Latest / Christian Business Growth Podcast / Beyond the Noise with Kathy Pirtle

Transcript

Beyond the Noise with Kathy Pirtle · Christian Business Growth Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to the Christian Business Growth Podcast.
• 0:03
  I'm here with Kathy Pertle and she's gonna share her story about the outdoor world.
• 0:08
  So, Kathy, how did God get you into business?
• 0:11
  Well, uh Lyle, thanks for having me on this show.
• 0:15
  This is my very first time being on a podcast.
• 0:17
  I hope it doesn't show.
• 0:20
  how did God get me out into the wilderness or this business?
• 0:25
  Okay.
• 0:26
  Well, growing up, I grew up in the city in Kansas City, and my dad was a factory worker and he would get four weeks vacation, and we took all four weeks and we headed north to
• 0:39
  Canada.
• 0:40
  And that may sound like really luxurious and wonderful, but it was a cabin that was kind of desolated.
• 0:47
  Uh, had some friends that owned the cabin, and I think we paid them a minimal.
• 0:52
  I I remembered two or three hundred dollars we would sit down at the end of the week and pay them.
• 0:57
  But anyway, uh I fell in love with God and nature in Canada in a cabin with no running water, an outhouse.
• 1:06
  I was a huge tomboy growing up.
• 1:08
  I was
• 1:10
  I had two sisters.
• 1:11
  I was the middle and I was a huge tomboy.
• 1:13
  So for me, it was really heaven.
• 1:15
  It was absolutely heaven on earth.
• 1:17
  Uh we fished off the dock and then we went out in a boat as well.
• 1:21
  But my dad would go out by himself.
• 1:23
  So anyway, I just cut the eyeballs of walleye fish out, you know, and we'd get this little marble and I'd set them up in the the window of the cabin and let them dry out.
• 1:34
  And I'd go home with see how many a pillbox of how many.
• 1:38
  walleye eyes that I could get that would crystallize and harden as marbles.
• 1:42
  I've just always loved nature.
• 1:44
  And I started going to church on my own when I was young.
• 1:49
  My family, I they have pretty good morals, but we did not have faith.
• 1:53
  But I started going on my own uh from a friend that invited me.
• 1:57
  And so I fell in love with God.
• 2:01
  I love nature.
• 2:02
  I love sports.
• 2:06
  And then I got into teaching.
• 2:08
  I I had to choose what I wanted to do.
• 2:12
  and I really didn't honestly, I did not my dad always said, You need to go into conservation, you need to go into conservation.
• 2:19
  But honestly, I had no idea what even that meant or how you know, I didn't have a lot of help with that.
• 2:24
  And I don't blame him for that, it's just that's how it was.
• 2:26
  But so anyway, I went to college, I went to a Christian college, and there's one day we had to decide what we were gonna do.
• 2:33
  I had no idea.
• 2:34
  So I chose teaching.
• 2:36
  And enjoyed that for 16 years I taught middle school science.
• 2:41
  I loved it, I liked it, and then it's like I don't think I can do this the rest of my life.
• 2:46
  And so I had a son that suggested something else that I perhaps do.
• 2:50
  So I did that, uh, and built a business with that and have done that for the last 10 years.
• 2:56
  And that's been great.
• 2:58
  And I thought this will be what I do for the rest of my life.
• 3:01
  But I felt God tugging at my heart, uh
• 3:06
  Let me back up in the summers.
• 3:07
  Since I taught school in the summers, after my kids were mostly in college, this has been about 20 years ago, and one was still in high school.
• 3:15
  I started going out into the wilderness.
• 3:18
  I started going, and when I say wilderness, I I live on a farm and I get I get uh nature and I can get a I can drive down to the pond, walk down to the pond and be alone.
• 3:28
  But I really felt like I wanted to backpack.
• 3:31
  I'd never backpacked before.
• 3:33
  And I taught a summer school.
• 3:34
  class and I had a lady come in on backpacking.
• 3:37
  I thought this will be cool.
• 3:38
  And before she finished, I thought that's what I want to do.
• 3:41
  So I asked her, How do you do this?
• 3:43
  How do you start?
• 3:44
  And this was 20 years ago.
• 3:46
  And so she uh kind of told me, here's what you need to do.
