Latest / Books4Guys / Finish Strong: Chris Widener on Leadership, Influence, Faith, and Building a Life That Matters

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Finish Strong: Chris Widener on Leadership, Influence, Faith, and Building a Life That Matters · Books4Guys

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Before we jump into today's episode, I want to thank our executive development partner, Standard Pursuit.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Founded by Hunter Didrickson, Standard Pursuit is a coaching community built for founders, entrepreneurs, and high performers who are ready to step into the next version of themselves.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Through one-on-one coaching and the Standard Training Club, Hunter helps people strengthen both their physical and mental operating systems so they can think more clearly, lead more effectively, and perform at a higher level.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: One of the things I appreciate most about what Hunter is building is that he understands success isn't just about business.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's about health, mindset, discipline, leadership, and becoming the type of person capable of achieving the goals you set for yourself.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you're looking to sharpen your performance, improve your habits, and operate at a higher level both personally and professionally, I encourage you to check out StandardPursuit at standardpursuit.com.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now let's get to today's episode.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: Mainly like Arkansas.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's where I grew up.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, okay.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so yeah, and then in Atlanta, you probably are familiar with Lou Giglio and his church.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: So that's where we went, Passion City, and uh man, love him, um, all kinds of good stuff.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: But man, Chris, great to have you on the Books for Guys podcast, man.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: I've been so excited about this.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: As I came, I don't I don't know how your LinkedIn popped up on mine, but when I came across your profile, I was like, okay, Chris, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, bestselling author.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: You're on top top 100, top 50, top 30, top 10 speaking list.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of that's motivational focus.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, well, I I love the energy, so like I got to get Chris on here to bring the energy.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but man, Chris, tell your story a little bit.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to know more.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: We were kind of talking off camera, just you know, you've been in ministry before, and then I'd really love to know just where your passion came from and working with leaders and sales teams, and just man, just what that transitioned into of books and and big time speaking engagements, and just man, would love to hear from yourself on your journey.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: So I'll try and make it really short and condensed, but give you the overview.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: I was born in Seattle, 1966.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: In 1970, my dad was the fifth partner at what is now one of the largest architecture firms in the world, NBBJ.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: And uh he made$90,000 in 1969.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we were living in a house that most recently sold for$3.8 million.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: And in 1970, at the age of 41, he got cancer and died in six months.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: And he had no life insurance.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: Well, he had$30,000, but you that goes quick.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: So my mom had to sell the house that we were living in because she couldn't afford$400 a month for the mortgage payment.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and we were in a country club that had, you know, views of Lake Washington, the Cascade Mountain range.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it was spectacular.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: And uh that began a downward spiral, 28 homes, 11 different schools.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: My mom shipped me off to live with relatives twice, once in the fourth grade, once in the ninth grade.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um and uh she had borderline personality disorder and you know, probably bipolar, and you know, life had not really been good to her.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: She just lost her husband.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so I grew up completely irreligious, completely irreligious.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'll tell a story that maybe some of the people who might be irreligious will kind of chuckle at, and they probably actually know the answer.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um I became a Christian the summer before my senior year of high school after leading just a really rotten life.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, my sophomore year of high school, I got 47 written referrals to the principal's office.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and so I'm sitting in Bible college the first couple weeks, you know, sitting there with, you know, 35 kids that have been in Sunday school every every week since they were three.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: And and this is how irreligious I had been.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sitting there, we're studying the first five books of the Bible, and we're in Genesis, and I go, hold on, hold on, hold on a minute.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: I just I want to make sure I get this right.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so Abraham built an ark, and everybody just burst out laughing.