Latest / Leadership Podcasts / LeaderImpact Podcast - Ep. 113 - Josh Irby - Choosing A Purposeful Path

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LeaderImpact Podcast - Ep. 113 - Josh Irby - Choosing A Purposeful Path · Leadership Podcasts

• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Leader Impact Podcast.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: We are a community of leaders with a network in over 350 cities around the world dedicated to optimizing our personal, professional, and spiritual lives of impact.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: This show is where we have a chance to listen and engage with leaders who are living this out.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: We love talking with leaders, so if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions to make this show even better, please let us know.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: The best way to stay connected with Canada is through our newsletter at leaderimpact.ca or on social at Leader Impact.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're listening from outside of Canada, check out our website at leaderimpact.com.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm your host, Lisa Peters, and our guest today is Josh Irby.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: Josh is the executive director of Leader Impact USA.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: And for the first two decades of his career, he worked with the University of University students in Atlanta, Georgia, Croatia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina to help them live a life of purpose that positively impacts their community.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: He and his family of seven lived cross-culturally for more than a decade while directing an NGO called Focus in Bosnia.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: Josh has a bachelor's degree in industrial and systems engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: He's written and published three books with his most recent bringing together global leaders to discuss cross-cultural partnerships.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: He's also the co-host of Mission Shift Podcast and editor of the Barnabas Factor, how cross-cultural partnerships amplifies global mission.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the show, Josh.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: So great to be here.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for inviting me on.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: Ah, I have heard lots about you.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: And what I've heard lots about you is you could be a CEO anywhere.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's what everybody says to me.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I appreciate that, everybody who's been saying that.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: That means a lot.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: So I was it was exciting to um, we have been working, I think, over the past couple of years just on guests to bring onto the podcast.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: So it is nice to finally have you on.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm excited to hear.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm glad you got to talk to a lot of my friends in the past.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm excited to hear more.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit, we always start our podcast with hearing a little bit about your story, but mostly those, that pivotal moment that got you to where you are today.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: And if you have a story or a snapshot that you could share with us along that journey.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I feel like I've stumbled into my career path.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: I went to Georgia Tech to study engineering, uh, thinking I was going to be an engineer.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I did get an engineering degree, but while I was there, I started taking philosophy classes, actually.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: And some people don't even believe that the Georgia Institute of Technology has philosophy classes.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Well, they do.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: I took all of them.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: And what drew me to it were these big questions of life, like why are we here?
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: What is the meaning of life?
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: How can we know that?
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I just love those classes.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: I thought I was going to become a philosophy professor and shape young minds, you know, wear a wear a vest, have a pipe, sit in the library.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: It was going to be a great dream.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: And during that time, I was involved with the student organization that's uh connected with Leader Impact.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the staff people came to me in my senior year as I was getting ready to apply to grad school to become that philosopher and said, Would you consider moving to Croatia to help start a student organization there?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: And my question was, uh, where's Croatia?
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And then three days later, I'm signed up to move to Croatia for a year.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I grew up in a big family with eight kids.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't go on my first airplane until I was in college.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I had never been on a transatlantic flight.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I got onto an airplane and went to Croatia as my first international experience to live there for a year.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it was unbelievable.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Everything I loved about philosophy, uh, just talking about what's important, pouring into people's lives, especially college students.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: And at that time, this is the end of 90s, Croatia had recently become independent from Yugoslavia.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: They had people coming out of the war, asking big questions about life.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I every day I would go drink coffee and uh talk about why we exist.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that was so much fun that I've been doing that for the last 26 years.
• 4:22
  unknown: Wow.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: How does one make a decision in three days?
