Randy Mortensen is committed to helping talented professionals create true significance through their success while ensuring they live sustainable lives. He hosts the Courageous Recovery Podcast. Randy interviewed me on these topics:
- The importance of being able to listen and hold space, in business and in your life.
- The power of curiosity.
- My history of joining a young software company as the first employee after the founders, building that company into a global powerhouse, and how a major disagreement ended a 20-year business relationship.
- Going sailing for two years in the Mediterranean and home schooling our three children.
- My struggle to find fulfilling work after returning from the Mediterranean, the coach I hired to help me, and how that coach got me into 12-step recovery.
- How I show up differently in my life now that I’m sober.
- What it was like to be an alcoholic in business.
Listen to our interview:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/861964/10080712
Are you feeling stuck in your business? Are you an entrepreneur who deals with alcohol or drug issues? I specialize in helping entrepreneurs with addiction issues. My own experience is that I had to realize that I couldn’t do it any more on my own. If that’s you, please Contact Me or call me at +1 (604) 721-5732. I’ve been there and no what it’s like to run a business fueled by substances and how to run a business in recovery. Call today.
Audio
Transcript
Randy Mortensen:
Welcome to the Courageous Recovery Podcast. I’m your host, Randy Mortensen. This is a weekly 20 to 25 minute program where we provide answers for your, I don’t know how, whether you’re dealing with recovery issues, emotions from a loss or maybe life is just thrown you one more curve ball than you were expecting. I’m just so glad to see that you’ve signed on today to watch and or to watch and listen. And it’s just an incredible opportunity for me to interview today my new friend, David Greer, from the great area of Vancouver in BC and David will sign on here in a second. It’s always great to know that there are people listening literally from coast to coast. And in the last count, we’re at 24 or 25 countries where we have listeners. So depending upon where you are watching this or listening to this, you should see a subscribe button or an area to leave a comment.
Randy Mortensen:
Please do that because those comments and that feedback are hugely valuable. For more information on who Randy is and what Randy does. You can go to my website, which is Randymortensen.com. That’s Randy Mortensen, M-O-R-T-E-N-S-E-N.com. And there you’ll see that there’s a 21 point assessment that can be used as a tool to determine whether you or a loved one qualifies for one of my programs called the Lifestyle Champion Cohort but without further delay, it’s very exciting for me to welcome Mr. David Greer to the program. So welcome David.
David Greer:
Thanks, Randy. I am thrilled to be here.
Randy Mortensen:
Well, it’s awesome to have you and just getting to know you has been a huge blessing for sure. And anybody that’s listened to the program knows my usual first question is, what is there that today that you wish your 22 year old self would’ve known? What comes to mind?
David Greer:
It’s probably a long list actually but so some of the things I wished I’d learned earlier, let’s put it that way. One would be how to listen. I’m a really higher powered individual, worked in very technical fields where being right was very important because there was most of the time a technically better answer but you can be right or you can be happy. And today when I coach entrepreneurs and high performers about listening when they’re in a sticky situation with someone, it can be a personal relationship, often it’s in a business relationship. I really coach them around, are you really listening to the other person. And signs you’re not listening as if the busy stuff going on in your head is, you’re so busy thinking about how you’re going to respond to this person and you’re not actually listening to what they’re saying.
David Greer:
And it’s taken me a long time, really many and a lot of like personal growth work to really get comfortable with holding space for someone who has a very different opinion from me and not judging it. My role as a coach is to not judge and to really hear the other person out. And so, if my 22 year old self was very judgmental and often was not very good at listening. I was way too busy trying to figure out how I was going to rebuttal, whatever was being said rather than honoring the other person.
Randy Mortensen:
Well and one thing that I say and that I’ve learned a long time ago and I wish I would’ve learned it earlier is listen 70% of the time and talk 30% of the time, life is just far better when we do that.
David Greer:
Yeah. Mine role’s to 80/20 but same difference.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’re close, we within 10%.
