Latest / More Than Before / From Quitting to Grit: Justin Hughes on Perseverance, Depression & the Power of Salt

Transcript

From Quitting to Grit: Justin Hughes on Perseverance, Depression & the Power of Salt · More Than Before

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I trained in the Marine Recruit Depot in San Diego, which just
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so happens to abut San Diego airport.
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So in the middle of getting screamed at by your drill
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instructor, he pauses to let a plane land and then continues
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right where he was keeps screaming at you.
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You are constantly seeing people leave.
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I didn't want to be there. All I could see is that I had
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made a terrible choice. I am not this type of person.
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I'm not proud of this. I tried to quit a lot, the
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senior DI said. If you quit this, you will keep
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quitting for the rest of your life.
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Hey everyone, I am really excited for our guest today.
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He is a manager of platform and service delivery for a global
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manufacturing company. He is a dedicated husband,
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loving father, connoisseur of fine cuisine, and he has grown
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and overcome much in his life, especially challenges.
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He's a good friend of mine and I am ecstatic to have him tell you
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about his stories. Justin Hughes, welcome to the
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show my friend. So good to have you on again.
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Yes, I'm so happy that we, you know, we're, we're going to get
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it and we're going to get keep doing it until we get it right,
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let's say. That funny enough, we've
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recorded this interview three times thus far, and third time's
1:20
a charm. The first time there was sound
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issues. The second time there was
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echoing issues. And God just said, hey, we need
1:27
to, we need to get a clear, clear picture of Justin's life.
1:30
I guess so, at least it's giving me plenty of practice.
1:33
Exactly. So you grew up in Des Moines,
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IA, is that correct? Yes, just outside.
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And you spent quite a bit of time outdoors, if I, if I
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recall, what was, what was childhood like growing up in the
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outdoors? Well, so I spent a lot of time
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outdoors, probably involuntarily because my parents were like,
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get out, I don't care what you do, just get out.
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So yeah, we lived not on a farm per SE, even though it's Iowa.
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We lived in 11 acres of of Woodlands and we we were
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regularly outside exploring the area by ourselves.
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We were going to places we were told not to go, like the
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neighbor's pond, but there was a Creek down back.
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It was a Creek, not a Creek, because it was too big to be a
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Creek. But yeah, so a lot of time was
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spent outdoors, losing my parents or my dad's boots in the
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mud, you know, leaving his tools out in the rain and things that
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generally 'cause people to go prematurely Gray that I'm paying
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for now that I have kids, so. Payback is definitely something
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that's happening. Yeah, yeah, I mean, it wasn't,
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it was certainly a lot of time by myself.
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You know, one of the things that as a kid I didn't have a lot of
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friends, partially because we were near a lot of people my
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age, but also because I I really wasn't adept at making friends.
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You know, my youth, I had maybe 2 friends while lived in Iowa,
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one who didn't live to two towns over and the other lived more
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central to Des Moines and, and yeah, I just had school.
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It was, it was not great. You know, I was, I was bullied a
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lot as a kid. And so I ended up spending a
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whole lot of time in my head by myself.
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You know, I did have a younger brother, Andrew, who's by 18
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months, 18 months younger than me, and we did spend a fair
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amount of time together outside, but he's 18 months younger.
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And that relationship was tested at times.
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That's a youth. Let's be generous about that.
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Yeah. I mean, we, we, we weren't
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always on the best of turns. We didn't always want to play
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with each other. I would say we got along OK as a
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youth. I mean, it wasn't really until a
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middle school, high school that we really started to really have
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a contentious period in our, our relationship.
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But I I'm sure we'll get to that eventually.
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So, you know, outdoors was a was a thing.
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I was a big thing for you. Like what did you want to be
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when you grew up? Every every kid has its ass
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their aspirations of what they wanted to be.
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I wanted to be an oceanographer, which I didn't know what that
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was, but it sounded really good. So like, you know, most kids, I,
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I think I was really interested in dinosaurs for about 10
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seconds. Also, like most kids, there's a
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time I wanted to be an astronaut.
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And then, you know, I watched space camp and I'm like, Nope,
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that's not for me. And then I think it, it morphed
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to like being an Air Force pilot.
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I always kind of like that one, that one lasts a lot longer.
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But I always like, you know, traveling, seeing new places,
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even as a kid, you know, like we we lived in Iowa, we would
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vacation in Michigan every summer on Lake MI.
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And, you know, it was just the I always loved the lake That
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evokes a lot of peaceful memory times just listening to the
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waves and playing in the playing in the surf and in the sand.
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But, you know, that kind of far off thinking, look, I was always
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a part of it. But yeah, the the Air Force
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pilot thing never did come to fruition.
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Well, I mean military though, and we'll and we'll get into
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that here in a little bit too. What, what were some of your
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early on jobs that you remember? Like, I don't know, there's
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something about like the worst jobs growing up that make you
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appreciate the jobs that you have, especially if you're not
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at hard labor. What were some of those early
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jobs that you remember? So I think the first job I had
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was a paperboy back when, you know, there were these things
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called newspapers, which would be delivered to people's doors
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every day that actually had stories about what was going on
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in the local town in the world. And I say this facetiously, but
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they almost had really died back since then.
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But so, yeah, it was a paperboy. And, you know, I was, you know,
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I was one of those particular children.
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So I didn't like to just throw the paper and I was trying to
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find ways to make it, you know, the delivery is as efficient as
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possible. And so I would like, roll the
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papers up and put rubber bands on them.
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So well, so I'd like the first thing I did in that route was
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sit on the curb and watch the cars pass while I'm rolling up
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papers. And then I could like bike
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around and I could deliver them pretty fast.
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I think I may have ended up taking more time rolling the
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papers than I did saving any time, you know, delivering them.
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But it was in my mind that was what I wanted to do.
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But, you know, especially since nobody had those little paper
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boxes, the, the, the, the little box around the mailbox where you
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put your, the paper. Most of the time I was just
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delivering to the doors. But, you know, that was really
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the only job I had until, you know, college and doing some,
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you know, jobs, you know, working, getting some college
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jobs that were at the school. You know, my family was more
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well off. We were upper middle class.
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My father, he came from much more of a working class
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background and really had to work to get to get his college.
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Like his parents divorced when he was a teenager.
