Episode 103

The TRIP Assessment: Tenacity, Resilience, Imagination and Purpose with Keith Renninson

Published on: 27th July, 2022

How many of you after reading read Eat Pray Love or seeing the movie thought to yourself, “that’s what I need, a soul searching, foundation affirming trek around the world to really help me discover what the heck I am doing on this planet!”

And how realistic is that for any of us? Not very realistic at all.


Well, good thing for us my guest today already did all of that stuff for us. He did the trek through Nepal and combined that with a lifetime of other lessons to develop what he calls his TRIP Technique ™  an Assessment which scores individuals on their strengths and weaknesses at tenacity, resilience, imagination, and purpose (TRIP), and you can do this assessment right from the comfort of your own home - no trip to Nepal needed. 


Listen in to hear the lessons that helped Keith create the TRIP Assessment and how we can use it ourselves.


Drink of the Week: Nepali Best Cocktail (Mountain Man)


Julie Brown:

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Keith Renninson

https://www.keithrenninson.com/


Sponsor

Nickerson


Transcript
Julie:

In 2006, I read, eat, pray, love.

Julie:

The memoir by Elizabeth Gilbert.

Julie:

The book Chronicles her journey around the world, which becomes

Julie:

a quest for self discovery.

Julie:

In her travels, she discovers the pleasures of food in Italy.

Julie:

The power of prayer and silence in India.

Julie:

And finally, and I guess unexpectedly, since she had just been recently divorced.

Julie:

A new husband in Indonesia.

Julie:

Reading that book can make anyone feel that in order to find themselves, they

Julie:

just need us soul searching foundation affirming Trek around the world.

Julie:

But how realistic is that for any of us?

Julie:

Welcome to episode 1 0 3 of this shit works.

Julie:

A podcast dedicated to all things networking.

Julie:

Business development in relationship building.

Julie:

I'm your host, Julie Brown.

Julie:

And today.

Julie:

I am talking with Keith Renison author of the award-winning book.

Julie:

Tenacity.

Julie:

You don't have to get lost in Nepal to find yourself.

Julie:

But it helps.

Julie:

This episode is sponsored by Nickerson.

Julie:

A full service, branding, marketing PR and communications agency

Julie:

with team members in Boston.

Julie:

Los Angeles, Miami and New York city.

Julie:

Visit them@nickersoncos.com.

Julie:

How many of you thought to yourself in order to search

Julie:

within, I really need to get away.

Julie:

Like far away.

Julie:

Like maybe the vorticies in Sedona and ashram in India or the rugged

Julie:

landscape of the Appalachian trail really helped me discover what the

Julie:

fuck I am doing on this planet.

Julie:

Now, how many of you have actually had the money?

Julie:

Or the time to do this, you know, and this stays in your calendar

Julie:

to take off and find yourself.

Julie:

Not many.

Julie:

I'm going to guess.

Julie:

Well, Good thing for us.

Julie:

My guest today already did all of that stuff for us.

Julie:

He actually got lost in Nepal spending one night cuddled up and becoming

Julie:

bed bodies with a 1200 pound yak.

Julie:

This experience combined with a lifetime of other lessons, led him to develop

Julie:

what he calls his trip technique.

Julie:

And assessment, which scores individuals on their strengths,

Julie:

and weaknesses at tenacity, resilience, imagination, and purpose.

Julie:

And you can do this assessment right from the comfort of your own home.

Julie:

No trip to nepal needed So let's dive into this tool And the lessons that help

Julie:

keith create it and how we can all use it ourselves Keith, welcome to the program.

Keith:

Good morning.

Keith:

Good to be with you.

Julie:

It's afternoon, where I am it's morning, where you are.

Julie:

You say you have a ton of stories from a life well lived., but let's

Julie:

start with the stories that you say define the four parts of the trip

Julie:

assessment starting with tenacity.

Julie:

You said I found tenacity while being fired 33 times during my 36 month

Julie:

probationary period at New York life.

Julie:

Not sure how you get hired almost.

Julie:

Many times as the months you were there.

Julie:

But tell us about that.

Keith:

Well, when I got home from Vietnam, I was, sort of bouncing around looking

Keith:

for what my life was going to bring.

Keith:

And I was working as a disc jockey at night and a mortgage

Keith:

loan counselor during the day Dr.

Keith:

Jekyll and Mr.

Keith:

Hyde.

Keith:

Right.

Keith:

And.

Keith:

I go to for vacation with, with my fiance and I came back and, we had

Keith:

a bowling league and I went to, the night for bowling before I went back

Keith:

to work and nobody would talk to me.

Keith:

They were all kind of avoiding me and I'm going, okay, what's the deal with this?

