The Power of Personal Stories: Jimmy Hayes Nelson on Vulnerability and Connection

hey everybody welcome back to Asus 53 with Ed Parco and myself Ed how are you doing today doing okay they're working on my street so if I drop it was nice being here it was you know what we forgot to hide the guest you know what my fault I was like your first time doing it in like three years you know I know I'm like damn it we forgot to put Jimmy away so guess what y'all y'all know who today's Joker is and that is Jimmy Hayes Nelson I met Jimmy at an event here in Dallas Brad suok brought in him to be the MC and we started talking about how important the job of an MC is but what I learned over time is in addition to being an MC Jimmy's also a speaker but what he really truly is here to help do now is help people craft their message all right so for most people an MC is like MC Hammer you don't you don't know no I'm just you're assuming everybody knows the same acronym we're g to use I'm sorry that is a very valid point I have those pants my you don't know the same definitely you do but we won't talk about that for everyone who's ever been to an event and they have somebody who comes out introduces the speaker kind of fills the void between speakers and introduces them like I said before they're the ones that help the facilitator really run the show they set the tone of the room they get the room going in the morning they have sometimes have to recover if a speaker bombs it's an interesting job because you are a pivotal part of the event itself and what most people don't know is a lot of speakers get paid they show up they talk they leave that you know they may be there in the Green Room for an hour but an MC is part of the event so they're in all the meetings ahead of time they have to understand what's the goal who's the audience what do we want to create for them and they're there from start to finish so it's one of the most arduous jobs in an event industry is the person organizing it because of course they have the pain of the checkbook and everything else but puts a lot of pressure on the MC to really pull that event off so the Master of Ceremonies is what we're talking the MC yes there we go I we gotta finally out the acronym that was trying to get you to explain I describing my job than I do so I may take this wipe my bio off of this audio now yeah oh it's funny because I did not know Master ceremony because I've always seen MC as emce so I did not you can write it either ways but yes masters of Master of Ceremonies is where that comes from did not know that see learns something new every day trying to help everybody understand because every's like MC was MC there yeah uh well I did see Jimmy did a post over the weekend about being at I guess you were the voice of God at an event also well I that was part of the part of my job so I have been an MC for if people have watched the Aspire tour for about the past year uh that's Andrew Cordell and Eddie Wilson and they jump from City to City once a month and there are a few speakers that they have at every event but then they bring in these huge celebrities and it really is like a personal development business development type event and so at this particular one uh they had people like Hulk Hogan and David gogins and John Gordon and Shaquille O'Neal and on my Instagram post I was talking about part of an MC's job outside of all the things you just described going out there you know uh setting up the event interacting with the audience edifying each speaker is occasionally you will have to do from the back what they call a vog or a voice of God and that's usually hey in five minutes we're going to get started get back to your seats it's a little bit of housekeeping and in this particular time it was towards the end of the event they had just made an offer so the other thing I I feel like I do I specify in as an MC is events that have a high ticket offer at the end of the event is I feel like I'm part of the sales process because as the MC I structure myself as the audience on stage hey audience you and I are going to take this journey together we're going to learn from all these experts right I'm G to come out I'm GNA take notes I'm going to get them so excited about the speaker before they hit the stage so Brian you know this right as a speaker if I can do half your job for you before why they should be so lucky to get from you he's hard to get it he's super busy Lean Forward take notes and they're already chomping at the bit before you come on right you're G to have more success on the back side of that I do what I call being the human highlighter hey back backstage these are the things these are my takeaways and then throughout the event I will Pepper in stories of my own entrepreneurial Journey right I share my story about being a former 100 pound overweight three-time College Dropout the first time I got to an event like that the first time I was nervous about investing in a coaching program or a mastermind so hopefully what I'm doing is by the time I have a different trust between me and the Audience by the time we get to the end of the event or the offer they happen to this offer towards the end and they were wrapping up the entire day with Shaquille O'Neal but what they did is it was really interesting the minute you make an offer and people go to tables trying to get that audience back in seats is a little bit like hurting cats at times and so they kept saying hey go do another voice of guy we don't want people to leave they don't want to miss Shaq and so that's what I was doing I was backstage looking at a monitor trying to use my biggest best announcer voice and about that time I felt two giant hands come over my shoulders