David Greer:
Exactly. Exactly.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. And when you learn to ask better questions, that’s all showing respect in many ways that you wouldn’t anticipate.
David Greer:
Yeah. And so the follow on to listening better is to be curious.
Randy Mortensen:
Yes.
David Greer:
Curiosity is one of the most powerful tools we have in all relationships. And the way I know I’m not being curious is when I’m so busy defending my position. It’s a flip the coin over kind to the listening. But if I’m so busy fighting and defending my position, that I’m not truly, I don’t think being curious about the other person and what’s going on for them and what’s showing up for them.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. And just the words, tell me more.
David Greer:
Yes. Exactly. Yes.
Randy Mortensen:
Will engage a person too. And in the world of recovery, when I can say to someone, I know how you feel, I used to feel exactly that same way. This is the path I went down and here’s why I am today. Is that feel, felt, found. There’s just, you don’t think about that, the psychological aspect of that or the relationship building aspect of that until you’ve tried it and it works.
David Greer:
It does.
Randy Mortensen:
So. Yeah. Yeah. So from a corporate standpoint, you had a lot of success early in your career.
David Greer:
Yes I did.
Randy Mortensen:
And traveled a good amount.
David Greer:
Yes.
Randy Mortensen:
And so, give us the background on that. And then we’ll transition into how you discovered that you maybe were having some compulsive drinking habits that weren’t treating you very well.
David Greer:
When I was still at university getting my computer science degree, I had a part-time job where I met a consultant and a software business founder who hired me as the first employee after the two founders. And the company was named Robelle for Robert and Annabelle, which even today is a good made… It’s because it’s a made up name it Googles well, there aren’t many of them and I like the place I stayed 10 years. And then I bought out Annabelle because she will wanted to retire, became partners with Bob and went another 10 years. And we built it into a global powerhouse, a very successful software company that specialized in a particular computer system from Hewlett Packard. We were world experts in that platform. And my former partner and I, we wrote a paper a year for 20 years and each and traveled the planet. That’s when we created belief in this small obscure Vancouver based software company, you were going to trust your whole business to.
Randy Mortensen:
Wow.
David Greer:
Because people would come and hear us talk and figure out we were pretty credible.
Randy Mortensen:
And now HP was more or less the leader in the early days, right?
David Greer:
Yes. Yes. I mean, when they first released the HP3000, the platform we were specialized in, they were the 46 largest computer manufacturer in the world. And then the HP3000 probably became the third, most successful mini computer.
Randy Mortensen:
Okay.
David Greer:
And in fact this year we’ll celebrate, it will be 50 years since they first released the HP3000. I mean, they haven’t made it for a number of years now but yeah. And it was pioneering, it was visionary, it was ahead of its time. And it turns out that’s been what’s happened in my career. I’ve often been on the leading edge of a bunch of things. But to me it was so normalized that it just, what do you mean? I’m 10 years ahead of the curve.
Randy Mortensen:
Wow.
David Greer:
I mean, the computer system I used at the University of British Columbia, which I also used as a student when I grew up in Edmonton and the prairies and the University of Alberta also used the same. It was one of the most advanced operating systems in the entire war world. And I’m, I don’t know, 15, 16 years old, I’m using this thing. I have no idea it’s the most advanced thing in the entire world. It just became my normal. So we come to 2001, we’ll just quickly go through the career.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah, please.
David Greer:
So Bob and I only had one disagreement in 20 years and that one was a doozie and it ended in divorce. So, we had a shotgun agreement in our shareholders agreement or we had a shotgun clause and I made him a really good offer and he’d never had kids and this was his baby. And so he turned around and he bought me up.
Randy Mortensen:
Okay.
David Greer:
So I’m early 2001, not really noticing the .com meltdown, busy chasing deals. Got a pretty good check on my jeans. And someone smarter than me said, “David, do you need to work right away?” And I’m like, “No, I’m not the on for life but I don’t need to work right away.” And she said, she told me how she’d had a career shift like mine and gone to Australia and bought a VW van and drove around for a year. Karalee and I hatched this idea were, I’m a lifelong sailor and she has sailed with me at that point for 20 years. We commissioned a sail boat in the south of France and took our three children and homeschooled them and sailed more than 5,000 miles in the Mediterranean.
