In this six-part series, we discuss part 3 of the ways of becoming miserable, which is staying down when life knocks you down.
Full Transcript
Hi Everyone, welcome to the You’re Daily Cup of Joe Podcast, with your host Joe Bautista. I’m also the founder of Grow With Joe, where I combine self-development coaching and financial planning. In this podcast, my goal is to give you quick lessons on how to grow yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually so you can have better careers, better relationships, and better personal finances.
I’m also the author of the book “More You Know, More You Grow: How to Get Better Every Day”. In this book, I wrote down over 30 tips to help you grow in those four cornerstones. I’m also the founder of Grow With Joe where I combine financial planning with self-development coaching.
In today’s episode, we’re are going to talk about part 3 of the six part series on the prescriptions to be miserable. Like I said in the last podcast, you don’t need to go to a doctor to get these prescriptions and prescription number three is Go down and stay down when you get your first, second, or third severe reverse in the battle of life.
I’ve had a lot of setbacks in my life. I remember getting into a serious car wreck that I am so fortunate that no one got seriously hurt. I did hurt my parents emotionally and that is the thing I feel most guilty for and I’m glad they forgave me and help raised me into a good person. I could of let that event hold me back in life but I just continue to work on getting better as a person.
I’ve started a couple of businesses in the past and they have failed past. If I would have just told myself that I shouldn’t start a business and just quit, then I would not be growing my current business right now and I’m so happy working for myself than to work for someone else because life is too short to work for other people. I work more hours for myself but I believe I’m creating something that will benefit society more than me working in the Federal Government to ensure people are doing what they are supposed to be doing.
I saw some crazy stuff in the Marines and Federal Government when it came to them using their travel credit card and what they thought was appropriate. I remember this one person swiped their credit card at a strip club and was later caught for it. When you travel in the federal government or military, they give you a daily allowance called per diem. Where you travel to will determine what your daily allowance is and it was usually around $50 a day. So if you just ate off the dollar menu at McDonald’s, then you could pocket $40 a day but what most people did was just used that $40 at the bar. I’m so glad I don’t have to monitor that program anymore because I can’t change the culture of the military or federal government.
So thinking of stuff like that motivates me to get back up and continue with my Grow With Joe business. I remember back in Oct 2017, my funds were getting low and I was worried about paying bills. My ex-wife’s grandma just died and so we had to spend money to travel from DC to Illinois, she was able to pay for most of the trip but her contract at work was also about to go up and she might not have a job come that Jan. I was freaking out about that and decided to quit my job to find something stable.
It was a hard decision because so many things were going wrong at work, I had so many clients backing out on me or taking longer than expected and I decided I was done. But while I was preparing to leave my old company, I just couldn’t think about doing anything else and wanted to continue being a financial advisor. Then came the hammer, my wife told me she wanted a divorce and was having a relationship with a co-worker that caused me to fall even deeper to depression.
I think what really helped overcome this huge setback was the stoic philosophy. In the stoic philosophy, they constantly remind you that moments like this will happen to use and you just have overcome this obstacle by looking at it objectively, take action, and have the will to endure that action.
So I decided that I was going to stick with my old firm because I didn’t want to stop running my own business because I believe that I need to do the work to help people understand their money since so many people don’t know what to do. I wanted to quit but I remembered that in life there will always be obstacles that come your way and when they knock you down, the best thing you can do is to get back up and try again and to do it over and over again until you get past that obstacle.
This is what the stoic philosophy reminded me to do. That I can’t control what happens externally but I can control what happens internally with my own reasoned thoughts. Now that I was single and didn’t have any kids, I didn’t have to worry about taking care of someone else. So I could go bankrupt and be fine because no one is relying on me. I heard these prescriptions to being miserable after my divorce but it was just a good reminder to tell me that I made a good decision.
If I would have just stayed down, I know I would have been miserable. I wouldn’t be living the life I was supposed to live and I wouldn’t be reliable to myself. This is what happens to a lot of folks though, they get knocked down and they just stay down. It’s painful to get knocked down and it’s exhausting to get back up, but it’s necessary to avoid being miserable.
Now I feel like I can handle a lot of tough stuff in this world because I went through that terrible two months. And what was another kick to the nuts was that I had a car repair bill that cost me $4000 and that made me stressed out but I was able to work out somethings with my supervisor to not pay my office bill that month. I’m thankful for that help and I’m also thankful that I had the training to help me get back up.
Life is tough but those challenges are what make life very fulfilling. I don’t wish anybody an easy life because when tough things happen, you won’t be prepared for it and you won’t be able to pick yourself back up. So have those uncomfortable conversations and do those uncomfortable things. It will be your training to get back up in the future and have a strong mind to handle even tougher stuff in the future.
Thanks for listening today’s episode, to summarize it, if you want to be miserable, stay down and don’t get up when life knocks you down again, but if you do this you’ll be giving up on all your goals and won’t be living your true to yourself and it will just cause other problems down the road.
To get a free copy of my book “More You Know, More You Grow: How to get better every day” just go to my website growwithjoe.me/book and just pay for shipping and handling.
I have a quiz on my website that grades your inner circle, so if you want to find out if your inner circle is an A, B, C, D, or F, you can take that quiz at growwithjoe.me/quiz
I’m also trying to do a feedback Friday episode, so if you have a question that you would like to have my answer on the air, just e-mail me at [email protected]
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Thanks for joining me today and remember if you go with Joe, you can grow with Joe, cause Joe knows Dough.
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