The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Coronavirus Thoughts

Episode Date: March 13, 2020

Coronavirus Thoughts

Hi folks, Chris Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com, thechrisvossshow.com. You know, I did a show earlier, it's been a rough week for a lot of people, and I decided to put it in the can and recut this baby. Kind of a somber show, if you will. But the show must go on. I was sitting around tonight thinking, God, what can I say? What can I do? I don't even want to do a podcast show right now.

Today was one of the worst days of the stock market, I think, in recent memory, going back to 1987's Black Monday, I think it was. Um, and a lot of my friends saw their retirement savings virtually wiped out today or this week over the course of this week. Um, I saw, uh, about $20,000 in losses from South by West, South by Southwest and NAB show. And, uh, um, well while that's a small drop in the bucket compared to what's probably before us, it's important that the show goes on. And I was thinking about some of the things

that I had been saying throughout the week right before NAB canceled their show, and I was hoping that I was looking at it from the aspect of in this great sort of time of tribulation and living in interesting times gives us a chance to re-evaluate some of our things with our life and what's important

and get back to basics if you would. I remember one of my favorite stories was and I forget the coach. He was a great college basketball coach. Nolton. The name escapes me. He always used to teach his players stick to the basics. He didn't want to know how well you could throw a three pointerpointer from the half court mark he wanted to see you work the tree he wanted to see you do free throws really well

uh he wanted you to master the basics before you try doing all sorts of crazy stuff and still be good at the basics because the basics are the most important part they're the they're the um they're the meal they're not the dessert, if you will. They make all the wheels go round. So this is a dark time for a lot of people. And I think it's only going to get worse. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. But it's also going to be a tough time. And sadly, there are people that are going to have it worse than some of the other ones of us. And most of us don't really know we're going to be on that spectrum. Although 80% of the people do get this virus and live fine with it.

It seems like it's got about a 1% to 2% kill rate. And it's highly contagious. A few things inspired me to recut the summer podcast that I did earlier. And a couple different things that came to mind. My good friend Robert Scoble, he wrote, welcome to insane times. Look for the helpers, be a helper. So I'm going to try and be a helper. I saw that and thought about the choices that I need to take and do and maybe we all need to do that. Maybe we all need to thought about the choices that I need to take and do. And maybe we all need to do that. Maybe we all need to think about the choices.

Are we helping? Are we helping each other or not? Are we lifting each other or not? Because really that's what we've got to do. We're all in this coronavirus pandemic together. And we've all got to work together to lift each other up. My friend Robert Scoville also posted something online. He said, everyone take three breaths, deep breaths.

Living at maximum fear means forgetting to breathe. It's important we don't all panic, that we all don't freak out, that we pace ourselves with what's going on in today's world. But the thing I was reminded of is Queen's, Freddie Mercury's famous song, Right Before You Died, the show must go on. And it occurred to me that I needed to do a show. And so I pumped out the earlier show, which is very, that wasn't too dark, but very somber.

And I thought, I'm not lifting enough. So here we are, the second show. Put the other one in the can and, I don't know, maybe we won't ever have to go back to something like that. But I figured it was more important to lift people up. And then I got thinking about Good Morning Vietnam, you know, the the movie of course with Robin Williams and how you know he kept everyone entertained through dark times

so here we are the Chris Voss show must go on in spite of kind of a rough week but I don't think we've seen the worst of it and I do believe that there are better days ahead for us. I do believe there are better heads for this country, but we are going to have to go through a reckoning of our health care system and how we've kind of let things become what they are. And hopefully we come from it with a new appreciation for life, for each other, for our loved ones, for our elderly,

and we discover what's most important and some of maybe the things that have chased us and that we've been chasing that have taken us down the roads that have gotten us towards what will be our suffering for not making preferably what seem obvious better investments in health care, better choices in our government and competent people to lead our government. And maybe it is time where we take a look at healthcare as being vitally important to everyone. Because certainly with this virus, this will teach us this as we come out of it.

