The Best of Motivational Business Stories with Michael Bayer, Bobby Maximus, William King Hollis, and Cody Byrns

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 You're listening to the Rodcast, a top 25 worldwide business podcast.
 If it's radical, we cover it.
 Here's your host, Ryan Ulford.
 We're getting fit today, folks.
 I'm joined by Bobby Maximus, fitness expert, author, speaker.
 Just a badass, badass dude.
 What's up, Bobby?
 How are you doing today?
 I'm great, man.
 We really appreciate you joining us.
 You've got a lot of your men's health.
 You write for right, speak.
 Do you do a lot of things that are out there, and everybody can find.
 We'll tell everybody where to find you here as we roll into the podcast.
 Yes, so I always joke that I'm a seven year old with a credit card.
 And I say that because I'm basically living a dream come true.
 If you would have asked me 20 years ago if I would be doing what I am now,
 I would have told you it's not possible.
 But through a series of fortunate events, I guess.
 And the way the world's unfolded, frankly, like Instagram's helped me a lot.
 Facebook has helped me a lot.
 You know, got to give a shout out to my space back in the day.
 Helped me a lot.
 Like, build a platform to where I am now.
 I grew up in a very blue collar environment.
 My dad drove a train for a living.
 My mom was a nurse in a small town.
 lived in a town of what 1800 people grew up very humbly.
 You know, we didn't have a lot.
 And I was bullied fairly heavily until I was 15, 16 years old.
 It culminated for me in an incident where four kids beat me up and broke my collarbone.
 And it left me kind of scared and feeling helpless.
 Anyway, when that collarbone broke, something snapped inside me.
 I didn't want that to happen anymore.
 Started trying out for sports teams could not make the basketball team.
 Could not make the football team.
 Could not make the soccer team.
 I couldn't skate.
 Couldn't play hockey.
 But the wrestling team didn't have cuts.
 So I started wrestling.
 Exercise really changed my life.
 Without exercise, I wouldn't be where I am.
 Maybe I can help people through exercise.
 And earlier on, I talked about liking my space in Instagram.
 It was kind of the dawn of that social media
 internet website world where now you weren't just a trainer in a small little box working for
 80 bucks an hour.
 You could actually reach a lot of people.
 It was the experiences I had fighting.
 The psychological battles, the wins, the losses, the failures, the successes
 that set the table for me helping other people right now.
 So it was that really good on the job training for what I do now.
 I don't think fighting's unique or special.
 Because you got to understand as a fighter, we're desensitized to that.
 Like you might look at a fight is throwing punches and stuff.
 Me, I'd look at throwing a punch like someone would look at
 kicking a soccer ball or sticking handling hockey.
 More scientifically, if you will, or strategically.
 It's part of what you have to do.
 But I don't average person understands the pressure of what a professional athlete is under.
 You know, a lot of body weight type things and you right have spoken about that.
 I mean, is that part of the foundation of simplicity of what you can get done
 without a lot of complex machines?
 You know, the reality is the pandemic really helped me cement that.
 Because all of a sudden there were a bunch of people that had to figure out how to work out at
 home and they didn't have a gym anymore.
 You know, for a while, I was aiming to more of the people that had access to all the equipment
 stuff and when the pandemic hit, it was, you know, for me, like here, I've been doing all this
 body weight stuff my whole life. This is a perfect time to show people what's up with it.
 I do see that you incorporate a lot of mindset stuff, you know, because it seems,
 and I think that's really smart and I think that's the bigger challenge with people is the
 mental challenge as much as the physical. I mean, we think we try to over complicate things,
 but a lot of it's up here, right?
 100%. The mindset is everything. And to give me an example of what I just talked about with
 simplifying things, if all you did was work out twice a day every day, you treated it like
 brushing your teeth. That's what I call it. You brush your teeth twice a day, sometimes three
 times a day. You should work out two or three times a day. It's just self-care.
 If you woke up and just did randomize stuff in the morning for an hour, it actually went
 in at heart and did that at night, you'd be one of the fittest people on a planet. That's just a fact.