Keith:

And finally, one guy took me aside and he said, our savings alone is being

Keith:

bought out by a large corporation.

Keith:

And you're on the list to lose your.

Keith:

And that nobody wants to tell you that.

Keith:

And so that was what was going on.

Keith:

So I started looking around to see what I was going to do next.

Keith:

Then I met with my life insurance agent to find out if, I could get a

Keith:

policy since I was getting married.

Keith:

And he suggested I take the test for New York life.

Keith:

Well, I don't think anybody ever fails an insurance company's tests.

Keith:

I think they're basically after war bodies and I passed and was welcomed with open

Keith:

arms by a gigantic man from Germany, his name was Wynn, had a thick German accent.

Keith:

He was like six, two, and just a massive man.

Keith:

And he became my general manager and he signed my contract on December 1st, 1975.

Keith:

And for the next 36 months, I was on a probationary contract.

Keith:

And that contract said that if I hadn't did not meet my, stipend

Keith:

each month, that I had 30 days, to do that, or I would be terminated.

Keith:

And so I would set at the end of each month in the bullpen, as we called it,

Keith:

where all the new agents set, making cold calls, trying to find somebody

Keith:

to sell a policy to and waiting to hear the click of the heels coming

Keith:

down the hall on the linoleum floor.

Keith:

And , if five o'clock has he made us all be there at five o'clock on a Friday

Keith:

night and any, then he'd go around and just quietly lay the paper on each desk.

Keith:

If you, if you

Julie:

Oh,

Keith:

needed a sign and we had to sign what was known as the

Keith:

termination contract, which that I, if I didn't make it, I was gone.

Keith:

And over the next 36 months, I was terminated 33, 2.

Julie:

Yeah.

Keith:

So tenacity became a part of my life early on because I learned

Keith:

that the insurance business was going to be exceedingly difficult, but the

Keith:

rewards in the long run or a we're going to be a life well lived because

Keith:

it would give me the opportunity.

Keith:

As you said, in your opening to have the ability to travel the world.

Keith:

When I wanted to, I had a secretary that could take over

Keith:

and run things while I was gone.

Keith:

The trip to DePaul was six weeks long.

Keith:

And I used every bit of that to find myself.

Julie:

How old were you when you did that trip to Nepal?

Keith:

Let's see, that was 1995.

Keith:

So I was 40.

Julie:

Okay.

Julie:

So I alluded to this trip to Nepal, in the opening.

Julie:

And you say that this.

Julie:

The six weeks in Nepal is where you learned resilience.

Julie:

So that 36 months at New York life taught you tenacity and going after things.

Julie:

But you said the six weeks in Nepal is what really taught you resilience.

Julie:

So tell us about that trip and what you faced and how you

Julie:

discovered your own resilience.

Julie:

In that six weeks.

Keith:

When I landed in Katmandu, I have.

Keith:

My whole itinerary laid out for me.

Keith:

I had been researching where I was going, which was, I was going to

Keith:

go to base camp at Mount Everest.

Keith:

You don't have to climb the mountain.

Keith:

You could just go stay at base camp.

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And I wanted to do that.

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It sits at about 19,000 feet.

Keith:

And so I climbed a lot of fourteeners 14,000 foot peaks before I left.

Keith:

So I was acclimated for high altitude.

Keith:

By the time I got there, my trip was laid out.

Keith:

I was ready to go.

Keith:

And I'm landing at Katmandu watching helicopters, land, and

Keith:

watching them unload bodies.

Keith:

From avalanches that had taken place with a snow storm that had

Keith:

occurred that had dumped about six feet of snow in the Everest region

Keith:

and were avalanches occurring.

Keith:

And a lot of people killed.

Keith:

And so , they canceled my tracking permit.

Keith:

So I had to completely redesign my trip with the help of a friend who

Keith:

I was staying with, who I had met on the first trip, I'd been to Nepal

Keith:

three years earlier with a friend.

Keith:

And, he helped me map out where to go for a second option.

Keith:

And it was to a mountain called Cancun jungle, which is in the

Keith:

Northeastern corner of the country.

Keith:

I had to take up an airplane ride, which actually went right past Mount Everest.

Keith:

I got a lot of really cool photographs from the window.

Keith:

looking out and up at Everest, but it was a single engine plane that

Keith:

was probably built in 1910, and it was bouncing all over the place.

Keith:

Looked like the wings were about to fall off of the seats were moving

Keith:

inside the cabin know it was a mess.

Keith:

I was just, I felt very lucky when we landed at Bhaktapur and I

Keith:

was able to get off of the thing.

Keith:

But from there I took a three day bus ride.

Keith:

Through the Himalayas, the foothills to get to where my trick would start at

Keith:

a town called Cavali and that bus ride was sort of all an experience by itself.