Randy Mortensen:
Over how… 5,000 miles over two years.
David Greer:
Two years. Yeah. That’s actually going at a pretty good clip. Because you got to remember, you’re only going seven miles an hour.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah, yeah.
David Greer:
That’s a lot at traveling, plus your homeschooling, plus, plus, plus, plus every new place you got to find the bank machine, the butcher, the baker, what day is the vegetable market on. That’s an experience and a legacy that we have as a family, we went 18 months without being in an English speaking country.
Randy Mortensen:
That’s impressive. There’s not a lot of people that can say that, that they were brave enough, bold enough and pioneering enough to make that happen. Well done.
David Greer:
Thank you very much, few dream, few dream it and even fewer have the courage to do it.
Randy Mortensen:
Right. Right.
David Greer:
And we had both, so we seized that moment and it’s a peak experience from my life.
Randy Mortensen:
Wow. And then how did you decide, at the conclusion of that, how did you decide what’s next? What was that decision-
David Greer:
Oh, that was a struggle. That was a really big struggle. So, I came back, I did three years of angel investing, looking at 300 deals a year and investing in one and being a board of director and working for options and it just was not fulfilling at all. And in 2007, I went to a training event with a guy Verne Harnish. He has a couple books scaling up. He has a framework for business that has been very successful in which I use and believe in. And I took one of my young startup CEOs to this event to help her learn about it. And at the back of the room were two coaches and I went and talked to them and one of them made me more uncomfortable than I’d been in years. In fact, I had tears in the corner of my eyes just based on a five minute conversation. And I think, I didn’t even know if I realized even in that moment how unhappy I was or unfulfilled.
Randy Mortensen:
Oh, okay. So they were challenging questions, very pointed questions that were stirring up a lot [of emotion].
David Greer:
I think the one that really got the tears was, well, “almost all this people in this room need your help” and I hadn’t been able to find a way to help any of them or make a career out of it or…
Randy Mortensen:
Okay. Okay.
David Greer:
There he is showing me they need you but I couldn’t figure it out. And his card sat next to my phone for three weeks and I tell you, the phone was way, way too heavy to pick up. And thankfully coach Kevin called me and he said, “I really felt a spark that day.”
Randy Mortensen:
And so this is the gentleman you worked with for the 18 months then.
David Greer:
Yes. So, which we haven’t told the rest of the audience that.
Randy Mortensen:
No, I know. I just want to make sure I was connecting the dots.
David Greer:
You are. So on my 50th birthday, on August 9th, 2007, we had our first coaching session. So Kevin is like, he’s as crazy as me. So I had to hire him for two full days, was our opening coaching session, 16 hours.
Randy Mortensen:
That’s intense.
David Greer:
It was. And so I worked actually for nine years with Kevin but and we worked on a lot of things but in the first 18 months we just chipped away at all the things that were in my life and just kept clearing off the table until there was nothing left except the elephant in the room. And that was that I was an alcoholic. And so Kevin was the first person in the world that I admitted I had a drinking problem to and it turned out that through his summer place and associates he knew there, he’d been introduced to 12 step recovery. And so he coached me to go to 12 step recovery and that was a Tuesday afternoon. It was January 27th, 2009. And I committed to him, I’d go to a meeting by the Friday. Being a typical overachiever, I looked online in the afternoon and I was going to, I was at a tech event downtown until eight o’clock and lo and behold one block off the street, I’d be driving home on, driving by to go home was a [12-step] meeting at 8:30.
Randy Mortensen:
Sure.
David Greer:
And so I went and it’s in a Legion. So Legions are like social clubs for military members.
Randy Mortensen:
Right. Yes.
David Greer:
And so it’s a 12 step recovery meeting on top of a bar.
