This is the fourth installment of a mini-series we are calling Finding the Meaning Movement. This mini series will show in your feed with the letters FTMM in brackets.
In this series, Dan welcomes Raj Lulla of Fruitful Design & Strategy as a cohost for some “Build in Public” style conversations about The Meaning Movement, the current state of Dan’s work with the Meaning Movement, and personal/ business / marketing problems that he’s seeking to solve for himself and on behalf of all of us.
It’s not necessary that you listen to the past conversation to benefit from this one, but it could help add some color to the conversation I’m about to share.
Listen in here:
Subscribe: Apple | Google Play | Stitcher | Overcast | Spotify | AmazonSoftware Generated Transcription:
Dan: Raj, how are you? Welcome back. How’s your day going?
Raj: It’s great. Finally got, uh, settled in here and, and glad to be with you.
Dan: Love it. Yeah, likewise. Um, where should we jump in today?
Raj: So, you know, last couple of times we’ve been talking about StoryBrand a little bit and, uh, you know, one of the major elements of story are, uh, failure and success. And nobody really likes to talk about failure but, but if we think about it, no movie, no story is good. Unless there’s potential for failure.
What happens if Luke Skywalker does not destroy the death star? What happens if, uh, you know, cat is, uh, doesn’t survive the hunger games, all those things. So, uh, yeah, weirdly I’d love to start talking about failure today.
Dan: Yes, I love, I love failure as a concept. I love it a lot less when I, um, yeah. When I go through, I remember, uh, years ago going through my Evernote, looking for something with a friend, I had this tag of failure and I was just at that time in my life collecting stories of failure. Um, And I think it’s because, because I love, I love people taking risks and I love people chasing after things in a, a, um, it’s necessary, like it’s necessary in the process that you will experience failure.
Uh, and so I think. You know, giving more attention to that highlighting that is work. That I’m a big fan of, but again like, but then sometimes it really hurts. Right? And then you’re actually in it. And, um, and it’s, it’s hard. It, it has so many repercussions and affects your mindset. It affects your, your energy.
and so I guess I feel like part of the conversation of, of failure is also a conversation about resilience and getting back up.
Raj: Isn’t that the insidious thing about failure is it’d be so easy to just write it off as it’s pain, let’s avoid it. But the fact is it’s this bittersweet thing, it’s this teaching thing. And it, it makes us learn probably better than any other, uh, tool or experience that we have. Uh, and yet we don’t, we don’t like it because it does come with pain and, and it’s very unnatural for us.
Embrace that
Dan: Yes.
Raj: that’s incredibly difficult. so, um, yeah. So in talking about failure today, um, you know, there let’s start with this there. I think there’s, uh, there’s lowercase F failure, and then there’s capital F failure. There’s there’s I failed at a, a particular initiative or venture and, but I’ve still got wind in my sales li fight another.
And then there’s big F failure, which is kind of ultimate. And, uh, I didn’t live my life.
Dan: Yes.
Raj: One of the things we talk a lot about in story brand is that when you’re, when you’re building a brand script, when you’re helping somebody kind of script their business, we actually almost exclusively focus on the small F failure. We don’t because if you, you know, if you tell somebody that, uh, you know, if they’re, they’re buying tied to get grass stains outta their kid’s soccer uniform, if you tell them.
If you don’t buy tide and the kid has grass stains in their uniform, then they’re gonna be socially ostracized. They’re not gonna get into the colleges they want. They’re probably gonna end up homeless or struggling for the rest of their life, maybe an addict. And, and then they’re, they’re going to die early.
It’s like, oh my gosh, that is dark. No weird. No one is here for that at all.
Dan: No that got dark fast.
Raj: yeah, but if you go small F failure, which is near. and is, uh, and is about, okay, well, what if this just doesn’t work? So what if I had forgot to buy tide at the grocery store? And, uh, and my kid has grass stains on their uniform.
It’s like, well, the near term failure to that, the small F failure is embarrassment. It’s, uh, you know, not doing our best today and that’s it’s pain to be avoided, but it’s. It’s not fatal. It’s something that, okay, well, we’ll get, we’ll get it next week. We’ll we’ll try again. so you are kind of an expert in failure and I don’t mean that by
Dan: Oh, thank you. Thank you very much.