Keith:

You see these YouTube videos where buses are passing one another on

Keith:

cliffs that dropped thousands of feet.

Keith:

That was this bus ride.

Keith:

And they fold the mirrors on the sides of the buses.

Keith:

And the bus is actually scraped as they go past one another.

Keith:

I always wondered why they were painted such wild colors.

Keith:

It's because at the next stop they grab a bucket of paint and they'd

Keith:

start painting the scrapes again.

Keith:

It was just hilarious and that the Nepalese people are

Keith:

so creative and advantage.

Keith:

So anyway, I got to Cavale, which was an old stagecoach stop, more

Keith:

than anything else, the rail getting into the Himalayas and.

Keith:

I was filled with anticipation because , I had to told that this

Keith:

was an area that had a lot of, crime.

Keith:

They had the people that were going in there and then disappearing.

Keith:

So I, it wasn't my ideal place to go.

Keith:

Plus I knew nothing about the accommodations, which

Keith:

turned out to these zero.

Keith:

There was no teahouses at the end of each day to spend the night, there was no place

Keith:

to, re supply myself as I went along.

Keith:

And there was no place to find water.

Keith:

So consequently, I started out , in jungle area at a lower elevation

Keith:

and had to work my way up to get to where I was going to be at a town

Keith:

called topless June and topless.

Keith:

June was up high enough up that I was going to get out of jungle

Keith:

and I could actually get into the mountains and within four hours.

Keith:

Because I had to, I was going through these conditions though, where I was

Keith:

following a path that I was told by the people that could volley that, that path

Keith:

right there will take you, to topless you.

Keith:

And I said, okay, that's good.

Keith:

So I figured, you know, two or three hours, I'll be at the next stop.

Keith:

And I came to a lot of wise.

Keith:

And you're going all right, do I turn right?

Keith:

Do I turn left?

Keith:

Do I go up?

Keith:

Do I go down?

Keith:

What do I do here?

Keith:

I had a very poor map that I had purchased in Katmandu and I had a compass.

Keith:

And so I started using that and I, I kept going up in elevation

Keith:

and towards the mountain.

Keith:

So anytime I would look at the compass to see which direction to go, and

Keith:

then four hours, I couldn't have found my way back out if I'd want it to.

Keith:

It was quite A scary kind of condition because I was carrying

Keith:

about 60 pounds on my back.

Keith:

I had gone for.

Keith:

With photographic equipment.

Keith:

Cause I was a heavy into photography at the time.

Keith:

I had just published my first book of black and white photography

Keith:

and short stories and poetry and poetry, uh, sales really well.

Keith:

And so I've got all this photographic equipment.

Keith:

I've got tripods and camera bodies and a hundred rolls of film in a led bag that

Keith:

wouldn't go through the x-ray machines.

Keith:

You can,

Julie:

I use I'm old enough to my first trips to Europe.

Julie:

I had those led bags to go through the TSA.

Julie:

So my film wouldn't get ruined.

Keith:

Yeah, you don't look that old.

Keith:

So.

Julie:

It's Botox.

Keith:

Anyway, I started getting rather fearful because it was at

Keith:

that point that both my tenacity and my resilience started to kick in.

Keith:

I sat down along the side of the trail and I had taken a course in the

Keith:

seventies, on, meditation and biofuel.

Keith:

And I knew how to lower my blood pressure, lower my body

Keith:

temperature, lower my brainwave activity so that I could focus.

Keith:

And so I sat down and I started the meditate using those techniques, and

Keith:

I started the journal right away, what I was experiencing and what I

Keith:

was thinking of, what I was doing.

Keith:

And several times during the day I would do that.

Keith:

And I had a case of cliff bars with me that was all the food.

Keith:

And because I thought it was going to be T houses at the end of each day and

Keith:

places to get more food and whatnot.

Keith:

So, I realized that I was going to run out of food quick if

Keith:

I didn't take care of myself.

Keith:

And at the end of the day, I happen to cross a small Nepalese family sitting

Keith:

across, along the side of the trail.

Keith:

And they had been kicked picking fruit in the orchards near them.

Keith:

And they were taking them back to their hut and the mother and the

Keith:

father did not speak any English.

Keith:

But as I walked up the little boy who was about six years old, man, his eyes

Keith:

got this big and he looked at me and he, because he'd never seen somebody like me,

Keith:

I mean, trekkers we were well loud colors.

Keith:

I mean purple scarves, yellow socks and red shirts that were

Keith:

totally out of color coordination.

Keith:

And he looked at me and was like, oh boy, what do we got here?

Keith:

And he'd come running up.

Keith:

And he said, who are you?

Keith:

And I said, you speak English.