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: But I literally truly had no understanding of any of these Bible stories.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: But um, I had a youth minister at a local Lutheran church in North Bend, Washington.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: North Bend is where they filmed the uh the TV show Twin Peaks.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, Twin Peaks was a weird show, but here's the even weirder thing.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: The town I grew up in was was weirder than the TV show.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: So anyway, I ended up going to Bible college, became a youth minister in northern New Jersey for three years, and then spent 11 years as a church planter in uh Seattle, Washington, started my first church at the age of 25, and then two more out of that one.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: And uh in 2002, I decided to go and write and speak full-time.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'd already been writing and speaking because when you're a church planter, the denominations usually don't have any money for you.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: They just give you a swat on a fanny and a go get them tiger.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so I was doing writing books and giving speeches and some of those things, mainly to high schools and summer camps and colleges, talking about the crazy lifestyle that I lived growing up.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh ended up being mentored.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: I worked personally with John Maxwell.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: I ghostwrote for him for two years.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: I spent two years co-hosting Zig Ziggler's television show, and I spent seven years working with Jim Rohn, and I wrote his last book called Twelve Pillars.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: And um, in that time I had a New York Times and Wall Street Journal best-selling book.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: It was number two on the Wall Street Journal, number seven on the New York Times, and number three on Amazon overall.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: Not a category, but overall.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, in fact, the two books that beat me were the pre-release of Harry Potter and the lost manuscript of J.R.R.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: Tolkien that his grandson found in the attic after his grandpa died.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, look, I kind of feel like I'm number one.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: If I'm if I'm only behind Harry Potter and J.R.R.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: Tolkien, I'll take it.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um so I felt like I was number one for a week on Amazon.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: But um I've done a lot of uh a lot of speeches, 2,500 speeches all over the world, 27 books now, um, lots of dozens of audio programs.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: And um now about a month and a half ago, two months ago, as of this recording, I uh turned 60.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and so I um I'm in the final quarter of my life.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if I live to 80, I'm in the final quarter.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm gonna write an article probably tomorrow.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and this is a little time-sensitive, so if you're watching this later on, you'll you'll get it.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the New York Knicks just won the uh the uh uh National Basketball Association championship.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm gonna write an article called Finish Like the Knicks, because the Knicks' best quarter in every one of those games was the fourth quarter.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, one of them, I think they were down by like 27 points at the beginning of the fourth quarter.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: So that's my new motto.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: Finish like the Knicks.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I got I'm in my last quarter and I want to finish like the Knicks.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: Finish strong, come out a winner, go to glory, leave behind a legacy.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: Man, I love that.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we watched uh we watched every game and it was incredible, just the progression that the Knicks had throughout the game.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: And then yeah, they were down by 27, or I think it was actually 29.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: And came back and won the game.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, Well, I'm a I'm a Sonics fan because I grew up in Seattle and I worked for the Sonics uh for seven years as a ball boy when we won the World Championship.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I didn't really have a dog in the hunt.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of I'm a big Victor Wembana fan, and so I was kind of rooting for the Spurs, but then I kind of I kind of transitioned over to rooting for the Knicks because it would just be really good for the Knicks to win.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, so anyway, I watched it loosely and didn't really didn't really care who won.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: But I want to finish like the Knicks.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love that.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: I love that message.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Chris, man, you've done some incredible things.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: I and do you ever just look back, and I know you're looking forward, you're you're you're trying to finish the as strong as possible, but have you taken some time and and looked back over the amount of people you've been able to have an impact on and just sit there and does in your wildest dreams growing up, could you have ever imagined that you would be on on these global stages or writing top best-selling books?