Randy Mortensen:
Right.
David Greer:
I walked in and the doors to the bar were open and there were beers on the table. And I literally stood there like a deer in the headlight. I hadn’t even been 24 hours sober. And some people went by and they had that sixth sense and they said, “Oh, are you looking for a meeting? Go down the hall and up the stairs.”
Randy Mortensen:
Interesting.
David Greer:
And that meeting has been my home group for 13 years.
Randy Mortensen:
And so it’s very few of us went to our first meeting by ourselves. So you actually went by yourself, walked in. Never had, knew nothing about what to expect. That took a moment of bold behavior on your part, for sure.
David Greer:
It did. But I built this relationship with Kevin and Kevin is this high powered or higher powered than new. And I knew when I admitted to him, I had a problem. He was never, ever going to let me off the hook.
Randy Mortensen:
Right.
David Greer:
Once I made the admittance to him, I just knew the jig was up. And so if he said do this, then and I had a lot of aversion to it. I don’t even know where it came from. I’d never been to a meeting and he coached me through that in the coaching session.
Randy Mortensen:
That’s awesome. So think about there’s that 49 year old guy, 45, 50 year old guy, that’s listening to this, that careers doing great. Has a couple kids, family life’s doing okay. But he’s wondering, “Huh, I wonder if this is what I’m supposed to do is go to an AA meeting.” What would you say to that guy to fight through the fear factor?
David Greer:
Well, I think this is what I would say is, if you looked at me 13 years ago, I had a nice house. A couple cars, was uber successful. If you look at me today, I have a nice house. We have two cars, I’m uber successful but the person inside is a completely different guy, completely different And 13 years ago was a very scared person who was trying to cope with life by numbing himself out by not feeling what was going on.
David Greer:
And I drank because I’m an alcoholic principally but I drank to make the highs higher. I drank to power up. I drank to make the lows not so low. It’s just what I did. And I was a daily drinker. And what I want to offer is that they’re… I just got sick and tired of being sick and tired. So if you’re anywhere close to being sick and tired of just the… And I eventually got tired of the, picking up the drink every day and it was five o’clock and then it was four o’clock and then it was three o’clock and it just got to be, I just had enough. And so if it feels at all like that for you, I just want you to know there’s hope.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah.
David Greer:
There’s hope and you don’t have to do it alone. In fact, I don’t think you can do it alone. I think the only way to do recovery is with others.
Randy Mortensen:
And with someone that you trust, someone that has character and integrity, maybe Kevin was a huge blessing for you because he hadn’t been down that path but he knew people who had and it’s when I can say you today can say to that guy, who’s listening. I know how you feel.
David Greer:
Absolutely.
Randy Mortensen:
The deceit, the lies, the guilt, the shame. Why did we drink? It was to cover all those things up or to put the mask over it in-
David Greer:
In it was like harder to get the empties out of the house because when they come in full, they don’t clink so much, the wine bottles and the beer cans when you’re trying to get them out, they make a lot of noise.
Randy Mortensen:
That’s good. That’s good. Right. That’s good.
David Greer:
If that thought has ever crossed your mind, then maybe we should have a conversation.
Randy Mortensen:
Right, yeah. So, so what was the motivation for your book Wind in Your Sales? What was the motivation there?
David Greer:
For Wind in Your Sales, I wanted to share my, at that point, 30, 35 years of business entrepreneurial experience and to share a lot of my scar tissue. Maybe you don’t have to, you can have your own scars, but maybe you don’t want all of mine. And so that’s its principle goal. And it’s not designed for a super sophist, if you’re on your fifth business, I think you’d find my book boring but if you’re an owner founder and you’ve always run your own business. I have 10 chapters, which I call the 10 strategies or the 10 parts of your business to think about.
Randy Mortensen:
Got it, got it.
David Greer:
And I would say most owner founders, if they’re like me, three or four they’re super good at, three or four they’re at least competent and they’re probably pretty good at and then there’s probably two they’ve never thought of.