Keith:

And he said, yes, which I'll tell you how he came about that in a minute.

Keith:

So I told him my predicament that I needed a place to stay.

Keith:

Uh, very tired.

Keith:

I'd started to wear a lot of blisters on my feet because my

Keith:

boots were made for high altitude.

Keith:

And I was trekking in jungle conditions still.

Keith:

And, he turned to his parents and explained to them what I had said

Keith:

and turned back to me and put his hands together in typical Nepalese

Keith:

fashion and said, no, I'm a stay, sir.

Keith:

Mom and dad would love to have fuse stay as.

Keith:

For dinner and we will give you a place to sleep.

Keith:

And my heart just left.

Keith:

I mean, it was like, oh God, good.

Keith:

I'm going to get saved by a six year old.

Keith:

So I did spend the evening with them and they headed me on , my direction

Keith:

and the next day to keep on going to try and get where I was doing.

Keith:

So my resilience popped up each day because each day I found that at the end

Keith:

of the day, I did not know where I was at.

Keith:

I did not know if I was going to get to where I was going.

Keith:

Nobody that I'd met on the trail, spoke English.

Keith:

And I knew very little Nepalese.

Keith:

This is before Google translate.

Keith:

So of course it wouldn't have worked out there in the wilderness anyway,

Keith:

so for the next four days, I pretty much just followed the trail.

Keith:

And I would say the word topless June for the town and points and people

Keith:

would, would point and pointless.

Keith:

Okay.

Keith:

So I'm on the right path.

Keith:

Well, as it turned out, Julie, if you had a target with cert a circular

Keith:

target and the center was top lesbian, I was just walking around it in

Keith:

a great big circle for four days.

Keith:

And it wasn't until the fourth day that, I ended up meeting three.

Keith:

Um, What they were known as school inspector.

Keith:

So let me come back to the little boy in schooling.

Keith:

Whenever a family dies off in Nepal, if there's nobody to take

Keith:

over their home, the there's not a school in the area already.

Keith:

They will turn that home into, uh, areas of geographical school.

Keith:

And then they'll bring somebody in from like the peace Corps or the UN that

Keith:

will teach kids and they in the area.

Keith:

And so this little boy had been going to valleys.

Keith:

To one of these little regional schools and learning English.

Keith:

And these men that I met on this particular afternoon, I

Keith:

was sitting on this Ridge stop.

Keith:

Uh, it was like four o'clock in the afternoon.

Keith:

The sun was going to set in about an hour.

Keith:

And because this is in November and I looked to my right down the

Keith:

valley and there wasn't a house with any smoke coming out of a chimney.

Keith:

I looked to the left and it was the same thing.

Keith:

You know, it was just green, everywhere.

Keith:

I looked for miles and miles.

Keith:

So I leaned up against the tree with my back on a backpack on, and I said,

Keith:

God, if you're going to get me to where I'm going, you're going to have to do

Keith:

it because I'm doing a really poor job.

Keith:

And so I closed my eyes and I actually fell asleep for a few minutes.

Keith:

And then I was awakened hearing the footsteps of these three

Keith:

guys coming up behind me.

Keith:

And they were the roughest looking men.

Keith:

They were dirty, they were carrying kind of some implements with them.

Keith:

Oh, is this people who make people disappear?

Keith:

You know, what, what have I got going on here?

Keith:

So I thought, well, maybe if I close my eyes, they'll just walk on by.

Keith:

And they stopped a few feet away from me and they kind of whispered

Keith:

to one another and then one of them approached me and tapped me on the

Keith:

shoulder and he said, are you okay?

Keith:

And I said, wow.

Keith:

Yes, you speak English.

Keith:

And he explained , they were school inspectors and they had been repairing

Keith:

one of these small schools and they were now on their way back to guess where top.

Julie:

June.

Keith:

So anyway, that's how

Julie:

take your four days.

Julie:

What was it?

Julie:

What was it supposed to take you?

Keith:

I should have been there the next afternoon.

Keith:

When I left there, when I left Cavali at six o'clock in the morning, I should have

Keith:

been there around two o'clock that day.

Julie:

Okay.

Keith:

So I, I made a right when I should've made a left or a bunch

Keith:

of lefts when I should've made a bunch of rights, I don't know.

Keith:

And, uh,

Julie:

Hey, listen, you're, you're talking to somebody who, to me north is

Julie:

always the direction you're going in.

Julie:

When Google maps is like, go north on main street, I'm like,

Julie:

Which way's north, tell me right.

Julie:

Or left.

Julie:

I don't know, but my husband he can look at the sun and he's

Julie:

like, Julie, that is north.

Julie:

I don't have that in my God gave me many gifts.

Keith:

That wasn't

Julie:

visiting and direction is not one of them.