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the way you grew up, it seems like it could have gone two different directions.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: It could have gone a totally different route to where, I don't know, who knows what you ended up would have ended up.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: I I am sure I would have been in prison for cocaine distribution.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah had I not become a Christian, I am sure I I either would have been the biggest coke dealer in America or I would have been in prison for being the biggest Coke dealer in America.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: You're trying to be the best at something.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: I don't do anything small.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: But one of the quotes I'm sort of famous for is it's just as easy to think big as it is to think small.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know, when uh when a buddy of mine and I in like 2004, we knew a guy that had he was distributing language learning programs through Costco and Sam's Club.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: And my buddy and I said, why don't we just call all my friends in the in the public speaking thing and let's put together a box of 14 CDs, one DVD, and let's sell it through Costco and Sam's Club.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't say let's make it and sell it through the corner bookstore.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I said it's it's one phone call to the corner bookstore or it's one phone call to Costco.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's both one phone call.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh and so, you know, that's what I did.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: We ended up, we were selling, we ended up with 18 SKUs and we were selling 50 to 75,000 boxes a month for four or five years till CDs kind of went out of, you know, went out of business.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: But um that's always been kind of my thing.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, when I was 14 years old, here's a funny story.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: My mom was working at Group Health Hospital up on Capitol Hill in Seattle.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: And there was a little guy, probably 40-ish.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know, when I was 14, they all seemed like they were 60, but he was like 40, and he worked in the medical records filing department.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: I cannot imagine a worse job in the world for me to do, right?
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, all day long, five days a week, all you're doing is filing folders.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't do it.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: So this guy borrowed seven grand from his uncle, and he bought the rights to a self-watering flower pot.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: It was, it was like, it was made out of like Tupperware, and it had the base where you put the water, then it had another thing that fit inside of it, and that's where you put the plant.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: And it had like a little nipple from the top one down into the bottom one, and it had a little lever on the side to determine how much water it would suck up.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, an African violet, it would suck up lots of water.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: You put it on one side, a cactus, you put it on the other side, didn't not much water needed at all.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: And uh he said, Oh, how would you like to make some money?
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Yeah, sure, that'd be great.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, I'll pay you a dollar for every one of these pots that you sell.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Fantastic.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_01: And um, he thought I was gonna go door to door selling them to little old ladies.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I called up, I th it was, I think it was Pay and Pack.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: It was the I think it was Pay Impact, which was a big regional.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: This was before the big box stores like Lowe's and Home Depot and those kinds of things.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: Called him up and I said, Hey, I've got a self-watering flower pot.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: I'd like to come down and show you guys.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: And they said, Well, great.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: Our buyer for that is Joe Schmoe.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: He can see you at four o'clock or, you know, whenever.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: So my mom had to drive me there and she bought me a blue blazer.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm wearing khakis and a blue blazer.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: I come walking in, and this guy goes, Oh, wow, you're a kid.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: I go, Yeah, but I got a self-watering flower pot.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: So he walks it over to the water fountain, puts the water in it.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: We didn't have anything for the plant, but he set it in there and he's looking into it and he moves the dial and water comes up and he goes, I'm a buyer.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Okay, great.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, I'll take uh I'll do a test run through 20 stores for a year and I'll buy four boxes a month for each store.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: Now I think there were 24 box 24 in each box, but let's call it 25.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: The math will be easier.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: A hundred boxes times 20 stores per month.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's 2,000 a month for 12 months.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: I sold 24,000 flower pots on my first ever sales call I ever went on in my entire life.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: I go back to this guy and I go, hey, I sold some pots.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: And he goes, You did?
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: How many?
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, whatever the number was.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: It was like 23,780.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I showed him a purchase order.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: Now that's a great lesson.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's just as easy to think big as it is to think small.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: But here's another great lesson, but kind of a bad lesson.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: That guy was so afraid he called the company up and got his$7,000 back and gave up the business.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: He was terrified of success.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: He was looking for like an extra three or four hundred bucks a month.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: And if I was making a dollar of a pot, I don't know what he must have been making.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: Three, four, five dollars a pot?
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: But he literally quit.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now, why my mother didn't beg, borrow, and steal to go get seven thousand dollars and buy it uh by the rights, I don't know why.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: But um I've always thought big.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so did I ever think I'd end up this way?
