Latest / I Am Wiser Podcast with Dr. Laura Purdy / Not Every Bad Outcome Is Your Fault

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Not Every Bad Outcome Is Your Fault · I Am Wiser Podcast with Dr. Laura Purdy

• 0:00
  Todd Westra: Let's not face our decision making or our position that we're in based off of our own decision making.
• 0:08
  Todd Westra: Because everyone's got the ability to choose how they treat us, how they deal with us, how they accept our goodness and and our and our badness, how they respond to us when we're saying.
• 0:23
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Welcome to the I am Wiser Podcast with the biggest question of health care and welcome to the collective wisdom of industry and I'm Dr.
• 0:33
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Marker, and here we explore the intersections of AI, care delivery, health.
• 0:39
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's about lived experience and real industry insights.
• 0:50
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Let's dive in and get wiser together.
• 0:53
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Hi, everybody, and welcome to today's episode of the I Am Wiser Podcast with Dr.
• 0:58
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Laura Purdy, where I explore the real stories behind groundbreaking innovations in the business landscape and the profound impact they have on people.
• 1:07
  Dr. Laura Purdy: On that note, I am delighted to welcome Mr.
• 1:11
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Todd Westra, the CEO of Growth Readiness and host of the Growth and Scaling Podcast, which I was on a couple years ago.
• 1:19
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Todd has dedicated his career to helping leaders of mid-sized companies, so that's me, realign their strategy, leadership, and execution to become truly growth ready.
• 1:29
  Dr. Laura Purdy: His growth readiness framework has empowered hundreds of executives to break through stagnation, rediscover alignment, and lead their organizations into the next stage of sustainable success.
• 1:41
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Welcome, Todd.
• 1:42
  Todd Westra: Well, thank you.
• 1:43
  Todd Westra: It's so good to see you again.
• 1:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Likewise.
• 1:47
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So the last time we met was when I was on your show in 2023.
• 1:52
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's been almost two and a half years.
• 1:54
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And I'm sure a lot has changed and happened in the world of Todd over the last few years.
• 2:00
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So yeah.
• 2:00
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Tell us where where are you at?
• 2:02
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What's going on?
• 2:03
  Dr. Laura Purdy: How has your life evolved in these last couple years?
• 2:06
  Todd Westra: You know, these last five years have been weird.
• 2:08
  Todd Westra: And the last two and a half have been pretty, pretty awesome, I would say.
• 2:12
  Todd Westra: Um in terms of like reflecting on where I've been and where I'm going and what what I'm doing with my life, you know, I've got uh, I mean, in the last two and a half years, I've had two kids leave the house, which is great.
• 2:23
  Todd Westra: Um hey, you know what?
• 2:25
  Todd Westra: Pause for just one second.
• 2:27
  Todd Westra: I apologize.
• 2:27
  Todd Westra: Yeah, literally just got a bloody nose, like as I'm talking.
• 2:30
  Todd Westra: Oh no.
• 2:31
  Todd Westra: Oh, look, I got on my shirt.
• 2:33
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Ah no.
• 2:35
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh my gosh.
• 2:37
  Todd Westra: Sorry, embarrassing.
• 2:39
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It happens.
• 2:40
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Listen, I have five children and I'm married to a surgeon, so there's there's no shortage of blood in my life.
• 2:47
  Todd Westra: Hey, give me one second.
• 2:48
  Todd Westra: I'm just gonna grab a shirt.
• 2:49
  Todd Westra: One second.
• 2:49
  Todd Westra: Of course.
• 2:50
  Todd Westra: I'm so sorry.
• 2:52
  Todd Westra: That is like so happens.
• 2:54
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Go, go, go, go.
• 2:55
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Listen, I I am the least, I am the last person to be concerned about a random bloody note.
• 3:00
  Dr. Laura Purdy: One sec.
• 3:01
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'm here.
• 3:02
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You have allergies.
• 3:29
  Todd Westra: Okay, you're a you're an MD, so are you familiar with um HHT?
• 3:35
  Dr. Laura Purdy: H H T Yeah.
• 3:37
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No.
• 3:39
  Todd Westra: Hereditary hemoglobin.
• 3:41
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh, hemorrhac oh really.
• 3:43
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Hereditary, yeah, yeah.
• 3:47
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh wow, that's really rare.
• 3:48
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Do you have that?
• 3:50
  Todd Westra: Uh I do, and it's not as rare as you think.
• 3:52
  Todd Westra: It's uh Really?
• 3:53
  Todd Westra: It's a one in five thousand people thing, but most people don't know they've got it.
• 3:58
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Why do you know you have it?
• 4:00
  Todd Westra: What's that?
• 4:01
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Why do you know you have it?
• 4:03
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Like somebody thought to look for it?
• 4:05
  Todd Westra: Uh yeah, one of my brothers like had a really, really weird, um he's got a really severe case of it.
• 4:12
  Todd Westra: And he like, he'll bleed out.
• 4:14
  Todd Westra: He'll like go into the hospital and get like three pints of blood.
• 4:18
  Todd Westra: Like he's literally almost empty.
• 4:21
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh my gosh.
• 4:22
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Hereditary hemorrhagic telangectasias.
• 4:26
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Yeah?
• 4:26
  Dr. Laura Purdy: H H.
• 4:28
  Todd Westra: And he'll telangictasias are pretty funky, and they um it for most people it it um it shows up as a bloody nose, but the fear is if you get a telangectasia in your lungs or your brain, you'll just go without knowing it.
• 4:45
  Todd Westra: You know what I mean?
• 4:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh, that's terrifying.
• 4:47
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So what do you have to get like frequent MRIs, or what do they do in the management of that?
• 4:52
  Todd Westra: You know, they're thinking just once in your lifetime really tells tells the story of what where it is and where it's gonna affect you.
• 5:01
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Do your kids all have it too?
• 5:03
  Todd Westra: Uh like half my kids have it, and my mom has it, and like two or three of my siblings have it.
• 5:10
  Todd Westra: So it's kind of a weird just like it hits and then it doesn't, and then it But when it hits, sometimes it just doesn't stop.
• 5:17
  Todd Westra: And so I'm I apologize.
• 5:19
  Todd Westra: I'm I'm keeping it G-rated, but um you poor thing.
• 5:25
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'm sorry.
• 5:26
  Todd Westra: It's taking a second here.
• 5:28
  Todd Westra: I think you're a doctor and like can understand this is just one of those weird body things, you know?
• 5:34
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I get it.
• 5:34
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I I get it.
• 5:35
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I don't have HHT, but I get it.
• 5:38
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I mean, you know, life happens and everybody has medical conditions.
• 5:42
  Todd Westra: So everybody's got something weird, and this one is just the most frustrating one because I've been up on stage before and like oh crud.
• 5:51
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh no, what did you do?
• 5:53
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What did you do when you were on stage and your nose started bleeding?
• 5:56
  Todd Westra: You can literally, if you tilt your head back the right way, it'll all just go down your throat.
• 6:02
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Okay.
• 6:03
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I mean, I guess you have to learn how to accommodate for it, right?
