John Vagueiro - Genuine Optimism vs. Toxic Positivity

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So to learn more and get started today, go to HubSpot.com and check it out. Hey everyone, welcome back to Make It Happen Mondays where we talk about sales, business, entrepreneurship, personal growth, mental health, and everything in between with guests who I truly respect and I think make a positive impact on the world around us. And talking about making a positive impact, man, John Veguiero is one of those people doing the work. Now, John is the CEO and founder of Adapting Social, a full-service digital marketing agency whose main mission is to validate small businesses' credibility online and build revenue. But that is not what we talked about. In this episode, we dove deep into optimism and gratitude, which I think you all know we need a lot more of right now.

And it's hard to come by. I mean, his story is incredible. At a very young age, he was the oldest of a bunch of kids and his dad came to him and basically was going to lose the house and he had to go to work. And not just work, like he was working at Best Buy and not making enough money though to save the house. So he ended up deciding to go off on his own and start his own agency at such a young age. And he said he spent three months knocking on doors and getting people slamming doors in his face and got that one yes that changed everything. And so we dove into where his optimism comes from and he talked about it in form of anxiety, which I thought was really interesting. He said his optimism actually comes from his anxiety and a lot of his mental health issues because he had to force himself to be positive in a lot of ways and how he was a people pleaser and how that's not a good thing.

And we talked about toxic positivity, which I actually come across a lot with some of my friends and people I know who are always, oh no, it's all great. It's all great when you know it's not. So we dove into that and why sadness is actually a good thing and how to deal with it. And then he gave us some very tactical things about his calendar strategy and how he deals with disappointment and depression and also his existential gratitude, which I thought was really cool. So like you always hear me at the end of all my podcasts, you know, go out there and make somebody smile today. Man, this is one of those episodes that I think more than a few people need to listen to. So I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Let's make it happen. John, welcome to Make It Happen Monday podcast, my friend. Thanks for coming on board. John, you have a fantastic name. Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. I'd be here. Yeah, I love it. And I'm looking forward to this conversation for a couple of different reasons. I think when I started doing some background, I mean, the optimism side of what we're looking at here, I think is optimism is... I've always kind of considered myself an optimist, right? But there's a lot of stuff going on right now that is making it hard to be an optimist. Just from a business standpoint, a macroeconomic standpoint. So I'd love to dive into that with you as far as learning some of the stuff that you talk about, about true optimism versus toxic positivity and those type of things.

But let's give the audience a little background of where you're coming from and kind of why you're doing what you're doing right now. Yeah, man. So why I'm doing... So initially, I got into the world of being an entrepreneur and started my first company, which was Adapt and Social, my agency, which is my main business. It's my baby's. Then I started from scratch when I was 17. You know, my parents came to me. You know, I'm an oldist at five. My dad approached me and said, listen, I'm in a top financial position. You know, we potentially could lose the house, right? And I'm like, oh, shit. Like, what can I do? Right. And, you know, at the time, I was helping him. I was working at River Tuesdays, like Boston, and I was a lifeguard at the beach.

And I was also working at Best Buy, doing a couple different jobs. I always kept myself busy. But I was giving him money from those things to help, and it just wasn't enough based on what his situation. So he told me nothing he said. And so I started Googling at the time, like, what can I do to make, like, you know, like 50, 60 brand a year? And this is going back, like, 15 years. What can you make that? Because I don't know. And I didn't know where I got the number. I just, like, Googled it. And I found a couple of things that I couldn't do, right? So one was an air traffic controller, right? You had to at least, you just thought you wanted to do that. And then a couple of other things. But the one thing that stuck out to me was website freelancer, right?

So I saw website freelancer, and I was like, oh, that's interesting. And so I started, like, looking things up at websites and stuff. I stumbled upon a couple of different platforms. And so I taught myself how to build sites. And so I started building out websites. My first version of it was, you know, remember Living Social with Groupon? Yeah. So at the time, this is before Groupon was on the scene, though. It was just Living Social. And I'm sitting there. I'm like, all right, I'm going to make a rival website on a really more micron level. And essentially, what I built out was a brick town deal. So it was just for my town that I grew up at Brick. And so instead of me, do you know the model and how it works, John?

No. So as a Groupon, let's just use an easy example. Yeah, we'll explain it. But I think, yeah, the Groupon model. So as an example, right? So let's just say you sell mason jars, right? You sell mason jars for $10. If you put it on Groupon, what they do is they say, okay, we're going to sell it for $5 now, right? And I'm going to take $2.50 and you're going to take $2.50. And initially, the thought process behind this is like, okay, you know, I'm going to get new customers. We'll try my mason jars. And if they like them, they'll come back and pay for the price. Right. What we started to see with Living Social and why we don't really care about Living Social anymore is that literally, you know, they would almost believe companies drop, right?

Because, you know, you have to have money to pay for every story, pay for employees. And when you have those deep discounts, yes, you're going to get volume, hundreds of thousands of people in your door, but you're not making money. Right. So my goal was to rival it. And so I did. And so essentially what I put together was where you just pay me a small fee. It was like 50 bucks a month. And you put as many deals as you want with it. So we built that up. I went door to door for almost like three months in the winter beer, Jersey, which is not Boston winters, by the way. We could say for sure. But it is damn cold though. And I was door knocking. And again, just picture like 17 year old kid have a suit.

It doesn't really quite suit me all the way. It's like the suit you have up to here was like from a speed 16 or something from like a year or two before. And I was going knocking on pizzerias, knocking on doctors, knocking on everybody I could. And eventually after three months doing that, I got one person who gave me a yes. And so this person said yes. And after three months of knocking, I was like, holy shit, this is worth it. And, you know, and I was trying to get them on my Brickdown Deals website. And he said to me, well, can you all, do you also build websites for companies? And I was like, his name is Jason. He's still a client. I was like, Jay, I was like, I honestly, I was like, I've never charged anybody to do this.