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: Not always, but at some point.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and at some point I just decided, look, if I'm gonna do this, I want to really just kill it.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't want to be, you know, schlepping it around in every little, you know, Howard Johnson's meeting room and, you know, those kinds of things.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_01: But I did start out that way.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: I started out giving free speeches, you know, I think I got paid$500 for my my first ever speech.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh, you know, eventually over the course of my 37-year career now, 38-year career, got it up to 40,000 plus travel.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and uh, like I said, 2,500 speeches all over the world, a lot of really big crowds, particularly in Europe, you know, 20,000, 25,000 people at a time.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: And and um and it was great.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: It was a great career.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but uh a few years ago I was shaving and I was looking in the mirror, so I must have been 58, 57, 58, and it was almost like God spoke to me, not verbally, but I just heard this thing in my head as I'm shaving.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: You're the old man now.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I knew immediately what that meant because I had so many great mentors in my life when I was a young man.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: I had a Bible college professor, and remember, I was real rough around the edges.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: He made me in charge of the Skid Road Ministry team.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: So we went down every Saturday and we ministered to, you know, homeless children and homeless, the homeless, and you know, all those kinds of things at a little place called the Sunshine Inn.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: And um, in my first job as a youth minister, I was in a very wealthy town in New Jersey.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: And at the time, the guy was the senior VP of marketing for Mars, and he ended up becoming the president of Mars Candies.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: He was my first, one of my first mentors.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I had a lot of those guys that were, you know, running gigantic businesses, Exxon and Prudential and you know, AT ⁇ T and all those kinds of things who they took me under their wing because their kids were in my youth group.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: And then, of course, John Maxwell, Zig Ziggler, you know, Brian Tracy, Dennis Waitley, who just passed away a few months ago, was really, really good to me.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so I knew that it was time to really shift.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still doing public speaking.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: If somebody calls me and wants to do it, that's great.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I'll do it.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm not really pursuing it much anymore.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I'm really back in full-time ministry, um, specifically around uh helping men live out their faith in the marketplace and uh and to have a deep, real, true, authentic faith.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm in a good place in my life right now.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm I'm happier than I've ever been in 60 years.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: My marriage is better than it's ever been.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um everything's, you know, it's not to say there aren't hardships.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh last September, one of our daughters passed away at the age of 31 from leukemia.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so life is hard, but you know, Jesus said, in this world you'll have trouble, but be of good cheer.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: I've overcome the world.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: So um I'm just in a really good spot.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: No, well, and I I I I feel the vibrant just light that you shine, Chris, and it's very just positive and uplifting, and um, you know, even through the troubles I couldn't imagine.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but you you answered one of my questions for you.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: I was gonna ask you who, you know, with so many people who have gotten mentorship from you and have been influenced by you, I was gonna ask you who are those individuals who are your mentors and who you sought out when you needed guidance, and those are some big names that you mentioned.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and I Yeah, I mean, I just God just put those people in my life.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, I joke around when I do coaching for people who want to become speakers and coaching for people who want to write books and things like that.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: And some I I always make the joke look, getting getting uh successful in the speaking business is really just a three-step process.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: Number one, have John Maxwell call you.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: Number two, have Jim Rohn call you, and number three, have Zig Ziglar call you.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: And once that happens, it's it's all downhill from there.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: No, it was just truly a God thing.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: It was, it was nobody could ever orchestrate that.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: No, I love that.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: Chris, you mentioned something earlier, and I was uh they kind of led me a question for you.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: You were talking about the guy you worked with the with the flower pots who was afraid of success.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Did you, and I know you do things big, and and things came to you and you were talking to big crowds and all of a sudden books, but was there ever any point in all of that where there were some moments that maybe you felt things were getting a little too big for you?
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: Or did you have a good path to where things grew at a rate that you were comfortable with?
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: I know we talk about getting out of the comfort zone and pushing yourself, and that's when the success comes through.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: And that's you know, sales reps the same way, like being just get past that little barrier, that's when things come in.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: But did you did you feel you were successful at pushing the boundaries at a proper rate, or was there ever a moment where you were like, Whoa, I uh I no, there wasn't one of those, and it's it's because I've always lived my own philosophy.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: And and there's a Bible passage, a proverb, it's in chapter four of Proverbs, it says, Um, above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I talk about this in my in my speeches sometimes, that um the problem for people and the reason their lives fall apart is because their success gets bigger than their heart.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: So the heart is the foundation.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have a 200 square foot foundation in the ground and you try to build a 10,000 square foot house, it's gonna eventually fall because there's nothing to hold it up.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um but if you have a 10,000 square foot foundation, you go up three stories, you can build a 30,000 square foot house and never have a problem.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: And and so I always tell people, you have to make sure that your heart is always bigger than your success.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I back in the day, you know, five, ten years ago, I I I would use Justin Bieber as an example.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: I would say, you know, people always say, how how can Justin Bieber be so crazy?
