0:03 hello and welcome to people making money I'm your host Kevin bamel and we're here every Wednesday at 10: a.m. Pacific time to talk about all matters related to business and professions and also wealth building and today I'm I'm gonna kind of put on my Rabbi hat which which I don't I don't usually do um in these shows um but um I want to talk about the uh place of faith in our business and professional lives so and and I don't
0:41 necessarily mean just religious Faith per se but the idea of having faith in something um and and so faith in kind of its broadest definition and I now for those of you who are regular Watchers of the show you know that I I do Le lead a traditionally religious life and so obviously Faith plays a big part in in in in my life um I was a chaplain in the Navy so it was it was literally my job if uh you know
1:17 when I was when I was in the military and all of that um but but I I see this this coming up when I talk to people about um their their their business Affairs about um their their personal financial affairs and and I think it's it's it's a subject that I I recommend that you um consider and and and and give some thought to how how does it affect you and how are you um dealing with it in in your own life and so I came up with uh kind half a dozen um
1:54 points that I wanted to talk with you about today um on this topic and they're not in any you know particular order of importance um but rather it's like I said it's it's it's food for thought so um first and foremost when we when we talk about uh Faith um and in this case faith in in the sense of um uh the the the sort of focal point of our life so I think for many people our
2:31 sense of purpose and Mission uh comes out of our our our faith in this sense our religious Faith so um I I recognize that um not not everybody has a religious faith and and and so this wouldn't necessarily apply from that perspective but the idea of having a purpose and a mission in our life and in particular particular in our business and professional lives I think is extremely
3:06 important because if all we're doing in our business and professional lives is um you know earning money so that a a as a a guiding principle I think it it it sets us up for a situation where after a while whatever amount of money we're making is not enough and so we have to make more money in order to be satisfied and then that becomes too routine and so we have to make more than that and so without a sense of what is my purpose
3:44 what is my mission there there's there's no end to the money Chase and now you you may have met people for whom that is the case right all they spend all their time you know chasing the next deal or all their time is focused on on earning money and um I think oftentimes um people who are in that situation find out too late that because they had no other purpose and Mission in their life um their life is
4:22 is very empty so when I talk about purpose and I I I use these terms in I I don't use the terms purpose and Mission interchangeably the way they often are used so I used purpose in the sense of self-definition who am I so in my case I'm I I'm a a servant of God I am a father uh I am a businessman with with certain uh you know acuities I am an athlete so all of these identify me to myself now by the
5:00 way if if you were to talk to people who know me they might identify me differently okay whatever um that that's IM material for for the purposes of what we're talking about because the self-definition is what matters because out of that self-definition of who I am comes a in part a set of priorities what I call conditions of satisfaction that directly relate to my
5:36 business and professional life okay so um for for if you can see this right behind me here um if you could read it it's in French so unless you read French you wouldn't understand it but um it starts out this top line here is um in French Myra that which is my purpose and then next is my mission and and then my Miss Miss is broken down into submissions not submissions submissions individual missions um for the the various um nine Realms of life
6:11 and then from there you can see my conditions of satisfaction and you you you can probably notice you know blue red and green and that's you know blue red and green sorry it's so weird doing this because it's the I have to move in the opposite way because of the the reflection of the screen so for me I put all of that together and and the Green in in the three pillars of attainment right right there um that that includes my professional life okay and and so you
6:46 you can see at the top is my Identity or well it's it self okay and at the top of self is the identity realm okay and our identity is our purpose and our Mission okay so my mission then is to become wealthy through the the opes of if you will kind of spreading the word about the three pillars of attainment in other words uh not I I don't want to be wealthy for the sake of getting wealthy I want to be I want to
7:22 be wealthy because I've benefited other people's lives uh through understanding this for myself understanding how this guides my life and then helping other people to understand the same thing okay and that and you see that of course in in all of my shows right they're all based on the three pillars of attainment right so when I take my purpose and Mission together okay I'm chasing money for the chase of making money does doesn't make sense to me because it doesn't fulfill