 The physical part of doing that is not actually difficult. It's just showing up and doing it.
 But the mental aspect of showing up every single day twice a day for my case 27 years,
 that's what crushes normal people. And that's why they're not successful.
 They don't have the mental willpower, the capacity, the obsession, the self-love,
 to even begin to understand what that looks like.
 Is it just some people that are never going to get over that hurdle? Or do you feel like
 in the coaching that you do and working with people and what you see, can anyone change?
 Or are we truly some of us just completely screwed out of a hundred people?
 There are ten who just do the right thing all the time. It's probably actually less than ten.
 It's probably one or two, but just are wired for success. And they want to be excellent in every
 area of their lives. Then on the other hand, you probably have ten or twenty people
 that will never accomplish anything, and they are beyond help.
 Then there's a whole bunch of people in the middle, and they can go either way,
 depending who they're exposed to, who they're around, what hand life deals with them.
 I think they can be influenced by a multitude of factors. There's no supplement
 for bad food, shitty work ethic, or a lack of sleep. If those things are not in place,
 supplements are not for you. You need to get that through your head.
 The reality is supplements may help you, the number depending on the day you ask me changes,
 but it might help you 1%, it might help you 2%, it might help you 5%,
 provided those other things are in order. So I just got to make that clear.
 Don't think you're just going to go to the first form website, or you're going to go to whoever
 else you're going to go to, and you're just going to buy a bunch of stuff, and magically you're
 going to wake up looking like Dwayne Johnson. That's just not going to happen.
 For you, the business of training, online training, the marketing of your business,
 I'd love to get some insight, you know, how it has changed that, how it's opened things up,
 and what does your business look like?
 That only ate broccoli and chicken breast, and just worked out like a machine all day.
 And it's interesting with social media, because different people, some people do better on Twitter,
 some people do better on Instagram, some people do better on Facebook. I'm an Instagram guy.
 I love Instagram, and it works best for me. I do email, probably about once a week. I have an email
 base website, and then the whole thing with marketing. And I'll say this is bluntly as possible.
 The best marketing on the planet is to just become as famous as
 just back. Here I am putting out all this content. It's great stuff. I'm writing for men's health.
 I'm doing emails. I teach seminars, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I have a fair size following
 if I could become a movie star. Oh my god, I would have 30 million followers.
 You turn that attention into scalable businesses and different things that leverage the audience.
 Build the audience, and then you build the business. Bobby, what's the future hole for your brother?
 What are some of your goals? I mean, what's down the path for you?
 There was a time that I would have been hesitant to say this. I think because of self-confidence,
 I want to be famous. And I don't know how I'm going to get there. I don't know if that's
 getting into the WWE. I don't know if that's getting into movies. I actually just filmed a movie.
 I don't know if it's like being on the men's health cover and working more. But I want to help
 as many people as I can. Because I really think that if I didn't found exercise,
 I wouldn't be here today. No one would know who I am. And I've seen it change my life,
 but I've also worked with people that exercise and some self-care, some self-love,
 some sports psychology work has improved people's lives from top to bottom. And to help the people
 that I want to help, I need to build an engine. I have that attitude because I have failed.
 There has been so many times in my life. I thought, this is the thing. I've finally got it.
 And I've fallen flat on my face and it's failed. And it hasn't. So to be decided.
 Yeah. Well, every failure is a learning lesson, right? If you treat it that way.
 Be ready to be transformed, my friends. We've got Mike Bayer on the show today. Two-time,
 New York Times, bestselling author, transformational coach, founder of cast centers. What's up,
 brother? Welcome to the show. Hey, man. I'm feeling pretty rad today.
 Hey, you got to. You're on the rad cast. I kind of avoided for, and I still avoid the title of a,
 you know, celebrity life coach, life coach. I've been tried and to call myself everything under
 the sun. And then when he tries too hard, you end up with these titles that don't even make sense
 anyways, but we'll get into that. But I grew up in Orange County, California. I'm the youngest of
 three. I was very driven towards basketball. I never did well in school. I got held back twice.
