The Dailey Edge Podcast
Join hosts Trent, TJ, and Todd Dailey as they explore the intersections of technology, culture, fitness, and personal growth. Through engaging discussions and personal anecdotes, the trio dives into topics ranging from childhood gaming nostalgia and cutting-edge fitness tech to the pursuit of happiness and lifestyle choices. Whether reminiscing about epic gaming marathons, sharing tips for staying on the forefront of fitness trends, or unraveling the complexities of modern life, The Dailey Edge delivers thoughtful insights, lively debates, and relatable stories for listeners of all walks of life.
The Dailey Edge Podcast
Episode 50: Earn The Miles and Manage Your Time
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A marathon medal for 18 miles sounds like a small rule change until you ask what a finish line is supposed to mean. We start with the LA Marathon decision to offer an off-ramp in hot weather and debate the real tension underneath it: safety versus standards, compassion versus accountability, and whether a one-time exception quietly trains us to look for the easy exit.
From there, we zoom out into grit as a modern value. Running culture has shifted as more recreational athletes enter endurance sports, and leaders are left deciding when to protect people from themselves. We talk waivers, slippery slopes, and why hard challenges feel “sacred” precisely because they cannot be edited when they get uncomfortable. We also share personal race stories that reveal the difference between building a smart on-ramp and rewriting the bar.
Then the conversation takes a turn into everyday life: punctuality. Being late is often treated like nothing, but it can signal priorities, respect, and presence, whether it is kids’ practices, in-person meetings, or back-to-back virtual calls. We explore how productivity changes with age, why mental bandwidth is limited, and how creating space can lead to better thinking and better relationships.
If you care about endurance, leadership, parenting, time management, or personal growth, this one will stick with you. Subscribe, share this with a friend who loves hard goals, leave a review, and tell us: where do you draw the line between safety and shortcuts?
Marathon Shortcut Sparks A Debate
SPEAKER_00Welcome back to the Daily Edge. I'm here with my brothers TJ and Todd Daly. And today we've got an interesting topic. Recently there was a the LA Marathon. They, due to I think, extreme heat, had decided to just allow people to run 18 miles versus the 26 miles and and still get the metal.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think this is going to get a little redundant because we've talked about this topic a lot, but I think, you know, what this outlined for me was interesting. So this happened and I had a visceral reaction to it. I think we've all been through it in the past where uh there was this period of time over the last decade where uh everybody talked about the participation trophy generation, uh, call it late mid to late millennial generation, um, which is kind of right after ours, conveniently, uh, where you know it was a lot about, hey, you tried, here's a participation trophy. And, you know, you can say what you want about people that grew up in those environments, um, whether it was positive or negative, right? In certain instances, I'm sure it was positive. It gave somebody confidence they may not have had or made them feel like they were part of a community. And then on the flip side, potentially it put them in a position where they expected to get everything without really trying. And I think this is kind of an interesting example. So when this happened, I had this reaction like, oh, this is awful. Um, and I had seen somebody who had posted on Instagram, and their perspective on it was, why do you care? Uh for me, I don't, I didn't care about the actual act. Like if one of you ran 18 miles and you wanted to go get a medal for finishing 26, fine. Doesn't bother me, doesn't affect me one way or the other. Not going to change my day-to-day. So in that regard, I don't care. My issue was more with the race, the race director, meaning the directors of the LA Marathon, um, where I thought instead of, because you said extreme heat, like it was extreme in a very loose usage of the word. I think it was supposed to get into the high 70s. Um and I've we've seen marathons, we've seen races well into the 80s, 90s. Um, and instead of offering people an on-ramp, right, more fluid at the aid stations, keeping the finish line open, like New York Marathon does that, right? They close the course down. But if it takes you 12 hours, they'll keep the finish line open for you. You're gonna have to get there, but they will. Um, so keep the finish line open, add more fluids. And instead, it was ah, you know, if it's too hard, just cut it out at 18. And I think that just contributes to um society as a whole justifying the easy way out. So I'd be interested to hear your guys' take.
SPEAKER_00Well,
Heat Safety And Hard Choices
SPEAKER_00put take the devil's advocate on this um because I I did also hear the same thing and I rolled my eyes. And as I as I try and do often, and as I've tried to lobby for uh on many of these episodes, is like be curious about why this happened. Um, here's my understanding is, and I'm gonna put myself in the race director's shoes, and I think part of the challenge here is that marathoning and long races has become much more recreational. I feel like the interest has climbed into uh more recreational runners. It's no longer kind of people who are uh predominantly elite or very experienced runners, you have a lot of people kind of trying to get into the marathon circuit that may not have where running's maybe not a huge focal point of their life. Um, and so I think as a race director that increases the risk of things going wrong, right? In particular. So when you've got, I don't know how many thousands of people run the LA marathon. I'm guessing several thousand would be my guess or take.
SPEAKER_01Maybe 10. I don't know. It's not, it's not the biggest, but it's big.
SPEAKER_00So 63 at race start, and that the highs that day were in the upper 80s. Okay. 87, 88 degrees. Uh, my understanding is the decision was a one-time thing. This isn't indefinite like future races you can peel off at 18 miles. But if you're a race director and you're thinking about people's health, safety, whatever. Now, particularly people who are running marathons are already masochists and are not necessarily great at drawing the line and saying, okay, I'm done. So here he's got an opportunity to say, okay, one time I am going to allow these people an off-ramp at 18 miles that gives them an opportunity to have a little bit of, you know, from an overall effort perspective, those of us that have run marathons in the 60s and 70s know 18 miles and that can very compare to 26 in, you know, much cooler conditions that one time uh, you know, offer these people an opportunity to maybe take a way out that doesn't lead to somebody having maybe a severe health condition or it being fatal. So what uh is it really the question I want to pose back to you guys? Because I hear this a lot in in business, where you do one thing and then everybody kind of panics and is like, well, if you you you give that one person that one piece of flexibility, then everybody's gonna want that flexibility, and then oh my gosh, and then it's just gonna be chaos and everything's gonna crumble around us because you gave that one person that flexibility. So this seemed to be a very exception-based one-off scenario where I don't know that it drastically or more broadly impacts the spirit of the sport. I'd throw that out to you guys.
