hurt bad, right?
Wow. Did that hurt? And. But I thought it'd be okay in a couple days, but a couple days go by, and it still hurt. Goes by, and it still hurt, and a month goes by, and it still hurt. So I went to my doctor, actually, and he kind of gave me some exercises that didn't do any good, and he referred me to an orthopedist. I guess that's the right way, an orthopedic doctor.
And I find.
And I was putting it off and putting it off and putting it off, and I finally went to the orthopedist this week to work on my shoulder, and there is indeed, he. He suspects a small tear in my.
Rotator cuff, whatever that tendon is there.
Yes.
And, uh, if.
If nothing else, there's like a. I forget the word that he used for.
It, but it just stretched or pulled or abraised somehow.
I don't know. I can't remember the word that he used, but it's a problem. I mean, it hurts. It doesn't keep me up at night, doesn't keep me from doing the things I need to do. Part of that is just me being stoic about it, and.
And part of it is it's not a full blown, full blown injury. But I did need to go to.
The orthopedist for this and start up my pt yesterday.
Okay.
Good luck with that. Like, yeah, the reason I call that a win for.
Oh, the reason I call that a win is because I didn't want to do it, and I was putting it all.
I understand.
I just didn't want to go through the process. I didn't want to. I didn't want to. I just didn't want to go, go do that. It was inconvenient. It was irritating. It was frustrating. I, you know, part of it is kind of feel like you're getting old because you tweaked it putting a seatbelt on.
And.
But I finally had to give in. So I'm going to call that my win for the week. I finally went to the orthopedist for my shoulder.
How about your resource for the week?
I think you're going to like mine, Joe. I hope it doesn't consume the rest of your Easter weekend. But I. When I have a hard time thinking of what I'm going to give for.
This segment, I go to a website called lifehacker.com. And the very featured article there was, there's a new king of chatbots, and it's not chat GPT.
No kidding?
Yes. In reading the article, there's a couple things there.
One is that there's this website that's called Chatbot arena, and you put in your prompt and it'll respond with two.
AI responses from different websites or AI engines.
And the one that's beating chat GPT is one called Claude three.
Opus.
Opus. Okay.
All right.
So you'll have to check out this website.
And I did put in a prompt.
I, I just found it this morning. I've only put in one prompt, and I was just. But I haven't really compared it at all. So there's, but there's two things there.
That chat GPT is not the only game in town anymore. Check out chatbot arena and you can compare the different ones and see if you enjoy some artificial intelligence from someone other than chat GBT.
I will definitely give it a shot.
I'm going to have to consciously and intentionally not do it this weekend. I'm gonna have to set a timer. I mean, I'm gonna have to go back to my old, my old resource or hack to my, my trusty little, my trusty little timer here and say, okay, I'll set that timer for three days. And because I'm the type of guy that might even take a vacation day to mess with something like this.
Oh, yeah, sorry about that. I realized that when I found this resource.
So I will, I will definitely check that out. But that's what, what I like about.
This resource, this AI world is really growing, and it's not stagnant, and there's.
Going to be, there's going to be changes in innovation. And we have to, we have to accept these changes and these innovations and, and if there's something better than chat GPT, you know, I'll change my usage over to, to whatever that is.
If it's Claude three, then okay. I'm okay with that.
Yeah.
We just talked about quitting, didn't we?
Yeah.
You can use different ones for different purposes. You never know.
Or try both.
Sure.
Definitely, definitely.
What's your resource?
Hackers?
I have an interesting resource.
All right, now hear me out on this. My resource is Nashville, Tennessee.
Okay?
The reason I say that is, and.
It'S a resource for me, and it's a resource for many, many people. Nashville, Tennessee is about a three and.
A half, four hour drive from Cincinnati.
And I went there this past week for a trade show for my work and to meet with some customers and to do that trade show thing.
And I love Nashville.
I've been there many, many times, and.
I'm so impressed with, with what Nashville.
Has to offer now.
Everybody thinks about Nashville as the mecca of country music, and it is.
And it is.
There are people in Nashville, Tennessee, that.
Are singing on the street corner with their guitar open and that are better.
Than any singer, any other singers you're going to find anywhere else in the nation, right? But they're down there just trying to make their way.
