Experience 77 | Joshua Emery, Co-Owner of Emery Counseling
Josh Emery is a Therapists, Coach, and Co-Owner of Emery Counseling in Fort Collins. Emery Counseling offers a variety of counseling specialists in Northern Colorado.
We talk about Josh's journey, which included a career focused on finance and then developed into Emery Counseling. We also discuss the topics of mental health, wellness, clarity, values, and focus.
I had a great time during this podcast, so tune in and I hope you enjoy it!
The LoCo Experience Podcast is sponsored by: Logistics Co-op | https://logisticscoop.com/
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Music By: A Brother's Fountain
My guest on today's episode was Josh Emory. Josh is a therapist, coach, and co-owner of Emory counseling in Fort Collins. We talk a lot about what holds people back in their lives, in their relationships. We talk about Josh's journey, which included a career focused on finance initially. And he went off to wall street and then found he didn't like it there. And, later founded a construction company and sold it and moved with his wife to Costa Rica and studying surfing in Spanish for a while. And then really was drawn back. Field that his father had worked in for many years beforehand and really has developed Emory counseling into quite an agency. We talk a lot about the topics of mental health, wellness, clarity, values, focus. And Josh also said that no questions were off limit. So I put him through the gauntlet of gun control, abortion COVID mandates climate change, January 6th, all the good stuff. So I hope you'll enjoy this conversation with my friend, Josh Emery. Welcome back to the local experience podcast. This is your host Kurt bear, and I'm honored today to be joined by Josh Emery. Josh is a therapist, a coach, and co-owner of Emory counseling in Fort Collins. And I thought today, maybe we'd just start by describing Emory counseling. Josh.
Josh:
Thanks, Kurt. Good to be here. Uh, yeah, Henry counseling has its roots with my dad, Gary. Yeah. Uh, started solo years ago. Uh, helping folks work through life. And at the time I was, uh, contemplating what I was doing in life, uh, and thought, you know, I'm good at listening, like talking to people, this seems like a good fit. Remember counseling started with my dad, then Bree, my wife also decided to go back to school, get her, uh, graduate degree in social work. And so we joined forces.
Curt:
And did you have a degree in that as
Josh:
well? Undergrad was finance. Okay. Uh, which I don't know a lot of there's a lot of fighting and nerd I loved it. I thought for sure, uh, New York bound, I did go to New York wall street style. Uh, it was Rockfeller center. Okay. Uh, worked for Merrill Lynch. Uh, lived in my buddy's, uh, house in New Jersey, took three trains to get to the city and get to work. And it, I didn't last long because I realized I was talking about people's lives and not their money. And you can't make money. Yeah. In that setting, just talking about life. So, uh, immigrant counseling, uh, Slowly grown. It was like, Hey, the three of us, this is great. Oh, we need an office manager. Oh, well, since we have an office manager away, we have an intern
Curt:
better have more counselors. Now we've got half an office manager. You gotta spread that expense around
Josh:
a little more. That's right. Uh, so it's just been a slow growth model, uh, without a lot of vision over the years in the last, the last probably three or four years, it's been more refined. Like, Hey, a lot of people hurting. Uh, we like what we do, people like what we do, uh, let's make this a little bit more clear vision. So, uh, uh, 12 people now, you know, two office staff, um, and just trying to have a good time while we also try to people, help
Curt:
people be healthy. Now, do you have, uh, specialty of your who? Uh, and even your, how, even a little bit, like, do you have certain, is there certain fields of I do the bug zapper method or, you know,
Josh:
whatever. Yeah. Well, we work pretty hard to not be limited to one modality or one, uh, particular demographic. Okay. But being in Fort Collins, that's not a gigantic, you know, diverse market of people they'll work with. So we. End up working with a lot of people that are family oriented. So, so, and so might see the husband or the husband and wife, and then, Hey, they got some kids or there have been some relatives also hurt by this or affected by this. So once you go see, so and so, um, but we have a pretty, a fairly diverse, um, approach at this point, be arranging from child therapy, uh, all the way up till, you know, you name it at lower later oranges life. Yeah.
Curt:
Uh, now it sounds like it's an event, usually, you know, other people that were hurt by this or impacted by this or whatever, like it, isn't very often people are like, you know, I'm feeling a little rough around the mental edges. I'm gonna go to tuneup. It's more like after something breaks. Yeah. Is that a true story?
Josh:
Yeah. There's usually a strong impetus for it. The, uh, the reluctancy or the, the vulnerability piece is uncomfortable for a lot of people. Yeah. Especially men, especially for men feels weak. Right. To go say, I can't figure this thing out. Uh, it doesn't take long to realize people don't learn the things that we talk about and, and that we need to implement. That's not being taught in like homes. It's not being taught in school. And so it's hard to, it's a little grandiose to say, but everyone benefits from learning how their mind works, how their beliefs interact with those and how their relationships flourish or tank because of that. Mm. So we, it's not a good statement or a tagline for a website. Like we work with everybody and can help everybody. Yeah. But it's true. And we kind of do work with a lot of people and, you know, a friend of a friend's like, Hey, I didn't think I had any problems, but my friend just said it was so helpful for him or her. I thought I'd give it a try. And then, oh, not surprisingly. We find something to tweak and improve. Yeah. In general. It's it's more, it's heavier stuff. Yeah. So it's divorce or it's depression, anxiety, trauma, um, a toxic relationship that brings people in. But once they're in. Not to say that, uh, I know a lot of dentists and what they do, but it seems like they can always find some work. You're like, Hey, there's a gum line dropping here. Or if you had a cavity here as a therapist, you can be like, oh, well I see some problems here we can work on. So yeah, it really comes down to the client how good they
Curt:
wanna be and how much, how hard they wanna work.
Josh:
Oh yeah. Is it in frequency and, and, uh, duration. It always comes back to like, do they implement what we talk about? Yeah. Um, well let's
Curt:
say old habits die hard. Right. And so it's not just my wife and I are having a big struggle. Let's go in for one session and it's gonna be all fixed up after that. Yeah.
Josh:
There are people that, that are hoping a little clarity. Yeah. They are hoping, can you just get him or her to do what I've been telling him to do and
Curt:
right. You'd be fine. Well, and I imagine like everything in the professional services, I think I would, I think we were paying like a buck 50 a session at the time when my wife and I were spending time with you that was close to 10 years ago or seven years ago. And now something probably, and. It was a real sacrifice. You're probably 200 bucks now. Cause your reputation has improved. Not that it was bad back then, but you've built a practice and got a fancy new office to pay for and
Josh:
all that. Yeah. It's a huge, it's an investment, but you know, uh, I think any person that believes in what they do can, can explain why it's worth it. So, you know, to say, well, how painful is, are these conversations? How painful is it to lay in bed at night with anxiety? How painful is it to
Curt:
blah, blah, blah. Yeah. How much would you pay to regain intimacy in your relationship?
Josh:
Oh, the list goes on and on then, and then you're like, well, you drove up in a new car or you have a mortgage. Like you don't have to live in that place. You tell me like how painful is your situation? Yeah. And we don't
Curt:
have to do that. Well, how expensive will your divorce be? Uh,
Josh:
if it were a cost benefit analysis, It wouldn't take long and be like, well, here's what the attorneys are gonna cost. Here's what he, or she's gonna
Curt:
take. Yeah. It's kind of in the same vein as like here's how much an Uber costs and here's how much a DUI costs
Josh:
Exactly. Yeah. But at that moment, right. Emotion and clarity are, are, I could just
Curt:
drive sleeping. I could push through this. Be fine. I've trained myself. Yeah. So what did it take for you to go like education wise, especially to go from being a finance guy, to being a valid
Josh:
counselor? Uh, the program that I went to for graduate school, uh, just had a few prereqs basically from almost any undergrad route, which I see
Curt:
little sociology, a little,
Josh:
whatever, you let's make sure these boxes are checked. And then, you know, the good thing about a, a counseling program is the, the internship and practicum experience is so extensive. Mm. Uh, that you really can't get through that gauntlet with. So it's almost like an apprenticeship
Curt:
for a
Josh:
skills trade. Yeah. Appropriately. So you're in a very intimate setting with a lot of responsibility. So you wanna make sure it's been tested and how do you gain
Curt:
that? Like, are you sitting in with clients when somebody that's a veteran, um, is doing it or are they are working each other, like massage
Josh:
students, they're more likely to sit in with you or behind the double mirror or we're gonna, we're gonna record it and we're gonna play it back and watch it together. Uh, every site, you know, practic,
Curt:
here's where you enable a non yeah. Here's positive behavior.
Josh:
Here's you shouldn't have said that you see their face So
Curt:
do you, how many clients do you imagine that you've individually worked with over the last say 10 or 15 years or whatever?
Josh:
Oh my gosh. Uh, that's a great question. I have no idea. Uh, hundreds. I got box that's hundreds and hundreds. Yeah, probably. Well, over a thousand couple thousand, uh, I probably have 20, uh, rubber made file cabinet files, right? In a lockable storage unit. Full of files yeah. Of individual stories and lives. So yes, like, and probably thousands
Curt:
where like, do you have a lot of those, like, can you remember a lot of the conversations that Jill and I, and you had from back in those
Josh:
days? Yeah. Uh, yeah, it's weird how things are stored. It's pushed out other memories, it's pushed out other things in life and made space for their story. And, uh, even though it's been five
Curt:
years and we
Josh:
might never, yeah. We'll come in and it'll be, it, it, that file in the head, like kind of like pulls it back, pulls up and yeah. Like, well, Hey, well you, you loved your motorcycle. What happened with that? You know? And that was always, you were like, get out of town, like, it's your quality time on your bike? Why aren't you doing that? Uh, but if I had to think about it on the spot, you know? Right. Uh, what was Kurt Jill's
Curt:
biggest issue? Yeah, it's complicated.
Like
Josh:
so like moving into that space where it was stored. Uh, but my mind does not retain knowledge, uh, in other areas like. So it's clearly a gifting in that setting. Yeah, I can't, I can't sit down and, you know, read particular textbooks and just right. Hold on, setting
Curt:
specific, you can capture those. I have a big gap. I cannot remember movie scenes. Like I'm great at all the trivia, you know, us history, world geography, whatever.
Josh:
So when people do the quotes and yeah,
Curt:
they're like, oh, you remember that line from the movie where, and I, I saw that movie seven months ago. I'm like, no, not at all.
Josh:
Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's just how unique we attach to things, right? Yeah. Uh, I don't attach to just anything and some people do, or some people have their unique attachments. Sure. So getting in that flow of a situation or a story, certain things are more Velcro. Sure. Other things slide right off dates. Um, specific little details. My mind's like, not gonna remember. It don't even waste your time, but bigger themes, like really stick. Yeah.
Curt:
So if you, on the topic of themes, like if you were gonna categorize like. Let's take business owners in general, because when you mentioned coach, right? Yeah. So you've been doing some executive coaching the last couple of years as well. Correct. Kind of moving toward that space a bit for at least your personal practice. What are the, the themes of things that high achieving, especially business owners struggle with the
Josh:
most? Yeah, great question. Um, uh, probably the most common theme is, uh, overwhelmed in their head. Mm. Um, so, you know, they would say the symptoms are anxiety, but it feels like, uh, difficulty focusing difficulty following through on, you know, said high priorities. Um, uh, and then I think knowing who they are and who they aren't is challenging, you get a lot of good business advice and they'd say on paper, that's a good business venture, go for it and fail to calculate. is that really a good fit for you? Do you have the time? Do you have energy? Yeah. What are the costs? What are the sacrifices? Uh, you know, good business ideas seem to be kind of evergreen, but they've failed to calculate like, well, who's the person, what's the context. What's the season. Yeah. And so I think helping people realize like what's realistic for them. Mm-hmm um, another, another struggle for business owners is accurate expectations. So they confuse grit with actual, uh, value or talent or opportunity and like, well, you gotta just work hard. Uh, yeah, you gotta work hard, but you also wanna make sure, uh, this, this fulfills the dream, or this is really you or this is really the kind of family you want to have. Yeah. And so values, clarification exercises are one of my favorite things. Uh, and that is a deep dive into who are you really versus? Who do you say you are? Yeah. Who do you think you are versus what's the track record really look like. And how would you build from that? You know, you can still tweak, you can still refine, you can still improve, but you know, you're not gonna, you're not gonna rewrite the DNA. You're not gonna rewrite your personality. And so just coming to grips and peace with like, that's not gonna be your thing. What could you do about that? Who could you bring on, how could you solve for that versus beating yourself up, trying to push something that you're not gonna be able to push. Yeah.
