Start With A Win - You Have Permission to Dream Big with Bob Goff

Episode Date: July 7, 2021

Our guest on this episode of the Start With A Win podcast is Bob Goff, a recovering lawyer who has found his life’s purpose in helping other people find theirs. Bob spent his first career of 32 years as a lawyer, commuting daily from San Diego to Seattle and only missing dinner four times in 25 years. He has always prioritized his family, recognizing that they are the most important thing to him. Even while he was practicing law, he was doing incredible work through his nonprofit called Love Does, where he now spends much of his time and energy. They have built schools in eight countries in the middle of their own civil wars because Bob does not want the next generation to suffer despite the political climates in their countries.Bob has written several books, and he just recently released “Dream Big.” This book encourages people to find and reach their biggest dreams and lets them know that they don’t have to ask anyone for permission to do so. In the book, he guides people to strip away barriers and baggage holding them back and letting go of the self-limiting beliefs that have affected them for too long. It is also crucial for readers to clearly define their dreams and think through what they want to do that will outlast them. One aspect of this process is focusing on your passions rather than obsessing about the wrong things. Bob says he has been amazed working with people and how taking a genuine interest in those you come in contact with can make a drastic difference. Bob has a relevant story to demonstrate every lesson, one of which is the story of The Oaks retreat center. He and his wife purchased the camp right before the pandemic hit. They weren’t able to do anything with it immediately, but Bob started looking at the adjacent properties and realized that if he purchased a nearby horse racing track, they could host horses and their trainers there. This opportunity would not have come their way had Bob not been intentional about looking around his current circumstances. Bob encourages listeners to get unstuck and unleash their potential. Connect with Bob:https://www.amazon.com/Dream-Big-Youre-Going-About/dp/1400219493 https://bobgoff.com/https://twitter.com/bobgoffhttps://www.instagram.com/bobgoff/https://dreambigframework.com/podcasthttps://www.oakscenter.com/  Connect with Adam:https://www.startwithawin.com/https://www.facebook.com/REMAXAdamContoshttps://twitter.com/REMAXAdamContoshttps://www.instagram.com/REMAXadamcontos/ Leave us a voicemail:888-581-4430

Every day is filled with choices. You're here because you're choosing to start with a win. Get ready to be inspired, learn something new, and connect with the win nation. And coming to you from Denver, Colorado, Adam Contanto, CEO of Remax with Start With A Win. That was a new dance move there, Mark. I know. I thought I'd throw in a little extra move. It was like punchy stuff. I hit my mic. We didn't hear it, but that's okay. It's all right. It's backward belongs.

That's right. So, hey, we have a really fun guest today. Very uplifting, amazing man. We have Bob Goff on the show. Mark, you ready to jump in? I'm so excited. All right. All right. Bob is a lawyer, speaker, coach, and author of the New York times bestselling books. Love does. And everybody always, I mean, how can you not smile when you hear those titles? So Bob's latest book is titled Dream Big. Know what you want, why you want it, and what you're going to do about it. So in Dream Big, Bob takes you on a life proven journey to rediscover your dreams and turn them into reality. I love this. Based on his enormously popular Dream Big workshop, Bob draws on a

lifetime of living and dreaming large to help you reach your larger than life dreams. Bob currently works with Love Does, formerly known as Restore International, a nonprofit organization that he founded. Bob, thank you so much for being on the show. Welcome. Hey, thanks, Adam. I'm glad to be on. It's great to see you. Something I noticed about you when we were researching you, Bob, every one of your pictures, you're smiling. I love that. Yeah, I'm a recovering lawyer. I'm just happy that I'm not practicing law anymore. So, I mean, what does that mean that you're a recovering lawyer? When people go, what's that? Yeah. I practiced law for about 32 years. Crazy. I lived in San Diego. I worked in Seattle and I

commuted. I went up in the morning. I did my work and I flew home for more than a quarter of a century. Is that crazy? I missed dinner four times in a quarter of a century. So I got home. The kids, when they found out that I worked in Seattle, they're like, you said you work downtown? I'm like, I do. Downtown Seattle. I know, right? It's just like that idea. I think what makes me smile is that idea of knowing what's the most important thing. And I just put my family in there. Faith is important to me. It's not for everybody, but like family, faith, handful of friends, and that'll put a smile on your face. Awesome. I mean, it's truly amazing. And I know you touch so many lives and you've touched so