So he's like, I wouldn't even know what to charge you, but I could build you one. And he's like, well, I paid a thousand, you know, for my last one. If you could do it for like five, six hundred bucks, you know, it's yours. And I was like, I was going to charge you at 50 bucks to 500 bucks. I'm like, I'll take it. I was like, let's do it. So I continued to build that Brickdown Deals. We got a couple of people on there. And then I realized that it's going to work a good day to be building a website and doing SEO. And then we fast forward, the overarching goal was I wanted to help. So I helped my family out of that financial situation. They did not lose the house. And then I found myself, you know, about to be graduating high school saying like, what do I want to do?

Right. Because in school, in the school systems, I always, you know, when I was in second grade, they helped me back. And that's why I had to learn disability. So from second grade on, I was in classrooms. They bought, in the East Coast, I don't know if it's all around the U.S. that they need this in schools. But I was in what they called it, classified. So in the classroom with me, there was a teacher's aid on top of a normal class with a normal teacher in the front. But the aid came around to me, a couple of people were like, do you know what's going on here? Do you need help? Do you need extra whatever? So it was like that extra love. So when I got out of, when I was getting out of high school, like I was like, not knowing what I'm going to do.

But I was already ambitious enough to say like, damn, I'm already making this piece of money here. So I'm not going to, I don't need to go to college. And I want to go to a county college for like half of a semester. And I want to say, this is not for me anymore. I want to do this. And but the core thing here is that it was my family in a desperation situation that put me in it. That made me say, I need to go figure something out. And then when I figured it out, the one thing that kept me bolted and anchored to this industry is that growing up, you know, I'm sure my parents in Michigan, like I've had, you know, anxiety disorder for all the time in my life. You know, again, learning disabilities, the school system, and all this other stuff.

And then also, my family at times, you know, they were from Sam's. We had a lot of financial troubles. So I didn't have like mentors around me that helped me say, like, John, here's what you should do. Here's the next thing. So this financial situation like that brought to me at the time sucked and I paid you every second of it, you know, but it actually was a big thing. And I think the biggest thing that I learned from it, now just bringing it full circle to this, is that, you know, when I first started the company out of desperation, now we're at today, it's one thing that kept me and it's, I'm obsessed with entrepreneurs. And when all the business owners, when I was young, you know, I actually said, I don't have no reason to do whatever I was trying to do.

I'm meeting these people who have fucked up stories like I did, right? You know, my family, you know, my parents, my dad had, you know, some alcoholism, you know, and so, you know, growing up, I've heard these crazy same similar stories that I went through that these people have experienced too. And now, they have a company of 200 employees and they have an elementary school or a rental school education and they're doing what they're doing. I was a flat. This is possible. And there's people out there like me, so I'm not to only fucked up for a step in the four months of this year. So anyway, that's what kept me angered to it. And, you know, since that, we've scaled that on social networks in two new countries.

I have a couple other companies that I own as well in addition to it and liquor space and other spaces like that. But, you know, it all started from, you know, that desperation. And I was, I think, at the example of like, when you look at, right? Like, you have some baseballs behind you and stuff. When you look at most of the world's top athletes, right? Whether it's Jordan, LeBron James, whatever. Most of these people, they had, whether they came from, they came from rough upbringings, right? And their role was to get their parents and their families out of it. And they didn't want to be there. And I feel like I had a similar vibe because a lot of times you get asked like, well, why didn't you give up?

Right? And to me, it was never an option. It's stay here, have financial, you know, difficulties, things going on, or anything bad of it. And I wasn't choosing it. And I think a lot of times you see that, you know, a lot of the core character, characteristics of entrepreneurs is that they had that tough up. Hey, I want to take a quick minute to share with you what I'm working on these days with my new JV Sales membership. It includes live monthly training delivered by me on my two signature courses, Filling the Funnel and Driving to Close. It also includes monthly workshops that I'll be running on specific skills and different tech like ChachiBT and how to leverage it in the sales process. And it gives you access to my entire online catalog with every course and every tip I've ever done.

You get all of this for $420 a year. as an individual or $5,000 for teams. And as an exclusive offer to my podcast listeners, if you go to www.jbarrows.com and click on the individual or team membership and use code podcast, you'll get 20% off. Let's make this happen together. But John, also, I'm a ramble. So if you need to shut me up, John, just tell me to shut up. No, this is great. No, I think that, I mean, first of all, the journey is always what I find most and most intriguing, right? And the learning, like everybody always talks about the outcome. Right. Versus what it took to get that outcome. And to me, that's where the learning is. That's where, you know, yeah, you figure things out and you fail a lot, right?

To figure it out along the way. And I'm curious with all that, you know, I think there is something to be obviously about just, I didn't have a choice here, right? I agree. But also, you know, and related to sales, if we go back to your cold calling experience with, you know, three, was it three months and knocking on every door and you didn't get one yes, right? Yeah. I mean, that's a, you know, that's a, most people would give up after that, right? So in, in addition to the entrepreneur and the passion for it and just the, hey, I got it. I got, and also I have to do this whether I like it or not. It had to be a little bit of optimism in you in the beginning to say, I got, I'm just going to keep going.

It's eventually going to work out, right? Because there's the part I have to do this so I don't have a choice. But there also had to be that part of like, all right, I believe that if I work this hard, I believe that if I do this stuff that it is going to work out. So where did optimism start to creep into your mentality? Like, where did it consciously hit you? To be honest, John, I think it came from the anxiety stuff, right? Because growing up, I was, my mom started, I was really young, I was shy. And then as I got a little bit older, I started, you know, building my personality and, you know, and I was like the friend when I was younger, like in elementary to middle school that like, I always, like I had a core friend group, but I always wanted to be bringing new friends, I wanted to meet new people, I had my friends and so, and I always enjoyed and love, right?

