Transcript
Speaker: got to go home and tell my wife, I was like, hey I just lost a quarter of a million dollars. And I remember she looked at me and she said, we're going just fine. You'll be able to figure this out. I love Jesus. Jesus hated religion, by the way. He hated it. He went after it. I'm convinced.
Speaker: that he kept all 613 of the Mosaic law and that he broke 100% of that extra ceremonial pharisaical stuff. I need the biggest boot imaginable to be driven as far up my rear end as possible.
Speaker: I found the boot. It just happened to lodge itself in your rear end. Yeah. Oh, oh, oh, oh.
Speaker: Welcome to Unstuck and Alive. I'm Todd Pinkston. And I'm Steven Nooner. We have watched it happen. Fear gives way to faith. Isolation melt into belonging.
Speaker: The stuck places break open and life begins to flow again. On this show, we sit around the fire, so to speak, and listen to the real stories of everyday heroes.
Speaker: men and women who have found freedom and stepped into the unforced purpose they were made for. If you're tired of striving, if you're longing to breathe deep, break free, and come alive again, then you're in the right spot.
Speaker: This is Unstuck and Alive. Let's go.
Speaker: Hey guys, welcome back for another awesome episode of Unstuck and Alive here, where we love to just sit around the fireplace and and tell stories. I'm just really excited today because I don't even know what we're going to get, but I know it's going to be amazing.
Speaker: We have my ah my friend here, my good brother, be Barron. ah Bo is the managing director of Barron Commercial Group. ah He's the co-founder of Hearthstone Capital, commercial real estate instructor, CCIM. I mean, it goes on and on, but what i What I love about Bo is is just how he shows up. You meet those people in the room and when you meet them, you just know that they love the Lord and you see these these breadcrumbs that just kind of point you back to them.
Speaker: Bo has been a guy I've been really grateful in life because when he just shows up, he often leaves loaves of bread. So no pressure today, Bo, but just really glad to have you here. Bo's a husband, a father.
Speaker: And he will probably teach us something about podcasting today because he's got a great podcast with his brother, Timmy, called Commercially Speaking. So ah but welcome, Bo. Thank you. go. And I'm thrilled to be here. I've been looking forward to this since you asked me to come on. And and Todd, I met to just a minute ago, but Stephen, you're you're the kind of guy that any time with you is a great time.
Speaker: And I'm in. So thanks for having me on. Thanks, man. Thanks, man. it's been Well, I mean, we'd love to, you know, there's so much i'm I'm curious about. And there's honestly, as much as we've gotten to know each other both last few years, i you know, I love the fact that I also know so little about you because it just makes it super special. So I'd love, you know, beyond the resume, beyond that, I'd love to hear ah just some of the some of the things that formed you into the man that you are today, the Bo that I appreciate so much.
Speaker: Okay. Well, when I was 10, my parents became Christians. And I didn't know what happened. I just knew something happened. And so the next summer I was at a church camp in Litchfield, Kentucky, this little bitty place.
Speaker: And there was this old timer there. he had He was the guy that had the John Deere hat. You can see the hat, right? It's like the foam padding in the front. And it had stenciled on it with those like iron on letters, chief.
Speaker: And everybody called him chief. You know, he's chief. And he told me that Jesus changes lives. Gave me the gospel like Barney style, like shotgun style, super simple for a 10 year old to understand. And he explained to me what I'd just seen happen to my parents.
Speaker: And I was like, ah, I want some of that. Like I'm in And so I trusted Jesus ah as a 10 year old. What I understood of the gospel at that time and kind of grew up in church from there. i was in the youth group subculture, you know, so a big church. All my friends were in the youth group. We didn't do anything wrong, you know, quote unquote wrong. You know, we were out partying and doing the stupid stuff.
Speaker: um I had a healthy fear of my parents. and And I mean that in the healthy sense, like I wanted to please them. I was afraid of displeasing them. And so it kept me pretty straight.
Speaker: um Then I went to college and it turns out my, what I thought were my personal convictions were more of the subculture that I was in. and after a couple of years of college, I went off the rails and decided ah Hey, look, if I'm going misbehave, let's really misbehave. Like, let's go all out. and that That tends to be kind of my nature. If I'm going to do something, let's think and do it, you know.
Speaker: And so I did that for a period of about six months and scared myself. And woke up one morning and and the whole time i knew what I was doing was wrong. Like, you know, some people think, well, do you think you were a Christian back then? And they yeah now like I was miserable the entire time because I knew I was doing wrong.