dig into my neck and I kind of crumbled to the ground and it was just Shaq messing with me and he just looked at me he's like I just wanted to see if you could work while being distracted and we just kind of hit it off from there but you just you're right as an MC you have to learn to Pivot and just kind of go with the flow no matter what's going on around you yeah and what was your first MC job oh my gosh so my background just as a public speaker in general um was with Beachbody the P90X and Sanity and Home Fitness people right I lost 100 pounds with them as a customer and um that kind of re sparked I was an actor as as my background it kind of resp sparked my acting career here in Dallas and I moved to New York City and while I was in New York City Beachbody shifted their model from just being the infomercial company to an affiliate network marketing company and that was kind of my first foray into business and we would do these events and when they would want somebody to go on stage and share their story or kick things off I ended up with a mic in my hands and sometimes it was you know was us 5 10 15 20 people to start but I did have a bit of an acting background so I I had a bit of stage presence and who I didn't know you know 17 years later I would be in front of these crowds of you know 5 10 20,000 people trying to do the same thing but that's really where it started was just me sharing my story of my own personal journey in Fitness and as led to a bunch of other Industries and and and utilizing those skill sets of acting of improv classes of being on camera um and I had no clue that that season of my life was going to be preparing me for this it's so sad what happened to Tony oh when he got sick yeah yeah he's better now dude that Dude Looks Rock and he's my dad's yeah but he went from what he was how skinny he was and good dude he and I used to do funny story me and when I was living in New York City I was just sharing this event I was just in um in LA with David Meltzer who was doing a collaboration event with with Dane Cook and um Forbes Riley was there who used to do a ton of QVC Fitness pitches and we got to talking about Tony and I was like yeah used to do P90X pitches on QVC with Tony and we'd have to do one at like 2 in the afternoon 8:00 at night and then two in the morning doing squats and pull-ups and all that jazz and so yeah a different lifetime ago now so we talked about the MC but what we talked about before we actually went live today was that that's one of your areas but what you've really kind of started to focus on more and more is helping people craft their story and understand what they can do for other people and the reason you we you came to mind was a week ago Ed was talking about he met with someone who said you know you're not in the mortgage industry you're in the dignity industry and it is interesting how did did I say that right Ed it's close enough close enough okay um I'll correct you later it's okay yeah be in the show not yeah that's what made us think of you was you are out there wanting to help people kind of dig out their story but then put it together in a way that actually helps them Excel is that a fair way to say it absolutely and I'm glad you reminded me that you and I met at a brad Sunrock event because that's a perfect example of an industry which you really wouldn't think storytelling is a big deal right but I had the opportunity to not only coach Brad but coach his entire um Inner Circle Mastermind group of people that were raising money you know they do multif family real estate and you think okay so you know most people are leaning in on what's the ROI and why should why is this investment and once you really got in a room with these people and started crafting a personal story that tied into their product and service it it helped you stand out in an industry so much you know like I said when I started in Fitness the whole reason I thought what I did only worked in network marketing only worked in Fitness right it's the before and after it's the personal story it's the struggle it's the confidence it's not just the weight right it's the confidence but then my dad God bless my dad so my dad has been in um residential real estate for 40 plus years at the time was a was a broker with re Max and he was watching what I was doing with people online because I was one of the first people around 0708 that was building that business via Facebook Facebook by that time had just opened up to non- col students and he said hey Jimmy can you come talk to my real estate agents and I just thought they wanted to do like a a Biggest Loser Challenge I thought I was just going to go in and help a bunch of real estate agents lose weight and he said no man he's like I watch the people you work with and they never really talk about their product and service by name but people flock to them and want to do business with them and I was way too close to my gifting like we all are right the things we do really well we usually kind of like we don't make it a big deal because we did it and so yeah and so I was like well why why do I have success with this and I was like oh this is just storytelling and then once I realized that and and then I thought well will this work with real estate so I started started studying real estate people on social media and I was like they're really bad at this it was like all I was seeing was houses and listings and who their broker was you know it's like cool you're with Keller Williams or you're with Remax but I'm like I want to know who you are and one of the things I always do when I specifically when I work with real estate agents I said look I've watched my parents for forever and I said I know it's not if