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: As I'm not, I'm thinking you were 21 years old.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: And this is a little bit part of my part of my story, but um so three days later, I'm uh this this guy who had challenged me to go had someone else come and meet me.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: And all he brought to the meeting were travel brochures for the coast of Croatia.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: So it would I wish I could say that it was all this noble intention and all these things, but it was the city of Split, which is just north of Dubrovnik, on the Adriatic coast.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I see these beautiful the beautiful water, the sea.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, maybe I could try this for a year.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Then I go to my philosophy class, and my philosophy professor, Professor John J.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Johnston, uh, he went on a tirade about how philosophy will ruin your life.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: And if you study it, one day your wife will leave you, your kids will hate you, and even your dog won't come when you call.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought, maybe I'll give this a year to see if I really want to do philosophy.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I wish I could say it was some kind of great sense of noble, uh, noble desire or something or else, but really great travel brochure and a and a cranky day for my philosophy professor, and I thought I would dip my toe in the water and give it a try.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: And you I didn't know that that uh toe dipping in the water of the Balkans would be become something and somewhere I went every single year for 23 years in a row.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I I think when I listen to that story when I was 21, and even to this day, we get scared.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I I sometimes I don't, you know, I don't know what to do with that fear.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: And and then there's people around you, like the professor and maybe your family who are going, What are you doing, Josh?
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: And and so yeah, and sometimes you just look at the brochure and go, I can do this for a year.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Like we just have to jump out.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: There's this decision paralysis that is um overwhelming sometimes.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I see it especially with young people because there's they're seeing on the Instagram and other places on social media the perfect life of other people and they want that, and they're scared they make the wrong decision and miss that.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: But so, so often um we have to start on a path that we don't know where the path is going.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: We we have to have enough faith that it's the right path.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have to know all the answers of what we're gonna do around the next curve, but we just have to know that that's the path we should be on.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: And that being on that path is part of the discovering the path that you need to be on.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: I I talk a lot about that.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: Just and it's okay if you get off the path, right?
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: In a year, you decide I'm going left.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like just just yeah.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, there's uh a saying, uh, when you come to the fork in the road, take the fork.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: Take it, yeah.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: When you when you get off the path, maybe that is the path.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I mean, I have I have an industrial engineering degree.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: All my friends went on to like almost immediately make six figures, and now they're all senior vice presidents, they're running their companies, all that stuff.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't choose that path.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and and there were points in my life where I thought, man, did I choose the wrong path?
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: Because that'd look pretty good right now.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but also uh I was on the path I was supposed to be on, and that's what's more important than the path that other people think you should be on, the path that it looks like you should be on.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that's really been a uh a huge part of my story all the way through.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: And as you commented, as we're, you know, uh a generation full of social media and we're looking at what other people are doing and you're comparing yourself, uh, it just makes it hard.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: Go like, uh, I'm not doing that.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not making the six figures.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: I don't look like that.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: I, you know, I don't have that.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: I uh yeah.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: Josh, what a great story.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm excited to continue this because we we talk our next questions about the principle of success.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: If you have a best principle of success and a story that illustrates that.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think it it ties in into this, uh, what we're just talking about.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: And if if I will can take liberty to to maybe give two and tell one story, uh I'll I'll try to tie them together.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: But um the first one, and maybe is an answer to part of this uh fear of the wrong path.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because one path we know that is the right path for us is to grow.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: And there was a point, probably in my late 20s, when I realized, okay, there's some things about me that that might mean that I'll be a higher level leader one day, that I'll lead people.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I could sort of see potential paths ahead of me related to that.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I made a decision at that point that I'm not gonna focus on what position I have or what prestige I have or where I am in an organization.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna focus on the kind of person I want to be.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just gonna be as clear as I can about the kind of person I want to be.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna put all my energy into that.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna make my goals around that, areas of weakness, areas of potential, and I'm gonna lean into that.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then whatever happens in terms of opportunities, then I'll be ready for them when they come.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because the opposite of that is you focus on where you want to be, you get there and find out, oops, I'm not the person who can handle that because I'd not been working on who I was gonna be.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of the image that was in my mind is of a a tree that is just trying to be a healthy tree, and healthy trees produce fruit.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: And the fruit is the um is perhaps the position how you handle that, but you can't control that to the degree you can control the kind of tree you're trying to be.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: So that's one of them.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um I don't know if you had any thoughts about that.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I I just I I I um I as I'm listening to you, I'm realizing um why people say that about your leadership.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: Is it listening to you is very calming.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh listening to your stories is very um, they're just down to earth.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: Like I understand, and I think that's the one thing about leadership we get afraid of.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: We we put people on a pedestal and we think they're there's something so big.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: And just listening to you and your stories, it's it's it's simpler, it's a simpler life, it's a purpose.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: So um that was all.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate I appreciate that.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: And and maybe I'm just a simple man.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe this is as deep as deep as I get.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: But um related to the uh to the path conversation, even the growth conversation, there was also a point, and I learned this through the Croatia experience.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh, but uh really solidified after that experience that you know, as someone who who believes in God is trying to follow God, I decided I was gonna be a kind of person who just said yes, even when I didn't know what that all meant, and especially when it was scary.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the starting of the path thing.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I had a point uh through being in Croatia, I got to know uh Bosnia and Herzegovina, I got to know Sarajevo.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: I visited there for the first time in 1999, which was only a few years after the war there.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Well, in 2006, my wife and I, we had a we had two small children, we felt this calling, this urge to move to Sarajevo and to work with young people there that were coming out of uh post-communism and post-war.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: And in 2009, we were preparing for that move, and that was again one of those things.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: Do we know what we're gonna do there?