I love connecting with people and stuff like that. And I think, when I look back, a lot of times people always were like, you know, you're always so, you're always this, that, whatever. And I think it came from the anxiety because a lot of times for people out there who are experiencing, you know, anxiety or constant anxiety, you know, so those anxiety you have to force yourself to be positive and there's something really beautiful about it, right? A lot of times with anxiety or mental health challenges, we feel fearful, fight or flight, right? And the thing is, is our natural instinct to get eventually depressed because it's like, why am I constantly feeling, what's going on? What the heck?

Why can't, why do I need to rely on this to feel better? You know? And I'm a very holistic person because of my mother. My mother was like the kind of person where, you know, you can say that if she has a headache, she's not going to take Advil, so just drink a ton of water and be like, you know, I'll figure it out, right? So that's how I grew up and so I'm not somebody who's like, I'm going to feel great. So for me, my self-medication holistically was like just constantly being positive, right? And like figuring out like, I'm not feeling great, but you know what? I'm here, I'm alive and I was always trying to pull on to these things to make it more tangible. I'm okay. Like, it's going to be okay, you're fine.

And then I think that turned on to a life liquid cell, to be honest. Yeah. And from that point forward, it made me realize that's the one thing I love. If you're able to, I'm not going to say conquer, but if you're able to get into a harmonious place with your mental health, if you're not. One of the most beautiful things is when you realize that, especially if you're doing this, like, you know, it's a struggle. It's a real struggle, right? And when you couldn't put yourself into a better place and you realize that you're capable of doing it, it's not easy and you have to beat your subconscious mind from trying to protect you, making you anxious, making you drown, or if you're depressed that you're dope meets, you have to convince yourself and you get to convince the automatic part of your brain that you're subconscious that I'm okay, right?

And so, I think the optimism for me and everybody that works with me at any of the companies or any of my friends and family, they all know me as an extreme optimist, right? And you brought up from the beginning the toxic optimism. That's what's going to be different, right? And dude, there is because when I first was early in building my T, when we were a small, like 10 to 15 people on T, I was the dude, no matter what was going on in the day, I was like, I would ask everybody in the whole company. We'd sit there at the end, this is before remote work, so I'm sitting there and I'd be like, we'd be in a conference and we're like, everybody every day I'll stay up one of 10, right? And for well over seven years, every day, I was like, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10.

And people would feel, what I realized is that people at my team would feel like, well, you know, how can you have a 10 every day? Is he being honest? Like, come on. And it would make them feel like they couldn't say less than a 10 or a nine or an eight because then they would feel like I'd be like, well, what's wrong with you? It's up to you to do that. So I was that guy for a long time and as I got older, I started to understand that that was the people pleaser, right? I'm a big people pleaser. I call myself a recovering people pleaser because ultimately, right, I want people to be happy. I want people to like me. I'm also an impact. So I sense energy. So if somebody's not excited, or giddy, I would always try to counter motivation, get them hiked up.

But I realized as I scaled T that when you're a people pleaser and for anybody, anybody who owns business or is in charge of a T year, it actually puts you in a terrible position because when you're people pleaser and you're constantly just want to be liked, it's not effective, right? And when your T is constantly not doing the right job and you're just being nice, guess what? They're going to keep repeating the same actions and behaviors because they're not getting chaos, right? And then you're still a happy person. So what I wanted to do for me was realizing that you have to offer respect to getting your salts, not through being liked because you're a nice person. And so I think just going back to the optimism situation, you know, I was just always overly optimistic because I know what I'm capable of and I pushed and I pushed out of other people but as I got older and more matured and seasoned in business, I realized that, you know what, it's okay to not always be, I don't want to say not optimistic and not always be cheery in a situation that is not favorable or going your way but I think what I learned personally for me was that I said to myself, I know that I should be optimistic because I'm, I don't, I'm also like religious, I'm a Catholic and I believe that, that God has a plan for me and I believe in a higher power so I know when I'm going through difficulties, I'm optimistic because thus far in my life what I see out of life in my 31 years despite it, I see that tough situations typically build demand and so I like that now and I'm stuffed up in the head about that because people are like, well, you're supposed to be pissed off, you're supposed to be sad, you're supposed to be bad here and I will be those things and I will feel those emotions that were in the past that's fate to you not, I think what made me a better leader, a better husband, you know, a better friend is I'm now a lot more realistic with well, I'm fucking pissed about this but I'm not going to stay there.

I won't stay there. So that's, and that's kind of the one thing because I know, you know, look, I got a bunch of friends who thankfully for me, I've never experienced mental health issues thankfully. Yeah, good. but I'm around a lot of people and friends who have and there's a lot of people who I think mask that depression, mask that anxiety with what you call toxic positivity but it's always the, oh no, things are great, things are great, things are great, things are great, right? And it's like when you know things aren't great, you know what I mean? Right. And it's kind of like you actually lose credibility in a lot of ways because now all your positivity is like kind of your 10 out of 10 all the time.

it's like nobody can be 10 out of 10 all the fucking time. Right. So, so I'm going to take a slightly different track than I was going to go with this but I'm curious how do you, how do you approach somebody like that? How do you, so, so say you're the 10 out of 10 guy that's, no, everything's great, everything's great, everything's great, right? And you're sitting there and you're at a company or whatever it is or you're just their friends and you know that things aren't great but you know at the deep rooted level there's real reasons why things aren't great so it's fucking heavy and they probably don't want to address it because of the challenges that they're going through. How can you be a friend to that type of person?