Speaker: Like, i'm I'm pretty sure ah that I was. But I woke up one morning after really misbehaving the the couple days before and I was, like I said, I was afraid.
Speaker: i was really disappointed in who I was becoming. i knew there was so much more um that was out there. And there was ah an Army Reserve commercial on the on the TV when I woke up.
Speaker: And I started thinking about all the men in my life that I respected the most. And there was a lot of military service there. My dad, my granddad's, some other men in my life. And I was thinking, man, I am not doing a very good job right now leading myself.
Speaker: And I need the biggest boot imaginable to be driven as far up my rear end as possible. And so I started talking to the recruiters. When I talked to the Air Force, I was looking for a bigger boot than what they had.
Speaker: didn't want to wear, no shade on them. It just wasn't what I was looking for. I didn't want to wear the Navy uniforms. I talked to the Army. They promised me all this stuff, you know, like payoff, college debt. I didn't have any, but signing bonuses, all this stuff. And and then finally, I walked in the Marine Corps recruiting office and I i said, hey, look, ah talk to the Air Force. Probably not a good fit. I don't want to wear the Navy uniforms. The Army has promised me this, this, this and this. What what do you guys have for me?
Speaker: And the guy looks at me and he says, I don't have bleep for you. I wonder if you've got the metal to be in my Marine Corps. And I was like, I think I found my.
Speaker: You found your boot. I found the boot. It just happened to lodge itself in your rear end. Yeah. from From the jump. And that guy was pushing my buttons the whole time. Like I went in there talking reserves because I pretty much wasted four years of college at that point. I had a whole nother year to graduate. i was like, I'll go in the reserves. I'll finish college. You know, he's like, are are you a half measures kind of guy? Isn't that what you're trying to get away from? And so like 10 minutes later, I'm active duty. I'm not reserves.
Speaker: and And then we start talking about jobs. do You want to be infantry? i was like, no, I don't think so. It's like, what about you mechanical in any way? It's like zero, nothing.
Speaker: You know, I've got the softest hands of any man I've ever met, you know. I looked at him, i was like, look, all I've got to really offer if if I'm thinking about it is i communicate and I can think like those those are my things. Like beyond that, I'm not very big. I'm not very strong. i'm not very fast.
Speaker: right like And so we started looking at the Intel type jobs. And there was this one called Cryptologic Warfare Linguist. And I thought it sounded cool. And it had a $3,000 signing bonus next to it, which was the largest one the Marine Corps gave out.
Speaker: Army had a lot more money, but I was like, what's that? And he goes, forget about it. You're not smart enough. And I was like, oh, it made me really mad.
Speaker: My identity was in my ability to think and and be smart. Like I really valued that I thought I was smart. And so when he told me I wasn't smart enough, it really made me mad. I was like, I was like, is there a test? He's like, kid, I'm not kidding.
Speaker: Forget about it. i was like, give me the test. And so they sent me to Louisville, had to take this defense language aptitude battery test, which is the craziest test ever. And it's not really how smart you are. It's does your brain work this way or does it not?
Speaker: And my brain worked that way. And so I ended up becoming a linguist. Funny thing is i don't like languages. It's just that the recruiter told me I i wasn't smart enough.
Speaker: And then once I got to the language school, they gave me some options. You know, you want Russian, you want Korean, you want Spanish, you want Arabic. And I was like, Spanish, give me Spanish. And they gave me Arabic.
Speaker: And I graduated the Arabic course two months before 9-11. who So when all that went down in 01, had just graduated the the Arabic basic course and in the world got really interesting there for a while. But, uh,
Speaker: that kind of led me to the point where know i did five years in in the marine corps got out started working with my dad in commercial real estate and know that was 20 some odd years ago now but that period of you know giving my life to jesus at age 10 and then seeing what it looked like on the other side when i was misbehaving and then being introduced to a culture of excellence in the marine corps that i fell in love with And then getting to work with my dad, who's a godly, awesome dude for a lot of years.
Speaker: Like that's kind of led me, you know, kind of the context or the nuance of my backstory, I guess. he Hey, Bo. Thanks for that, man. Can can I drill down ah just wherever things kind of show up? The one one thing in particular, I'm curious, you know, you talked about the culture,
Speaker: um that you're in, right? Like you thought there were convictions. There was a bit of it that was culture. Then you go to and a new culture. i just, I'm curious, like what lessons you learned from that? Like if you were to look back, um what, how do you think about the communities you're involved with now?