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: We don't yet know the language, how we're gonna do this.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: And it was six months before our move, and I was uh playing basketball with um some of the students, which is what I did to relieve stress, uh, because I was pretty stressed about how to move my family to Bosnia.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I go up for a rebound and I tear my Achilles tendon.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: Oh.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: So now I am trying to figure out how to move my family on one leg and feeling even more overwhelmed.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: So it's at that time that I get a message from a friend of mine who I had recruited to kind of move on the to go to Bosnia on the team that went before us.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: And uh he was reading us a book about Bosnia's history, and he sent me this sentence that said, In in 1860, Miss Pauline Irby moved to Bosnia.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: Now, Erby is not the most common last name, I R B Y.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: This was I R B Y.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so while I was recovering from surgery on my leg, I was reading a biography I found in England from the 1950s about her life, and discovered that not only was she a person of faith, uh, but she was born into the noble, uh a noble family in England, was friends with people like Florence Nightingale and uh knew Prime Minister William Gladstone, but chose to leave all that to move to Bosnia because she believed girls should have an education.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: And she started one of the first schools for girls under the Ottoman Empire in Sarajevo, one mile from the place that I was going to be living.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: Oh.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: And the road behind the president's house in Sarajevo is called, or the government building for the president is called Miss Erby Street.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: Really?
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: So here I was stepping onto a path that I felt was the most random path in the world.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Scary path, foggy path.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: And here I'm finding out, well, maybe there's actually meaning and purpose and a plan behind all this that I just don't know it until I start walking on the path.
• 14:10
  unknown: Yeah.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'd been traveling to Sarajevo for a decade.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: I had walked on Miss Urby Street probably a hundred times, never knew it was called Miss Urbie Street, never knew that connection, never knew that she was my distant cousin who went to the same place for a similar purpose.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and that indelibly taught me the lesson walk the path even if you don't know where it goes, if you know it's the right path, say yes.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um I love that story.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that you um because well, I love the whole idea of messages coming.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, a friend of you, a friend of yours tells you about Pauline Irby and like, did you know and you didn't know?
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: But for that friend to have sent you that message at that time when you're making that decision.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I think of the messages that come to us, and we we put them off and go, yeah, you know what I mean?
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like there are some positive messages that come that affirm a decision you need to make, you know, a fear that you're having.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, yeah, Pauline Irby.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: So the my second year there, I did more research on her life, wrote a book on her life that got published in Bosnia and was put in the bookstores, which the best thing about that is suddenly I had access to any school I wanted to go to to influence the students.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the city hall was number one, Miss Irby Street.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: So do you think I could get a meeting at City Hall with somebody?