Accountability, Waivers, And Risk
SPEAKER_00I don't know how to answer that, but what I I what I was thinking is when should the race director get involved? I think this is where I like at what point, because the whole point of a marathon is to push yourself past limits, right? 18 to 26 are hard arguably the hardest. You've trained, you've you've trained for it, and that's where people go into their dark, deep, their deepest, dark places to try to do they're doing a marathon because they're trying to prove to them themselves that they can do something that is really, really hard. So, like the whole point and process around allowing someone an opportunity to do something great versus giving them an opportunity to take it away. So I care, I'm curious. Like, there are instances and it could be tornadoes, it could there hail, there could be some like outside of people getting super injured through like a weather storm, why would why would a director take that away due to due to heat when a runner can take that away themselves, they have the opportunity in order to do that. I think it's it's tough for people to know what their limits are, especially in a heat stroke type scenario. Let me ask you this if somebody When is it on them versus him? When is it on the director versus the person? I don't think it is. I don't think there's a clear line of responsibility. I think here here's the other side of this, and this is all hypothetical. This isn't like this wouldn't have happened. If someone, let's just say they don't do this off-ramp at 18 miles, right? They don't offer the battles. Someone pushes themselves, a recreational runner that maybe doesn't understand their body or their limits as well, and they die. Okay? Well, let's just say it's one person, one person dies in the process. If that were the alternative, you have one person loses their life, or you offer for this one race at high 80 degrees, you offer people medals at 18. If you're a race director, which do you choose? Do you choose everyone having to go the full 26 and not compromising the integrity of the race or one person's life?
SPEAKER_01I choose the the prior, and here's why. It's on them. When you sign up for a marathon, you must be over 18 years of age and you sign a waiver. You know what you're getting into. Point being, how many people died at the mini last year? Two. It happens. It it it and I'm not trying to be like very um like there are scenarios where um something, you know, there there's an I mean, because then you start to then you're on a slippery slope, right? Because then, you know, a lot of these deaths, I think it was many, one or two of them, but anyways, a lot of these deaths are unknown heart conditions. So do you make everybody take uh uh heart stress test before they run a marathon? Um, or there's some other genetic condition that their predisposition to uh this particular scenario. So didn't do you have to start testing for that? Um I think with you know, with with these scenarios, from a race director's perspective, I mean, that's why when you run any of our ultras, there's a waiver. Like you're signing this. I mean, I've signed actual waivers for certain ultras where and it's a little tongue-in-cheek, but it's real, where they say death is a potential here. Um I have a like uh Nobone, I think, puts their waiver on the shirt itself. And it's like, I understand that death is a possibility. Um point being is that like, you know, that particular race, I've actually run a race, uh, grandma's in 2018, maybe, and it was 63 at the start. So similar. Um, and I know, and I I bet if you looked, if it was 87, it was probably 87 at 4 p.m. Not, you know, because the race, I I'd love to, I'd like to look, but from what I heard, the peak temperature for most of that race was in the 70s somewhere. And that's a substantial difference between 75 and 90. Um, but maybe I'm wrong.
SPEAKER_00Maybe it was seven sixty-three at the start, and maybe it rose. I think the the challenging thing here is is like the marathon was created. I don't know why it's created, but I'm gonna say it's it's like it's this grit hard thing, right? In a world of AI where we're taking shortcuts on absolutely everything, to take something with such that has is so hard and so demanding physically, and to create a shortcut, I think, is where you're like, yeah, there's not a shortcut to the marathon when it's 60 degrees isn't easy. When it's 40 degrees, it isn't easy. And so there's this like holy call it the holy grail, this really hard thing to do. And in these really hard things, there are there is risk and there shouldn't be concessions unless it's life-threatening to everybody involved.
SPEAKER_01Well, and there's
Grit Stories From Real Races
SPEAKER_01precedent here too, right? Like Chicago has been blacked flagged at least twice, where you know it's gotten, because it's in October, right? Where it's gotten into the 80s, they've run out of water at the aid stations, and it is what it is. You come back and you try again. I had a buddy who ran, who did an Iron Man in Texas, and the weather, there was a tornado, and they shut the finish line down, and he was 10 meters from the finish line. Didn't give him his finish. 10 meters, like 10 to 10 to 50 meters away, and they didn't give it to him. So, what does he have to do? I gotta go back and try it again. I've got to do another Iron Man. Um, and it it sucks and it's tough, and you know, but uh yeah, I I think you're right. The larger picture is okay, how do we foster um the desire to go grit? Like let okay, we didn't make it, let's go do it again, or we had to walk it in. Maybe next time we'll run the last thing.
