The $1 Billion Mission: How Purpose Fuels Success

[0:00]  sometimes we don't know that we are great leaders until the moment is thrust upon us today I sit down with Kate Williams the CEO of 1% for the planet where we talk about how she heard she was a great leader from somebody else putting trust in her to go save a group of people who was on a Wilderness Expedition we'll learn about her journey and rescuing her team we're going to talk about building for the future and overcoming some of the immediate challenges that come along with challenging our minds and getting us to believe in who we can become one day today's episode is full of lots of golden nuggets so let's tune in and listen to this amazing heart and hustle story from Kate Williams what I've been working on is how to um kind of how to love the challenges um and not feel like the point is just to

[0:50]  get through them CU whenever I get asked like you know what have been the biggest sort of transformation moments when I look back it's like oh well it was that really challenging thing that felt yucky in the moment and where I doubted myself the most and where I really had to like reflect and learn the most and like all the hard things but then you know kind of getting through that and you know the the way forward is always through Kate Williams the CEO of an amazing organization 1% for the planet welcome to the show I'm excited to have you here

[1:38]  today this is gonna be fun thank you I'm excited as well so Kate I have to know why did we dedicate so much of our time to doing such impactful work like this with all the other avenues that we could have gone down in our career how do we get to where we're at here today for me it's about passion and meaning and I think you know maybe to a fault I never saw that I could sort of create a path otherwise so you know I think from right after I graduated from high school I really started sort of being oriented towards how can I build a career based on what I believe in and what were some of those early experiences that you kind of had on this journey that helped you not only realize that you were a leader but you had a fundamental impact on the work that you were doing let's kind of talk about those early days yeah I had a um an aha moment literally um and I'm

[2:27]  grateful for that and I realize that um I I was aware of it in the moment which is a gift so when I was 18 right after I graduated from high school I had the you know great opportunity to go on a extended backpacking trip in the mountains in Wyoming the Wind River range and on that trip we had all sorts of adversity snow and missed rations of food and challenges like that and then um and we soldiered through all of that and then the kind of Big Challenge moment came when one of our instructors broke his leg and and in that moment it really kind of crystallized a leadership opportunity for me which I have been learning from ever since so basically in that moment as an 18-year-old who had you know thought of myself as having zero experience in this climate or this environment um I was tasked to lead a

[3:15]  group um because we had groups going in different directions to go out and get an evacuation underway to carry the instructor to a pass and I was tasked to lead the rest of the group and in that moment I didn't believe that I could do it but I knew I had to kind of accept a leader I respected asking me to and so it was this great opportunity to realize all right I get to tap into everyone around me and we get to do this thing and we did and we actually even had some fun and when we got up there and got through everything and the instructor was being lifted off in a helicopter so we had been successful I had this amazing moment of being like exhausted my boots were wet like I was still hungry all the things but I felt like at ated and clear and I said to myself this is what I want to do with my life and

[4:04]  that this was some combination of loving that big wild place where I had gotten to really challenge myself and also really loving the additional challenge of figuring out how do you organize as a group to do this hard thing together so that set me on my path it's amazing how we have those early experiences in life that show us almost a glimpse of our Brilliance you know what I mean in moments where we're asked to either ring the bell or or stand back it's amazing to see how that internal motivation helps us step into a new version of ourselves that we didn't even know was possible that's such a great observation and I realize like my tendency is to be like oh no no it wasn't Brilliance but I think I appreciate you saying that because I do think um having uh a leader in this case the leader of our overall Expedition like point at me and say Kate

[4:52]  he didn't use these words but essentially what he was saying is I believe that you can do this I need for you to do this do this and so I that enabled me to believe that I had it in me and that I could figure out how to do it so I think you're right it really is incredibly powerful and sometimes we have to be reminded of that Brilliance as we go through kind of our professional career so we're 18 years old we're standing on the top of a mountain hellac just left our boots are wet what does the journey look like between there and here of being a CEO of 1% for the planet what other kind of professional mountains did you have to climb during that I would say Journey many um and I would say I've had many other sort of figurative experiences of feeling like an 18-year-old who doesn't know exactly what to do and I think that's been really important to realize that in a

[5:39]  way that's that's the work and that's the opportunity is to kind of keep facing the next um Challenge and seeing it for what it is um and so basically my path uh was one of figuring out what I meant when I was like this is what I want to do and if I divide my career into kind of chapters the first chapter was saying I want to be an outdoor educator because it was really powerful for me to have that experience to learn and build relationships with other people and with wild places in such a meaningful way so I um was an outdoor educator for the first chunk of my career taking students out and creating hopefully that experience for them fortunately no more uh broken legs on the part of leaders but like other you know just real objective challenges that you know are incredibly and deeply