but when there's going to be a hiccup in the entire transaction you can do everything right and somebody's late or somebody doesn't get some paperwork in and so a lot of times when I started working with those people early on we would find a personal story that may have nothing to do with real estate of when they young coming up when they did all the right things and somebody else made something challenging and how they overcame that or when they thought they were doing the right things and accidentally made a mistake and how they overcame that that way once and then the art form of this is is seamlessly tying that to your product and service and then reminding them hey you know going back to the story and say this is why you're going to want me in your Foxhole regardless that things go smoothly or there's a hiccup in things because we're going to get through this and even if you have the most analytical of backgrounds with the financial advisers mortgage guys real estate I've worked with Scientists if you can connect with people emotionally first just you can get to your numbers you can get to all the the facts the figures the ROI people will remember and will connect with you faster and longer if you'll just take one to three minutes to to connect them with a with a personal emotional story yeah I learned that being on radio I got on radio in 2018 and yeah and you know the producer was like this is what you want to do and tell personal story about what happened and and so we constantly have that so tell this day I'm still on radio once a week and we have a hour real estate it's called real estate jerky we give you something to chew on and uh it's it's on iHeart you know Power Talk 1360 all the way through so but what's nice about it is people got to know who I was right from being on the radio because I was Private before then I was the best kept secret yeah and some people I'm sorry Jimmy I was saying that and that's cool that you made that transition because there's certain people that that they want to be they want to stay behind the scenes right they don't want to be out front and I just think if it really comes down to at the end of the day I feel like all of us in business at some point the money is nice to build things is nice but if we really want to grow our impact with people at some point you do have to be the guy that comes from out from behind the curtain like The Wizard of Oz and really and it's because some people don't want to be vulnerable and I find story most people don't want to tell is the one about them falling flat on their face I do not enjoy getting on stage and reminding people that I was 100 pounds overweight that I dropped out of college three times that I moved back in my parents at 22 but I have to tell all those stories because with this goes for all three of us or anybody watching if you're some professional and the only version that your audience knows is that version of you now they may admire you but they don't feel like they can relate with you so we got to go back and meet them kind of where they are and let let them know we understand what their pain points are or why you know they're feeling vulnerable or or overwhelmed or whatever to make that connection and say cool let me meet you where you are to bring you on the other side and show you how I've come through on the other side as well it's what they're doing right now with all the politicians or trying to do with the Poli trying to do yeah I think I think that's probably a better a better sentence far back you need to go to be a good politician well it's not talk about what we just did let talk about like years and years ago because I haven't done anything good in the P time then so but it's about the story and you need to know people want to know who you are before they're going to do business with you and absolutely having my book come out which you know has some more information there about me and some other stuff has helped out a lot too so yeah that's absolutely it you know there's a a good marketing book that I read probably like 15 years ago 20 years ago called trading up and they go through and list how all these companies were just companies and a good example until they started sharing their story and William Sonoma is one of those so it's pots and pans but they put this little tag on the story of how they found that item and you know was discovered being used in Italy in this little small town and that's why they're charging $200 for that pan versus if it was at Walmart you just go okay that looks good and you're right by telling the story and adding to it you become you know enamored with it and then it's got a story you can tell your guests and so we've seen that over time is it's not now oh well I work for X it's I work for this because of this so I was with Janine driver yesterday and we're talking to a pharmaceutical company and almost every one of their Executives has had a family member affected by the solution they sell and that was their whole story is why they were there and if you hear that you're just like because a lot of Executives you hear about well I'm here for the bottom line I'm here for the revenue but their story was so amazing because they were impacted by it and want to be part of the solution help other people not go through what they went through and it that I mean you're just talking tearjerker almost when you hear the story behind things and that's always the thing when I sit down with somebody and ask I always ask you know was your story the customers's story and and if it is that's always a great place to start so like for me in weight loss absolutely whether it was selling the products or building a network marketing company that was