Curt:
Interesting. Um, if you had to do like a, a five minute recap of what a values or not even a three minute recap of what a values exercise, like, how do you set your pointer? Right. I something that my wife and I struggle with sometimes is that, you know, I'm working on my thing with my own set of kind of values driving it. She's got some shared values and we have many shared, but then she's got some other ones that are, you know, not as important to me. And so like as team bear, especially is what I'm thinking about. Yeah. But it also applies to a, a business, whether it's a partnership or just a team of. individuals, you know, some people are employees, some people are owners. Yeah. But you still wanna be all kind of pointing.
Josh:
Well, the benefit is that, uh, when someone knows what they value, uh, there's increased understanding by everyone around them. Mm-hmm right. And so there's more likely collaboration. There's more likely synchronicity of like, oh, well, hold on, we don't align on this and this, but this is our thing. This is where we overlap. Let's really, let's double down on that. And then let's compromise on these other ones, cuz I don't really care how we do that or what that looks like. But you do, you have to take and run that and I'll, you know, take this and then this is our overlap mm-hmm But when people aren't honest about who they are or knowledgeable about who they are and what they really like and want or what they're fearful of, what they're trying to prove and all that stuff comes out in a values, clarification exercise, you know? Yeah. Who do you compare yourself to and why? Uh, why is that important? You know, the, the, the really interesting piece has always come from like three or four questions deep, like, oh, well I. I like to travel like, oh, why you like to travel? Well, I always saw that growing up, you know? And so I admired that like, okay, what does it do for you? And so, you know, three or four to five questions in, you might find, oh, uh, it allows you to clear your head so you can clear your head doing lots of things. You don't have to travel, but if you wanna travel great, but don't make that equation. You could just cost too narrow. Yeah. You could do a hundred other things to, you could meditate multiple times a day, versus we've gotta travel through Europe three times a year, you know? Right. Business is like that too. Like, well, what do you really want from this? Why would be successful? What does successful mean? Well, you know, I gotta, I don't have to worry about things like, well, why do you have to worry today? Well, we're not where we want to be. Why do you want to be there? And then it, it really confuses people, but then gets them that sense of clarity, of like, oh, I'm kind of chasing this Mirage. Right. I never really reach. Uh, and it doesn't mean, you know, the tendency is the all or nothing of like, well, what do you expect me just to quit everything and not do anything you like, whoa, whoa, whoa. No, no. Yeah. There's always this like tons of space in the middle, like have good goals, have good routines, but don't be fooled to think reaching that finish line that continues to move and change is gonna make you feel on the inside the way you want to feel.
Curt:
Hmm. I was, uh, one of our chapters had a speaker yesterday. It's actually the, the owner of one of the bigger business brokerages around and, and she wrote a book and whatever, and it was all about maximizing your kind of sale. And part of that is working your way out of the business, but also stop dumping a bunch of, uh, personal expenses in there and things like that. Cuz you're hurting your chance to, to have a good multiplier and don't have a spouse salary and whatnot. Um, but I was thinking to myself, as I thought about logo think tank I'm like, I don't wanna sell. So I'm gonna keep dumping my personal expenses through. Yeah. Sorry. My common shareholders. Uh, yeah, that's what he's doing. that's wonder he never makes any money, but like, it really depends on what you want to do. Right. Exactly. Like if I was trying to sell Loco think tank, I would probably operate the business a lot differently.
Josh:
Yeah. There are a lot of business owners that wouldn't know how to relax and enjoy life once they sold. Mm. And so one of my, you know, questions to always clarify is like, well, what do you think you're gonna get out of that? Why does that look so attractive? Because you might be miserable, right. You know, evidence by people that retire early, uh, and don't know what to do with themselves. They lost their routine, their identity, and that kind of that appropriate tension. Yeah. Thinking I'll just sit on the beach and feel
Curt:
great. That's one of my missions actually for local think tank, or one of my reasons for existence is seeing that happen over and over again, during my banking career. Of people selling, especially men selling their successful business, retiring at 52 and by 55, they've got a terrible alcohol habit or a new much younger wife had broken relationships with their kids, you know, and it don't give somebody something to do. And they turn into kind of a yucky person
Josh:
sometimes. Yeah. Culturally, we have a really unfair narrative about career and work that it, it seems, uh, like an assumption that you're gonna do it till you can't, you don't have to do anymore and you get out and you should celebrate. Right. But any guru throughout time would talk about, you know, peace and happiness is finding enjoyment along the way and enjoying the process of every day versus. not till I hit this mark. Right. You know? Well,
Curt:
like Elon Musk certainly has enough money to not have to work again. He can hang out in Costa Rica and buy his own island somewhere if he wants. Yeah. But I think he's having a lot of fun generally. Yeah.
Josh:
Well, I think that's, that's available for a lot of people and maybe not, you know, Elon, not his level lifestyle, but you know, to be able to enjoy your drive, your walk, your lunch, your conversation with a coworker, uh, I'm astounded by how poorly people know how to enjoy their life. Hmm. It seems like everyone thinks they know what would make them enjoy their life, but they prac they don't practice it. Right. We weren't taught, you should enjoy your life today. You're taught, go achieve these things. And then it delivers enjoyment. Yeah. And then they get those things and like, well, this wasn't it. I needed to do more or different. You're like, no, no, no, you have to develop the skill of enjoying today. And if you want to have something else or more go for it, but if you can't enjoy this, you're definitely not gonna enjoy the next thing. And that's across the board business owners, business owners, especially because they've kind of really bought in what that business is gonna do for them.
Curt:
Right. Well, and there's a lot of business owners and there's a lot of business owners, you know, where the business owns them. Yeah. Yeah. And they feel trapped in it in some capacity, because for whatever reason, it's just too demanding or, or usually because they haven't worked on it enough. Yeah. And
Josh:
yeah, and I don't wanna under, you know, undermine the amount of work that it takes to build a business and keep it running. It's significant. Um, but I know from the people I get to work with and interact with everywhere, a lack of mindfulness and, and presence in what they. Is always gonna Rob them of the greater experience. Yeah. And so then the narrative of stress and overwhelmed and behind seems so familiar and so easily, you know, like, oh, I get you. Yeah. But no one challenges, someone else usually in casual conversation, like, are you really behind what happens if you don't do that? Yeah.
Curt:
Well, and very seldom do people want to gather around, behind somebody that isn't very clear on where they're going, you know? And so that makes the struggle as a leader that much more magnified is because there's a leverage impact. Yeah. Impact. Well, it's confusing. Yeah. It's confusing to the whole team and turnovers higher things like that, where,
Josh:
and then they fill in the blanks. Like they, well, this place is really well. I think so. And so, yeah, without that clear leader, People love to fill in the blanks with whatever they think and feel, and that gets super sloppy.
Curt:
So talk to me about kind of that time of converting, if you will, or not converting, transforming over time, Emory counseling from a, a family practice, uh, to a counseling business, uh, really with that back office support and things like that. Like, was that easy? Was it hard? What were the steps a little bit along the
Josh:
way? Yeah, it seems, it feels like a familiar story for a lot of people, not, not a, probably a lack of vision. And so it was a lot of trial and error. Um, and then, oh, I think we could do this. Oh, let's do that. Wouldn't that be nice. Just to be able to have an office manager someday, and then you hire the office manager and you know, like, oh wow. We did it. Uh, and wow, it'd be nice to have a greater, a bigger team. And, and so it's been pretty organic and slow by business standards, but. It matches our value system. It matches our desired lifestyle. We didn't want to prioritize growth over good living. Yeah. Um, and that's got, you know, pros and cons to it. Um, but we're, well, we're comfortable with the cons and favor of the pros that it's not top heavy, it's been ground up. Um, but I'd say mostly trial and error, you know, are your
Curt:
counselors, um, subcontractors then? Not some family. Yeah. So that they're, they scale up and down in income based on how many people they
Josh:
see. Uh, yeah. We've experimented with, um, paid employees, uh, and we've done and independent contractors. Yeah. Um, uh, what makes what's worked the best is to have independent contractors. So, you know, they have final say in a lot of things, but per contract, here's what you do when you show up here, here's what you're gonna get paid. Yep. But you know, part of our way of managing is not. And not want to be too hands on in controlling. And so pros and cons are people have flexible schedules. So there's missed opportunity. There's opportunity costs of like, Hey, no, one's in the office. It's Friday. If someone, someone needs help somewhere. And we also want healthy people that are out having fun and getting in the outdoors. So we're like, well, there's more to it than just making money.
Curt:
Well, I think it keeps the motivation to do good work stronger as a contractor. It seems like as an employee, you're just like, kind of, and to go get your own clients and keep those clients and whatever, as an employer, you're like, well, I show up Monday morning and I leave them Monday night. And if they have clients for me, that's great. If they don't, whatever, I play words with friends on my phone.
Josh:
Yeah. Uh, we've put a lot of we've learned, you know, from mistakes and from successes, you hire the right people with the right visions, similar vision, similar character traits, similar desires. You don't have to hold your hand. You don't have to track hours. You don't have to track vacations. Yeah. Which is awesome. Cuz I don't wanna track that stuff. but I don't want a system for it. I don't want to be like, Hey you've where were you on that Tuesday? Did you get your work done? Are you doing good work? Are you healthy? Great. Let's not, let's not lose time over those small details. So I think for us it's more about the right people than even some of those structural things. Right. Um, whether they're an employer or 10 99, I think if you have the right people that fit our culture or your culture as a company, it's gonna be less of an issue. Fair. And I imagine
Curt:
your administrative staff is staff, right? Like they're have to be what you want'em to be doing the things, whatever. Yeah. So, um, let's let's learn about little Josh. Oh was your dad a counselor when you were 10 years
Josh:
old or whatever? Uh, yes and no. He, he had a pretty diverse background. Um, was, uh, he was a contractor for a while. Uh, He was a pastor. He did some youth ministry, um, was, uh, he went back to school actually, when I was finishing up undergrad. So we both graduated something at the same time. Oh. So, uh, 97, I graduated finance. He graduated with his master's in counseling, uh, which was a, you know, a fantastic fit for him. He's a, a warm, loving, accepting, yeah. Uh, and wise person. And so it was, it was always an inevitable landing spot. Well, if you wanted
Curt:
to retire someday, he was gonna have to stop being a youth pastor. That's right.
Josh:
He was tired of putting the, the family through all the financial hardship of where.
Curt:
So you grew up pretty poor, then it was tight. Yeah, for sure. And do you have, uh, uh, like younger brothers siblings, your sisters?
Josh:
I have one younger brother. Okay. Uh, he's three years younger lives in Denver. Uh, he's a assistant principal at a high school in Denver. Okay. Fly fishing guide. Father three fantastic guy. We have a, we have a great family. Uh, yeah, one of the,
Curt:
but, but you were not the rich kids in the, in the high school. Were you here in Fort Collins? Did you grow up here?
Josh:
No, we grew up in Fort Collins. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, it wasn't that obvious. Yeah. You know, well, such a, uh, monotonous, not a monotonous homogeneous population. So the middle class was pretty big. Right. And there wasn't a gigantic stratosphere of like, oh, that kid versus this kid. So, uh, yeah, we,
Curt:
I had free school lunch all through most of my school. Nobody else knew that. And probably half of them did too. I don't know. Yeah,
Josh:
yeah, no one, uh, no one really cared for sure. And if they did, I didn't know about it. Right. Um,
Curt:
but you guys, weren't taking big luxury vacations,
Josh:
no road trip to California in the car that broke down on independence pass and we had to get out and push. Uh, but we had, we had a ton of fun and, and to say poor. Probably on paper. Yes. But you know, we had motorcycles, we played all the sports we wanted to. Yeah. We always got the shoes that we wanted for the sport. So it wasn't, yeah, you didn't lack, but it was like, it was tight enough to where, Hey, you're bringing your friends home for lunch every day. They're eating all our pizza out of the freezer. Right.
Curt:
That's we're gonna have to
Josh:
do that so that, yeah, we didn't really, we never went without anything, but we are well aware of the impact of those costs. Yeah.
Curt:
Fair enough. Well, I think that's probably a pretty healthy way to, to live as a family in a lot of respects.
Josh:
Yeah. It it's, it's interesting to see the generational swings, you know, of like what people react to now. We just want everything we want. Well, I don't want my kids to go through and you're like, well, but that's healthy. Good. And like, I know, but we could just pay for that.
Curt:
You know, if they have a job that if they, you know, they have to help buy their own car, that's not a terrible thing.