Julie:

So.

Keith:

in Colorado we have the, uh, the, the wonderful advantage of the

Keith:

mountains are always to the west.

Julie:

Yeah.

Julie:

I mean, we should have that here at the waters that we used to the east,

Julie:

but it's not always right beside,

Keith:

That's true.

Julie:

so, so your next one, imagination and the trip assessment

Julie:

note as a fellow skier, I'm not sure.

Julie:

I want to even hear the story about how you discovered your imagination.

Keith:

Well, The resort for the people that are listening to this podcast.

Keith:

I have a background that shows the ski resort behind

Keith:

me and the Colorado mountains.

Keith:

And it's a one that I volunteer at it's called winter park.

Keith:

And.

Keith:

I worked there for 13 years, as a guest host where I helped the skiers

Keith:

in the morning find equipment and in the evening, find their car.

Keith:

And during the day I patrol the mountain with ski patrol and look

Keith:

for people that are in trouble.

Keith:

And this was my fifth day skiing in December.

Keith:

It was December 20th.

Keith:

It was a really cold day.

Keith:

It was windy and it was icy because we hadn't had a lot of

Keith:

snow and we'd been making snow.

Keith:

And that makes for icy conditions.

Julie:

Terrible snow.

Julie:

Yeah.

Keith:

And my boots were killing me.

Keith:

And so I didn't have them as tight as I normally do.

Keith:

I had gotten new inserts put in them and they just weren't fitting well.

Keith:

And I was tired.

Keith:

I was cranky.

Keith:

It was about two o'clock in the afternoon.

Keith:

And I rounded, to a spot where we would always watch people.

Keith:

Cause it's where you enter a tunnel and.

Keith:

I stop at the top of that because I want to make sure people are going

Keith:

slow, that they're not running into one.

Keith:

There's a lot, a lot of kids in that area.

Keith:

And I stand there.

Keith:

So I was rounding the corner of a slow sign.

Keith:

They put them up on bamboo poles and just a big sign that says slow on it.

Keith:

And my right ski cut the pole.

Keith:

My left ski caught an edge.

Keith:

They both went different directions than it actually flipped me up in the

Keith:

air and neither ski binding release.

Julie:

mark.

Keith:

And I broke both ankles, the right ankle in two places in the left ankle.

Keith:

And.

Keith:

And as soon as I stood happened, I stood up right away.

Keith:

This is always my reaction.

Keith:

Never I fall skiing.

Keith:

Oh God, am I okay.

Keith:

Standing up?

Keith:

And I didn't feel anything.

Keith:

I didn't feel any real pain.

Keith:

And I, got out of the bindings and I walked around the skis and a ski

Keith:

patroller who had been standing across from me, came over and she

Keith:

said, boy, you get really hard.

Keith:

Are you okay?

Keith:

And I said, yeah, I, I actually think I'm all right.

Keith:

So I stood there and kind of gathered my census, put my skis

Keith:

back in the binding, started to ski.

Keith:

And as soon as I started to turn, they wouldn't turn

Keith:

because the bones were broken.

Keith:

It was the most embarrassing call on the radio I ever made was to call myself a

Keith:

sled because I had to call ski patrol to come take me off the mountain.

Keith:

So back to your original question, because of having two broken ankles

Keith:

and I live alone, my son's grown.

Keith:

I have nobody in a two story town house.

Keith:

I had to start using my imagination for absolutely everything.

Keith:

Yeah.

Keith:

I had walking boots on both feet, you know, they told me don't walk on

Keith:

the right one and try not to walk on the left one and I'm going, oh yeah.

Keith:

How am I going to do that?

Keith:

You know?

Keith:

I wasn't experiencing a tremendous amount of pain at first.

Keith:

I think I was sort of still kind of nonplussed.

Keith:

They gave me stuff in the emergency room.

Keith:

Well, goodness bless you.

Julie:

Sorry.

Julie:

I don't know where that came from.

Julie:

My whole head went crazy.

Julie:

Like my hair just blew up.

Julie:

Sorry.

Keith:

That's okay.

Keith:

So over the next few days, you, you learn.

Keith:

Be creative.

Keith:

How do I reach stuff on upper shelves?

Keith:

How do I get from the bathroom to the couch?

Keith:

I have a Walker with wheels on it breaks my son had done got it was

Keith:

my dad's, before he passed away.

Keith:

You start looking.

Keith:

How to order food that can be delivered how to get grocery

Keith:

stores to deliver things.

Keith:

And this is in the middle of, the pandemic anyway, or we're all

Keith:

looking for those kinds of resources.

Keith:

And I still wanted to continue my business cause I, obviously we weren't

Keith:

speaking much, but I still had my blog.