I'm hoping the next election coming up at the end of this year will make everyone realize how important science is, how important healthcare is, how important these things are to all of us because we all sink and fall together. We can't just go, Whoa, you don't have insurance or, Oh, you got cancer, you know, screw you, step over you and don't get in our way. Um, this is a pandemic that's going to teach us that, that we're all important. We're all in this together and we're all in this little boat. And we need to rise up together and build something better. And so hopefully this is something that we achieve after all this madness takes place with the coronavirus, etc., etc. And like I say, there will be probably darker times ahead.

This is probably just the beginning. So breathe and try and focus on how you're going to adapt to this. One of the most important things that I learned in life was, and I learned this the hard way going through many catharsis, cathartic life experiences and moments, is that it's not what's happening to us. It's how we interpret it and react to it. And all you can do with the worst of times is do the best you can do.

And I think it's important for us to all keep focused on. It's all important for us to stay educated, to stay smart and wise, to share with each other and do the best we can and lift each other up. The other thing that's important is to focus on the things that are important in life. Okay. Maybe chasing the cars, the women, the, um, the wall street life, whatever the case may be, you name it, has gotten us off the wayward track. And maybe this is a time to remember that people we love, people we care about are the most important.

Maybe we should spend some more time with them. And maybe those times are more important than some of the other silliness that we've been maybe chasing or taking care of or arguing about over the past little while. I certainly have been spending more time with my family and my dogs in this time and kind of realizing that I wasn't spending quite as much time as I should with them. The coronavirus is going to kind of do that. It's kind of forcing us, if you kind of think about it, to reevaluate our lives. It's going to force us to reevaluate our government, our healthcare system, but it's going to force us to reevaluate our lives. We're going to have to go real close to each other.

We're going to spend time together in locked in homes. Already my friends are seeing their schools close and they're being sent home from their work. So everyone's at home, probably getting on each other's nerves since they're family. But maybe think of it this way. Maybe this is a good thing. Maybe this is an opportunity to get to know your family better, to love your family more,

maybe spend less time on electronic devices, maybe break out the board games maybe spend more time getting to know the people around you and who you love and who you care about I've actually been doing some of that being in Utah taking care of my mom and realizing that she's the last bit of family that I have. And in doing so, I've kind of gained a new appreciation. I've been spending time with her to create new great memories and do some new stuff, maybe get both of us out of our comfort zone and stuff like that. Fortunately, we're going to go spend every week,

we're going to go eat someplace new and different. Now we're gonna go spend every week we're gonna go eat someplace new and different now we're not doing that but you know look at these as times of opportunity the I posted the other day it was the night before I was thinking then I was thinking that NIV might shut down my friends were telling me you just need to start betting on it, Chris. The NAB show. And sure enough, the next morning they shut down, which cost me a boatload of money, but I'm not crying.

That's just the way it is. So I posted the other day this thing from Bobby Kennedy. This is from his Cape Town University speech in June 6th of 1966. It's one of my favorite, favorite speeches. The Ripples of Hope speech, if you will. But there's an excerpt from it. And I posted that on Facebook where Bobby said, Like it or not, we live in interesting times.

There are times of danger and uncertainty, but they are also more open to the creative energy of men than to any other time in history. This is going to be a difficult time, but one of the things that we need to do is look for the opportunity in the darkness, the light, if you will, and search for the light. Think of it as getting locked in a cave, the light, if you will, and search for the light. Think of it as getting locked in a cave for a while, which is dark and scary,

but we've all got to scramble and look for the ways to either improve what we're doing and survive or find ways to get to the exit or when we emerge from the exit to make sure that we don't get in a cave ever again. I wrote something on top of what Bobby said. This is my words from the post. Change that is scary and dark, therein lies the potential to rebuild something better. Our mortality makes bedfellows of us all. The time for change, whether we like it or not, is now upon us.