[6:27]  instructive as well as you know connected so I had that chapter and then you know really decided I wanted to Pivot into more of the focusing more on the leadership space and also a little bit less in the field as much as I loved that it was time to kind of settle a little bit so I went back to grad school and then shifted into working in the environmental space to still stay close to what I you know really loved and what was meaningful to me and to really start honing which is now the lifelong process what it means to lead people and I say it's a lifelong process because I think with every passing year I really learn that it is a new Mountain every time because you have different people you have different challenges the environment around you changes so you definitely learn some things along the way but you're always faced with a new

[7:15]  context a new um a new way of seeing things that longer time Horizon often scares a lot of people from leaning into that Journey you know one of the things that I think we've seen in the recent years is the landscape of life life the landscape of work the landscape of how those two things come together has completely changed and it doesn't seem like we have the benefit of sitting back on The Laurels of leaders of the past in order to help us navigate these new turbulent times being a leader today is a skill set that continues to need to be refreshed we have to be curious to think about how we're going to meet people where they are but also Inspire different generations to kind of follow along the mission and the journey that we've been laying out there what do you think has been kind of your biggest lesson in leadership that you've been

[8:02]  able to kind of hone in over the recent years I think the biggest thing for me um is essentially a process of um making what was kind of implicit like I sort of naturally showed up um with some leadership quality so the reason my instructor in that 18-year-old moment pointed at me as in some way without me being super conscious about it I had demonstrated some of that so my journey has been like kind of getting closer to what is it that is is inherent and then what do I need to learn and develop because I certainly have a lot of those things so I think for me that sort of long-term vision is essentially one of balancing both like some degree of

[8:51]  confidence but also a high degree of humility like I'm I the Curiosity I guess is really what pulls me along because I always feel like oh okay I now i' I've learned that now like but wait I don't know if I know how to do that so I think it really is that uh implicit to explicit with a lot of curiosity and increasingly awareness of like oh the point there's no there there I'm never going to get to the point where I know it all um and and I kind of highly doubt anyone who says that they do um but most you know most importantly in terms of me the the point is that it's a journey and I get to keep learning and what I get to get better at is how I learn and how I show up in the learning process there's almost an undercurrent of gratitude that

[9:41]  has to be balanced in this journey right often when we get our goals right they're in a Finish Line a destination an event right and it's like hey we made it but when we get it wrong it turns into a horizon we take one step closer to our goal it seems to move one step further away how do you think you've been able to stay grounded in that sense of gratit ude because becoming a leader is a great leader is a challenge that a lot of people can't really quantify in their mind about how long this path really is to be able to accomplish the things that we say we want to I think for me the um couple of things one is I am just curious like I do really like learning I'm you know in addition to kind of seeking meaning I you know I find that I'm most energized when I'm learning so I you know I fundamentally like the process of always realizing like oh okay I've got that to

[10:29]  learn you know there's moments when it's discouraging but like generally I I like it I think also I really um fundamentally like people like I'm interested in people I'm curious about people I like connecting to people and I learn a lot through that and so that's a big part of leadership is relationship and so I think I'm I'm sort of pulled Along by that because I think there's always relationship um and then one other concept that I didn't have early on but I have kind of come to that has really helped frame how I approach it is this concept of an infinite game so you use the kind of you like um you know challenge event done check seeing what we get to do as an infinite game total changes everything so we're still like

[11:16]  in it and figuring out the rules and playing to win in the sense of to do our best but the point isn't to end the game the point is to continue the game and to say how do we sort of keep going and that concept again is one that I only came to in an explicit way a few years ago but it really for me when I look back I think that's a lot of how I've approach this and how I think about it and what keeps me going I've been playing around with the framework um part of what I've been blessed to do is spend a lot of time with um older leaders people who are in their final stages 80s and above right and you know one of the things that I've heard a lot is the idea of regret and a lot of these old older leaders and I ask them you know what is the biggest thing you wish you would have done differently