SPEAKER_00What did that happen to us? What did we do at Disney? We did Dopey. Dopey, it's a 5K, so it's four days in a row. The hardest part, by the way, is getting up at 3:30 every morning. It's 5K. The next day you wake up, you run a 10K, next day you wake up, you run a half, next day you wake up, you run a full. Day three, half marathon. I don't remember if we ran a few miles or whatever, but it got canceled. What did we do? We went out and ran the half marathon. We ran we ran circles in the parking lot, right? With a bunch of hundreds of other crazy people, because I would not dare take a dopey metal or wear a dopey shirt without doing the total 78 some miles for the reduced it down to a 10k again. Yeah, and but then we did the other seven miles in the parking lot. That is the mentality that we have to have. And I think your point is is like if we take the the grittiest things out there and start creating shortcuts for those, what are we doing to society as a whole? You know, uh it's interesting. If I asked you guys if they did that for a 5k, you probably wouldn't have as much issue with it. Is that fair? Probably. Probably. I think part of that is where I'm going with the marathon. Certainly the 5k and the marathon are still worlds apart, but I think your grit, your true tests of uh physical limits and capabilities, a lot of that's moved into the ultra world for your more experienced runners. I think the the marathon community 20, 30 years ago, even maybe 15 years ago, is now your ultra marathon trying to run 50Ks, trying to run 50 milers, trying to run 100 milers, or running big backyard ultras and trying to do and I and I think you know your half marathons and your marathons, you know. Uh so so that's where I think it's it gets a little bit more complex. It did say mid 80s was likely around noon to early afternoon. Um so probably your that's probably your what four plus hours. Four plus hour people, yeah, which is your higher risk population in general.
SPEAKER_01So and I would be, I would bet you I don't less than a hundred people took that medal. Yeah, I I mean I would think for the most part anybody that's gone through that process, but you know, with the 5K, I mean I think it goes, I I think you're right because I I do believe that a lot of 5K's and instances are done for entertainment purposes. Um, but I mean you guys remember when we went to Disney and and I think I was talking about it earlier, everybody. Like when we went to the Disney cruise, and there was the 5K on the um island that I won, by the way. They said in the pre-meeting, you don't even have to run it, you can just go get your medal at the stand. You can just walk over and get your medal. I don't again, I don't know if anybody did that, but um, I yeah.
SPEAKER_00Is the real challenge that you like these really gritty things, whether it's a marathon, a 50k, like you can't change the bar. You can't, regardless of who's competing, regardless of where we're at, like, regardless if it's recreational, like we're not gonna make an Iron Man and cut it in half. We've already, you know, gone from a full to a half marathon. I imagine half marathons weren't. I was listening to I saw something. Dan Daniel Tosh said, now what is this with this half marathon? Like, yeah, like I'm gonna tell people like I read half a book and like I'm never gonna pick it up again. Like, who does half of anything, you know, and had this big joke about it? But we've created a society where half is good.
SPEAKER_01That's the biggest question. I would I like your perspective, both of your perspectives on it. This is the biggest question for me. Why do we, or are we at a position in society where we're constantly giving people off ramps, where we're even, I mean, I I'd probably be guilty of it, where we're like justifying. You know, we have this rule at backyards. Don't bring your mom to a backyard. You don't want somebody at after yard four to be like, oh, honey, you did so good, great job. You know, it can be done the first time you came to me when your legs hurt. I didn't say, Oh, dude, you did great today. Way to get through 50K. Like, it's cool, you know, you got to ultra. You know, and and and and I think that applies down the line when you had John reach out to you years ago and say, I want to run a marathon, and you're like, here's your on-ramp, not uh, dude, you're 60 pounds overweight. Like, you know, maybe get into walking and you know, whatever. So I'd love your perspective on why are we why are we justifying the off-ramps versus like, hey, here's a here's a way to get into this that could could make your life better.
SPEAKER_00I think it's too hard. I think the for the majority of the population, it's too hard. Now, I started my first long run was the marathon. I didn't start with a half. I mean, the first thing we did was monumental, and it was like, and then it was like halves became easy, so you could like run a half without training and like let's do halves, but like the marathon is still a monster, and I still don't love them. Like, there's something about it. You guys got Boston right around the corner, and um, I I would rather run the 50k than the marathon. I hate 26 miles of high intensity, and I haven't so the marathon hurts, it always hurts every time, and people want to get a medal that doesn't hurt. And I think society as a whole, that's I mean, we've created such um I I think the conveniences in life have gotten so good that we have to continue to create things to create adversity. Like, I'm getting a cold plunge because everything's so easy. Now I gotta find a way to go sit in a frozen tub because I'm spending some time on my couch. Or, you know, I don't have to go to the outhouse in the middle of the winter to use the restroom anymore. We don't have to do the normal things that our ancestors did that provided grit. So now we're fabricating those through, I don't care whether it's through the the high rocks or the whatever it's called or running long distances. We're all trying to create some of that adversity to still make us feel tough. Society's gone super soft, and I think it's gonna continue in that direction as we get more conveniences and comforts. I mean, we just um that that's an that's an inevitable reality. All of that that you said there was a hundred percent true. We are much softer as a society than we've ever been, and we will continue that trajectory for the foreseeable future.
SPEAKER_01So, you know, kind of going back to it from uh so I mean I mean, let me say that was kind of my perspective on this whole thing, and I feel bad now saying, you know, at the beginning of this that everybody can just die. It's on them. I'm not that uh uh cut, it's not that black and white and that cut in that cut and dry, but I do feel like accountability is important.
SPEAKER_00There's there's rules. You run two races, prairie on fire. If you're not in the corral, you're out. Like it's just what it is. You know, we I I joke my kids, their grades and their homework, they can literally turn an assignment in like any time. Oh, yeah, I'll just make that up, I'll turn that in, or they can do bonus work. There literally is no more deadline, like, oh, that paper was due and it's due on a Tuesday and it's in on a Tuesday. It's like, oh, I didn't get it on Tuesday, but they'll let me turn it in on Thursday or Friday. Like, there's very, very few finite things that have to be done in a set time.