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He had to take care of his his family by working jobs before
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college. And then in college, he was
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working jobs to two different jobs, like a, you know, janitor
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at a hospital and garbage man just to work his way through
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college. And I think he was really
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conscious about the fact that he wanted his children to have a
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childhood. So looking back, I kind of wish
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I would have had more of those work experiences early on.
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But I, I look back and I think that he really, he, he was
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trying to, to look out for us in that way and make sure that we
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weren't just having to, to survive as kids.
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We, we were actually able to focus on our studies and focus
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on, you know, you know, the family and, and other things.
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A lot of that what who are some of those early mentors that you
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had and what were some of the lessons that they taught you in
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your life that have kind of stuck with you over the years?
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I think my dad was certainly one of those biggest mentors in my
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early childhood life. You know, one of the, as I think
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back, you know, he taught a lot of the value of doing a good
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job. You don't really making sure
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that you do the best job that you can with something.
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And he also taught me respect for others.
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I was talking with my mom just the other day.
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You know, my father, one of my father's best friends growing up
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or not growing up, but my growing up there was a man named
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Ron Langston. He's a wonderful man.
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He's an African American and then went to law school
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together. And you know, I just have the
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most fantastic memories growing up of times when he came over to
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our house. And I just don't remember any
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time in my life where I saw color as a value marker for a
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human being. And I'm feel very blessed that
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they really instilled in US kids that color adds variety, but it
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doesn't change the value of a person and gender doesn't change
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the value of a person. It's like, you know, male or
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female, it doesn't matter. They still have value inside of
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God. They still have worthwhile and
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they shouldn't be treated as less for that.
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I love that because it really does paint a picture, you know,
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especially as you grow up and you get into the IT industry and
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where you're working with numbers and really everyone is a
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number in IT. You know, you have a ticket and
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you treat everyone with the same level of respect no matter what,
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you know, ever Everyone, we all have the same, you know, genetic
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composition for the most part. And so you look at the you go,
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huh. Well, you know, my parents
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taught me to treat all people with respect and to love them
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and care for them. And, and I think that's I think
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that's really cool for even with where you are today.
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So when you were going through school, what kind of student
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were you were were you? I mean you, I know, I know you
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said that, you know, I know, I know you said that.
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You know you, you were in your head quite a bit in your
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childhood, but like, were you captivated by books?
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Were you an avid learner and reader?
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What was education like for you? So, you know, I, I don't, I
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don't have AI, don't think I was an avid learner as a, as a kid
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for the most part. You know, I was AB student and
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average student through most of middle school or elementary
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school and through middle school even, you know, there, I
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remember this story where, you know, my dad was frustrated with
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me because, you know, I had this paper due and I didn't want to
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write it up myself because, you know, back, back in the, you
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know, 90s, you know, you wrote your first draft by hand and
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even you revised your first draft by hand and then you had
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to type it to turn it in. And he, I was not good at typing
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and I wasn't even trying hard. And he was typing it for me and
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he was just getting frustrated with me and I wasn't getting
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good grades. And he was like, when are you
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going to take school seriously? And I think it was an eighth
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grade at the time. And he said, and I said, I'll
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take, I'll take it seriously when I get into college.
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And I did, he says. I stepped forward.
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And as I entered high school, you know, then I stepped up my
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grades. I got in the honor roll
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consistently. I was never not on the honor
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roll in high school. And I think I graduated 10th in
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my class of 54. So it was like, not that it
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wasn't like it was a huge achievement and it was a small
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school, but I did start taking things seriously.
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And then and then, yeah, college, college turned a lot of
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my preconceived notions on his head.
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And then I went back to just really struggling.
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And there was, there was actually a moment too, I recall
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you talking about when you were 15, when you got the opportunity
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to go to France. What did that do for you?
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So, you know, my grandparents, they do, they do come from money
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and you know, they were had lots of trips.
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You know, my family was a little more eclectic in his desires.
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My dad was a chef and he liked to cook and introduced me to
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things like French food. My parents would speak French,
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you know, to avoid us, you know, us understanding as kids.
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And so I was like, he's saying, I want to learn how to speak
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French. And my grandparents knew how to,
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you know, my grandparents traveled a lot.
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And, you know, we have a ton of artwork, in fact, that that
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tapestry behind me is an actual tapestry from, from my
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grandparents that they bought on one of their travels that that I
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ended up inheriting. And, you know, it was one of
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those things where on when I turned 15, they, they invited me
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to go to France with them. And so it was just very eye
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opening. You know, I got to see all the
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famous sites, got to experience French food and it's best and
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weirdest. Like, you know, you think of all
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the things like souffle, you know, MU chocolate mousse, you
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think of French bread and croissants and all the wonderful
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things that France has produced. And then like the first night we
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were there, I had a salad and they had this, you know, whole
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egg in it. But they had taken the yolk out
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and they'd replace it with salad dressing, like a red salad
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dressing. It tasted weird and it would
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freak me out. And then there was another time
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we were in Orange over in Alsace and we pull uped to the
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restaurant and there was no one there.
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And the the owner just like comes by on her little moped,
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her little Vespa there and they wheels up and she's like in this
13:44
whole rocker style. And we asked what, what does she
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recommend? She recommended pig's ears.
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They were just pig's ears cut up.
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And they were and they had good flavor, but it was pure
13:54
cartilage. And we were just like, we don't
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know what to do with this. And there's a time in Monaco
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where we ordered pizza. Pizza's normal, right?
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And my grandmother ordered like a prawn pizza.
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Well, the prawns came out still in their shells, still with
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their heads and their antenna. It was very artful.
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But it, the pizza was cold by the time we got to the point
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where we could eat it. But it just, there's so many
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memories of that experience. And and then later in high
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school, after taking more years of French team, we had a school
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French trip and I think it was a junior at this time.
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And one of the one of the activities, the planned
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activities on on this school trip was visiting a French
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winery. Now at that French winery, there
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is a wine tasting. Now in France, you know, with
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guardians there, it is perfectly legal for 1516 year olds to
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taste wine, but not in the US And so the school, they're like,
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no, So we actually, you know, approached the school board and
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I was the, I was kind of ended up being kind of the
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spokesperson for it, you know, trying to argue for, you know,
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tasting, you know. Civil liberties to be able to
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taste. I I know it's like, and they
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ended up shooting it down, but what we didn't know is that
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apparently there was a reporter from CNN and so I ended up on
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CNN. Yeah, that was, it was it was
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amusing it. But yeah, no, I the the some
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early experiences with travel, which you know, kind of I think
15:35
cemented one of my loves, which is just experiencing new
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cultures and new foods and new people.