[12:02]  and they say you know not set Higher Goals for myself not say you know accomplish these things but I wish I would have enjoyed the journey a little bit longer and a little bit more because we are so when you're a high achiever often are focused on the next Finish Line right but when you're playing the infinite game it creates a freedom a feeling of enjoyment to be able to say okay if this is the entire process I'm in the middle of it right now how can I soak and get the most out of this process as I'm going through the next 10 15 years which is similar to that infinite game but that scares a lot of people yeah that's a really good point and I guess where I would land on that is you know I'm not 80 so I feel like I'm kind of still in it and so in a way what I've been working on is how to um kind of how to love the challenges um and not feel like the point is just to

[12:52]  get through them cuz whenever I get asked like you know what have been the biggest sort of transformation moments when I look back it's like oh well was that really challenging thing that felt yucky in the moment and where I doubted myself the most and where I really had to like reflect and learn the most and like all the hard things but then you know kind of getting through that and you know the the way forward is always through it's never there's no workaround um and again it does not feel good in the moment but it is the opportunity so I don't know if it's possible but I do feel like the more or I can have an awareness of how do I love the challenge and see see the challenge as the opportunity without foregoing the

[13:40]  like you kind of got to feel the hard things to to get the value from them and when it comes to such a big mission right like the things we're trying to accomplish specifically 1% for the planet right we're talking about a huge goal that we're trying to impact here and when it comes to you know the idea of well I hate having to restart the simple answer is then stop quitting along the way and you wouldn't have to restart there's been so many times Kate when I've come across these challenges and in the moment I'm like this is not what I want to do this is the worst thing possible but on the other side of that hardship is where you actually get those secret lessons and those blessings that come out of those things and unless you've been through it it's very difficult to understand the the compounding return of not giving up but I feel like in society today it's very easy for people to give up and say hey

[14:26]  I'm going to go restart over here or go do something different but we never end up building the momentum that we need to have really big impact like we're shooting for that's another great point and I guess the you know when I think about that one of you know one of the kind of uh challenge opportunities of my own kind of way I approach things is that I'm very I feel a great deal of responsibility and sometimes loyalty to the people and Concepts I've made a commitment to and organizations that I've made a commitment to so for me part of my Integrity is doing what I said I'm going to do and sticking with it um and you know I think that's been helpful for me even if sometimes you know I've had to learn like you know sometimes you need to step away in order to get

[15:14]  through and you know that's been a learning for me but I do think you're right that it can be very attractive to see that other shiny thing over there which would obviously be so much easier but I think um um you know I've had enough experiences now and I think this is the gift of having LED for a while is I've had enough experiences of going through the hard stuff and seeing the sort of deep rewards which are not necessarily shiny but there are these like the sort of deep fulfillment of seeing something through and doing so in relationship to what you care about so if you could go back to let's say that 20-year-old version of Kate right who's still riding the high of that amazing

[16:01]  experience she had on that mountain top what would a piece of advice be that you gave to her how she was going to navigate the next couple years of her career anything that you think that would really help her or just refortify her on this journey I would say two things probably one um no fear in the sense of um you know truly be courageous which in my mind means like feeling the fear but then like Discerning when you need to say but I'm still going to step over the edge here and I feel like I've generally you know taken some risks but I also know there are places where I may have like not sort of asked those hard questions around like what is this fear telling me or not telling me so that would be one thing I would say and the other is um try and like banish should from your

[16:52]  vocabulary both in terms of the voices inside your head that might have shs but also in terms of like talking to other people just because I think it's like a way of judging ourselves and a way of judging others and I just feel like eliminating should um is is a good thing and I don't look back with regret on either of those fronts but I do look back with like learning let's double click on the should a little bit why did we say that out of all the pieces of advice that you could have given to Kate what does that mean I think I was and have been um you know somewhat based on my family circumstances uh like I'll do the right thing um and I have two older brothers who were um you know kind of lived large during High School which created some stress in our family um you know and live large is a nice way of saying like

[17:40]  they you know definitely um rebelled against the norms and fortunately they're fine and I love them um but that was you know that I think I was probably wired for this a little bit but then I really stepped into like I'll do the right thing I'll get good grades I'll do this and you know there was some should in that um and I think uh seeing now that there's no one way to do the right thing there's no one way to um be a good human um and I think creating a little more space if you take out you have a little more space to you know put some different verbs in place like what could I do what might I do what do I really want to do you know for me those have been really uh

[18:29]  opportunities to live into as I've gotten older and been able to kind of separate from the should we live in such a a predominantly should culture you know what I mean if you think about even what it means to be a nonprofit CEO people say you should be doing this you should be doing that what it means to be a leader you should be doing this you should be doing that what it means to be you know in business you should be should be and I feel like often we don't ever really recognize how powerful it is to go against the should until somebody has The Bravery to do it and they become that new Cornerstone of oh there's a different way of doing this do you know what I mean there's always that prolific leader who goes against the grain when everybody else is becoming a copy and paste version of everybody else which is really interesting to me yeah I think you're right and I think it's also like there's