I think if I were to go back if you were to come to me we knew each other just us, us two John squared, right? And we had to give up to me and you're like, listen, I know we lost that big client and I know you're being positive about it or I know that person quite umpteen and you're trying to be positive about it but I just want you to know that you don't have to pretend to be strong for me because I want to take that weight with it. Now, I would like to think in the, I'm thinking of my current consciousness and my current space versus my then, my mentality then and dude, I was like jacked up on like Steve Jobs, Tony Robbins and it's like all this stuff since I was a kid so I always put those blinders for those things so I would think if you were to approach me at that certain juncture I would probably say to you well John, I'm not pretending I'm totally fine, right?

I would think that I would probably mask it still, right? But there's a lot of ego ties and my ego is different but I would say if, because there's some times that are sure like, you know, I'm an alpha male so there's a lot of times for if that type of situation pops up now, my ego is a lot less because I think the levels of success that I've wanted to achieve in this world, I've gotten to most of them and because they're family related, right? It's not monetary for me. For me, it's like I found my dream woman, you know, almost nine years ago so my wife with a child and I have my dream child. Anything I could ever want in the world like is right there and then also I have my family so, you know, I retired my bomb, right?

So like, there are things like that that like, my ego, I'm not attached to you, right? Because like, whatever I had to do to get to work, it helped me do that, right? So now, being open to feedback and I think that's the biggest thing that shifted for me. So first, so here's the thing, the people who are that 10 out of 10 guy, right, that I used to be, they're so egocentric and they're not trying to do it because they want to be better, right? At least that was my, it was because I wanted to always be strong for the people around and my ego was attached to being the strong guy, right? So, I think. Then, because that's what I worry for, right? Yeah. Because, you know, you hear the stories of like Robin Williams.

Oh my gosh, yeah. Or like, or, you know, Chris Farley, right? They were always wanted and you said it to, I'm, I'm, I'm not as, you know, people pleaser as you explained, but I'm definitely a people pleaser. I'm the one that's at the, you know, we hope my wife and I host a lot of parties and I'm always, you're having a good time, like you're having a good time, you know, I always want to make sure you're having a good time. If you're not having a good time, I'm going to hyper focus on you, figure out what the problem is and see how you, right? But I'm not, I wouldn't consider it toxic whereas I have other friends who are like, like if you're not having a good time, if you're not happy, they over index it, but it's, it's to hide their deep-seated issues.

I mean, I don't, I mean, I don't think anybody was overly surprised when Chris Farley died, right? But I think when, when, when, because you knew his drug use and all that, but I think it, it hit a lot of people when Robin Williams died, at least it hit me, right? Because I look at him as such an incredible soul, such a good person, you know, and, and, and it's funny all the time and seemed to, I mean, he had his problems, he did his drugs too, right? But when, when, when all of a sudden it was uncovered of how deep his depression went, how deep it went, you know, you were like, oh my God. So for a lot of people, we take, we, we don't, I want to say take advantage of, but we, we don't recognize that toxic positivity that is hiding something and I'm just trying to figure out, you know, is there, is there a way to help or identify that it's real positivity and optimism versus toxic positivity because they're trying to help everybody else so that they don't focus on themselves?

It's such a great question and I, I have a rule of Stalin that I utilize now for myself as my, your star. So, as an example, if I'm going through some shit at work, right? And I'm like, damn, I'm all upset about this, right? What I used to do was, it's okay, it doesn't matter. Like, you know, I'm going to figure it out, right? It's, I think the one thing I heard, and I heard it said of Tony Robbins at Irby for almost 10 years ago, right? And I, and I played this back in my head every time I found myself in that position and they asked him like, you're Tony Robbins, you're the world's guru on personal development. Do you ever just sit on the couch with a bag of Cheetos pissed off drinking a Diet Coke or something?

And he was like, these are laughing. He's like, listen, you know, he goes, do I get mad? Am I human? Yes. But he's like, I choose. Not to state it, right? So for me, my new, my new, like, it's almost like a filtration system, right? I want to be like a pool filtration system where you get all the cops chemicals out, you get all the shit out and filter it so you don't have bugs over your pool. For me, it's okay, I'm going to acknowledge this feeling, this emotion, right? I'm going to put knowledge into it because it's real and I'm feeling that. But here's where positive optimism comes to the fight because you're like, here's my city, here's the cars and I'm not happy. I don't want to be here.

I don't want to be in this position. But I'm pissed off. I'm giving myself the space. I want to give myself the space and the time to process these emotions, right? My wife actually said this very well two years back when first out, I think we were disengaged and she, and this is what I was toxicly bothered and she was upset about something and I'm just hitting her with everything, right? Hit her with it, right? And she goes, can you just let me be upset? Yeah. Right? And I remember thinking that like, why would you want to be upset, right? But you know what? You need to process emotions. And I think that's where toxic positivity comes in when you don't allow yourself to process it. And so that is my new filtration system.

I process the emotion. I don't pretend that it's not there, but I allow myself the space and time to process it. And I say, all right, well, I'm not going to stay here. I'm moving on, right? So that is my new rule of thumb. So turn it in, process it, understand it, and then move past it. So there's a couple of examples that I love and I want to get into your calendar strategy here for a minute. But, you know, you ever seen the movie In-N-Out? In-N-Out. Yeah, Inside Out. It was the cartoon. Oh, yes, yes. So the reason I love that movie was because sadness. Remember, remember Happy was always trying to get rid of sadness? Like, leave? No, no, no, no, no. Sadness. No, no, no, no. It's always happy.

It's always happy. Yeah. And then at the end, it was, well, the reason you are happy is because you're totally sad. Right? And that sadness allows for the happiness and you have to process that emotion. It's got the chills, by the way. Podcast of things. It's got the chills on that one. But it's right, right? I mean, that's what that movie was all about ultimately. And there's another one that I learned from my mentor, Jeff Hoffman, where, because I, sometimes I feel bad because I have a, I judge when I don't want to. I hate judging people, but I do. You know what I mean? Like it is like, oh, you said, you know, you look, and even like superficial shit, sometimes you look a certain way, whatever it is, we all have that in us.