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Yeah, how? I'm curious how that kind of
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spurned on your curiosity for life because, I mean, you really
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are someone who loves the eclecticness of food, of trying
15:52
different foods. You know, you spend a lot of
15:54
time over in Japan in your current role of flying back and
15:57
forth from there. And I know you love Japanese
15:59
food, but I'm curious, how did, how did that early introduction
16:03
to, I mean, growing up in the Midwest, not having a plethora
16:07
of different options, probably more like meat and potatoes,
16:10
kind of growing up and then going into this whole new world
16:14
of seeing food in a different way.
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How did that craft the way that you moved forward in life to
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experience those types of things?
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So I will say that, you know, yes, the Midwest, especially in
16:28
the 80s and 90s weren't, wasn't exactly known for its eclectic
16:32
variety of food. I would say, however, that my
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parents had had some of those experiences and had kind of
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helped spark a lot of that desire.
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But one of the things I've noticed is is I've experienced
16:47
these new things and you can, you know, approach new
16:50
experiences either with a, this is different or oh, this is new.
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And a this is new could result in something really cool or
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really bad, but you don't know until you try it.
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Like, for example, in Japan, I've experienced a ton of new
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foods that I never would have tried before.
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Some of them I really loved uni. He liked the sea urchin Roe.
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It's very controversial, but I found I really liked it.
17:21
Squid bones, not so much, but I didn't, but I was willing to
17:25
try. And you know, it's really
17:27
fascinating. One of the things I've I've
17:29
realized is that if you go into a new culture, one of the
17:31
fastest ways to get them to accept you is to be curious
17:38
about the food they love. If you're interested in their
17:42
food and you want to try the food that they love and you know
17:46
a little bit about it going in, even don't have to know a lot,
17:49
just a little bit. And you're like, hey, yeah, I've
17:52
heard of this, did and this and this.
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And they're like, this is amazing.
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Let me show it to you. And you know, there's so much to
17:59
this world. There are so many people out
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there who have different experiences and different
18:06
backgrounds and different ways of viewing the world.
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And in that exploration of it, you really get the sense of how
18:15
wonderfully diverse our world is.
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And you can pull that into the workplace where people come up
18:22
with things you never would have thought of, and it makes
18:25
everything better. And they may see the problems or
18:29
potential issues that you never would have.
18:31
And it's really irritating, especially at first when they
18:35
come up and pop your balloon. But at the same time, it also
18:41
can help you to avoid a lot of pitfalls.
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And I like if you approach it just with the fact that we have
18:49
all the, these are people of value and they have worth and
18:52
they have something to say. And even if they don't
18:55
necessarily come at a situation with the same kind of openness,
18:59
there's still something we can learn from them.
19:02
Yeah, it's, it's true. And what I love about your
19:06
journey is really that understanding to explore things,
19:10
to try things out, to try and connect with people that are
19:15
from different backgrounds, different types of philosophies.
19:18
Like you're, you're constantly wanting to sharpen yourself to
19:21
become the best connector you can be.
19:23
You went to school for computer science.
19:25
What brought you to computer science and what caused?
19:28
For a year. For a year so I, you know,
19:33
growing leaving and I'll be straight up the reason I I went
19:37
to computer science because of video games.
19:38
I love video games. I wanted to start a video game
19:41
company and so I went to computer science with the aim to
19:45
start my own video game company. I like the, the Japanese style
19:49
story games like the final fantasies of the world that, you
19:55
know, told the story in an interactive way.
19:58
And I love that I still really drawn to stories.
20:01
Stories kind of my bread and butter in many respects.
20:04
And I love the idea of interacting with that story.
20:07
I very quickly learned that I don't have a great mindset to be
20:12
a programmer. It's something I can do.
20:16
It is not something I'm really good at.
20:18
And especially in my freshman year of college, I didn't know
20:21
how to ask for help. And I struggled and I struggled
20:24
and I. Did terribly and I got my first
20:27
D in a class which was computer programming.
20:29
And I'm like, I, I can't do this.
20:31
And I and I really lost my way my freshman year there.
20:35
I was completely disillusioned. That struggle in that first year
20:40
is what led me to dropping out from from Taylor University.
20:45
Initially I was going to go back and do like systems at a closer
20:50
university to my home. And yeah.
20:52
And then over that summer and talking with a recruiter and a
20:56
friend of mine who is joining the Marine reserve specifically,
20:59
I decided it's like, you know what my dad had, you know, been
21:02
a Marine. I'm not in a position where
21:08
today I can I have a direction if I'm ever going to join the
21:13
military, this is the ideal time to do it.
21:16
Now I'm an introvert. Not really an introverted
21:20
decision to make. I'm not very loud.
21:24
I'm not athletic. And so it was a bit of a, huh,
21:30
moment for everybody who knew me to go.
21:32
Wait. He did what?
21:33
Yeah. And so I joined the Marine
21:35
Reserves and I spent that that fall semester in boot camp.
21:39
And it was. What was that like?
21:41
Because, because going through boot camp, you know, I've, I've
21:43
heard different people, I've normally said that, that it's a,
21:48
it's a difficult process to go go through.
21:50
It's a wedding out process. And then, then I was talking to
21:53
a, a guest previously on the show and he was like, that was
21:56
the easiest thing I've ever done.
21:58
And I was like, wait, wait, what?
22:00
I think you're the only person I've ever heard to say that.
22:03
What was what was boot camp like for you?
22:05
What? What did Boot Camp tell you
22:07
about yourself? A lot so and let me clarify one
22:13
thing. Marine boot camp is not a
22:15
wedding out process. They tell you upfront and
22:19
regularly that you have signed a contract with them and you're
22:24
going to become a Marine. Are you going to jail?
22:26
Jail wasn't an option, was it? Well, I'll tell you what I was.
22:31
Considered it a couple times. And so I'm, you know, I'm what's
22:35
called a Hollywood Marine, which means I trained in San Diego and
22:39
the MCR Marine recruit depot in San Diego, which just so happens
22:44
to abut San Diego airport. So you were in the middle of
22:49
getting screamed at by your drill instructor and he pauses
22:52
to let a plane land and then continues right where he was
22:56
keeps screaming at you. And then a plane takes off and
22:59
he pauses. And then, but here's the other
23:02
thing that's a bit more of the mind torture.
23:04
And that's the fact that you're constantly seeing people leave
23:08
and you don't want to be there. Well, I didn't want to be there.
23:11
It was so much of a different world for me.
23:16
And up until this point, I had never experienced anything so
23:19
trying. I didn't know the philosophy of
23:23
why they structured it the way they did back then, but all I
23:26
could see is that I had made a terrible choice.
23:29
This is absolutely not what I was meant for.
23:32
I am not this type of person. I just need to find someone to
23:37
tell to help me say I need to go home.
23:39
I'm not proud of this, but I I really need to to be open about
23:43
it. It's just I tried to quit a lot
23:46
in. Fact.
23:47
You even went to the extent of having them call your dad,
23:51
didn't you? So yeah, that's, that's kind of
23:54
where it can round up to. So there's two, there's only
23:57
one, there is only one successful way that people were
23:59
getting out, and that was by wetting the bed.
24:01
And I have a lot of pride and I was not willing to do that.
24:05
You wet the bed three times and you were out and I was just
24:07
like, Nope, that's not me. I cannot do that.
24:09
I don't I, I. There are certain lines I can't
24:12
cry. There are certain lines I was
24:14
not willing to cross and that was one of them.
24:17
And you know, here's the thing, you know, I at one point, it was
24:21
about six weeks in, I got to the point where I'm just like, I'm
24:24
done, I'm done, I'm done. I, and finally I stood a stand
24:27
in protest where I just, it was over a weekend as a Sunday I
24:31
believe, because all the other DI's were left except the mean
24:35
one. Mean one was the only one on
24:37
duty that day. And he he tried to convince me
24:40
and I just was, I was, I'm a stubborn person and I was just
24:44
done. And now he's out of his league.
24:47
He doesn't have his senior in there.
24:49
So he he takes me to across the the Bay to another platoon where
24:54
there was a scene that was on duty.
24:55
And he's trying to convince me. And I'm just like, I'm mad about
24:58
the man and there's nothing going to move me, right?
25:01
Nothing is going to move me. I'm going home or somewhere, not
25:05
here, anything but here. And, you know, he in in talking
25:10
to me, finds out that my dad was a Marine.
25:13
And he's like, well, what would your father think of this?
25:15
And it's like, and it's like my father would support my
25:17
decision. He's he loves me.
25:18
He cares for me. He will support me.
25:20
It's like, what would be OK if we called him and talk to him
25:24
about this? Like, yeah, I'm confident he's
25:26
he's going to support me on this.
25:28
He called my father and I, you know, my my forefather, I love
25:32
him. DOAI didn't want to have to do
25:34
this to him. But, you know, he was told the
25:39
situation. He was told by his son and, and,
25:43
and he's like, you know, putting it on, it's like, sounds like I
25:46
love you, but I cannot support this decision to quit.
25:49
And it broke me. I was so convinced.
25:53
I was so convinced. But you know, The thing is, is
25:58
the senior DI said, he was telling me, it's like, if you
26:00
quit this, you will keep quitting for the rest of your
26:03
life. You need to stick this out.
26:06
Even if you're right and this isn't the your future, you need
26:09
to stick this out for you. You need to stick this out to
26:12
prove that you can complete something hard like this.
26:16
And my father agreed with him and it broke me.
26:18
I was so astonished because my father was not on board with
26:22
this is like I was my, my rock of assurance was gone.
26:27
And I agreed to stick around and agreed to see that even though I
26:30
knew it wasn't. It's like he's like, just serve
26:32
your term and you'll be done. And so I agreed to it and I
26:35
said, I'm going to finish it out.
26:36
I mean, we're, we're already halfway through and yeah, you
26:40
know, afterwards it was amazing how easy boot camp was the next
26:47
day. It was all because I had a
26:49
change of mindset. Before that.
26:51
Every run was torture. Every workout was torture.
26:56
The only relief was like, I like drill practice and I liked the
27:01
the classroom area. That was the one area I was good
27:03
at was the classroom because I was the nerd.
27:06
All the screaming, all the training that was like, you
27:10
know, the yelling and all of it ended up being so much easier
27:14
afterwards. It's like yelling wasn't a big
27:17
deal. I was like, I realized I'd lost
27:19
40 lbs and had to had to get all new uniforms.
27:23
I could keep up with the runs. They weren't torture anymore.
27:26
And it was weird because the next day nothing had changed
27:30
physically. I was still physically the same
27:32
as I was the day before, but my attitude had changed.
27:37
And that change of attitude made everything easier.
27:41
Well, I think it's huge because a lot of people today in the
27:44
world that we live in, they come up against something that's
27:47
difficult, something that's hard, and they try and find that
27:50
out. They try and find the easy way
27:52
around it of giving up. And there's a certain point that
27:56
in life you can't get out of something like you have to
27:59
actually go through it. It's the Crucible of your life.
28:02
If you don't go through it, you don't become the person that
28:05
you're created to be. But there is a mentality piece
28:08
to this. There is an attitude piece where
28:11
if you're not going into it with the understanding that you're
28:13
going to learn and you're going to be growing through it and
28:17
growing to the next thing that everything is going to be hell,
28:20
everything is going to be frustrating.
28:21
Everything is going to pull you down.
28:23
There's there's something that you've talked about a lot and
28:25
we've talked about a lot too off of the podcast.
28:28
You've had this piece of wrestling with the depression
28:32
and you've been a spokesperson for people of understanding, you
28:36
know, what's going on and not just keeping those thoughts
28:39
inside your head. How has your interaction with
28:43
depression? How has that changed over your
28:47
life? You know, because I think a lot
28:49
of times we, we put ourselves by ourselves, we recluse ourselves,
28:54
we, we tend to push the world away.
28:57
What did you find throughout your throughout your life of
29:01
dealing with this and really looking for opportunities to
29:04
break free from that? This period of going through
29:08
boot camp, this is before I had ever admitted to being depressed
29:12
or ever had gotten treatment for it.
29:15
Growing up in the 80s and the 90s, you know, depression was
29:19
known about, but treatment had wasn't really normalized.
29:24
And it was about 2004 where I had actually gotten to the point
29:31
where essentially I had an intervention.
29:35
It was like I was a family dinner.
29:37
I was out in the balcony and then all of a sudden, like the
29:40
entire family is out on the balcony with me and they're all
29:43
like staring at me. And I'm like, what's going on
29:47
here? Surrounded.
29:49
Yeah, it it really was. And, and I call it intervention
29:53
because that's exactly what it was that like Justin, you need
29:56
help. My mother had already started
29:57
getting treatment for it. My brother been getting
30:01
treatment and they're like it just you're depressed and you
30:06
have a history of depression and you need to seek treatment for
30:10
this. And I did and that's when I
30:12
started kind of the journey of learning about depression,
30:17
trying to treat it. And initially I just tried,
30:19
treated it with the therapy, Prozac and SSRI SSNRIS and the,
30:25
the standard treatment. And for many years that was the
30:27
only thing I tried. But The thing is, is that I
30:30
never got better. I never, I was just resigned to
30:34
it was always going to be this way.
30:36
I was never going to just feel great.
30:38
I always felt like there was not anything I could do with it.
30:44
Just was always going to feel bad.
30:46
As I continue to try and look at things.
30:50
I got nerdy about it. I started trying to think about,
30:53
you know what, how does this work?
30:56
Because for a number of years in the past, it was just ignored.
31:02
You were just melancholic. That was just kind of who you
31:05
were. You were just kind of this
31:07
somber type person and then, you know, there was, Oh yeah,
31:11
there's this thing called clinical depression, but we
31:14
don't really talk about it. It's not really a thing we
31:17
address. And you get into the early
31:19
aughts and the the teens and now it's like, yes, there's the
31:24
thing called depression. You just treat it.
31:25
You just give your, give them Prozac, you give them whatever
31:29
and you treat it. It's a mental disease with a
31:32
biological thing that the best way to get take care of it is
31:36
through medicine. It just wasn't working.
31:38
I tried all It's like when the only way to treat depression is
31:44
to experiment with different drugs prescribed by the doctor,
31:49
but experiment with different drugs because this isn't
31:52
working. Let's try it, this and this.
31:54
OK, that's not working. Well, let's try this and this.
31:57
Oh, that made it worse. OK, let's try this and this.
31:59
It gives you the impression that they don't really know how to
32:02
treat it. And so I started looking more
32:04
into the research behind it, and I started looking into what does
32:07
work. And that's where I started
32:09
developing more of a broadview of depression.
32:13
I still think medication is an important part, but it's no
32:17
longer I think the most important part of managing
32:20
depression or mental health in general.
32:23
And so I came up with an idea that I call siege warfare.
32:28
I call it siege warfare because in a siege, they're essentially
32:34
3 main components to being the defender in the siege.
32:39
You have your defense, you know the walls, you know the the
32:44
Moat, the things that keep the invaders out.
32:48
You have your offense. How do you keep them away?
32:50
It's like, you know, if you just offensive all the time, they'll
32:53
eventually wear you down. You have to go on the offense,
32:57
you have to attack back. And then you have what I call
33:01
the resources, the supplies. If you run out of food and
33:05
water, you're not going to last very long in a siege.
33:08
And then there's the optional 4th 1 and that's the
33:10
reinforcements. So reinforcements like, you
33:14
know, you're lasting for a long time and maybe wearing down, you
33:17
get reinforcements from an outside source.
33:19
They come in and help repel the invaders.
33:22
So this is a siege defense. So in my analogy, the defenses,
33:29
that's your physical health. So if we if we think of
33:33
ourselves as a completely whole person where you have your mind,
33:37
your spirit and your body, any one of those out of kilter is
33:40
going to affect the rest. So if my health is bad, that
33:44
affects my mood. If I'm, if I have a fever, it's
33:49
really hard to keep a good attitude.
33:51
But consequently they actually show that if you're overweight,
33:54
you have a higher propensity towards depression.
33:57
It's not a one to one correlation.
33:59
It's not a guarantee, but there is a propensity towards it.
34:02
If you are eating poorly, if your diet is poor and you're
34:06
just not eating great foods, that's going to affect your
34:08
mental clarity. The other thing is exercise is
34:11
one of the things that has actually scientific backing to
34:15
show help that it helps with depression.
34:17
And I think that was part of it is just stress release.
34:20
You know, you're working out some of the emotions.
34:22
I think it's also productive because you're actually doing
34:25
something. And when you're in the depths of
34:27
depression, you just do not want to do anything.
34:31
You feel nothing is accomplishing.
34:33
So this gives you that subconscious maybe idea of
34:37
actually doing something. So that physical side that
34:42
bolsters your body up, that protects you against the
34:46
onslaught of the dark thoughts, Then you have your offensive.
34:49
That's that's where like cognitive behavioral therapy
34:53
comes in. That's where like they've got a
34:55
bad rap these days. But affirmations, they come in
34:58
there, they get a better rap because I think a lot of people,
35:00
they develop their affirmations on things that don't relate to
35:04
them specifically. If your affirmations are true
35:08
and true to you, they will hold weight.
35:11
And the science backs that up too.
35:13
But you, you can't just say, you know, the, the whole, you know,
35:16
guy smiling is like, you know, I'm loved and you know, gosh
35:20
darn it, people like me. He's like that, you know, that
35:22
that whole concept that has given it, it may be a bad Rep.
35:27
You know, there is actual truth behind, you know, saying, look,
35:31
I don't feel it, but I do have people who love me and my my
35:36
parents love me. My wife loves me, my kids love
35:39
me. They would miss me if I'm gone.
35:43
They were here to support me. And that's where that's where
35:46
that, that those thoughts that you have to combat the bad
35:52
thoughts when you're depressed, you have lots of negative,
35:54
invasive thoughts. And if you just let them sit in
35:57
there, you mentioned it earlier, if you just let it sit in there
35:59
and fester without speaking with somebody's talking it out.
36:04
If it festers, it's going to rot.
36:07
So you have to combat those negative thoughts.
36:10
It doesn't make it feel better instantly, but it does help.
36:13
And it's like nobody will miss you when you're gone.
36:15
My family will miss me when I'm gone.
36:17
You combat it. You combat the negative thought
36:20
with what? Something that's true.
36:21
It's also habits of thinking. It's like, what do you do when
36:24
you're not in the depths? It's like, what's your intake?
36:28
Are you reading the news all day long?
36:29
It's probably going to make you depressed.
36:31
What are you feeding your brain? I have to be very careful about
36:37
what I consume because if I consume too much news, it
36:40
affects me mentally. I love that you talked about the
36:43
inputs and inputs have been a a big piece of your life,
36:48
especially as you started to learn about leadership and
36:52
develop yourself to truly step into different roles.
36:55
You know, you got certified with Maxwell Leadership a while back
37:00
and you were serving in a role at I Woo, and that was during
37:04
COVID-19. And when COVID-19 hit, all of a
37:07
sudden a lot of the world experienced a leadership vacuum
37:10
and you experienced a leadership vacuum in that organization.
37:15
In fact, that was really one of the great opening points for you
37:18
to step in and to truly lead in a way that you'd never done
37:21
before. How did that leadership vacuum
37:25
open up for you? An opportunity to get you to
37:28
where you are today. You mentioned the inputs and
37:30
that was kind of part of where I was, you know, training myself
37:35
and training in leadership, you know, with, with Maxwell, with
37:39
Zig Ziglar, with Dale Carnegie. It's like, how do I prepare?
37:42
Because I was not in a leadership role.
37:44
And so I was very much in the in the position of just teaching
37:49
myself to, you know, it's like, what does a leader look like?
37:53
So, you know, Maxwell has the five levels of leadership.
37:56
The first level is positional. I didn't have a positional
37:59
leadership. So what am I doing to do?
38:01
It's like, well, next level is relational leadership.
38:03
You know, people follow you because they like you.
38:05
So I could work on that. I could work on, you know,
38:08
gaining influence by my relationships.
38:11
Yeah. Third level is, you know,
38:13
success. People follow you because you're
38:15
successful. I could work on that.
38:17
I could be productive. I could have have wins by
38:20
actually accomplishing things. And so I could work.
38:23
I, I focus on the things that I could work on, even though I
38:25
didn't have that it, it wasn't just that there was a leadership
38:28
vacuum. And you know, I, I was able to
38:30
just step in. I had put in the work ahead of
38:33
time to prepare myself. And you know, you talk about
38:36
the, the second string quarterback, when, when they're
38:39
called up, they, they don't have time to prepare for it.
38:42
They had to have prepared ahead of time or the Chinese bamboo
38:45
where you like, you know, you water for years and years and
38:47
you see nothing. And then all of a sudden you
38:49
have an invasive weed problem in your, in your yard, at least
38:52
here in the US. And that really was it because
38:55
like in, as you said, it was COVID and you know, my leader
39:00
came back from vacation in June and he says, like, look, I
39:04
decided it's like, I'm, I'm good.
39:05
I'm, I'm just going to retire. And like the, the next day, you
39:08
know, his boss came back and said, you know what, I'm done,
39:11
I'm out. Both of them retired on the same
39:13
day. And so we had like a double
39:15
level leadership vacuum. And you know, this is a point
39:18
where, you know, I came to the CIO and he says it's like, look,
39:23
I know we have a, we have a issue coming up.
39:26
It's like, let me know where I can help.
39:28
It's like, how do I, how can I serve you in this?
39:31
How can I help you? And so they put me in kind of as
39:36
an interim leader for the time being, then later made it
39:39
permanent at the, at the start of the semester.
39:43
And, you know, I spent the next two years reforming the entire
39:47
group and trying to, you know, take advantage of the all these
39:51
lessons and say, it's like, look, the I've been listening to
39:54
this team for, for years now. And you know, it's like, what
39:58
are the, what's the most good I can do?
39:59
It's like, well, we can reform this, we can reform that and I
40:02
can. So I focused on those things
40:03
that I felt the greatest impact on on the team that ended up
40:07
opening kind of a, a, a doorway as I was starting to kind of hit
40:11
the limits of how I could grow it.
40:13
Indiana Wesleyan University. And, you know, IA vendor friend
40:17
of mine who he, I've done a lot of who, who did a lot of work
40:21
with us. He said, Hey, I know this
40:23
position coming up. I'm currently serving as a.
40:27
You know, interim, interim CIO for for this pneumatics
40:32
manufacturing company and I've got this role coming up for a
40:35
global IT manager. It's like, I think you'd be
40:39
great for it and looked into it and ended up being a really
40:43
fascinating role. And, and someplace where he's
40:47
like, you're going to come in and it's going to be hard
40:49
because you're going to have to build this whole thing from
40:51
scratch. Because the, the team, the, the
40:53
IT team there, the global IT team at SMC had experienced the
40:57
massive reduction and was kind of rebuilding from the ashes, so
41:02
to speak. So I came in to help kind of
41:04
rebuild that team and it's been 2 1/2 years since then and it's
41:10
been a wild ride. But we talked about the talked
41:13
about how in boot camp, I was told it's like I needed to
41:16
finish boot camp in order to, you know, not quit.
41:18
And it's like there, there been a lot of times where the
41:21
challenge has been really hard here.
41:22
And I think back to that time and I goes like, if I had not
41:28
had that experience, persevering through difficulties, I don't
41:33
know if I could have withstood the challenge that I'm currently
41:36
facing today. I love how you talk about that.
41:40
The opportunity to didn't show up and you stepped in.
41:43
It was something you've been preparing for for a long time.
41:46
We we had met and we've been talking for a long time prior to
41:49
this opportunity coming up for you to step into that leadership
41:53
role. And what's interesting is a lot
41:56
of people want something bigger. They want something better in
41:59
their life. They want to improve their life,
42:01
and yet they never take the steps that they need to to
42:04
sharpen themselves, to develop themselves.
42:06
COVID-19 hit. I remember one of the one of the
42:09
big things that Warren Buffett came out with that first,
42:12
probably six months into it. He said right now, if you're
42:15
losing your job, the number one thing you should do is go
42:17
develop yourself, go find a skill that you have and sharpen
42:21
it, make it really good. So that way when there is an
42:24
opportunity, you can step in and you can fulfill a need.
42:27
You can help other people. And that's something that you
42:30
were really doing. You know, you invest all this
42:32
time and this money into it. You can see the benefit of how
42:36
that's really paid off in your life.
42:38
Your life is so completely different because you truly
42:41
sowed seeds of leadership and learning and growth in those
42:45
times that man, maybe you weren't really sure that
42:48
something else was going to come, but it did eventually come
42:50
and you were able to step up to that.
42:52
So I love that. I I have a couple more questions
42:55
here for you, one revolving specifically around family.
42:59
I think there is a moment where you become a dad and a moment
43:02
also when you become a spouse that you really start to learn
43:06
who you are and you start to say, man, I, I want to, I want
43:10
to show up in a different way, in a different capacity for my
43:13
family. What have, what have been maybe
43:15
the top 2 lessons that you've learned over the years of, you
43:19
know, having your beautiful daughters?
43:21
What have they taught you about who you are as a father but also
43:26
as a man? You know, it's it's interesting
43:28
is like, I don't know how others thought, but I don't think I
43:32
expected to be the father of daughters only.
43:36
But looking back, I don't think I would have had it another way
43:40
because, you know, they're they're so unique.
43:43
They're so different. Oh my gosh, are they all
43:45
different. And the echoes of of myself and
43:53
my wife in them that the good and the not so good.
43:59
It really highlighted for me that there are a lot of areas
44:04
for me still to be healed. I never expected to have the
44:10
anger issues I did in many years.
44:13
It's like, and, and you know, it's one of those things where
44:18
you know, you, you, it's like how even in the moment, I'm
44:22
like, how am I getting this angry this fast at the same
44:27
moment as being uncontrollably angry?
44:30
It seems I'm also looking at myself going, this is an
44:36
outsized reaction. This is wrong.
44:38
I mean, they really forced me to address some things that I
44:42
didn't realize I had. And as much as I learned a lot
44:47
in terms of coming to grips, it's like, how do I, how do I
44:50
show up for them in their place? So I don't want to just show up
44:54
to them and say it's like, OK, this is how you go.
44:58
This is how you can move forward.
45:00
But at the same time, the thing that my father did, which I felt
45:04
was the most unhelpful thing for somebody who has a lot of ideas
45:07
and a lot of skills, was to say you can be anything you want.
45:10
Because if you're only good at one thing and you said tell them
45:12
you're going to be anything you want and they want to be that
45:14
one thing, then that's perfect. It's great.
45:16
But if you have interest in this and this and this and this and
45:19
you're good at this and this and this and this, saying you can be
45:22
anything you want, but you have to pick 1 is really hard.
45:26
So it's like my approach to them, it's been more like, help
45:30
me understand where you're OK, you're interested in this.
45:33
Here's what it takes to do that. And trying to say I didn't have
45:37
those stress testing pieces in my earlier life.
45:41
And so when I encountered them like a boot camp or in college,
45:45
always been prepared. It's like, how do I help them
45:49
push through that stress testing piece today?
45:51
How do I help them say it's like, look, this is part of who
45:55
you are. You're going to have to manage
45:57
this. You're going to have to learn
45:58
how to deal with this. It went from more than just
46:01
being a parent to being kind of a, a guide in some cases, not
46:07
just to like the path forward, but to themselves.
46:10
It's like how, how do I help them draw out in themselves who
46:12
they are? And then same with a spouse, you
46:15
know, it's like, you know, my wife and I have a, a rather
46:18
amusing story, which I, I don't know if we'll get into today of
46:22
we finally came to be a couple. But in doing so, the, the long
46:26
and short is that we were friends for over a year long
46:29
before we started dating really good friends.
46:32
We knew each other very well going into our engagement and
46:36
then marriage. So we started off as friends and
46:38
we came into this with a a full commitment of being tied to each
46:43
other forever. We didn't come into it with a
46:45
full understanding of what that meant.
46:48
And, you know, like my family, little more spicy, little more
46:53
open with contention, a little more open with loud words.
46:57
My wife's family and not so much, you know, that her parents
47:00
never fought in front of her before she was married.
47:03
They fought. They just never fought in front
47:05
of her. And and so she, I didn't know
47:10
how to handle that. And she didn't handle
47:12
confrontation well. And I was like, no, we need to
47:14
be confrontational in order to like, get it out in the open and
47:18
you come to a solution. And it just wasn't working.
47:21
And you know, this 23 years of effort, it's like we've gotten
47:27
so much better. And yet last Saturday we had a
47:31
fight over a silly thing. And before the night was over,
47:34
we resolved it and affirmed each other because we've grown.
47:41
And you know, it's, it's interesting how you can have all
47:45
the patients in the world with the idiots at work and come home
47:48
and have 0 patience with your spouse.
47:50
And it's still a mystery to me how that works.
47:53
Yeah, You know, it's always funny to me how many people I
47:55
meet. And from the outside, they look
47:58
perfect, like everything is together.
48:00
They never fight. And yet I know deep down inside,
48:03
they go home and there's fighting everyone.
48:05
Everyone has a clash. If if if you have an opinion and
48:08
your spouse has an opinion, there's going to be a clash at
48:11
some point, Right. You know, friction makes fire
48:14
and a spicy marriage. A man, there's a lot of fire.
48:17
I I remember Ken Davis, comedian, he was constantly
48:22
talking about how, you know, it's, you know, couples fight,
48:26
it's OK. He's like here's and you know,
48:28
he had this old couple come up to him after a concert or after
48:33
a concert and he's like, we married 62 years, never fought a
48:37
day. And he looks at the old white
48:41
woman, says, Ma'am, you are married to a carrot.
48:51
Oh man, I love that. Justin, I have loved getting to
48:55
go through your story for people to hear it.
48:57
I do have one more question for you here before we kind of wrap
49:00
up. You know, you truly are someone
49:03
that loves cooking. You love culinary arts.
49:07
You have a cooking YouTube channel and it's probably maybe
49:11
more in the retired section right now because of your time,
49:15
but it's something that you really love to do.
49:17
You love to learn, you love the looking at the different aspects
49:21
of cooking and how to make things elevated.
49:24
Something that you do with your kids is you're constantly
49:26
introducing them to new types of food, trying new foods of
49:29
different cultures. Like food is a huge thing in
49:32
your life. And there's something that I
49:34
really want to touch on that all of us understand, but maybe not
49:37
quite to the level that you understand it.
49:39
And that's this idea of salt. Salt, it's in a very important
49:43
thing to a lot of people, but we don't really think about it.
49:46
We just think about salt like you throw it in food and salt is
49:49
it makes it makes things better. We don't know really how or why
49:52
we do it, but it's just something we do.
49:54
And not a lot of people have studied, but I know that you
49:57
have. And so I'm curious, why is salt
50:00
important in food and why is it important in terms of life?
50:05
So salt, you know, can serve a number of functions in in our
50:10
food. You know, I think the first most
50:12
obvious thing is, is its role in changing the flavor.
50:15
And when we think of food, we think of salty, you know, adding
50:19
salt. You know, I don't take a bit of
50:22
salt. And I put it in my mouth and
50:23
it's like, wow, that's salty. Yeah, It's like it is salty.
50:26
But it we don't define it as a flavor distinct from salty.
50:31
But when I add it to a food, it doesn't make it salty.
50:35
It makes it more itself. It's amazing how like you have a
50:40
steak for say and you take that steak and you and you, you've
50:45
spent all this time, you've cooked it just to the perfect
50:48
temperature for, for doneness that you love.
50:52
And then you take a bite of that and it's like, oh, this is
50:54
really good. But you add a little bit of salt
50:56
to that. And then you take a bite and
50:58
it's like opens up everything. It's not saltier, but it's more
51:05
steak, more flavor steakier, more steakier.
51:09
Steakier. I don't like that.
51:10
I like it's more steakier. So it, yeah, it's very much,
51:14
it's very much an enhancer, a magnifier, an amplifier.
51:18
Too much is too much. I mean, you can put too much
51:21
salt and then it becomes inedible, you know.
51:23
And I think, you know, if we talked about it from our
51:25
personal lies, it's like, you know, if I'm being salt to
51:29
somebody, you know, you talk about salt and light and just
51:32
like, I want to be salt to somebody, you know, how am I
51:36
adding value to that? How am I being a plus in their
51:39
life? And am I overdoing it?
51:41
So I was like, I want to be a plus in their lives, but I don't
51:44
need to be too much of A plus in their lives.
51:46
It's like there there's a point. But let's start by just saying
51:50
was like, well, how much am I adding to them?
51:52
How much am I guiding them? You know, it's another function
51:56
of salt as a preservative. You know, historically, through
52:00
the eons, salt was used to preserve food.
52:03
You see it today, Bacon, It's salted, right?
52:08
It's one of its primary core purposes was being salted for
52:11
preservation sake. You look at preserved foods like
52:15
sauerkraut or Pickles. You know, Pickles can be
52:18
preserved in vinegar now, but classically they're preserved in
52:21
salt. Kimchi.
52:23
Preserved in salt. Yeah.
52:24
Brine, You know, salted meats that were dried and then
52:28
preserved that you could then do then use later when you didn't
52:33
have things like refrigeration to keep meat lasting more than
52:36
just that day. So for eons, salt was used to
52:41
preserve food. And in our own lives, salt is a
52:44
preservative as well. You know, it allows us to, you
52:48
know, if I'm being salty, it's like, you know, how am, how can
52:51
I, how can I bolster them up? How can I help prolong them if
52:56
I'm being a, a preservative, you know, am I encouraging them and
53:01
am I, am I bolstering them up if I'm, you know, if, if someone's
53:05
down, then you talked about depression earlier.
53:07
It's like, you know, it's like, so that third portion, the
53:11
supplies that that that we didn't get to, you know, that's
53:15
the spiritual aspect. And that spiritual aspect of
53:18
filling somebody's well is partially in the faith category,
53:23
but also in the relationships category.
53:27
How am I filling somebody up? How am I keeping them up?
53:30
And I have a friend, a dear friend who's going through some
53:33
hard times. And it's like, you know, how do
53:35
I help him walk through this hard time?
53:38
How do I, you know, pray for how do I support him, encourage him
53:43
through that hard time? So those are, I would say, 2 of
53:46
the, the major functions of salt.
53:48
You know, there are different types of salt.
53:51
You know, you have, you think of just sodium chloride, which is
53:54
the, the salty salt, the stuff we just add to our foods.
53:57
But you know, there's all sorts of different types of salts that
54:01
are used. MSG, monosodium glutamate is an
54:04
assault. You know, it's just pure
54:07
enhancer of meatiness flavor. You know, you have things like,
54:12
you know, Prague powder, which is used to preserve foods.
54:14
So there's all sorts of different ways you can add
54:17
different salts to, to to deal with it.
54:20
But yeah, it's there. There's a lot more to it.
54:23
And had we had more time, perhaps I could dive in more to
54:28
some of the there's. A reason I ask that can be used.
54:32
Like in it like, for example, like, you know, the the fact
54:35
that it changes the temperature, you know, of ice, you know, you
54:40
add salt water, you can cool it down.
54:41
That's the old way of making ice cream is like you'd add salt to
54:45
the ice and that made it lower the temperature down.
54:48
Yeah. So not sure how that applies to
54:51
our lives though. Well, I love it.
54:55
I just even the first two points.
54:57
Salsa is an enhancer and it preserves.
54:59
Those are two things I think we could all stand here today in
55:02
the world that you know, are you an enhancer?
55:04
Are you an enhancer of the people around you?
55:06
Are you salt in the way of are you, are you enhancing the
55:09
flavor of the people around you? Are you making their lives
55:12
better? Are you improving people's
55:14
lives? There's also this idea of the
55:16
preservation, right with salt, Are you preserving the people
55:21
around you? You know, sometimes the world
55:23
hits, sometimes the world will cut you down.
55:25
And are you someone that preserves that person?
55:28
Are you the person that comes in and, and brings them back up and
55:32
say, hey, this is who you are. This is who you were created to
55:34
be. And so I think it's a really
55:36
powerful lesson. And and there's a reason why I
55:38
asked it of you because I know that you love food.
55:41
I know that you love salt and I think all of us can take a note
55:45
from this to say, OK, so are we going to be salt today?
55:47
Are we going to enhance other people's lives?
55:49
And are we going to preserve the people that are around us and
55:52
encourage them in a way that they can truly stand and who
55:55
they were created to be? So Justin, I really appreciate
55:58
you coming on. This has been such an incredible
56:00
time to spend with you, for you to Share your story for all of
56:03
you listening. I want to thank you for
56:06
listening and I want you to make sure that you like subscribe to
56:08
share this episode with a friend, especially someone who's
56:11
going through a difficult time right now.
56:13
Be salt. Be light to them.
56:15
Share the episode to encourage them.
56:17
Until next time, remember to be more, see more, and experience
56:20
more.