How we react to it is paramount. In this moment, let us rise to find the opportunities and priorities to build a better world by coming together. These are the times when we find out how mortal we all are and that we're all in this as one humanity. I think it's an important aspect to recognize. This may not be the time for change. This may be the time for action, for education, for vigilance to survive this pandemic as much as we possibly can. It's not a time to panic. Certainly, we know that the majority of people are going to survive this. The economy might get bad. That's fine. I survived the economy crash of 2008, which almost led us to a great depression. I lived through that. There

were plenty of food on the shelves. There's no reason to do crazy buying or thinking that, you know, whatever, if anything, that will contribute to the destabilization of our systems right now we've got just health care primarily to worry about and I think we'll be fine with food and all the different other necessities that we may need I'm mostly worried about having coffee I gotta tell you as long as we keep having coffee I'm gonna be fine but I think it's just a time where we've got to take a look at the aspect of what this is it's scary we need to embrace how scary it is and how and how important it is that we all work together I mean to me I've always worked

from home since 2004 so I've been very lucky that I don't have to go out in the world do things and everything else. But I am missing going out to eat. I got to tell you that much. I'm more concerned about my elderly and two of my sisters in care centers. Fortunately, they've sealed off both their care centers this week. So they do not allow visitors or family to visit anymore, which is probably more hard on us than it is them. My one sister has MS and dementia,

so she's probably not going to be too aware of what's going on. My other sister has cerebral palsy, so she has no idea any of this is going on. And so hopefully they'll be just fine. I'm more worried for them. I don't have a wife and, uh, so that I, hopefully there'll be just fine. I'm more worried for them. Um, I don't have a wife, any kids. If coronavirus decides it wants to come knock me out. Well then great.

Uh, I've lived a wonderful life and I'm just, I've had a good time. I don't, uh, there's nothing I can look back and go, I wish I would have done something, this, that, or the other. I mean, I do think I would fix some things that I did, so I didn't do them, but I lived a good life. I had a good time, and I had a better time than a lot of people, actually, on the planet. So I'm going to go, okay, all right. Um,

but yeah, I worry about people I care about. So anyway, it's, it's, uh, I think it's paramount that we remember what's important. We focus on it. We get back to basics and we go, what's important in my life? What are the most important things? And I'm sure that that's your friends and your family and the people around you that you care about. Um, and this is going to be a time where we're going to get an incredible opportunity to spend more time with each other, locked in our homes, trying not to circulate the coronavirus. And, uh, maybe it's a good opportunity to get to know each other better. Maybe if you're a spouse or a, uh a or a significant other

girlfriend boyfriend you know however that works out for you maybe this is a good time to look that person and go hmm maybe there are things that you discover about this person learn about this person maybe that's a relationship with your kids or your kids to you maybe it's a good time to start spending some quality time. Certainly good excuse. I mean, you can't be like, I could be at work making more money passing around the coronavirus. You're like, Hey, I get some time off. This is kind of cool. I can get paid to stay at home and get to know my kids and have maybe a better relationship with everyone. Although it might work conversely the other way.

I do have to say. So anyway, guys, I just say in parting that I think once we get through this and we will get out the other side, there's always light at the end of the tunnel, and there might be some more darkness to come. And it might seem overwhelming and whatever. And my advice would be pick up the phone and call somebody and we're all in this together. Keep that in mind. If you need to text me, email me, and, uh, you're certainly welcome to call me.

Um, and, uh, if you want to ring me, call me at 702-997-5747. And, yeah, I will tell you that you want to email me or text me before you call because I get like 50 trillion calls a day, and they're all just spam risk, spam risk, spam risk. So I don't even bother answering the phone anymore. I just let it all go. And then I figure anybody who really wants to talk to me we'll leave a message or email or text me it doesn't help that I keep buying websites and every time I do 50,000 companies call me to go we will

hope to build your website from India yep so anyway realize that things happen in life and it's our perception and how we react to them that is most important. And I'm going to be someone who tries to do that. And we're going to try and keep the show going. We're going to try and keep it upbeat, bring you maybe some other things to talk about other than the coronavirus. So we'll talk about, you know, all the different aspects of business and life because life and business will go on. Right now we're just trying to mitigate how hard we overflow the hospitals and people that might pass away if they can't get good health care.