kind of my first foray into business helped me get out of debt whatnot so I could tell that story but there are certain businesses where your story is not the customer's Journey so what we want to do is we want to find something that you have a story that has a similar emotional Arc to what your customers are going through um I'll use an example if when I get on stage and I share my story a bit of what I I said before and even after I lost the weight I talk you know towards the end of my keynote it's this time I went to New York City I did all the right things I thought here here's the end of this story right this little fat kid from West Texas loses weight gets his act together moves to New York and becomes famous and I talk about about 29 years old I found myself at 6: a just trying to make some extra money passing out chocolates in a stupid outfit in Time Square and how I'm looking at all these Billboards and like this is the way this was supposed to end well my audience may have never had a weight problem may have locked in college but at some point in their life they felt like they should have been further along either felt like they should have been further along than they were or they felt like they did all the right things and things still weren't working out for them so it's not so much important that it's the details but it's that it's that emotional part and as I work with people I show them phrases on how they can tell their very unique story they don't have to worry about it's relatable but there are some very specific techniques that allows us to say things like well for me it was this for you it might be and then you you're you're tying those things together where you can take a very unique story in fact one of my clients uh was the guy to catch a touchdown pass from pton Manning okay nobody else has that story and he's like should I even tell that story I'm like yeah and so we found ways of taking us into that game and how he was down the death chart and how that all worked out and it was this story of perseverance and being ready instead of getting ready and then we found ways to where it became it went from this very unique personal story to this very Universal story that people could take away and actually take action themselves as well right by the way my team's the Broncos Benny Fowler yeah well the question would be I first was like last ever from when he was at what team the final ever or the fin yeah that Super Bowl that last game that he played in the Super Bowl versus the Panthers right um that that last touchdown pass um because that I think that's he hung it up right after that it's a way to go out he needed to he could barely walk yeah um gosh just lost my train of thought damn it happens all the time I know I know you're gonna text me the greatest question ever right after we we get done here like this yeah uh it was I was oh no I was gonna bring it Ed in okay I remember it now so you were talking about you you have people share their failures or where they don't feel like they were a success and Ed you want to tell them your problem you have with your podcast at times with guests they don't want to share their failures I know it's great isn't it and it's just an ego and pride thing people think and I always go back this is a silly analogy but it works I always ask them when people are do that I always ask people what their favorite movie is and they usually are some movie it's like it's Rocky or it's the Wolf of Wall Street or things where even when there's like these badass characters and so let's say I was like yeah but even let's say you know any of those things I like that dude whoever it was Rambo you know uh any Tom Cruz movie at some point that dude got punched in the face and got knocked down and the reason you dig him and the reason you cheer for him was because if the movie started and he's shredded and Rich and has the girl we hate that dude like there's nothing about that guy we're like f that guy like whatever but it's it's in the being vulnerable that we're going to have more people come along with us and it's interesting even people you know clients that I work with that have a very established brand over a long time if you can let your audience feel like they were a part of building something man they're way more into that they're way more into helping to support something that still feels like it's building than something that's established it's like when you're in college and you see that Indie band that you really latch on to before they hit it big and then they hit you know then they sign the big contract and you're like oh you don't even know these are my guys beforehand and you have a different connection to them because you saw when they were struggling or you saw when they were playing in front of five people and so even if you're established if we can take people back to that this is what it was like when I showed up in five people or my presentation or nobody was showing up or I was knocking doors or whatever those people get to relive coming along with the journey and being invested in that growth piece all over again and if you could go back because once they become famous especially bands are usually change yeah not they totally change what they what they did to get them there they want to stay there so they change I remember in the 80s I listened to all the you know the Smiths and yeah and and all those different bands and once it be became famous they weren't the same or it gets really overproduced right and it's no longer gritty and it has that edge that you dug about them in the first place yeah it's like Tears for Fears their first album is nothing like what they went when they went public yeah so