Keith:

I was putting up every week and I was connected.

Keith:

I was recording a lot of YouTube videos and I actually had.

Keith:

Uh, podcast two days after I broke the ankles that I was on the podcast

Keith:

and she said, why are you not in bed?

Keith:

I said, well, you know, what's that going to accomplish?

Keith:

I might as well sit here and talk to you.

Julie:

Right.

Keith:

So anyway, the imagination and purpose, both kind of, sort of

Keith:

surfaced a lot then because I had.

Keith:

I had to change a lot in my life.

Keith:

I had to change what my purpose was every day, what I was going to

Keith:

do, how I was going to do it, and that my body wanted nothing more

Keith:

than to sleep, but it was healing.

Julie:

Yeah, of course.

Julie:

Yeah.

Keith:

Yeah, that was so frustrating because I'm a type a guy.

Keith:

Through tenacity with resilience, using my imagination to serve

Keith:

the purpose of keeping moving and keeping my life exciting and fun

Keith:

and being of service to people.

Keith:

So I had to walk the walks.

Keith:

There's no pun intended for my trip system and actually is certainly very well.

Julie:

So, were there other things that helped you define your purpose?

Julie:

I mean, I think you've said that , you've discovered multiple purposes

Julie:

in life and maybe your purpose when you were younger was something

Julie:

different than your purposes now.

Julie:

Like, and I think that's how , we're supposed to evolve as,

Keith:

Oh, totally like completely you're.

Keith:

So on target with that one.

Keith:

My purpose when I was 16, was meeting girls in 57 Ford go really fast.

Keith:

Right.

Keith:

Uh, you know, I don't have a 57 Ford.

Keith:

I'm not really looking for girls a lot anymore.

Keith:

Uh, and so things have changed a lot at 74, but I'm finding that.

Keith:

And I wrote this in my blog the other day that people should have multiple.

Keith:

Uh, if you're single, definitely have multiple purposes.

Keith:

If you're married, they may narrow a little bit because of family obligations.

Keith:

You can have a travel purpose.

Keith:

You can have a work purpose.

Keith:

You can have a charity purpose.

Keith:

I think if we have purpose in life, we have a reason to get up every morning and

Keith:

that's something I think a lot of people were struggling with during the pandemic.

Keith:

Okay.

Julie:

So I, you sent me a link to do my own trip assessment,

Julie:

which I did, and I printed it out.

Julie:

So maybe we can go through my assessment and you can break it down

Julie:

for me, and tell me what it means.

Julie:

And then that way, when the listeners go on and do the trip

Julie:

assessment, they'll kind of understand all the different parts.

Keith:

No, of course.

Julie:

So again, the trip assessment is tenacity, resilience,

Julie:

imagination, and purpose.

Julie:

And so you're scored, I think you're scored super active, active and passive.

Julie:

Okay.

Julie:

So my trip assessment is my tenacity score is super active.

Keith:

I would not have doubted in any other way.

Julie:

So it says, I can power up my determination to be fierce and

Julie:

persistent in reaching my goals.

Julie:

I am probably already a leader in love facing or taking

Julie:

risks, which I think I do.

Julie:

I think you, in order to be an entrepreneur, you have to like take away.

Keith:

Oh, yeah, definitely.

Julie:

You know how to activate your tenacity muscle when needed and

Julie:

exercise that regularly to always be on your game, you have the ability

Julie:

to make it fun and find humor in this situation to brainstorm with others

Julie:

and to be a good listener and observer.

Julie:

You say I love the feeling of tenacity, which is true and the energy

Julie:

it brings, to boost my motivation.

Julie:

So what have I had in, uh, one of my tenacity wasn't super active,

Julie:

cause I'm already now at like the super active, so like great.

Julie:

Is there any negatives to having it super active?

Keith:

That's a really good question.

Keith:

Nobody's asked me that one before.

Keith:

I love it.

Keith:

When somebody gives me something new.

Keith:

I think that with super active people, well, what I have found cause I'm

Keith:

one too, is that we have, uh, a time when we will fall into complacency.

Keith:

And I think that that comes from oftentimes from being bored.

Julie:

Yeah.

Keith:

I think that if we're not challenged often enough in ways that are.

Keith:

Whatever turns us on mine is creativity.

Keith:

If I, if I get challenged for something creative, I'm on it.

Keith:

I'm not ready to go.

Keith:

And physically, I mean, I raced bicycles up until five years ago.

Keith:

I mean, you know, I skied mountain climb and I think that boredom

Keith:

oftentimes causes us a lot of problems.

Keith:

I think we'll make decisions that aren't always, in our favor.

Keith:

I think that we look for, for things to excite us that maybe,

Keith:

uh, Once again in our favor.