Punctuality Signals Respect
SPEAKER_00And this takes me to an off-topic that we're gonna hit that I want to hit and I want your guys' opinion on it punctuality, showing up on time, and this is why this is important. So I'm I'm coaching a I'm helping coach a basketball team for my youngest son. And like as being the coach and being there, it's like I'm there 20, 30 minutes early, right? Because I mean, you had a basketball game, you got to show up, you got to get loose, you got to do things, punctuality, and then in soccer, you know, show up like I feel like it's become the norm that if practice is at six, we show up at six, or we show up at 558. And I think that happens in kids sports, I think it happens in our lives. What are your guys' thoughts around punctuality these days and what the norm is in your life versus what it should be?
SPEAKER_01I think it's really interesting. I've thought a lot about this, um, strangely enough. You know, we joke a lot about people who are as they get older, like our dad. He'll show up to a flight three hours before the flight, or he gets to a Colts game two hours before a Colts game. Um, so I think some of the punctuality happens naturally because you're exposed to more context. And so you, you know, when you're going down to a Colts game, he's thinking of the 17 things that can go wrong, which never go wrong, and ultimately he's it the first person in the stadium. Um, you know, but but if it's a situation where there aren't a lot of those variables, like I'm on board with you, you know, there are times. Um, last night I told you I would be at your house around 7 15, and I'm like, the key we decided last minute we're gonna come to Marion, and so we're scrambling. And I'm like, you know, pushing, pushing, pushing, but it's like, okay, do I lose it because everybody's not moving as fast as I want, or do I show up five or six minutes late, which I did. I think I was seven or eight minutes late at the end. End of the day. Similarly, this morning, we were running and like I got there three minutes early, and I'm all proud of myself. Again, different scenario because it was 6 a.m. I'm not showing up 20 minutes early at 6 a.m., but uh ended up being late because I didn't read my texts. But it's important, I think, to be there early. Um, you know, I had a run last night where I was there 10 minutes early. Miles, he goes to his practices 20 to 30 minutes early, games 20 to 30 minutes early. And punctuality to me is extremely important because I think it conveys, at least to me, the way I read into it, and I'm sure it's not intentional most times, but I read into it as a person's respect for the other person's time. And that and when somebody just throws caution to the wind, I I will give people I will give certain people grace. Um but like that grace is variable. Like if I know they're gonna be seven minutes late every time, I'll just show up a little bit late myself and I know that it's some something, something. But if it's seven minutes once and then 30 minutes once, and then then they know show, like I'm done. Like that's the kind of behavior that well, I'll just shut somebody down. Like I don't need somebody like that because you'd obviously don't respect me or my time.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, for me, I think it depends on the situation as well. I'm trying to think of the things that I'm intentionally punctual to and make sure we get on there on time. Like kids' sporting events is something we're always there on time. I think about what's on time. Uh, I mean, when the coach asks you to be there, which is generally 15 to 30 to 40 minutes ahead of the game. So that's is that a typical thing for practice though, too? Do you guys show up to practice this 10 to 15 minutes early?
SPEAKER_01Or are you we show up to practice 30 minutes early because that's miles? Like he wants to be the first person there, so I just let he's got that agency, and so you know.
SPEAKER_00Um not practice. Practice generally, we're there before it starts. We're generally there, walking in three to four minutes before it starts, just walking in and going.
SPEAKER_01We're normally more five to seven.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I would say three to four um on that front, like mass, it's very important for me to be on time to mass. I do not like to walk into church late. Um I would say some things I think where I struggle uh at times is uh in the work setting when I've got back-to-back meetings. So what's tough is it's not just like, hey, I'm showing up because I'm, you know, was just doing whatever. It's usually a meeting's running over, right? And you get into a conversation with somebody who's trying to express something to you or is trying to, you know, you get in that towards the end of a conversation and you don't want to like hard cut them off. You want the conversation to end uh smoothly, uh, you know, depending on the topic too, you want to try and thoroughly get through the conversation. That's where I run into issues. And for me, you know, in the work setting, especially with virtual meetings, um a lot of times it's like you're just sitting on there cranking, doing whatever you would be doing if you didn't have a meeting anyway. And so, so for me in those cases, I'm generally not super sensitive to to someone being two to three minutes late. Once it hits five minutes, that's kind of my radar in like a business setting that like, okay, so uh if someone at least then text me and let me know you're gonna be a five minutes late, you can stop and do that. So um in the you know, in-person meetings, uh I would generally agree a hundred percent. I think if it's an in-person meeting in a group, unless there is an extenuating circumstance, and depending on if there's a meeting prior to that, that's in person. I mean, that's where I think it gets fuzzy for me. But just the, you know, I I'm one that also I will say, and you guys know this, tries to maximize my time. I try and fit a lot in. And so generally, I'm not somebody who's going to build 15 minutes of buffer in between everything, uh, although I've had to do that on my schedule, you know, end meetings at 50 minutes after the hour, so I can, you know. Um, so it's so it's one of those things where I I pack my schedule a little tighter, but I would say that's where I'm at on punctuality. The I I I think the virtual stuff has made it more common to like show up meetings at three. You come right into the virtual meeting right at three. Like if you show up at 255, nobody's there and you're just kind of waiting. Um it really is interesting because it does send a similar message to me of importance. It's like most important person is the one that's you know always doing something or always late, or it's uh it almost conveys a lack of of importance or a lack of respect for time. Um and it's hard because I think it's become the social norm. I think more than anything, it's just like it's a social norm of like it's okay, meeting starts, it's okay to be two, three, five minutes late. Practice starts, you know, everyone's walking in during practice, and um it just has become the norm. Now I would say on the flip side, if practice runs over five or ten minutes, nobody really cares either. Um, but it's just this, it's almost a mentality thing because I've since we started coaching, I've had to like we leave 30 minutes before to get there 20 minutes before, and I'm used to leaving 15 minutes before and getting there five to seven minutes before. But you got to get your cleats on if it's soccer, you've got to get your so I don't know why, but that's one of those things that bothers me too. It's like punctuality creating, and it goes back to this busy active world I think we live
Busy Schedules And Meaningless Meetings
SPEAKER_00in. We're trying to all do so much and so many things. And if we could just slow down, I think there's a lot to be gained in those moments that we can create um and showing up on time for things.