Chicago same thing like completely kind of changed the same yeah I think just saying so if you can come so you need to go back keep to keep your people coming with you you got to relate back to stuff that has happened to you so that they're still along for the ride so they know that you're still growing you're still trying to get bigger or do something different and all most of us go through fiveyear phases where we're doing really well and then something happens and we have to start all over again or do something differently not completely all over but there's things I mean I just went through it myself with our uh alus interest rates so yeah and and that is the thing it's that the next mountain and the next thing and if you know the good coach or the good Storyteller is reminding people hey we've reached this Summit here here's the next challenge here's the next piece I need you to come along with me and that goes back to telling a story you know it is that Braveheart moment of rallying people that you got to remember this is why we're here this is why we're a big moment and this is why I need you to come along with me I think one of the biggest shifts I made from being an actor and a performer to a public speaker is realizing I remind my audiences of this all the time specifically when I'm being an MC or a host for somebody else's event is I remind them I was like look we're going to co-create this event together as an actor you're just performing and and we've I think we've all seen speakers that just talk at the audience and once because like let's say I would go into if I would go into an audition and you guys were the guys behind the table I wasn't allowed to use you as scene Partners right it was it was usually i' have to you know perform over your heads and something that really it's terrifying but once you lean into it once you and I'm not talking about call and response from an audience I'm not a huge fan of that either but once the audience feels like you're talking with them like one of the things I tell people is you know people like are you nervous on stage and I said oh yeah when I first started auditioning when I was still heavy I used to have this involuntary leg shake like it I couldn't control it getting up in front of people I felt stupid because you know people always gonna say oh you've always been good at this and I'm like no I said however I still get nervous before I go on stage and the first thing I do to ground myself is I just scan the audience quickly and the first person that's giving me like great energy and I can tell they're already into it I say my first line to that person but what it does for the rest of the audience is they sees that I'm actually talking with people and all of a sudden the rest of the audience does what I call plays up they get involved they lean forward as opposed to be the audiences like back or being talked at and it really gives us an opportunity to co-create something and and create some great spontaneous uh moments and it makes every time a little different that way again I think we've all seen speakers where you go oh my gosh they've told this story so many times they're no longer connected to it like they're doing their grocery list back here and they put it on autopilot in the front but if I'm talking with you Brian in the audience and stuff I'm still engaged in that moment yeah we know a lot of those people them we could just stand up and do it for him he just oh absolutely yeah and that's so I when I was in the Navy I started modeling and acting in San Diego and so when I was really young and came out in my rotary and they found my pictures they used it for my kickout so I became very vulnerable because they saw the stuff of me but what I did differently this year as the president of my rotary each meeting I was in the audience engaging with everybody where all the other presidents for as long as it's been they've been at the front standing there behind a Podium just talking at them I engaged them freaked them out because I walked everywhere throughout the whole meeting and I would you know just step up behind somebody and do and it would just and that's you're talking about engage with the audience not just talk to them Zig Ziggler versus Jim ran right Zig Ziggler worked the stage and talked to everybody that was there Jim ran hid behind a Podium they both had amazing information especially Jim ran brilliant brilliant guy but people would go see zigg five times over because zigg was made them feel like they were part of it and said like your grandpa right like you were hanging out with your grandfather or something yeah I was by uh Jim R because I love Jim you're right he was always behind the podium one of my secrets when I go host or MC an event um before the event starts I just did this with the Aspire tour so it's Orlando you know I know there's gonna be 5,000 people in the room but I would go out early specifically like the first three four rows and just start meeting and talking with people hey are you from here where' you come from and then I would make some joke I'm like look I'm going to be your host the rest of the day I was like I need y'all to be in my corner and just laugh at bad I just make some like self-deprecating joke and just connect with them on a real level and it makes all the difference in the world because once I hit the stage the hardest part for a host or an MC is that opening five 10 minutes right and it's it's getting the audience on your side to trust you to come along to participate however the people you know certain different audiences are different there's the jumparound clap audiences of network marketing companies or there's you know there's there's you know I've been