Keith:

And I think the people that are super active need to have that

Keith:

stimulus, they need to have that, goal oriented kind of thing.

Keith:

People like us that have super active ranking on tenacity are always

Keith:

looking for the next challenge.

Keith:

And is it, do you ever wake up first thing in the morning and go, my schedule is

Keith:

kind of like today, what can I do though?

Keith:

You know,

Julie:

Yeah.

Julie:

Um, I think maybe people like us who are super active in tenacity, maybe

Julie:

we have a tendency to burn out because we look at an empty calendar and

Julie:

we're like, now we've got to fill it.

Julie:

We've got to learn something new.

Julie:

We got to do something new and maybe that's the downfall because.

Julie:

That is probably my thing where when I see an empty day on my calendar,

Julie:

I wonder how quickly I can fill it with things to do when maybe I should

Julie:

just be taking a rest day, you know?

Julie:

What if someone ranks passive and tenacity, how can we work on getting,

Julie:

moving that from passive to active

Keith:

Really do a deep dive into self-examination.

Keith:

If somebody has a lesser ranking in any of these, uh, character

Keith:

traits, that's what they're, that's what I'm encouraging them to.

Keith:

Is to do self-examination and find out, okay.

Keith:

If I'm really not ranking very well at tenacity or resilience, why, what is there

Keith:

that I can do to be able to bring my score up later on if I want to take this again.

Keith:

And I think that people look at, uh, their workout.

Keith:

There, whether they're getting right.

Keith:

Kind of exercise, whether, I mean, it's simple, easy, common sense

Keith:

stuff, diet, exercise, mental health, it all wraps up into one.

Keith:

I told you that one of the first things I did when I was lost was I sat

Keith:

down and I journaled and I meditated because that was what helped me focus.

Keith:

I think people that are passive need to learn how to focus on something, you

Keith:

know, to bring themselves into alignment for what they're trying to accomplish.

Keith:

If you want to become active or super active, you've got to be proactive.

Julie:

Yeah.

Keith:

I just, that was a good one.

Keith:

I may have to write that one down.

Julie:

I'll send it to you.

Julie:

So I was only active in resilience.

Julie:

Under active in resiliency.

Julie:

It says, well, low moments that you hard, you always find your way,

Julie:

find a way to pull yourself back up.

Julie:

I agree with that.

Julie:

While you do bounce back, you don't tend to draw on the lessons

Julie:

learned or strengths you've gained from past experiences.

Julie:

I will also say that I make the same mistakes over and over again.

Julie:

And it says that if you looked across your life, you've probably discovered

Julie:

that you drew upon your ability to be resilient more than you realize, but

Julie:

you haven't given yourself credit.

Julie:

People may describe you as being tough, but in flexible.

Julie:

And I would say that is me spot on.

Keith:

Wow.

Keith:

I'm glad.

Keith:

I'm glad to hear that.

Keith:

We did that.

Keith:

Well.

Julie:

Yeah.

Julie:

Especially the doing more than you realize, not giving

Julie:

yourself credit for it.

Julie:

So many people have told me, like, why don't you celebrate your wins?

Julie:

I'm like, because I'm, I'm done with that win and I'm onto the next.

Keith:

Yeah, we have to celebrate the small successes because the

Keith:

big successes are so in free.

Keith:

If you made a good decision, you need to celebrate the success of that

Keith:

and you can do it in a small way,

Julie:

So for imagination, I'm actually surprised I scored active.

Julie:

I kind of thought I would be passive because I don't really think of myself

Julie:

as like an Imagineer, . The analysis was you see imagination as something

Julie:

to tap into during those big brainstorm moments or blue sky moments, but

Julie:

not as relevant in your daily work.

Julie:

I agree with that, it says is presented with an obvious or incremental path.

Julie:

You'll take that before having to put in the effort to be imaginative

Julie:

and people would describe you as being smart yet realistic.

Julie:

I am nothing, if not real.

Julie:

So I I'm actually surprised.

Julie:

I think I almost teetered on the passive, I just made it

Julie:

into active for imagination.

Keith:

Imagination is that childlike quality that we all lose as adults.

Keith:

And I talk a lot in my keynotes about how we all daydream at certain

Keith:

times in life about things we want, or we date dream about the.

Julie:

Yeah.

Keith:

And it's the negative.

Keith:

That's the more powerful, and you have to be able to look at those

Keith:

daydreams and turn them around, make them more positive and start

Keith:

looking at the kinds of daydreams that you want to be able to have.

Keith:

And you daydream on purpose.

Keith:

This is part of the, the biofeedback training that I had

Keith:

years ago was the brain will react to the positive so quickly.

Keith:

If you give it.

Julie:

Yeah.

Julie:

So for purpose, I scored active.