 And I had dreams that I was going to play, you know, college basketball. And I don't know. One day
 get married. And I guess I have kids and go to Disney World in Orlando. And then the American dream.
 Yeah, I take that trip to Hawaii once a year. But for me, I, for whatever reason, just wasn't
 that into women. And I thought that eventually, as we get older, we suddenly get really attracted
 to the opposite sex. And I didn't even know what being gay was or anything like that. I literally
 knew that of the village people and the TV show or at the time there was RuPaul. And I was both
 of those two existences. I wasn't that bonded with. And so I just thought I was weird. I thought
 it was very weird. And, you know, so I overcompensated with, you know, going with the homecoming queen
 to the high school dance and captain of the basketball team and vice president of the school.
 And then when I wasn't doing that, I was doing drugs. And I was doing a lot of drugs. And I love drugs.
 And I don't necessarily think because I hated myself for being gay is why I did drugs. I just
 loved getting high. A lot of people do this. Like we all know people like this that are like,
 I'm getting sober. That's the last time I'm going to drink like that. And then you see them a
 month later. And they're like, no, I'm just doing wine. I'm not doing the hard stuff. Or I'm just,
 I just quit out weed or whatever it is. And so I didn't know how to stop. And eventually at 22
 years old, I went to treatment for the final and last time. And I've been sober over 19 years. And
 started working in this profession of mental health. I've owned a treatment center for over 15
 years. And it went from me working in crises with addicts and alcoholics to eventually
 coaching and helping artists and entertainers. And it's just, it keeps unfolding.
 It sounds like you had a different experience than some people I've heard. Like you thought the
 switch was just going to come on. It didn't sound like you were necessarily running from something
 you were aware of as much as you just thought, okay, I'm going to eventually be like everybody else.
 Yeah, like I thought this is like part of the progression of like growing up.
 But it is, it is really confusing in our childhood years, you know, dictate how we operate in our
 later years, whether it's in business, whether it's having deep beliefs that get in the way of us
 thriving in our life. Unless we really go back and look at kind of what happened and connect
 some dots, we end up just creating that same fabric, but with different characters as we get older.
 Obviously starting the cast centers and the treatment centers. And I mean, was that it had to
 been fueled by your own experiences, right? For sure. Like I got sober. I was a counselor
 that I did interventions for many years. And then I wanted to create a place where in the
 psychiatric or psychological world, there's something called the D, I think it's the DSM-5 now.
 And everything is a diagnosis. Well, a big reason why there's diagnoses is to part one is so that
 people can have a roadmap potentially. So if you're labeled as, let's say, chemically dependent,
 that they can look at the different criteria and go, you are a drug addict or you're an alcoholic.
 And the same thing applies for so many different types of issues, anxiety disorders, personality
 disorders, and so forth. The other is so that insurance, you fill out on the forum and you say,
 this is their diagnosis, so that insurance will peg. What I've kind of realized was we were
 getting dictated by the insurance world. They were dictating like length of stay and how people
 could get help. So I wanted to create a program that helped people with everything from depression,
 anxiety, addiction, or they could all be on their own islands. And so that's kind of what my
 vision was when I got sober. Because the place I went, you just basically were like, yes, I'm a
 drug addict. And my life has become unmanageable. But like all the other underlying issues were kind
 of just, we're going to deal with that later. And years later, I just had to go to years of therapy.
 For addiction like that, like someone's a, it was alcohol or crystal meth or whatever it is,
 like, is it just an all or nothing thing? Like, is that why you like, you truly have to be,
 I don't know if you do even drink. I, I haven't know. So, but it's just had a trigger. Like,
 is that the problem is like, there's just no, it's all or nothing. For me, like recovery's a
 loose garment and everyone has to find their fit. And I'm very much a believer in people figuring
 out authentically for themselves. What makes sense? Some people, they went through a tough period.
 Other people, it's like, they got that personality where it's all or nothing.
 For me, it's just not worth it. And I think that for a lot of people, it can be a phase.