7:59 my identity right and and so um the the earning of of money and the creation of the building of wealth all stems out of my sense of purpose and Mission okay so if if I'm not following my purpose and Mission then I'm not I'm not I'm not going to be earning money and I'm not going to be Building Wealth it really it's really that that that simple and basic now I will say that it's not easy to come up with our purpose and Mission
8:35 uh I mean uh while I can do so now and in very succinct terms I couldn't have done this 40 years ago when I was a young guy in my mid 20s uh I didn't understand myself well enough I didn't understand what life was all about well enough um however I I did have a sense about certain things so I know that by when I hit my mid 20s that was when I realized I really did want to be a father for example I did want to get married and be a father I should say uh and and it it took me another 10 years before I I did get married but but
9:11 that's that's what it took okay so I'm not saying that if you're young you're unable to do this what I'm saying is I think it's more of a challenge um to to do it sort of for the first time or the first few times to to figure this out than it is after you know when you're an old guy like me and I've been doing this now for you know 40 years essentially so I it's I I've been able to gain Clarity over the decades and with with respect then going back to our our our main topic which is Faith in our business and
9:47 professional lives so when when we what part of what drives our purpose and Mission hopefully is our faith Okay so if you do have a you know a connection to religion so then what does that tell you about why we're here right why why did God create the world why did go God create human beings in each one of us why did he do that okay and and I I can tell I can answer that um that from my
10:24 perspective we're here to to emulate God and what does God do God takes care of his children so what does that mean that means we're here to help God take care of his children we're like his Junior partner in doing that okay and so how do we uh how do we take care how do we take care of God's children well that means we need to take care of each other right we need to support each other we need to look out for each other we need to work toward creating a better world and a better environment I'm I use that word you know large not just the physical
11:00 environment I mean a better a better world a better Society right that that's what we're here to do so we're not here just to make money nothing wrong with making money but that that does from my perspective that isn't why God created Humanity okay now for for those of you who you know don't believe in God um and one of my closest friends is an atheist so uh you know he I I think he has a sense of this um that he's developed
11:35 through his study of philosophy and and and other things like that okay and um I you know I've never asked him you know what is your purpose what is your mission why why why are human beings here for for whatever reason and all the you know hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of conversations we've had for some reason we've never hit on that particular subject but but I think you know to the extent that your purpose and Mission doesn't come from your faith so then I I think you still need to find it okay and and and let that be the driving force behind your Business and
12:11 Professional activities as opposed to just the pure pursuit of money okay so that that's that's that's number one on the list of of the connection between faith and our professional lives number two is from our faith we we get our sense of of morality of of ethics and integrity and and this is the next this is the next I mean it's such a crucial issue in in business and I I I I I have
12:46 conversations with people about this on a regular basis because I I find it mystifying how some people act in the business setting so um one of sit situations I'm dealing with actually I I got a call from a client just before I got on the broadcast and someone had called him and and and basically said a bunch of stuff to him that was just really in inappropriate you know and and it was on a business matter not not that it's okay to say inappropriate things on a personal matter but I'm just saying
13:22 that you know I don't I I mean I know I know the person who called him um and I I I think I was able to explain to the client why he did it um but I think that if if if the person who who you know called my client if he were really honest with himself he would say that I I I shouldn't have done that that that that was not an ethical thing for me to do it it violated uh how I look at how people should behave in a business setting right but because of the the
13:59 stresses of the situation he's under and and a sort of a sense of desperation etc etc you know he did this thing and and and and and that that's what happens and I'm not saying by the way that you know that people who have a faith background don't make mistakes clearly clearly they do I think the difference is is from that faith we can develop a a a standard of how we want to act in our business and professional lives and then we can build mechanisms around us to hold us
14:35 accountable for doing so so I can tell you in in in my practice um I I regularly interact with people who if I fall short of the Mark um will say to me basically Kevin you fell short of the mark right so um I don't go and you know brag about about my high standards um but I think I I I make it clear what my standards are for myself and for the people that I work with and