SPEAKER_01Well, like, you know, I mean, I think it it also there's a there's this element of value and prioritization. So you talk about these practices. I mean, I know that for me, um, and again, I'm glad that Miles has chosen to approach soccer practice the way he has. But, you know, for me, there's value there, right? Like you're getting the opportunity to practice with some coaches that played at a very high level or that have been coaches for over a decade and have great experience there. And if you really value that, then you will show up on time because it's an opportunity for you to get better. You know, and it's and it's but but on the flip side of it, um, you know, the there are, I think we've we have, you're right, we've created so many almost meaningless interactions that you know we maybe accidentally accidentally prioritize over something more valuable. I'll give you an example for me. There's a meeting that we have every week, two a week. And most of the time I show up late, um, intentionally. You know, it's a meeting that starts at a little bit after noon and typically runs for 25 to 30 minutes, but it is a twice a week full company update. So you have 40 people giving five-minute updates as to what they're doing, what they're doing that week. And 90, 80 to 90 percent of it is um kind of like you said, when you're in a virtual meeting, you're just kind of hammering doing things away anyway. So it's like, you know, it would be, I think there could be some real soul searching and self-exploration on, you know, I think we've talked maybe before about like these, I think you've got a pretty strong philosophy on these pointless meetings that we have. And so like cutting some of that out, you know, how many times are we, you know, how many, but I every now and then I'll find myself wanting to finish a video or wanting to finish a game before I leave for somewhere. And I normally cut it off, but most of that and a lot of that stuff could probably be cut out. I'd be really interested to see, you know, the people that are walking into basketball practice at 6'10 for a six o'clock practice. What were you doing? What was that real? Like, could you not find cleats or did you want to finish an episode?
SPEAKER_00It's the parents for sure.
SPEAKER_01That's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00They're just you know, they're just kind of going and like they've lost. I'm curious, like less meetings is kind of like less like how how do you receive that? Like, well, if I didn't try to jam so much in there, then I wouldn't have feel so rushed, and I don't want to feel rushed. I think it's easier. Um depending on what your daily scope of responsibility is. I mean, I'm one to I'm big on prioritization, and I think uh I think different meetings hold different levels of importance for different people based on what their their uh responsibilities are, right? So there's probably five people that that's a really important meeting to, whether that's the company leadership who's wanting to get informed on everything, there's others that are important. Like for me, my most important meetings are the ones generally one-on-ones with my employees, where I am helping remove roadblocks, we're brainstorming, we are talking about day-to-day blocking and tackling and making sure the organization can run, right? Like to me, those are like top. Um I think there are for you, it is like the Monday morning meeting, right? Is like this that is your time to get updated on things, to share your thoughts on things. And I think naturally uh that makes sense because of your role in the organization, right? You you don't you're not doing as much of the day-to-day blocking and tackling. So if you have, for example, one meeting on your calendar for the day, like that's the that's your centerpiece. Whereas for me, a lot of times we go in there and we're just kind of, you know, talking and kind of, you know, just kind of shooting the breeze, or we're just, you know, and just kind of, and in my head, it's piling up, and we've talked about this. Like, I'm you know, I got a lot of things piling up in the back of my head trying to like, you know, make the organization run day to day. And so I think, I mean, that's a meeting I'm generally uh on time to, uh, I, you know, so uh I wouldn't say like that's when I show up intentionally three minutes late because it's not important, but I do think um based on the volume of meetings you have and the volume of activity that's going on, I think that can change, change the landscape of things. Like, for example, we talk about dad all the time, right? When he has to do laundry and has a haircut and has a doctor appointment on the same day, it is a full day, and that is like that is packed and like you know, whatever. And each one of those things is a very important because he's planned around it and that's what he's in, that's what he's doing, and that's that slow, that's the slow, you know, and I think there's there's some beauty in that for sure. I mean, I'm continuing to try and declutter my life, so fully philosophically, I agree with everything that's being said here. I also think that there is other perspectives, you know. For us comparatively, we have we're trying to, even those of us that live slower, there's still infinitely more things to get done in a day that can be done. And for us, like when I think about practices, right? I think about urgent and importance, urgency and importance. You know, what makes a practice such a high priority is the time of it, right? You got to be there on time. This is the time, and that creates a sense of urgency. Our kids, well, the reason like they're pretty packed athletically. Their training schedules are pretty full. Most days they have something going on. And so for us, that event is more of a casual experience than it is like the centerpiece of a day that we're like, okay, we got practice in 30 minutes, or we got practice in 45 minutes. You know, this is we're once a week or twice a week, like we've got to start getting ready for that. It's like we're just coming in from this and we're going out on this, and it's a little more fluid. We still get there on time, but again, it's two or three, maybe four minutes, not um not five, ten, or fifteen.