 But the challenge is a lot of people think it's a phase. And then they completely lose it. And so,
 I think it's really understanding for oneself, what is that line? And you know, they say in
 Sandy is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. And a lot of people
 who should not be drinking at all, keep doing it over and over again. The typical alcoholic,
 like I'll use these labels, doesn't get sober for about 25 years. So, by the time they start drinking,
 till about 25, maybe 30 years later, they don't really reach that point where they have to do much
 because maybe of health issues, you know, consequences. I do think it's interesting that it's
 just led you there. I mean, what you did all of this, it had nothing to do with who or why you
 did it for, it was more the greater good, your, you know, your influence, you've gone through it,
 you want to help others, you want to treat the whole problem, not part of the problem. But what
 what got you into call it the celebrity circuit entertainment circuit? Yeah, I never realized that I
 would have the ability to help more people by going on a big platform. I always was kind of
 like, well, why would someone want to go on television? Even though I worked with these people,
 like I understood it from music. I understood it for actors, but I kind of just didn't want to be seen.
 And I, I didn't want to speak at events. I didn't want to tension. That was never on my vision board,
 or in my like thinking of like, oh, this is that next phase. But I feel like when you keep doing
 great stuff, and you're really passionate about what you do, the bet, even better circumstances
 come into the mix when you're not trying to control it or force it. And that's just been my experience.
 It's like, you know, help someone as much as I can out of that just comes other opportunity.
 Hey, you know, you want to fix yourself if you fix others firmly believe that, you know,
 somehow that's how Dr. Phil ended up in my life. I would never have thought that's how, but
 you know, he's the number one daytime television show, and he's taking me under his wing,
 and my reach is so much bigger where I'm hoping that I'm able to do some really cool projects. And
 it doesn't have to be in Kurdistan, but it kind of forced me to realize like, no, Mike, you gotta,
 if you want to do this stuff that you're really passionate about, you have to have a little bit
 of currency, like you say. Yep. And, you know, and every growth is always starts with discomfort,
 you know, and you're right. And you didn't want the attention. You didn't want all of that.
 You wanted to do good. You wanted to do all that. But then you said, okay, well,
 tension brings opportunity, but it was, it's been
 uncomfortable pushing, you know, to grow and to make decisions and do everything that
 takes to be an entrepreneur. So what's the biggest realization you've had about yourself in this?
 Probably that I had what it takes to do it. I mean, I'm a confident guy, but you have self-doubt,
 you know, when you start something like this, and I had grand ambitions and, you know,
 we're just getting started. We got a lot of green pasture ahead.
 You know, this is what we do often when we feel like we're not very good at something,
 as we look at other people, and we compare ourselves. And it's not that we compare ourselves
 necessarily and go, God, they're so good. Sometimes I was looking at speakers and I was like,
 God, they're so cheesy. You know, like, I don't, I don't want what they have. I just don't want what
 I have. You know what I mean? And it's like, but that's a way of trying to diminish ourselves or
 not feel like we're good enough. And then suddenly you start speaking enough and then you're like, well,
 I actually kind of do like it because we were afraid. When we think we're not good at something,
 we shut down. And the reality is like, sometimes like you're saying, the discomfort is when we
 grow and that that's really that resonates with me because I it's a good reminder.
 It takes time. And I say they were building brand and building companies like
 everybody wants everything yesterday. You know, we live in such a immediate, you know,
 immediate gratification world. Yeah. And I think the the scariest thing for an entrepreneur is if
 they don't reflect and look at themselves. And you know, because I do think some people just aren't
 cut it to go lead like they're not because they don't have self-awareness. But at the same time,
 I think that you're right. Like part of the growth and part of the the pain of it all, even if
 it's a little bit is is expected. Are there a couple you talked about it like common techniques
 that you use, you know, with people in trying to get them the right mindset? I find it's really
 helpful to help someone figure out who their best self is being able to bring that part of themselves
 into every business meeting, bring that into when they're performing. I find it's a really helpful
 tool. I also like to help people figure out their anti-self, that part that gets in the way,
 the part that we can't stand about ourselves. And I find that it can help people conceptualize,
 you know, if someone is going to have a difficult conversation and they're like, I'm really worried
 about what they're going to say, well, what is what would your best self do? And nine times out of
 10, they're like, well, my best self would say ABC and D. And I'm like, there's your answer.