• 6:08
  Todd Westra: It on a on a weird level, because I can tell you're like into weird body stuff, you know?
• 6:13
  Todd Westra: Like you can literally, um, when it's bad, you can feel each sinus fill with blood as you're.
• 6:22
  Todd Westra: Oh my gosh.
• 6:24
  Todd Westra: Oh my gosh.
• 6:25
  Todd Westra: It like will literally go like here, here, here, here.
• 6:31
  Dr. Laura Purdy: All of your sinuses.
• 6:32
  Dr. Laura Purdy: That's hard.
• 6:33
  Todd Westra: And you just have like these stupid um clots that just need to come out as soon as you're done.
• 6:39
  Todd Westra: Yeah.
• 6:39
  Todd Westra: You know, it's just weird.
• 6:41
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And there's nothing you can really take, right?
• 6:43
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Because it's a blood vessel problem.
• 6:44
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's not like a real clotting problem.
• 6:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's not like hemophilia, it's not a platelit disorder, it's not a clotting disorder, it's a blood vessel disorder, right?
• 6:53
  Todd Westra: So it's a blood vessel disorder.
• 6:55
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What can you do?
• 6:56
  Todd Westra: You know, I I have like um I've done a lot of like study because the there's an HHG clinic here in Utah at the University of Utah, and um it but they don't really know anything, and so it's kind of one of those where like they're trying to figure it out, and so they're like, okay, it's gonna cost you $20,000 to do the study, and we're still trying to figure it out.
• 7:21
  Todd Westra: I'm like, shouldn't you be paying me to study my condition?
• 7:25
  Todd Westra: Like, I'm not gonna pay you $20,000 to study me.
• 7:29
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No.
• 7:30
  Todd Westra: Anyway, the the stupid thing is that um you know, so what I've done personally is I have been playing around with like uh I used to put like Vaseline in my nose to kind of keep it moist so that they wouldn't like crack open or whatever.
• 7:47
  Todd Westra: And um then I learned that Vaseline is literally petroleum jelly, and I was like, uh I didn't put that together.
• 7:55
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Well I'm literally putting like petroleum products into my body that will never dissolve.
• 8:00
  Todd Westra: So I actually started making my own like um lube, like my own like uh really concoctions significantly reduced my episodes.
• 8:15
  Todd Westra: Like I'm probably once or twice a week I get a bluttery nose, whereas it used to be like three times a day.
• 8:23
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And that's less.
• 8:24
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh god.
• 8:25
  Todd Westra: Yeah, yeah.
• 8:26
  Todd Westra: And so it's um I've just about got it killed here, by the way.
• 8:31
  Dr. Laura Purdy: That's okay.
• 8:32
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I mean, three times a day, that's that's really intrusive.
• 8:35
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I mean, you like you know it's gonna happen three times a day.
• 8:38
  Todd Westra: It's a it's a pain in the neck.
• 8:40
  Todd Westra: Like it it truly is.
• 8:41
  Todd Westra: And you know, the one brother that's got it really bad, he just had some major surgery to try and like I don't know what they did, but they went up and like uh it was more than a cauterization.
• 8:54
  Todd Westra: I think they like took something out, like some kind of um major blood vessel.
• 9:00
  Todd Westra: But he was like on an artery.
• 9:04
  Todd Westra: Like his was like, it was something crazy where they couldn't believe he was walking.
• 9:10
  Todd Westra: Like when he would come into the hospital for ER stuff, they're like, How are you even standing?
• 9:15
  Todd Westra: Like, how are you even awake?
• 9:17
  Todd Westra: And and he's like, I don't know, but they'd give him like three quarts of blood, and he'd be on his way.
• 9:25
  Todd Westra: And anyway, okay, I'm gonna change my shirt, I'm good to go.
• 9:30
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Okay.
• 9:30
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And uh what an adventure.
• 9:34
  Todd Westra: I'm so sorry.
• 9:35
  Todd Westra: I I seriously, like, you're not bothering me.
• 9:38
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'm good.
• 9:39
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Honestly, Todd, I'm just glad you're here.
• 9:42
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I don't even care.
• 9:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Listen, with the I'm sure you can relate to this, but with the high volumes of no notice cancellations and no shows, I'd rather you be here with a bloody nose than not be here at all.
• 9:56
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Okay, so our cancellation and no show rate is ridiculous.
• 10:01
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So I'm just happy that you're here.
• 10:05
  Todd Westra: Alright, one second, one second.
• 10:07
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No problem.
• 10:08
  Todd Westra: I think.
• 10:09
  Todd Westra: All right, I think I got it all off my face.
• 10:17
  Todd Westra: New shirt.
• 10:20
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Like all good businessmen, you just have to learn how to pivot, right?
• 10:23
  Todd Westra: Dude, I'm telling you.
• 10:25
  Todd Westra: It is the weirdest thing ever.
• 10:28
  Todd Westra: And I I uh I apologize.
• 10:31
  Todd Westra: That that was not a little one either.
• 10:32
  Todd Westra: That was like a I probably lost a few cups.
• 10:36
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh, like a crime scene.
• 10:38
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh, that's terrifying.
• 10:39
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Okay.
• 10:39
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Well, make sure you eat your spinach and your steak tonight, or whatever it is.
• 10:42
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You have to spinach and lots of water.
• 10:44
  Dr. Laura Purdy: There you go.
• 10:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Lots of water.
• 10:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: All right.
• 10:47
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Let's go.
• 10:48
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Well, listen, let's dive back in.
• 10:49
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You know, we'll cut all that stuff out.
• 10:50
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So, so we're to recap, we're catching up on the last couple years of our lives.
• 10:56
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Where have we been since then?
• 10:57
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What have we been up to?
• 10:58
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And most importantly, how are we wiser for it?
• 11:02
  Todd Westra: Right.
• 11:03
  Todd Westra: Okay.
• 11:03
  Todd Westra: Well, I will, I've got a good, I've been thinking about it.
• 11:07
  Todd Westra: Um, I have learned a couple things.
• 11:09
  Todd Westra: So here we go.
• 11:10
  Todd Westra: That's good.
• 11:11
  Todd Westra: Here we go.
• 11:13
  Todd Westra: All right.
• 11:14
  Todd Westra: So, yeah, last couple years have been super interesting for me.
• 11:17
  Todd Westra: I have been um on this journey where it COVID, you know, my my business got completely wiped out.
• 11:24
  Todd Westra: And I didn't share this with you when I was doing our interview, but I literally was transitioning because I went through a a one-week stage in 2020 where I lost about four and a half million dollars of revenue, and um it was like a kick in the pants.
• 11:39
  Todd Westra: And you know, I heard all over the place people were just booming during COVID, and here I was like, freak, I gotta sell my house.
• 11:47
  Todd Westra: I don't know, I don't know what I'm gonna do.
• 11:50
  Todd Westra: And I started interviewing CEOs, and I I literally, um, our podcast was me interviewing you as a CEO because I was captured, it was almost like a therapy session that I didn't know I needed.
• 12:03
  Todd Westra: And and what ended up happening is I had these awesome guests coming on saying, Hey, this is this is what I loved about growing my business.