[19:17]  so many subtle opportunities for us each every day to kind of think about that because for me I know like the should does come like roaring back in when I'm stressed or something like that cuz it's like that's my default if I do that that's kind of the right path and it's like no actually like what it like stop listen learn be courageous um and that's where the sort of sh and fear courage like that's all part of the same kind of thread but I do think you're absolutely right like having that ability to not be limited by the shs because effectively it's a limiting framework if you get that out of the way um so many things are possible that are not possible when you have should as your ceiling there's a an interesting there's a really good book it's called the untethered Soul um I don't have the author in front of me

[20:04]  but I read this book back in like 2020 2021 he talks about the analogy of that voice inside your head he talks about it as a roommate he said often you know we live our lives directed by this narrative or this voice in our our head that tells us what we should be doing but one thing you need to recognize if you can hear that voice that means that you are an observer of that voice meaning that that is someone else's voice that you spent so much time with that you confuse it as being your own how do you think about your relationship with that inner roommate and how it's dictated kind of your career and the things that you do as a CEO as well that's a really great way of putting it I'll have to get my hands on that book I think you know having children for me has been an opportunity to kind of clarify a relationship to that in that when my kids kind of launched which they have now launched it was a little

[20:53]  heartbreaking I mean love them so much and um you know having that chapter of kids at home end and moving into a chapter of like that a new chapter for whatever reason I think partly just given what I was describing in terms of sort of my own experience growing up with some shs in place imposed mainly by me um I think uh that gave me a chance to be like well wait a second like I actually there's no should script that I'm even aware of for this chapter in my life so it really did help me in a new way to um to kind of be able to talk back to that roommate to use your language so for me and in a way I don't totally know why that was the moment but but other kind of challenging moments

[21:42]  that have like cracked open the kind of path um another time was when I got laid off from a job I was like wait this wasn't the narrative that I expected I don't know how to do this narrative it really did um give me a chance to have to tell that roommate like I'm not sure that you know the script anymore than I do so like wait a second so when I got laid off one of the greatest takeaways from that again like challenge being opportunity is for whatever reason that experience um gave me a really clear and it's stuck like ask for what you want I realized I could do that which for probably for some people listening are like yeah of course that you know you can always do that for me that was pretty new to just be able to say well what do I want and ask for

[22:30]  it and it's been a really like powerful learning for me when it comes to what you want and how you ask for it how are you taking those lessons and implementing those as the CEO of this amazing organization what are some of the things you're focusing on and what are you really asking for as CEO one of the things I think about a lot is how do I lead in such a way that I create the conditions for everyone in the organization to be wildly successful I definitely do not get that right all the time so for any of my staff who are listening just like full ownership that I know you know that I say that and I know you also know that I don't always get it right but for me being clear and putting words to my best hope for how I can be my best

[23:19]  leader that's what I want and then that gives me a way to and it's and it's you know there's probably rarely going to be one day where I 100% get it right with every single person in the organization so it's like a an aspirational goal and that to me is important because then that always is going to pull me through to be better and on my good days I'm staying really attuned to how do I know if I'm creating those conditions what are questions I need to ask better on my less good days maybe when I'm feeling like the shs crowding in or my roommate like you know kind of winning the argument um I think I can get a little like more like less curious and less able to sort of see the those ways and so that's clearly like The Learning Journey uh continues when

[24:07]  it comes to the work that you guys do at the organization why is this so important for you I really love that question because I do think for a impact focused Mission Le organization it's feels extremely important to me that our team and how we are doing our work together you know is effectively kind of consistent with that so if we're about our our why the why of 1% for the planet our purpose is to inspire action and commitment so that our planet and future Generations Thrive so that's what we exist to do it's really important to me that there's coherence and and sort of integration with how our staff experience doing the work how our

[24:55]  members and all of our stakeholders experience being in relation ship with us and again don't always get that right but I I do think um to not even strive for that sort of integration across what you're striving to do and how you do it then you're you're always going to be sort of dragging down the mission because to not be creating the ability for staff or for the larger community that you're involved in to be an exampler example of what that Mission and why are um that feels like then you're kind of always going to be a little bit you're lesser than what you could be why is this work so important for the future generations to understand the connection between us in this I