 It seems overly simple, but it works. It's important to get centered. Like when I say centered,
 it's important to like regulate the body and get your nervous system to to chill and to take time
 just to be in the moment. And it's again, it's simple and breathing, but we have to be reminded
 to do the most simple thing that literally allows us to just get back into the moment.
 We're talking wisdom today, my friends. We're talking motivation. We're talking to William King
 Hollis. What's up, my man? Man, what's going on? Let's ride out for man. So, man,
 motivational speaker, author of best, the best gift start from the bottom. Let's, um, King,
 let's just, let's start from the bottom, man. You know, a kid from Pontiac Michigan, man, uh,
 mother was a heroin addict. My dad was a career criminal, um, ran the streets. I bounced around
 from from house to house, um, you know, like a lot of inner city kids trying to
 understand who we are as young men trying to understand our place on this earth and what really
 matters and what don't. A lot of people don't realize going up in the inner city. You see drug,
 dealer uncle, drug dealer cousin, drug dealer brother, and everybody goes to the penitentiary
 and the only thing we remember about making money is selling drugs. So, we stepping
 in a place and it becomes a life cycle. And this doesn't matter if you black white or yellow,
 this happens in all places. I've been some places in Florida where I saw different, different
 complexity people, uh, selling more drugs than anybody. But I understand about my life and,
 and what I wanted to do for my life, I wanted to change that demographics in my community.
 I wanted to be a greater version and I realized this when a tree dies, sometimes you got to let it
 die. And this can be the family tree. Sometimes you got to let it go and you got to replant a new tree.
 You got to nurture it better. You got to love it better. You got to appreciate it better.
 So it can grow and be something that you want it to be and something that represents you. Sometimes
 people think about it and look at me. I look at the 32 year old kid from Pontiac Michigan,
 the son of a heroin addict. How is he inspired or teaching these people? How is he touching these
 people? He's not saying the most profound thing you ever heard in your life. It's not that the voices
 are instrument of God. This is when I discovered my purpose came. I went to Tony Robbins conference,
 Tony Robinson walked past the goal. He walked to the silver. He stopped at the bronze, spoke for a
 second, turned around and talked to the silver and gold. A whisper came in my head and they said,
 who speaks to the broken? Who speaks to the poor? Who speaks to the people that cannot give them
 anything but a word of inspiration saying I made it because of you. I said the only way a man
 contains this world, he must be willing to give without getting anything in return. That's
 the sacrifice a man must make to make a claim. Our duty in this lifetime is to live full and die
 empty. And you speak into these people and you talking from a place not that I'm higher than you.
 I'm talking from a place that I'm in a fight right with you. I'm chasing my dream right with you.
 And people tend to listen to people that's in the grind with them because God said will
 if you focus on the broken, I will take every pain that you ever had in your life and I will
 move it from your body and I will turn your pain into strength. A lot of people don't know when they're
 on the edge, that's when all the strength is being made. The way I look at every event when I step
 on the stage, I look at a million people standing on the legs. I got 45 minutes to talk to these
 million people on this 10,000 foot legs. I don't want one person in the room. I want the entire room.
 That's my mission. So when I go in and I speak, I bring something totally different. I study
 Earl Nightingale. I study TV Jakes. I study Les Brown. I study Jim Rose and you know what? We put all
 that all that all up in one ball. And now you got William King, Hollis. Somebody that don't need
 no pen, no pad, no sticky notes. Give me my topic. Let me feel the energy at a moment. I'm a
 deliverance speech that you never seen before. I don't care what topic you is. Let me tell you
 something. Entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs has forgotten the child that laid on the mother's lap.
 The ones that got so high, they forgot about the days of walking miles to get a pack of noodles in
 college. They forgot about the days when the dream meant something when they talked about it as a
 bar with their friends. They forgot about the essence of the dream. So now they made it to the
 top. And now they're into the inside. That's why you see suicide amongst CEOs. They lost their passion.
 They have nothing more to fight for because they forgot the first purpose to help the world.