And I always feel guilt for judging. And I don't, and I'm like, and I don't want to judge people, but I do. And so I would beat myself up about it. My, my mentor, Jeff, he said, John, he's like, cause he goes to a lot of therapy and he goes, look, I have, you know, it's almost like this little Buddha elephant. And he's like, his therapist labeled that as his judgment elephant. He's like, look, we all have it in us. Okay. And he's like, look, sometimes we have to take the judgment elephant out and let it be it. Let it judge, but realize that that's not us. And so we're going to put it back in its place and we're going to go about our day. But every once in a while, we got to take the little judgment elephant out.

So he almost objectified it. He's like, this is a thing. It's like, it's like a little pet, it's a little pain in the ass pet that I don't like, but it's my pet. And I got to let it breathe every once in a while, but I'm going to put it back in its box because it's not going to control me. And I think it's the same thing with sadness and processing it. It's like when people die and they don't process, you know, that emotion of that lost loveling and that, no, no, no, I'm good. I'm just going to bury myself in work. That's like the Catholic guilt thing that just ends up eventually coming out and ruining, you know, in all the wrong ways, health wise, reaction wise, that type of stuff. Because if you don't deal with it early and as you need to, it's got to, it's there whether you like it or not, right?

Right. So, what a beautiful reference. I'm really happy to be brought that up. And for your listeners, I think one of the things that I just want to say, I have a lot of international clients and a lot of times, the first time this happened to me was a couple years back, but I remember I was on this thing, I was on this board meeting virtual hall with a client and, you know, around the country. And I remember at the end of it, this, one of the guys in the T, one of their executives pulled me aside, you know, on a sidebar chat and was like, why are you like being so like positive and happy all the time? Like, can you be serious? And, and I remember him thinking like, you know, it was just like, you Americans, he literally said, he goes, you Americans think you're always supposed to be.

And what you just said there, like resonated with me about like, hey, all the show in the area of sadness and the movie is set out. So there's a show called The Marvelous Miss Maisel. Oh yeah, my wife's one of my favorite shows. I love, yeah, she loves it. Mine too, right? So I'll typically watch it through my wife. Yeah. But there's one scene in the whole show that cracked me up where, have you actually saw some of the episodes? Yeah. Okay. So there's a scene where he, Maisel's father, right, finds out that his grandson is a part of this happy tribe in the school system. Yeah, I saw this one. Because he's not, right, he's not academically like, you know, inclined. So, so he's in the happy group right now.

And so he goes back to the table and now his whole family is there. It's his son, his wife, his wife, you know, both kids and stuff. And he goes, do you know that your son's in that happy group? And, you know, and the guy's like, what do you mean? What's wrong with that? He goes, because, you know, and then his son goes, he goes, pop, we'll have plenty of time to become miserable. And he goes, nobody who's ever accomplished something worthy of life was truly happy, right? And I think there's a lot of truth to that and there's a lot of interesting thoughts around, right? Because when you look at Steve Jobs, right, people looked at him like a miserable fuck. And a lot of people did not like to work with him.

If you respect building businesses and you respect design integrity and just, you know, operational success, you look at that guy like a God. But the people around him were genuinely like, this guy is miserable. Like, we don't like him. Anyway, my whole point though is that in most countries outside of the US, they don't, like sadness, being depressed, being anxious, doing all these other things, it's normal. There's normal love because you're not supposed to always be happy. Anyway, I just wanted to say that a bit though because they think a lot of ties people don't realize. Yeah, and I think it's important to sit with it for a while and let it sit. I mean, you know, my dad passed a couple years back and, you know, I kept myself busy taking care of my mom and my sister at the time and then, you know, I had the chance to, thankfully, I would, you know, my wife had gotten us, this was right when COVID, this was actually 2021 and it was, it was February and we were in Aruba and we had a two, we had like a, beautiful place in Aruba for two months because we were going to be remote anyways, might as well and didn't want to be in fucking Boston in the winter, right?

So, so we were there and thankfully I had the, the ability to kind of sit with it for a while and, you know, do those long walks on the beach, sit at the end of the pier, you know, have that conversation with myself and, you know, whoever was out there listening and, and it was, you know, it allowed me to, to be sad, right? And I think if I, if I had just done what I had typically done, which is bury myself in work and just fuck it, you know, I'm just going to get through this and, you know, I'm, I'm fine, I'm good, I'm good, right? Like, no problem. Then I, I don't think I'd be in the same space as I am right now, right? So, yeah. So, so talk to me a little bit about that calendar strategy though because, because you talk about how, you know, the, you know, look, pessimism creeps in to all of us and, and it, and it kind of chips away at some of the stuff.

So, what's your strategy of, of this calendar strategy and how you look at this to kind of compartmentalize it? I, I call that the, it won't matter strategy, typically. Um, but the calendar strategy works just right. So, essentially, here's what I do. So, when I'm going to do some shit, whether it's work, personal, whatever else, I legitimately, like, in my, in my, my, like, phone calendar, I put the, I put the specific date that this happened and I, I put a note there and I put a reminder, right? For a 30-day check, okay? And so, every 30 days from the day that I had shit day or shit week or what's the starting of that shit, I go back 30 days and I look at it and I ask myself, how much did that day matter or like, are you still going through this?

And John, I'll tell you, 95% of the time, it never really mattered, right? And that's why, if you're somebody who can find yourself being hypercritical of people, you know, we, then you're probably the same route, most of us. We, we focus more on things that are not going well over the wings, right? Because we're hypercritical, right? And I think I like to, I like to do that as a example so that I can start to build a part of my brain that's, that's fortuitous enough to see that, okay, today, I had this happen to me, this sucks, I don't know what I'm going to do here, I know, I put it down on my calendar instead of reminding me 30 days, I'm going to do what I got to do and then I'm going to visit it back, you know, how bad was it?