SPEAKER_01I think you bring up a good point. It's like we talk about letting the day breathe a little bit and not being as packed. And I always find myself kind of exploring um the value of what I'm doing with my time. Like, you know, we talk a little bit about um, you know, our responsibilities to our children, our responsibilities professionally, and some of those things. And so, you know, there are days where uh oh gosh, what was it? It was this week. Um I had a couple hours worth of calls. And would I like to take those calls in front of my computer so I can look at screen shares and view spreadsheets and download files? I absolutely would. But um, you know, the value that I think I'm bringing to my kids, keeping them consistent, uh, giving them, you know, letting them essentially play with their friends, because that's a lot of what sports are at this age. You know, I feel like utilizing my time in that capacity, okay, well, I'm going to sacrifice being as present as I probably could potentially be. Now if it's something major, right? If you have a major strategy meeting with a major partner or something, then I'm parked. But um I always find myself analyzing that situation and being like, look, yeah, I could sit on that meeting that I explained earlier for 35 minutes and listen to a bunch of people talk about a bunch of stuff that isn't relevant to me. Uh, or I could be playing basketball with my son um during lunch, because it's right during lunch, you know, to keep him engaged during spring break or something like that, or make him feel like you know he's got somebody to play with because his sisters have friends over. So it's it's very interesting to me um how we evaluate and prioritize those particular things in those scenarios. And I wonder, I don't know, I'll kind of pause there and get your guys' thoughts because I have more on it.
SPEAKER_00But well, if you go back 30 years to when we were in sports, that this is where it gets real interesting. We were always early to everything because there was nothing else to do. There and so it makes you wonder, especially around the sports, not the business world, but like, man, they didn't have the cell phones and the video games and the television wasn't on demand. And so it was like, you know, they got home and yeah, there was dinner and trying to get, but your whole thing was revolved around just that activity. And so, well, now it's like, you know, I can sit at home and be distracted and entertained. And so it's like you take 30 years down the road, there's so much more access, there's so many more things to do, but you just wonder how much of that is like legitimate. I'm going from practice to practice type stuff. I'm just got a lot going on versus like sitting in my chair on my phone, or like now, even like most parents when they go to practice, they'd watch the practice. Now they sit in their car or sit whatever, and they do they play games or candy crush or whatever just to pass the time away, right? So it's like I wonder how much of it is distraction versus importance. I think that's where I I'm I would be more curious because it seems to be a generational thing. Yeah, it's interesting. I have a lot of thoughts on it. The other thing that I kind of mentioned in terms of the fluidness is I do think with kids uh you've got to be kids, just they're not gonna naturally be prepared at the time for practice. And so there's a level of stress and anxiety that needs to be injected into a situation in a lot of cases to get someplace on time or ahead of time, or you've just got to be very, very thoughtful and like at 30 minutes, you're like, hey, you know, and at 520, hey, you know, and like um for better or worse, we don't tend to have as good of that kind of advanced awareness on everything that's going on, and so we sometimes will forego injecting that additional stress into a situation um and be there a couple of minutes early than then five to seven or or ten. I was saying what's interesting in our family since we shut off the internet is like Isaiah's like ready to go to practice, he's like ready to go, excited, like, hey dad, can we leave yet? We've shown up a couple of times 30 minutes prior just because he's like he's so bored, ready to get out of the house, wants to go shoot shots. Let me ask you this. You show up to most things 30 minutes early, give or take. The other day you were we met in the Indianapolis office and you said I'll be there at 730. I said I'll be there at 7.30, and you texted me at 6.50 and you were in the parking lot. How often do you feel like when you're 30 minutes early and someone's not there until five minutes early that they're late because you're 30 minutes early? Like, how tough is that to process? Um, you feel like I'm here, I'm ready, where is everyone at? I I think if they're still early, they're early. I think it shows a level of importance and a level of thoughtfulness of what's going to be talked about or what's in the meeting, preparedness. You can tell when someone just walks in off the cuff and they're like, you're sitting the first five minutes and they're still checking things and doing things, drives me absolutely crazy. Like, I would love there's a cell phone policy. If I'm talking and you're on your phone, like I'll stop the meeting. Like it just it's like, dude, if what I'm saying isn't important, then just tell me, you know, oh well, I got this important, whatever, whatever. And I'm like, no, like I'm not. So I'm okay if people are still early, but when it gets after the the time, like I value my time considerably, and I can be just as busy as anyone else out there. I've got just as much going on. I can throw myself into just as many things and get just as much tied up. And I just choose not to because I want to go into the meetings that I have are highly, highly important with people that I highly, highly value. And I want to have that time because I don't, and I'm seeing more and more of it. I don't get much of it. I don't get you, but like two hours on a Monday. And that's fine, that's good. But like it's like when I'm meeting with you in person, I value that time. I'm gonna give you that same respect, and I just want it back. So um I do love being early. And I I have found being early create there's for other people that are early, it creates those moments. It's like sitting in the parking lot with your kid before practice and you start having these just conversations, like about it, gives you that space to have some moments and to have some discussions that you wouldn't have when you're all coming in, okay, we're here, let's go. Let's get in the board. It's like there's these moments of like building trust and personal, you know, time. How's your family? It's just it just allows space for that human element.
SPEAKER_01Well, you know, that brings up a great point. As you age, do we think that you because again, you're right, you look at dad, and like those are big things for him. Do you start to recognize the importance of those moments and look to let everything breathe to its absolute maximum just in case you were to encounter things like that? Is that why, you know, because I think most people are like that. There are people that stay present, stay busy, relatively speaking. But um, as and I'm finding this with myself, you know, I'll be 47 in a hand in a week. Jeez, um that I'm starting to let those things breathe a little more. And and and maybe it's because I want more of those experiences, or maybe it's because you know, I'm seeing the value in it. Because you're right, like when I go to Miles' practices, which I go to most of them, um, they're right at the end of my workday. So his practices, you know, if they start at five, we're there at 4:30. And for him, um, he has those moments, right? I'm not talking to him very often, but he's playing pickup with his friends pre-practice. And like that's what he enjoys more than anything. And for me, I find so much value in staying present during practice. I sit on the finch, on the fence, and I watch so that we can talk about his wins. Or um, you know, it's that fine balance, as they all say. You don't want to keep their attention while they're out there playing. You want them to look at the coach and listen to the coach, not you. But um the I think the value in showing them that you're paying attention, that you care, that you're uh giving your time to ensure that they're uh progressing or that they have somebody supporting them. Like I see the value in that. So I guess that's two,
Presence, Productivity, And Mental Bandwidth
SPEAKER_01that's a two-part question. Do you think this is something that happens naturally as we age? As we as we get over the um personal as we get over generating value from doing tactical stuff and we get more into the the experiential human connection thing, is that why we start to let things breathe more? And then two, I guess let's start there.