Raj: and I don’t mean that by, um, experience, but , you, you just failed so much more than the rest of us. Uh, but. No, but you’re, you’re an ex you’re exper uh, an expert in failure because you help a lot of people through failure or, or what they perceive to be failure. and a lot of times I was, I was just telling you, before we started recording, we get to these moments where we go, oh my gosh, I think I’ve hit the end of the road.
I don’t know. I literally don’t know where else to go from here. And, uh, and sometimes the answer’s right in front of ’em or they’re just about to take that step. That is the right. And, and best one.
Dan: Yep.
Raj: so can you talk to me a little bit about that? Like when people engage with the meaning movement or the calling course, or even just you personally, I know you’ve coached people personally before, uh, what are they experiencing when they get to that kind of realization that they’re failing or feeling even that they’re failing?
Dan: Yeah, I’m trying, I’m trying to like take myself outta the equation. Cause I feel like I’m talking to myself here. And as soon as I start talking to myself, I, I have a lot of resistance to it, but let’s say, let’s say I’m, I’m talking, talking to someone, someone else about their, their failures, not my mountain of, of, of failures, with their experiencing is a, um, Emotional pain.
I mean, just to, to, to define it emotional pain as a re at a, as a result of, um, unmet desires. So there’s something that they’ve they’ve want they want, or they’ve wanted that they put action and resources towards, and the result was not what, um, Was not was, it was not the desired result. And I think where it gets really tricky and where there’s a lot of overlap with everything that, that, um, I’m trying to do with the meeting movement, invite people to, with the meeting move movement is the more you hope.
For something, the more desire you, um, you let yourself have the higher, the level of disappointment, the more and more emotional pain can result as a can result from, from that, that failure. And so in some ways, I guess, really what I’m inviting people to is, is to open themselves to the possibility of more pain and more failure by.
Pursuing, you know, more deeply the things that we want, um, in the world and a life that we, we want to be living, you know, at a deeper, a deeper level.
Raj: Yeah. So.
Dan: how I begin to talk about it.
Raj:
So Dan part of my question is, you know, if, if there’s some people who say that the way to have everything you want is to not want anything, then why are you inviting people? Have desires to, to have dreams and chase.
Dan: Yeah, that is, that is a great question. And I think you should have some boundaries on, on, you know, what you, what you want and think, you know, intentionally about the things that you are are desiring, make sure you’re making good, you know, choices about those and not just, um, inheriting them or letting, letting culture or, um, you know, others shape your desires.
and so first I would say, you know, yes, The the way to, the way to have everything you want is to not want anything. Yeah. And so maybe there are fewer things that we should want or different ways, different kinds of things that we should want. But as far as the, the idea of wanting something and desiring something, that’s how, how meaning is, is made.
And it’s, um, it’s how we find our, our sense of, of satisfaction fulfillment. Um, I talk about it in terms of agency, which can. Little bit of a, um, you and I talk about college college, wor words agency is your ability to produce change in the world. It’s a, it’s a, a way to talk about that. and so the fact that we can, you know, Push a push a Boulder and it rolls like that’s, that’s your yes.
Your agency in, in action. And so when we talk about it, in terms of, of meaning and purpose and fulfillment, we get F we find meaning we find fulfillment by producing change. In the world around us. And that could be change from something very small, as far as like, you know, making your, um, your children laugh, but it could be something really big, like changing policy that affects thousands of people’s lives.
Um, and that’s where we find, we find meaning. So the, invitation to desire and to focus on your desire is an invitation to be more intentional about the way you’re living in order to create meaning in your.
Raj: So Dan, I, I love the way that you described failure and people experiencing failure as, you know, emotional pain as a result of not getting something that you desired or wanted. Uh, but one of the problems is that we, as a society, don’t really deal with emotional pain. We, we obvious skated a lot. We hide it a lot.
And so for you personally, you know, we’re building this in public. So for you personally, When you started to feel burnout, when you started to feel this sense of failure, what were some of the cues that you were experiencing? Emotional pain? How did you know.