[25:43]  would say digital cocoon that we seem to live in in the connection to Nature that is so not common to so many people here today why is the work that you guys do so important to kind of bridge that Gap I think it's really important because fundamentally there's not a gap we experience it as a gap but as human systems and human communities we actually are part of nature we have done our darnest to create lots of ways that we don't experience ourselves as part of nature um but we are and so I think doing the work to reconnect and to um create communities of experience where people are able to see and feel

[26:33]  and be healthier as a result of kind of tapping into that connection whether it's cleaning up pollution or giving kids access to outdoor experiences or all of the things that we do through our impact areas you know fundamentally when we sort of reestablish healthy Connection in which we are part of contributing to and part of a healthy ecosystem there's so much gain for everyone in that ecosystem human plant animal and everything in between it seems like a lot of the prevailance of the mental health challenges and all of the feelings of isolation and loneliness and everything else that's going rampant through our society today seems like there's a

[27:21]  really obvious antidote that's sitting on the table in front of us but nobody really wants to grab it it's like hey go outside let's get grounded experience what it means to be connected to this entire being of Earth that you're a part of every single day whether you like it or not and let's get off of these devices doesn't seem pretty obvious that I mean at least through your life experiences and that aha moment at the age of 18 showed you that your connection to this bigger being of Earth was something that a lot more people need but it seems like it's such a challenge for us to be able to tap into today I don't know why it's a really good question you know and there's all sorts of good like evidence about you know people in hospitals heal f F even when they have like a tree outside their Hospital window it's like super simple so it doesn't need to be big mountains in Wyoming it can be um you know a tree growing out of a cracked sidewalk and

[28:10]  just like being able to you know lay hands on it but I think you're absolutely right like I know for me that's hugely important and I guess I you know it seems like balancing what we gain you know you and I are having this great conversation I'm able to um from a dead end of a dirt road in Vermont where I happen to live you know play a role leading a global community and I value that and so I'm you know I'm aware of the you know what we have gained by some of these connections but I am to your point very aware of what we've lost as well so you know I do think one of my the some of the meaning in my work is and and really where my whole career started is like fundamentally it's about relationship and I do believe that our relationships with each other and we can

[28:58]  make those happen in person and you know be sort of breathing the same air in a um you know in ways that enable us to be sort of connecting in a particular place at a particular time are an experience of Nature and then you know if we can do that with our feet on soil in the presence of trees that's great and again it doesn't have to be big wild places a community garden but I think it's really really important I had a guest on the podcast last week his name was Chris Nelson he's a CEO for Freedom service dogs we were having an amazing conversation about community and connection and he said you know Keenan although we have all of these opportunities to connect with one each other one another over virtual connectivity like zoom and everything else that we use you still have to remember that you're sitting in your office right now with headphones in

[29:44]  sitting in a quiet room by yourself in front of a television screen and I had to pause and look around and say Chris you're right you know what I mean like I do this virtual connectivity all day but I'm still missing the human element and you cannot ignore the intuition of your brain telling you that this is not what I'm looking for but it's a substitute that we created which is an opportunity for us to connect and have these conversations which is great but it still can never live up to that Human Experience of spending time and feeling the energy of somebody else which is so unique absolutely and I really do believe in that sort of energetic connection and if that sounds woo woo for some people woo all day I apologize but I do think it's really important to just name it because I'm glad we can have this conversation and to acknowledge that we're exchanging words

[30:31]  some hand gestures but we're not like in the same sort of physical space which means that there are sort of senses and exchanges of information that we're not doing and you know just acknowledging that like we can value this for what it is but then also recognize that you know being together in the same place has that ability to kind of give us a Next Level connection so look forward to meeting you at some point yeah 100% we're going to make that happen um so my question for you is you know I was having a conversation a little earlier today with a uh a digital transformation consultant and she was talking about how every business leader today continues to think about things like artificial intelligence for them to be able to I would say execute on their business mission and vision how are you thinking

[31:19]  about technology being the supercharger the additive whatever you want to call it to help you guys execute on your guys's vision for the connection with nature and Environmental Conservation everything else like that yeah at the simplest level I would say the way we're thinking about it is how can we leverage technology from like you know more sort of basic digital tools to machine learning to AI to you know automate or expedite those things that are better done faster done like more sort of done in a better service orientation through those mod ities such that our limited staff can you know maximize the ways that they're having phone calls traveling to events