So the whole country music scene is amazing in Nashville, Tennessee.
I mean, when you go down Broadway and you see the neon lights and you see the excitement and all this stuff that was going on, it's really.
A neat experience, and it's a great little getaway.
And it's not. I was staying in downtown Nashville, and it's not terribly expensive to stay in downtown Nashville.
For me, it wasn't.
But also, there's a lot to do.
In Nashville that's really interesting.
They have a, they have a full scale replica of the original Parthenon in Athens.
It's.
And it's a neat place to see. The zoo is fantastic. They have the Opryland Hotel, which is this great, neat hotel, even if you're not staying there. It's this huge hotel that almost has its own atmosphere inside it. It's that big. Nashville's just a neat place to go. And I know it's weird to say Nashville, Tennessee, as a resource, but if you want a quick little weekend getaway with lots to do and you like country music and you like interesting things, try Nashville, Tennessee.
It's really a cool place. If you need a quick little getaway.
There'S a lot to do. That you can do in a short period of time and a long weekend in Nashville, Tennessee.
I love it. I love music. I think it doesn't have to be just country music. There's lots of great music and I'm.
Sure everywhere you go there's a fun.
I love live music.
Yep, me too.
I'm all about it.
You have a quote for us?
I do have a quote. Let go of certainty.
The opposite isn't uncertainty.
It's openness, curiosity and unwillingness to embrace.
Paradox rather than choose upsides.
The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves.
Exactly as we are but never stop.
Trying to learn and grow.
Tony Schwartz.
I don't know who Tony Schwartz is, but there's great wisdom in his words.
I don't know Tony Schwartz either, but.
I like that, man.
I like that.
Misses Schwartz is really well into our discussion.
Yeah.
Schwartz, Schwartz and Schwartz.
He's part of the legal team.
Three Stooges.
Whoever, whoever, whoever Tony Schwartz is. He's a wise man because, I mean, you do have to let go of certainty, right?
Yeah.
If you want to grow. And this really dove, dove, doves tale perfectly into our conversation about quitting, about pivoting.
The opposite isn't uncertainty, it's openness. I love that.
That's about the whole mindset change. It's openness, curiosity and willingness to embrace paradox. I love that, man.
Good quote.
Mine comes from none other, none other than Albert Einstein.
And I don't know if this is attributed to Albert Einstein.
I'm not sure it really came from.
Albert Einstein, but we'll just, we'll give.
It to him anyway. Now keep in mind our conversation about.
Quitting as I, as I give you this quote from Albert Einstein, and we've all heard this hundreds of times, but.
It'S appropriate for this moment.
Now, insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Yes, I love that quote.
Yes, I've heard that many times.
How true it is, man. Now we know that that's not the clinical definition of insanity, but I understand his, the spirit of what he's saying.
Yeah.
Sometimes we beat our head or our head against the wall because it feels so good when we stop.
And when we do something over and over again and expect different results, we're.
Going to drive ourselves crazy and it's going to be painful and it's going to be irritating and frustrating.
So stop it.
Quit.
Quit doing that thing that doesn't move your life in the right direction.
Yeah.
If you're knocking on a door, no one's answering stop knocking on the door. Go knock on another door.
Oh, that's beautiful, man.
Right?
Stop knocking on the door if nobody's answering. And that's a, that's a courtesan right there. I don't know if you made that up on the.
No. Beautiful, dude.
Yeah, I think I heard that somewhere.
And I think the time has come to quit this show. To quit this episode.
Great show, Joe.
Let's quit right there.
Our website is dudesinprogress.com dot. Dudesinprogress.com dot. If you want to email us, you can email us@dudesinprogress.com. That's dudesinprogress.com. And as we go into this beautiful Easter weekend. Happy Easter, everybody. You're probably listening to this either late Saturday or on Easter day itself. Remember, you may have to quit. And if you're quitting the right way and for the right reasons, you're making progress. And progress is better than perfection. So let's keep moving forward.
I love it. I gotta do some more quitting. I'm inspired to do more quitting, Joe. I'll start next week.
Yeah, try to quit something this week, buddy. Talk to you soon.
I'll blame it on.