 You'll get all the way to the top and you'll realize I never held anybody else. That's what God
 told me. Work for your purpose and not the money because your purpose will make you shine brighter
 than any individual that works for walks this earth. If you make yourself the currency, no one can
 ever stop you. Money can never buy you. Nobody can buy you because you are the currency.
 And that's what I that's what I dream to be is the currency and the person that puts his money
 where his mouth is. You seem to have embraced social media though early. I mean, YouTube, now they're
 everything else. Like is that just innate? And you like you saw all the opportunity to
 leverage these platforms to build your brand? My brother to this day, where King Hollis don't
 even own the laptop. No, no. All I do is I found I built everything you all see from
 my iPhone from the speeches to the to the painting purpose video you see on YouTube with
 with diversity. All I did I recorded a video against the white wall. Now I stopped a lot of
 people don't I freestyle all my speeches. I don't write anything. I'm just learning, man. Like I
 said, I built all of this, you know, without ever going to speaking classes or any I don't need
 those type of things. The main thing for me is just continuing to learn, man, and always being
 open to learn and be a student of the game, man, being a student that is like right now we don't
 live in a generation where a lot of older individuals see young kings and be like, yo, man,
 I want to see this young man be great. I want to see this young man be successful.
 You know, I always say the most successful people are the most curious people and and the most
 interested like that that absorb things. And I feel like there's like something naturally magnetic
 about you in the way you take things in and then translate it in your own way.
 Just ask your gift. I mean, you got a lot of gifts, but that I'm hearing you talk. I'm watching
 you and I'm seeing how you you interpret things, but then you make it your own. It's a real gift.
 You know, you know, you know what I have? I have a mentality of I cannot fail.
 I put everything into this. I put everything my heart, my soul, my blood, my sweat.
 I slept on the outside on concrete for opportunities. I put everything into this. When you put
 everything into something, you you operate from a standpoint of seizing every opportunity that
 comes your way, getting the ambassador piece award in Kingston Jamaica. It was one of the greatest
 and most humble experiences I have experienced in my life, just being a kid from the
 inner senior Pontiac Michigan and being something like a folk hero in Kingston Jamaica amongst the
 people. Where's it going, man? What's on the bucket list? My bucket list right now, man, is to
 create unity throughout the world, man. I want to do a tour called Pushing Peace Sword.
 My team is now searching for sponsors, people to, you know, just get behind me. Everybody know
 the speaker industry, a lot of top speakers. I have a lot of sponsors. I have yet to get my
 first sponsor yet. That's something I always reach out to just so I can start doing more events,
 mental health events for students around the country. The suicide rate is through the roof.
 With all the school shootings, the kids are traumatized and I want them to know that it's nothing
 to fear, man. The only thing you must fear is the opportunities that you miss out on. Live like
 fool and die empty. The kids must know who they are and what they represent and what they play
 in this generation, man. And my main theme is love. We got to spread love and inspiration.
 There's no topic. A lot of people get it misconstrued when they talk about booking me.
 It's not just students. It's life. It's entrepreneurs. It's that guy that lost that passion,
 that workforce that lost that passion, that lost that, that, that, that it factor that took
 them to the level that they are today. I just remind people, I'm not on my side up.
 I'm like a alarm clock. I'm just a reminder of the greatness that lives inside of you.
 That's all I am. I'm not greater. I'm not better. I'm just a man chasing my dream,
 just like the rest of these kings around the world. But I'm willing to help other people
 on the way to the top. That's the difference. A lot of people believe you can't help people
 on the way to the top. But that's the best time to help people because you're learning
 and they're learning too. It's a wonderful success for everybody out here, every speaker.
 No reason to hate on each other. No reason to be against each other. It's one objective.
 One objective. Bring love to a world that has lost it. We got a radical story that I'm excited
 to tell. Welcome to the show International Speak or bestselling author, Cody Burns. What's up,
 brother? Hey, man, just you are. You are. I'm glad to be here with you. Hey, man. We're excited
 to have you. I think you have an amazing story of inspiration and just overall radicalness that,
 you know, I'm excited for all of our audience to hear. My story kind of begins like everyone's
 story back in childhood and had an amazing family. Still very close with all of them today.
 I grew up in Southern Indiana right in the middle of a cornfield. And so you kind of learned
 and find ways to entertain yourself. So I go to the circus and, you know, they,
 my family was a, you know, they was enjoying it. Obviously I was. It was the first time I ever went.
 But there was one act that really stood out to me more than any of them. And it was this juggler
 that was down there doing all these tricks. And I remember myself wanting to learn how to do that.
 And so as soon as I left the circus, I started practicing. A few years later, I would go to a
 children's camp. And so all of us kids we were there in this big auditorium, speakers on stage,
 sharing this message and message of hope. But at the same time he was doing that, he was juggling.
 And so I'm like, get out of here. This is, this is cool to see how the two mix so well together.
 And something on the inside of me in that moment said that this is what I'm called to do.
 And so from a young age, I had a passion to give hope to people and doing it along with juggling
 and comedy and finding creative ways to get the message across. So I pursued that. And time I got
 out of high school. I went to a ministry training program in Rockford, Illinois. And I got my past
 oil credentials. At the same time working with kids on a weekly basis. I got the travel to
 country to motivation of speaking and using juggling and comedy, spoken kids, cams, conferences,
 all kinds of fun stuff. It was really starting to take off internationally. Up into the point of
 being 23 years old, I had spoken to thousands of children across the nation. And as well as teenagers
 and adults, but my audience more so at the time was with children. And then in May of 2013,
 my life took a drastic turn. And I was stopped at a red light. And at this red light, everything
 goes black almost as if I didn't exist. And when the first responders came to the scene by the
 looks of it, they said it's a fatality. So they had already called the corner and assumed I was dead.
 And it wasn't until they saw my hand move that they would change their plans. And I'm glad that
 they did because come to find out if they didn't see my hand move, I would have probably been burned
 alive that day. But there's a powerful message in that because I think there's a lot of people
 in today's world. COVID world is especially that have found themselves at stoplights. And
 those stoplights, maybe the career is no longer what it used to be. Or maybe there's death in the
 family or divorce who knows the list goes on where life, as we know it, suddenly comes to a complete
 stop. And we find ourselves in difficult circumstances trapped in the heat of life. And I certainly was.
 And all that to say, there's people that have found themselves in tough situations. And no
 different than my hand, that little bit of movement, it changed everything for me. And I wonder what
 a little bit of movement can do for many individuals in their life. Maybe they have found themselves
 trapped. But I dare everyone to take a little bit of movement and then see what may happen in
 their life. And it made a tremendous difference for me. When something like that happens, when you've
 been helping children, you're guiding children, you're involved, you know, God's guiding you in
 some way, right? Or a lot or every way. Did you ever question your faith coming out of that
 situation? Oh, man, you better, you better believe it. And, you know, I think that, I think we're all
 human. I mean, at the end of the day, we're all human. And I don't care if you've got a past
 world agree behind you. At the end of the day, we're not perfect. We have our humanity that just
 comes through. And so naturally, I wondered why. And I think as a result of all of this, my faith
 hasn't grew stronger, but it took time to get to that place. God has taken one of the worst incidents
 of my life that he's turned it around for my good. But it boiled down to me making that choice to
 say that I'm not going to allow this to affect me negatively. And that's powerful because I had
 to realize I can't change, can't change what happened to me. The only thing I can change is what
 I do today. That's what makes the difference. I ask everything, you know, has a purpose and a
 reason. And it's because I know that there are people out there that have probably might be relating
 to the story, different selves and others. And, you know, I think it's important to hear
 perspective for how people kind of got over that moment. And I think you can capitalize that
 perfectly. It was a lot a long road to recovery. But through all of that, I learned a lot about
 myself and life. And I think pain is one of our greatest teachers. And one of the most
 empowering moments for me was when I was in it and say rehab, I had gotten this garbage bag full
 of get well cards from all these kids that I had spoken to prior, a couple years prior to the
 wreck. And it was Oklahoma sitting. And everyone's get well, get well, Cody. You know, at the end of
 the day, we can all talk a good talk when life was going great. We can preach a good message. It
 sounds good. It tickles people's ears. But then when tragedy strikes and rubber hits the road,
 our faith, our message, everything that we're about is put to the test. And my faith in that
 moment, just as I shared earlier, it was put to the test. But I had to practice what I preach.