15:10 and then you know I I invite them um to hold me to the standards as much as I would hold them to it that this is a mutual uh a mutual function okay so it's it's not like it comes down on high from me and you you are subject to it it's that we we are we we interact on a essentially equal level in in holding our each ourselves accountable for for our ethics for our integrity for the morality of how we we deal with it and I
15:47 I can tell you in in the um weekly staff meeting that I have um usually you know after the the sort of more business part of the staff meeting is done we'll talk about these kinds of issues for a little while um and and and it's very it's the richest part of of our staff development is as we come to understand you know what are our values where do they come from how do we um create structures around us in this case as a team to make
16:22 sure that we fulfill them and and that that all of us have faith of one sort or another we can bring all of that together and and and it becomes even stronger because of our our ability to discuss the the different perspectives and figure out okay where where are each of us coming from how is it best to interact with each other right so all of this and and and and we we can speak about it openly so nobody nobody has to feel ashamed nobody is expressing some
16:59 sort of uh chauvinism about their faith it's it's not about that so so whether it's things like honesty whether it's whether it's um uh just the way we we we treat other people for for example by you know not raising our voices um whether it's you know how how rapidly we respond to uh you know a particular client request whatever that is um these are all these are all matters that are coming from our faith
17:36 and because they are driven by faith they they they take a they they have a strong impact on us and I would say too that um you know for for those of you who you know don't don't have a a religious connection and and perhaps because you find you know religious people to be um hypocritical and those kind of things so you know as they say it in The Big Chill you know hypocrisy is like it's a it's a Americans or people's favorite you know Pastime you can't get through the day without at
18:11 least one juicy hypocrisy I I mean unfortunately that's true and it it isn't any less true for um people who um assert a religious connection than for people who don't um it's it's part of the human condition so um I think the the real test of this is what does the person do when faced with an ethical dilemma and having fallen short or faced with a moral dilemma and having fallen short so does the person seek to self-
18:48 justify and and essentially pave over that shortcoming or does that person you know take responsibility for it which which I consider to be the the mature adult path um and and and if they do then I think you know in general we have to respect the fact that we're all human beings we all make mistakes and and and reconcile it on that basis and and and move forward so again number two ethics Integrity the the sort of moral
19:23 fiber within us and how that impacts our business relationship ships our business activities that's another aspect of our professional lives that can be informed by our faith next is resilience and mindset so this is where I think about faith as being a muscle so and this this is uh this is one of the things that when people ask me um well how can you believe in God you you you you can't prove that God exists and my response is
20:00 is um you're right I I can't prove that God exists not objectively um I I I've I've listened to people who say that they can objective objectively prove that God exists they've never convinced me on on that basis um I I I believe that I I believe in God As a matter of Faith uh and and and I I also believe that that that's the way God wants it um if indeed God is who we believe him to be which is omnipotent omnicient right he certainly
20:36 could somehow objectively prove to each one of us that he exists he could do that um but I think that that's not his plan he doesn't want us to believe in him from an objective standpoint he wants us indeed to believe in him not unlike the way um Abraham did in that Abraham figured out God must exist be as as part of the fabric of existence and and and and Abraham had unshakable faith in God's existence I'm
21:13 talking about Abraham of of the Bible of course um and and and much of um especially the first five books of uh what what we would call what I would call the Hebrew Bible what Christians would call the Old Testament Christians and Muslims who call the Old Testament um is is really about understanding how these you know great personages of the bibl of Biblical times had faith in God's existence and why was that important because they just
21:48 like us inevitably faced very difficult uh times in their lives and having a Bedrock of faith on which to rest oftentimes is the difference between being able to get through those difficult times and not and and so by insisting that we believe in God As a matter of faith we we have to exercise what I call the faith muscle and and and so you know when