many with your bestselling books and the programs you offer, coaching, things like that. And you say your mission is to help people find and reach their biggest dreams. What got you into that? Why did you start doing that? I think it's seeing this potential that people have ambitions and some people think they need permission to go after your permissions, this ambition. I want to just do this Jedi move and say like, dude, you've got permission. What are you waiting for? So I think sometimes even if faith is important to somebody, they say like, I'm waiting for God. I'm like, well, maybe he's waiting for you. Oh, I love that. So we ended up starting schools and we spend, I'm just volunteer with Love Does for the last couple of decades. And so we have schools in eight countries. All of them are in the middle

of civil wars. Afghanistan, we're building our second school there for little girls that the Taliban won't teach how to read. And we're like, oh no, they're so getting books. So we'll be back there in the next 30 days. It's just such an important time for that country. And I just want to teach their kids. If this generation's screwing it up, maybe the next one can sort it out. That is just such a heart-touching thought that we have to be the saviors of ourselves. We have to participate in the rescue of mankind. And there's genocides going on around the world, civil wars, things like that. And, and it's, it takes some people to take action to do something about this. So it's nice that you're, you're working to educate these kids and give them a brighter future. I have a question for you. You know, you talk about

helping people reach their biggest dreams. What are some of the most amazing dreams you've heard? I think sometimes people have these ambitions for their families, like what it could be. Somebody may want to cure cancer, which is terrific as well. And I'm all for that. But I don't think God grades our dreams on a curve. I think what it is, is that you have these ambitions. I just want to be dazzled by asking people what theirs are and so encouraged as they pursue them and to say, hey, how can I help you on the way? There's a lot of people that would style themselves as a guide. I think I'd rather be a Sherpa because the guides pick the mountain and cook all the meals getting there. A Sherpa just tells you what you don't need to get up to the top. They let you pick the mountain,

they set the ropes, and they say, you don't need to carry all that stuff to get to the top. That's awesome. So I think more Sherpas, fewer guides. So you're kind of stripping away some of the obstacles of them achieving those goals. Yeah. So sometimes they're for real, like there's a real live impediment to getting there. And you got to see it before you can understand it, before you can fix it. So sometimes what you'll do is you'll make up a story when you're eight, like maybe your

parents split or something difficult happened. And so you made up a story. It wasn't correct, but you decide because you didn't have the tools to deal with it that everybody's going to eventually leave me. And so then you make up rules to support the story. So the rule is I'm not going deep with anybody because the story, although inaccurate, is that everybody's going to be. And so now you're 40 and you don't have any friends. You wonder why all your relationships are shallow.

It's because you made a rule to support a story that wasn't true. And it's stripping you of your future. So what I want to help people do is say, what stories did you make up? What rules did you wrap around the stories? And are these rules like actually at one point they were scaffolding to hold you up, but now it's kind of like this prison to keep you in. And I want to say like,

can we start taking that thing apart? Like step-by-step. I've got a great caper. Adam, you ought to come with me. I teach a class. I got 150 guys in it. It's San Quentin. And so most of them are lifers. So when that was kicked out for COVID, I'm like, well, see you later. I'm sure. Unless you tie some bedsheets together.

But these are guys that are understanding the stories that they told themselves and the rules they made for themselves. And I'm, man, I am not their teacher. I'm their student. And finding somebody who's kind of plumbed the depths has been super helpful to me. Find a couple of people that have had some big setbacks and then just learn from them. That's amazing. You know, you've got these four key aspects of your book, Dream Big. And, you know, one of those is identify the obstacles holding you back, which you just went through that. I mean, do you think that we get just as human beings, do we establish our own self-limiting beliefs? Is that, I mean,

why, why does that happen? Yeah, I think it's that people were really well-intentioned, but they messed with our minds by mistake. My dad loves me a lot. And he told me when I was young that rattlesnakes, they get underneath these logs to get out of the sun. So if you ever see a log, you have to jump way out from the log so the snake doesn't bite you. I think he just didn't want to suck the venom from my calf. But I'm 62 years old. I have never seen a rattlesnake by a log. Every time I come to a log, I jump way out from it because he tried to instill love, but what he did by mistake is he instilled fear. I'm just afraid that there's a snake under every log. And so maybe part of that idea of going back, seeing it so you can understand it, so you can fix it, is it just kind of carve a new groove in your brain and then say, I want to go Grand Canyon with this group. I want to say whether it's a work ethic, whether it's a limiting belief about what's out there to bite you, to say it's a new groove you got to carve and it ain't

going to be easy. If it's as easy as getting a puppy, you'd have two. You'd already have it done. And say like, no, no, let's do the heavy lifting. Kind of bend from your knees. All right. I want to get into that a little bit here. But first I want to ask you, you teach people how to clearly define their dreams and find them within themselves. You talk about that. How can people work on clearly defining their dreams if they're so overwhelmed with society? Yeah. I would say put a shot clock on it. I'm not a big sports guy, but if you don't shoot the basketball within the time they give you, it's the other guy's ball. If you don't hike the ball in football, it's the other guy's ball. And so I would put a shot clock on it and to say, I'm giving it the

next six weeks, six months, six minutes, but don't say like someday I'm going to whatever, but just put a shot clock on it. I got this week to get this done. So part of it is saying also, what's going to outlast me? On a good day, we get 27,373 days. Isn't that crazy? That's the average lifespan. And for a guy who has about 20,000 in the rear view mirror, it's starting to get very real. And so I'm not sad. Someday I'm going to be in a jar. I just want a couple books leaning up against it. I want to let my kids, kids, kids know what I thought about life. So that's why I write books. I think it people listening, I'm boy, like, leave some stuff that'll outlast you. That's when you'll get clearer on your ambitions and which ones to pursue. That's amazing. And such great ideas. You talk about accomplishing something. Do you have any recommendations on creating a plan? I mean, obviously, we have to deconstruct these things into actions and activities in order to pursue our dreams. Don't people get afraid of doing that? And how can they

deal with that? Oh, here's the first thing to do. Here's your plan. Stop obsessing about the wrong things. I love that. Whatever it is that's distracting you, just stop it. I wanted to get a pickup truck and we got a camp and got horses and cows and all that. And a Prius just is not going to carry those. So I went to the Ford store to get a... There's no plug for Ford, but I just went to get a pickup truck. I saw one that it didn't have a rug in it and it's just rubber carpets. I said, that one. Like, I'm not much of a shopper. And then they said it was $75,000. I wouldn't pay that for a house. And so I'm like, oh, heck no.

So I got to use one with 100,000 miles on it for 25. I'm driving it home. And out of, I've smelled soap. And I'm not very, is your nose very sensitive to like what things smell like? Oh yeah. Yeah. Like too much perfume or cologne or BO or yeah.

Yeah. So I wouldn't have thought that I was like the big deal for me, but it's just bugged me so much. I got home, I rolled out all the windows. I'm like, I'm blowing it out. And when he got home, it smells gone. Go inside. Next day, get in the car. Smells like soap. I'm like, what the heck? out. And when I got home, it smells gone. Go inside. Next day, I get in the car.

Smells like soap. I'm like, what the heck? And it's just like bugging me. And so I was supposed to perform a wedding for somebody. So I turned on the heater all the way up in LA. Three hours up, three hours back. I just cooked it out. I'm like, I'm burning that smell out.

Pitted out my suit. I got back. Mission accomplished. Soap smells gone. Next day, I get back in it, smells like soap. I'm on this manic bender now. I'm like, I'm so like, I hate this smell. I don't even notice I'm at the upholstery place. And I throw the credit card in through the door with my keys. I'm like, new carpet, leather, whatever. Three days later, they give me my car back. I opened the door. It smells like dead cow and soap. And I'm like, what the heck? And when

I was driving back, I put my sunglasses up above in that little tray. There's a 25 cent air freshener in there. I spent $2,000 fixing a 25 cent problem. And this is the problem that I think we have. We're spending all this money fixing big, like throwing big money at small problems. I think we're spending tons of time at small problems. Figure it out. What's going to outlast you? What's really going to matter? Start with your faith, your family, your friends to say, what do I want to be known at? And then let's just start carving that groove, a new groove in our brain, a new pattern to get there. That's so true.

I'll tell you, for all of our listeners, they hear me talk about this. The key in life is focus. The key in life is focus. And focus helps you really find your passions and it helps you work on those things over and over again. And it's like this force field against distraction as well. And I mean, what you're saying is just, it touches my heart and it makes me happy to hear it. And the stories are so cool that you have Bob. So thank you for sharing those. So we've got, we have a lot of things that try to drag this down right now. You know, we've got, I heard it put best today, don't doom scroll, you know, where people get

on social media and they doom scroll. Yes, that's a great choice of words. And it just drives them into the ground and it just deflates their enthusiasm. I mean, you know, obviously the easy answer is, well, don't do that stuff, but how do we get people to look at the good instead of the bad in life? Do you have any suggestions in that? Yeah, I think it involves taking a genuine interest in people instead of just saying like, hi, I'm Bob. This is what I do. Um, but just ask like the third question, not what's your name or what do you do, but what are you hoping for? What is it that you're hoping for?

I know in high school, I was just hoping for a date. Never happened, but I was hoping for a date. But then to get adjacent maybe to some of the things that you were hoping for. I know I wanted Maria Goff to like me. She wasn't Maria Goff at the time, but I met her and I wanted her to like me in the worst way. And it just wasn't working out of law school. And so I found out that she was going to be at a camp volunteering. She's going to take 10 volunteer high school girls to this Young Life Camp. So I got 10 high school guys. And the first night, some elderly woman, she's eating her spaghetti,

her pacemaker stops, a face plants in the spaghetti, she's out of here. Go to St. Peter, you're gone. But I knew how to do CPR. And for the next 30 minutes, I am pumping on her heart. I'm blowing into her wrinkled lips. And she lived like total Lazarus thing. And she's surprised. I'm surprised. And Maria thought this guy is not much to look at, but he could be useful in a pinch. Well, we ended up buying that camp and 35 years later and turning it into a resort. But right then, then COVID hit. I'm like, no. And so one of the things that I want us to do is when we have a setback to remember why you started. What is it? What was the big dream that you had? What did that ambition look like for your family, your friends, the arc of your life?

And remember why you started. Instead of being distracted by getting everybody's approval, I'm not trying to build consensus. I'm trying to build a kingdom. Don't be like a kingdom about Bob, but just something where everybody's invited. Everybody's welcome. And I'm not an umpire calling balls and strikes. I'm a base coach saying, run fast. Just run fast. Run your race. All right. So you're talking about the Oaks, right? Yeah. The Oaks. All right. So I want to hear about this because I mean, this is your newly renovated retreat center. It's beautiful. Tell us about this place. Oh, well, we got this place. Now we had tumbleweeds like blowing through

this thing because nobody could meet in California. So I looked at what was adjacent and across the way, there's a valley, a beat up barn and an old racetrack with weeds five feet tall. So I got the valley, I got the barn, I got the racetrack and I sought what is adjacent to us. And we thought like I could train, I'll bring in a horse trainer and we'll train other people's horses. Isn't that fun? So I don't know anything about horses. Don't even know what end to put the hay in. But these horses come from all over the world now. The last two arrive from France on their own chartered planes. And so for a guy who doesn't know anything about horses, I would say applying it to somebody who's listening, they have something that's a hope and

an ambition. It's just not working. They're stuck. I'd say, what's adjacent? I got adjacent to Maria. Well, I tried this camp and converted made it look beautiful. And then another pandemic hit. What was adjacent? I want to ask people instead of wishing over a rainbow, I want to say, what's right next to you right now? What's within arm's reach? And then make a bold move. Have you seen, Adam, that movie, We Bought a Zoo? No. It's like, oh, you got to look at it tonight. It's a widowed father who's trying to explain to his son how life works. And they bought a house, but it ends up being a zoo by mistake. There's like rhinos and giraffes in the backyard. So he's explaining life to him.

And he says, you know, all it takes is 20 seconds of insane courage, 20 seconds of embarrassing bravery. Your whole life will change. So I would say, if you're listening, if you're stuck in traffic or pulled over to the side or in your couch, say, what would be 20 seconds of insane courage for you to do? So for me, start a school in Afghanistan. I don't know anybody in Afghanistan until I got off the plane in Kabul. I'm like, okay, here we go. So to say, maybe it's a text message you need to send to somebody. Maybe things got kind of wonky in a relationship. That

would take 20 seconds of insane courage. I think if we could get unstuck, then we start unleashing, really, to your point, some of this potential that's been dammed up. It's like a beaver put all these sticks across our creek, and then it's all dammed up and you can't get anywhere. I'm like, let's blow up the dam. I like it. I like it. So let's dig in a little bit more into the Oaks. What kind of retreats do you have there, Bob? Yeah, there's like, I'll do once a month, I'll do a writing retreat. There's another outstanding outfit called Onsite. If you've read any of Don Miller's book, he wrote a book called Scary Close. It'd been like him going to this place for some healing and all that. And not in a mystical way, they just have a bunch of counselors. And Don had gone there. He was talking about relationships,