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I always say, Oh, that's the simplest answer, simplest question you've ever asked.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's because if you hand a 17-year-old$250 million, he's gonna go crazy.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like most of those kids go crazy, um or end up in trouble, or drugs, or suicide, or you know, all of the above.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so um, you know, I've always tried to maintain a close relationship with the Lord.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: I've never believed my own press.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I I still I I still marvel when I'm sitting at a book signing table and there's 75 people in line.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, for me, like I just I I just don't I I look at some people and they're just so arrogant because I don't view it as me.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: I view it as God in me and and working through me.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so that means it's God, not me.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: Now I think that I have some really great natural giftedness and talents in speaking.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm articulate, uh I'm smart, I'm quick, I'm sharp.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: But what I've realized over the course of my career is that my influence with a crowd goes far beyond my skill set.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: And that's God, but that's not me.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: So, so that's really my my theory.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: If if you think it's about you and you're not achieving what you want to, then yeah, you're gonna suffer.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: But if it if you can really hold everything, you know, I always do this with my hands, I hold everything open-handed.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_01: God can put in it what he wants, he can take out whatever he wants.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: So that's always been my philosophy.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: And and, you know, I tried to keep my heart big, I tried to guard my heart, and as I did, it allowed God to put more and more stuff into my hands.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's amazing.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: Chris, what are you, as you look back at some of the things you've accomplished with the book, with the speaking, what are a couple of things that you're most proud of that you've been able to do or have an impact with?
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: What what's something you're just you just look at yourself and go, I'm really, really proud of myself that I was able to accomplish that or to achieve that?
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think writing the books.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I have a friend of mine played in the NFL, and uh every time I release a book, he calls me, Oh man, I gotta, I gotta write my book, blah, blah, blah.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: And and we'll do it every year or 18 months.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: We'll go to lunch and and he's written one book while I've written 27, and he wants to write more, but he just doesn't ever discipline himself to do it.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but um I think the thing that is most heartwarming to me is when somebody mentions one of your books and says how it changed their life and what they did because of it.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, in fact, I went uh to a um an event this past week and I saw this speaker.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: It was a woman, uh relatively famous woman, and we got pictures taken with her, and I said, I just want to tell you something.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: I said, you know, as public personas, we don't always get to meet the people that we affect.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, But I've watched you and and learned from you.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: We my wife And I, my wife was with me.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: We we both have watched you and learned from you.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I just want you to know there's millions of people out there who will never write you a letter, never go to an event of yours, but you just need to, you know, to take peace in the fact that that you are really making a difference.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so when we get those kinds of emails or letters or whatever, they're great.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I also have to just realize that if, you know, I I know a congressman and he tells me every fax we get or every email we get or every phone call we get, we assume there are a hundred other people that think the same thing.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: So a 75 people column that's 7,500 people that they represent.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so um, you know, I I just take heart in that.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: And then ultimately, you know, we all die, we all go into a pine box and our life is over and the results are what they are.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: As people who have seen you speak or have read your books, or or people who are listening to this and it influences them to pick up a book of yours, what are a couple things that you've always had that you hope the crowd that you're speaking with takes away from what you're trying to say, or what do you hope people who read your books take away, if nothing else, that you're trying to share with them?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: Well, my books are more principal books as opposed to um, you know, seven-step books.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I I I want people to think of about the big picture so they can translate it into whatever life they're living.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a a homemaker watching it is a lot different than a you know, a bank president watching it uh or reading it uh versus a professional athlete watching it or reading it.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: And and so, but the principle is the same for all of them.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: So if I can give them the principle, then they say, okay, how do I take that principle and being a homemaker?