SPEAKER_00It's a tough balance. Productivity over like space and allowing some like it is, it's a really tough balance. I find to use similar when we show up early, they're playing knockout on the basketball court and they're just you know high-fiving and doing stuff like creating space for stuff to naturally develop, I think is super, super important, but it's hard for us to value it because it's not very productive in the sense that things that we all look at things. So that's where I I won't cut you off. Yeah, I mean I think presence um presence is whatever you're doing. Being able to be present during that, I think is a little bit of a lost art that we've you know, as a society, I think need to figure out how to get better at. Um I have found That space for me is not necessarily valuable for the sake of space, but I'm finding as I get older, I have a more limited capacity to be truly productive. I can tactically go through emails for 12 hours a day. But I found like when I was in China for 11 days and when I engaged on work things, you know, particularly the flight out, and then what I would engage an hour or two a day, my quality and level of thinking during that hour or two was much higher than what it typically is when I'm packing more things in. So I think there's nothing wrong, I think, with productivity. I think it's just making sure that we're healthy enough mentally to actually be. I think sometimes we can think we're more productive than we are, uh, if there's not enough space to recover and and recharge in between. That being said, it'll be interesting. You know, so I think for me, that is what has pulled me back from uh where I have found progress there. That's what's pulled me back from um kind of a supercharged day. I mean, even I think back to in 20, I think it was 21 or 22 when I was doing basically the only person on premium logic, and I was doing YouTube Lego videos every you know, a couple of months and like I mean, it was Did you see the new Lego set that's coming out? Bananas. I mean, no, I haven't. It's like a the largest set uh ever. It's a 12,000 piece like Catholic cathedral. Really? I'm not yeah, I was gonna I'll show it to you later. You were gonna comes out June 1st. Fantastic. I'll make sure to get you one on Lego Insiders. Yeah, we've I've got a few. I've got the uh Hogwarts completed. I need to pay come over and do uh she was she was the one who initially requested that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that that that channel actually, you were getting some traction. Like that was a really good one.
SPEAKER_00I'm gonna need to put those QR codes up in my Lego museum. Uh still have maybe 700 subscribers, 800 subscribers. It was pretty fun. Um, yeah, so uh I think presence is something that is important, but I I also am wired a little bit differently. I am more purpose-driven, and so I think people uh it'll be interesting to see as I age if I shift out of that with age, or you know, because I feel like not that my me personally um is benefiting from whatever I'm trying to accomplish, because uh I would say you guys know this 20 hours of the work that I do on a weekly basis is complimentary. I make no money, and you know, it is not benefiting me or my family really in any particular way, but it's like there's a mission there that I'm very uh aligned to, and that's very motivating for me, and to be able to leave the world better off than I found it is a very important aspect of my existence for me. It's it's less about did I enjoy this moment? You know, is it it's less about how happy I am or how much I'm enjoying, or the convenience or comforts of um, you know, I think emotional connection is important. You guys know I I do the quarterly trips with the boys, so some of that is it's a little different. I take them to school a couple of days a week and shuttle them to a lot of their practices and we get conversations in in the car. So for me, those are important things, and I've found different ways to prioritize and make sure that interaction happens. Um, and it's just a balance. I think we all are gonna kind of balance things a little bit differently based on how we're oriented because I probably very rarely, I mean, I do when I'm making a 45-minute trip like to Noah's AU practice, I'm sitting and watching. Sometimes I'll be doing some work, but I very rarely will sit at their practices and watch, right? It's like I'm dropping them off and I'm thinking like they value the fact that I'm spending most of my evenings taking them or picking them up from whatever they're doing, and that's kind of how they feel see, feel or seen supported. Um, so yeah, I think some of that will does change with age and some of its orientation.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I for me with Miles, he's just at that age, you know, at seven, where I think he really notices. And and he's he's communicated that out loud. Like when not as many people go to his games or whatever, it it matters. So you don't want to set expectations that it's always gonna happen. And and Kay's even even at times, oh, you always watch Miles, you know. So I'll go to uh one of her practices or two of her practices a month or something like that to make sure she knows. But I'm also at every one of her track practices, at least offseason stuff. Um, but yeah, it is it's just I don't know, it's just an interesting thing. It's like I'm finding so much more value, and I get so much more out of like, I'll have two days a week where it's packed, where it's like a bunch of tactical stuff and it's just you know, run through. Um, but then there's other days a week where it's like seven things. It's like our meeting here, hour meeting here, hour meeting here, um, a couple big project updates. But again, like, you know, I think you build so much um the ability to optimize, you you build that out over the years and you know exactly where to go and exactly who to go to for what needs to get done, you know, um to make certain things happen. And it just doesn't take as much time anymore. Um but I'm finding so much more value in just, I mean, I take the kids to school every day. And sometimes it's even it's even conflict in the car, you know, especially with the young ones because they're going to school together and there's more opportunity for that. Or I'll sit, I'll take Kay and a friend to school and they won't say a word to me for 30 minutes. But there's something about it that I'd like look forward to doing that every morning, and and I'm getting a lot more out of that.