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I could.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so suddenly you can't make this stuff up.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: You can't you don't sit in a room and think, first, I'm gonna have this person do, you know.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: And suddenly this path is laid out for me that opened up doors for me to do what I felt called to do and what I wanted to do among young people.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it wasn't about me, it was about this bigger thing that's going on.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: And and so saying yes uh was my part.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh coming up with an awesome plan was somebody else's part.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I've tried I have I worked hard years ago.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: That was my just say yes, Lisa.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um if you feel it, say yes.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: Worry about the other stuff later.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: The plan will come.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, just say yes.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: And it yeah, my heart, my heart is full when you share that story.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um I love talking about failures and mistakes because I think we both know we learn more from them.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, do you have a failure, uh like you're a failing, it doesn't, you know, maybe that word is strong, but something that a mistake, then you learn so much more from it.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know you were gonna ask that question.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: I might need to sign off now.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, that's uh that's a fair question, fair question.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I would like to say I had to think a long time to come up with one, uh, but uh I have many on my mind.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: I would say that the failures that crush me the most as a leader that I feel the heaviest is when I make a decision or do something that hurts someone that I care about that I'm leading.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um I can think of one specific instance where it was while I was in Bosnia and we were, you know, we had a team and we're pioneering stuff and we're busy.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: And as a leader, you're busy, busy, and you know, you're up earlier and you're working harder, and you're leading, you're not just going to the meetings, you're leading the meetings.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember being in a conversation and um saying something that I probably made the choice to say it because I was a little bit tired and rushed instead of going through the process I should have done.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: In saying that, I I broke someone else's trust and hurt them really badly.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I could just feel that you know all throughout my body, uh, that the the pain that I had caused there, the the relationship that I had made worse through what I said.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it wasn't like I there was a sense in which I broke that person's trust, but not like I told a secret that was that I was promised not to tell.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: It was more of that was not the wise choice at the time.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: And as I was processing that, I realized that I owe it to the people that I lead to be rested and healthy.
• 18:28
  unknown: Yeah.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: And that to do the things I need to do to be rested and healthy is not selfish.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: It is a gift to the people that I lead.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: And that means if if it's Friday morning and I'm gonna go into the office at 10 because I'm gonna go for a run first.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: If that's I don't have to do everything that everybody's doing plus everything that I'm doing.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: That sometimes I need to let them do that, and I need to take time to do the things I need to do to make sure I'm showing up as best I can.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, because the higher level that you lead at, the more power you have to hurt the people that you lead.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't want to be a leader that hurts the people that I lead.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: So I wish that I learned that one time.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: I think I've learned that multiple times, uh, that same lesson.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: But that was definitely something I took away from a failure I wish I could take back.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: I think there's a lot of times in a leader's in a leader's life, the the moment, the heated moment.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, unfortunately, you you said something maybe you could have have had a little more sleep on.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I have been praying a a lot about that and just and my my thoughts keep just pause, Lisa, pause and pray.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: Like, just hold it in.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um and unfortunately, I have failed too.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: And um, but sometimes I I just and I I'm speaking for myself.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes people just they if they say something and it goes against your your your your um you just the way you live, the way you lead, the way, you know, and you just I blurted something.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm I I'm weighing this.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: Like, am I guilty?
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: Should I have paused?
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: But sometimes I just feel like I need to shut that person down in the way they're thinking, like, it is wrong.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: And then I go into the self-righteous, and um, oh, this is wrong, Lisa.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: So um, so I my point is I'm failing still at that.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think even the fact that your your self-examination of it is part of the the health of it.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, because to be the person who blurts that out and then thinks, I was 100% right on that, and I don't need to question myself.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: That's when we get in the in the danger zone.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's kind of a silver lining uh behind that my my friends that I have around say, well, at least you care that you hurt them.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's a good point.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: That that's a that's something that gives me courage to lean in and keep on trying to grow.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: We we can always apologize and explain in the in the what happened or you know why you felt that way.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah, I I'm in a loop right now on that.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I think the more I pray for God to uh he just gives me more opportunity to prove.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: At least I'm just gonna turn that back around.