22:24 we're hit with a setback or when something bad happens in our lives or something that we perceive as bad happens in our lives we we can reach out whether it's through some kind of ritual whether it's through prayer whether it's through some kind of M meditation whatever that that mechanism is to call upon our faith that that life still has meaning that we can overcome our difficulties and we can
22:59 you know sort of move on from this you know from this um setback and go on to you know live uh you know a worthwhile a productive a better life right so and I do think um that that one of the one of the things that that most impoverishes people is a a lack of of this Faith muscle the ability to to to look at oneself and say well okay um you
23:34 know I I failed a test or I made this big mistake at work that you know caused the company problems um but but I'm still uh a worthwhile person I can take responsibility for my shortcomings I can redouble my efforts to improve and and I can go on and and and become better and and and hopefully not make this same mistake again I'll probably make some other mistakes and and I'll have other hurdles to overcome that's what it is to be resilient and that kind of
24:10 mindset I think I is is so powerful but it needs to have the component of Faith behind it I mean if you've repeatedly uh failed in in your business life um it it it with without faith that things can change I I it's easy to draw the conclusion I'm never going to be successful in business so I I think that's always the wrong conclusion the the the the correct conclusion would I
24:47 think would typically be what I'm doing here if I keep doing this I'm not going to be successful I need to try doing something else so it may be that I need to find a different business that's more in line with my um education and and um um my my education skills and experience it may be that I need to partner with somebody whose whose strengths are complement my strengths so that together we can go on to be successful it may be
25:23 that um I'm very good at what I do but I don't know how to mark Market myself effectively and so I either need to learn to do that or find some other way to generate business almost always that's that's what the perspective is when when we're not successful in business or for that matter you know in a job so but but it you know multiple failures could lead us to conclude I'm just a failure that that's that that is a a faithless uh position to take I would
25:59 argue and and so we need to build this Foundation of Faith so that even when we hit rock bottom rock bottom still puts us on this Foundation from which we can say all right you know I've gotten knocked off my horse several times now I I need to once again take stock of where I'm at take a look at my situation and really figure out okay how do I go on from here in a way that will be more productive than where I came from before and without faith I think we we're we're not going to do that because we're just
26:35 going to assume that I I I don't have the ability to do it so so resilience and creating that the kind of mindset that allows us to survive failure and and and go on and and and indeed learn and profit by it that's part of what faith gives us in our business and professional lives next is is leadership and service so I will say at the beginning I am not a fan of the so-called servant leader
27:10 where in some ways there's an implication that the leader is subservient to the the people that he's leading I I I I don't think that's I don't think that's right um it's it's a very popular belief I know and I know people who espouse it I've I've had um at least one such person as a guest on on one of my shows um but I think that that the idea of the servant leader it's in it's inherently um uh
27:45 contradictory so as a leader we need to lead okay now our leader our leadership should be in service of a mission okay now that's different than being a servant leader okay so our leadership is not in in service to the people we're leading per se it's in service to the mission that we are charged with
28:22 achieving and so how we lead our team needs to be informed by the necessity of meeting the mission that's what I would say is you know how leadership and service connect okay so for example if I have a member of the team who you know has not for example uh bought into the mission okay so then my job is to figure out
28:58 how to get that person to do so and if not suggest that they would be better off in a different organization now that doesn't sound like servant leadership the way it's normally understood excuse me but indeed it is the best for that person because if the person isn't aligned with the mission of the organization at least in their profession Prof or business life then eventually I think they're going to find themselves getting burnt
29:34 out or Worse they're going to be resentful about their the part that they play in in the organization and so this this is again where where leadership it this this idea of leadership ship it ties together some of the other uh issues that we've talked about whether it's uh having a sense of purpose and Mission whether it's the the sort of moral underpinnings of our business and professional lives whether it's our resilience and our mindset all of those should come together in a way that as a leader we have we have Clarity
30:11 in what we need to do and how we need to work with our people how we need to indeed lead our people now a leader needs to have Clarity okay and Faith helps give give us Faith helps give us Clarity okay and and so as we look at our professional lives if we are failing as a leader I think that it's it's unlikely