Oh no, here was the solution. So, I started to do this, you know, for probably the better half of like two years and what it started to build in my mindset is to be better in those moments, not being as hectic, not being as crazy or frantic, it's going to be okay, you figure this out again, 10,000 times now, eventually the future when I get to 10,000 times that happen in the calendar, you know, I'll be able to say definitively, you figured it out, you know, don't worry, it's fine, it's sparkly. And you know, and there's something to say about that too because we find ourselves thinking that we're not going to fix it and we're stuck where the reality is. Y'all know that I love being on this new network because of all the cool exposure and cross promotion that we do, but also because of some of the podcasts that I'm getting exposed to here that are quickly becoming some of my favorites, especially this one coming up Created, hosted by John Uche.

Now, Created gives you an inside look at how to build a business as a creator and improve your creative process and also stay ahead of the latest content trends. He's an ex-YouTube and Instagram employee and breaks down the creator economy of guests like Logan Paul, Paris Hilton, Jake Paul, and many, many others. And his most recent episode, Why YouTube's Biggest Star Left, is really interesting. Lisa Koshy, she was actually there before Mr. Beast and she was, had I think 25 million subscribers or something like that and she bailed on YouTube and they dive into why, which I thought was fascinating. So you're going to have to listen to it. So check out his podcast, Created, wherever you can get your podcast now and let's make it happen.

And it's funny to say that because there's, I mean, I was watching this roundtable with a bunch of, you know, movie stars or whatever and they were talking about learning lessons and Tom Hanks, you know, was like, hey, what's the one thing you wish you knew, you know, when you were younger, right? And he said something that still sticks with me is he's like, this too shall pass. No, I heard, I think I saw that. I think I saw it. That was fire. And everything, right? Like this too shall pass. Like, no, like, you know, and it's funny how, you know, and I do this to try to remind myself and remind the people, you know, that I engage with, you know, when I do my out of office, for instance. Yeah.

So I just took a two week vacation and every single time my out of office says the same thing. It says, hey, thanks for your email. Due to the fact that I'm not an emergency room doctor, I'm guessing your email can wait until I get back. So thank for your email and I'll get back to you when I get back to you. And inevitably, I get at least a half a dozen people emailing me back being like, dude, I needed that reminder and that's probably one of the best out of offices I've ever got, right? Because check on like, look, everything we do isn't that important ultimately at the end of the day. I mean, you- So true, man. I mean, in your early, don't get me wrong, and there are some desperate times that you had paying the bills for your family so you didn't lose the house, right?

That is, yeah, that is dire. That is, we have, but this too shall pass. You know what I mean? Like, there'll be an option. You might lose the house, but something else is going to happen. And I don't know if you've ever read it, but I'm not a huge reader, but my favorite book by far at this point is Matthew McConaughey's Greenlights. I have not read it, but I heard good things. Oh, dude, you have to. Like, and actually, I'd listen to it as opposed to read it because he's got the Matthew McConaughey voice and he just kind of- I want to hear that all that. You have to, like- All right, all right. Well, and he actually tells the story of all right, all right. Do you know that was the first line in his first movie ever?

I did not know that. So, like, he didn't even know he wanted to be an actor. And there's a sidebar. He didn't even know he wanted to be an actor and he just kind of took this gig and he was supposed to be this dude and he didn't know how to play the dude. So, he's like, how can I, you know, whatever. And so, the first line when he was trying out for it, he was like, all right, all right, all right. And then that was it. So, the fact, and that to me, but the book Greenlights is all about, you know, I used to say, and I think this is actually very insensitive these days, which is why I wish people wouldn't say it. And I wish I didn't say it in the past, which is, oh, everything happens for a reason.

Right. I think that's insanely insensitive because, you know, let's talk about the people who are getting bombed and their daughter just got killed because of a drone attack. Like, you tell me that person, like, that happened for a reason. Can't, can't, true, yeah. No, you tell me my dad happened, died for a reason. Fuck you. I'm going to literally punch you right in the fucking eye if you tell me my dad died for a reason. Right. But, I've, I've shifted it to, I believe there's a silver lining. If you look hard enough, there's a silver lining in almost every situation. Yeah. Right. Which is what Greenlights is about. It's like, oh, holy shit, this thing happened and this is horrible right now.

But, with what your approach, the calendar strategy, like, in a month later, you might look back and say, holy shit, that was the best thing that could ever happen to me. Totally. And, and that's like, I have a bunch of examples. I, you know, I wrote a blog post called, you know, stop doing what you're supposed to do. Right. Because there was two points in my life where I, I, I was going through the motions. I was doing what I was supposed to do and somebody else made the decision for me and I thought it was the worst thing. Like my, my first fiance, seven years, I was engaged to her and she broke it up with me and I knew it was wrong, but I was doing what I was supposed to do. Like, I, you know, what do you do after seven years?

I was fucking devastated for like two days. Right. And then after like two days, I woke up and I was like, holy shit. Like, it was like literally the weight of the world got lifted off my shoulders and then a year later, I met my wife and couldn't be happier and everything else. Right. So that mentality of, A, this too shall pass and, and that there's silver linings if you look hard enough, but you got to sit with it first. You got to, you got to manage that emotion so that you're not just pushing it and suppressing it with some toxic positivity. So. For sure. And the one thing I'll just say on that topic though, the reason why I started to do that Calvary thing was when I fully forgave my father for our troubled childhood and shit.