Josh:
Yeah. Yeah. It now, depending on the family, right in their, uh, where they're at in the socioeconomic. Bracket, you actually have to reinforce or kind of fabricate some hardship and some ownership where, you know, certain growing up situations like, well, there's no choice you in a car, right. You're gonna drive grandpa's car that smokes through the vents. you're gonna find out about until grandpa sold for a thousand dollars, right. And at the stoplight smokes, rolling through the, the vents and people want to tell you, you first smoke it. This saw, this is your first car, I guess this is my first car Pontiac, 6,000 nice, uh, that had an oil leak, which then would heat up and produce smoke through the vents. Yes, yes. That people would love to say like slowly drip on
Curt:
cars, on fire exhaust manifold or something like that. So, um, what kind of a kid were you, were you like athletic? I'm guessing he pretty tall guy.
Josh:
Always into sports. Yeah. My dad played college football. Oh really? So we were always, we were always playing something. Um, were your brother close? Yeah, we three
Curt:
years is kind of that awkward space where it's a little too far.
Josh:
Yeah, I wouldn't say we still the same baseball team. We had a few fights here and there, but yeah, we fished really well together, which we still do. Uh, you know, we'd make up all kinds of fun games. Like we had, we had a good relationship. Uh, it's gotten a lot better over the years, just as, you know, you grow outta those awkward younger years and begin to appreciate and mature, but you know, he's a, he's a wonderful human being. Very cool. Yeah.
Curt:
So I, because of all your experience kind of being with people and, and analyzing their brains and their values and things like that, I wanted to kind of describe this, uh, this system to you and get some feedback that we've been studying. Uh, it's called halos relational intelligence, huh. Uh, and if I had my stuff together, I would have tested you first, so I could share the results with you and stuff. Um, I'm gonna guess you to be a green, white, uh, Probably or orange, uh, probably anyway, uh, which is very close to me. There's five colors. It's a lot like a disc or a Myers Briggs thing. And I'm a white green, uh, the white type is kind of like the blank slate, the ideas, uh, principles and values. Very important. Love philosophical conversations. Yeah. Uh, the green type is the social relational and has a lot of empathy. A lot of understanding can see various perspectives easily. Um, but sometimes as a drama queen or plays the victim. And so I like to say like within local think tank, even as local community. Yeah. Think tank it's there, I'm a white green. Yeah. Um, and there's three other types. Alma is a blue, which is like the organizer planner. Yeah. The logical analytical, um, the orange type is the achiever entrepreneur. So that's like the gut. And then the brown type is like the integrator. The systems thinker thinks about the consequences of plans and builds complex systems better. Uh, and so each of these acts in polarity, yeah. So you have positives and negatives and nothing, no type is better than the others. Sure. Um, and they act in polarity contending for you against each other. And then there's a third type that's developed over time. Uh, for me, that's the entrepreneur, the achiever. Um, and so I know that's like a super fast over view, but it's, to me it seemed, um, intuitive based on my interactions with the world. Yeah. Like before I learned about this, I always used to say, I just like to have all the ideas and just leave'em on the table for somebody else to do. Yeah. and so, and I'm a strong, white type. That's like what they do. Yeah. Um, does that seem valid based on just strictly that simple explanation and your experience.
Josh:
Uh, yeah. Personality type structures, uh, are always interesting and pretty accurate. It's fun to see people have that, that sense of being known or identifying with. Yeah. Um, yeah, and I would, I would confirm that, uh, although we want to be unique people, we want to think ourselves, you know? Yeah. We want to think the snowflake kind of like, no, one's like me, but like actually a few billion people are just like you and here's what we call you 1 billion. Right. yeah. Uh, and so it's helpful to know it's helpful to know some of those things, because then a sense of failure, all of a sudden isn't a sense of failure. It's like, oh, that's not failure. That's like who, that's how I operate. Yeah. You know, and that doesn't mean we can't tweak it, but when you don't have that and you compare to one metric, uh, or the another metric of another color. It's easy to be like, wow, I'm really, I'm a failure. I can't do that. You're totally. But hold on. That's not, that's just not you. Right? I mean, organizations and communities and families need what you have, but you can't operate outside that color because you're gonna go off of the, the wrong metrics.
Curt:
I'm actually reconsidering. And I'm thinking you're a, a brown, perhaps a brown orange or something.
Josh:
Well, I like the white, uh, yeah. Okay. Because I love the, I love the contemplative philosophical idea batting around. I don't like to implement, but I do love systems. Yeah. So I like the, but I like the analytics, but not the details too much, but I don't want any that's detail brown type. We're gonna talk about it and then we're gonna delegate it. Yeah. Who's gonna implement someone that loves, you know, implementation. Right? Why wouldn't you
Curt:
pick that person? yeah. Yeah. Better than me. Like procrastinating on it forever.
Josh:
Well, but until you understand that it's, it's a, it's part of that personality or skillset versus a failure. Someone just continues to beat their head against the wall being like I've gotta implement. Yeah. I'm just gonna change myself. No, find someone else that implements do what you do best, you know, and its unfortunate. It takes us too long or oftentimes a long time to figure out and come to peace with that versus a false judgment.
Yeah.
Curt:
And that's one of the things I really like about this system is that it's, it clearly helps people recognize that every type is special, unique and valued and equal and valued to the other types. Yeah. Just valuable for different things perhaps whereas yeah. Some of'em like, like dis could almost, you know, if you're not a high D well then why would you be a business owner or things like that, right? Yeah. Or it's just very, seems value driven more than
Josh:
type driven. Yeah. There's a, um, I'm blanking on her name. She wrote the book book quiet and it was about, uh, introverts. And half the
Curt:
book I listened to her on Jordan
Harbinger's
Josh:
podcast recently. Okay. Yeah. So, and I forget that she just came out with another one, something about being happy. Um, basically calling bullshit on both of them by saying like there's cultural pressure to be extroverted. Yeah. As a business owner, as a leader, you're supposed to be out in front and cheering everyone on and you're supposed to be happy all the time. Right. Uh, and going through good factual like data, like actually that's not true. This many CEOs, is it 35% or 41st cent are actually introverts. Hmm. Um, but, and they can motivate, but they're not gonna be outside of words, not cheerleading. They're not shaking hands and kissing babies on the streets. They're like in their reading room or isolating. And so culturally we've
Curt:
been very judging. Yeah. And writing a personalized note to everybody that on their birthday
Josh:
super intent. Right. It can be incredibly personable, just not in the out front kind of way. Yeah. Um, and so there are those biases that are embedded in cultures that segregate or. Penalize certain groups, certain colors, right. In that scale. Yeah. I was like, oh, well, you can't be a business owner because you wanna do systems only. Or, you know, you're an organizer and like you've gotta motivate, but plenty of systems that's shown, uh, complete the chart, you know, we'll find someone else that can fulfill that. Yeah. And if you can do your thing the best, like, and you got a good product and you stay with it, you're gonna succeed.
Curt:
So what did it look like for you coming up to that end of high school? Did you know you were gonna go to college and where, and stuff like that, that was all pretty
Josh:
sorted or? Yeah, it was, uh, somewhere in the high school years, um, business struck a chord, um, couple of business classes. I had a great business teacher in high school, Mr. Johnson, uh, who just did a good job of inspiring and, and, uh, showing what it could be. And both my parents owned their businesses at different time. So at home we saw an entrepreneurial spirit and the ups and downs of that. So it was. it was decided the whole time, you know, I'm gonna go to college, I'm gonna get my business degree finance, because I like the, I like the nitty gritty of the numbers, even though it's not a great skillset. Yeah. Right. You know, I'm not the guy who wants to sit there and build out models and spreadsheets, but it's helpful to know the, the foundational components, but you can build,'em pretty good when you needed to well, and with, you know, with systems now you plug in, right. So easy plug play and be like, build me this model. But, uh, I love that. I love the visionary components and numbers. Yep. Um, so finance was always the goal and I thought I was gonna be investment banking, but not because I was educated or wise, uh, it was probably, I'm gonna go make a lot of money. Right. Hey, if you're gonna work, why don't you make a lot of money? And then I'm like, oh, like I don't wanna work that much or be that miserable. so right. You know, 80 hour. Working for people that seemed really unhappy. So were you
Curt:
already married at that time in
Josh:
your life or? No, I got married, uh, 25. Okay.
Curt:
So you had that season first and then yeah, like, did you just like take the subway home from work one day and you were like, you know what, I'm
Josh:
out close. It was a Monday, uh, my boss Curtis, uh, sort of a bitch son of a bitch, Curtis. He, uh, I was playing, so I was going to play softball. I was gonna play softball with some of the Merrill Lynch office staff. He saw my bag and he, uh, he looked down, I could tell he was like giving me this kind of judgment. Look, he's like, Josh, come back here, come back to my office. Oh, okay. Close the door. Hey, uh, what's up with the gym bag? Oh, I'm playing softball. You know, three of these guys are playing in the park, uh, and I'm gonna play his, uh, like verbatim or something. This is verbatim. Josh, uh, stockbrokers don't play softball. We golf and sail. If you wanna get a good time, I'll take you on the course. We'll drink some bourbon. We'll smoke cigars, but you're not playing softball. And I'm sitting there thinking like, where are the cameras? Where am I? Is this
Curt:
really happening? You're low C on the just thing too. You're like, you're not
Josh:
telling me you are not gonna tell me. Uh, and that was it. I, I went home. I told my buddy, Pete, uh, Hey man, I appreciate you. Let me crash here. Uh, but I'm going home like this is, and, and, and it was a good decision. Not that I think quittings always the right decision, but that was a great job to quit from. It was a ton of fun. I called from a burger king in Ohio. This is like pre-sale phone. And it was like one of the best phone calls. I didn't even talk. I just said, Hey, Fausto tell Curtis, like, I'm not coming back, man. I'm on my way home. And it was like a reunion drive home, you know, I'm like, this is so great. Hit the rock. Tears are rolling down as I'm driving down. I 25 from Cheyenne, I'm like, oh my gosh,
Curt:
like you're like 23 years old
Josh:
or something like that. 23 years old. Yeah. Uh, and then a couple years there of like go experience the world, you know, travel play.
Curt:
Cause you had saved up a bunch of money or you had credit card or the high love,
Josh:
not at all. Uh, I always had a job. I went right to, I went right to work, uh, great place in Boulder. Uh, went back to Boulder where I went to school. Okay. Lived with roommates and then went to veil. And uh, I was like, Hey, if I don't know what I'm doing with my career, I might as well, ski and fish and mountain bikes. So worked at a golf course. Framed houses had a great time. I'd already Metree my wife. And so she finished up school at CSU and then after she graduated, moved up to VA, got married and then went back to grad school. Gotcha. Gotcha.
Curt:
Um, and didn't you was there the, the Costa Rica thing somewhere
Josh:
in that time? Two. So after grad school. Okay. Uh, finished my degree. Was still doing some construction, cuz I had learned to trade a little bit from my dad, but then it kind of mastered it and veil, uh, it was a good way to make a living, um, start a construction company in Denver. Oh, it's going well. Um, and then, uh, my wife's, uh, mother was killed in a tragic accident. And so we, she was working at a homeless shelter for teenagers as a social worker. I was doing construction as a young person, you know, stressed outta my mind and were like, let's leave. Let's get outta here. Um, what are we doing? Like life could be over any second. Where should we go? And so we went to Costa Rica, uh, went to school down there. I say school, it was called in school, but, uh, it was surfing in Spanish. It was basically
Curt:
a, a, a way to be there for a long time about visa
Josh:
or where it was awesome. And so picked a, a little town and, and it was like, it was surfing and yoga and, and we stayed after school was over. Can you speak Spanish? Uh, see, yeah, I mean, when we're down there, when we're in the flow, we can take care of business, but, uh, uh, Brie and I, it's interesting talking about personality types. She's got a, a block or a reservation of speaking, but she can interpret really well, so she can hear, and she can receive Spanish and like process it pretty quickly. All I can say, not anything, but I can get my point across and I'll say it the wrong way. I don't care. Yeah. And then they'll say something back and I have to look to Bre what they say. that's a
Curt:
partnership right there.
Josh:
Yeah. uh, but we were down there in, uh, just put that early retirement scenario to the test, you know, Weren't working and didn't have to work. And we were just chilling. Um, like, because
Curt:
she inherited a bunch of
Josh:
money, inherited some money, something, just some life insurance. And we're like, Hey, let's, uh, I sold my construction company to my partner. And so we had monthly income. Oh, wow. And so it was a great setup, but not surprisingly, you know, lacking family, lacking purpose
Curt:
friends. Well, you're just young for already having that kind of
Josh:
a situation in life 25. And, uh, can I ask,
Curt:
like what kind of tragic accident is that something you talk
Josh:
about? Uh, yeah, it was a drunk driving accident. Somebody yeah. Young person driving a semi truck. Oh, shit drunk. Yeah. Yeah.