30:46 to stem from some some sort of financial issue and often times it's probably not a lack of knowledge per se failure of leadership is almost always happening in the spiritual realm in the sense that we we don't have Clarity and we don't we are not connecting with our people in a way that we understand who they are and what they need from us to become
31:22 a productive member of our team that's the the the duty of a of of a of a leader so often times it's called empathy right people skills or soft skills all of these emotional intelligence you hear all of these sort of buzzword they all come down to the same thing a leader has to have the ability to understand his team members his people at a very deep level okay and that's why by the way
31:57 it's it's so leadership it on the one hand is so difficult and and so therefore we we actually can't lead a huge group of people per se okay what we what we can do is lead generally speaking our five to seven closest Associates and then they can lead five to seven people and then they th those can lead five to seven that's really how leadership uh should work and and so if I've got uh you know if I've got you
32:32 know three layers in my company I'm not directly responsible for leading that that third layer right it's it's the people that I lead then that have leadership responsibility okay and and one of the reasons that's the case is because it it it becomes increasingly difficult to really understand people and to spend the amount of time it takes to understand understand them their perspective their values um their their own purpose and Mission and how that connects with the purpose and mission of
33:07 our organization it become it's a it's a timely process to understand that okay and I think I think leaders fool themselves when they think oh I've got you know 10,000 employees in my company and I I lead all of them I mean only in the loosest sense of that word okay that that not true leadership so you may set the example for everybody in your company but you're not leading every not you're not fundamentally leading everybody in your company okay or in
33:42 your organization and and so these qualities that it takes to be a good leader are qualities that come out of the sort of faith-based nature of human beings and they are they are things like uh humility like Integrity like Clarity like empathy okay you see these are all emotional traits if you will their their their mental traits right that's how leadership is in the Contemporary World okay it used if we go back you know
34:19 3,000 years leadership was often tied to who was physically strongest okay and because the the man who is physically strongest and could kill the most people he was feared and therefore he was the leader right these days leadership by fear while it still exists in other countries okay certainly in in in Russia right Vladimir Putin leads by fear Kim Jung ill I think it is the the leader of North Korea he essentially leads by fear right so people follow him because they're afraid if they don't he'll have them thrown in
34:55 prison or killed um that that is not the kind of leadership that that is effective in in the business world anymore today I'm not ever I'm not sure it was ever effective in in in the business world in the United States because people can always quit so we need to lead from from a a spiritual core that that creates connections between us and the people who we lead that's and and and that is that comes from our faith so I will say
35:32 this for a leader who believes that he is the ultimate and there and he does not follow anyone so for example for a leader who believes he you know he does not follow God um that's a that's a difficult leader to deal with because on some level that leader is expressing the idea that he's infallible and and and that almost always will lead to problems so all leaders all human leaders are fallible we have to keep
36:09 that in mind that's why humility is such an important component of leadership okay and and I I I see this by the way um um I was talking about a court hearing that I was in last week where um I mean the level of judicial arrogance was was really it really astonished me and I I as you know I don't like to speak in hyperbole um but but it really did and in talking about it afterwards um with with the lawyers involved and with a colleague of mine who knew this particular judge um it quickly became
36:45 clear why she was behaving the way she was behaving and and it's a shame um because she's actually very new to the bench she doesn't have a lot of experience and because of and and although earlier in her time on the bench she did display humility which which was very beneficial to how she conducted herself she seems to have replaced humility with arrogance and it's causing a lot of a lot of trouble right and and unfortunately it's going to end up causing a lot of trouble for her as well
37:20 um because she's ruling contrary to what the plain meaning of of the law in this particular case says and and so that's why I say leadership fundamentally comes down to um understanding that we have a responsibility to something higher than us we are not the ultimate deiser and that that that sense of humility then becomes Central to being a good leader right and and and it also by the way
37:56 Keeps Us open to understanding how is our leadership impacting those that we lead so these are all I could say faith-based ideas that leaders have to Grapple with and and this is another place where faith and the business World intersect okay next is is um um priorities so uh you know one of the one of the things that I see um in you know in my
38:32 practice is how people deal with the various priorities in their lives now uh you'll often hear people say I don't have very good life balance um and and I if you if you read any of my you know early blog posts from uh you know 10 12 years ago I did at times talk about balance and I quickly realized there really is no such thing as balance per se we don't reach balance in our life um what we do is we we go through
39:10 constant adjustments so while I consider my you know my family to be the most important thing in in in my life the reality is um there are times when I cannot make my family my my first priority which is which is redundant I can't make my family the my priority um because there are matters of business for example that are just so critical if I don't attend to them they will
39:45 materially damage my my business and so then you know I'm kind of out of the game because I I don't have the resources to to take care of myself and my famili responsibilities right so when we look at Faith as it impacts business it hopefully also informs our priorities what is most important and again you can see this in the U you know the the three pillars of attainment that's that's why
40:21 um uh Pursuits is not on top um indeed self is on on top you say well well that that sounds pretty selfish I mean I I put other people before myself I I hope that's actually not the case I hope you're not that self-deprecating okay because if you are always putting other people ahead of you you are destroying yourself I I saw this countless times as a Chaplain in the Navy right and so having a a a a centered Faith allows us on the one hand
40:57 and to take care of ourselves without being selfish and that's the trick okay and and so it it also allows us to sometimes say to uh you know our spouse or our children I I I I I know that you have needs I I have this extremely important thing that I have to do and it it has to take priority and here's why and and this does not mean that you're diminished in my you know r large
41:34 priorities it just means that at this moment I do have to attend to this other thing right now for someone who has a good sense of purpose a good a good sense of mission who has ethics and integrity and and who has a proper mindset so that we understand that that priorities adjust all the time right and and so while at this particular moment in time my business matters maybe take precedence but then you know this
42:09 evening non-business things take precedence right and that's by the way that's why I do my show jigger's place in the in the in the afternoons um the show is will be tomorrow at 5:00 pm Pacific time because generally speaking after at 5 p.m or later that's a time to not be doing Business and Professional activities from my perspective I'm I'm not someone who does you know business dinners and and things in general now once in a while I do um you know again sometimes the priority is such that um I
42:44 I have to I have to switch things around right I don't set things so in stone that I'm so completely unflexible that I can't I can't deal with you know what's what's in front of me um but but in general right I I I I stack up my world like I do in the three pillars of attainment and in that sense I keep balance and what I mean by that is I I don't so overemphasize one area of my
43:19 life that I'm you know I'm like a three-legged stool with one leg very short or with two legs very short and one leg leg at the regular length so that I'm I'm walking around through life you know like tipped over like this right I do think that and this is why by the way there are three pillars of attainment is that we do need to to attend to all all three pillars all nine Realms in order to make sure that we're living a holistic life okay and and that that too I I believe primarily is a
43:55 matter of Faith although there is lots of of um um data to support that so you know we need to have time off we need to eat well those kind of things um but in the end the idea is we're balance at any given moment in time is probably not possible balance is is something that we can maybe look back on the year you know as it comes to a close and say you know did I take care of my family well did I address my Rel relationships uh well did I take care of myself well did I take
44:33 care of my business well and if I can answer yes to all of those questions at the end of the year so then I've I've achieved balance but on on any given day I would think that the answer to a number of those questions is no not as well as I would have liked to but that's just that's just the way it goes and and have faith that I'll be a able to adjust the deficits going forward right and and and and this is again where faith comes to play in our lives um so that we don't
45:08 overemphasize our our our professional and business lives on the one hand on the other hand so that we don't neglect them because we say to ourselves well you know my family is the number one priority so I'm always doing things and and then you end up you know getting fired right and I knew I knew Sailors and mares who they were so focused on taking care of their family members especi and even extended family members that they end up in danger of of of getting kicked out of the military because they weren't doing their jobs well and they would come to me as a Chaplain at that point and say you know here's what's going on Chap and I say
45:44 well how are you going to help these people if you end up getting kicked out of the Navy and they'd look at me like say well you know you mentioned you're helping out you this relative financially and this other one you you call her on a regular basis so if you don't have a job and don't have an income how are you going to be able to do that right and and that's where you know people really start to have to think okay so so as we talk about faith faith can also help us deal
46:23 with competing priorities and and deal with the anxiety that comes out of having to deal with competing priorities okay and at some point you know you'll sometimes hear religious people say I'm just going to give it up to God right and life is so chaotic right now all I can do is just say you know Lord help me through this time right and that's that's a function of resilience it's a function of mindset uh but having a resilient grit minded grit uh oriented mindset will help us navigate through
46:59 priorities successfully and in a way that maintains our relationships and finally um faith can help us in terms of developing a community so this deals with the the ability to create relationships so I think I think number one we have to have faith in other people as well as a higher faith and it that can be
47:34 difficult because people will disappoint us right inevitably people will disappoint us even the people who presumably care about us the most our parents our siblings our grandparents our aunts our uncles whatever um they are going to disappoint us okay that again it's just a given we have to have faith that despite disappointing us at times okay these these people do care about us they care about our well-being
48:09 we should care about them we should care about their well-being and that we will be able to sustain mutually nourishing relationships with them now sometimes that's hard okay especially if we have a parent who's struggling maybe we have a parent who has a mental illness for example it can be very very difficult dealing with that kind of situation and sometimes all we're going to have is the faith that we're going to get through this right and oftentimes relationships break up because one one
48:46 person in the relationship just loses Faith now usually they will say they've lost faith in the other person's goodness or in the other person's love or the other person's ability to satisfy them or or those kind of things and and and that may very well be the case but such a statement says ifof facto that person has lost faith in their ability to develop that relationship okay you can't have one we out the other it just does not it does
49:22 not work okay now sometimes times we we will lose faith in our ability to productively be involved in a relationship okay but we should just ackowledge that and we should take responsibility for that okay we shouldn't blame it solely on the other person okay um because when we do we're we used to say in the 70s that's a copout okay so if you break up a relationship purely
49:58 because of the other person okay you're showing a lack of faith in yourself as well okay now maybe you've gone through counseling and and and this is you know you've had numerous discussions and you've come to the conclusion this relationship after you know a lot of struggle a lot of you know difficult interactions you come to the conclusion this relationship just isn't going to work okay but then just
50:33 acknowledge you have lost faith in the relationship so let's not kid ourselves into saying well I still have faith in the relationship um it's it's this other person that doesn't okay that's it that's that's the adult thing to do okay and by the way if for whatever reason you decide decide that you're breaking up a relationship without trying to save it okay without letting the other person know in advance that you're breaking it up then accept the
51:08 responsibility for doing that okay accept the responsibility that you you've acted faithlessly okay and don't you know don't try to Kid the other person that somehow you're you're doing this this Noble Thing by breaking up the relationship you're not you're not doing a noble thing okay right and and some and people don't always act in a noble fashion okay and this while this sounds like maybe it's only happening in the interpersonal realm this happens in the business realm all the time whether it's with a business associate a business
51:44 partner whether it's with a vendor whether it's with a customer or a client these are all types of relationships and you know there there there are there are situations where business relationships have to terminate as well okay and and and I think we need to be honest with ourselves when that happens and and and not you know not say um it's it's purely the other person's fault okay so I I've
52:19 had business situations where the way someone where the way another person um does business is just it's too hard for me to to deal with it causes too much wear and tear on me okay and so I've terminated those relationships right now you could say well it's the other person's fault they're being too hard on you well they're being who they are okay so the responsibility is mine okay I just I just don't have the ability to sustain that type of