Yep. And I think one of the things for me, I was, again, probably Robbins referenced yet, but, you know, we were sitting there and went to UPW at least a hour if they were coming around. And also, you know, here's just going through, you know, people have some thought that should happen. You know, people who, you know, they got reached by their uncles and their parents knew about it and just crazy shit like that. So that you wouldn't even, so that you would think they wouldn't even write movies that happened to people in real life. Which God bless them for getting through that stuff. But, you know, there was this one lady who that was the situation. You know, she got great by her uncle, her parents knew about it, whatever, like in this old big issue.

And it's crazy to think that, right? So literally, you know, but she's just super successful entrepreneur, but can't find happiness, right? So she has kids, whatever, she's severely depressed, suicidal thoughts, whatever. And where I was able to free up my father from this note where we, where you like to, as tough, he goes, if what did not happen to you, God, you know, I would never want that there. I know you wouldn't either. He's like, but you wouldn't be you if it didn't happen to you. And that's really fucking devastating to say to you. But he said, you wouldn't be. And you have the successful people working to you that are, that are living their lives, paying their colleges, living in their homes, being in their careers.

And not that you needed that perspective of, you know, being insensitive to what happened to you. But you wouldn't be you. So as much as that's challenging, you have to be grateful for your past, what happened to you. And that's hard to do. And that's why a lot of times people have depression. They can't come to terms that this happens. These are my hearts. And so the calendar thing for you when I heard that, right? My situation, but I have an awful problem, whatever, you know, I looked at it and I said to myself, damn, he wasn't that person. If he didn't come to me and have that conversation, you know, if I didn't have to step up when I was like early to remember I was like 11 and never was years old, you know, him being out, being out at the bar and stuff, I had to step up as the man of the house.

You know, I was constantly like disciplining my brothers and my sister or having to do those types of things to help my mom out. But if he wasn't who he was, I would be who I am. And so that calendar thing came into play because when I came to P, peace, which I'm not going to lie to you, I still feel my body sometimes was that instead of show up, right? But it's like I've come to peace with the terms that like he had to be who he is. But if I wanted to be XYZ person, it wouldn't have helped, right? Like who he was helped me be who I am. So I came to terms with that and I accepted it ultimately. And it made me realize like, wow, if I were to look back at my past and do the Steve Jobs method, which is you can never connect the dots of them.

So you can only connect them. So my connecting of my dots are on a 30-day site where I say, okay, did this pan out? Oh yeah, it did. It worked out fine. Did that person quit? All right, you know, did it work? Did it want to be better? I actually want to be better, right? Or maybe it didn't, but we figured it out. So anyway, that's the whole calendar shot. Brother man, let's finish up with gratitude because I think that plays, that has played a massive part in my life of getting me through, of just kind of reflecting and saying, you know, what am I, even the small things, right? I remember I had a friend who was going through some tough times and you know what? Everything was negative. Everything was negative all the time.

And I asked her, I said, hey, do me a favor. And I don't even know where I picked this up from, but I give her a suggestion. I was like, here's a notepad. I'm like, tomorrow I want you to write down every positive thing that happens to you. And I mean everything, right? I mean, if somebody opens the door for you, write it down. If you make a green light on your way to work, write it down, right? If you get a text message from a friend who you hadn't heard from in a while, write it down. And I just want to talk to you at the end of the day, see how your day went, right? And she came back to me with like four pages of notes and she was like, oh my God, I had the best day ever, John. Like, oh my God, this is incredible.

Like everything seemed to be going right. I can't believe, you know, our conversation yesterday was just so enlightening. And I was like, can I ask you, why do you think today was different than yesterday? I go, what was different today than it was yesterday? And she's like, I don't know. She's like, everything just seemed to be working out. I go, did it really? Or was it you just shifted what you were looking for? Because all you were looking for was negativity in the past because I know it because I talk to you a lot. And all I did was say, just start looking for the positive things and be conscious about it, right? And write them down. And that was kind of a light bulb for her. She was like, holy shit, you're right.

She's like, I was actually looking for the positive things instead of looking for all the negative things. And she's, I'm like, nothing changed between today and yesterday other than your view on things. And so that to me, gratitude, it helps me is realize that how fortunate I am to be where I am, how fortunate I am to have what I have, right? And so talk to me a little bit about how you cultivate, I think you call it existential gratitude. Talk to me a little bit about that and how it plays a role in your life. Yeah. For me, I'm a big believer in you. Like, I only want like, as I'm getting older, I just had my first child, you know, me and my wife, seven months ago. And, you know, and it's, it's changed a lot of my safety, especially about people, right?

Because like, right now, you're somebody's child, I'm somebody's child, right? Like, we're somebody's kids and whether they're here or not, and I think the thing is, is I look at every day, you know, somebody, the other day, somebody said, dude, you're a self-meat guy. And I've always said, and I've always loved that saying. I've always, I've seen people do it and I've heard it and I've always loved it, you know, nobody do whatever, you get it yourself. But you know, though, as of recently, you know, I started to shift my thinking and I was like, you know what, every day, because in the morning, I have my morning rituals, to eat, right? My meditation, the workout and prayers. And I do, I have a gratitude to this, right?

And, and whether I write it down or I mentally put it every day, I think about it and I think about the people who will help me be who I am, right? Where, where I've gotten. And it's a easy example, like my grandmother, my grandmother, grandma Joan, you know, was 83. She literally, like when I first was like, had this idea, she was living at home with us, right? In our small little ranch, I was packed in, Chinese training. And, you know, she was super excited about it, you know, thought it was a great idea. She was my first bookkeeper, like she helped me find, she co-signed my first laptop at Best Buy, my first camera. Nice. And, and it's like, you know, when you think about that, and I think gratitude for me, stems from that, right?