Curt:
What a, what a hard thing. Yeah. As such a young woman, especially, uh, did rehab siblings and, and Chad
Josh:
lean on sister. Yeah. She's got a sister and, uh, both lived in town together. Um, and so, yeah, that was. That was a sense of support for sure. But yeah. What
Curt:
a, it's hard, interesting thing to go through. One of my recent podcast guests actually, uh, Clint Ja told the story of his wife's no, dad, I think passed just like a week after they got engaged. Oh. And he had lost his own father as a teenager. And so he had kind of an awareness of what that kind of trauma yeah. Was like. And so he was like, I guess that's at least part of the reason I had to go through my trauma was cuz I was gonna be there for Lindsay's, you know?
Josh:
Well, and it's until someone experiences it, it's really easy to, to keep it out there kind of in the, in the statistical realm. Yeah. It doesn't really happen, but it, but if you look at, you know, just human history or human existence, you would say, well, it happens all the time. Yeah. Right. I mean it, someone we love or know is gonna be hurt or killed or harmed in the next few days, but we, we fail to calculate that and therefore we fail to deal with it. Properly because we're like that shouldn't yeah. Well, what do you mean should yeah, well, no, that happens. Right. And we can't prevent it you're right. But it shouldn't happen that way. Well, okay. How should someone die early unexpected
Curt:
right, right. Yeah. The, the steps aren't made out of zeros, you know, they're Jill lost her mom, you know, probably, you know, uh, fell down the stairs in the fall of 2020 at 73 years old. The same as Ivanka Trump. Yeah. So that was an interesting new memory that like sparked up a, you know, almost two year old trauma with her just recently. It was like, yes. I was like, did you notice that Ivanka fell on the stairs at the age of 73? Wow. Just like,
Josh:
yeah. I noticed Yeah. Yeah. We, I mean, having, you know, the privilege to sit, sit with people daily, right. Where there's always a story like that. It's, it's really emphasized and highlighted when, when a day goes, well, whatever it is, your car starts. Your lungs work, uh, your, the, the fridge worked, right? Yeah. Yeah. Uh, obviously no one died. It deserves celebration considering yeah. Probability of something breaking and someone dying is not high, but it's like, obviously there's probability, right? Yeah. It's a problem. And yet we don't, we don't, we don't celebrate. We're not like, Hey, laying in bed, like, well, these things worked and my heart's still pumping and I could smell. And you're still here. And our kids are still, you know, our kids are in bed. We're like, oh, tomorrow I gotta do this, this, this, and listen to what so, and so said to me today, and I know that's our human tendency, but given our human experience so clearly like temporal, it's wrong. It's wrong in that? Like, there could be a celebration. Yeah. All the time, because it's not, it's not promised it's not guaranteed. And if anything, it is guaranteed. Well, you're gonna die. And everyone, you know, is gonna die. how come you're not celebrating that didn't happen today.
Curt:
this is a awkward change of pace, but somehow I, I came up with this question and thought is getting a death to what's next well as somebody who's been, uh, quote unquote under my hood a little bit, you know, we've spent quite a few sessions together and stuff. My question is is if you were approached legitimately by like the FBI or law enforcement or something, because Kurt had gone missing and we think he's this, whatever, uh, white collar criminal or something like that, could you please describe him into the best details to help us fill out our psychological profile? Uh what would you say? Like if you felt like it was legitimate, you should just say nothing. I had to VO for the record for you. Yeah, no, you don't have to vouch for me. You're just trying either way. You're you're just gonna describe to a, a neutral audience.
Josh:
Oh, uh, passionate for community, uh, passionate. Uh, meaningful relationships and collaboration, um, uh, uh, a genuine enjoyment of thought, uh, sharing and development. Um,
Curt:
can I have to throw some eggs here cuz otherwise they're not gonna find me
Josh:
rest? Well, those are, yeah, those are all the core of you. Like the outside the shell, uh, uh, flustered messaging through a busy mind that gets distracted and too comparative and uh, uh, and probably too concerned with a narrative or some scorecard. Even that question is
Curt:
indicative of of all of those latter things. Oh, we could stop. We could stop. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. We
Josh:
covered enough positives. Huh?
Curt:
Um, so you asked how would you describe yourself in that same vein? uh, cause I, I can't imagine you're quite perfect yet. I know you've been working on
Josh:
yourself quite a while. Yeah. Um, grateful. Hmm. Um, a, uh, a growing ability to be really present, but has, uh, and, and simple and focus with a, with a negative attached to that of maybe a lack of compassion or care when I'm in that zone of like, Hey, I'm just doing this right now. Objective. Yeah. So objective that I can't really, like, I can't entertain how you feel right now. Like I'm doing this thing, which is not necessarily like, I don't wanna live like that, but sometimes those come into conflict. Yeah. And so there can be a, I think it could be perceived as selfish when I'm just not, I refuse to, I would say play a game of obligation. Mm-hmm um, And maybe an, a tendency to maybe under serve or under care, because sometimes I can be so focused on just being present and being okay with who I am. Yeah.
Curt:
In that halo thing that I described, there's a, I, I described the polarities, just a little bit of the positives and negatives, but even within like, like sympathy and antipathy, you know, whether you have feel warmly towards somebody, you know, that's positive, but it also, you can be permissive. Yeah. Right. You can fail to hold them accountable. You're not objective. Whereas if you have antipathy towards somebody, you don't really trust them right away or whatever, you can be very objective. You won't build much relationships. So there's yeah. Like there's positive and negative attributes of words that are the opposite of each other. Yeah. Like, well, what's good about cold. Well, it keeps my food cold. Right. You know, it keeps things from spoiling and whatever, but sometimes you're freeze to death. Yeah. You know, what's good about hot. Well, you can cook things. You know, you could get a sun, tan, whatever, but
Josh:
well that, you know, that's analogous to like all of life. Right? Right. There's always this like, well, not enough of that's gonna be a problem, but too much of that's definitely a problem. And right. That balance and which, you know, a common thing I, I see in a lot of my clients is all or nothing kind of thinking behavior, which is obviously unnecessary and destructive. And people get frustrated with a lukewarm lukewarm middle. Yeah. But you're like, but balance is healthy. It's not a failure to do this or that, you know, balance is a fluid, sustainable pace in lots of ways.
Curt:
Do you read my blog
Josh:
on occasion? I don't. No. Oh no. That's not true. You have, I absolutely do.
Curt:
I don't remember when it was probably about two and a half years ago, I wrote one before pre COVID. So, uh, and it was the unstable balance between contentment and striving. Yeah. Yeah. And the answer to that unstable balance I put was gratitude. Yeah. Like if you're grateful, then you can both be content. And strive to totally give more to the world in
Josh:
whatever fashion. Yeah. And, and too many people take like, you know, one camp or the other, or refuse to be content because they feel like they're giving up on goals. Right. Progress. But they don't compete they're they coexist. Right. When you, when you can practice the, the appreciation enjoyment of the process, regardless of outcome and still prioritize prolong or, or pushing towards outcome. Right. You know, but that's a hard skill. That's a hard skill to
Curt:
develop. It is. Yeah. Contentment or gratitude even itself. Yeah. I, uh, it's still on my calendar and I haven't written in it for like a few months because I lost it. I left it in my anyway. I had a gratitude journal and I, for, for quite a while, every Friday I was writing it. And then I, like I said, I lost it. And, but it pops up in my thing every Friday morning. Yeah. Right. In your gratitude journal dummy. So
Josh:
I do that every, almost every morning. Yeah. And, and, uh, I realize the. The old Josh would've been very critical or dismissive of some of my, uh, entries, current practices.
Curt:
Yeah. Of the entries
Josh:
of the, the entry. Yeah. The entry itself. Right. Of, of dismissing it as it gets not substantial enough, like as gratitude re like gratitude requires some sort of prerequisite. Right, right. But I, it was a, it was a judgmental mindset that said, like, you can't just be grateful for like a, a glass. We had a
Curt:
thunderstorm yesterday afternoon just for a bit was incredible. Amazing. It cooled it down like eight degrees, 10 degrees,
Josh:
you know? Yeah. But a judgmental, uh, or narrow mind would say, well, that's supposed to happen. Right. Or, or, or something ridiculous, like dismissing this like ability to enjoy it, which is like, no one benefits from your negativity or your inability to enjoy it. Why not be grateful for that? So do
Curt:
you, have you been counseled, do you take your own
Josh:
medicine? Um, I have, yeah, yeah, not actively. And I, uh, a few years ago began a deeper dive into meditation and mindfulness, which, uh, don't or whiskey little bit, uh, just a little bit, a little bit. We got time, uh, which has been unbelievably therapeutic. Like if I wouldn't have a job, if, if everybody just was practicing mindfulness and meditated, because really they you'd CA you'd see all your own bullshit. And so when I'm paying attention to thoughts, uh, I'm more likely to see it as like you have a tendency to do that. Remember, and you, you know, you can't trust every emotion because they're unreliable. Right. And so that process has sharpened. I think my life,
Curt:
you can pull the weeds while they're little.
Josh:
And obviously anyone can be helped, right? Anyone can be better. Uh, my wife, uh, despite my frustrations with her delivery from time to time is, is great at accountability and pointing out my weakness. She doesn't think you're quite perfect
Curt:
yet.
Josh:
Uh, that, that word would never cross windows
Curt:
is that, uh, there's a meme of some sort. It's like, you're amazing. You're perfect. Now change uh, most humans, the women's credo,
Josh:
especially most humans live that way even with themselves. Right. We, we love the idea of change. I
Curt:
wonder, I guess, so I feel like women have a higher calling to try to change their men than men do to try to change their women
Josh:
in relationship. Well, uh, speaking from an expert seat versus a sexist seat, I can say, uh, yes, but let me a huge aspect next to it. Uh, there are plenty of things that guys do, uh, innately, right? That are equally
Curt:
divisive. We're much more
Josh:
annoying. Uh, we, all, everyone has their thing, right. But, but women oftentimes create an equation. Men do this too, but I hear this often for, for women that the equation is if you loved me, you would. Right. Totally. And I'm. But hold on, hold on. You just made that equation up. Like you can't just say, you love me. If you do this, that's not how it works. Right. But you could say, I feel loved when you do this. So it's confusing when you know, I need that and you don't do it. Right. That's that's, that's palatable. But when you say you obviously don't love me, cuz they said, I don't like do that. And then you planned it. Yeah. You know,
Curt:
or I got my hair done and you didn't notice for three hours. So clearly you don't love me an
Josh:
unfair formula. Right. But guys have the same with sex oftentimes. Right? Mm-hmm well, if you loved me, uh, why wouldn't you do this? Why wouldn't you have sex with me? Why wouldn't you, you know, I have a need for physical connection. You obviously don't love me. I'm feeling unloved. So we all have, have a tendency. We have a tendency to, to apply our need in a formula and then apply it to someone else. Yeah. Even, and it's not productive. And the math isn't even the same system. Yeah. It's like apple storages. You're like, oh, well that's never gonna
Curt:
work. Fair enough. Um, so what else will we like to talk about from a, from a counseling, from a business element, you were a member of Loco think tank for a year or two, uh, uh,
Josh:
least ish,
Curt:
maybe a couple years, three, even, maybe. Yeah. Kind of during that business development phase, a lot of that happened during that season. What was your experience there? Was that therapeutic for you? Um, you know, being a kind of different or was it, was it about the business? Was it all about other people's problems, but not in the same? You don't have to fix it. You're just a member here.
Josh:
Yeah, it was nice. It was easy compared to sitting across from someone feeling the responsibility of fixing. Uh, it was a great, I'm a verbal processor. So it was a great venue to be able to not tire up my wife or, you know, annoy someone else. Uh, that was, that was appreciated. Um, and at the same time I can't help, but be who I am. So inevitably I did feel, uh, equipped or even encouraged to like help people, like, well, hold on, like your mindset's jacked up. Right. You don't have a business problem fix
Curt:
em up real quick. Yeah.
Josh:
Your business, plan's fine. You're crashing yourself with like your thoughts or your practices. So, uh, I enjoyed it. Uh, it was good. I always enjoyed meeting people. Um, it was a good environment to do that in, um, we had, uh, a few, we have a turnover with facilitators. Yeah. Which has created enough, enough friction where, you know, it doesn't take much sometimes be like, oh, you know, I need to change for, for not even a great reason. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but I, I still see people in the community. Uh, I still have the privilege of speaking into some local groups, um, and seeing some of those
Curt:
faces, which I appreciate. Yeah. By the way, Brandon has, uh, taken that group over and fixed it up. Pretty good. Yeah. It's uh, got a real solid membership right now.
Josh:
Well, I got to do the, I got to values clarification. Oh yeah.
Curt:
Perfect. Yeah, I remember that. So awesome. Um, so yeah. Anything else on the counseling side thing, best practices, if you wanna do a, um, a thought bubble of things everybody should listen to and pay attention to when they're getting to this point.
Josh:
Well, yeah. Uh, you know, it's, I would say it's like being healthy persons, like being a kindergartner and reading some poster that would say, you know, appreciate all of it. Uh, be nice. Uh it's if you wanna set some goals, fine and work toward'em fine, but not the expense of enjoying your life cuz you don't know when it's gonna end and it it's just remarkable how simple. And how pleasant people's lives would be if they could really like embody that. But years and years of conditioning of do this, and then you'll feel good and avoid this and don't deal with this. And all these really unhealthy dysfunctional habits create really tormented people. But the recovery process is actually incredibly quick when they know how to like respond to false narratives. It's not years and years and years of therapy to overcome years and years of trauma, it really comes down to the operating system that they believe in. And once the lights come on and they realize they can just sit there and not have a problem, they can drive walks, sit, sleep, poop, eat, and they don't have a problem, but their minds tell'em they have a problem. Yeah. They listen to their mind. They believe their mind. And they're like, oh, I gotta go fix this. Ah, bigger business, smaller business, sell that house, new partner. And the external attempt to fix internal problems is, is a treadmill. And so. Business intuitive. And sometimes business owners use their business as their external fix. And it never is gonna, it never doesn't qualify or quantify or fix the internal problem. And so they go to busier, bigger businesses. Right. And they ask'em 10 years ago. What would make you happy? Hey, just to be able to pay the bills, right? Oh, are you paying the bills? Uh, yeah. Well, what do you want now? Well, we need, we want, we need a bigger 2 billion revenue. Oh, that'll make you happy. Yes. Cuz then I wouldn't worry about da, da, da, da. Oh. And then find'em a year later. Oh, where's your revenue. Wow. We're at 3.2. are you happy? Well, uh, no, but we're close. almost
Curt:
happy. So that's a huge, I just have a t-shirt that
Josh:
is almost happy, happy, and it's got the dog or whatever with the stick and a carrot on the end. Right. And it really believes just, just about
Curt:
the, yeah. The donkey should be a jackass with a stick in a carrot. Yeah, for sure. That's me almost happy. Where's the carrot. Um, I had another kind of weird thought come up, but so you do these values, clarification things with your clients, especially with coaching clients and things like that. Like, do you ever like get to the end of that? And you know, usually they come up with one or three values or whatever, and you're like, yes, that's your value, but that's wrong. like, you need to drop that value and get something different.
Josh:
Uh, not yet. No, it's, it's been, uh, I, I don't think most people have a very big breadth of. Uh, values, you know? Yeah. It's like, Hey, I want to be happy. I want meaningful relationships. I want to be healthy. Rarely does someone really, you know, after going through a three to four hour exercise, rarely do we come to the conclusion that they want to be the best. So and so in the world, because we've already uncovered, like, what do you think that's gonna bring you? Oh, so you can lay comfortably in bed at night. And so, oh, you want peace? Right? Right. So we've kind of on, we've already like dismantled the fake value or the fake trophy and identified that deeper thing. And that's where they, you can see the burden drops. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and there's like a sense of peace. Like now it doable, like, oh wow. I can have this. Like soon. I don't have to like find some way on the podium.
Curt:
Yeah, I, uh, so if you were gonna describe your particular client base, not your greater firm, but, um, cuz I met you as a marriage counselor, reco I've recommended like five, at least people to you in that capacity probably or some relationships as well. Um, by the way, one of our mutual friends supposedly broke up with his girlfriend finally on Tuesday
Josh:
after, uh, way too long.
Curt:
yeah. Um, but like if you were a breakdown, your, your, uh, breakdown, like, do you still do a lot of couples and marriage counseling? Do you do, uh, more coaching executive stuff now, do you do teen stuff or just regular? I think I'm going crazy by myself.
Josh:
Still. All the, all the above. Yeah. Yeah. I got uh, uh, kids. Yeah, teens, young adults, couples, families, business owners, coaching clients ranging from. Small business to, uh, growing mid-size business. I, I, I need that diversity. Oh, uh, that's
Curt:
interesting. I was that's I wondered because you probably could more than book up. Like you have to be a little bit selective at your point in your career and push frankly, some of your opportunities off onto the other therapist in your office.
Josh:
Yes. But the, the
Curt:
diversity, if you've been pushed off, it's no offense. Actually's just too busy. Well, some,
Josh:
yeah, some people
Curt:
and some people are better equipped than you are to help other problems. I
Josh:
imagine. Absolutely. Yeah. There's no, I don't have, do you say corner of the market and what, what are you bad at? Uh, what kind of people? Well, people that don't wanna do any work
Curt:
well, all therapists are bad at that. Aren't they
Josh:
well, uh, yeah, I can be pretty patient, except for someone that doesn't wanna take respons, they
Curt:
don't make any progress
Josh:
or, yeah, fair. But if someone is good at asking questions and, and a decent job of implementing. That excites me, you know, that's like the lights are on, like, we got this thing. We're gonna make some real progress here versus the person who wish, wants to bitch and point fingers and doesn't wanna do the work. Like I'm I don't have time for that. Yeah.
Curt:
Fair enough. Well, sorry. I was that kind of clap. Yeah. Right?
Josh:
You, you were the poster child of like, oh, hardly. This is the guy who doesn't do the work.
Curt:
Okay. Yeah. That's that's not the kind of poster
Josh:
child. Oh, you'd ask good questions. And you're you didn't do the work, but you asked good questions. You're complaining would all inevitably lead to
Curt:
something good where I'm pointing back at myself. Yeah, that was usually my experience is I would point at Jill with some problem and then eventually you would bend my finger around until I was pointing at myself. Yeah. Not physically cuz that's against your insurance. Probably um, so let's jump into the, the closing segments. We got faith, family and politics that we always talk about. Um, which would you prefer to start with?
Josh:
Uh, we can, we can, uh, I'm comfortable with all those. Well, I know, uh, politics, let's start with politics.
Curt:
That's a uncommon start. Yeah.
Josh:
So, well, it's, it's a, you know, it's a colorful environment for sure. Colorful atmosphere.
Curt:
I told somebody today, actually at the chamber lunch that my prediction cuz I've always had kind of a look ahead is that Biden becomes obviously not capable of doing the job and Kamala's gonna be put in place, setting up Michelle Obama for the 20, 24 ticket against DeSantis. What do you think of my prediction?
Josh:
Uh, I forget who I was listening to the other day and they were, they were kind of tossing the idea around of how likely she would be to run. Uh, I think she would win. Yeah. It's hard to think she wouldn't win. Yeah. Uh, I obviously don't know the woman at all, other than what she says, she's Oprah Winfrey,
Curt:
as far as I know, as far as what she believes, but she's famous enough
Josh:
and she seems, uh, smart mm-hmm and reasonable and kind, and I'm like, those are good characteristics. Um, who would
Curt:
you vote for in a DeSantis? Michelle Obama
Josh:
ticket. Oh, I'd go for Michelle. Would you? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I, again, what I know of someone is limited to what they've shared, but sure. You know, studying eyes and facial expressions every day. Hmm. Uh, there's quick, there's quick conclusions drawn of lots of people. And I'm like, that's a, that's a really solid woman. Hmm. Whether I have to agree with all her politics or not, I wanna sound reasonable leader that I can disagree or agree on lots of things, but, but she's pretty impressive to me.
Curt:
Cool. I like that. Um, so let's talk about more current politics. We've got lots of current events. Yeah. Um, we've got, we could talk about climate change. We could talk about Ukraine war and how that's related to climate change. We could talk about Sri Lanka, uh, Taiwan. Uh, we could talk closer to home here.
Josh:
Yeah. Well, not surprisingly. What I get passionate about is the human experience regarding politics. And what I get most frustrated about is people's inability to respectfully talk about topics. Right. And so, yeah. I have to listen to people. I, I feel compelled to listen versus teach or facilitate when someone's essentially paying me to come and like provide a service that doesn't really want my opinion. Right. And so I, I take a lot. Um, but in that process, oh yeah.
Curt:
So it's like reading the comments section. Right. So, yeah, I hear how, how are people feeling about Joe Biden these days? Well, it depends.
Josh:
It depends on the who they are, their party affiliation. Uh, I'm disappointed in the, the lack of breadth of, um, how people, how quickly people jump to conclusions. Right. Of like, yeah. How, how do you, do you know, now if you've heard someone say something enough and you can see their face, you can see their relationships. Right. Doesn't take long to be like, oh, I don't think they're a trustworthy person, but I'm disappointed in the, in the human experiment of a lack of understanding of, of points of view or the ability to disagree, but still see the value in the person or the concept that they're trying to fight for. I know. And that's, what's frustrating about our system is it doesn't allow now that everything's so rapid fire on Twitter and right. Which I'm, I'm not on and I'm not really, I'm not on the socials. Uh, so I only hear right. What people do. But it just, it lacks face to face accountability, right? Sure. There's no, like you blew up that relationship. And so when you go in that restaurant that person's not available to talk online, you don't know who they are and you just say these absurd things. And I, I long for like a atmosphere or a, a platform where there's just more time to deep dive and say, well, hold on. We might not agree. But I think, I don't think you fully understand where I'm coming from versus just like slinging mud And so, like, that's, that's what my last blog
Curt:
was about was, uh, was, are you speaking my language about just not even understanding the other person's
Josh:
perspective? Yeah. Adamantly, uh, dogmatically against because of the, the first initial step is obviously unwise, right? Like we might go all the way down the road and realize we still don't agree, but given that we can't agree on everything and given that history is always shown, we don't agree on everything. where is the appreciation for the process? Like there's no appreciation for the process. It's just either on my team, right. Or you're the enemy. Well,
Curt:
parliamentary process was designed to help that kind of be a thing. And that's basically forbidden by the parties and the social media machine at this point.
Josh:
Well, and I'm not educated in the, you know, the, a lot of the European government systems, but it does seem like even the, the diversified parliament structure obviously has limitations as well. Right. Given what the Italian prime minister is. Oh yeah. I mean, it's a mess in today. Yeah. And then Boris, uh, you know, out again, right. Or like, so I don't, I have no idea, like we should do this or we shouldn't do this, but I do know if everyone's forced into two that are adamantly, you know, almost forced to disagree because of principle. I mean, that's obviously not wise. Right. So. Three or more would be fantastic where we're like, there's more space and room back in terms of parties. You mean? Yeah. Like, oh, I do agree that we can do a better job in this capacity, but we don't need to be against this group. We don't have to like put this in place. Yeah. And that's what I get disappointed in politics, inevitably in our culture to talk about one subject, all of a sudden you have to, you feel like you have to talk about all of them, because now you're showing your cards and you're like, well, I know where you stand on all these issues. Right. And personally I'm all across the board. Yeah. Uh, you know, I was telling a client the other night, uh, uh, I forget the issue, but I was BA one of the reference points is right outside my office. There was a red light on house, right on, on how and Oak can house and, uh, Magnolia there's lights. I leave the office a couple nights a week at 10 o'clock. No, one's around. Right. And I got a red light and I'm gonna sit there for two minutes. No, I'm not.
Curt:
That's ridiculous. There's not, there's not a camera
Josh:
on top of my someone made that stop light for safety reasons. No one's unsafe right now. Right? I'm gonna run this. He's like, oh, here's the Republican guy. I'm like, no, actually it's libertarian guy who thinks like laws are stupid laws should be ignored, stupid laws, that law that light's great during the day. Sure. Right. Yeah. Otherwise
Curt:
nobody could get
Josh:
across that intersection. Be a shit show, make sense. I stopped. I looked, um, but to sit there for two minutes makes no sense. Right. So like I can go depending on the subject, uh, I, I'm not an easy like pinhole where you're like, oh, he must be on this situation. Okay. Uh, very comfortable talking about all of it in a, in a counseling setting. Uh, I have limitations because my, my opinions about outside factors aren't really relevant to their life. And so I have a practice. I'm not gonna share that because it's not really in your best interest. And you're not asking me for that for me to share that right now. Yeah. I'm like, that's, I could talk all day about that topic, but that's not really why you're here and what I, you're not gonna listen to really what I think in that capacity.
Curt:
I've just written down like a half dozen of the, the most, uh, contentious topics right now. Do you wanna just wrap and fire through? Sure. Um, well, we'll start with the easy one Roe versus Wade. Recent decision. Yeah. But it, on a state side, is that to me from a logical perspective, it seems right. Because it's just, it's just not in the constitution and yeah, what's not in the constitution is reserved to the states, but I recognize a lot of ramifications about state lines and women's rights and right. You know, so I can steal man for me. Well, I'm setting you up here, but for me I can steal man. The, the pro-choice argument pretty well. I think. and I still fall the other way that at least this decision to make it on the states is I think, right. Yeah. Like I wouldn't wanna see a national abortion ban either. Yeah. Because I that's, I'm a state's rights guy. Yeah. And that's one of my high values.
Josh:
Yeah. Well, it's funny cuz it, I don't think it gets presented in that capacity. No, it, it is is should abortion be right or wrong? And what really, as far as I understand it, what really happened was they've punted to the states and said, this is not a federal thing. This needs to be a state thing, which obviously breaks down into not surprising results. Like, oh, well these states are gonna say it's outlawed. Right. Right.
Curt:
Um, and which is taking away all these rights from all these women, according to one
Josh:
side. Sure. Uh I'm I'm actually, uh, uh, I hate to say like you're, pro-abortion I'm pro right? Uh, I think people I'm pro I'm pro-choice I think people, I think women. uh, it's an awkward thing that I can't fully comprehend and I don't really feel like I need to, and I think people should have that. Right. And, uh, there is this, this awkward
Curt:
gray area of should always try to avoid it if you can. Well, you I've seen well, and what's the line, is it, you know, three months is that's the nine months, eight months in 26
Josh:
days. And it comes down to belief systems. Right. And you believe like there's inception and there's a person there's a soul and there's this, and there's a heart and it's pumping. Right. I can, I refuse to get lost in that, like in those weeds. Yeah. Um, and so if it really is punted to the states, um, then I would say the individual, uh, at least they have an option to like going to another state. I mean, maybe not everybody, obviously not everybody. Sure. Um, but that's different than saying federal ban on that. And so I think that's what gets played out a lot is the emotional reaction, which is not surprising. There's this big of, like you can't do you have to. Uh, but to say, well, you can, it depends on your state. And not that everyone chose to live in the state that they were born in, they live in, but you could go to that state and have that procedure. Well, and you
Curt:
said, not everybody can leave and stuff, but like as much as places like my home state of North Dakota are like star, like every small town is starving for somebody to work at the local gas station for$22 an hour. yeah. You know, and different things like that. Like pretty much everybody can like leave and start a new life. That's where America was
Josh:
built on. Well, least that's my a long time. That's my perspective, but I know my perspectives limited to my experience. And so I don't know either it's belief system or it's logistics. Uh, and I wouldn't want to say and believes leave. Like I can leave, like, uh, is it a free country to do that? Yes. Does it take much to apply for that gas station job in Colorado from Kentucky? I don't think so, but I can't can, it does
Curt:
take a lot to leave your family
Josh:
and everything you've ever known. That's great. And I, and so I can't really say. Well, Hey, they can go to Colorado and good abortion if they're in Kentucky. What's the problem. Yeah. There are plenty of problems. I don't have a great suggestion, but to, for the federal government, which, you know, plays out through Trump's appointees, very strategically placed to put in fact, you know, put in place or dismantling of RO versus wait. Yeah, I think that's the reaction like this passion or reaction is this is not representative of the majority of the United States. Yeah, evidence by party lines, but that's also like the conundrum of politics and how everything plays out. That's a complicated
Curt:
one. Yeah. Yeah. And that's part of my blog was like, all these topics are really hard and if you don't think they're hard, then you're just not paying attention to
Josh:
the other side. Yeah. And that's hard for people, like that's hard for the far right. And left to accept for sure. They want to act cuz they're they don't like the label. Right. But they're, they're generally dogmatic. Yeah. For sure. And legalistic in whatever their stance is. And that's a problem that doesn't mean everything they stand for is wrong or right. But to carrying out that way only pushes that other side to be further away from you.
Curt:
Okay. Here's a actually easy one. Um, gun control. Is it a gun problem or a mental health problem and what should we do to try to prevent such catastrophes
Josh:
or not to? Yeah, well a again, I feel like there's. I like statistics and I like analysis and I don't have it. I've listened to a number of arguments and a number of presentations or proposals of what they think the problem is ranging from. Apparently the country of Canada has more guns per capita of the United States. Um, and then pales in comparison to mass shootings and killings. Well, they don't have
Curt:
inner cities, like
Josh:
yeah. And there are a lot of factors like that, that I don't, I mean, I don't think that way, right. Like, yeah, that's a great point. I mean, obviously inner city, inner city,
Curt:
Toronto is not the same as inner city Chicago.
Josh:
Right. Which then you'd say, well, is it mental health or is it socioeconomic factors? Is it, is it, you know, uh, cultural dynamics can play out over and over again. Yeah. I, uh, I'm sure if I found myself on the right setting with the right time to like to dive into that information, I could maybe come up with something intelligent. Otherwise I would say, uh, A quick, quick glance at mass shootings over the last few years, it seems to be a lot of white men in their twenties, um, that are following copycat kind of styles. Mm-hmm which is a, it's a mental health, but I don't even know if it's mental health as much as it's just psychological, right. This sense of like fame and honor narcissism kind of. Um, and they, and I don't, I mean, that's a needle in haystack, right? How are you gonna find that person to shut'em off? Uh, so then access to guns. You're like, well, can we have like, can we build a system where that's, you know, will you'll ever prevent that? I don't know. I'd say
Curt:
somebody that's that passionate about getting a gun and killing people because of a mental health issue. I think they figure
Josh:
it out, but then you'd say like, let's go to Europe and, and, uh, and find like there's probably a 22 year old crazy. Sure. But he doesn't
Curt:
have dreams about shooting people because he's never seen stories about that.
Josh:
So then it's exposure. Right, right. Versus like it's organic. That part of what I
Curt:
think we should do is not carry those news stories period. Like, frankly, it's a, it's a propaganda machine that works against itself. Like frankly, a lot of things offer such efforts like the, the intent to try to, well, like, like my next question, climate change, like the efforts to combat climate change by shutting down production, shutting down nuclear in Germany's case, becoming dependent on clean burning, natural gas from Russia has created a lot of challenge for the people of Ukraine. Yeah. Um, so it's like, it's not a Ukraine issue. It's a climate change issue. And, and, and I've been writing recently in my blog about, you know, basically energy is more like money than money is like money in today's world, because energy is something you can't just print. Right. And it's the ability to do things. That's what money gives you the ability to do or freedom? Money is freedom. Well, energy is freedom. Yeah. You wanna travel from here to there? Well, you can walk or you can not walk. Right. And so like, talk to me about that challenge in general. Like I I've taken to the notion that, you know, oil is so useful that you can only stop humans from using it with a gun, whether it be regulatory or, or, or
Josh:
a better option or a better
Curt:
option. Right. So, or a better option. So that's what I'm hopeful for. Yeah. Honestly, I think nuclear in a lot of respects is a better option. So, so energy dense. Yeah. So geographic footprint shallow. Yeah. Comparably. I mean, should I take a Nebraska full of solar panels to cover the energy output of one modern nuclear
Josh:
plant and what little reer research I've done? That seems to be the case in the, the, it seems to be an exaggerated fear. Of the potency or the lethality of that source of energy. Mm-hmm which I would say let's let the let's no, this, these all stack on each other, if we can't trust the scientists, right. We're gonna have a really hard time making informed decisions. Right. So if you could say like, well, what does the, what does the science say about the, the risk factor of nuclear energy? Right, right. And again, very small, what's the data say?
Curt:
And what's the science say there's two different
Josh:
things. And I would love to say, is there a way to determine like the risk factor of that? Cuz if it's that powerful, if it can replace that many different sources and we can control the risk factor, we'd be crazy. Not to, I, I have no idea. Right? I'm, I'm susceptible as anyone else to say like, well who's feeding me the energy. Can I detect an angle or not? I don't know. But well,
Curt:
and one thing I haven't really thought too much about is, you know, you can probably destroy a nuclear plant with a nuclear missile. easily, I would imagine, but even a, a solar plant, the size of Nebraska, you can only like wing it. so it's the little more dispersed of course all the Nebraska's are like, well, why'd I have fucking solar panel.
Josh:
why did Kurt throw that idea now we're
Curt:
screwed. So I want to, uh, I wanna shift it to, since we're talking about following the science. Yeah. COVID mandates. Yeah. How did you feel about that? Like what kind of emotions were in, especially let's start with your clients. Yeah. Like how many people were tweaked, like me when it came to being locked inside, I imagine. Did you have to go to remote or were you essential?
Josh:
We went, we were essential. Most of our industry seemed to go remote, but I hated it. I wanted the human connection even with a mask
Curt:
on. Uh, but you didn't wear masks usually?
Josh:
Uh, I didn't often wear a mask. I did. I went through spurts. Yeah. Right. Uh, Uh, I'm just not a fearful person, but that doesn't mean science doesn't give a shit about whether I'm fearful or not. Right. And so it was an awkward, are you
Curt:
gonna spread it? Are you
Josh:
not gonna spread it? I mean, yes, I'm going to, if I get it and they get it and I got it only recently, right? February. Yeah, that was December. Um, I was, I was vaccinated. I was boosted. I, I have no problem. Uh, taking things. When
Curt:
did you have a problem with the mandates of boosting of vaccinating or were you okay with
Josh:
that? I was mixed. Yeah. I mean, I, I understand the predicament. I understand the, the government has governmental. Uh, we must do something. We, I mean, like for example, you know, like the government writes a ticket. If you don't wear a seatbelt, you're not flying from your car and hitting anybody it's for your own good right. No, one's throwing a fit over wearing a fucking seatbelt. Right. And then to take this vaccination, which they're arguably people can debate no, no evidence that it's really gonna be a problem. And, but being told to do it, like you're told to do lots of things. Why are you picking this fat, this battle? And I, and I don't want to be told what to do at the same time. Right. I don't even stop at a red light in the middle of the night. right. So I go back and forth between like, oh, well, I see the idea. I see the agenda. And I see the benefit. And I also don't want to do things that are re just overly fearful based and ridiculously like enforced. So I, I would say, I agree, I understand the mandate and I wouldn't wear one in my office. And I would only wear one in a space when it felt like I had to. Cuz I'm like, I don't, I don't, I'm not afraid of catching it that's, but that doesn't mean, I don't think it's a thing, not social responsibility. And I'm not saying that people can't get it for me and die, but I just choose not to live. I just choose to live reasonably. And that's, it's hard for
Curt:
you to be afraid of anything.
Josh:
I'm not kinda like me. I'm not afraid of much because I've, I feel like I've already kind of factored in the outcome of whatever could happen. Yeah. I'm like, well, that's not interesting. That's not
Curt:
new. That was one thing that was striking to me when kind of this was all going down is that, you know, you might tell one person that this is a novel disease. It's a novel virus. Whether it came from a lab or not, one out of 200 people might die. And some people like me were like, eh, one or 200. I got that. You looked around, not scared. We were the hundred 90. Come on, fatty. See you later. Yeah, exactly. Other people are like, oh shit. Like especially health officials at the state level or federal, like what on level? Holy fuck.
Josh:
Our, well, they feel responsible. Right. And I don't feel responsible. Right. And so there's a difference also in position if I was, yeah. If I was putting in and had to sign legislation that that I think would impact people's death, I think I would probably feel more. But I haven't, I haven't put myself in that position to feel that responsible. So it's different. Right. We fail to understand everyone's unique role and their influence. Like, I didn't have that. I didn't have to say our town has to do this. I could just bitch about
Curt:
it. Right. I did a lot of that. what last, uh, one last, since it's right, like right in the heat of battle right now, uh, January 6th, attempted insurrection or overblown protest gone a little bit wrong.
Josh:
Yeah. I would love to find, uh, an, a description. That's what I trying to figure it out. I would love to find a description that's right in the middle of those, cuz I do think, uh, if what I've read or what I've heard is accurate, I think, uh, Trump overstepped, uh, proper leadership. Yeah. Uh, I think he ignited unnecessary anger and doubt in a system that worked pretty well and pretty flawlessly. and at the same time you go and push buttons and soak the fire of any group, and they're gonna want to have their right to like protest. And my impression was a lot of those people were, it was like a party, obviously not, not everybody, not everybody, but like we're gonna get together. And then there were people, there were people I think that were way more malicious and destructive, but the, I think it's a breakdown of good leadership, you know, I think fair and I don't want to get too, like, uh, I don't know, American like integrity character base, but it it's a huge undermine to like a proper president should never have allowed it bad leadership, no matter what country you're part of or whatever you're leading. Well, it's kinda like the
Curt:
gore Bush election way back win, like had gore kicked up his heels and really made a fight out of it. They could have, but I think they kind of decided not to
Josh:
cuz it was yeah. Cause it actually was in hindsight, right? Like way closer and way more. Vague and persuasive than how it ended. Totally. But there was a, but
Curt:
go guy is a revenge, he's worth 350 million now or something that flies a private jet everywhere to talk about how the climate is dying.
Josh:
Yeah, I can't. Yeah, absolutely. And I, and I have no idea what his agenda was back then, but that seemed like a, a commitment to decency. Yeah. And yeah, honestly. Right. And, and a government system is like a currency. It's like any other belief, totally
Curt:
trust is like lubrication to the system. Antitrust is like, you pull
Josh:
out gravels, you're pulling out the foundation of the whole thing. That's where I feel like there was a huge misstep. And I feel like we can, maybe we can, you know, reinstate a sense of confidence in the system that requires ongoing trust. People will do what they say they're gonna do. And your vote does count this way versus the last second, this guy convinced this guy and they've rallied and it lost it. That's like saying the dollar is nothing but a piece of paper. Yeah. Holy shit. Like, why do I have it then? right. In our democracy, in our legal system is not that different. So that's where I get disappointed. Yeah. In like, I, I have no idea who these people are. I'm sure some of them are great people. Some are horrible people if they're like everybody else. Right. Uh, but to invoke that and to stoke it and to cover it up and manipulate it. Yeah. That reminds the trust system that our government needs agreed. What do
Curt:
you have, have you watched 2000 mules? No. Have you heard about it? No. Oh, you should watch it. Probably. I haven't watched it either, but okay. To hear it described, there's like multiple thousands of people that went to the same Dropbox a whole bunch of times over election season based on cell phone records. And there's this documentary that the mainstream media has squashed mostly in Georgia and Pennsylvania and Arizona. And they were ballot harvesting from nonprofits. Basically there was, it was Zuckerberg put in$350 million into the democratic election into pay all these mules. Wow. Yeah. Well, I'm surprised you don't know, but frankly, frankly, nobody knows because you're not on social media necessarily, but also like literally there's no mainstream critics have reviewed the movie 2000 mules, even though it's the most watched documentary of 20, 22. Yeah. I have no idea. And it's all based on public records documents. Huh? So anyway, commercial for, I, I need to get like, you have to register for daily wire and like download it from the internet and shit. Cuz no theater would play it cuz they'd be huh, ransacked. But there's strong physical evidence, uh, for an organized. Effort to influence election that's. That was my big thing is I'm like, well with vote ballots, like my mom's cousin in California voted for Joe Biden. She hadn't voted for 30 years cause they had mail and ballots and the media obviously made it clear that the orange man bad. Yeah. And so she voted for the first time in 30 years, even though she really didn't care. Yeah. That was, to me, the bigger challenge with the election was the fact that we, as an American public, we could be like, okay, 95% of the media has decided this 5% of the media is pushing back against it. And it is what it is. Yeah. And that doesn't seem quite legit.
Josh:
Well, it's hard because we,
Curt:
unless they're right. It's great. but if they're not right then it's rough.
Josh:
Yeah. And I don't, I have no way to know, like what's more true than something else. That's the thing. Right. I'm depending on. the media, my sources. Right? How could we, and I, and there's no way I'm gonna say all my sources are correct. And they're always right. Cuz I know people have alternative agendas and totally, and it's hard when conspiracy theories, uh, there's a plethora of conspiracy theories out there. And I would say human history has shown some of'em are right. right. So that's one of my favorite, you know, how do you know which one's actually a fact and which one's just made up? I don't know. One
Curt:
of my favorite memes lately is, uh, I need to get some new conspiracy theories. All my old ones have come true. all we beat that horse enough. Yeah. Uh, but thanks for playing along. Everybody else is so scared to play the politics question. Oh, I'm fine with it. Um, politics, family or faith would you like to take up next? We've talked about your family a little bit. Do you want just go there and maybe build it out a little bit more? What? Sure. You, you and Bree have been married now then like 22
Josh:
years. Nice. Yeah. Uh,
Curt:
easy peasy for her. Oh, geez. Harder for you.
Josh:
No place a versa. I mean, comparatively, right. And I can say comparatively well, women are a
Curt:
lot easier to live with when they're high functioning than men are, men are always kind of annoying to be
Josh:
married to we both annoy each other plenty. Uh, but we've gotten better at tolerating. And that's something also that as a, as a marriage counselor, it's interesting cuz American belief systems, uh, don't want to embrace tolerance. Yeah. Right. But it's unbelievably helpful in politics, in a marriage and a business. Just anything to do with another human tolerating is essential. And there's a difference between toxicity and tolerating and you know, just preferences. Yeah.
Curt:
You can't just tolerate terrible
Josh:
things like abuse. Right? Right. You wouldn't tolerate someone hitting you or someone getting drunk and wasting all your money, but to tolerate. The way someone says something sometimes, right. Or their preferences, or he
Curt:
leaves the toilet seat up sometimes
Josh:
ranging from one to 10. Like the ability to tolerate is not discussed and promoted in our culture and it's weakness. Yeah. Right. And you're not supposed to tolerate, you're supposed to speak up and fight for change. Right. Well, well this person's this color. They're not changing when this, you wanna die on that hill. Right. Yeah. But they don't know, they don't know they get locked in. Right. They think if you love me, so, and so does this, why don't you do this? And so we've gotten, I think, uh, probably reluctantly or begrudgingly tolerant of the way we communicate. Uh, not necessarily the things that we like, but, but the way we address certain things. So 22 years of, I would say, um, a very hard fought committed and, uh, intentional reward, intentional and rewarding. But rewarding because we it's hard. Yeah. It's really hard. It's not a, I don't think it's a natural process. It's an unnatural process. Despite some belief systems that, that promote it as a very natural process. Yeah. Looking at it from my angle. It is anything but natural. Well, and the, the desire to have a, a loving partner seems natural. Sure. But to share life at the level that we share life with our partners, with as many differences we have is it can't say it's a natural process. I go watch the elk herd. Right. I'm like, that's natural. That guy hums that girl. And he leaves. And then he hums that girl and he leaves, pumps that girl. And he wanders around and Frances around the field. And she's like that shit. I got these, all these babies. I got these babies to grow. I'm not promoting that as a lifestyle for our culture, but I'd say that's natural. That's what the
Curt:
welfares take caused is the inner cities. Not that we went there.
Josh:
oh man. Uh, so family. Uh, two kids, 13 year old daughter, 10 year old son. And what are their names? Uh, justice is our 13 year old daughter. Isaiah's our 10 year old son. And, uh,
Curt:
if you've listened to my podcast a lot, you know, that I always ask for a one word description. Oh, you have listened to my podcast,
Josh:
uh, for each
Curt:
kid. Yeah. And for Brie too, just because, yeah.
Josh:
Uh, just, uh, for, for Brie, um, one word committed. Yeah, justice, uh, dynamic and, uh, Isaiah, uh, uh, intelligent. Hmm. And not in a, not in a performance base. Right. I just, I love how I love how his mind works. Yeah.
Curt:
Let's talk. That word dynamic a little bit and justice. Can we? Yeah, absolutely. Um, like dynamic to me indicates like a lot of change and evolution and, and even some, uh, power. Yeah. I think, um, like
Josh:
strong personality. Yeah. Uh, a mind, uh, very intuitive and, and observational, but also, also despite having a cell phone as a 13 year old, she's also really in the moment to the point where she can really pick up on the nuances. Oh, that's cool. That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I don't feel like I'm with a 13 year
Curt:
old kid. I'm actually looking at her in my mind's eye right now from paddler's pub from about five years ago. Yeah. Nice. when we hung out there four years ago, maybe. Yeah. Um, uh, so you've grown up well, uh, justice, but yeah. Yeah, but I actually, I was thinking about that. I was like, she was really interested in who. I, and we were even at that time, probably a nine year old or
Josh:
something. Yeah. Yeah. It, it's not a flippant look. Right. It's a, she's serious. What is this? Who
Curt:
is this? Right? Who are they about? She's a brown type probably as well. Yeah.
Josh:
Yeah. But she's a, she's a, I love it dynamic in the fact that she loves so many things. Right. She can grab some chalk and be on the sidewalk, or we don't have a sidewalk cuz little up on the hill hill, but uh, on the driveway, you know, and just like lo lose herself for an hour, drawing something on the driveway, uh, music, uh, she's her dad's girl. Well, and, and seems like she's a really, she's a good, she's a good blend. I mean, she's got breeze fire, um, and maybe more dogmatic kind of stances on things. Mm-hmm, where I was when I was younger and now I've become more, uh, I don't know. Fearful just kidding. not no BA
Curt:
nuanced or balanced, or
Josh:
I think nuanced is to see like, there's always like different shades and different shapes to everything. Yeah. If you look at it long enough and see a deeper appreciation for that. Yeah. But she can, she can see that for sure. Yeah.
Curt:
Uh, yeah. And then Isaiah, um, like you took a little while to come up with intelligent and that's like, it is what it is, but it isn't very descriptive in some
Josh:
ways. Well, he's yeah. He, cause he's, there's, there's a different level of breadth. Uh, he's not a social, uh, there's a, uh, not a diverse set of interest. It is. He does love, he loves learning, uh, engineering, science, video games. And so growing up in a home where everyone else is into sports or has that history in sports. Interesting. And has that, uh, that kind of cultural practice, uh, It's just a different form of connection. Sure. Um, but is the way his mind works? Uh, I mean, he's 10 and I know this says something about us and him, but he's probably the smartest scientist in the family, uh, whether it's dinosaurs or stars, you know? Yeah. And astronomy, yeah. All off the
Curt:
beer table, whatever Isaiah,
Josh:
like, why does that Hawk do that? Well, dad it's because, uh, you know, when they sense this fear of threat, they do. Uh, and I don't even know if he's bullshitting or not. he, I have that skill too. uh, but intelligent in that he, he absorbs really well. And I don't know if it's, I don't think it's photographic, but, uh, he's an avid reader and he absorbs information really well. What was it
Curt:
that, um, caused Bree to fall in love with you when you guys were first getting together?
Josh:
Whew or vice versa? You're gonna have to answer both questions either way. Yeah. I guess. Well, for her, her, to me, well, it's hard to separate out, like what I think the impact of origin of family is just given 25 and 23, right. When we got married. So 23 and 21 when we met. Yeah. Um, you know, we don't know each, we don't know ourselves. Sure. Extensively. Yeah. And so there's always, there's like, you've been pre-conditioned
Curt:
well, yeah. Well, what was it at that time? Like what probably drew you together? What got you? Well, in
Josh:
hindsight started, wasn't what got there, she's a lot, like my mother in that low maintenance, um, committed, independent. Yeah. Loyal and committed, strong. And so it's this subconscious like familiarity of like, oh, that's a good partner. She just said,
Curt:
and forget it wife. Yeah. Until I, which I'm sure until she's like, Hey, I need some attention too,
Josh:
until I do that wrong thing over there. And then it's not forgetting, like what about the forgetting? Uh, so that's me to her, her to me. Uh, I think, uh, uh, you know, coming from a strong family, um, and having that family, that, that family background and sense of security being a part of something bigger, just having more of a fractured family growing up. She did. Yeah. Uh, obviously I, I, I can't say for certain what that attraction was, but, um,
Curt:
well, security is for a lot of women anyway, that's part of it, right? Like it's huge. Yeah. And when, when men start freaking out and having mental breakdowns and stuff like that, like that doesn't well,
Josh:
which ironically, you know, younger, there were, my emotional world was much more of a rollercoaster than it is now that didn't lead to a life of rollercoaster, but, but being a part of a bigger package, you're like, oh, well his is his family, his family's here, his brother's here. This is his track record. This is the stability. Generational. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, you're part of a, you're joining into a bigger, more secure unit. And then you're like,
Curt:
we're moving to Costa Rica.
Josh:
well, she was the, she was, was the in, in skated to that more initiator of like, she was kinda running away work. Yeah. This is, this is too intense right now. Yeah. Let's go to a place and that's awesome. Yeah, the, the water called her good for her to recognize that it was, yeah, it was awesome. Great, great experience. And, uh, and, uh, and to share that together, right. To look back and be like, we did that. We gave up this, this and this. Yeah. And whether it was a setback or a leap ahead. It was awesome.
Curt:
So when we think about family from a broader view, did you have grandparents that you were close to or uncles, or like people that really impacted you even in a way that was family? Like without actually being family
Josh:
along the journey? Yeah. My mom's parents, uh, were really involved, uh, childcare, uh, a lot of support. Uh, so we grew up with, uh, them being pretty involved. My dad's parents, uh, not so much. Hi, his side of the family, my mom, my mom didn't have much of, she had no siblings. Mm. So we had no cousins on that side. You were the focus of interest over there. Yeah. So not surprisingly, we got a lot of attention, right. To compensate for the lack grandkids.
Curt:
my dad was talking about his grandmother, uh, with me the other day and she had 46 grandkids. Oh my gosh. And she used to talk to, she actually, um, my, my grandma's mom had passed and so she didn't have a mom. And so she became kind of close to my dad's family. And my dad used to have philosophical conversations with her, like I, for an I, and eventually the whole world gone blind and things like that. And he is like, I don't think she had a relationship like that with any of her other 46 grandkids. Wow. You know, and anyway, I digress, but it reminds me of that notion of having that next generation so involved.
Josh:
So we had that with my mom's parents. Um, but uh, very minimal depth with any cousins, more so early on. And then as we got older, no, yeah. Uh, aunts and uncles, not really. I mean, nice people, those that are left. Uh, yeah. Um, but no, the, there was a ton. My dad made an in significant effort in kind of compensating for his family experience by, uh, uh, you know, a Baptist preacher. That was way more concerned about his time on stage. And then the pulpit versus really taking care of his family, not taking care of like food on the table, but fostering relationships, fostering integrity, it was rights and wrongs and dos and don'ts. And my dad, you know, his distaste for that dramatically led to a lot of intentional. Parenting. Um, so the four, it was four of us, but it, it, it might as well felt like, you know, at a huge extended family, cuz it was really solid and really intentional. Yeah. That's
Curt:
cool. Um, faith, we haven't talked about faith yet. Yeah. Um, so Baptist grandfather. Yeah. And probably at least a mini revolt from the strictness and sounds like somewhat the hypocrisy of that for sure. Right? Like you're preaching from the pulpit all the time saying about how important it is to be close to your family. Yeah. But you got no time for'em. I mean, that was a generation ahead, but it had to inform your experience.
Josh:
Uh yeah. But not like you would think my dad surprisingly remained incredibly faithful. Yeah. Um, and, and didn't, and didn't tear down the, the belief system, despite the hypocrisy or the legalism made a significant step towards. More acceptance and more grace, which, you know, I I'm grateful to this day because we don't align anymore. My, my faith has, uh, you know, I said, probably say bluntly has, uh, dissolved. Wow. Because of, I would say mostly rooted in my human experiences with people and seeing, just seeing the, the desire for faith and see how faith is like reconstructed and followed or not followed, or just the human desire for story and peace and like security. Um, you know, I went to, I went to seminary. I didn't know that for, yeah, for my graduate program, they had a, it was Denver seminary. And so it was, you know, half Bible classes and theology and half counsel. And so it was absolutely, you know, reinforcing a belief system that I was, I was brought up in and I was conditioned to believe, but I don't have a, I don't have a tragic story of like, oh, I was hurt by this church or hurt by this person. Yeah. I hear a lot of those. Yeah. Uh, I had no reason, no, no experiential reason to, to believe anything differently. And I didn't, I didn't even really choose anything. It just, it slowly dissolved with my human experiences to say like, oh, well, that's what humans want to do. Humans across the globe have always decided humans, be humans to wanna make sense of why we're here, what we're doing and what's next. Okay. And you know, you go from one country the next and you're gonna hear, well, this is what I was taught. Oh, how are you taught that? Well for my parents and my grandparents and, and to see the, the desire and the need for a religious. An explanation of like, why we're here and seeing that there, it always seems to fall short of the actual human experience. Uh, and yet the blind desire for it to make sense seems so desperate. Yeah. I, I couldn't force myself to continue to believe it. Once I saw the way I saw it. Right. And it's different in that no one hurt me that caused this chain of reaction totally was run that way. I don't have an, I never had like an agenda. Right. I didn't, you have a moment of whatever. No. Yeah. There was no like this broke and this, you know, it was this slow, you just kind of
Curt:
slowly went at church less and less and slowly believed less and less. Is that what I'm hearing? Uh, yeah. And by the way, I use faith instead of religion, because I think religion's kind of gross. Usually. Usually
Josh:
it's abusive and it's unnecessarily narrow. Yeah. Uh, yeah, but my, but so then how did the
Curt:
universe come into being, oh man, who is Jesus?
Josh:
Yeah, these are great questions that I, I, uh, am grateful to not even feel the pressure to answer or to know. I mean, I'd be happy. I get talk about it all day or all week or all year. Sure. And I used to feel compelled to be able to, to know, and, and now I'm like, I don't have to know that I don't feel compelled to know that where, you know, typically belief systems are based on doc. Right. You must believe for you're the enemy. Yeah. And, and now I'm like, well, but I, I'm only confined to that if I believe that if I don't believe that I don't have to believe anything. So I could say, I don't know, uh, what we know about Jesus through, you know, some books that were recorded a few decades after his existence was that he was an unbelievably wise kind and caring, uh, person. Um, and I think the, the huge shift for religions or faith people is the. The conundrum of, is it attributed to the father? Is it contributed to a higher power or is it just a wonderful human that lived the way that we should all live? Right. And I think was he the
Curt:
best prophet ever? Yeah. Like the Mormons or perhaps some of the other kind of divergent
Josh:
and I can comfortably say, like, that seems like a really wise way to live based on everything we know about humanity. Yeah. You're, that's a good life. Right. But I don't feel compelled nor can I say he is part of this system of like a creator, the Xfinity that most, well, this happened and this
Curt:
happened, then he's the one that forgives and you can have sanctification and
Josh:
whatever salvation somehow created this, believe in him created this whole world and didn't account for this one angel that fell but then is like corrupted everyone. Yeah. And so wait, oh, can I make a plan B, I'm gonna introduce a son and he's gonna call me, he's gonna do this stuff. And then he is gonna die. And then we can have a new reentry. To someone who's outside of that system, it, it looks unbelievably forced and unnecessary. Sure. Yeah. But when you're in the system, you're like, oh, well, okay, sure. That makes sense. Well, I'll follow that guy. Well, I think, and that's what I, that's where I was. And
Curt:
that's what I did. One of the strengths of my white type is I can see both perspectives pretty well and a perspective that I've been noticing. Well, not just noticing, but like that NCHE noticed really is that it, it wasn't like a celebration. God is dead. Yay. It was more like, oh shit, God is dead. And we killed him. And what do we do now? And that's unfortunately, if God is dead, like if the, if nothing is above the state, then the state is God. And that unfortunately seems to be the place that we have come now. And that seems like. Honestly, a worse place for human thriving to my eyes.
Josh:
Yeah. Yeah. I know there's a lot of nuance to that, but in general I would say, yeah, like to, to forfeit, like it's
Curt:
better to live as though Jesus is real and God is alive yeah. Than it is to acknowledge that God is dead and Jesus might be
Josh:
fake, but that goes back to like the tendency for all our, nothing thinking. Oh, and I would say, well, there seems to be plenty of space in the middle to say, why wouldn't we all live like Jesus and use our systems to like, reinforce that reasonably versus finding, you know, faith or, or religion or salvation in a system, right. Or unnecessarily finding faith or, or re or salvation in a, a narrow. Blind that every religion has to take because they all find their identity and validation. You gotta pick your niche. Right. You can't just be the general, like, right. And you gotta be the
Curt:
only way cuz if you're not the only way say that, then why would you yeah, exactly. No, I get it. You guys are
Josh:
all, all
Curt:
of these things. I compare like a blurry lens. Like I say, Christianity is kind of the, they're all blurry lenses, but Christianity seems to have the least blurry cuz it's like a whole bunch of words that this dude said kind of, that seemed to be pretty darn inaccurate. Yeah.
Josh:
Um, to me the creation story and the need for salvation story, once I was, once I found myself outside the circle. Yeah. Uh, and I know I can't speak about my own journey. Yeah. A lot of your clients are gonna listen
Curt:
to this like, oh
Josh:
shit. I can't speak about my own journey without it, unfortunately, reflecting on other people's faith or journey. Right. But this is. Mine. Right. I can't stand outside that circle and look at that story and, and see truth in it. Yeah. And so then I'm like, well, I can't follow something that makes no sense to me. And it's always a big and Jesus, uh, Buddha, uh, a number of people throughout time have lived amazingly. Right. And I'm like, that's wise, we should follow that. Right. But to say,
Curt:
yeah, I think Jesus, would've been great friends.
Josh:
Yeah. They'd be like, we're hanging all the time. We might go. We won't have a slightly,
Curt:
if we team up, we're gonna totally change the
Josh:
world. The ultimate conglomerate. Right?
Curt:
Hold on. You're gonna get too much. Let's check Welch's company. The I, that I GE GE yeah. We're just gonna pull all these yeah. Clubs of things. Jesus and Buddha, Jesus of Buddha, Inc.
Josh:
Can't the world can't stop.'em
Curt:
so have you heard, so my oldest joke that I can tell on command is, uh, so God created in the heavens and the earth and, and all the animals and Adam of course, and stuff. And little bit later, he is like, so Adam, what do you think? You know, you know, you got done naming the animals, thank you by the way and stuff, and you know, how how's it going? And Adam's like, you know, it's amazing like the, the fruit trees and the waterfalls and all the things are great. The animals are awesome, but I'm kind of lonely. And, you know, it would be kind of cool if there was somebody more like me, that that was here instead of just all these animals that can't talk like me and you, and God's like, you know, face Paul, like, oh, duh, I should have thought of that. You know, what would you like? Have you heard of this one? No, no. And, and, and Adam's like, well, I would love somebody that was. Honoring and beautiful and kind and sincere and emotionally balanced and steady. And God's like, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's gonna cost you an armor to lake And then I was like, well, what could I get for a rib? I love it. Anyway. Yeah. I learned that in seventh grade and I can still tell it on command. It's good. Yeah. That's good. Well, thanks for sharing. Is there anything else you'd like to share, share on that topic? I guess one thing that I would share is for people that are listening, whether you have a faith background or a no faith background have a value system. Yeah. Like a know where it comes from. Well, and, and because otherwise you just get unmoored well, and everything
Josh:
is okay. Respect, practice, respecting other people's beliefs or value system, even if it's not root in your belief system, because we just, we can't be better. And, and I know certain belief systems aren't really focused on being better. It's about the next, the, the next thing. Yeah. But, but in general, People don't need to sacrifice the next thing, whatever it is in order to have more respect for people's values that aren't rooted in the same beliefs, but that's, that's where we're lacking is like, well, is it really a big deal? It is a big deal when we think there's a huge story that's following and it's all got, you know, it's all mapped out, but none of us can prove that. Right. And most of us disagree on what it's gonna look like. So why can't we say, Hey, get along. Totally. I know that this sounds elementary, but who doesn't, you know, who doesn't wanna get along? People that are hurting and they want to take it out on someone else. Otherwise it just makes sense. Like otherwise you do you, yeah. Find commonality in the differences, keep, keep your differences to a minimum, celebrate the commonality. And it's a better exist and even celebrate
Curt:
the differences sometimes be like, wow, that's interesting that you
Josh:
think this, it doesn't have to be a problem. Yeah. But when someone ruminates on it, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's well
Curt:
said. The local experience is your most. Extraordinary or exciting or crazy experience that you've had in your lifetime that you're willing to share. Whoa. Yeah. Other than this podcast right now,
Josh:
most extraordinary experience I've ever had.
Curt:
Yeah. That you're willing to share that wanna embarrass your wife too much or anything like that, your kids or whatever, embarrass the hell. I don't care. Not my, not my practice. It's kidding. Yeah,
Josh:
nothing. Uh, I traveled to Europe after college, uh, and it was the first time that I had really had the level of independence to interact with alternative beliefs. Hmm. And, uh, you know, it's sad to say in hindsight that it was at 22 to, to really grapple with different worldviews. And again, you know, European worldviews, aren't dramatically different than a lot of America. They're still very
Curt:
Western, but, but still like, oh, well God was dead a long time earlier there. He had been,
Josh:
he was here. He had been down a few hundred years in Europe. Yeah. It just showed the, the. To me, there's just so much to learn. Right. And, and when I think I have it all figured out and I can't learn from someone else, uh, I'm probably wrong. and so, yeah, I know that's not one event, but there was a, a three month experience that continued to expand. There's a lot of different ways to be human and you can't really prove one's right or wrong. So stop trying to like Trump, trying to prove
Curt:
that that's cool. I like it. Um, tell people how to find Josh Emory or Emory counseling, if they wanna find you on your, you said you're not on
Josh:
socials personally. Yeah. Uh, I have those website accounts. I just, I don't frequent those. Yeah. So Emory counseling.com uh, Joshua Emory counsel.com is my email. Yeah. Uh, no ne no exciting, uh, avenue to meet me. Yeah. Without the social, your Instagram feed
Curt:
is very
Josh:
boring. There's a few pictures there from years ago. uh, Bree post more and links me to those. But, uh, yeah, I, I. I, uh, not that I'm opposed to being found or interacted with, but I love the, the simplicity of being present and those things distract me usually. So
Curt:
well, thanks for being present with me here. I hope you enjoyed yourself. Absolutely. And, uh, we'll see you next
Josh:
time. Oh, it was a pleasure.
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