with construction guys and they don't want to they don't want to you know interact at all and you but it's just it gives me a vibe to figure out okay who are these people and how can I how can I match them to if we were sitting around and having a beer or sitting around having a cup of coffee so it has that kind of intimacy even from the stage but if I take some time like you said before I go on stage and kick things off I just go make friends with the first few rows and and it's usually really apparent who's like oh yeah I got you you know I'm in this and and then all of a sudden you kind of have a HomeField advantage at least a little bit it's like if you remember the old Areno Hall Show and he's like those people over there he always had that the dog pound in the corner I just go try to make my dog pound before I hit the stage you just need to crack a beer with those construction people beforehand oh no ABS dude I did one here that was uh these two guys called the real business owners great dudes but everybody in there Bri I think I told Brian this story and so Ed you're going to fit this this mold everybody in there had facial hair and a black hat of some kind and I walked in and I tend to walk in I used to I usually do things and I'm in a custom suit kind I have my my my gond Draper wannabe look at things and so I don't look like anybody in there so I've had to make this joke about being the narc on stage in like and I'm the only guy with no tattoos in the room too so no tattoos no facial hair and definitely not a black hat and so I was like I know you guys are already wondering who's the narc on the stage here I said guys we only have two days together you could give me the next five years and I'm not going to be able to grow that facial hair no tats I was like but if you get me a black hat by the time I get the end of this and crack some smiles and again trying to find common ground with just or you know is this an event where it's a big you know these guys do they cuss a lot do they not cuss a lot do they you know and then you kind of figure out what's what is the culture of that specific audience and then just try to go meet there but you're right there's probably certain ones that if I just walked on stage and cracked a beer I'm already on their side right well I just been go to the audience and go hey you're on my here's a beer have a yeah you better even more so if I go pass them out right yeah just take a ice chest down there with you next time hey you want be this yeah that's awesome that's absolutely and it could still it could still be you know the lightbeer or no alcoholic it's just the fact of doing it you connect with them you know absolutely going back to one of the things you brought up earlier it's interesting that nobody wants to talk about what they did earlier or they only want to cover their success and not talk about the journey because it was Joseph Campbell who wrote the book early on the hero's journey and it's basically a blueprint for almost every television show every movie every book you know it's somebody wants to do something more something happened to them they're hurt they've got to overcome it they come out on top and then they may stumble back down again and then it comes back up I mean look at you could take you go totally nerd on this Star Wars that's the whole thing back and forth you can go like you said Rambo Rocky you name it so in the Rock R yeah it's any Epic Journey yeah it's absolutely yeah and every sequel it starts over something again exactly oh my God we just went out yeah it's like yeah H three even how bad that was that was still the same thing and I think the people that don't want to share that it's just it's an ego and pride thing it really comes back to that and so where I always lean in and challenging those clients that are working with me is number one I'm like well why are you working with me do you want to impact your audience more what's the purpose of you bringing me in you know because if you're already just going to do things the way you already do them there's no reason to come work with me but there usually some kind of I want to impact more people I want to connect on a deeper level I want to get more clients or customers and I'm like any of those things then you got to be willing to be vulnerable at least a little bit and and again right not every great keyote or every great talk or what I call a well-crafted story has to be your worst moment I I for the past three years I've helped judge uh what's called the Great American speak off that that Grant Cardone has done and I've been the host and and a judge for those things and me and some of the other judges joke by the end of the day we need a therapy session because we have heard every I died three times suicide story like it is everybody and I said you know you can connect with your audience and tell us some light-hearted something and still make a point like it doesn't have to be the darkest most depressing story either but at least something where it's vulnerable or silly or somewhere where you messed up a little bit and came out of the other side because that's the only time we ever relate is if you'll take a moment to show us when you're not your shiniest or you aren't your most perfect you said you're not gonna keep going well I feel I don't want to interrupt you Ed I thought you were gonna say something start talking did I I interrupt you all the time well I was going to say is it's interesting because the last what we're coming on a year and a half of doing this Ed watching social media is that's one of the things too is watch like the Ryan minin people it's the what's cturing the most people's attention right now on reals and everything