• 21:16
  unknown: Yeah.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah, great, great story.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, thank you for sharing.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I'm I'll continue to pause and pray.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um so you are part of Leader Impact.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: You've become the executive director of Leader Impact USA, so you know we are here.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we want people to grow personally, professionally, and spiritually for increasing impact.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm wondering if you're willing to share a story, which I think your whole life is, you've shared your whole journey, but um how you continual to make the spiritual a practical part of your uh life as a leader.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, really practically, I try to start my mornings with the spiritual aspect of that.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: And As I sit there before everybody else gets up, which, you know, I have five kids, so it gets earlier the time to get up.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: But I can feel my body relaxing and my neurology coming into alignment as I sit and I read the Bible and I pray and I journal.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: I have times when I've that's not been a habit, when my first habit is to go to my phone and start reading emails and start getting stressed out.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: But instead being able to anchor and even uh even this week, it was I was dealing with something that was a little more stressful at work.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: So I just got up a little earlier and had a little more time to make make sure that's going on.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that process and then even the the self-examination of I try to spend some time each day thinking back through my day and asking where were the points that I felt like I was leaning in towards God and where was the point I was leaning away from God?
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: Where were the points where I was leaning towards other people when I was leaning away from other people?
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: Why why was that?
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: What was what precipitated that?
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: What was before that?
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, how can I deal with the root cause of that?
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: How can I apologize for that to the people or to God?
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_00: How could I receive a sense of forgiveness for that?
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: All of that, getting to have a redo and a reset each day so that the max my account holds is 24 hours.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um that is such a practical leadership thing.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because as you know, leadership is hard.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, maybe, maybe you maybe you don't know.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: I assume you do know, but uh leadership is hard.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_00: People are complicated, especially if you're trying to do something important.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: The more important the thing you're trying to do, the more difficult it is, the more obstacles you face, the more pitfalls that you find all around.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: And um if you if I don't have that anchoring, stabilizing sense, uh, I'm just gonna make it harder for myself.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not gonna be the person who shows up like the person I want to be when I show up, a leader who cares about people and is believes in the mission, is moving it forward.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I loved your comment about the account has 24 hours in a day, and every morning it resets.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and and I love that you uh when you have kids, you have to get up earlier.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: And at one point I remember, and to this day, I still get up at 5.15 for my time because my daughter was an early bird and she kept getting into my space.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I have to get up earlier, and uh, but I love it and I continue, and they're both gone now.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: My children like both have moved on, but I still get up at 5.15 because that is my time to reset and you know, reflect on the the other day and go, I get I get another 24 hours.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: That is, I love that.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: That makes me smile.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: I don't I don't reflect enough during the day though.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's uh to remember that to you know, in the moment.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: I've been I've I've tried at different times to to have breaks in my day, whether at lunchtime or midday before I go home.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm I'm hit or miss on that.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: The times that I do it, it's really helpful.
• 25:15
  unknown: Yeah.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_00: Instead of 24 hours, you're down to six or or twelve, which is kind of nice.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's also hard in the evenings.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: You're tired in the evenings.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you want to wind down.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh for me, kids are running around still.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but I I've never thought it wasn't worth the investment.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: But it comes and goes.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: I think I always have to keep refreshing it and finding new ways to keep it new and not wrote and and not um be something that really I'm showing up for, I guess, instead of just going through the motions.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: Have you ever I think this is a terrible question.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's not.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I've set an alarm and and it's something like the my one of my morning ones, what are you grateful for?
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like just pause for a moment, and it actually is an alarm on my phone that goes off.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's the only way I can do it.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: Because I get I get my head down.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, or I'll schedule meetings, you know, one minute between the two, so I have time to make my coffee and then you know go to the next meeting, uh, even scheduling margin.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: So, but uh thank you, Lisa, for the reminder of that that I've not been doing that lately, and now it's going on my list.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: So Okay, yeah.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's what I'm here for.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's great stories, Josh.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: I I feel I sometimes feel when you said you know leadership is hard, I think people um there's no leadership class in c in university or well or in high school.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: And you know people sometimes put in a position of leadership and don't know, and it is really scary.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's why I continue to show up here and listen to other people um because it is hard and to listen to other people share their stories and to go, okay.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: I I'm on a I'm on the right track.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: I have a lot of work to do.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: So, Josh, thank you.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um at Leader Impact, we're dedicated to leaders having a lasting impact.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_01: So, as you continue to move throughout this whole journey, what do you want your uh faith legacy to be when you leave this world?