Speaker: That's an interesting question.
Speaker: you know, I, and I don't know if this is a good thing or not, but I generally don't like churchy stuff.
Speaker: like I'm a huge fan of the church. I'm an elder at mine and stuff, but I don't like churchy. and I think that goes back to just, I mean i call it like a youth group subculture.
Speaker: mean We were separate. I we didn't hang out much with our lost friends or or whatever. and And that was not a, there was a lot of good in that.
Speaker: Like I had healthy relationships. I learned a lot in that subculture, but you take me out of that and you put me in the real world. And, and I didn't have the personal convictions that were ready for that.
Speaker: And, and so, Yeah, I think that's, i like I like real. I don't like fake. I don't like religion.
Speaker: um ah love Jesus. Jesus hated religion, by the way. He hated it. He went after it. I'm convinced that he kept all 613 of the Mosaic Law and that he broke 100% of that extra ceremonial pharisaical stuff.
Speaker: I think he broke every single one of those pharisaical, I'm going to ask him when I get there. Yeah. But I, and I just, don't like it. Like the real world is the real world and and people need Jesus and us hanging out.
Speaker: in prayer groups 100% of the time, not engaging with people, doesn't i mean that's not what we're called to do. right and I don't know if that's what you were going for. but no No, I'm not going for anything. I'm just trying to dig into it a little bit because I think that oftentimes it sounds like there's ah some lessons there. and so You're in a subculture. You go into a community that's new, right and then you find out that those convictions aren't what you were. Tell me, you said you were miserable, right like I think was your word.
Speaker: like while you were doing it, like you knew. So like help paint a picture for like what's going on there. And like, like, and and at what point, like what shifted in it, got you unstuck there. Cause sounded like you were, you were on a path for at least a season and what, what finally broke loose for you.
Speaker: so the The guy who who mentored me used to say, if you take the nature of a cat and you put it into a hog, like this guy was a hog farmer. Okay. So he had these kinds of analogies. Take the nature of a cat and you put it in a hog and that hog goes and plays in the mud.
Speaker: He's going to lick itself clean like he's a cat because the nature is who you actually are. So you take a person who's who, know, we've got a sinful nature, and then Jesus comes in and oh turns our heart of stone into a heart of flesh. We get a brand new nature. We're indwelt with the Holy Spirit. All of a sudden, we're kind of like a hog with the nature of a cat.
Speaker: And so I'm a saint who still sins. And when I sin, and ah miserable. And so when i when I spent about six months in college, like trying to see how much I could sin, like it was different than like, you know, today I'm walking with Jesus, but I still s sin every day.
Speaker: Of course. I still get to repent every day and and deal with the sin. And sometimes I leave awake that I've got to deal with and and This wasn't that. This was like, all right, I'm going to go all out, sin, see what happens.
Speaker: And I was miserable the entire time because I still had the nature of a cat. and And I was wallowing in the mud and I was miserable. You know, there's another part of your question and I forget what it was. I'm curious, you know, like what do you like in retrospect? What do you think was behind that?
Speaker: Right. And then what finally broke loose for you? Well, what broke loose for me, I'm not really sure what was behind it other than, know, you grew up in in church since age 10 and you're kind of in this subculture that's a little bit protected and separated.
Speaker: And I was curious, you know, i don't I don't know that it was any more complicated than that. But once once I did some things I never thought I would do,
Speaker: and woke up one morning for that. And I was like, I can't believe I just did that. Like, this is going to lead me down a path if that has real consequences that I don't want.
Speaker: Like at that point I was like, how did I even get here? and And how do I get out of it? So I was looking for an escape path and it ended up being the military for me, which God used in a very effective way. In fact, the first Sunday I was at bootcamp,
Speaker: um you know, you've just had the most disruptive, disorienting four or five days of your life. but kid by that You can go to church and I'm like, everybody went to church because they said there's no drill instructors for that hour.
Speaker: The drill instructor, we'll go to church with you. And we're all like, we're going to church. Everybody goes to church. You give me an hour away from drill instructors after those five days, like everybody's in. So we go to church.
Speaker: They start singing these songs that we sang back home and I wept for an hour. Like it was all of this just pouring out me.
Speaker: And that's like, I'm from a family with a large amount of emotional control. Like that stuff doesn't happen to us. I thought I was going nuts. and And I think the Lord has just given me a little bit of emotional cleansing there, you know.
Speaker: And I started to realize a few things, like how important my relationship with the Lord really is and how stupid I had been in comparison and how important family is.