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: How do I take that principle and drive it down through my bank?
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: How do I take this principle while I'm playing professional sport?
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: So for me, um, I want them to understand the principle and how the power that it has to affect their life.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: No, uh so I had a friend once, he gave me a testimonial, he's a big tech startup guy in Seattle, and I loved how he phrased it.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Chris Widener teaches universal truths, not vogue content.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: And and when he said that, I thought, I'm gonna make that the mantra of what I do.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna teach universal truths, timeless truths, not vogue content.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: I love that, man.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: If you were to, you know, a lot of things at Booksford Guys, we're we're, you know, kind of the mission and purpose behind this is to encourage that curiosity train and critical thinking and that desire to learn at a at a younger age, you know, than myself and and other people.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: If you were to talk to a group of, let's say, a high school football team or a college business class, what's what's something you would like to share with them so that they can work towards being their best selves, you know, faster than than trial and error, you know.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: But if you get a chance to share something, what what would that message be?
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's funny you said high school football team.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: I spoke to a college football team at uh Arizona Christian University one time during their chapel that they held every Monday.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: And my opening line was, let's just get this out of the way.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: None of you are ever gonna go to the NFL.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: That was my that was my opening line.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, folks.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know, um, but it's true, and none of them did.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but uh, you know, every now and then, like a guy like Christian Okoya will come out of like an Azusa Pacific or something like that.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: But most of the time it doesn't happen that way.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um and but I challenge them to make themselves better men.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't matter.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: If you end up a football coach, you end up a husband, you end up an employee, it doesn't matter.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: You end up owning your own company.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: Let's let's understand that football is fun for now, but the most important thing that you can do is you need to govern your life.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: You need to be purposeful about your life.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so, you know, what I tell people is you have to have a plan, you know, and the plans will change, but you have to have a plan.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, if if you're waiting around for somebody else to come up with a good idea for you, never gonna happen.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, most people are thinking about themselves, not thinking about you.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I always joke and I say, You wanna you wanna know how much how little people care about you and what you're doing?
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: Take your best friend in the world out for lunch, the guy you've been friends with since kindergarten.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: Take him out for lunch, buy lunch, and in the middle of the lunch, say, can I ask you a question?
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: How much time have you spent in the last week thinking about how I could become more successful?
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: Your best friend in the world is gonna go.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: None.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: He's thinking about how he can become more successful.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: So um, if you know, the old saying it's gonna be it's up to me, which is true.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but um, you know, life is short.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I would tell young people.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: Life is short, man.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: I never thought I'd be 60.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I knew I would be, but I didn't think I would be.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: And now all of a sudden you're here and you're in the final quarter and you start going, yeah, it's true.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, I had a really good, it was a bad situation, but it taught me a good lesson.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_01: That's what my dad died when he was 41, prime of his career, making 90 grand a year in 1969.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: And um uh it taught me life is short.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: And don't worry about it.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: Just keep plugging away because we don't get to determine when we're gonna die.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in fact, I'll tell you a funny story.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_01: My brother is 13 years older than me.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: He's 73 now.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: And my mom called him on his 41st birthday to wish him happy birthday.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: And she said, How are you doing?
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, You know, mom, I'm I'm really doing well.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Um, I gotta be honest with you, the whole last year I've just been afraid of dying.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: And my mom said, Now you gotta understand, my mom was a real piece of work.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: She said, Why were you afraid of dying?