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: Will you be Pauline Irby?
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_01: Will there be a street?
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there is already a street.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I want the legacy.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't really care about the streets and the and the awards and things like and buildings and things like that.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that the people that know me know or say that I was a person that said yes to God.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_00: That maybe like Abraham, who left his family in a place he knew to go to a place that he didn't know where he was going, but he just said yes and went.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that I have some of that.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: I hope I inspire other people to do that and take risks.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh to say yes also.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that uh my legacy is written in other people's lives who've been changed through interaction with them, yeah, who themselves have come into a relationship with God or decided to say yes to God to some way that that was challenging and scary, and then they saw the fruit of that.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think about Barnabas, who's the guy that I wrote the wrote uh edited a book around just recently.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: And he's a guy who he's in the Bible, people know about him.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: He kind of gets the reductionist treatment as like an encouraging guy, you know, the guy you want around just to say something nice to you.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: But actually, behind the scenes throughout the story uh that you read in in the book of Acts, he's kind of making stuff happen.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: He's getting Paul his first meeting with the leaders of the church.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: He's inviting Paul, who's the most famous missionary there is, to come come and use his gifts.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: He's even willing at one point to become second to Paul, who's a person that he got involved.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: And people don't talk about him as much.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: But he was instrumental behind the scenes and everything that happened.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't mind having a legacy like that.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because it's it's it's the people that are in your presence.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's the, you know, it have have you changed their lives?
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so clearly Barnabas changed people's lives, you know, in the background, working in the background.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh gosh, I I don't have any questions.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: I just yeah.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: I I truly, I gotta go read about Barnabas now.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like I gotta refresh myself on this story.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for that.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, our last question is just about joy.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: What brings you the greatest joy?
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: I get a lot of joy from my my family.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I get the joy from finishing projects.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm like classic achiever type person where I wake up every morning and I'm at zero and then I have to achieve something that day to feel like I have a reason to exist on the earth.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I have I get joy from finishing projects and things like that.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, really from my my family.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um one of the fun things about living cross-culturally is you get really close with your family.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: And your kids because you're you're what you have that is you're the people who understand each other, and uh you have that shared experience.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so I get a lot of joy from my from my wife and our relationship.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_00: I get a lot of joy from my kids.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_00: Got five kids from 10 to 20, got two off to college, three still in the house.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: I get joy from the questions that my you know freshman and high school and middle school daughter asked me.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I get joy from our 10-year-old son that we adopted from Bulgaria, who uh has way too much energy, but uh always keeps things interesting.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's probably the the place I get the most joy.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I loved listening to your about classic achiever when you wake up.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_01: Like I need to, I I am I'm the check mark girl.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: I write the list and I've got to check the marks.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um thank you for sharing that.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um I as I listen to you um and and ask you these questions, you answer so um with such heart so fast, and not so fast, but with just my words, my words aren't counted, but just how do and I asked you this earlier just about being a speaker.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I because you I mean, what did I write in my notes?
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: Just yeah, going back to my, I said you're an author, a podcast host, a writer, a speaker.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: How do you um and I'm sure you're asked to speak a lot.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: So how do you just go into it with such confidence?
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: And where did you learn this?
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, when I think of an engineer, and and that's where your background came from, that's very type A personality, write things down, like very methodical, and here you are, and then philosopher.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: How did you learn to be?
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_01: Where did that trust come from?