52:54 relationship um I I I don't have the ability I don't have the the um the resilience and so I'm and so I'm I'm giving up on it but that's the decision I made okay that's apart from anything the other person may or may want or not want okay and oftentimes by the way I found that the person doesn't want you know to give up the relationship um and so I'm the one I say well you know I'm sorry but I am doing this and and it is it is me not having sufficient faith in
53:29 myself that I can endure through this relationship okay and and we're all we can make those kind of decisions in business in fact it's important for us to make those kind of decisions okay for our own well-being for the well-being of our our organizations Etc but again we shouldn't fool ourselves into thinking that um you know the these are um these are sort of um pure votes of confidence in in our abilities they are saying something about um our
54:06 abilities and and you know maybe five years down the road we'll we'll have more experience in dealing with people so that we can deal with people with with you know people who are difficult for us to deal with we can deal with them more successfully and maybe um you know more be better at maintaining those kind of relationships I will tell you that that's the case in in my professional career the people I can deal with successfully now uh is a much broader array than when I first started in business um you know back in the you
54:42 know mid mid 1980s um and and I've learned a lot about how to do that okay so this again this how this comes back to Faith is we we have to have faith in ourselves we have to have faith that we're the decision we're making at a at a given time with respect to community and relationships it's the right decision for now even though it may show a lacking on our part and and a faith that we have more to learn okay and and so we
55:21 can go out learn more experience more and be more effective as a member of a community be more effective as someone in a business relationship okay so that's that's how I think Faith intersects with the business World in our professional lives um some this is really kind of food for thought so I I I you may have very very different ideas about this than I do I I would love to hear what you think about the things that I've said what your
55:56 perspective is on this issue especially if you're not someone who um is involved in traditional religion uh how do you see uh Faith you know being involved in your business life I I think we were afraid to talk about these things because we might offend somebody or something like that and I do think that that's a shame because um human beings are innately spiritual I know there are people who don't believe that fine um but but I but I I think it's true I believe it's true I'll put it that way I believe it's true and and so it's it's
56:33 very healthy for us to explore these kind of issues so I invite you to do so links Ser to my social media will be in the show notes after this posts on YouTube Excuse me so I invite you to post there if you have something of a private nature um that you don't want to post publicly my email address will be there as well and you can send me an email I'm I'm happy to um entertain your thoughts on that um normally I I I give the um the caveat that if it's something out of my area of professional competence uh then I'll refer you to
57:09 someone else but in in matters of faith I think my standing as a rabbi hopefully doesn't exclude something that you would bring up um although you can you know you might come up with a question that I just don't I don't know an answer to and if so I will you know um I'll get back to you and we'll figure out a way to uh you know to bring some some clarity to the issue that you raise um but I thank you very much for joining me today on what I acknowledged at the beginning is is kind of a different topic for people making money um but uh I I think one
57:45 that's that's very important for us to consider um especially we're heading into the fall soon and and and then into the holiday season so um you know the the the these things really have meaning and they have a big impact on our well-being and on our professional and business success so I mentioned this already tomorrow at 5:00 pm is my every other week show jiggers is place and we're going to be talking about a subject that may you could say is kind of related to today's topic we're going
58:20 to talk about Tre how to treat people should we treat people nicely or should we treat people kindly now you may be saying well there's there's no difference uh there is a profound difference to the two um and and it has to do among other things with on whom we're focused so I hope you'll join me for a cocktail and a chat again tomorrow 5:00 pm Pacific time at jigger's place and then next week starting on Monday at 10: a.m. is trust and Estates weekly Tuesday at 10: a.m.
58:57 is business lessons from the military and I usually talk I usually mention what the topics are so um I'm not sure I'm not sure what the topic is on next Monday I'll let I'll have to let you know about that um next uh Tuesday at 10: amm is um citizenship day and so there'll be a special edition of the way to wow shows for citizenship St and then a week from today will be my monthly economic Echoes where we'll talk about various uh economic issues and how
59:33 they impact our individual lives so that we can more effectively uh plan and and act for ourselves and our families so one last time thanks so much for joining me wishing you a wonderful rest of the day and signing off as I always do Marie dark