SPEAKER_00It's really hard to be present in everything all day long unless you're just super intentional. But that presence, like, I can't. I'll give a funny story. When I first started insurance in 07, 2007, I went into Bob Stone's office. Shout out Bob Stone, neighbor. Um, and he was like, I gotta prepare for this renewal. It was 8 30 in the morning. The renewal was like at 11. It was two and a half hours. And I kind of just sat there and I'm like, like watching what he's doing, and you know, he's probably in his 60s 60s at the time, and I'm like losing my mind. I'm like 27 years old, used to running hard, Microsoft, MSN operations, taking tickets, doing things. He spent two and a half hours, arguably, to like maybe type a little bit and print something. And I'm like, what in the world? Like, that is a 15-minute thing, and I'm like, why does it take so long? And like now, I won't do anything if I don't have an hour. Like, I just I won't, I won't even start. I can't even I need 10, 15 minutes to be thinking, maybe 20 about what's coming up to get my head in the right spot. I need time afterwards to process. Like, it's so funny as you get older, you're like, yeah, I could have done that task in 15 minutes, but now I'm like, I'm I'm letting it soak in at a different level. And you can only do that so many times a day. And it's really hard to be super present and super thoughtful more than a handful of times a day. I love when you talk about Jeff Bezos, he's like, I'm not paying my top people to live in the present and to make a bunch of decisions. I want them to live in the future and they need to make, you know, one to two big decisions a month. And that is the pace of life that I'm starting to get accustomed to is like what I do has to be really thoughtful and really thought-provoking. Like the last couple of months, it's been value proposition. It's like it's a lot of time, it's in weird areas and pockets, but it's just like when I am gonna get into that mode, I need two or three hour blocks because it takes me a while to get back in it, spend a few hours in it, and then digest it and then spit it out. And so um I don't know how this all ties back to grit because I think there is a level of like preparedness that is important, you know, for when you go into these situations of of true grit. And I just it's been something that's been bothering me as far as you know, more in athletics in the kid phase than anything else. But um I think it sends a message either way, depending on who you are.
SPEAKER_01I think we tie it back this way to close
Balancing Grit With Space
SPEAKER_01it out. It's like there's two different it's funny because we're at two sides of the pendulum, right? You've got the the grit, which if you look at it like from a traditional, from a from a I didn't even say new media, but current media perspective, the grit is David Goggins, right? Grit is like if you look at it, it's Chad, Chad Wright, this extreme. Like, if you're not all in full throttle, everything, you know, burn it down. And then on the other side, we're talking about the beauty in thoughtfulness and letting things breathe. And it's unfortunate that a lot of times these two sides can't see each other, right? Like the 27-year-old, like you just said, looks at this side and they're like, loser. Like this guy's weak. He's not doing anything, he takes too much time. You know, all of the, you see it professionally, right? All the internal strife around the perceived level of exertion that elevated executives are are having. I'm just sitting here working 40 hours a week, typing away, doing this, that. And they're, you know, on the golf course. Um, I think you can find without realizing that look, everybody, for whatever reason, as we as we age in our 20s and 30s, we are wired to drive to get all of that satisfaction and all of that self-worth out of how much we can accomplish and how well we can perform with our backs to the wall. And that's where we we get it all. And as we age, we get it from this other side. And so it's like, I wish there was this transition there, there was this thing where they could see. Look, yeah, you may think they haven't done anything, but they put all this time in just like you did. And now, for whatever reason, the spirit is desiring less of that, and it's it's it's it's okay. You know, it's just as cool on either side. So I think it that kind of ties it together.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's uh I I could extend this by 30 minutes just going into like what what is what are we doing? Like what are we trying to accomplish? What is our goal here that I think is another episode uh on another day? But I think a lot of it comes that comes down to that. Is it are we trying to accumulate um joy? Are we trying to accumulate moments? Are we trying to accumulate achievements? What's the balance? What's the like at the end of the day? I think that's the measure. Like you look at a Jeff Jeff Bezos for 30 years, he probably was. I mean, he grinded. He was uh, I think an investment banker, maybe in his until like 30, and then he started Amazon. And you know, for 20 years, he probably ran extremely hard, and he's created uh, you know, depending on how you look at it, he's certainly transformed e-commerce, right? And so, like, was it worth it? Uh, was that is that good? Is that bad? He probably has obviously, I think the relationships in his life suffered from that. That's fairly well documented, I believe. And you see that with a lot of people that have significant professional success in a spotlight. Um, whether that is, it could be a speaker, it could be a professional athlete, it could be a personality or just a CEO of a large company, they dedicate the vast majority, they really narrow in on one particular thing and they excel at it. And a lot of times it's at the expense of balance in other areas of their life. And is that good or bad? I don't know. You know, for me, parenting is very important. If I were to take all of my capacity, pour it into parenting, and have my kids grow up to be the best that they could be, you know, like is that so I I think for me, I think it's a it's a complex, um, it's a complex question, and I think the right answer for some may be having a ton of space based on what they're trying to use this life for. And for others, it might be different. Yeah, it's uh that's a good bow. It's um we're all different. God made us all different in what some we're all gonna value things differently. I have a friend that just quit his job to spend to homeschool his kids. He makes seven figures to just come out because he he values that time with his kids and and his family. So yeah, I think you're a hundred percent right. Our values systems are different as well as I think our value systems change as we get older. Um, and we're starting to see that. So uh yeah, that uh took a little bit of a turn, but um really good discussion. And uh we look forward to seeing you guys next time. Thanks.