Randy Mortensen:
Right. Yeah.
David Greer:
So and then it’s a combination of some theory, how to think about it. And then a ton of practical. This is a book, it’s supposed to be on the shelf. It’s like, you’re really stuck with something. You go look in the index, you go read three, four pages and you’ve got one idea that you didn’t have five minutes ago.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. That nugget, that one nugget that you didn’t know.
David Greer:
And then the other thing was a third of the book. So I interviewed over 45 entrepreneurs and sales leaders and business leaders for the book. And every chapter ends with a case study from an entrepreneurial friend of mine. So a third of the book Is other people’s stories. It’s not just my scar tissue, you get the scar tissue of 10 other, very successful entrepreneurs.
Randy Mortensen:
Lot of wisdom, lot of wisdom, to-
David Greer:
A lot of wisdom packed into 150 pages.
Randy Mortensen:
Right. Okay.
David Greer:
And that’s the motivation, you don’t have to invent it all. You don’t have to go through it all yourself if you don’t want to.
Randy Mortensen:
No. And so guys and gals, the website for David’s practice is coachdjgreer.com, G-R-E-E-R.com. And there’s just a ton of information there. And it’s a very impressive website. His book Wind in Your Sales is available in print or in audio I saw on there too.
David Greer:
And all the eBook formats.
Randy Mortensen:
And all the eBook formats also. So please be sure to check him out. I do want to make mention also of an upcoming men’s retreat that we have here in central Florida. You can find more information on that at lifestylechampion.org, that’s lifestylechampion.org. It is the first weekend in April. And check that out if you’re interested in signing up, if you use the hashtag code of #courageous will actually save you $50 when you sign up. So if you are interested in more information and you want a simple way to reach out to us, you can just text champion to 66866 that’s champion to 66866 and go to my website or go to David’s website.
Randy Mortensen:
And I’d love to get you connected. Great city in Vancouver. We didn’t get to the point where I’ve spent a whole bunch of time and a whole bunch of money in Vancouver and a deal that didn’t go so well a few years ago but we won’t bring that up here. But I think too, I have a number of spouses that listen to these podcasts too. David, what would your wife say and I don’t want you to put words in her mouth, just what do you think she would say that here was the David before and then the David, after a couple of years of sobriety? What lifestyle changes do you think that she would tout if she was speaking to another spouse?
David Greer:
Yeah. So we live our life more or less the same way. I think what she would say was I had a personality transformation and I wasn’t so loud and I wasn’t so demanding and I didn’t walk into the room and take all the air out of it because all the attention had to be on me. That I was able to show up in our life together in a completely different way.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. And then did you start listening to her better or were you always a good listener?
David Greer:
No, I was not always a good listener and we will be married 40 years this coming April and we did. So after I got into recovery, it’s that, you know when one person changes, then it upsets the apple cart and a lot of things start changing. So we’ve actually done eight years of marriage counseling work on and off, which is more than we’d done in the previous 30.
Randy Mortensen:
Okay. Okay.
David Greer:
And that has led to much better listening skills. And that has led to being much better holding space for each other of very different points of view. And that’s okay, you can have your point of view and I can have mine and that’s the way it is. We do have to come together on certain things but yeah, we don’t and we had a lot of codependency issues.
Randy Mortensen:
Well, do you know who the worst co dependence are? Those of us who have figured out how to not drink. Okay. Because now we’ve lost the mask. We’ve taken the mask of drinking off and now we don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings. We don’t want to say no. So in many instances, those of us in recovery become horrible at being co dependence until it’s pointed out to us. And I just want to give you kudos as a professional, you were willing to seek other professional help, even. There’s a lot of us that would say, “No. Why in the heck, should I do that?” So good for you to do that.
David Greer:
I hired coach Kevin and I worked with him for nine years and then he didn’t want to do one-on-one coaching because he does a lot of facilitation and he helped me find my next coach Nat O’Connor based in Atlanta. And I still have [her as] a coach that I meet with twice a month. And in this whole process we did marriage counseling work but I did five years of therapy work as well. And I’ve worked the steps of my 12 step recovery program many times.