else is somebody interviewing someone else and the reason why that's so good is because the person interviewing ask questions that you wouldn't think to ask yourself and I see the same way with you is yes there's chat GPT yes there's ways to improve what you think but you need to get someone else's perspective to ask you questions about your story that you just bypass or that you don't think is important and that's why people come to Someone Like You is they think they have their story but that's the story they want to tell but that's not the story people want to hear or need to hear and so going to that that third party person is almost like going to a therapist where you want to get your message out but you need help with it being pulled out of you is that is that kind of what you do absolutely or some people don't think their story is big enough they have a great story I remember one time I had a client who she was a she was a health and fitness coach and she's like Jimmy I know I was called to help women with their health and fitness journey she's like I I just need to lose 30 more pounds before I launch because I've only lost 20 pounds and I really don't work out very consistently and I was like wait wait pause I was like say that again and she kind of repeated that she's like oh yeah I know what I'm supposed to do I want to impact these women I I just F she felt like she needed to lose 30 more pounds to be to validate herself because she'd only lost 20 and she doesn't really work out and I told her I was like do you realize you're a rock star to the woman that's been like sitting on the couch thinking about doing something that 20 pounds to somebody else could change their lives right now and I've seen that over and over again and I even in my own life when I shifted from Strictly health and fitness to doing what I do now I'm like there's a lot of people out there that are teaching storytelling and helping writing people's Keynotes and so I thought oh I have to wait till I have this this and this resume or this size audience because I just assumed oh would they're gonna go I remember when I first started using a story the number one question was like if you heard of Donald Miller I'm like yeah I'm super familiar with Donald Miller and so I just was always like oh everybody's gonna go see Donald Miller or Bo een or Michael Porter most these people I've worked with or friends of mine until I realized oh not necessarily because there are things about each of us that somebody's going to specifically relate with us more and a lot of times the other thing is we know we know all the experts in our industry because live inside that bubble and there are people that still have no idea I ran into somebody the other day that still didn't know who Tony Robbins was and I was like okay and I was like if you don't know who Tony Robbins is then that's just proof that I bet they don't know half the people that are writing Keynotes or speaking coaches or story coaches or whatever you want to label me out there so I might as well continue to share my story because there are people that will resonate with me and I tell my clients this all the time there are people that would rather resonate with you because they have more access or it's a more of a boutique experience than going with whoever you consider the big dog in your industry that they're never gonna have access to that they're gonna have to talk to that person's coach or they're only going to be able to read a book and it's just like cool then you just rob somebody from having an experience to change of changing their life because you made an assumption that your story wasn't big enough or that they were going to automatically want to go with somebody else in your industry well first part of that I mean well they've never seen shallow how I mean come on at least then never have I'm not your Guru on Netflix but on Netflix yeah just use him as an example because I feel like you know in that business face okay what's a name everybody knows and I'm like okay if that person exists then that goes for any industry 100 per. but he actually has taken down what he he used to be on TV all the time he's not on TV infomercials yeah yeah but that all changed after he got sued so you know and then because he used to have Castle delmare down in San Diego where he used to live and and that all changed in the 90s so and so there's a lot of people 90s on who have no idea where he is yeah but I just make that point to say look your story is big enough right it's it's people always think I always say you know it's not it's not you know 50 pounds or $50,000 later that you should start sharing your story you need to start sharing it now and bring people along again going back to that idea of people like to be a part of building things even if you don't have the backend results if I if you share a story and say hey and now I've made it to my mission to help X number of people or to move in this direction I would love for you to be a part of this movement there are people that will come along it's not like you don't have to be established or have uh this huge track record to already start serving uh your audience or really helping people you know change their lives whether that's you know you said something about it being dignity for me you know health and fitness wasn't about a number it was about confidence or it I used to always say in my trainings you know we don't sell health and fitness we don't sell a inhome business we deliver hope to a world that desperately needs it you know it was this idea of not necessarily what the actual T again Selling Houses it's not necessarily the brick and mortar that someone's living in it's security it's family