 And more so than words, our actions is what makes the difference. And so I had to think to myself,
 what am I going to act out in this moment? How am I going to be an example to these little lies?
 Children watch us. They watch us. We can tell them to do something. But at the end of the day,
 it's how we're acting. They learn from our actions.
 What do you think differentiates people that become and embrace the victim versus people that
 become and embrace the other side of taking a choice and putting action in their own hand?
 I mean, having gone through that now, maybe you ever distill that or do you know what separates
 one from the other? When you grasp that reality of how life is short and at the end of the day,
 life isn't fair for anyone. We all have our ups and our downs. All of us, we could set back and
 we can play that victim card. It's certainly easy. But at the end of the day, pity, it can only
 get you so far. And at some point, you got to put on your big boy pants and realize that
 this is my life. How am I going to live it? And what example do I want to set to others? Do I want
 to be a Debbie Downer? How do I want to be remembered? Somebody that give up, that you can
 plane and beck her and was bitter at the world or somebody that, you know what, I'm going to get
 it back up and I'm going to keep pressing forward and I'm going to make something of myself and
 of my life. You know, once you were at a place of recovery, like where did it, where did kind of
 the, you know, building to the foundation and different things like that, but like what,
 what was kind of phase one for you? Well, there's, there's many steps in getting to the other side
 of something traumatic. And I tell you, my support group made a tremendous difference. Obviously,
 I spoke in churches and I had a lot of pastors and leaders that were surrounding me, a family
 that supported me. Our surroundings have a powerful impact on our lives and I had to put myself
 in a good environment, a good environment, an environment that would encourage me, support me.
 And so if you want good results to come about, find those individuals that are producing good
 results and grab a hold of them, communicate with them, go do activities with them because you
 need that. We need each other. If you want to live an epic life, you apply these steps. So the
 E stands for embrace challenges. Challenges will always present themselves at one level or another.
 It's just something we have to embrace. And then we have the P which is provide perspective.
 How can I look at this situation differently? What are the lessons I can learn through my pain?
 And then we have the I which is implement change, applying those lessons to our lives.
 And then we have the C which is celebrate. Celebrate your story. Celebrate the fact that you're
 here that you're alive and champion of the day to live. And out of that celebration, we're serving
 others. We're serving others and making a positive impact on the wall around us. And for me,
 these are steps that I learned through this event and steps that I continue to live out on a
 daily basis, because they do. They apply not only in our personal lives, but they can also apply
 in our professions, our businesses. And so it's certainly something that I encourage everybody to
 grab a hold of and take action. I like it, man. I love I love having marketing. I love a good
 acronym. As I heard you say that, I was like thinking it from both a personal level and a business
 level. And I was like, I see a lot of business practice there. It goes back to me. I think every I
 believe everything happens for a purpose. It's just something I've always believed in. I do
 have faith. But I've also just kind of been wired that way. And I hear your story. And it feels like
 just, you know, whether it's a higher power, you know, intestinal fortitude or whatever. But it feels
 like it's also purposeful. I look at, you know, life, it truly is a gift. And when you go through
 something so traumatic at a young age, you learn to appreciate life. And you find out what is most
 important at the end of the day. And back whenever I was at my younger 20s, it was like some of the
 things I was worried about really worth my time and energy. So I try to examine my life. And if
 there's things I'm getting frustrated over, I'm like, is this really worth it? And most of the time,
 it's not. And so I just focus on what is the overall good of what I'm looking to achieve in my life.
 And that is to bring hope. So I try to lead every area of my life by that.
 To listen or watch full episodes, visit us on the web at theradcast.com or follow us on social media
 at our Instagram account v.rad.cast or at Ryan Alfred. Stay radical.
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