David Greer:
And for the last three years I’ve been involved with adult children of alcoholics and dysfunctional families, which has been a really big game changer for me to look at the generational, where I come from and why I behave the way I do. So all of the… When I came into recovery, I committed to myself a few things, I’m going to really work to be present. I was there a lot because I was a high functioning alcoholic but I wasn’t a hundred percent there. And so it really committed to being present to myself and to those around me, who are important to me and committed to personal growth for the rest of my life. It might only be small increments but to just stay on the path of, there’s always more to learn about myself. There’s always, especially on the emotional side, there’s always more to learn about what’s there and how I can grow.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. The other thing I would give you kudos for, I think I have this right, that currently you’re actually taking off 12 weeks out of every year.
David Greer:
That’s my goal. I’m not perfect at that but that’s-
Randy Mortensen:
Oh, you’re not there yet. Okay.
David Greer:
I probably got to at least 10 last year, I haven’t quite added it up to see if I made the 12 and I took one week off last month and I’m going sailing for the next two weeks because I’m really committed to making sure it’s 12 this year.
Randy Mortensen:
Well done. I mean that’s, I was on, I don’t even know. I was somewhere within the last couple of weeks where a gentleman that was speaking said, he said, “I don’t refer to work life balance.” He said, “Getting a balance is virtually impossible.” He said, “I like to use the term work, life blend.” So you’re blending, there are times when it’s okay to pick up your phone when you’re sitting at dinner, to look at an email or something like that. There’s other times where that’s not okay. And he just puts his phone down sometimes for three, four hours at a time, just so he’s present with his kids or present with his wife or whatever he’s doing. And that was challenging for me because I’m the guy, whenever my phone buzzes, I’m going to pick it up, see who that email’s from.
David Greer:
Well we have a no phone at the table rule with my wife and I.
Randy Mortensen:
Good for you.
David Greer:
And we try and put it in another room because if it vibrates, you often can hear that and you react even if you don’t go get it, you’re. I did want to just share with you. So from my former coach, Kevin Lawrence, he has a model to get to that work, life balance. Because again, I think when we talk about work, life balance, we’re missing the most important piece. So I coach people or encourage people to think of their life in three compartments, which overlap. But one is business career, one is life relationships and then the part that, especially for us high performers get squeezed out in the middle is yourself.
Randy Mortensen:
Right.
David Greer:
And what happens is we get super passionate about our business. And then we’re often very, very passionate people about our life and our kids. And now I’ve got a grandkid who’s going to be here for the weekend. And what happens is that if we don’t bring a lot of conscious effort to what sustains us, me, David. So, , last November I went sailing for four weeks. Well Karalee joined me for a week but I went away for four weeks, more or less solo on my boat. And I actually worked part of that. I took time off part of that but I did that because that is part of what really sustains me and it’s like, you can’t pick up water with a bucket that’s got holes in it.
David Greer:
So, how do you fill the holes in your own bucket? And you need to really bring conscious choice to this and I really encourage people to every week, there’s some things or at least every month, you were doing something that is just for you. And if you’ve not done this, sometimes people around you react very negatively because they see it as totally selfish. I’m like, yes, it is selfish. But I look at it as, you know those things that swing and knock each other, the little round balls, well there’s selfish on one end, there’s selfless on the other.
David Greer:
And if you’re totally out of sync, if you’re totally selfish, well then you won’t have anyone in your life because who wants to be with someone who only thinks of themselves. But on the other hand, if you’re totally selfless, everything is about contributing to your business, contributing to your industry, contributing to your life. Then you will disappear and eventually burn out or get sick or have other consequences. And so you need to, I encourage people to bring conscious choice to where you want to be on the pendulum and start swinging back and forth and to make sure that some of it is just purely selfish. And that is a good thing.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah, absolutely. And in what comes to my mind in the faith-based recovery program? I lead here in Florida, I taught on step five last night. And so what you’re saying, even just getting away, those of us who have been through the 12 steps, know that step four is one of the most challenging and yet most rewarding after the fact. It’s that inventory, it’s that balanced inventory. And what you’re saying is, I think what I’m hearing is if we’re not taking time for ourselves, how can we expect to improve? How can we expect to grow? How can we expect to be rested and fulfilled?
David Greer:
How can we expect to have any energy and resiliency to be there for other people?
Randy Mortensen:
Right on.
David Greer:
If we don’t look after ourselves first, then there’s nothing of me to give to others.
Randy Mortensen:
Yes. Right. That’s right. Yeah.
David Greer:
I have to make sure that some of the time and energy is just going into… So my program of recovery is in some ways, very selfish. It’s really, for me when I look at from like a family point of view. Obviously it’s not selfish when I’m there because the way I get to keep my sobriety is to give it away.
Randy Mortensen:
Right. And okay. So we’re within a couple of minutes of wrapping it up here but I don’t want to miss out on this. So your sobriety date was just the 27th, so you got a new medallion.
David Greer:
I did.
Randy Mortensen:
So how did that feel for you to get that within the last few days?
David Greer:
So it was very weird to become a teenager, honestly. And I just have, so I’ve had some really big events in my personal life. My nephew died last night of colorectal cancer.
Randy Mortensen:
Oh my gosh.
David Greer:
And he was 32 years old. And his mother, my sister, I didn’t know until I was 61 years old because I was relinquished for adoption at birth. And it took 60 years and actually almost 10 years of recovery till I was ready to go on a journey to find my birth families.
Randy Mortensen:
Oh my goodness.
David Greer:
And his mom, Wendy and I have become very close friends and it’s been remarkable to think. I only met Owen two years ago and I’ve only been face to face with him three times. And yet I’ve been deeply, deeply infected by his loss.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. I can imagine.
David Greer:
And I just learned about it this morning but so what I reflected on and what I shared on my 13 year cake on Tuesday is that, I’ve been able to stay with the waves of a motion. And earlier today I was very sad and very melancholy, wanted to curl into a ball, when I got on the call with you, I was filled with energy and excited and you and I sparked each other off.
Randy Mortensen:
Absolutely.
David Greer:
And now as I’m talking about Owen, I’m a little bit sad again and that’s all okay. Before I used to drink to just numb all of that.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. Yeah.
David Greer:
And 13 years in, I can actually stay with the waves and this too shall pass.
Randy Mortensen:
Right.
David Greer:
And be okay with it. It’s right. It will all work out.
Randy Mortensen:
Yeah. Those are good words. Good words. Good words. Okay. Well ladies in general, if you know someone that’s struggling today or maybe you’re that person who’s battling a compulsive and destructive behavior, please don’t wait another day to seek help. You can call my office and I can give you some guidance or speak with you. My office number is (321) 757-hope that’s (321) 757-hope. And if you’re looking for resources, I’m blessed to be in a huge network of care providers. And I don’t want you to wait because those who are dying today are husbands, wives, sons and daughters is somebody who dearly loves them. So today’s the day for you to seek help. As I mentioned, if you’re looking for more information, just text champion to 66866 and we’ll be connected. And David, just as closing words, what would you say to encourage that guy that says, “I got to do something about this drinking today.”
David Greer:
Well, I’d like to echo your offer. So this is what I do offer people, which is call me, text me, or call me (604) 721-5732. And my, if emails more comfortable, it’s on my website. Just Send me an email. You don’t have to go another day, reach out to someone, I’m on the West Coast, Randy’s on the East Coast between us, one of us will be available. So reach out today.
Randy Mortensen:
Right on. And again, his website is coachdjgreer.com. If you want to, I will connect you. I do hope you’ve found this information helpful today. You can look for the replay of this to be available on the usual podcast online outlets, Buzzsprout, Apple Podcast, Google Podcast and others. I want to just close with this, have a blessed day and be extraordinary today.