[32:08]  to be together um you know doing the things that are not better done bya digital modality but are better done by saying hey I heard your feedback and I'd love to learn more from you like could we get on a call or whatever the case may be so you know that's that's our sort of highlevel sort of framework which we've imp mented in some successful ways and we have like learning and opportunities for growth for sure what are some of those ways in which you guys have implemented that stuff just so everybody can understand you know 1% um is an amazing organization that's doing so much for the environment conservation and it doesn't seem like you guys would be using so much technology to put the human in the human seat which is really interesting yeah so a couple things we're doing you know we have a network of more than 5,000 members and more than 7,000 nonprofits and we have a staff of

[32:57]  at this point fewer than just under 50 and all of those relationships at different times um you know we're we're in direct relationship with all of those you know more than 10,000 stakeholders um and then more and so for those we're using some tools that enable us to kind of automate some sequences of responses when that's helpful when it's a sort of repeatable process that you know someone is seeking information about so super simple nothing fancy but we use that we have some tools that enable us to um facilitate kind of First Response Communications when someone emails in you know just again super simple but it enables us to um have a smaller group of people managing a larger Network at a

[33:47]  high level of service so those are just some of the basic things and those are all awesome ideas from staff members who sort of saw the bottlenecks named them found Solutions and and made it happen which is the way it should be absolutely so this didn't come from Kate's brain you know she's using the team to be able to think about how we're going to use all these Technologies in so many different applicable ways Let's uh let's talk a little bit about the future so the vision that we're casting for the 1% team how are we getting people excited about where we're going and how are we using that Vision to attract the next great generation of you know 18-year-old Kate standing on a mountain top who realize this is the work that they want to do we have a big Vision that has two parts um and just to back up a quick step the way our model works is that we

[34:35]  have business members who give 1% of their revenues every year so we we certify that and we call that our certified impact and so our sort of key metric of success is the total tally over our lifetime of that certified impact so our Big Goal looking ahead of the future that also has a secondary goal our big goal is to get to one million Us in lifetime giving in the next two to three years so we're on track for that we're at about 670 million US Dollars now so that's the sort of big impact goal and the sort of supporting goal is to build the organization um that can get to the next billion and the next billion faster and you know so that we can kind of keep scaling from there because to our infinite game conversation earlier you

[35:24]  know that's not a Finish Line that's a like we we learned how to do this we've built a community that can do this now we need to engage this community in all that we've learned to sort of keep going and keep accelerating what an amazing mission to be a part of I'm so glad that we were able to touch on the infinite game here today because at the end of the day if we put a Finish Line in front of ourselves I think we are often cheating ourselves at the full potential of what we truly could accomplish with the experiences and the people and the relationships that we come across in the future Kate as we kind of uh lay on the plane here today one of the question questions that we do at the end of our podcast came from our previous guest now this is an amazing individual uh CEO of an organization um that's helping advocate for the next generation of great thinkers and education he wants to know what is the worst piece of advice

[36:13]  that you've ever gotten oo that is an interesting one um I think that the worst piece of advice that I have ever gotten is um you um this is going to sound small but I'll go for it you should um not you should stop setting it as a goal to get back to running because you have a you know you're older and you have a knee injury you should just like kind of back off and that was given to me by a PT after knee surgery and I know it's not like a CEO example but I do like for me it was a um I can pull it in metaphorically to the

[37:00]  rest of my life because I'm always using kind of sports metaphors for how I think about stuff and you know and it had and I the reason I hesitated and it was hard to think of is because it actually like came out to be like good advice because my like somewhat the there is a stubborn person in here was like well wait a second I completely reject that um so how can I go find what I need to find to be able to get stronger um and I did and you know feel like I'm actually stronger than I was before the knee surgery but no thanks to that particular advice or maybe thanks entirely to that piece of advice which kind of lit the fire and I think that's important to me as just a CEO and a human because it reminds me and as an example of um kind of our should conversation and don't be afraid

[37:47]  or don't like limit yourself like of course they are going to be limitations I know that when I'm 90 I might not be running as fast or whatever but like hopefully I'll be strong in the way that I can be strong in that phase in the same way that leading new challenges that I can't even anticipate right now which is basically the work of being a CEO you know I want to keep saying oh okay wait that mentality won't work I got to try to find a new one okay that's an amazing way for us to put a perfect bow on today's episode I want to say for all the amazing work that you're doing the team that you're inspiring the personal journey and those aha moments that you shared here today it's been amazing to know you on the podcast thank you so much for joining me I really appreciate it thank you so much it's been a great conversation and there we go guys