Dan: Yes. Yes. There’s, there’s two things I wanna say about this first. I wanna talk about just the society piece just for just a quick second, because I think our, um, a society, we don’t deal with emotional pain. Well, and one of the outcomes of that is people that stay at jobs way longer than they want to, even though they, they know they’ve had this feeling inside them, that there’s more for them, but in order to actually take that step, like that’s a perfect example.
Having a desire and then being afraid of that possible failure of stepping towards that, that desire. And so we just stay stagnant instead of continuing to grow as people and continuing to, to become more of who I believe, who, who were, were made to be for me personally, to go to back to your, your question.
Um, I think it was really highlighted by the fact that I, I. A lot of desire for what the meaning women is about. This is in many ways, a passion project. I want to help people around finding meaning and purpose and fulfillment satisfaction in their, in their lives. That comes from my own story and struggles with that.
So there’s a lot of, you know, good. Good real juicy meaning stuff around that for me. So the desire’s there, but there’s has been a disconnect between what it would take to go from where I, where the project is right now to really, um, embracing that and, and fulfilling that desire in a, in a bigger way, which means, you know, helping more people, which means me spending more of my time on it, all of those things, which as I think we’ve talked about, like one of my goals for the project is for it to be a primary income source for, for my family.
Um, So, I guess the, what what’s brought it up for me and, and where I’ve come to realize it is like, I know that there are things that I need to do to go from where I am to that version of the future. But I have a lot of hesitation, uh, to actually take them on. I, it feels, it feels like my energy. I just, the energy isn’t, hasn’t been there, even though I know at some level that’s where we need to go.
Raj: Yeah. So the energy to do the things you need to do, uh, even the things you want to do was lacking. You talked in the first episode about your friend calling you out lovingly about being short with your kids and you used that word under resourced. I thought that that was really good. What else? Like, what else were you experiencing that, you know, cuz we, we have to experience a fair amount of pain.
I think, especially as men. And I know it’s a stereotype, but you know, there’s lots of stories of men ignoring chest pains until they dropped in the grocery store, you know,
Dan: yeah. What were the
Raj: how we’re built in this.
Dan: the other symptoms? Yeah, I
Raj: what, what were some of the other things, cuz people listening might be experiencing this and go, oh, I’m fine.
And then they go, oh, I’m pretty short with my kids. I’m I’m struggling to have energy. What else are we looking out for? What, what did you experience?
Dan: Yeah. Yeah. I think, um, I’ve felt a very fractured, um, maybe that’s a good, maybe that’s the right good word for it. Fractured. Sense of, of my work like that. I, I have a, I go in a lot of different directions. Uh, some of, some of that I think is just who I am, but at some point it be, it has come to the point where it’s just like, I just feel like I’m doing too much and not doing enough.
Well, um, and so that’s, that’s a, that’s a have this desire to like, Consolidate bring things together, unify my work as much more so than it has been. Um, and just a dissatisfaction with the current state of things. Like if, if the meaning movement is just gonna be, um, You know, the, a, a side, you know, a side project with, you know, a, a small to medium size reach.
Like, that’s fine, but it’s not like, like, and I don’t know if this is, you know, grandiose, you know, grandiose desires of my ego and my personality, but like, I wanna like. I wanna move the needle on something in the world. And I wanna give my time to that. Um, and so I think there’s just a growing dissatisfaction with the current state that also, I guess, has kind of pushed me, helped push me over the, over the edge.
And then the other piece is just about time that I’m at a phase in life when I’m at I’m I’m poor on time. I have three kids, six and a half and under, and anything that I’m doing. time that I’m not spending with them. And so I need to be more intentional with my choices than I, than I needed to be five or six years ago when I, when I started this podcast, for example.
Um, and so that, that’s another piece where it’s like, okay, this either needs to, to scale up or scale down, but like existing as is just, isn’t really an option anymore.
Raj: Yeah. Yeah. I’m gonna ask a tough question. One that requires a lot of honesty, personal honesty, where have you failed with the meaning move movement? What, what things haven’t gone the way that you wanted them?