So it's important each of us make a little of a sacrifice, go the extra mile not to so much keep the coronavirus from us getting it. We're all going to probably get it eventually. Um, but to make sure that the people who, uh, it will affect the worst and the most dire can get the help they need and will survive. And I, I would probably impart to you that we don't know who will. I was watching on, um, I was watching on TV today, and the doctor said a bunch of people went to a ski resort in Europe, and the whole group contracted the coronavirus. The guy who's 82 is doing the best on it.

So we don't know who's going to survive and who's not. And like I say, this may be a good time to get to know everybody, your family, love them, care about them, spend some good times together because we don't know what the future is going to hold. And this is probably an example that's going to teach us a very hard lesson of what that means. We kind of live with that every day, but now it's kind of really full frontal in our face. So I think the best thing to do is try and stay as positive as you can, try and stay as healthy as you can. If you're not working out, might be a good time to work out. I'm doing that. And exercise is always a good way to keep the spirits up. If you need to talk to someone, I highly, highly advise that feel free to make a call,

call your friends, call whoever, Talk to them on the phone. Say, how you doing, man? How you doing, man? And let's all bring each other up. And if you need to, you're certainly welcome to call me if you're in that place. And, yeah, man, we're all one human race. We're all humanity. We're all Americans,

although the world seems to be sharing in this. And let's all try and get through it together as best we possibly can. It won't be perfect like anything in life, but all we can do is try. And hopefully out of it will become something better or we will learn lessons that will help us design something better. And that's probably what where we need to go with what's going on in life.

Anyway, guys, I hope this made you feel better. I hope it helped you in some way, shape or form. Gave you some good advice, made you feel uplifting. Good morning, Vietnam. And that's that. I mean, keep smiling, people. Sun comes up every day, and as long as you're here, that's a good place.

Keep smiling. And take care of your loved ones. Take care of the people around you. Do what you can to help others. Don't be panicked. Don't be buying all sorts of stupid crap. You know, the world's going to go on. We're going to be fine.

It's just, it's going to probably have a higher death rate than the flu, about 10 times it looks like. And we've got to try not to make it worse so we're gonna sacrifice a little bit and but that like I say that leads us to some opportunities at reevaluating everything we've done on life I'm hoping out of this we're gonna come with a higher appreciation value to health care and why it's important for everyone to have it so that we don't all get the virus, uh, from people that don't. Um, and, uh, that we're all on the, this, this virus has us

all on a level playing field. The rich, it's not just the rich people that will get it or the poor people that will get it or people in, uh, inner cities or the people in the rural areas it's everybody's a target so um i think that just speaks to our humanity and why we need to realize we're all in this together we need to lift each other a rising tide lifts all boats and that's probably where the time is set for us to take our course in life so i hope we learn these lessons and I hope we learn them well because they're not going to be easy lessons and they'll be painful but I think knowing that looking into the face of the dragon knowing what stands before us and how we approach it will be all the better and

how we hopefully come out the other side anyways that's my positive spin and I apologize if it's not the best certainly not Robin Williams good morning Vietnam I don't know maybe just referencing that will make some people smile or think of something good and my work here will be done So hang in there guys We're gonna keep the show going as Freddie Mercury would say the show must go on and we'll try and bring you some better business stuff and entrepreneur and uplifting stuff and things of that nature to

To make you I don't know to make you, I don't know, to make you more happy and be well. Anyway, thanks to my audience for tuning in. I certainly appreciate you guys. And I appreciate you guys taking and being a part of the show. And maybe I'll be doing more podcasts because I'll be locked inside my house and I can't leave. So there you go. If I get the coronavirus.

Maybe I'll try and do my best. To keep putting it out. All that stuff. Anyway guys. Be well. Take care of yourselves. Don't panic. Breathe.

Breathe. And if you can't be a lifter. Find someone to lift you up. And I hope that's our show. Or whatever sort of thing you take and do. Anyway, guys, be well, and we'll see you next time.