• 3:51
  Here, you know, don't go alone.
• 3:52
  Don't do this.
• 3:53
  Don't do.
• 3:54
  And so anyway, I started really getting into backpacking.
• 3:57
  And I went, there was a girl that she and I kind of started off going together.
• 4:02
  And we'd do eight to ten days in Colorado.
• 4:04
  Um, we chose Long Long's Peak.
• 4:09
  I don't know if you know Colorado, but as our very first Fort Teener that we were gonna climb, which we knew nothing about Fort Teeners.
• 4:16
  And so, anyway, it's been a learning experience of of how I choose what mountain I'm going to, what mountain range.
• 4:22
  But we we would acclimate and just be in wilderness for about 10 days.
• 4:26
  And it was so hard, but it was so fulfilling to me.
• 4:30
  And so I just
• 4:32
  I really started liking it.
• 4:33
  And then she went on and did and I couldn't find anyone else to go with me.
• 4:37
  So Lyle, I stepped out in faith in two thousand thirteen and I thought I'm gonna do something big.
• 4:47
  And so my husband supports me in in this and he's like, Yes, do it.
• 4:52
  And I hiked the John Muir Trail in twenty eight days with four food drops and so I had all the food dro I'd I'd never and you know the internet I I mean
• 5:02
  It sounds crazy.
• 5:03
  I mean, there was a lot out there, but not as much as there is now.
• 5:06
  And so I knew nothing about it.
• 5:08
  So I got the Tom Harrison maps and uh ordered them and planned.
• 5:13
  And it was so much gave me so much joy to even plan for this.
• 5:16
  And so I planned it.
• 5:18
  And I did the John Muir Trail in 28 days.
• 5:20
  It was so hard, so difficult.
• 5:23
  But what I started finding, Lyle, when I was out there, I started finding who I was.
• 5:32
  Who I wasn't?
• 5:35
  And I'm not gonna say, wow, everything was clear and everything became wonderful all at once, but I started learning more about God.
• 5:43
  And I knew a lot about God.
• 5:45
  I mean, I've I've known God since a child, but I started learning how to depend on God.
• 5:51
  And then there's a thing called the three-day wilderness effect.
• 5:54
  And I didn't know about it when I started, but since then I've learned about it's called the three-day wilderness effect.
• 6:00
  And what happens is when you get away from noise.
• 6:05
  You get away from your schedule, you get away from phones, you get away, you start hearing things.
• 6:13
  and I don't mean audible hearing things, but you start hearing things in your spirit.
• 6:16
  You start feeling well, there's a lot to that, the wilderness effect, but I'll I'll just leave that for now.
• 6:25
  But anyway, I started um just realizing what life was about and what it wasn't about.
• 6:32
  And so every summer I would look forward to it.
• 6:34
  And I live in southwest Missouri.
• 6:36
  So like hiking and stuff's not like, let's go hiking and 100% humidity, you know.
• 6:41
  So, but in January, sometimes I'll go down to Arkansas and hike.
• 6:45
  But anyway, it was just more and more and more that I wanted to do.
• 6:49
  And then when I turned 50, it wasn't like, I'm turning 50.
• 6:53
  I I saw something in January.
• 6:55
  It was in Backpacker Magazine when they still had their magazine and it said, um,
• 7:02
  You can apply to go on um it's called Summit for someone.
• 7:07
  And I thought that's a good idea.
• 7:08
  And it and you would actually be taking the trip to um pay for a youth, an urban city youth, so that they could you they could get the equipment and then that those people
• 7:20
  could take them on that.
• 7:22
  But they were gonna choose uh I think eight people and you had to apply, they had to tell your your skill level, um
• 7:32
  physical level and all that.
• 7:33
  Well, anyway, I did get chosen to do that by the grace of God, I'm pretty sure.
• 7:37
  But so I went on that and it was climbing Mount Shasta.
• 7:41
  It was an ice climb and I could have never done that on my own.
• 7:43
  So the only reason I even say that part about Mount Shasta is that that alone, when I turned 50 and I did that on my birthday.
• 7:54
  It was on my birthday.
• 7:56
  I forgot that part.
• 7:56
  That's when I saw it in the magazine.
• 7:58
  I thought that's on my birthday.