Dan: I think a lot of, well, the first, the first place that comes to mind is product. every time I’ve launched a product and there’s been, there’s been. There’s been many. I have, you know, the, the calling course, which I’ve told that story a bit, um, future builders, which is a, a, a course that haven’t been selling in a long time, which is about, you know, habits and goals.
I have a operating instructions, which is about goal setting. We have, um, I, I created a print, a poster that I was selling. Um, I’ve tried to launch some cohorts at different times. Um, all of. Have generated some interest. Um, most of them have generated some income. They, they all have been.
I feel like if there was something in baseball, that’s less than a base hit, but still, uh, but still helpful to the team. That’s kind of where it feels like like, that’s kind of what it feels like it is. It’s like, okay. This isn’t a total failure. And I think that’s some of, some of the challenge, at least that’s the story I’ve told myself about it.
You can, I’m curious to hear your thoughts actually on this. Um, not a total abject failure. I didn’t totally like, you know, totally strike out. Um, but it’s also definitely not a home run and probably, definitely not. Didn’t get more than one base and I don’t even know if I got to the first base. And so it’s just.
This kind of the state, right. Between like, not, I can’t call it a total failure and I can’t call it a success. So it’s just like, ah, well that was what it was. And it was disappointing.
Raj: You fail, you fouled it off. And so it, it kept you at bat, but it’s not, but it’s not successful enough to go. Okay. We’re making progress.
Dan: Yes.
Raj: Would you, would you say that’s the right analogy?
Dan: yes. Yes. I don’t know enough about baseball to find the right baseball analogy. Uh, but that sounds right.
Raj: Yeah, so you alluded to it, but I, I wanna call it out specifically. There have been a lot of little F failures with the meaning movement. I think, uh, the launch of the calling course, as you’ve said, it has not reached as many people as you believe that it should, uh, a number of other products as well.
And so there’s a, those are little F failures for sure. And I think it’s important for us. Be able to describe them with that, uh, that way without covering it in shame, covering it, embarrassment, anger, those things that we, we tend to do when we approach our own failures. And, and you’re good at that. You’re a healthy person in that way.
Um, but, but I think that maybe one of the places where you started to experience burnout was L looking at the culmination of those little F failures and. and it’s almost like you’ve come up to a cliff and you are seeing that it might be big F failure and the, like you said, it either has to scale down or scale up.
It’s either gonna go full tilt, big F failure. And, and we, we just didn’t, I, I was wrong about the whole thing or you, you need to find some bridge across that canyon to get from little F failures to. The promised land on the other side. And so in your mind, as you have done that as you, you’ve kind of totaled up those small failures and worried about big F failure, um, we’re gonna go to the place that StoryBrand doesn’t normally go because, because that’s part of the work that you do, which is helping people identify whether or.
Little F failures are big F failure.
Dan: yeah.
Raj: So for you with the meaning movement, with your own work, with your life, what would be big F failure?
Dan: There’s a, there’s a couple, couple directions that I would go with that one level. It’s like to say to call it quits and say, you know, the meeting movement was a good attempt and I made some good progress. It’s time. It’s time to stop without ever feeling like I did everything with within reason to take it where it could go.
I think that’s that’s one, one place I go with that, but I think the, the bigger failure, so you’re would be to get another five, 10 years down the road. And. Feel like I didn’t make a difference.
Raj: Mm.
Dan: I think that’s the, I mean, that’s the deeper, that’s the deeper feeling. And I think that’s a lot of my drive to like keep at the meeting movement for all this time is like, I just want to, to help. I mean, the, the, the, the worst I wanna say is like, help people feel something. Um, and to know that, like, you have something to say and a reason to say it. Um, and so I think the bigger failure is it feels like, it feels like in some ways, for me, that’s the definition of. I don’t know, wasted potential, or I would almost say wasted, wasted life.
That’s not totally true because there’s other things in my life, my family, for example, my kids like that, you know, bring me meaning. And, but as far as work, like as far as far as making a difference, like, I feel like that’s my, that’s my mission.
Raj: You preemptively answered one of the questions I was gonna ask, because you know, your first, your first answer was. About, you know, how quitting without giving it, your all would, would, you know, be a big F failure failure for you regarding the meeting movement. And I was gonna dig into that because it’s like, okay, is it about money?
Is it about any of that? But you got there and you’re the second part of your answer where it’s really about your personal mission. It’s about helping other people. Feel something, and that is not to be taken lightly because I think at the, at the essence of it, that’s what the meaning movement is. That’s why I joined the meaning movement eight years ago is because there’s this crazy person standing on the streets of Seattle saying.
Hey, it’s okay to feel something it’s okay. To not just be caught in the corporate rat race and, uh, to not just be chasing soccer games and driving a Volvo or whatever. It’s okay to, to be feeling this feeling. You’re that you’re experiencing
Dan: Yeah.
Raj: about like, wanting more about. Having a heart inside your chest and maybe even wearing it on your sleeve.
And that’s why thousands of people have, have flocked to you to the meaning movement. And so I think, I think this really important moment that we’re experiencing is the meaning movement has had a lot of little F failures,
Dan: Yep.
Raj: it is not a big F failure. So that means we live to fight another day and that’s really important.
How are you, how are you experiencing that? How are you receiving that right now?
Dan: It hits deep. I think like, I dunno, just hearing you describe me as the, as the as the crazy crazy guy in Seattle. Like, I, I, uh, I mean, that’s who I wanna be, like, I’ll wave this flag for, for you, for everyone, until you can wave it for yourself, you know? Um, But I think like what, what hits me so hard about is also just as, as we, as we’re talking about like, just that the, the smaller failures add up and that’s a weight, uh, a weight to a weight to carry. And I feel like, Like, I, I feel like that’s, you know, I know that’s, we can have all the, the inspirational quotes about resilience and getting back up and everything, but like how many rounds, how many rounds can you go? And how many times can you, you know, get knocked down and then have to get back up again before you just say, I don’t know.
I don’t, I don’t know. I don’t know if I can do it. Um, I think that that’s a lot. Where I, where I have been, it’s just like, Ugh, like I so badly want this. And also, I don’t know that I have many more attempts, um, in me, um, to make it what I want it to be.
Raj: Did you know. John Kazinski had called his mom and told him to, or told her to pick him up and bring him back home. Cuz he had failed at acting. I think it was about a month before he got the office. He had reached that point. He had reached that point where he was just like, I, I guess this was a huge mistake.
And I took as many attempts as I thought that I had in me. And she basically told him it was like, well, just wait till the end of the year, because that would be a better time to move you. Basically, she just like put him off by just enough. And , and, and then
Dan: such a practical reason. I love that.
Raj: yeah. Yeah. Which I think was also some mom judo, you know, of.
Give it, give it one more shot, you know, and, and then he landed it. And now he’s an action hero and, you know, married to Emily blunt and, you know, just absolutely living his best life. And, and so I, I say all that to, to just as a reminder, that this happens a lot to people that the moment that we feel like we’re almost outta tries or completely out of.
Is often the one right before it actually works.
Dan: Yep.
Raj: And so for you, um, you know, we have to have something that keeps us going, right. It of why, why, why do we bother with something? You know, I, I’ve seen some pretty crazy ideas in my life of startups that people wanted to do or ministries that people wanted to do that just were bad, objectively bad.
It’s like, yeah. You know, that Facebook already exists, right? Or it’s like, I’m not sure anybody needs a goldfish ministry or just what, whatever. So there are some objectively bad ideas out there. But one of the things that I have found in working with you over the last few months with the meaning movement is that it’s actually objectively not.
and that, that all comes from a story that you told me about how all of this got started with the one-on-one coaching. Can you tell me a little bit about, uh, what both the people in the one-on-one coaching and the actual and the, you know, handful of people who’ve actually gone through the calling course?
What, what have they experienced in their lives?
Dan: yeah. At a high level, people who have gone through the. The it’s the same, it’s the same process, whether it’s the, whether it’s done via one on one or, or, um, the, the calling course, um, it’s the same, yeah. The same journey that I’m, I invite people to, um, what the movement that takes place is typically some sense of feeling stuck, um, lost, um, UN uncertain of, you know, where to apply their, you know, their focus, their efforts, um, feel, they feel somewhat maybe out of control of some area of their life, but don’t really know where, where to find the controls.
If that analogy makes sense. Um, And through the process. It’s a process of, I, I think of it as a process of identity formation. So usually there’s some guiding question that people are coming in with that, you know, should I change careers? Should I leave ministry? Should, what should I do? You know, now that my kids are out of the house or like, I just have this growing dissatisfaction in life and I don’t know what to do with it in the process that, um, I invite people to is really, um, A process of identity formation that then results in typically some sort of resolution to the presenting, those presenting problems.
And so, um, some of the steps along that journey are, are digging into people’s personal narrative and helping them, um, look through, you know, their, their past history and, and some of the significant stories in their life to better understand how they have. Who they are, which also then informs who they are, because identity is at its core, a story.
So helps bring that story to light, put words to that story. Um, help them. It helps them, uh, identify themes in their story to help them, you know, help us all, um, have a better understanding of what is meaningful, what is impactful like the, the, the. Movement. We wanna be a part of in the world or the impact, the theme of our, our work that we, where we really find satisfaction, fulfillment from it.
And then, um, invites them to a process of iterative, um, experimentation around. Those themes. And so to put that in more simple words, like trying things, uh, try just an experiment. Okay. What happens if we put Dan in a situation where he can do more of this or that kind of work, and how does that feel? And then.
Let’s go back to the drawing board with that, um, with that data and see how that, uh, uh, affects how we think about our next steps and what our, our next focus and the focus of our next couple months should be. Um, so that’s, you know, that’s the process and, you know, through that comes a sense of, of peace.
I think there comes a sense of, um, like feeling, I, I think I use the word control, like a sense of control being in control or more in control, um, of. Your life. We, you know, you and I have used the word, like the director being the director, um, of, of your life in some ways. Um, but yeah, that’s the, that’s the process and that’s, um, I love it.
I love being a part of that transformation.
Raj: Yeah. and have a lot of people asked for refunds, like, is this, you know, does this format not
Dan: Does it, does it work? The people who have asked for refunds are, it’s never about the content. It’s like, I bought this and then I told my spouse about it. And they said, no, we shouldn’t be spending money right now. Like those, those kinds of things. Um, and
Raj: so the, so most of the people who buy it, uh, or, or have, or have hired you to coach them personally, they’ve actually experienced this success, this
Dan: Yes.
Raj: Okay. So, so then again, going back to this idea of objectively is the meaning movement, a big F failure. We have to say no there, because you have actually helped people in the way that you’ve said that you were gonna help people.
And, you know, what I find really fascinating about this whole thing is. That last piece that you talked about, experimentation trying things, once you’ve identified the themes, the, you know, the patterns in your life, you’re the kind of the story that you’re in and you know, that you’re aiming at the right thing.
And I think that a little bit of objective proof is part of that, right. Of, you know, has, has everybody asked for refunds I’m goldfish ministry or whatever, you know, it’s like
Dan: Yes.
Raj: if they haven’t or if you, you know, if you’re making any traction at all, especially even on, on a one on one level, You know that you’re on the right path.
So it’s not big F failure, but I think that that puts us at the, at the end of kind of the calling course process then, which is experimentation. We, we need to continue to try things to find, to find that bridge, like we talked about, you know, that find that bridge across the chasm, to the promise land, to where this actually works, because it, we know that it works on a small scale and.
We, we need to find that bridge, which may even just be the way of talking about it, to help other people understand that it’s for them.
Dan: Yes.
Raj: So what I would argue is that the big F failure for the meaning movement for you would be to stop, experimenting, to stop trying.
Dan: Yeah.
Raj: You’d be both failing your own story, your own, your own narrative.
and you would be failing the process of the calling course of the meeting movement by, by knowing that you’ve made it through all of these correct steps and experienced the, you know, the objective proof that it does work and that it is the right thing. And then, and, and then deciding to stop trying.
Dan: Yep.
Raj: That’s how we can help ourselves identify that we’re not there yet. We’re nowhere near that yet. Actually.
Dan: Yeah. Yeah.
Raj: So we have to pick ourselves up and try again tomorrow because, because it’s worth doing, and I wanna point out that that’s, that’s not nothing like, we it’s easy to talk about, but
Dan: it’s hard. It’s really hard.
Raj: yeah.
When you’re talking about not feeling like you’ve got a lot of tries left,
Dan: Mm.
Raj: mean, the complexities of being an adult of having kids who are all wired differently. And, uh, you know, even just biochemically, you know, it’s like sometimes you just don’t don’t know. I read this study out of, uh, England where the, there was a doctor who, uh, who, who wrote a paper, the headline was something the effect of do tomatoes, turn people into criminals.
And they found that like eating to acidic foods, uh, especially tomatoes caused a gut reaction in people that actually made some people violent. And it was like, it’s like trying to figure out your own children. And if you.
Dan: Yeah. Yeah.
Raj: eating tomatoes turns them into psychopaths or, uh, or if sugar or red dye or whatever, just that one thing is super complex.
And then navigating the complexities of, am I doing my life’s work is, is the most I can make of my income in my funding, my 401k, uh, you know, it, it, should I go for that other job? Or should I stay here? Is there a growth path or sales, you know, just, oh my gosh, all of that. Being a spouse, uh, being a spouse to somebody who changes over their lifetime, both in their values, in their, uh, biology, in , you know, in, in personality experiences, all of those things, uh, you know, your own personal health, again, lots of biochemical realities there.
And, you know, should I eat more protein and fewer carbs and ha what kind of exercise and what do I do with this energy or this injury and
Dan: Yes. All of it.
Raj: It is not nothing to say, get up and try again tomorrow because all of those little F failures of I ate too many carbs yesterday and I yelled at my kid and I blew that sale.
And like, all of those little F failures can make us just feel like giving up.
Dan: Yes.
Raj: And so, as. Approach this next season of experimentation with the meaning movement of trying it is. Okay. It is absolutely okay. To take a breath to admit that it’s hard. And you’re great about doing that
Dan: Yeah.
Raj: to also want to keep going and to have belief that, that it can happen.
Dan: Yeah.
Raj: One of the things we’ve been talking about is that. I think that the podcast has not served the meaning movement. Well, up to this point, because it’s been a lot of, kind of one off stories and it’s people who, uh, have been successful, which is great. It’s nice to hear how those stories happen, but we, we know almost nothing about the content of the calling course.
I’ve been around here for eight years and having never bought the calling course. I didn’t know what was in it until you showed me a few months. You just told us a lot about it, which is probably the first time on the podcast that you’ve actually told us that much about it,
Dan: Hmm.
Raj: but it, uh, yeah, the, the podcast so far has, has been a lot of guests.
Who’ve kind of told how they made it. And it sort of, to me feel has felt like, um, you know, All you have to do is read this book and that book and this book and try this framework and, and then you’ll be successful. and, and it’s like, man, I’m already overwhelmed. There’s already too much going on. Just all those kinds of things that I mentioned before. And recently, one of the things that you and I talked about was that I personally think that if the calling course or sorry, if the meaning movement podcast was more about these coaching moments was more. You helping somebody who, who comes to you and says, I don’t know to about my physical health, about my career, about my relationship, about my family, parenting, all of those things.
And you know, you’ve identified that. So a lot of times it’s like, I, I quit my job or I lost my job and I I’m experiencing this moment of change. How do I get through this?
Dan: Mm-hmm
Raj: I think that that’d be an incredibly compelling podcast where you actually coach people through those moments and you have been resistant to it.
And I’d like to unpack that. just a little bit, um, why, why have you been resistant to it?
Dan: Uh, well, I think it like. I think it comes back to few things. One is like when I hear the, in our conversations about the podcast of podcast podcast format, like I have a workflow and a template that works and, um, to make a change to that. Well that’s yes. That’s what you’re, that’s what you’re saying.
Yes. Does it work? It does not work as well as it could. We that’s that’s. And so the hypothesis here is if we change the podcast, will it result in, you know, in change, in bigger changes to, to, you know, helping people more, more engagement, all of these, you know, more engagement from listeners to all these things.