Like even the bad thing, like, you know, so for me, that, that existential gratitude comes into play where even thinking about the littlest things, and I love what you said about catching a green light, right? It's like, dude, everybody knows that feeling when you're in a rush and you catch that light, yes, like let's go. Like literally, but it's like being grateful for those things. But for me, it's looking at everybody who helped me be who I am today. And I'll even change. So this year is going to be the first job, starting to 32, it's 10. And this year, for the first time, I'm trying to completely do. I'm going to be, instead of having a party for me, right? I'm actually throwing a party for the people who made me, right?

Because even though I was born on this day, right? It's not about me, it's about the people who make my life amazing. And that's what I want to ship my birthday for me. About me, to me celebrating everybody that matters, right? Love it. And also potential thought for the listeners too. I'm also doing this for the first time. Well, at least for my core people in my life, my media shambling, my best friends, my wife, people. I'm doing an anonymous survey monkey, right? With how I impact their lives and when I can be doing better. And so, I'm going to get the poll from everybody around me and do that. Yeah. Because I think part of gratitude, I think it's service, man. For me, gratitude comes with like, maybe this is just my mentality, but I want to serve.

I want to serve. I want to serve my wife. I want to serve my solace, her parents, my family, her family, my team, my friends, you know, my siblings. I want to serve people, right? And I take, you know, that's the biggest thing that I think where gratitude comes from because, you know what, it's like when, I don't know if you're, I'm sure you've been in this position where you thought picking up something for somebody at the store, for like a holiday and you got us and they weren't expecting it and they were like, oh, it's so nice of you for doing that. And you just feel like, wow, you know, it makes you feel good serving other people or helping other people. I think that's my gratitude for this man.

As I sit there, I look at it, like all the things that I'm completely, completely grateful for. Loving their people. Yeah, I think that's, that's one of the things that, and not to be, you know, politics or anything, but I remember when Obama said like, nobody's a self-made man, right? And everybody fucking went bananas like, fuck you, I did this. And I was like, no, no, no, you didn't. There was somebody who paved the road that allowed you to get to work. There was somebody who made the car that allowed you to get to, you know what I mean? Like, I mean, if you look at it at that fundamental level, none of us are self-made, not one. We've taken the initiative to do it, but without anyone, there's not a chance.

I mean, think about it, customers, right? You're not self-made. Customers are helping you be you, right? Right. Paying your fucking bills. Totally. There's not one person out there that has been a self-made person a hundred percent. 100%. I think that realization and that ability to take a step back and be a little bit more humble about, you know, where you got to and how you got there is a much easier path to, I mean, happiness, ultimately, you know what I mean? And realizing, because, you know, I go back to Gary Vaynerchuk. He says it all the time and I agree with this. You know, you make 40 grand a year and you're happy, right? You win. Because I know a million who are just miserable pricks and I'd rather be happy than a miserable prick and a lot of that comes from a service, you know, service backgrounds of like wanting to be successful as part of yours.

So, awesome job. Look, I love this conversation. I think we need to have it more out loud, quite frankly, for a lot of people because there's just right now so much negativity out there. Everybody seems to be angry at something and everybody would actually just kind of take a step back and realize that we're all pretty similar. You know, most of us have the same needs. We want to do the same. We just want to be good people. We want to serve our families, take a vacation every once in a while and, you know, grab a beer every once in a while after work. So, wait. So, I appreciate it. Are you a Sam Adams guy? Yeah, yeah. I went from being a Budweiser guy for a while and then Budweiser tore my stomach up because they're rice-driven whatever, how they ferment their shit and then I went to Sam Adams and now I follow the seasons with Sam Adams.

So, yeah, there's no question. I love to say, I love to say about this commercial where they go, your friends from Boston. Oh yeah, your cousin from Boston. Yeah, that guy. Your cousin, your cousin. He fucking nails it too. He's like, your cousin from Boston. Every fucking, every commercial, I'm like, I know exactly a kid just like that who's going to do that exact fucking thing and he's going to be the disaster at the wedding but at the end of the day you're going to be fucking psyched that he's there because he's going to be fun. Oh my God, I love it. I love that commercial. That literally makes my day very nice in that. Yeah. Awesome job. Well look, tell the audience here where they can find out more what you're doing with Adaptive Social and everything else that you got going on these days.

Yeah man, so again, Adaptive Social, we focus on two core things for businesses ranging from an individual that could be like small business like a real estate agent to a smaller contracting business up to or to have other clients. They come to most of our clients come to us for two things to build their revenue streams and then secondly building brand credibility in their work. So if those two things fit for you, you want to scale your business and scale your revenue. That's our books point. You can find us at Adaptive Social right here on every platform. So literally all the channels all platforms even the new ones threads and whatever else you can come out in the future. And for you personally you can find me on John Baguero or the Johnny N-J-N-Y on Instagram.

Love it, man. And for those listening I'll put it in the show notes but last name V-A-G-U-E-I-R-O check them out on social, LinkedIn, Instagram and everything else put it all in the show notes. And John, it's been an absolute pleasure, man. I loved having this conversation. Thanks for coming on, man. John, again, we started this way we're in this way great name. Great name. Thanks for having me on, man. It's been an honor. Absolutely. And for everybody out there I think my outro on all my podcasts is going to resonate hopefully today more than most which is go out there and make somebody smile today because no matter how bad your day went or how bad you think it's going you go out there and make somebody smile and you know you had a good day and the world needs a lot more of that right now so thank you all very much and I will see you on the other side.

I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did. With your support and our incredible guests we're one of the top sales podcasts out there right now and I can't thank you enough. Now to keep the momentum going it would mean the world to me if you could go and leave a five-star review on your favorite podcast platform and share some of your favorite episodes with your network. Also, check out my new website at www.johnmichaelbarrows.com where you'll find even more ways to engage. There's a ton of free content and you can also get trained from me directly as an individual or for your team. Look, I'm out there selling every day just like you are and I'm doing my best to stay on top of all the latest trends and technology so if you're looking to level up and you give a shit about this profession of sales let's connect and let's make this happen together.