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: He goes, Well, you know, with dad dying at 40, I was just afraid I was gonna die at 40.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_01: And my mom, who couldn't leave well enough alone, said, Your dad wasn't 40 when he died.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_01: He was 41.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: So my brother spent the whole next year.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_01: He spent two years worrying about dying at the age of 40.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: And then at the age of 41, it wasn't until he turned 42 that he kind of just let it go.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, life goes by fast.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh make the most of it.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Most of what the world values is not of any value.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh love your wife, love your kids, don't let work, you know, work as much as you want, but yeah, you have to understand that there's always a trade-off because every minute you're at work is a minute you're not with your your family.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't mean you should be lazy and not work and live on, you know, food stamps and just stay home with your family all the time, but it does mean make sure that you're taking care of the important stuff.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: Chris, one more question for you.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: And it's one I ask everybody who comes on the podcast just from a book standpoint.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm always curious to know what is a book or two that has meant a lot to you personally or professionally, and what's a book that you love to recommend to others?
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I'll give you a few.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, one of the best business books that I've ever read, and it's it's similar to mine.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: My my book is called The Art of Influence, but this book is more the science of influence, and it's called Influence the Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he's an ASU marketing professor, uh, Arizona State University.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I think it's one of the 10 best business books ever written because it talks about how to influence people.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um a lot of really great stories in there, research projects, you know, those kinds of things.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um one of the books that I'm rereading right now with a men's group that I run, I started a group called The Royal Table, and uh it's for men who want to grow in their walk with the Lord.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: There was a book, when I first read it, it was called Money, Sex, and Power, written by a guy named Richard Foster.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: And if you think about it, um, money, sex, and power is the three biggest things that guys have to deal with.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_01: And and when I had a group of guys read it 30 years ago, one of the guys said, uh, I wish somebody would have had me read this before I got married.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: And a bunch of the other guys said, Yeah, me too.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I started thinking, what are the three biggest problems in a marriage?
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: Money, sex, and power.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the problem is that some brain surgeon in the marketing department at the publishing company said, let's change the name of it.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: And they changed it to the challenge of the disciplined life.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, they need to hire a marketing guy because money, sex, and power was so much better than that.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: But it it's now called The Challenge of the Disciplined Life.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's it's the subtitle, Essays on Money, Sex and Power or something.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: Really a profound book.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: Really, really a profound book.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: And then the book that I think everybody should read is a book written by a guy named A.W.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: Tozer called The Pursuit of God.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_01: Now, you need to understand before and it's a thin little book.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's, I don't know, a hundred pages.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you need to understand that you don't read that book at one sitting.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_01: You really don't even read a chapter at one sitting.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_01: This this is not a cotton candy oatmeal book.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_01: This is a deep, full meal deal.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_01: You could really probably read it a paragraph or two at a time and just sit on it and think about it and pray about it.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so those are those are three of the books that have really profound, profoundly impacted my business on the one side, influence the psychology of persuasion.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_01: But then those two other books that have formulated my my own spiritual formation and spiritual growth.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: Love those recommendations.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'll I'm I'm gonna add those to my list, and I'm sure there's a few others that'll do the same.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_00: But Chris, man, thank you so much for taking the time to do this.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's been so cool just to learn, just learn more about you directly on just your experiences and your thoughts.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: And and man, now that I know like you're so focused on this fourth quarter, it's gonna be really cool to follow your work and just to see what all you do with it.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, I mean, if it's anything like the first three quarters, it you know, it's you're gonna crush it.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the first quarter wasn't so good.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_01: Well, still second and third quarters were pretty good.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: You you had some sort of foundation though, and it led to some really amazing things, and you got more amazing things to go do and and more people to reach.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: And so You know, that's that's probably a pretty good lesson.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_01: You're not gonna play well every quarter.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you you're just not.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna have some down times, you're gonna turn the ball over, you're gonna get some traveling violations, you're gonna commit a foul or two.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but it's about the whole game.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: And and the there's there's not a better story than a comeback.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that those are the best.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_00: But Chris, man, thank you so much.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: We're proud to have your books on the Books for Guys website.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna make sure all of them are posted on there so anybody who's interested can go find them and and follow yourself.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: But man, just keep doing what you're doing.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's an honor to have had you on today.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: I appreciate you having me on.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_01: I know when you bring somebody on, it's like, okay, what's this guy gonna say to my tribe?
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: So it was all good stuff.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Chris.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks.