The Bossticks - Nick Vujicic On Overcoming Extreme Adversity, Depression, & How Our Hardships Can Become Our Strengths

Episode Date: October 20, 2020

#302: On this episode we are joined by Nick Vujicic. Nick is an Australian-American born without arms or legs who has become a world-renowned speaker, New York Times best-selling author, coach and entrepreneur. On today's episode we discuss how Nick overcame extreme adversity and how you can too. We also discuss how to overcome depression and how the hardships we face in life can actually become our strengths and sources of inspiration.  This episode is brought to you by Elemis x The Skinny Confidential For the first time ever The Skinny Confidential has launched a n extremely limited Co-Brand with the iconic skincare brand, Elemis. To check out the collab and make sure you are able to grab the cobranded product before they run out head over to www.elemis.com and enter promo code skinny20 for 20% off all Elemis products. This DOES NOT APPLY to the co-brand but it does apply to regular products.  To connect with Nick Vujicic click HERE To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) This episode is brought to you by Avocado Green Mattress Avocado green mattresses are better for your health and better for the planet. A natural mattress is more sustainable and responsible. It's an essential piece of a conscious lifestyle. After all, you spend roughly one-third of your life in bed, on a mattress. Detoxing your bed, then moving on to your bedroom, and ultimately your home, can be liberating. Visit www.AvocadoMattress.com and use the code SKINNY200 for $200 off Avocado's NEW All Latex Mattress and Luxury Organic Crib Mattresses. Valid now through November 30, 2020. This episode is brought to you by Brooklinen Brooklinen sheets are the perfect place to start making your mornings great. They offer sheets for every season using the most luxurious materials without the luxury mark up. Brooklinen is SO confident in their product that all their bedding comes with a lifetime warranty! To Get 10% off your first order and free shipping use promo code SKINNY at Brooklinen.com This episode is brought to you by Pique Tea Ever since I discovered Pique Tea, I've been obsessed. I now incorporate at least a cup of Pique into my daily routine and it's really been increasing my productivity levels. Pique Teas are made from organic high quality tea leaves and ingredients sourced from around the world, delivering up to 12x more antioxidants than any ofor heavy metals, pesticides and toxic mold so you know you're getting the best stuff.    Use code "SKINNY" for 10% off piquetea.com. They rarely (if ever) have sales so you'd definitely want to check this out! P.S. This discount does not apply to their fermented pu'er due to their limited quantity.ther tea. What's better is that they are all Triple Toxin Screened Produced by Dear Media

The following podcast is a dear media production. This episode is brought to you by Elamus and get excited because it's Elamis times the skinny confidential. That's right, you guys, my first ever co-brand with Elimus, which makes so much sense because you know how much I love skin and I know how much you love skin. Okay, this is a bag that we designed together over the last year. Every detail was designed by me. It's pastel pink. It's a little bit of lilac. It says skinny confidential on it. You can carry it out with your friends. You can use it for your skincare, your vitamins, whatever you want. And in it comes three LMS products. These are products that I have been using for the last four years, ones that I love. So we're doing a buttery rose cleansing bomb. I talk about this all the time. This is what I use to remove my makeup. It doesn't pull down the skin. And then I have a collagen, a rose mist. I use this every single morning. It wakes me up. And then lastly, I did a rose facial oil because you know I love oils and oils are life. They really, really do. leave your skin radiant and dewy and plump, which we all love. You're also going to get these hair clips,

okay? These hair clips are going to go in your hair when you're washing off your cleansing bomb. So they're going to protect your blowout, okay? You're not going to get hair and gunk in your bomb. And then I have a mirror. It's a heart mirror. It says skinny confidential on it. It is cute. This fits in your kit so you can travel with it. You can take it out for happy hour, whatever you want to do. And then lastly, we did stickers. These are stickers only for this collab. This is an extremely limited run. So when it's gone, it's gone. It's available at Ulta. Sold online, also at Elamis.com. Elimis is also giving you guys 20% off with code Skinny 20. It's not valid on my bag, but it's valid on their products. Definitely grab my kit, Skinny Confidential, first co-brand with Elamis

and pick up a couple of their other products. I'm telling you, you guys, Elimis is one of my favorite skincare brands. I know you are going to love this co-brand. I could not be more excited. Code Skinny 20 is valid now through December 31st, 2020. On that note, let's get into the show. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie.

And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her. I think people themselves are they, greatest limited factor and it's that mindset and it's that wanting to live wanting to love yourself and wanting to believe that you are here for a greater purpose hello everybody bringing in that tuesday energy that clip was from our guests of the show today nick booeyachick and on this episode we have a plateful of inspiration for you if you're feeling down and out you're feeling like you're

having a tough time this is the episode for you for those you that are new to the show my name is Michael Bostic. I am a serial entrepreneur and brand builder. Most recently, the co-founder and and CEO of the Dear Media Podcast Network. And next to me, swiping on her phone, not yet super engaged with me is my wife and co-host, Lauren, what are you doing here? Well, you didn't bring me coffee. Come on. Get it together. We got to bring the energy to the people. This is what you do. You bring yourself coffee and you didn't even bring me a peak tea or a coffee. Well, this is, this one's from a lot earlier. It was before you were awake and it's soggy and old and done and you don't even want it. You You don't want this nasty coffee.

Okay. So let's talk about who are a guest of the show today. It's like really let's dive deep because he was so inspirational. I'm so excited for this episode. I love stories about people who have beaten all the odds and lived their life on their own terms and helped other people and inspired people. And that's what I got out of this episode. Nick is an incredible character.

He's an Australian American that was born with Tetra Amelia syndrome. It's a rare disorder character is by the absence of arms and legs. So yes, you heard that right. Nick was born without arms and legs. He tells the story on the show. His parents, you know, they did an ultrasound in Australia. They looked. The doctor actually didn't even identify that he was missing his arms and legs. And when he came out of his mother, is that the right way to say that one? When he came out, they discovered it then. And so, you know, he's had to live his entire life without the use of limbs. And he's really, really inspirational what he's done. He's built a massive career. He's made a beautiful family. He's got four children. And it's just a

really inspirational story. And I think it really provides a lot of perspective on the challenges some people face in this world and how to overcome them. Another plus of this episode, too, is that he is a motivational speaker. So he's very, very good at getting on a mic. And sometimes, you know, we interview all different kinds of guests and you never know how comfortable someone is with a mic. And Nick just happens to be so eloquent and so smart, so thoughtful and so compelling. With that, guys, without further ado, let's welcome Nick Buoyuchick to the show. This episode is brought to you by Peak Tea. Recently, I found out my blood type and I realized that coffee was not doing well with my blood type.

It was making my cortisol level spike. So I decided, okay, I'm going to do one cup a day, sometimes no cups, and replace it with matcha. And I could not be more excited to tell you about Peak Tea because this is the matcha, guys. This is the match you want to travel with. You want to stock your tea. tea drawer with this. I'm telling you, their sun goddess matcha is so, so good. When I drink it, I feel like I meditated for an hour, but I'm also energized. You know how with coffee, when you get

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because there's so many teas that come in tea bags and all these chemicals just seep into your water. Even Michael's on the mantra train. I'm telling you guys, try it out. Peak Tea is offering sitewide discounts specifically for TSC listeners. You can go to peak tea.com and use code skinny at checkout. Grab the sun goddess matcha and prepare to fall in love. Peak tea rarely offers discounts on their teas, so you should check this out. Enjoy. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. So we got to come visit you in Dallas. Come.

It sounds very, very interesting and intriguing and it sounds like it's pulling me towards Dallas. So we'll definitely come see you. Nick Vujic. That's how you do it. Correct. Did he say it right? I hope so. No, you did.

Perfect. Okay, perfect. I know, I like to get the names exactly right when we do this. You know, it's just one of those things. No, I get it. It's all good. Yeah. Four kids.

Four children. Seven and a five-year-old son. Okay. And they've started school straight up on the gun, a private charter hybrid home school, which is what we had out here anyway. Explain what a private charter hybrid is. So it's a classical Christian education where you can opt out of going there every day. So you do two or three days at school and two days at home. So they do that in Texas.

I like that a lot. That's kind of what we're doing before we shut down. That's what we were doing at this company. It was like some days you can come in, some days you can work from home. And I found that it was very, very productive. Like the whole team was in loving it. We've been doing that for several years. And in fact, before I met my wife, she was actually helping her boss do the homeschool part for her kids.

And how old are the two others? Oh, they have, we have twin girls. Oh, my God. We have identical twin girls. You're a busy guy. Dude, we're done though. And they're nearly three in December. And how are they?

They're amazing. Like how they're doing it? loving it, loving the new pool that we have there. It was a bit like I was wondering if Texas is going to have a second shutdown then there's going to be an economic correction like out here in California. But Texas ain't doing that. Texas sounds fun. You actually breathe a lot easier. And I just want you to know, I'm an Aussie. You don't say. California is in my blood. Like I'm a dual citizen, US, Australia, swore I would never leave California. Every time I left Dallas, my wife never bought it up, but I just told her, babe, for the record, I will never move to Dallas.

I don't like the heat, which we just fixed, finished. I don't like the mosquitoes, which I can't kill because I have no hands. And I like, just those two things and the climate here is beautiful. But man, I have not missed California for a minute. How about the mosquitoes? mosquitoes. Mosquitoes eat her alive. Yeah.

Like how bad? Well, it depends on the week. Depends on the rain. I'm loving the rain. We've had a whole annual fall of a Californian annual fall in like freaking six weeks. What is your setup in Texas? Like, do you have a garden? Do you have like, what's your like day to day?

Do you go outside? Like, what's your deal? We used to have that in California. This is not part of the interview, right? This is a pre-in-adue thing. No, we're just talking. Oh, we're just sitting. You guys are bag.

Oh, my goodness. We just jump right in. I love it. It's almost like we're at happy hour with each. That's like, cool. Like, that's literally how we do it. Should I then add some more hand sanitizer? Here we go.

So we used to have a beautiful garden here in California. No, we don't have a mature garden over there yet, no mature trees yet. But eventually, step by step, we've got to get the kids a playground first. Okay. Yeah. But it sounds like it's a lot of nature. We're in the farmland. Yeah, we've got an acre out there and there's farms.

You actually don't feel like. you're in a city downtown anywhere and we're 35 minutes from downtown but it's probably it's also like probably a nice drive like 35 minutes driving in LA is a pain in the ass because you're just stuck bumper to bumper looking at the back of somebody's car for whatever and all the buildings and trash or so it's like you know I always say like 35 minutes driving out in the country is much different than 35 minutes driving in the city no it is I mean you've got 10 minute country and then you're going to freeway and you're down downtown 20 25 minutes depends on there's some traffic but nothing like LA

it's beautiful for me to go through DFW Airport compared to LAX I mean they're one of my fingerprints here and everything I'm joking so let's I think we're serious for a second I was like

what I was gonna wait and see if that one went on your head on so let's sometimes things go over my head I'm not gonna lie let's get into the interview portion so for those that are unfamiliar with you let's get a little background let's talk about how you got here how you left to Texas and what you're all about

here and we're gonna obviously get into it background, your childhood. First of all, thanks to, thanks to Ed My Lett for like making this connection. Ed, my Lett, I fucking love you. Ed, I love you too. Everyone has a crush on it. Everybody who listens to this show loves Ed. I love Edmys. So, a background. I was born in 1982 to Boris and Dushka Vuechich, who actually fled Yugoslavia in 1960s. My grandfathers were both in prison for their faith. Talk about oppression and rules and regulations. and different doctrinal values compared to the government. Anyway, my parents were poor, went through refugee camps, met in Australia, got married and I was their firstborn son.

They had no idea that I was going to be born this way. My mom actually was a nurse and she delivered hundreds of babies as a midwife. So she knew everything about medicine and birth and pregnancy and all that. So she was extremely careful. No thylidamite, no wine, no caffeine, nothing. She was extra, extra careful. And she actually told my dad, something doesn't feel right. Anyway, they did three ultrasounds.

And every time they did the ultrasound, they got so excited that they didn't check that I had arms and legs. So when I was born, the doctors held me low enough. And the nurses started like, oh my God. And they held me so low that my mom couldn't see me, but my dad did see my shoulder. And he nearly fainted seeing my shoulder and no arm. They took me to the corner of the room. And my mom's like, what's going on? She heard me cry.

She knew I was alive. that's a good thing. And then they took me out of the room. And they basically were told, sorry, we didn't pick up on the ultrasound that you had a child with no arms and no legs in your womb. Sorry, we never gave you an opportunity to kill him. How does that happen? How do they miss that? 1980s, I don't know.

Australia. I don't know. To me. They said we didn't give you an opportunity to kill. To abort. Yeah, to abort. That is horrible. Okay, so that's the quality of life, right?

So little did they know what kind of quality of life I would have, which is why I'm quite a megaphone going to be very loud for pro-life next year moving on. And I'm not doing the motivational circuit anymore, going around the world anymore. There are some deep things that I believe in that now I feel like I'm a poster child for to help people know that everyone has value and give everyone a chance. when you don't get a miracle, you can still be one. And yeah, I'm going to say, I'm thanking God that they didn't see that just in case. They didn't know that I'd walk and I have a little foot.

For those of you watching, on the bottom left of my torso, I've got a little foot with two toes, which now I can type 53 words a minute on a normal computer. Shut up. After two cups of coffee, yeah. Holy shit, that's cool. It is cool. It is cool. Little did they know that I'd walk around and swim and golf and fish and skydive and all these

kinds of things. You know, it was hard going to school. First one, actually special needs child to go to the mainstream school of the Victorian education system in Australia. I was on TV, young citizen of the year, trailblazing special needs integration into the education system. Bullying was hard. Talk about that a little bit because bullying, online bullying, whatever it is, is still happening every single day all day long. So can you talk about like, actually? actually go in depth about it. I mean, I would come home crying saying, mom and dad, why was I born this way? And they didn't know why. I mean, the doctors didn't know why. They didn't know why. Lady Gaga don't know why I was born this way. And did you remember that song? I just want to make

some people laugh because we're about to go deep. But the bottom line here is, is I felt like, it's not like one day I woke up and I looked at myself in the mirror and said, you know, what happened? You know, like I knew I had no arms and no legs, but no one thought or made a big deal until I actually went to school. So I already had a brother and sister born after me with arms and legs, 24 first cousins around me as my community. Then I went to school and people laughing at me, people, whatever, calling me names, not being, you know, exed out of a group, right? And then I'd actually find myself in the garden at school alone, pretending that I'm just looking for stuff, but I just don't want to see anyone, don't want to talk to anyone. I had a lot of complexes in my elementary school years

where I had a teacher aid to take me to the restroom, but I didn't want a stranger to see me naked. And so I actually would not go to toilet the whole day at school. So I learned how much to drink during the whole day. So then no one's, no stranger would. So there were those things that I had to really overcome. Then I'm trapped talking to a teacher who don't even feel like being there while the kids are playing something that I can't play. And then I'm realizing, wait a second, you're not here for fun. This is your job. Mom and dad have a job.

I'm not going to get a job. I'm just a burden to everyone. I can't do everything. And I'm going to be picked on for the rest of my life. Girlfriends, boyfriends, holding hands. I'm not going to get a girlfriend. I'm thinking at age eight. I'm never going to get married.

Even if I got married, I can't even hold my wife's hand. Even if I had kids, I can't even hold my kids when they're crying. What kind of a father is that going to be? What kind of a life do I really have? My mom and dad helped me to believe that there was a creator and having faith in God and believing that there's a greater plan for your life. I'm like, but what the heck? Where is he? And I didn't understand. And so I hated the idea of a loving God for many years. And I went to a climax of depression where I attempted suicide at age 10. I had thought of suicide for two years into that. On the kitchen counter watching my mom cook and I loved it. It was therapeutic.

it was safe. It was rhythmic for my own fear and anxiety of life. And then I'm trying to think like, okay, what if I just snap my neck here and just try to jump off and pretend that it was an accident? But I got to make sure that I actually kill myself and not just get paralyzed. I mean, there's one thing worse than having no arms and no legs than I can't move. I still can move. So then I actually decided I'm going to tell dad, dad, I would just want to soak in my bathtub. And it was the first time I looked at the bathtub as my coffin. We filled it up with six inches of wood. I turned over three times trying to choke on the water,

trying to figure out how much air are you holding your lungs before you let it out and then start choking on the water. It was scary. It was very scary. And on the third attempt of rolling over, I was stopped by one thought. And it was the visual in my mind, see my mom and my dad and my brother crying at my grave, wishing they could have done something more. And they did nothing but love me.

My mom and dad, there was strong. They were strong. They disciplined me. They got that belt on my butt when I, you know, made some trouble and they found my fingerprints and stuff. When I go to a store and I want something, they would never give it to us. They knew as refugees as kids, you never give you kids everything you want when you want it, how they want it, because they're never going to be thankful for anything. They never gave that to me. I vacuumed the floor for $2 a week. I bought my own stuff if I wanted toys. If I wanted toys. If I want to be thankful for anything. They never gave that to me. I vacuumed that to me. I vacuumed the floor for $2 a week. I bought. I bought. I want to to give money to an orphan, which is what we were told to do one day. I was doing that as a kid. So they didn't give me any slack, but they did love me all the way through that. The first Tony Point out of depression was age 13, playing my favorite sport, soccer. A guy kicked the ball to me. I jumped up in the air thinking that was a cool thing. The ball hit my foot so bad, I sprained my foot and I couldn't walk for three weeks. Staring at the ceiling, I'm thinking as a 13 year old, man, this sucks.

I'm thankful for my little foot and I'm not going to be angry for what I don't have from this day on. At age 15, had a spiritual, cool little ripening thing that was my bigger question as to why I was born this way and that faith element came in. And my life then changed forever at school. I was 17 and I just got elected on the student government board as a prefect in Australia. What is a prefect for the Americans that are listening? It's like you're the leader of your, like, you know, you got the president, vice president, the government body basically. Okay, the student body.

The student body, sorry. So the prefect. And then I'm in the restroom and I fly by the janitor, his name's Arnold. 61 year old Arnold, he looks at me and says, you're a prefect. He said, yeah. He said, congratulations. I said, thank you. He said, I know what you're going to be.

He said, what's that? He said, you're going to travel around the world. and you were going to be a speaker. He said, let me arrange your first speech. I'm like, you are crazy, dude. Like, no way. He said, yeah, why don't you talk to that little student body group that, you know, goes there every Friday?

And you just share your story. I said, I don't have a story. And I walked away. Next day, he said, speak. I said, no way. Like, this guy's nuts. He's not leaving me alone. Three months later, he twists my arm.

I said, yes, and I'm finding myself in front of six students. My palms are sweating. My knees are shaking. I don't know what to say. and just start speaking from the heart. People are crying. And I'm like, wow. At 17, I'm thinking, I nearly ended my life because I felt like I had no hope.

And here I am, we're still no certainty of future if I'm going to get married, if I'm really going to blah, blah, blah. But people received hope. And then I started doing speeches. And I went to, I was in the stock market. I learned a lot about financial literacy because my mom and dad. said you need to be a millionaire, you need to be a millionaire, just to survive. Hurry up. And so I read books. I went to a stock market, went to real estate, and I did a double degree in accounting and

financial planning. And my dad said, Nick, you should start a business and have your employees to be your hands and feet. Graduated 21. But as soon as I graduated, I went into full-time speaking and in that time, I was maturing and going around the world and thinking, man, there's two billion people, even back then, who only had a handful of food. I'm like, I just want to do my part. And if I could be paid to help someone be inspired on some sort of level, that seems like the best job in the world. Recently, we had a wellness expert on the podcast and on the blog, and they were telling us all about green mattresses. So I started doing some digging and found avocado green mattresses. They're better for your health and for the planet. So get this. It's a natural mattress that's more

sustainable and responsible. It's an essential piece of a conscious lifestyle. I mean, I feel like we are spending one third of our lives in bed, sometimes more, with quarantine. So it's important to know what's in your mattress. This specific mattress is made with Gaut's organic certified cotton and wool and gold's organic certified latex. So like I said, it's all sustainably sourced from farms they co-own in India. Michael and I are truly a fan of brands. that disrupt the market, and this disrupts the market. Let me tell you. I mean, they make eco-luxery, organic, certified mattresses and their betting is from their California factory. So it's a real win. The farm-to-bedroom approach is my vibe for 2021. Okay. I feel like we've been quarantined. We need a good

mattress. Lastly, they're also climate neutral certified. And in 2020, they went carbon negative with their carbon footprint. And they donate 1% of all their revenue to environmental nonprofits. Wow. Okay, visit avocado mattress.com and you're going to use the code skinny 200 for $200 off avocado's new all latex mattress and luxury organic crib mattresses. This is valid through November 30th, 2020. Again, that's avocado mattress.com and use code skinny 200 for $200 off. Happy sleeping. So who were most of the people, like the kinds of people you were speaking to? Is it people that we're just looking for inspiration or people that were looking for perspective and like what types of organizations and how did how did that all kind of start snowballing so between ages

19 and 23 a lot of it were it was in the faith sector where i would talk about my faith and help people understand that you're not alone that you can overcome all things so that was that but then it really pivoted pretty quickly to corporate market conferences big companies billionaires that said i want you to come to my country, Brazil, several times because I have 60,000 employees and we can't put them all in our stadium. So now that's morphed into 74 countries. I've been to China 37 times, Singapore, 14. I've met with 21 presidents and vice presidents was able to actually address 10 national governments. I just talked to the United Nations yesterday that's being showed next week. Now I feel even more honored that you flew all the way out here to talk to us and talking to

talking to governors and presidents and shit. It's my own honor. And you guys are quite influential. Thank you for bringing some help, especially in times of these and bringing me along and just allowing me to spread my message. That's awesome. So that's basically where I'm at. So I help governments bring in now social, emotional learning curriculum that doesn't teach just right at school. We don't want to just teach academics anymore.

Everyone's understood now. We need to teach values. We need to teach self-awareness. We need to teach principles and help them not just say or hear us say, don't do that because we said so, actually give them the canvas to actually think for themselves and as a school, learn from each other, have empathy for one another and understand our value as all human beings and proceed forward. So I'm now a youth advisor to three governments around the world for anti-bullying and anti-suicide programs for teenagers all around the world. I love that. I mean, before Lauren's grandmother passed, you know, whenever Lauren would get down to

Lauren, I don't want to take your story, but she would always tell her, like, get outside yourself, right? Like, start thinking about other people, get outside yourself. And I think one thing we try to do on this show is to bring on all sorts of different people to, you know, present all different walks of life and to say, like, hey, like, maybe you think your circumstance is tough or maybe you think you don't have, oh, but, look at all these other experiences and there's a way to look at the world in a way that you have. And I think that we do as an abundant place as opposed to just like this oppressive negative space. You know, I think

if we can have more conversations like that, which is why it's so important for us to highlight positive people in positive conversations and get away from negative ones, like I think it's a noble thing to do. I do believe that 100%. And I'm going to add a layer to that because what I believe that every single human being is made of is a soul, spirit, mind and body. and one of the biggest things that helped me to find hope in my life was the instigation of purpose. If you can help someone who maybe can't help themselves, which is actually something that we've been doing as a family when we can, whether they can thank us or not,

it's about you understanding that no matter where the climate of the world is, that you have your place in this world in trying to help someone, whether it's just a friend. You're a friend to someone. Depression and suicide have doubled. No one has got the stats yet, but I'm telling you right now. I've got friends in 43 countries. This year or just in what span of time? Already in six months.

Okay. Yeah. Already in six months. I have 43 friends in 43 countries and in government places. They've got data already that they don't want to share yet. Suicide has doubled. Depression has doubled. Addiction has doubled.

Most of the abuse that was happening in homes were over some a month when everyone's home. what did COVID now do to that? Listen, I get in a lot of trouble and flack and it's all my stories and I leave it up because I'm so many if I put something out there, I'm not going to take it down. It's out there. I put it out. But my whole thing is like, listen, obviously this is a serious situation that we're dealing with with COVID.

But there's also a lot of other situations that I don't think people are paying attention to, suicide, addiction, abuse, all of these things. And it's like, we want to believe as a population that it's like all of these things are isolated to one thing, but everything has a ripple effect. And when you make one decision, many other things are impacted. And so I'm glad you're speaking on this because it's not that we have to stop doing one thing. It's that we have to also be aware of what that one thing potentially causes. Exactly.

And whether that's from some organization that makes a blanket rule about something or, I mean, just one example. I can look you straight in the eye and tell you some massive, massive organizations in the billions have told me that child poverty has now already in three months gone backwards 10 to 20 years. He's like, we're back in the 90s now. Like, it's sad. And so what I mean with all that is you, yes, going away from the negative, but finding how you can help rescue one of those 30 million sex slaves, right?

And doing what you can to really check in on your friend, not just text, call him. How are you doing? And actually overcome your fear of inadequacy thinking that, oh, what am I going to say? How am I going to encourage them? They're going through the same thing. put that aside and say, no, how are you? Because I'm just want to say this before, before, this is really important for everyone to understand. What you see is what you get with me. I've got nothing up my sleeves. This motivational speaker that's gone around the world and

spoken to 9.5 million people face to face, a billion people in China on TV, billion people on TV outside of China. I was on the floor myself, March, April. I had a numb mind for four weeks, two weeks of panic attacks. My business for-profit, non-profits fine. For-profit business went to zero in January. I watched the world news. On the third week of January, I email my family, buy your masks now. It's going to be gold and stock up on food. Because I see things coming before the media comes here. And so even with that, everything went to zero. And I'm the one who talks about motivation and hope. And September may be the first month on my for profit that I've actually stopped losing money. And I still haven't paid myself. Yeah. And I honestly think. And it's hard for anyone.

That story though, and this is what I want people to hear is like, you're maybe and that's good. It's starting to see profit. But like there's a lot of business that still are not in that position and not even close. And maybe never coming back. And maybe never coming back. And that is all difficult. My mom's sister lost an aunt to COVID. three weeks ago. Okay. She was fresh. She was nursing home and but but the bottom line is this. 2020 has been really rough. Yeah. And even the strongest of us were on the floor. And so I just want everyone to know take one day at a time. You have hope. You have value. You're not valued on what plan you think you had. Your success of whatever you, you are irreplaceable. You are beautiful and you're loved and

you're here for a reason for such a time as this to still make a difference in someone else's life. And with that instigation of purpose, say, okay, of the crap that's going on in the world, of the people that I know, how can I try to do something small? I mean, look what the janitor did for me. I don't think you realize, too, how powerful it is that you're having these conversations about suicide and online bullying because my mom committed suicide when I was 18 and no one talked about it. And so I was, and I was telling him this the other day. I'm 18. I'm sitting there and like, it was taboo. No one wanted to talk about what happened or anything. And so I was sitting there alone. So these conversations to me are so progressive and so important to have because there

are so many people struggling with people that have lost people from suicide or they're struggling with themselves. Yes. I think that it needs to keep opening up and it shouldn't be so taboo. I 100% agree. A hundred percent agree. And I feel like the next generation, though, will look at me. Can you imagine this visual? I heard someone on a TEDx video. I didn't watch the video, but someone said, can you imagine in 25 years your own kids looking at you and crying?

How could you ever let that happen to all those 30 million slaves for so long? How could you not do everything you can that if we can't help Africa, can we teach Africa? how to be financially sustainable and actually get that food out somehow through education and all this. To me, it's like, it's not a burdensome thing. It's like, how can I really do everything I can where I understand that the world will always have problems, but my place in this world, I want to make this world a better place. And what I think COVID has done is it made us have a deeper conversation with a, ourselves that we haven't had. Yes, it has to a lot. Yes, of course. It's had and we have to,

there's a lot of people that are forced to look inward now because we've lost a lot of our external, you know, vices, right? We're just, we're sitting at home. We're alone. Many of us are isolated. Luckily, you know, Lauren and I get to have these conversations with people like you and we're at home together. But there's, there's many of us that are at home and they don't get to get into the workplace and they don't get to be social and they don't have a partner. And I empathize with those people because it's in a painful place. Lauren and I have been like, you know, Lauren for longer than me, but in a, let's say, a public space for a long time. And I've watched this space over the years. Like, I've never, I've never engaged in the last five years in a space that's been more negative.

And I think it's because there's, it's not because people are negative people. It's because they're in a pained place. They're in pain. And I get that. It comes, but like, if we can, if we can have conversations that say, hey, like, let us help you lift you out of your pain and figure it and show you a way out. Like, that's ultimately what I want to be a part of. Let's talk about one of my personal favorite subjects, my sheets. Brooklinen, been using Brooklinen sheets forever, okay? Why I like them is I change them out depending on the season. So right now we have these beautiful linen sheets.

They're white, they're crisp, they remind me of shutters, Santa Monica. They're just very good vibes. I think when we go into November, I'll probably switch them back to my cotton sheets. sheets, but regardless, Brooklinen really, really does have the internet's favorite sheets, I'm telling you. Just to give you a little background, Brooklyn was the first direct-to-consumer betting company. They worked directly with manufacturers and directly with customers. There's no middleman. It's all luxury products without the luxury markup, which is why we wanted to partner with them on the podcast. They have a variety of sheets, color patterns and materials for all

your lounging needs. Think linen, lux, cashmere, they're cool, they're crisp. Most importantly, though, they're timeless. They're nothing crazy. They're just very classic, beautiful sheets. What we did was we got the bundle sheets and the betting big, so you save bigger. This includes a duvet, a sheet set, and extra pillowcases. We need extra pillowcases. Michael and I like a lot of pillows. You should also know before you order that there's over 50,000 five-star reviews on these sheets. They are the shit, okay? Brooklyn and sheets are the perfect place to start making your mornings great. Brooklinen is so confident in their product that all their betting comes with a light. lifetime warranty. Get 10% off your first order and free shipping when you use promo code skinny only at brooklinen.com. Brooklyn and everything you need to live your most comfortable life. And check out those linen sheets, I'm telling you. It's awesome. So let's do that right now. I'm going to unpack it four or five steps. Here we go. So number one, right, when you are just on the floor, and this is not just now, like we're talking about 48-year-old women who are watching this right now or listening to us, who are still disabled and handicapped by what their father told them when they were

nine years old. I tell teenagers all the time, I believe it's worse being a broken home than having no arms, no legs. It's not about the face of adversity. It's about the actual how you deal with adversity. And so believing that beautiful things can come from broken pieces still, that's hard to believe. But here are some steps to help you on that way. Number one is embrace what you feel. I think one of the biggest struggles when we're in pain is just trying to oppress that yuck. and then how to get unstuck of the yuck. But when my parents saw me, same thing. They had to go through shock.

They had to go through grief. They had to go through confusion. They had to go through all these things. And then, number one, so not oppressing and dealing with that. So if that means journaling, if that means talking to somebody, if that means you can't even pray for yourself spiritually, ask someone to back you up spiritually and pray for you. I believe all that's very important. But to deal with those emotions somehow eventually in that hand in hand, step number two is to give

yourself time. Time. Time is your friend. But there is a time where your spirit awakens and says, I am sick of being on this couch, eating potato chips and being addicted to this and this and pornography and all that. And I've lost my job and I don't even know where to begin now. How do I even begin to have confidence to even start drafting my resume for hopefully another job that I don't know even exist or not for me. How do you do that? You give yourself time and then you listen to skinny confidential and a guy without arms and legs tells you, get up off your butt, go get up, stop that, you know, potato chip addiction and pornographic addiction. You're better than that. Get up and don't play the victim card. Great. We're all victims in this, but the people who understand how to make the

world, the best place we could be are those who don't play the victim card and say, I'm going to do everything I can. So step number three. Can we distinguish between that we, I agree, we are all victims, but then there is playing the victim card. Can we talk about that a little bit? Because I think there's, there's a distinction there to be made. Because it's not, it's not saying that we're not all, like, that we're not all going through a really shitty year. But it's also saying like there's a choice you have there. Yeah. And there's a time where you can cry. There's a time you can be depressed. There's a time where you blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But you can't stay there. because who couldn't play the victim card?

The 13 children, me and my wife's sponsor in Africa and Mexico, talk about a victim card. The person down the street who was sexually abused by her whatever, play a victim card. But it's when you actually intentionally feed your spirit and your soul and your mind with inspiration. What are you feeding your mind that either makes you comfortable, there that you never will get out of that dark room. Feed your mind with stuff like this that you can say, wow, that's an amazing story. Ed Milette, Lauren, Michael, people who are actually like,

you all could have, you know, everyone's got something, but you actually realize it's not about what you dealt, it's how you deal with it. And where you realize that if you are sexually abused, it's not the end of your life if your mom does commit suicide at 18 it's not the end of your life if your business fails and your dreams change or go away you're more valuable than a dream or success or this or that

you 10 years 20 years from now can find someone else who is 18 whose mom just committed suicide and you can say my mom did too but this is my husband this is my child and this is our life my name's Lauren and I want you to know I'm with you you're not alone same thing like when I met someone with no arms and no legs and his parents you know found a lot of hope just meeting my parents can you imagine that was probably

powerful wow it was beat yeah like I could die after that moment and be absolutely happy after that. But little did I know that anyway. So that's that. So that's when the victim card, what are you feeding yourself? What are you allowing yourself to get fat on in your mind? Right? There's fat in the right? And that's unhealthy when it's overboard. Same thing with the mind. And also I think too, I like to take inventory of what I'm feeding my mind. Like I actually like to dissect. Okay. Like is this content serving? me, you know, and whether that's replacing a gossip podcast with something that is really educational or an audible book or something that's going to expand my mind. I think it's important to really

examine what you're looking at, like not scrolling through Instagram. No, I think like that. I mean, there's a, I mean, I think, you know, there's a, there's a time in a place to feel those feelings, but then there's a time, like you said, to pull yourself out of those feelings and get back on the horse for lack of better analogy. And to give yourself a chance if you cannot get out of it, that someone then comes in your life where you're actually open and listening and you're not in this little bubble that's watching the news and being terrified and handicapped with fear. Yes.

I mean, and the content that we consume right now in the news, like that's a whole other store. We could do a whole other tangent. But I just, but I, but I, but I, a hundred percent agree with you. I mean, like, and that's why I wanted to make the distinction because it's not like, we never say people aren't victims. Why, we say, actually, everybody's a victim to some degree of something, but it's like, what do you do with that after? So, imagine this.

This is really cool, actually. I've never thought of this before, but just here. At the end of your day, we almost do a subconscious, conscious without knowing, kind of like an update of the day. Before you go to bed, what changed from yesterday? Nah, you still suck. You still, you're still a failure. Yeah, you're nothing. Yeah, you failed and you'll never.

Don't let that news go into you. No, oh, something happened. I heard about blah, blah, blah, that was inspiring. I read a book. You know, I mean, entrepreneurs understand that like me. I've lost my money twice already. Last one was 2011. And those who really become successful understand that money comes and goes.

And feelings and depression are real. So when you own it, you embrace it, you deal with it from a healthy level. Then you give yourself a chance to go through that time and arc, but then give yourself a chance to get out of it. Yes? You mentioned something, but you said your thoughts. Your thoughts are powerful. Even this morning I woke up with a negative thought

and immediately I was like taking inventory of my thought and I was like, uh-uh, something I'm grateful for, replace it. I think that sometimes we tell ourselves all these narratives and negativity and we need to actually be almost stepping outside ourselves and looking at our thoughts and saying how are our thoughts actually affecting our day to day? Absolutely. And that's the reframing. You hold captive that thought, take that negative thing out, put in something positive.

So I actually grew up learning how to reframe. And so when I wanted something on the shelf really, really badly, and my mom said, no, get it yourself. Without her knowing if it was impossible or not, I then found the dignity and found the courage because of my desire to look at something as an obstacle, as an opportunity instead to know, well, what else is possible? Because I don't know what's impossible until I know what's possible. Most of everything I've ever done without arms and legs is already been broken as a myth of impossible, right? It's impossible that I have an incredible wife that I have. And I don't have hands or hold her hand, but I realize, you know, I don't need to hold a hand.

I can hold her heart. It's beautiful and amazing miraculous that when my kids are crying, I can't put my arms around them, but I realize they can put their arms around me. It's miraculous to understand that there are many things that other able body people can do. But man, there are some things that other able body can do that could never do what I do. And taking that inventory and trying and reframing that, that this is not just all negative. This is an awakening. This is an obstacle that would maybe bring one of the greatest opportunities in your life, whether it's in business or family. Do you know how many families are breaking right now? I mean, you know, through the roof, right? Through the roof because we're facing the music.

But at the same time, there are other families who are seeing this as an opportunity to give their marriage another chance. There are parents who are giving their friendship with their children another chance because they're home and they're with them and they realize, oh my gosh, I didn't even know you. And some people make that decision to say, I want to try hard to have what we once have. Lauren's been, you know, we just had our first child and she's been a little postpartum this year. We've talked about it on the show a lot and she was, you know, in a, I don't want to say negative headspace, but she was, you know, she was struggling with postpartum. And I kept reinforcing or like, because this year's been tough on everybody.

It's been, like, if you look at what's happening to businesses and what's happening with deaths and, like, all in the election, it's all crazy. But I keep reinforcing, like, this is the best year in my life. And people, like, maybe sometimes don't like to hear about it. My framework is this. I had my first child this year. I get to spend all this time with her that I would never have got to spend because two weeks into this, she was born in January.

I went right back to work. This, the lockdown forced me to be home with my wife. And your dogs. We had a dog. We have dogs. Like, I've got to spend time with them. But, like, I realized, like, holy shit, I would have never have. had these first eight months with my daughter, first daughter, if this didn't happen. And so I just

keep going through with the framework of that. And it motivates me. And I think, you know, sometimes people don't like to hear that because like they say, oh, you're just this eternal optimist. It's like, no, it's not that. It's just that the other frame of reference would be me saying like, oh, man, this is terrible. I hate being home with my kid. I'm bringing that energy to her. I don't like being home with my wife. Business is tough. Like, you know, revenue for this, like for everything we're doing. Went into the shit. Like, it's course. It happened to everybody. But I still think like this is, and I keep saying this, the best year of my life for so many other reasons, even though the world's in a ton of pain. I just don't want to acknowledge that it's negative all the time.

I want to acknowledge that it's also very positive. Exactly. So actually, you've been reading my notes or my palm cards. The third thing is about the attitude of gratitude. And this year sucked so bad that for the very first time in my whole life, not only was I thankful for what I had. I actually, it was so hard that I had to say, Nick, do you remember this variable and that variable which really could have gone even worse? So when it gets really tough, if you have to even bring in what did go bad, but really could have gone way worse. I've actually had to do

that. And then fourthly, is doing everything you can. So I want to also give credit to Lewis Howell. and Ed Milet because those were the two people that I happened to be on their podcast as my plane, me, I mean, going straight into the ground. Those are two good people to be surrounded by during tough times. Amazing people, you're kidding me? And they inspire me like, yeah, Nick, just do a podcast. Just start from scratch. You know, just don't.

And those were the two people that I could pick brains on and have wisdom. And they inspired me to get it done. I did it 24 weeks ago. Is it where I thought it could be? No. Do I even know exactly what I'm about? No. but I had to do everything I can to then know what is in my control and what is not in my control.

Therein as a vicious visionary entrepreneur, I can go to sleep, knowing I've done everything that I can. Because in so much uncertainty, no one's going to tell me what's really going to go on more than I can actually do. So when you hustle and you do everything you can and then you accept what results that is and then accept what you can't, change. Now you're going to be on that path and back up on that horse. How did you get to that place, though? Because I think that's, I have 100% agree, focusing on what's in your control and not thinking about what's not. Because if you've done everything you possibly can, like, the reason you can sleep well is because there's nothing else to do, right? Like, that's it. But how did you get to that place being able to accept, you

know, your fate, what's in your control, what's not, and how much work to take you to get? There's, I think a lot of people listen are like, oh, easy to just say that. But like, what are the tactics to actually snap into that. So for me, from a personal point, I couldn't do it without my faith in God, believing that up until now age 37, that when I did not have strength, it was wonderful and humbling to admit I need him. And because I have that, I have unlimited understanding on the fact that I know very little and I can do very little compared to who he is in my opinion and my belief. so I'm not alone.

And then you go back to the most desirable things in your life that you still have. I have my wife. We have a bed. We have a house. We have children. We have food on the table. I'm so thankful for life where we were so distracted and even subconsciously already going to some... All success is not good.

Because from a mental health point of view, you reframe. again, your self-awareness and self-value because of who you think the world thinks of you, or what you think you've achieved, or how much money you have in the bank. And when that's taken away, or even a rhythm or this or that, when that's taken away, we realize how fragile we really are as human beings. And that's when people start looking inwardly with the spirit and soul, but really be thankful and hold on to, I'm going to take one day at a time. I know I don't feel yet what I want to feel. I don't feel strong. Dude, I'm looking you're strong. straight in the eye. My first good day of 2020 was six weeks ago.

You have no idea. And we're in September. And we're in September. Like, I've had a really rough time. But I came alive because finally, some things are slowly coming together and the holes in the boat are being plugged. And what I love about this is the greatest revolutions emberthing in the corporate world of multi-multy billion dollar companies most of them always came from a massive crisis or solving a problem there's this book by ryan holiday that i've been reading this entire year and i just keep opening a page have you ever connected with him no i haven't you should he i think you guys would get along yeah is he in dallas or austin he's in austin he's not far um i think maybe we can all go have a drink are they close or no it sounds great

I'd love to have a scotch with you guys I would love to have a scotch with you I don't fucking drink scotch but I would love to have a scotch with you I drink a lot of scotch I like tequila there's this book that he wrote called The Obstacle is the Way

and it's so fucking relevant for right now I mean it's just you open a page and it's everything you're saying it's like you have to go through it awesome with crisis comes great opportunity I love that

can I just say one-off thing because on a personal note family was everything If I'm not belittling the pain, I'm not belittling the suffering, I'm not belitting all the stuff going on in 2020. But from my personal point of view, one of the other things that I was thankful for that could have gone even worse was that COVID did not come that I would have continued thinking one day I'm going to slow down to be at home full time. That was my next question, which was you've spoken about your wife a lot. Yeah, I love. Oh my God. You would you. You want me as a guest. No one even knows her story in full yet because her- Tell her to come on with you. We'll do a him and her show. Done. Okay. We're back in November if you want.

I'm sure. And we can come out there. We come out there. No, we want to go out there. Sick. We're coming out there in October. We used to do like a traveling road show here. Really? Yeah, we did. That's how like this whole thing got started. Head sets and going on the country. Done. Can we have a scotch while we do an interview with you and your wife? I don't know if she drinks scotch. She can have tequila. And I have no problem. We try and make sure that no video of me has alcohol there, but we can just pretend it's apple juice and no one here just understands that.

You want some apple juice? Yeah, we can just say it's apple juice. It's hilarious. Put it in one of those little like apple juice containers that we used to drink. Oh, we love a little apple juice container with you. Taylor has one back there. I don't know what Taylor's doing back there. Your wife seems like she's someone that you go to as a source.

of calmness from how you've talked about her. Can you just speak on your relationship and how that's helped you in 2020? You're spot on. You're spot on. So I met her in 2010 in Texas first. It was love at first sight, couldn't feel my legs. And we got married 2012 in 2011. Oh, that's fast. Yeah. So we, well, for us, we felt it was great. We dated for 12 months, six months engagement. But we met six months prior or three or four months before we started dating. And get it done, man. That's what he says. Get it done.

Yeah, what are you guys waiting for? Get it done. You think you're going to get better? You took way too long. I got it done. I'm in. I made it take it too long, but I made it take it too long. Yeah, you took.

You were young, but I'll give you that. I love this. So, anyway, so was it love at first sight for her too? You guys saw each other and it was immediate. Okay. So 48 hours before we met at the gig where we did fall in love, Her and her sister came to the house that I was at, my friend's house. And no, that first meeting was not love at first sight.

But oh my gosh, when we did meet at that gig where we were all, you know, finally dressed up and I had my fine shoes on and everything. She came up. She looked at me. I looked at her. It was done. But she actually had a boyfriend at the time, which was very interesting. And then when I asked later, are you marrying him? She's like, no, I'm not marrying him.

like then why are you with him? And she explained this very long story. Now, quick story straight up, that guy's happily married with kids. But, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, you can ask us all about that when you interview us. But let me just tell you why I bring up pre-married or experiences about her calmness and strength is when we dated 35 days into our dating. I lost all my money. And I had panic attacks for 30 days straight. I couldn't talk. to anybody. And finally I could talk to us, I said, babe, I lost all my money.

She's, don't worry. I'll get a nursing job and support the both of us. Who is this woman? Is the woman I'm going to marry? And for me, it was really important that her family would accept me because my previous relationship, her family didn't accept me.

And they didn't accept you for what reasons? I wasn't the ideal Prince Charming for that family. Okay. Oh, that's, and you know what that makes me want to do that throw-up emoji? You know the emoji with like throw-up coming out, projectile? I know. But I still love them all. They might be watching.

The bottom line is she has this strength. She's half Japanese, half Mexican. We call that Japsican. And she's five years younger than me, but she's lived already two lifetimes of pain and grief and struggle and all that. Incredible woman. And she inspires a lot of them. We have a book called Love Without Limits. You can buy it on Amazon.

I've authored five books and one of them is love without limits. And so our story is all there, buy on Amazon, whatever. But she, when I went through this, she doesn't talk to me because she knows, I internalize things. She prays, she'll look at me, she'll hug me, she'll hold me if I'm crying, which she has done before. But I just know that she's just, she's with me. she stands by me no matter what stands by me and so even through this pre-covid november 13th there was some things that was happening in my minds and heart my spirit about moving out of california never thought i'd move out of california ever in my life and when she got evacuated in that last

november fire that was the last straw that broke the camel's bat and like we're moving now we're going sold the house during covid very thankful and we were in the dallas for Fort Worth area. And because her family's there as well, she's now got her, you know, deeper, meaningful, if you will, childhood friendship with her sister and her mother's there and everything. So she is strong. Let's see how that worked out. She was there for you and then it seems like you were there for her when she wanted to move. And we feel amazingly surprised that I don't miss California for a minute. My nonprofit, sorry, my nonprofit, our nonprofit ministry, Life Without Limbs is still headquartered here. But as much as California was in my blood, I am nervous about the future of

California that is a little bit more spiked than some other states that are not doing what some things are happening here are happening, if that makes sense. Yeah, California is a shit show. What do you think the trick to parenting is? You have four. What's the tricks? I love that. I love that. I really liked what you said about how you can't give them everything. I think that that's so important. I think it is too. Yes. So our boy, he earns money and he buys what he wants. He just made up his own business plan for the next 40 days and how his goal is and because we're making a cubby house above his room in the attic and he wants to chip in. You need to bring up your four children four different ways. You need to spend time with each child alone. Just like I spend time with my wife alone.

And you need to be friends with your children and your wife. And so one of the marital, beautiful things that me and my wife do is we ask each other every 30 days, babe, what am I doing well that you want me to keep on doing? What am I doing that you want me to stop doing? Oh, my God, I'm doing this with Michael. We're starting today. Talking to the mic if you're going to do it. That's what I want you to do.

And then what am I not doing that you want me to start doing? Like biggest companies in the world, they can only change three things a year. What if you could ask your spouse every 30 days, those questions? Because if you really care, if you really care, it's either your pride or ego that's getting in the way. And it's a great way to break down your pride and ego when you hear your spouse say, yeah, you really suck at that. Like you just, you're going to have, you don't have a clue. every time you do that it pisses me off

so bad and you're like oh I had no idea I'm gonna give just one little one just little ones that are like little like why do you have to slam the drawer when you get your boxers out of it I want to know

I want to go into the world with that energy every time you slam the drawer in the morning to get your boxers out I'm like let me ask you this learn okay would you like me to interview guys

I'll be here, guys. Lauren, let me ask me this one. I love it. I don't know if you go through this. Why do you need to get a spray tan like a paint booth and then get into the sheets and have the sheets look like a murder scene? I'm trying to look good for you. There's a little thing. You want to go through a therapy session here?

I love, I'm ready. Listen, we're ready. No, we'll come to Texas. We can do that then with your wife. You guys can give us a therapy. And you know, I still want to get to your fifth thing. Oh, yeah. Of the ways to get out.

Yes. Absolutely. I don't want to cut you up on here. We can always get to it. But I do. I am interested in number five. I love that you actually brought it up. I'm going to be OCD about the list and be like, I need to, I can't, we can't leave it unfinished. I can't wait to see you guys in Texas and just chill. It's going to be fun. Look, I'm going to say for the audience here, number five, I think is really, really important. I'll morph it the way that I think is perfect for this audience is take one day at a time and don't be an enemy to yourself. I think people themselves are their greatest limited factor.

And it's that mindset. And it's that wanting to live, wanting to love yourself, and wanting to believe that you are here for a greater purpose. And one of the ways that I did that as a teenager when I was going through hell in school, I put a photo of an orphan on my mirror that every time I look myself in the mirror to see how good looking I am. and if I grew an inch taller or not, that smile of that orphan held me through. And it was more meaningful to tell myself religiously,

I am one day closer to helping that one kid. Didn't know who that kid was. But I knew that if I could just get through my life and just help one other person not feel what I'm feeling, and I can help one other person not commit so, I don't care who they are. I don't care what race, religion, sexual orientation, we all have value. We may not all agree on many things, but what we do understand is that every single person is valuable. And to give yourself a chance is the biggest decision you'll ever make in your life.

Because people can believe in you, but you need to believe that there are broken people. that can still be mended together in a beautiful way. What are some micro things that you do in your marriage that you think make a big difference overall? I actually feel what's beautiful is that she has time with her friends without me and I have time with my friend or friends without her. I think that's really important. It is really important.

It's actually more important than most visionary entrepreneurs believe because we get used to being alone at the top. and going 400 miles an hour many people don't translate that and understand that but it's not about what you do entrepreneur same thing with my wife there are things that her friends will understand and she'll be able to feel comfortable to tell them that's that's going to encourage her or them so i think you're having friendships outside of that marriage it's number one no like real like freaking you know same-sex you know friendships not you know I don't have my wife talk to another guy, right?

Just make that clear. Don't be getting any ideas, Lauren. Don't do that, Lauren. Don't do that, Lauren. Now, am I that husband? I'm not that husband, but you know what I mean. Number two is we go out on dates once a week without the kids religiously. And sometimes it's two hours and sometimes it's six.

Sometimes it's for the whole day. Sometimes it's a two, three day trip without the kids. It's time together. It's not interacting in the day. It's setting time together. And so I think the third one is really asking her, how you feeling? And having those religious things, like one of the things I do well that I keep on doing is she just got flowers today. Saying, I'm coming home.

Coming home soon, babe. Or you're looking beautiful. Just to make a smile. I text her every day. I love you. You're beautiful. She texts me. so thankful to God for you, you know.

And that just makes everything okay. Even when it's not okay, we know we're in it together, no matter what. And how long have you guys been married for now? Eight. Years. And are you done for kids or you want more? Biologically, we're done. We made sure the factory's closed.

The factory's closed. You got the snip? I didn't. She did. Yeah. How does she get a snip? Well, she had a C-section with the twins. I'm saying, babe, you're.

You know, you're under the knife anyway. Oh my God. Manipulation. It is not manipulation. Wait, what do they do? I didn't know that the girl can get the snip. What do they do? They rip out the ovaries.

Oh, come on. And I got the doctor. After four kids. Yes. But I mean, think, I mean, that's right there. Not doing it. Lauren. I will do it.

I'm saying this on this podcast. I will not do that just despite you. She was having a C-section. You understand that? Nope. She's got a weird. version of wanting to me to get snipped at some point. I want him. I want to watch it. I will never get snipped. No. I don't, yeah. It freaks me. Sniffy snip. And I'm thankful we had C-section for her.

I squeezed a baby out of my vagina. You can get your balls sniffed. No, but we'll tackle one at time. We're not going to tackle one at a time. Listen, God willing, we still, we still have a few more kids in this is the first one. But yeah, I mean, that that's something that also keeps you up in end of that snippet. But we were so fertile, just, you know, not much more information than that. But it didn't, you know, by God's grace, we were able to conceive pretty easily. I got the doctor to hold up the ovaries across the room to show me, not the ovaries, but the tubes, you know, whatever. Like, good, four inches. You know, not just sniffing, not just. We do, though, we do want to foster and adopt one day, for sure. We want to go heavy. Like, one of those things, like going

back to the beginning of this conversation, like, how else other people are suffering? Oh, my gosh, the foster care system needs help. Yeah. We've never had anyone speak on that on the podcast. I would love to know more about that. Okay, you need to then interview a woman called Lindsay Impact at Lindsay Hadley from Hadley Impact. I would love to. Oh my gosh. You know, you know her?

Yeah, no, I was with her in Salt Lake City like 36 hours ago. We'd love to interview her. We had breakfast. She has this meta campaign going that is worldwide to help. Oh, my God. If she just knew that right now, she would be. Lindsay, open invite on the show. Bowling her eyes out.

Like, bawling her eyes. I'm like so emotional right now. Oh my gosh. I got goosebumps all over me. 100% we'll do it if we get the introduction. So we met on a panel, of course, in Europe. And I said, they asked me, what are you passionate about? And I wasn't supposed to be talking about God or Christianity.

And I didn't. But I did mention that it hurts me that we have 100,000 churches in America that represent $480 billion for buildings in churches that are now empty. I've been saying this though for years before COVID. And we have 425,000 children waiting on a waiting list to get somewhere. To be in a foster home and 111,000 children waiting for adoption. And so she's got this amazing meta campaign called orphan myth. Orphan myth.

Orphan myth. Yeah. It's coming out in November, 20,000. And I'm an ambassador just to help get the word out. And they're trying to fundraise just for the last seed money. Bro, she is a mover, shaker. She was the one in 2011 that helped match the 118. And she's still doing fundraising?

Well, listen, all you rich motherfuckers that listen to this show, go in and look into this organization. It's a good thing to do. Just got to Hadleyimpact.com. She helped match Bill Gates, $118 million fundraise concert in Australia. for polio. Yeah, I'm gonna, she is a mover and a shaker. She would,

you would love her. Yeah. Great. Done. I can't wait. You know, like there's something we talk about all the time on this show.

Like if like this show can potentially have someone like her on and open people's eyes and also in taking it a step further, potentially have people help her with that organization. Like I'm in 100%. And it's not that hard. Like if a hundred, I'm not asking 100 families to consider fostering adopting.

The people already got one or two, foster or adopted kids. Let's help them and resort. them and surround them with a hundred families that help tuition for their kids, that help with free babysitting for their marriage that they can go out on a date and go from one or two foster kids to five or six. And so one of the greatest inspirations was my previous employee for five years. He was my caregiver, Peter.

Him and his wife have had 27 foster kids here in Southern California in a span of, I don't know, seven years and their first experience was three sisters who eventually they came in there was their first foster children and eventually they said hey let's take a photo together and the four-year-old said okay four-year-old goes to the bathroom gets naked down to her underpants comes back up and says I'm ready for my photo oh what the fuck why why because she was in the porn what do you mean that's Probably she's been trained when someone says, let's take a photo. Someone trained her to take her clothes off. Oh, that makes me so fucking angry.

This is a serious, serious problem. If you want to unpackage that, that's a whole, I'll tell you, I'll even pay you to have me back on to talk about foster care here in America. But Lindsay, Lindsay is the one that she would tell you what's going on, but maybe, but he's the point. Now, this thing deserves a whole dedicated episode. Yeah. Good on you, bro.

Good on you. I'm proud of you to even think of that because there's not enough people talking about it yet. Well, it seems like there's a lot of powerful people trying to silence this subject. Yeah, but it is a whole different podcast, meaning like, we'll do it. And to come from, again, come from a point of view, you see the negative, see where your positiveness then comes in against the negative. And not on like, oh, yeah, I agree or this or that, blah, blah, blah. do something for someone who can't even help themselves today. But it goes back to what we were saying earlier about suicide. If no one talks about it, then it's just like this underground subject that's taboo that makes

people feel alone. It sounds like it's the same thing right now is happening with sex trafficking. And it sounds like in the foster, I didn't know anything about this until you just brought that up. Makes total sense. Yep. It sounds like... Oh, if you knew the percentage of how many people

the government makes money in prison because of the people who are in prison and then the percentage of those people who are in prison for something they're wrong there's a massive majority who are actually raised and graduated out of the foster care system. If you just look, that's why it's 40 grand

to pay the government out to adopt a kid. How does the foster care... Which doesn't seem right at all that if you want to do something like that and help a child that you have to pay 40,000 to be able to do that. That's fucked up. You should be giving them $40,000. Thank you so much for helping them out.

The government should be incentivizing people to help other people and turn them into citizens that could potentially be productive later. We got a lot to talk about. Anyway, sorry I interrupted you. No, what are the tangible steps that we can take in the foster care system to make it better? Like, where do you even start to unpack everything that's wrong? Let me just say one thing that's really important that you said that's really important that might save a life.

Here's a practical way of understanding how to put this in action when Lauren says you're not alone. Tell someone that you're thinking of committing suicide and not just a friend or call a suicide hotline right now, but talk to a friend and say, hey, I've been thinking or I've been slit in my wrist or these are the drugs that I was going to swallow tonight. But Nick Voyichichich, Lauren and Michael, they said, instead of that, it might be hope for me. can you help be my friend through this? That's when someone knows that they got to do something different for then you to feel that you're not alone. No one's going to know if you're alone until you tell them you're alone. So the kids need to start talking about it.

Talk. And not only, I also think not only the kids, the kids who are adults now that have been in the system and experienced it, they have to start telling their stories and talking about it. Right. Exactly. And if you look at, I'm very into addiction memoirs. I'm very interested in them. And I think that addiction has been like, it's not taboo anymore. People talk about it now. And now more people are getting help. There's more people in AA. Before it was like the secret society that you couldn't tell anyone.

The more people talk about something, the more the stigma goes away. But we just got to make sure that someone's going to teach them the right principles and values and attitudes, which is why we're very excited about the social emotional learning curriculum that AIA attitude is altitude has actually made for school systems. So right now we're brokering school systems around the world and some school districts in America, 90 schools in America already, have Nick Voyichich videos, curriculum, self-awareness, all these principles and values to help walk through somebody in believing that they're valuable. Fucking genius.

I'm so thankful. I'm so thankful. So you've got to have like a holistic point of view. fostering the other question really look up hadley impact dot com ask them about more orphan myth they're they've actually raised 750 of a million they all all they need is not 250 i'm an ambassador of them and i i told them i don't want to get paid i just want to help yeah taylor can we include the link in in our show notes like i said i mean if you want to set that up we'll do it when the tide rises when the tide rises all boats rise okay and that's the impact that she's doing

Because I have a lot of Christian friends and influential, she's asked me, Nick, can you help us encourage the church to do what the Bible says? I'm like, absolutely, that's what I'm supposed to do 100% and then talk about pro life in 2021. Well, listen, man, I'm really glad we got to do this. I'm so thankful you came on this call. And we'll do it again. I mean, what we try to do with this audience is introduce people to, you know, inspiring characters like yourself and people that have a message and then, you know, really get a frame of reference. then keep the conversation going. I mean, that's why I love this medium.

And this is for everyone. This is not just if you're Christian or not. This is like everyone. So she just asked me, hey, can you, because you have some friends, some influential networks,

can you help us with this part? I'm like absolutely. Yeah, if this can be a helpful mouthpiece, like I said, open invite. Let me know how I can help you guys, because you guys is so nice.

I would love to share on my stories, what you're talking about when this comes out. I'm going to get your number. And then if we go, we are going to Texas. I think we'd love to interview you and your wife again. I mean, I feel like there's there are so many facets that we like just generally went over that I would have loved to like dive into of this conversation. It's awesome. Can you leave our audience with a book

or resource that you would recommend? For where, whoever you're at right now with 2020 out of the five books that I would recommend you to purchase is called life without limits. Life without limits. and I published it in 2010. I'm now just about to write another book on Attitude and All That. It doesn't matter about that. But the bottom line is, if you want also weekly information from me, go to YouTube.com slash Nick Voyagechich. It's where the videos of my podcast, Nick Voyage Podcast, which is also on all the other platforms

in audio. What's a podcast called just so we can look it out? Nick Voyage Podcast. Okay, cool. Yeah, the Nick Voyage podcast. So, yeah, we're so thankful for where we're at and not because of it. of the quantity or the numbers, it's about finding the new reset. I mean, can you imagine where I'm at 37 years old? I'm actually at one of the best times of my life now. But six weeks ago, remember,

even this guy needed some time. That is impactful right now because you feel like your life is over one day and then five days later, two weeks later, six weeks later, you can see the light. Time is on your side. What's your Instagram handle and what can they expect? from your content there. Nick Voyage, N-I-C-V-U-J-I-C-I-C. I've got 9 million Facebook fans. I've got 1.6 million Instagram fans. I did one video and whatever. TikTok got 2 million just because I wanted to make people laugh. But I'll tell you this. I'm trying to still figure out how I use those things. So are we? Especially 2020. So what can you expect? I'm not really posting up my children anymore at all. That's for sure. There's a lot there. And then I'm going to

to try and just motivate people, inspire people. So Monday is motivational Monday on my podcast, which will then be put on YouTube and Instagram and Facebook. Wednesday, I have a leadership executive leadership podcast every Wednesday called Leadership Now. And Fridays are going to be financial Fridays. And this is like three months from now. And then Sunday is going to be spiritual Sunday. So whether you need motivation or you need leadership or you want to grow in your financial literacy and investments, which is what I love to help empower people as well, to help themselves. And then spiritual Sunday, if anyone wants to know more about my spiritual life, there'll be some posts that I'll be doing that help people. Because I think it's holistic.

This was one of my favorite episodes. Oh my gosh. It was. I love you. It was. Awesome. There was so much to unpack. I just think so many, there's so many takeaways that I hope this audience will take from this episode. And I think like, you know, what you're doing is, is credible. You're helping a lot of people and like we're just happy to be part of it. I jump on a plane any day you tell me to come out of you. No, we're coming to Texas next. All right. I love you. It's so nice to meet you. We love you. The audience I'm sure is going to love this episode and you're coming back. Awesome. I look forward to our apple juice. Thank you. One lucky giveaway winner will win some rose elemous oil. We will send one of you,

one of my favorite oils on the planet. All you have to do is let us know who you want to hear on the skinny confidential podcast next. You can tag them on my latest at the Skinny Confidential. Thank you guys so much for supporting the co-brand. Elamist times the skinny confidential. Check it out. Elamist.com and on Ulta. And we will see you on Tuesday. This episode is brought to you by Elamis and get excited because it's Elamis times the skinny confidential. That's right, you guys, my first ever co-brand with Elimus, which makes so much sense because you know how much I love skin and I know how much you love skin. Okay, this is a bag that we designed together over the last year. Every detail was designed by me. It's pastel pink. It's a little bit of lilac. It says skinny

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