Julie:

And in the assessment, it says sometimes you tackle the day with

Julie:

driving vision and other times you feel like the day is driving you.

Julie:

And that, that is a hundred percent true.

Julie:

And when you think about your bigger purpose, you feel a sense of energy and

Julie:

excitement bubble up in front of you, but it also easily dissipates when things go.

Julie:

And I would say, yeah, like I, all I want to do is, is speak professionally,

Julie:

on networking, in business development.

Julie:

I'm so passionate about it, but when, I lose a speaking gig or when I I'm finding

Julie:

it difficult to tap into new markets, like I get very frustrated because

Julie:

all I want to do is talk about this

Keith:

No, the pandemic made it even worse.

Keith:

It placed us all in the same box where we were suddenly.

Keith:

Really frustrated at not being able to move the ball forward.

Keith:

And we had to really slow down.

Keith:

And in that regard, I have to say that that was a period of

Keith:

time when I meditated a whole lot more than I had in a long time.

Keith:

Cause I had the time to do it.

Julie:

Yeah.

Keith:

And it allowed me to see that I wasn't alone because there

Keith:

was so many of us in the same box.

Keith:

And I could see that there was lots of things I could do that I could change.

Keith:

My, my trajectory and I started doing podcasts and, uh, um, I'm closing in on

Keith:

number 100 and, uh, it's, it's a wonderful way to still stay on top of your game.

Keith:

About what you want to speak about because you, you know, for 45 minutes,

Keith:

I get to talk about my stuff with you.

Keith:

you.

Keith:

know,

Julie:

So in conclusion, how can people find this test so they can

Julie:

get their own this trip assessment.

Keith:

Um, I've got a real easy way, it's the trip technique.

Julie:

Okay.

Julie:

That's easy enough.

Julie:

I can put that in the show notes.

Keith:

And that will take them right to my website.

Keith:

And it's, it says trip a trip technique assessment in the toolbar at the top, and

Keith:

you can click on it and go from there.

Julie:

Oh, perfect.

Julie:

This was so much fun.

Julie:

Thank you so much for coming on.

Keith:

Oh, no, I, uh, I'm glad we finally met

Julie:

I know,

Keith:

some of these.

Keith:

You go back and forth, back and forth before he actually think

Keith:

it happened, but thank you for your tenacity and sticking with

Julie:

of course, super active on that.

Julie:

Thanks so much.

Keith:

you're welcome, Julie.

Julie:

It was interesting how my assessment aligned so well with

Julie:

how I feel I actually operate.

Julie:

Good and bad.

Julie:

I think this assessment is like any other assessment we've talked

Julie:

about on this podcast, like Myers-Briggs or the Enneagram.

Julie:

Having an understanding of how we work, what propels us, what encourages

Julie:

us, what holds us back and only serve to help us be better in our

Julie:

personal and professional lives.

Julie:

So I encourage you to take the assessment to see where you fall

Julie:

on these four elements, tenacity.

Julie:

Resilience.

Julie:

Imagination and purpose.

Julie:

Some of the answers and then the subsequent power tips that come

Julie:

along with them might surprise you.

Julie:

So.

Julie:

For the cocktail of the week, I did some research and it was hard

Julie:

to find any cocktails from Nepal.

Julie:

But I was able to find one video titled Nepali, best cocktail, and

Julie:

then paranthetically not in man.

Julie:

And if there was a way to describe Keith's adventures.

Julie:

In Nepal, it would be mountain man.

Julie:

Maybe.

Julie:

Last mountain man, but mountain man, nonetheless.

Julie:

I don't have exact measurements because there was only one video in no recipes.

Julie:

I'm going to do my best guesstimate for you.

Julie:

The recipe and the cocktail looks a lot like a Mohito made

Julie:

with dark rum and orange juice.

Julie:

Here's what the video did he metaled some mint leaves in a glass added fresh lemon

Julie:

juice and simple syrup, added ice to the glass, and then added about a one and a

Julie:

half ounces of dark rum and topped with fresh orange juice stirred to combine.

Julie:

And that was it.

Julie:

All right friends.

Julie:

I hope you enjoyed this episode and until next week, Cheers.

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About the Podcast

This Shit Works
The people you meet can 100% Change Your Life! Networking is how you meet those people. Which sucks because you hate networking, you think you're bad at networking, and you certainly don’t have time to network. Bullshit! Welcome to This Shit Works, a weekly podcast hosted by entrepreneur, CEO, public speaker, author, business development strategist and networking coach Julie Brown. Just don’t call her Downtown Julie Brown - she doesn’t like that.

Each week Julie will bring to you her no nonsense tips, tricks and conversations around networking your way to more friends, more adventures and way more success!
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