And it’s hard for me with all the small Fs. That I’m carrying on my back of those failures to be excited about bringing on a change, uh, of implementing a change without like, and, and just risking another, another F to throw on, to throw on that pile. Um, And I, I was talking to my wife about this and, you know, saying, you know, what, some of our discussion and possible changes, we’re kind of brainstorming different ways that we can go about, you know, making some of these changes to the podcast format specifically, and more content, maybe more co-hosted, um, content, you know, all these, you know, coaching, all these things.
And I was talking about my resistance and she was like, so you want to like change, you want to change the meaning movement, you know, it needs to change, but you don’t want to change anything. I was like, yay. I guess that kind of sounds right. and so I think I’m, I mean, I think it’s partly a pro product of, of the burnout and just feeling like it’s just, it feels heavy.
Um,
Raj: Yeah.
Dan: but in spite of. I, I signed up for this. I, I, this is why, you know, a big part of you, your, our conversations we’ve been having is because I know that that, like, this is a case and point of a decision that like, I know would be healthy to make, but I don’t feel like I could, I can’t get myself to do it on my own.
And so. To be like, well, Raj thinks that it, that this is so at least if it doesn’t work, then I can at least blame you Raj
Raj: a hundred percent
Dan: So maybe that’ll maybe that’ll take a little bit of the edge off if it doesn’t work. But, um, but we’re not gonna know until we try. And so I’m willing.
Raj: I, I want everybody to zoom out with me for a second here and, and notice that the small F failures like a podcast that maybe hasn’t had the listenership that it, it could have had over the years, uh, you know, lots of emails that have gone out on unanswered. All those. Those things can, uh, are, are sometimes easily fixable.
Okay. Let’s try a different format on the podcast, but they can also put us in danger of making the big F failures ourselves.
Dan: mm-hmm
Raj: Like you, your small F failures. We said just a few minutes ago that the big F failure for you for the meaning movement would to be not to try anymore. And the small F failures are pushing you towards not wanting to try.
To the big F
Dan: mm-hmm
Raj: And this happens all the time to all of us. And so I wanted to crystallize that one particular moment, that one particular idea for all of us, that the, you know, part of the reason we quit right before we hit success is because we have bought into a story that says that we are a big F failure because of all the little missteps along the way, but that the actual big F failure would.
Would be to not try to not experiment, to not push it one more time. And, uh, so I’m glad, I’m glad that you are willing to shake things up and try again. And so my challenge to anybody who’s listening, um, I’m even gonna ask Dan to maybe clip this specific challenge out into the emails.
Dan: Yes.
Raj: If you wanna be coached by Dan, if you.
To acknowledge that the, the guy in Seattle who’s waving the flag saying that you can live a life of meaning you can live a life wearing your heart on your sleeve, like fully being human with feelings and everything. If you wanna be coached by Dan, we’re gonna provide a link, uh, either in the description of the podcast or, or in the email for you to sign up, to be coached on the podcast.
To be brave and let other people hear what it looks like to work through something
Dan: Hmm.
Raj: prove, prove me wrong, uh, that, that this could work,
Dan: I love it.
Raj: you know, I think there’s a bunch of us out there who would really do a lot to, to spend an hour with Dan, spend a half hour with Dan having him. Use this framework, you know, to help us get unstuck in moments.
And it doesn’t have to be huge things like, you know, you’re being unfaithful to your spouse or, you know, you want to blow up your life in some way. It could just be that feeling stuck with, um, your health, with, uh, a particular relationship with a situation at work, fill out the form, be on the podcast and, and.
Let’s make the meaning movement, ours. Let’s, let’s jump in and be the kinds of people who, who, who are chasing movement in public together, who are admitting that we have hearts and feelings and not just knuckling under and, and surviving. That’s my
Dan: I love
Raj: to you. Join the meeting movement, be on the podcast, uh, with that link that we’ll provide either in the description or in, in the email.
Uh, we, we want to hear.
Dan: I love that challenge, Raj and, um, listeners. I I’m excited to chat more. Let’s do this. Sounds like a great plan.