• 7:59
  What a great birthday.
• 8:00
  that would be.
• 8:01
  And so I raised the money to do that, mostly paid for it myself because I didn't want to ask anyone for money to help me do something that I wanted to do, but it was for a good
• 8:09
  cause.
• 8:11
  And so it was on that when I came back, I felt so empowered.
• 8:14
  And it's like, you know what?
• 8:16
  I can do more.
• 8:18
  And I'm going to plan something next summer that's going to be epic.
• 8:21
  And I didn't know what it was, but I started hearing about the John Muir Trail and the Sierras and King's Canyon and
• 8:27
  California is a beautiful place that I saw pictures and it looked beautiful and it looked really hard.
• 8:32
  Well, it kind of didn't look hard because it was in pictures.
• 8:38
  But uh anyway, I got the Tom Harrison maps, uh did my research and I did that for 28 days and just have fallen in love with the mountains.
• 8:50
  Uh and I think
• 8:53
  in the Sierras, like once once you're in, once you're out of um Yosemite Valley, you see hundreds of people there, kinda like the Grand Canyon.
• 9:02
  You see so many people there.
• 9:03
  But then when you get in one or two days, you may see one or two people.
• 9:08
  One or two people.
• 9:09
  And that was the case.
• 9:10
  This has been two thousand thirteen, two thousand fourteen, and then I did it again in two thousand fifteen.
• 9:16
  And now I think I'm you you might see ten or fifteen people within a certain but it's um
• 9:23
  Two hundred and sixty-four miles.
• 9:25
  And I know there's young people that do it in ten days.
• 9:29
  most people it takes twenty-eight days, and it did me, took twenty-eight days with four food drops.
• 9:35
  Anyway, so how did this business now come about?
• 9:39
  This this business really w is a dream that's kind of taken I I mentioned those wilderness experiences because I it's like, okay, I like nature, I like wilderness, but what am I
• 9:50
  gonna do?
• 9:52
  You know, it just sounded so simplistic.
• 9:55
  But then when you put God in it, He starts putting things in your heart.
• 10:01
  And I I knew that I would like I didn't want to take women on a 28-day backpacking trip.
• 10:06
  I knew that, because that's hard and some people would end up hating it.
• 10:11
  But so two years ago, I was working with someone, a coach, and didn't even know I needed to coach.
• 10:19
  Well, I just thought, oh, I I I don't
• 10:22
  You know, but you know, everyone needs a coach, I've learned.
• 10:24
  Everyone needs someone.
• 10:26
  And we have God, yes, we have God.
• 10:28
  He's our coach.
• 10:29
  And we may have a good spouse that listens, but you need someone that's outside of you to help you see what you have in you.
• 10:36
  And this person did that for me.
• 10:38
  He started saying, Kathy, you're amazing.
• 10:41
  Look at all the things you've done.
• 10:42
  He and and then he started uh pulling things out of me.
• 10:47
  It's like, oh, and so
• 10:49
  Two years ago is when I believed Soul Excursions with Birth.
• 10:53
  It the name wasn't there yet.
• 10:54
  The name's been there for about a year and a half.
• 10:58
  But I didn't know how it was gonna look.
• 11:00
  Uh I didn't know what it was gonna mean.
• 11:03
  And I really didn't have when I say content, I don't mean like a curriculum.
• 11:10
  But I mean, how is it how am I gonna lead women into excursions or because I loved God and I loved self-development, I loved all of those things, but I didn't see how they could
• 11:22
  mesh.
• 11:23
  Well, a year ago in August, this August, so not even a year ago, a friend of mine said, I want you to meet Tom Ziggler.
• 11:32
  And it's like, why?
• 11:33
  Tom Ziggler, why?
• 11:35
  And she goes, I don't know.
• 11:36
  She goes, I just believe.
• 11:38
  that what you're talking about and what you have, you can pitch it to him or kind of share it with him and he might have an idea of something.
• 11:47
  And I said, okay.
• 11:48
  So I was really nervous.
• 11:51
  And I hadn't even read Tom's book, Choose to Win, which is crazy because I read all self help, development, all that thing.
• 11:57
  And I'd I think I'd listened to several audio books of of Zig.
• 12:01
  Not I think, I know.
• 12:02
  And then I'd read books before, but it'd been a while.
• 12:06
  So I met with Tom and Tom being his gentle, wonderful soul that he is, um, I kind of pitched the idea and I said, This is what I'm thinking, and I kinda wanna do this and kind
• 12:17
  of and I was really no clarity at all.
• 12:20
  I kind of and he goes, Why?
• 12:24
  I so I I said, Well, and I came up with something and he goes, I know, but why?
• 12:31
  And then he said, Let's meet again.
• 12:33
  And we had other things to but when I told him about this, he said it sound this I think this was on the second call.
• 12:39
  He said, It sounds to me like this is about transformation for women.
• 12:46
  And I thought about that.
• 12:49
  It's like, well, it could be, but who's gonna transform It's not gonna be me.
• 12:53
  But no, so I'm really guiding women into transformation.
• 12:57
  And that's so this last year, Lyle, I've been through um
• 13:01
  the ZLC program, which was great.
• 13:04
  And I thought, this will be and then I went through the choose to win um coaching program, which was so amazing for me personally.
• 13:13
  And then I got to take someone through here not too long ago and I got to see her transform.
• 13:18
  And it's like just by asking questions, just by asking her questions.
• 13:24
  And that's all they did for me is asking me questions.
• 13:27
  And it's it's pulling it out of yourself.
• 13:29
  And I know that sounds so elementary.
• 13:32
  But it's so true.
• 13:33
  You have to have someone on your side asking you questions that you're not gonna maybe ask yourself, or maybe you did ask yourself, but someone else puts a spin on it.
• 13:43
  So and then I went
• 13:44
  in our world today, we don't take time to process things.
• 13:48
  And you're talking about taking people out of their normal world, out into nature a little bit.
• 13:52
  They got a little bit of glamping, I'm sure.
• 13:53
  Um, but you're asking them to reflect on things and to process what God's doing in their lives.
• 13:59
  We ask questions, but we don't take time to answer those questions because we're busy going to the next thing.
• 14:04
  And you're saying separate yourself out and let God speak to you.
• 14:09
  Amen.
• 14:10
  That is exact that's beautifully said.
• 14:12
  That's beautifully said.
• 14:13
  And I think anyone can hear noise around them, but it takes intention to listen, like you're saying.
• 14:21
  And it takes courage to pursue what God has placed in you.
• 14:27
  and I don't think I I know there are women that do that.
• 14:30
  There there are people that do that, but I think all of us that do that would say just what you said.
• 14:35
  Yeah, we we may even listen, we may even hear.
• 14:39
  But to take time on that instead of like, I'll get to that later, to really go, no, these are questions.
• 14:44
  And so, yeah, this is what Soul Excursions has been birthed about.
• 14:48
  And I just had my first uh woman sign up on Sunday when I came home from church, and I don't know her uh at all, which is exciting to me.
• 14:56
  And she is so excited because she read the brochure and she said, This is what I need.
• 15:03
  She said, This is what I need.
• 15:04
  She's a professional businesswoman at a college and
• 15:09
  And it's this is for really for anyone that just, you know, I just love how God uses people that are different uh in our lives.
• 15:19
  You know, I've been around so many people that are doing so many different things than I'm doing, but yet we can we can glean from one another and learn from one another and grow.
• 15:28
  And that's in community.
• 15:29
  And I have not had that community until I got into the Ziggler, uh
• 15:34
  And it's not, I mean, I had my teaching friends and I had that community, but that was a whole different thing.
• 15:39
  But I'm talking about the community of growth-minded people that want to continue to grow until the day that God takes them out of this world.
• 15:47
  And so that's really soul excursions.
• 15:50
  and we're doing light excursions.
• 15:52
  We're not doing anything hardcore.
• 15:53
  And we're staying at a beautiful seven thousand foot Airbnb in Colorado, uh, where there's gonna be time, each woman will get their own space, their own bedroom, which I think
• 16:04
  For women our age, that's you know, we want that, or at least I do.
• 16:07
  And so I kind of curated it for like what would I want?
• 16:10
  And so we're gonna do a hike one day, paddle boarding on a remote, beautiful, amazing lake, and then another hike, and they're just soft, gentle excursions, but there's
• 16:22
  content, we're gonna eat great food, and this we're gonna see how it goes.
• 16:26
  And I I believe it's gonna be transformational for six women.
• 16:30
  I really do believe that, and God's put it on my heart.
• 16:34
  And I've told him in this last year, I've told him so many times, like I could be doing so many other different things, but this is what you've put on my heart to do.
• 16:43
  So the faith part, Lyle, you're asking me earlier about what my faith steps are or to encourage someone, just take baby steps.
• 16:55
  That's what I've been doing all along.
• 16:57
  I am taking baby steps.
• 16:59
  And this has been, I think it's been in the making for 20 some years.
• 17:03
  But the last two years, but the last six months especially, it's like I'm getting more downloads from God through being in a community with people that, you know, it's like, oh,
• 17:13
  that and so anyway.
• 17:15
  Yeah, that's your business growth tip is to be in that community with people.
• 17:18
  Kind of talk a little bit about that, how that's helping your business grow.
• 17:22
  Well, you know, when I first thought of that, it's like I don't want to I don't want to just get in a community where I can say, Hey, who do you know?
• 17:30
  But it's not like that at all.
• 17:32
  These people like you, you know, who knows?
• 17:36
  And and God n the neat thing about God is that He connects dots that we can't connect.
• 17:41
  We couldn't possibly connect dots, but there may be someone that says, Hey, I know I have a friend that
• 17:50
  This sounds like her cup of tea.
• 17:52
  It sounds like something she would like to do.
• 17:54
  Let me connect you with them.
• 17:56
  And they may not be in in this community that we're in, but that you know, people know God knows who needs it.
• 18:00
  And for what you do, you know, God knows the people that you need to interview for for reasons that I don't know.
• 18:07
  But God knows.
• 18:08
  And I believe that if our heart is after him.
• 18:12
  And we're seeking him and that he he wants us all to succeed in whatever he's called us to do.
• 18:19
  And I look at other people in my community and and think, oh, they could do anything.
• 18:26
  But I don't often look at myself and go, I could do anything too.
• 18:29
  And so that's I'm stepping into that as well.
• 18:33
  And but it's so important to be in a community of people.
• 18:36
  You could you pay someone to coach you, pay someone to be in a community and
• 18:42
  You know, if you don't have the money to do it, find a way because it's vital.
• 18:47
  And I God didn't mean uh for any of us to do this walk alone.
• 18:52
  You know, uh the the people around us, God uses anyway.
• 19:01
  And it's biblical.
• 19:02
  You see people, you know, Ruth and Naomi, you see Paul and Timothy, you see it all through scripture where God has used to put somebody to help somebody else along the way.
• 19:11
  And that's just how it expands.
• 19:12
  I mean, the twelve disciples impacted the entire world because they were in connection with Jesus directly.
• 19:18
  That's good.
• 19:18
  That's good.
• 19:19
  Yeah.
• 19:20
  And sometimes Lyle, and I haven't told told you this part and probably won't talk a lot about it, but I think, you know, I had childhood trauma.
• 19:28
  I had um a lot of childhood trauma.
• 19:30
  A lot of things happen, a lot of things in my life that have not been oh you know, wasn't raised in a Christian home.
• 19:38
  And but those I've never felt like a victim.
• 19:41
  And I've had several things, even in the last three years, that have happened to me.
• 19:46
  But I believe we're overcomers.
• 19:47
  I believe that with all my heart.
• 19:49
  And I believe that God can use all things together for good.
• 19:53
  He didn't cause those horrible things.
• 19:55
  He didn't cause.
• 19:56
  And I think there's other women that they've had things in their past.
• 19:59
  They've had things that that are all back there that are all they're supposed to be in the rearview mirror, but sometimes we keep them forward.
• 20:06
  And it's like God doesn't He doesn't want us to keep those things.
• 20:09
  He wants us to eyeball, eyes forward.
• 20:12
  I think it was in Jim Murphy's book.
• 20:15
  uh the latest one that he had written that I I think that's where I read it, but it it and I know it says it in the Bible too, but eyes for no, it was in the Two Chairs book by Bob
• 20:25
  Bodine about eyes forward, eyes forward, eyes forward.
• 20:28
  And so that's where I am.
• 20:29
  I use the things in my past.
• 20:32
  I'll use them.
• 20:33
  I can relate to a lot of women that have been abused or uh
• 20:39
  treated wrong or you know, all the things or have been hit by a car uh while walking or divorced.
• 20:46
  I I can relate to women of a a lot of different things they've been through, but it's not uh it's well, I'm not a victim and nor are they.
• 20:58
  And we're overcomers.
• 20:59
  And so I'm excited about women stepping out into their new season of life.
• 21:05
  And some some people I just think they're thinking like, no, there's God doesn't have anything for me.
• 21:10
  And you know what, Lyle?
• 21:11
  oh If I were to be truly transparent, I thought that for years.
• 21:15
  I mean, I taught school.
• 21:17
  And then after that, it's like, you know, God doesn't have anything.
• 21:20
  What I don't play the piano, I don't sing, I don't preach, I don't teach, I don't um, you know, I don't speak, I don't well, you know, all those are really lies that the enemy
• 21:33
  likes to go, oh.
• 21:34
  You can't but through him we can.
• 21:36
  And so I'm stepping into waters that I'm not always comfortable with, but I know that it's not about me.
• 21:44
  It's about God and leading other women to find out who they are.
• 21:49
  that's what God did with Moses.
• 21:50
  Moses says, I'm I stutter, I can't speak well.
• 21:52
  So he put Aaron in place, but then Moses kept talking because God already had him lined up.
• 21:57
  Here's a Bible verse that came to mind as you were talking about this.
• 21:59
  This is my life verse.
• 22:01
  It says, Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to take hold of one thing I do, and this is the powerful point, forgetting what is behind, straining towards what is
• 22:09
  ahead, I press on towards the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
• 22:16
  Amen.
• 22:18
  I do too.
• 22:19
  Thank you for sharing that.
• 22:20
  one little s quick tidbit of wisdom and how can we get in touch with you?
• 22:24
  Okay, oh wisdom, let's see.
• 22:26
  Well
• 22:28
  You've already dropped a ton of nuggets, so just
• 22:30
  thank you.
• 22:31
  Uh wisdom and knowledge are two different things.
• 22:34
  And I was reading a book not long ago that talked about the differentiation between those two.
• 22:39
  Wisdom, it said, often doesn't come till after 40 years of age.
• 22:43
  And boy would I ever agree with that.
• 22:44
  Sometimes after 50 or 60.
• 22:47
  But no, wisdom, it's his wisdom in my interpretation.
• 22:52
  But even wisdom in our own life.
• 22:54
  We have we may have knowledge.
• 22:55
  I have knowledge for twenty years about self help.
• 22:58
  Did the
• 22:59
  But the wisdom comes when you're willing to say, How can you use this, God?
• 23:04
  So I I would just say, and for years, Lyle, I said, I don't think I hear from God.
• 23:10
  I don't think and I don't.
• 23:11
  I don't hear audible but his words there, and I hear what he says in his word.
• 23:15
  And so
• 23:18
  And it's okay to be at a place that you don't know what you're doing.
• 23:23
  I mean, you know, that vulnerable space, like no, I don't know what I'm doing, and I need help.
• 23:28
  So that to me, that's wisdom, just saying I don't I don't have all the answers, but maybe I can connect you with someone that has some area of expertise or something in that.
• 23:38
  Um, and then how people can get a hold of me.
• 23:42
  Um, my website is soul excursions.co dot co.
• 23:46
  oh
• 23:48
  SoulExcursions.co.
• 23:49
  And on that, I have I have a brochure about this upcoming excursion and my phone numbers on that brochure, my uh email address is on the website and that brochure, my phone
• 24:04
  number, and I'm and I have a calendarly link that if anyone wants to just say, hey, I don't know if I'm interested, but I just I just wanna chat with you, Kathy, for an hour.
• 24:13
  Uh
• 24:14
  Free coachings, free, absolutely free.
• 24:16
  I would love to connect with anyone that would like to reach out and and ask more about soul excursions or just that needs help in their own life or for something else that has
• 24:26
  nothing to do with soul excursions.
• 24:28
  So I'm available for that.
• 24:30
  Thanks for your availability and thanks for being with us today.
• 24:33
  Thank you, Lyle, so much.
• 24:34
  Thank you.