• 12:11
  Todd Westra: This is what I love about uh, this is my biggest challenge, and this is what I'm gonna do to change it, and and this is what I recommend other people do with my problem.
• 12:18
  Todd Westra: And I was like, Okay, yeah, oh, I've had that.
• 12:21
  Todd Westra: Oh, oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 12:23
  Todd Westra: Yeah, that's my problem too.
• 12:24
  Todd Westra: Yeah.
• 12:25
  Todd Westra: And I just discovered that like we're all kind of in this weird world of entrepreneurship where we think we're the only ones going through certain problems, and the reality is that we're we're one of many, as opposed to just being these lost on my own island and nobody knows what I'm going through type things.
• 12:44
  Todd Westra: And so, as I had these conversations in these interviews, I turned the podcast off and I was like, all right, I gotta make money, gotta feed my kids, I got I got seven kids.
• 12:53
  Todd Westra: I'm like, they're not gonna get fed without me.
• 12:56
  Todd Westra: And so I actually started um diving into more like agency work.
• 13:02
  Todd Westra: I started doing content production for some people, and yeah, I kind of loved my podcast.
• 13:07
  Todd Westra: I was like, man, how can I make money just doing podcasts all day?
• 13:10
  Todd Westra: And I didn't figure that part out.
• 13:12
  Todd Westra: I side note, I interviewed 60 podcast hosts and said, How are you making money?
• 13:17
  Todd Westra: And only three of them were making money on their podcast.
• 13:20
  Todd Westra: So I was like, okay, that's not my moneymaker, but it is a fun fulfillment thing.
• 13:27
  Todd Westra: And so I turned off the show, I came back to like reality, and I started building content for other people, and that was a fun business.
• 13:36
  Todd Westra: Well, of those people, I started getting asked to come in and do their marketing.
• 13:40
  Todd Westra: And I was like, well, yeah, yeah, let's.
• 13:43
  Todd Westra: So I started this fractional CMO thing, and I started being this fractional CMO.
• 13:48
  Todd Westra: Well, while I'm doing that, I'm like going into these businesses, and I was kind of targeting, you know, like like an 8 to 15 million.
• 13:55
  Todd Westra: That was kind of like the that was my minimum viable person I'd do work for, because I otherwise they're just not, they're still launching, right?
• 14:03
  Todd Westra: Like, I'm not there to launch business, I'm here to like grow businesses.
• 14:06
  Todd Westra: And so I go into these companies, and I'm literally thinking, okay, dude, I've heard that one before.
• 14:14
  Todd Westra: Like, like they're all looking at each other, these partners, and they're all like, okay, well, we're gonna sell this business in three years.
• 14:22
  Todd Westra: And then the other one's like yeah, yeah.
• 14:25
  Todd Westra: And then the other one's like, no, we're gonna go raise some capital, we're gonna buy all of our competitors.
• 14:29
  Todd Westra: And then the other one's like, no, dude, I've like got this awesome gig going, and I just want to have my kids come work with me.
• 14:36
  Todd Westra: They're teenagers.
• 14:37
  Todd Westra: I and I'm like thinking, oh my gosh, this is the most bizarro world I've ever jumped into, where every set of leadership teams were so diverse in their thinking of where the business is going that no matter what cool marketing strategy I was bringing to them, it wasn't gonna land because those are all different strategies.
• 14:57
  Todd Westra: Like raising money is a different strategy than than exiting.
• 15:00
  Todd Westra: And and trying to um hide stuff, hide your revenue and tax, you know, tax deductions is a whole different thing than trying to show I'm this guy this massive EBITDA, right?
• 15:11
  Todd Westra: Yeah.
• 15:12
  Todd Westra: So I'm like, I'm like my head spinning, and and I took on three fractional CMO roles, all three had the same, same, exact same condition.
• 15:21
  Todd Westra: And you're a doctor.
• 15:22
  Todd Westra: I'm looking at these these companies, these entities, going, dude, do you realize that you're all over the place?
• 15:31
  Todd Westra: And you're no matter how cool your sales director is, and no matter how cool your product guy is, no marketing strategy is gonna encapsulate what you're trying to do unless we fix that problem first, right?
• 15:44
  Todd Westra: And so I started thinking and I started thinking about my podcast, and I and I said, you know, I need to kick the podcast back on because I need more case studies.
• 15:53
  Todd Westra: And so I literally turned my show back on and I started asking better questions and I started like diving deeper.
• 15:59
  Todd Westra: Like, hey, if there were two things you could tag to your latest growth or your biggest growth, what are those two things?
• 16:07
  Todd Westra: And the conversations got much more interesting and they got a little more exciting, and I started kind of capturing this stuff and I started building a framework, and I was like, I think I've got this growth thing dialed in because everyone's got the same problems, and and I think I can solve it.
• 16:25
  Todd Westra: So I tried doing it in a in a workshop format, and that was kind of fun, but it was hard.
• 16:32
  Todd Westra: And then I started doing some one-on-ones, and I actually took on another three or four fractional CMO roles, and those taught me the same lesson, but I was actually able to fix it better, and I was able to find that alignment.
• 16:45
  Todd Westra: And so, Laura, like here I am um launching this cool product called growth readiness.
• 16:51
  Todd Westra: And my whole question I ask everyone is like literally, like, if you if you had the wish of your heart, if an investor came in today and said, you know what, Laura, you're doing such an awesome job with your business.
• 17:03
  Todd Westra: How much money do you need to take it to the next level?
• 17:06
  Todd Westra: Just name your number, and I'm gonna give it to you.
• 17:09
  Todd Westra: And if I give it to you, what are you actually gonna like, Laura?
• 17:12
  Todd Westra: If if I gave you $10 million today and you said, Todd, I need $10 million to do this cool thing that I think I could do, really cool, and I gave it to you.
• 17:21
  Todd Westra: Would you actually deploy it?
• 17:23
  Todd Westra: Or would you just be like, oh crap, I gotta figure out how I'm gonna do this, right?
• 17:27
  Todd Westra: Oh, I would be terrified.
• 17:28
  Todd Westra: I would go, oh totally, totally.
• 17:32
  Todd Westra: So that's where I keep running into this thing of like, are you growth ready?
• 17:36
  Todd Westra: And people just kind of chuckle, oh, that's cute.
• 17:38
  Todd Westra: No, like really, like, are you?
• 17:40
  Todd Westra: Like, are you?
• 17:41
  Todd Westra: Are you?
• 17:42
  Todd Westra: And so that's the name, Laura.
• 17:44
  Todd Westra: It's been fun, it's been so fun.
• 17:47
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Wow, that's exciting.
• 17:49
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So it has been weird.
• 17:50
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You've had some devastation, you've had some loss, you've had some struggle, you've had some wisdom, you've had and look at this big smile that you still have on your face, despite all of that.
• 18:01
  Todd Westra: You know, regardless, my wife still loves me, my kids think I'm pretty cool, and um, you know, I don't know.
• 18:08
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What more could you want, right?
• 18:10
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What more could you want?
• 18:11
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So, one thing that I heard you say, which points me in the direction of wisdom, is you learned how to ask better questions.
• 18:19
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And that's pretty cool.
• 18:20
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I do a lot of consulting, I still do a lot of work in telehealth with small businesses, non-position-owned businesses.
• 18:25
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And I know what you mean when you say you learn how to ask better questions.
• 18:29
  Todd Westra: Yeah.
• 18:30
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Tell me a little bit about the wisdom behind learning how to ask better questions.
• 18:34
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What's what's on the other side of that?
• 18:36
  Todd Westra: Well, as you know, as we get older, it's like um people expect you to know more.
• 18:46
  Todd Westra: You know, I I've I've had in the last uh since 2018, I've had, you know, um five kids uh four kids now move out of the house.
• 18:56
  Todd Westra: And um, you know, some of them are out earning uh the last few years of mine.
• 19:03
  Todd Westra: And I'm like, okay, you're cool.
• 19:06
  Todd Westra: Um, that's really awesome.
• 19:08
  Todd Westra: And and I and I started kind of reflecting on like I turned 50 this year, and as I turned 50, I was like, holy crap, man, what where am I?
• 19:20
  Todd Westra: Like what what have I learned?
• 19:22
  Todd Westra: And I think that this this whole transition to turning 50 has been the weirdest year of my life.
• 19:27
  Todd Westra: And and as I as I kind of came out of that, Laura, it it became a game of like I've done some really amazing things in my life.
• 19:37
  Todd Westra: I've had $100 million years, I've had, you know, multi-million dollar losses, I've had like you know, all these kids, I've had kids get married, I've uh, you know, I'm the grandfather to a grandpuppy.
• 19:50
  Todd Westra: I mean, who could want more there?
• 19:52
  Todd Westra: You know, but like all those little things have led me to think if I'm not asking the right questions, how can I impart the wisdom to my kids?
• 20:00
  Todd Westra: And and I've come to also recognize people that ask me really good questions, I appreciate it more.
• 20:07
  Todd Westra: And I don't, I never did before.
• 20:09
  Todd Westra: It was always like, well, why do you want to know?
• 20:11
  Todd Westra: And it's now it's like, huh.
• 20:13
  Todd Westra: They probably actually want to know something deeper than that question, right?
• 20:17
  Todd Westra: And that's where I think this whole I am wiser show that you're doing is so inspirational.
• 20:23
  Todd Westra: I think that as we age and as we learn, we kind of want to deflect that to the next set of people coming into where we've been.
• 20:33
  Todd Westra: And it's like, how do I help them not make idiot decisions that I did?
• 20:40
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I made idiot decisions.
• 20:42
  Dr. Laura Purdy: But I would rather people learn from me, from you, from us.
• 20:50
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I tell people, don't be like me.
• 20:52
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Learn from me.
• 20:53
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Please don't be like me.
• 20:54
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's exhausting, and you have to get a lot of lawyers to help clean up your your your missteps or you're overly trusting of people who then exploit you or try to.
• 21:06
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You know, don't, don't, don't be like me, learn from me.
• 21:08
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And that's why, that's why we're here, right?
• 21:10
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Because someday my kids, my grandkids are gonna go find this podcast somewhere and they're gonna be like, oh, oh, grandma's talking to that guy Todd about all these CEOs and the fact that none of them knew what they were doing, and maybe I'm gonna be a CEO and do better.
• 21:24
  Todd Westra: Right?
• 21:25
  Todd Westra: No, it's fascinating.
• 21:27
  Todd Westra: It's fascinating, you know, and and I just I just feel like um, you know, if there's if there's one thing that's changed since the last time you and I talked, is you know, I I felt like even at that time, even though I was nearing 50, I wasn't there yet.
• 21:41
  Todd Westra: And and it was something something in the year of being 49 that that just like I started reflecting, holy crap.
• 21:49
  Todd Westra: Like I remember people turning 50 and thinking, oh my gosh, how are they moving still?
• 21:56
  Todd Westra: You know, and and now that I'm there, I'm like, oh my gosh.
• 21:59
  Todd Westra: Gosh, how do I help my kids?
• 22:02
  Todd Westra: You know, like, you know, I saw my oldest, you know, this summer get a little dad bod going.
• 22:08
  Todd Westra: I'm like, be careful, those don't go away as fast as you think, you know.
• 22:12
  Todd Westra: And he's like, whatever, dad.
• 22:14
  Todd Westra: You know, but it's it's like you you kind of just want to teach those lessons of these are some of the biggest mistakes I've made.
• 22:23
  Todd Westra: Don't do that.
• 22:24
  Todd Westra: If you want to have a happier life, avoid these ones because those ones suck.
• 22:29
  Todd Westra: These ones are okay.
• 22:30
  Todd Westra: Like it's okay to learn by beating your head against the wall sometimes to start a business.
• 22:34
  Todd Westra: But it's not okay to trust someone with all your assets.
• 22:39
  Todd Westra: And you know what I mean?
• 22:40
  Todd Westra: Like, that's not good.
• 22:42
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Never, ever.
• 22:43
  Dr. Laura Purdy: They'll shut down your whole domain and take away your nickname and make you have to rebrand your entire company.
• 22:48
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And that's why we don't say America's favorite doctor anymore.
• 22:52
  Todd Westra: Wow, it sounds like a personal.
• 22:54
  Todd Westra: I just tapped a little vein there.
• 22:56
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And that might be someone that you were personally family friends with who later tries to sue you for breach of contract and it's really gonna wish they didn't do that.
• 23:05
  Todd Westra: Whoa, hypothetically speaking, that sounds horrible.
• 23:07
  Todd Westra: I'm just saying that in the work of a crazy thing.
• 23:13
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Holy crap, Laura.
• 23:14
  Dr. Laura Purdy: That's not very good.
• 23:15
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Life happens.
• 23:16
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Life happens, we get wiser, always have a good lawyer.
• 23:19
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Or two, or lawyers are good.
• 23:22
  Todd Westra: Lawyers are good.
• 23:23
  Todd Westra: You know, I would say one of the better decisions that I made, um, you know, it probably about a dozen years ago or so, uh, maybe 15 years ago, I started a an agency, an offshore agency doing um a lot of marketing work, both telemarketing as well as, you know, tons and hundreds of offer pages and all that kind of stuff.
• 23:44
  Todd Westra: And it was a really fun business, but operating offshore, I was like, dude, I I gotta cover my, you know, I gotta cross my T's, dot my I's, make sure I'm not gonna get like investigated by the government or, you know, something stupid like that.
• 23:56
  Todd Westra: And so I literally hired an in-house attorney.
• 24:00
  Todd Westra: Smartest move I ever made.
• 24:01
  Todd Westra: And and he protected me from so many lawsuits that I think I would have had otherwise.
• 24:08
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Yes.
• 24:08
  Todd Westra: I am wiser because I did that.
• 24:11
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And you know what?
• 24:12
  Dr. Laura Purdy: To all of you out there listening to this, going, oh no, what do I do?
• 24:15
  Dr. Laura Purdy: How do I not get sued?
• 24:16
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Like you might still get sued.
• 24:18
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Getting sued, you know, it it happens, it happens, but it can be absolutely minimized.
• 24:24
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It doesn't have to go farther than that first response.
• 24:27
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Uh, know the laws of the state in which you live.
• 24:30
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's actually pretty hard to serve someone in Florida because they have to serve you or an adult that lives in your house.
• 24:36
  Dr. Laura Purdy: But it's okay, right?
• 24:38
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Have a good lawyer.
• 24:39
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Everything's gonna be fine.
• 24:41
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Don't do illegal things.
• 24:43
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No, no, my lawyers are my biggest assets right now.
• 24:47
  Todd Westra: Okay, okay.
• 24:48
  Todd Westra: Here's another lesson, Laura.
• 24:50
  Todd Westra: Um, Dr.
• 24:51
  Todd Westra: Laura.
• 24:51
  Todd Westra: I'm ready.
• 24:52
  Todd Westra: Sorry, I'm ready.
• 24:52
  Todd Westra: Sorry, I keep I keep forgetting the title.
• 24:54
  Todd Westra: Okay, so Dr.
• 24:55
  Todd Westra: Laura, I I uh, and this is kind of a sad thing, and and I'll just say it, you know, um uh so one of my partners from from the 20 teens, uh early 20 teens, he um, you know, I was kind of the conscience of our operations.
• 25:12
  Todd Westra: We had we were doing a lot of online offers, and and with online offers, you can do a lot of shady stuff.
• 25:19
  Todd Westra: And and I was always like, that's gonna cause problems.
• 25:23
  Todd Westra: That's gonna cause and I had my attorney that was telling us, you know, don't do that, that's gonna get us all in trouble.
• 25:28
  Todd Westra: And and literally one day the FTC came in and shut him down.
• 25:34
  Todd Westra: And uh, like I'm not even kidding, like FTC, which by the way, hopefully they don't hunt me for saying this, but they are an interesting organization.
• 25:44
  Todd Westra: And they hunted this guy down from a previous business he had.
• 25:49
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No offense.
• 25:49
  Dr. Laura Purdy: We love you, but yeah.
• 25:52
  Todd Westra: I am wiser because I avoid FTC.
• 25:54
  Todd Westra: Um there you go.
• 25:55
  Todd Westra: There it is.
• 25:56
  Todd Westra: And he had done something prior to our business relationship that they were like keeping their eye on him type of a thing.
• 26:03
  Todd Westra: And we literally launched an offer that did $100 million in six months, and it was an amazing weight loss pill.
• 26:09
  Todd Westra: And it was just like, whoa, we rode this way with Dr.
• 26:12
  Todd Westra: Oz, and it was like phenomenal.
• 26:14
  Todd Westra: Like we were just all just counting money and just like, yeah.
• 26:18
  Todd Westra: And it was the coolest offer.
• 26:21
  Todd Westra: Well, FTC comes in and literally froze all assets, all of it.
• 26:25
  Todd Westra: I had like a million plus dollars in invoices I still need to get paid.
• 26:29
  Todd Westra: Like it was just like, it was just stuff all over the place.
• 26:32
  Todd Westra: And I was like, okay, I've got 400 employees that I need to go manage and take care of while we sort this out.
• 26:39
  Todd Westra: Can you release some funds to me as a vendor?
• 26:42
  Todd Westra: And they're like, Yeah, tell us what you know.
• 26:45
  Todd Westra: And anyway, yeah.
• 26:47
  Todd Westra: Sure.
• 26:48
  Todd Westra: We continue to do that.
• 26:49
  Todd Westra: I walked the FTC through the whole operation of what we were doing, and they were like, Yeah, that sounds legit, but we need to investigate.
• 26:55
  Todd Westra: So it turned into a four-year legal battle, and it was a joke.
• 26:58
  Todd Westra: And and anyway, we continued to do some work together while that was all happening.
• 27:03
  Todd Westra: And then finally I was just like, you know, I'm out.
• 27:05
  Todd Westra: I'm gonna go do some something different.
• 27:07
  Todd Westra: And so I left in 2018.
• 27:09
  Todd Westra: Well, um, a year and a half ago, I see pop up on my newsfeed um, you know, this big arrest in in Utah that they had found these, you know, this ring of illegal whatever, you know, money laundering kind of stuff.
• 27:27
  Todd Westra: And I'm like, oh no.
• 27:29
  Todd Westra: Let me see if it is.
• 27:30
  Todd Westra: So I look, and sure enough, it's my old partner.
• 27:33
  Todd Westra: Well, Laura, this this good friend of mine like was so determined not to go to jail that he took his life this summer.
• 27:42
  Todd Westra: And just a month before they were gonna read the verdict of whatever they did, and I don't, I wasn't involved in any of it, just you know, I'm playing.
• 27:52
  Todd Westra: But um literally, business can cause so much stress and burden, just do it the right way.
• 28:00
  Todd Westra: And and and that's where I remember meeting with them in like 2020, and I was like, dude, you don't have to do offers the way that you've been doing them.
• 28:11
  Todd Westra: You can do offers very clean, you can do it the right way and do it legally.
• 28:16
  Todd Westra: You've already been investigated by the FTC.
• 28:18
  Todd Westra: I'm sure you're on a radar somewhere.
• 28:20
  Todd Westra: Yeah, don't do stupid things.
• 28:22
  Todd Westra: And and literally it just turned into stupidity.
• 28:25
  Todd Westra: And so that's where I really just feel like you've gotta like dial into stop, you know.
• 28:32
  Todd Westra: I am wiser because I don't do illegal things.
• 28:35
  Todd Westra: I am wiser because I don't even get close to that edge of doing illegal things.
• 28:39
  Todd Westra: And that's one thing that as a as this 50-year-old guy who's done nothing but entrepreneurialism my whole life, don't do stupid stuff.
• 28:47
  Todd Westra: Like be careful who you do business with, and and don't just assume that everyone has your best interest in mind because there's a good chance that they could just take your entire brand away from you, right?
• 28:58
  Todd Westra: And you're screwed.
• 29:00
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It happens, it happens.
• 29:02
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And I'll tell you one of the things that I've learned over the last few years, because I've been the victim of federal identity theft multiple, multiple, multiple times.
• 29:12
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Actually, the first time that I found out that I was a victim of federal identity theft was like a year before I met you.
• 29:17
  Dr. Laura Purdy: We're talking years, this stuff's been going on because doctors' NPI numbers are public and anyone can find them.
• 29:24
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And if you're multi-state licensed, which I was and still am, you can become a target.
• 29:30
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Holy shit.
• 29:31
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And it is always, yeah, but you're but but I hear you when you say don't do stupid stuff.
• 29:37
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Know what the laws are and know how to follow them.
• 29:41
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Because if there's one thing I've learned, and I'll tell you how I'm wiser, if people do crimes as you, you cannot be held responsible for someone else doing something wrong with your information, with your name, with your likeness, with your image, with your company, with your brand.
• 29:59
  Dr. Laura Purdy: If you are doing the right thing, then you're doing the right thing and you don't have to worry about getting in trouble.
• 30:05
  Dr. Laura Purdy: In fact, you can help.
• 30:06
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You can help those.
• 30:07
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I just had, I just found out about a new one yesterday.
• 30:09
  Dr. Laura Purdy: There's like five or six lab companies in California that have been doing COVID tests and billing it to Medical under my NPI number.
• 30:17
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And I have never once in my entire life ordered a COVID test for insurance.
• 30:22
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You can go buy them at one point.
• 30:24
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh my gosh, if you want to.
• 30:26
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Oh my gosh.
• 30:27
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Know the laws, know how to follow them, know not to break them.
• 30:31
  Todd Westra: And just avoid any sign of stupidity if you can help it.
• 30:36
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You know what?
• 30:37
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I had another one just I would say um last month.
• 30:40
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I got a pitch from a staffing agency, and they said, Oh, we're looking for a client, they're gonna pay you $10,000 a month, which that's a red flag.
• 30:48
  Dr. Laura Purdy: If it sounds too good to be true, you know, it probably is.
• 30:51
  Dr. Laura Purdy: We're looking for a doctor who will sign off on all of these assessments done by the nurse practitioner, and then they're gonna bill health insurance under your name as the doctor.
• 31:02
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And I wrote them back and I said, that is illegal.
• 31:05
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And if I were you, I CC'd my attorney.
• 31:08
  Dr. Laura Purdy: First thing I did was I CC'd my attorney, and I said, That is illegal.
• 31:11
  Dr. Laura Purdy: If I were you, I should I would recommend disassociating yourself from that client right away, getting your own legal counsel and understanding that the things that you are propositioning me to do are federal crimes.
• 31:23
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Goodbye.
• 31:25
  Todd Westra: Amen.
• 31:26
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I never heard from them again.
• 31:27
  Todd Westra: Yeah, I would think not.
• 31:29
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No, never heard from them again.
• 31:31
  Todd Westra: So what a mess.
• 31:33
  Todd Westra: Yeah, no.
• 31:33
  Todd Westra: So in other words, like you're learning things, I'm learning things.
• 31:38
  Todd Westra: The big question mark though is how do you get that generation to actually listen and appreciate these experiences?
• 31:47
  Todd Westra: Because a lot of them just feel like I've uh I'm different.
• 31:51
  Todd Westra: I'm gonna learn this on my own.
• 31:54
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Well, I hope, I mean, this is what I will tell you.
• 31:57
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I know that my own children who live in my house, every single time, every single day that something like this happens, I tell them.
• 32:06
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Ooh, I'm I just told them yesterday, I'm on the phone with the regulator.
• 32:09
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Somebody, somebody's committing fraud.
• 32:11
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'm not ashamed of it, I'm not embarrassed about it.
• 32:14
  Dr. Laura Purdy: When I got regulated, so I did get regulated in 2023.
• 32:18
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I don't know if we talked about it, but I was in the process of getting regulated that year in May of 2023.
• 32:25
  Dr. Laura Purdy: There was a um, how would you say, there was a dispute in Mississippi over whether you could do a video chat or a text-based chat to establish doctor-patient relationship for cash pay.
• 32:38
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I know it sounds so ridiculous.
• 32:40
  Dr. Laura Purdy: But in most of the states in the United States, you can do a chat-based visit and in single digit less than 10, they mandate you to do video for cash pay.
• 32:49
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And my lawyer will still say that if you interpret the law most strictly as the way it was written, we should have been able to do video.
• 32:57
  Dr. Laura Purdy: But they, or we should have been able to do chat.
• 33:00
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So they brought me to administrative court.
• 33:02
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I was like throwing up in the bathroom.
• 33:04
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I was so I was just a wreck.
• 33:05
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I was beside myself.
• 33:06
  Dr. Laura Purdy: They raked me over the coals for two and a half hours.
• 33:09
  Dr. Laura Purdy: They thanked me for my service, of course, because they're all patriots.
• 33:12
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And um, and then they disciplined me.
• 33:15
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And then they waited 32 days to sanction me so that by the time I got sanctioned, I would be outside of the reporting timelines for all of the rest of the states.
• 33:24
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You're kidding me.
• 33:25
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No, I promise you, this happened um in 2023.
• 33:30
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And so one of the things that I have done when it comes to kind of sharing with the next generation, I am very verbal about what has happened.
• 33:39
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I released a press release saying this is what happened.
• 33:42
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I tell everybody that I can about it.
• 33:45
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'm actually going to be filming um a five-part course in a couple months.
• 33:48
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'm filming a course for doctors.
• 33:50
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Okay, so you get reported to the medical board falsely, unfairly.
• 33:54
  Dr. Laura Purdy: People are coming after you, your name is getting slandered.
• 33:57
  Dr. Laura Purdy: What do you do?
• 33:59
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And I hope that I hope that by bringing these dialogues out into the open and letting people know this can happen to anybody.
• 34:05
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And just because you get in trouble doesn't necessarily mean that you are in trouble.
• 34:10
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And it doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with you.
• 34:12
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Because sometimes people do get targeted.
• 34:14
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So I hope that talking about it helps.
• 34:17
  Todd Westra: And and the same thing goes with with business ownership.
• 34:20
  Todd Westra: You know, I I have had um, you know, since since my recovery of COVID, um in my business growth, I've had so many weird experiences with with clients who felt like you know they didn't need to pay me anymore.
• 34:35
  Todd Westra: And so they just didn't.
• 34:37
  Todd Westra: And and like like very serious things where I'm out cost of employees and teams and all this stuff.
• 34:43
  Todd Westra: And then they're like, yeah, you know, I decided not to go that path.
• 34:46
  Todd Westra: And it's like, well, we did all the work, and and it's not my fault you guys don't know where you're going, you know, and that this leads back to my new solution set, right?
• 34:55
  Todd Westra: But my kids, I've been I've been very open with my kids about, okay, so what do contracts mean?
• 35:02
  Todd Westra: Does it mean you're safe and protected?
• 35:05
  Todd Westra: No, they do not.
• 35:08
  Todd Westra: It means pick your pick your clients better, pick your employer better, pick people who you know you can trust.
• 35:16
  Todd Westra: And and unfortunately, um, you know, I I tend to get pretty excited by cool opportunities and and you know, like uh, hey, this could be a multi-billion dollar thing.
• 35:25
  Todd Westra: I'm in, you know, and you get signed up and you're over there helping them, and all of a sudden you're out, and your contract doesn't really mean anything sometimes.
• 35:33
  Todd Westra: And so there's a lot of stuff to it that that so much of the wisdom that I'm trying to impart to my kids, like you, in telling other doctors and your kids about like this just happened.
• 35:46
  Todd Westra: I would say as a parent, don't be afraid to tell your kids what is happening because they gotta know why their ski pass isn't showing up in time for the ski season, right?
• 35:55
  Todd Westra: Like, I just got hosed about 300 grand last month, and I really can't recover in one month, you know.
• 36:03
  Todd Westra: So let's move on to the next thing, you know.
• 36:06
  Todd Westra: So it's on we go.
• 36:07
  Todd Westra: Those kind of things happen, and I think that to your point, um, we all become wiser when we don't try to to hide those things that we're ashamed of, and we just talk about it and say, holy crap, what would you do?
• 36:22
  Todd Westra: I mean, I know I know the seventh grade locker hallway is a little bit stressful, but like imagine where I'm at.
• 36:28
  Todd Westra: What what do you think I should do?
• 36:30
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I agree completely.
• 36:31
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Uh pause one second.
• 36:33
  Dr. Laura Purdy: The I think the computer got unplugged.
• 36:35
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I can see the I can see that it's gonna die.
• 36:38
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Sharon, can you hear me?
• 36:40
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I don't know if Sharon's there.
• 36:45
  Todd Westra: Sharon's there.
• 36:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: We're just running, Sharon, if you can hear me, we're just we're just running a little bit behind.
• 36:50
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'm sorry about that.
• 36:51
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I would say less than 10 minutes.
• 36:57
  Dr. Laura Purdy: No problem, Sharon.
• 37:01
  Todd Westra: I had a medical emergency.
• 37:04
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Yeah.
• 37:04
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Thank you.
• 37:08
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Okay.
• 37:11
  Todd Westra: I can say that, right?
• 37:12
  Todd Westra: I had a medical emergency.
• 37:14
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Whatever you want to say, that's your medical emergency that you had.
• 37:18
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So, okay, so what we got it plugged in?
• 37:20
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Okay, perfect.
• 37:20
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I just didn't want the computer to die.
• 37:22
  Dr. Laura Purdy: So diving back in, I I agree with you.
• 37:24
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And I think one of the ways that I I am wiser is I've learned how to redefine and to reconsider what does embarrass me or what does a shame me.
• 37:35
  Dr. Laura Purdy: For sure.
• 37:35
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Because if you're in business, if you're in healthcare, and if you're in the media, you will become a target in any one of those things.
• 37:44
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You are a target.
• 37:45
  Dr. Laura Purdy: The more money you make, the more visibility you have, the higher up in the hierarchy of the chain of command, the food chain, the higher up you are in the food chain, the more eyes there are looking at you, the more um opinions there are in your direction, and the less people you have at the same level as you to kind of have your back, right?
• 38:06
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And and I've really had to, I've been defamed, I've been attempted to be blackmailed, I've been attempted to be uh extorted, I've had my identity stolen so many times, I've been betrayed, I've been uh I've one time I actually thought I had been poisoned, if you can believe that.
• 38:22
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I mean, it's yeah, it's been wild.
• 38:25
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I've had um patient lists stolen, I've been like publicly defamed, privately defamed.
• 38:31
  Dr. Laura Purdy: My husband's been defamed to his boss by uh people who worked for me, which is crazy, right?
• 38:38
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And and what I've learned is that I have had to first of all be humble and to not have an ego about these things at all.
• 38:45
  Dr. Laura Purdy: There's really no room for for ego, and you have to be humble and understand that these things don't have to be embarrassing.
• 38:53
  Dr. Laura Purdy: They are common things that happen to people in these types of circles.
• 38:58
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And redefining the way I think about shame, embarrassment, and honesty, authenticity, and transparency, I think can help inspire and motivate people not to make these same mistakes.
• 39:12
  Todd Westra: Right, right.
• 39:12
  Todd Westra: Well, you know, you bring up a point that I think I think will kind of connect all the dots of what we've been talking about.
• 39:18
  Todd Westra: And that is, you know, when I um I do a lot of family history research.
• 39:23
  Todd Westra: I I find it super fascinating.
• 39:25
  Todd Westra: I I've got like, you know, like most Americans, I'm like a quarter Dutch, a quarter German, and then like half a bunch stuff, you know.
• 39:32
  Todd Westra: Sure.
• 39:33
  Todd Westra: And so I think it's really cool to kind of connect the well, I there's this family picture of my great-grandma.
• 39:38
  Todd Westra: I actually have my grandma, she was about three years old, um, with her mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother in South Africa.
• 39:45
  Todd Westra: And and I I love this picture.
• 39:47
  Todd Westra: I've always loved the picture.
• 39:49
  Todd Westra: Well, I just discovered like um two years ago, I was reading in a journal of of one of my the great-great-uncles or something like that, and he was talking about the death of the husband of my great-great-grandfather.
• 40:05
  Todd Westra: And apparently, you know, never knowing, yeah, I just always look at these pictures of black and white, they look so cute, and they're probably the nicest people, right?
• 40:12
  Todd Westra: Well, her husband was a drunk and he was abusive, and he would beat her, and all this stuff.
• 40:18
  Todd Westra: And and she was across the street when there was a house fire in their house, and she didn't go rescue him because she saw a better life.
• 40:26
  Todd Westra: And and I was just like, Well, whoa! That was a secret.
• 40:31
  Todd Westra: That was a secret that you would never know.
• 40:34
  Todd Westra: Yeah.
• 40:34
  Todd Westra: Moving to today, moving to today, we are in a day of social media, we are in a day of of kids learning things that that you and I didn't learn until we were much, much older.
• 40:45
  Todd Westra: And they're seeing these things happening.
• 40:47
  Todd Westra: And I think that like our generation, um, you know, we have to do a better job of being transparent and saying, life sucks.
• 40:59
  Todd Westra: You know, I I one of my kids was so mad about not being able to go to a sleepover.
• 41:05
  Todd Westra: And I'm like, yeah, none of your six siblings have done sleepovers because there's a reason.
• 41:09
  Todd Westra: And let me just tell you why it's not so stupid.
• 41:12
  Todd Westra: And you'll probably thank me later, you know?
• 41:14
  Todd Westra: And so it's like we have to be transparent as to why we make certain decisions we make and why we do certain things that we do.
• 41:21
  Todd Westra: And and when I do stupid things, I will flat out tell them, I'm like, yeah, that was a really stupid move by me.
• 41:28
  Todd Westra: Like, I should not have trusted that person.
• 41:30
  Todd Westra: And they look like, oh, you know, yep.
• 41:34
  Todd Westra: And so, you know, in in relevance to this, this connecting the dots of this show that you're doing, Laura, which I think is fantastic, is how do we become wiser?
• 41:44
  Todd Westra: We become wiser by acknowledging ourselves that that we are idiots sometimes, and that if we want people to not do the stupid stuff we did, let's let's not hide it.
• 41:55
  Todd Westra: Let's just be like, yeah, dude, like that deal was a killer.
• 41:59
  Todd Westra: That deal was amazing.
• 42:00
  Todd Westra: If you could replicate that, do that a hundred times, please, you know.
• 42:04
  Todd Westra: But but I think that this whole like mission you're on to define what is wisdom and and how do we push it forward, I think this is how we do it.
• 42:15
  Todd Westra: I think you documenting these stories is a is a fascinating journey.
• 42:19
  Todd Westra: I think it's gonna help people.
• 42:20
  Todd Westra: I think I think if anyone has any interest in in learning how to be an idiot, they can look really clearly close.
• 42:26
  Todd Westra: They don't have to look that far into most of our lives, right?
• 42:31
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I mean, the stories are there, right?
• 42:33
  Dr. Laura Purdy: If you want to know how to be an idiot, just listen to the stories.
• 42:37
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's kind of like that old show, like A Thousand Ways to Die.
• 42:40
  Dr. Laura Purdy: It's like a thousand ways to be an idiot.
• 42:41
  Dr. Laura Purdy: That's the subtitle of my show.
• 42:44
  Todd Westra: Right, right.
• 42:45
  Todd Westra: Seriously.
• 42:45
  Todd Westra: I think it's your subtitle.
• 42:47
  Todd Westra: I think I think you need to plug that in somehow.
• 42:49
  Todd Westra: It'll work.
• 42:50
  Todd Westra: Lesson being like, Why are you so interesting, you know?
• 42:55
  Todd Westra: And and and honestly, like again, I I hate to get super reflective, but like this year turning 50, it was like, oh my gosh, I got four kids out of the house.
• 43:06
  Todd Westra: I've got three left.
• 43:08
  Todd Westra: I've got a business that was I I had so many blessings during the previous 20 years of my life.
• 43:16
  Todd Westra: And now all of a sudden, like I feel like I can't do anything, and like I'm I'm hitting brick walls all over the place.
• 43:21
  Todd Westra: What lesson am I not learning?
• 43:23
  Todd Westra: Right.
• 43:24
  Todd Westra: And and then you got these kids asking questions of like, well, should I take this opportunity or should I not?
• 43:30
  Todd Westra: And it's like, go for it.
• 43:32
  Todd Westra: And they're like, well, yeah, I see you making opportunities and it's not panning out, dad.
• 43:36
  Todd Westra: And it's like, you know, and they're and they're right.
• 43:39
  Todd Westra: And I'm like, Come on.
• 43:40
  Todd Westra: And I'm like, yeah, you're right.
• 43:42
  Todd Westra: But you know what always works out is that when you learn the lesson and don't just look in the mirror and say, Boy, I'm an idiot, and you say, Okay, what parts of that experience am I an idiot for?
• 43:54
  Todd Westra: I landed a big contract, I did a lot of really good work, they chose not to pay me.
• 43:59
  Todd Westra: And am I an idiot for that?
• 44:02
  Todd Westra: Probably not as big as I made myself out to be.
• 44:05
  Todd Westra: You know what I mean?
• 44:06
  Todd Westra: And so that's where we gotta take lessons out of things that that you know, why do bad things happen to good people?
• 44:13
  Todd Westra: Because God gave us the gift of choice and a lot of people choose to be jerks.
• 44:18
  Dr. Laura Purdy: You know?
• 44:18
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Life.
• 44:19
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Right.
• 44:20
  Todd Westra: So let's not let's not base our decision making or or our positions that we're in based off of our own decisions only.
• 44:30
  Todd Westra: Because everyone's got the ability to choose how they treat us, how they deal with us, how they accept our goodness and and our and our badness, how they respond to us when we're stupid.
• 44:41
  Todd Westra: It makes a big part of what our end results are.
• 44:44
  Todd Westra: I love it.
• 44:47
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Yeah, I think you're right.
• 44:49
  Todd Westra: There's my wisdom, Laura.
• 44:50
  Todd Westra: I mean, I I don't know what else I lacking.
• 44:52
  Todd Westra: Too much deeper without getting emotional.
• 44:55
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I know.
• 44:55
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Lots of wisdom though.
• 44:57
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Todd, thank you so much.
• 44:59
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I I I love having these shows because I always feel wiser.
• 45:04
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And when I feel uplifted after a conversation, I know we've done it right.
• 45:08
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Because if I can feel uplifted here with monitors and lights and you know, being blinded and and wearing all this like silly makeup with like, you know, if I in these ridiculous shoes, if I can feel uplifted, then so will the people who are choosing to listen to this show because they want to feel uplifted.
• 45:27
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And so thank you for participating in this with me today.
• 45:30
  Todd Westra: Listen, you're elevating everyone around you by the show.
• 45:33
  Todd Westra: And and let's let's not pretend it's not a fact, but those shoes and and that sparkly getup you're in.
• 45:40
  Todd Westra: I mean, how can you not feel uplifted by that?
• 45:45
  Dr. Laura Purdy: That's the point.
• 45:46
  Dr. Laura Purdy: That's the point.
• 45:48
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Well, Todd, let me, I want to let you shamelessly plug yourself before we go, and then we'll we'll call it a day.
• 45:53
  Dr. Laura Purdy: But can you tell us if people are listening to you and they're like, that guy is really cool, whatever it is that he's doing, I want to be a part of that because I'm gonna learn how to not be an idiot just like him.
• 46:02
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Where can they find you today?
• 46:03
  Dr. Laura Purdy: How accessible are you?
• 46:05
  Todd Westra: I'm I'm almost everywhere at Todd Westra.
• 46:08
  Todd Westra: So if you just remember, I'm a double D Todd.
• 46:11
  Todd Westra: I mean that that that's different.
• 46:12
  Todd Westra: You know, single-d Todd's are a little different, but double D Todd Westra.
• 46:17
  Todd Westra: And uh, and you can find me anywhere.
• 46:19
  Todd Westra: I I I live a lot on LinkedIn, but I'm I'm growing more on X.
• 46:23
  Todd Westra: I feel like X is a is a much simpler environment to find a way to influence people and impact people.
• 46:30
  Todd Westra: And I got a YouTube channel, I've got I've done over 550 CEO interviews, and um and now I'm starting to like kind of impart my wisdom differently than just interview style.
• 46:40
  Todd Westra: And it's it's been very fun, it's been very rewarding.
• 46:43
  Todd Westra: So go to toddwestra.com.
• 46:44
  Todd Westra: You'll find all my links of whatever I'm up to.
• 46:47
  Todd Westra: And uh, and yeah, it's uh life is a beautiful thing.
• 46:51
  Todd Westra: Don't get don't let the crappy stuff that happens to you define who you are.
• 46:56
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I love it.
• 46:57
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I love it.
• 46:58
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Words of wisdom from ToddWestra today.
• 47:00
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Thank you so much, Todd.
• 47:01
  Dr. Laura Purdy: I'll see you soon today.
• 47:03
  Todd Westra: We'll see you later.
• 47:04
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Thank you for tuning in to the I Am Wiser Podcast, where each episode brings us closer to a wiser, more human approach to healthcare.
• 47:13
  Dr. Laura Purdy: If today's conversation inspired you or sparked new ideas, share it with someone who's ready to rethink healthcare.
• 47:20
  Dr. Laura Purdy: And if you have a story or innovation that could light the way for others, reach out.
• 47:26
  Dr. Laura Purdy: We'd love to hear from you.
• 47:27
  Dr. Laura Purdy: This space is yours too.
• 47:29
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Don't forget to follow, rate, and review us on your favorite platform.
• 47:33
  Dr. Laura Purdy: Until next time, stay curious, stay courageous, and stay wiser.