and he was kind of engaged and kind of not engaged. And he went there to sort that out. And when he was all done, he said, Bob, will you write the foreword to the book? I'm like, oh, Don, I'd be so honored to. And then he said, but you have to go to onsite first. I'm like, oh, heck no. There's no way I'm going for a week of counseling. And then sweet Maria Goff said, dude, your issues have issues. You need to go. And so I went and Miles Adcox, who runs it, one of my best friends. And so what he'll do with the Oaks, there's a gathering right now. There's 53 people up there just going deeper in like life stuff and marriage stuff. And they're just trying to sort it out.

And I think to get a little bit of help, to find somebody to help you kind of connect, what are the stories? What are the rules? What have the setbacks been? I don't know if you followed that, Adam, but I spent 25 years building a lodge in Canada out of logs. First growth cedar. My nearest neighbor is 10,000 square miles away. We're out in the bush.

I build hydroelectric plants. We make all of our electricity off the glaciers. And then three guys showed up to paint it and they burned it down by mistake. They put their oily rags together, spontaneously combusted, gone. In 20 minutes, what I'd spent 25 years building. And it isn't a home that maybe a listener has lost, but it was a hope, a desire, a relationship, an opportunity. And you got to decide what I had to decide. Am I going to rebuild it? And so I bought a 150-foot crane. And for the last four years, I've been swinging logs and it's done. I rebuilt it. Here's my question. What is it that you want so bad you would build it once for a quarter of

a century and you'd spend the next 10 years rebuilding it? That would be a clue to some of your ambitions you ought to throw some energy behind. Amazing question, Bob. Amazing. And I'll tell you what, you've set such a great example for everybody doing this. So many people find a reason not to, or that they can't, or won't, or shouldn't, or something like that. You look at it and you go, why not? Yeah. Plus I got a crane and it'll make an awesome tree swing for you. Adam will get you a body cast and just swing you out over the inlet. All right, I'm in. That sounds like a lot of fun.

Very cool. Hey, Bob, you've shared a lot of great wisdom, kind of really things that touch your heart, touch your mind, talking about our dreams, things of that nature. But you wake up every morning like the rest of us and have to start your day. So a question I ask all of our amazing guests on this show, and I've heard some really cool stuff and knowing who you are and what you're about. I'm sure you have a fun answer to this, but Bob Goff, how do you start

your day with a win? Oh, I'm a note taker. Like I just read stuff. I was reading all about fallow land and Marcus Aurelius, youus, one of the good emperors early on in Rome. He started out his day journaling. I started out my journaling as well. Do you know what? George Lucas, he was writing Star Wars and at the same time he was scoring American graffiti. And you find a scene by saying the role in the dialogue. So, role 10, dialogue 8. And he asked them about where this particular scene is. And they said, it's in role 2, dialogue 2. And I'm not kidding, George Lucas wrote down R2-D2. So, all the people that have really set the world in motion have been journalers. They write down stuff that catches their attention and

they dig a little deeper. Staying curious, I would say that would be the fundamental thing. I'm trying to fan the coals on my curiosity. Be curious, not just about my own stuff, but what is it, Adam, that makes you work? What makes that disagreeable person across the street work? I wonder what is going on. And not with a critical tone, but just say like, wow, I bet there's some bogeys that they're chasing. If somebody flashes at you, just say like, I bet there's some stuff going on there. Maybe they're just as insecure as me. Awesome. Bob, you're an amazing man. Thank you so much for being on Start With A Win. And everybody, be sure to check out his latest book, Dream Big.

Know what you want, why you want it, and what you're going to do about it. That's how you dream big. Bob Goff, thanks a lot for being on the show. Hey, thanks so much, Adam. That's right. And hey, thank you for listening to Start With A Win. If you'd like to ask Adam a question or tell us your Start With A Win story, give us a call, leave us a message, 888-581-4430. Don't forget to go into iTunes and subscribe, write a review, and rate the show.

And for more great content, head over to StartWithAWin.com. You can follow Adam on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. And remember, Start With A Win. win.