it's memories it's that's that's really you know again it goes back to connecting on a more emotional level than just strictly the analytical side of things going back to one of the things you said I don't want to bypass this you don't always have to look at the big big successful people so I'll speak from personal experience when I got started I thought oh there's no way I'll ever be bradlee but then I found don't try to be Bradley because there you don't see the 20 years that he's been working on stuff instead find somebody who's slightly higher than you are follow their lead do what they're doing and for me that was Neil Holmes if you've ever seen his um Instagram account he got hacked had go back to zero and two years later he was doing the what it's I think it's called the Ford event is the one that he does me see what his is called yeah the Ford event and so his whole thing I looked at him and I thought wow that's neat that somebody who lost everything and had to start all over with social media yes people will find him but I looked at somebody who was there versus looking at people who are way up on the Mountaintop and so just look for somebody who's slightly better than you that you're trying to catch up to and then you pick another person if you outgrow that one and to your point you get more access to people who are newer than people who are way up there there's a a certain person that will come in speak in an event they charge for every photo that someone can take and they literally come in speak take the X amount of photos and leave and nobody can interact with them at all yeah and that's so you can pay a lot to have a picture with someone or you can invest in someone who's growing to help you be more handsome on and work with you and things so absolutely because you'd much rather have the emotional interaction with somebody than just the photo right Jimmy he was talking about himself that's what he that's right it was the Reynolds photo too so I just lay and they come and take a picture when you take your hat off yeah but okay um so I know that one of the ways that they can reach you is here at your website the coach jimmy.com and yeah we were talking also so what is it that is the first way that you really start to help people with figuring this out so what I put together and uh is people you know I come on podcast things like this and I know I spew a lot of here's a strategy here's a strategy can be overwhelming it's a little like you know drinking out of a a fire hydrant so if they just go to story Wellcraft it.com I've done a couple things there's a checklist of a lot of the things that we've talked about today the second part on there is what I call the story memory jogger and it's something I take every new client through and you think these stories are insignificant so it's questions like tell me about your worst date tell me about your first car it gets people out of just this linear I can only tell this story and it kind of gets your brain rolling and I know I went through something like that early on because the story I start my Keynotes with is about me singing on stage as a fat kid in stupid pajamas in the first grade in West Texas it was because somebody took me through a memory jogger and then I was like oh and I realized how it tied in to what I do now and so really yeah right there just storycraft decom there's an entire checklist plus the memory jogger and that'll at least just get you started on the Journey of figuring out do I have a story the answer is yes but it helps you realize you do what are some of the elements you need to do that and then how to tie that to your to your business even if you feel like there's no connection awesome Jimmy thanks for being on the show today awesome guys thank you so much for for hanging out I hope we can do it again soon yeah and Ed when you come to Dallas you can go out with Jimmy and I because he actually lives close by here but it's bad we get out and we go start drinking old Fashions and bad happens so yeah I also co-host a Texas whiskey show that's a whole different that's an EP that those are conversations for another day yeah I do I will share one last funny story on the way out so um Jimmy calls me the other day he's like so uh do you have my credit card because we both have amx's that are similar but mine has designs on it we didn't realize when we went out drinking the other day that the bartender gave us the wrong one back and I'm getting ready to leave the country thankfully he caught on to because I never even looked at my card I just pulled it out paid for gas and whatever and yeah we had each other's cards so I didn't want a bunch of H Europe tags all of a sudden on my uh my credit card I'm glad we caught that one damn it I I'm not I we charged up C on right I guess I got all the points the silver all right than guys for us opportunity yeah our pleasure Ed you want to take us out sure what the heck why not you do such a horrible job at it I do I do it on purpose to make you feel important yeah it's like when your wife your ex-wife asked you to clean the house you did a shitty job so you wouldn't clean the house anymore you got cameras in here talking to your other house okay you do the job so bad that they stop asking you to do it that's right yeah all right everybody I appreciate you both being here today I appreciate you for being here if you want to support us the best thing you can do is just subscribe to our YouTube channel and again we're here every Tuesdays and Thursdays at what is that 10:00 a.m. Pacific and noon Central yes noon Central the important time yeah the important time all right we'll see you next week thank you both for being here I appreciate you both thank you