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: Where that that energy, that trust of I know what I'm gonna say, and I I have, I don't know.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't know what I'm gonna say.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's a little bit scary sometimes, but okay.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I'd shared that I'd written the book about Miss Irby, and I had a really strong sense that that was one of those yeses I was supposed to say yes to, and I had no idea how to write a book.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: Oh.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I was I found out that the 100th anniversary of her death was coming up uh in 13 months after I had decided to write this book that I didn't know how to write.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so I needed to write it, find someone to publish it, which my original plan was print it out on a copier and hand it out on the street.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_00: And um then I felt like I needed to do some event to mark her 100th anniversary.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: So through a friend of a friend, I found an English teacher in Arizona who would coach me on the writing.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I would write my pitiful little writing, I would send it to her, and she would tell me very bluntly how horrible it was.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I mean, I'm not I wish I was joking.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like you couldn't see the black for the red, I'll put it that way.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: Then I would do it again and I would send it to her, and she would tell me that it was only mildly horrible, and then I would do it again.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: So having someone who could just give me absolute blunt, blunt, painful feedback created this loop that I got better really fast with that.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: And so I learned how to research a book, how to write a book in in that year, because I was driven by this end goal of I needed to get it done in a certain amount of time.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't have time for someone to say, you know, sandwich the feedback.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_00: You're a really good writer.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, it was horrible, you know, you can figure this out.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: No, it was just like, this sounds like a Hallmark card.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: You get a better ending, you know, like that kind of feedback.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: And that really helped.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_00: So that was one of those growth periods.
• 34:01
  unknown: Wow.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: The second one was um because of Mr.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: We ended up getting into the different high schools, and I would I would go into a hundred high school classrooms a year and talk about values-based ideas like relationships and character and things like that.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I would give the same talk or discussion talk uh 15 times in a week.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_00: That more than anything made me better because just the rep getting the reps in of just doing things over and over again.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_00: That that really broke me free from needing a lot of notes to being more free from notes because just that the first time I do it, you're kind of stuck, and then you then you start to experiment and you make it better and better, and then you get to do that.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: And then I think just overall, just putting yourself out there and and doing your best.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: And in the end, you have you have character and you have skills.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: We all have skills that we don't have.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_00: We need to get better, we can improve that.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_00: But if you had to choose between having character or skills, choose character.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: Because when you get below the surface, what's actually in there is gonna come out.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so spend your energy working on your characters.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: Second, work on your skills.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think that helps a lot as well.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that that's great advice.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, the whole feedback thing, I think too many times, right?
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_01: We get the feedback and we're like, you know what?
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_01: I'm better.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_01: And we see too many videos that are shot 300 times, but I only see it once, so I think it's perfect and think they're perfect, and you know, but no, they had feedback, and uh that's feedback's tough, Josh.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: I can imagine getting more red than black on your papers.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: And it's better to ask for it than wait till it till it becomes unbidded.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_01: And then I think just practice, it it's so hard to um to not be perfect.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_01: We wanna we want to wait till we're perfect to go out there.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, get the practice in.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, that's what I gotta do.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm great.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'm you know, I knew to ask that question.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I'm hearing.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you're gonna get some great practice on this global exchanger going on pretty soon.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_00: So there you go.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_01: Josh, I want to thank you for spending the last half hour with me or with us, with all these viewers.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I've heard I've you've lived up to everything I've heard.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I show up here, you this brings me great joy to show up and hear more stories from you've, you know, you you changed the way I've thought of things.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: You've given me some great pointers.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: I hope other people have walked away with that.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_01: If anyone wants to contact you and find you and read more about you or what you're doing, how what's the best way to contact you?
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'd love to be in touch on LinkedIn.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: You can find me there, send me a message, send me a connection.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_00: If you're in the U.S., I'd love to connect as well with this national movement we're trying to build with Leader Impact.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: We look up to our big brothers and sisters up in Canada, and we're excited for the legacy that that you've created there, and we want to do something exciting in the U.S.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_00: as well.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_01: Josh, thank you for joining us here today.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: We it's been a pleasure.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much.
• 37:11
  unknown: All right.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: All right, well, if you're part of Leader Impact, you can always discuss or share this podcast with your group.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're not yet part of Leader Impact and would like to find out more and grow your leadership, find our podcast page on our website at leaderimpact.ca.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: You can also check out groups available in Canada at LeaderImpact.ca, or if you're listening from anywhere else in the world, check out LeaderImpact.com or get in touch with us by email.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_01: Info at LeaderImpact.ca and we will connect you.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_01: And if you like this podcast, please leave us a comment, give us a rating, or a review.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: This will help other global leaders find our podcast.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for engaging with us, and remember, impact starts with me!