Speaker: I mean, I knew from that Sunday on that I was going to go work with my dad when I got out of the Marine Corps. Like I didn't need the rest of the 13 weeks of bootcamp or the other five years that I was in. Like I knew from that point on, which was really a lot of the clarity I was searching for,
Speaker: um So it was a it was a moment. I've only had like three or four times where that kind of emotion flowed out of me for that long of a period of time. I was sitting there thinking, man, if these drill instructors show up and I'm still a weeping mess, I'm done. you know i was starting to really it like, am I going to be able to dry up in time?
Speaker: But yeah, the Lord really, it's like he showed up for me in that moment. And that was one of those turning points where I think he just said, all right, it's time for you to pivot. I'm going to make it very clear.
Speaker: he Bo, talk about some of your your experiences in the Marine Corps. You know, right before 9-11, obviously the world changes then. what you know You stayed in five years. You talked a little bit about the you know the mindset going in was like, don't tell me I'm not smart enough. Like, I'll i'll prove you wrong. It was kind of this, you know, you can you can look back at that story and see you're an achiever. You know, you you're You're out there to prove somebody wrong. It's the, you know, it's the person that says you can't handle this. or you and You know, you're not that type of person that sort of drew you in What were some of the experiences within the the five years of serving that shaped you?
Speaker: Well, one of them is I should have just listened to my dad. My dad always told me that not good enough was or just good enough is not good enough. But I never bought it from him.
Speaker: You know, I should have just listened to him because in the Marine Corps, just good enough isn't good enough. Like they require excellence, not perfection, but excellence. And it was the first time I ever had to give an excellent effort to to achieve. And you're right. Like I'm going to every day I've got a checklist of things I'm trying to achieve.
Speaker: And it was the first time I had to give maximum effort and I loved it. I loved the results and I loved what it looked like when you're on a team where pretty much everybody's doing the same thing. It's like, this is awesome.
Speaker: You know, um, when 9 11 happened though, i was, i was in this weird kind of limbo. I'd graduated the language school. I was waiting to get my top secret clearance so that I could go to the next school that required the clearance.
Speaker: And so I was just working in the admin shop. So 9-11 happens and, you know, we're, I'm in Monterey, California, at the Defense Language Institute, and it's run by the Army.
Speaker: But Marine Corps are known for their ability to, for security. Like we guard the embassies, we're on the nuclear submarines for the Navy, like we guard stuff.
Speaker: So the army leaders on post grabbed some of us Marines who were just sitting around waiting. It's like me and three other guys. And I just, I just happened to be a few years older than everybody else. Cause I'd wasted those four years at college first.
Speaker: And that benefited me my whole time through. us just a little bit older, a little bit more mature. And, and so they grabbed me and a couple other guys. the The Defense Language Institute was not secure at all.
Speaker: We had a public road running right through it with no gates. It was a school, it wasn't really a base, you know. But we were training the linguists that could understand our enemy.
Speaker: And so all of a sudden we're like, are they gonna bomb us now? Like we thought maybe this could be a a real target for the enemy. So they gave, i was a corporal in the Marine Corps at this point.
Speaker: And they gave me and a couple other Marines the responsibility of securing the base. I'm like, what do I know? I've been to boot camp and language school. What do I know? But we're like, okay, let's come up with something, you know?
Speaker: No chat GPT to look it up back then. Yeah, there's no chat GPT. That would have been great. So we, and there's no armory on post, you know, there's no, but we had rubber weapons and I kid you not, we had M16 rubber duckies as we called them rubber duckies. They were the right weight and they looked right. And we had those. And so we, started we started patrolling with rubber weapons as if they were the real thing, just to do some kind of security. We shut down access to the post. We made the town reroute around the hill. They were really mad.
Speaker: But it was just, you know, let's go on things weird things happen. So I found myself in positions of a little bit of authority with no ability or training to do so, which was one of these interesting things that the Marine Corps is pretty good at throwing you into the deep end and and seeing if you can swim or not.
Speaker: I really loved those situations. It was like I had the freedom to come up with something that made sense. And in the Marine Corps, they'll give you the yeah give you the commander's intent, the rules of engagement.
Speaker: Commander's intent is take that hill, essentially. Whatever the mission is, take the hill. The rules of engagement are the left and the right lateral limits of what you're allowed to do. So stay in this lane, but within this lane, just take the hill.
Speaker: And under those, like when you have clarity of the commander's intent on what the mission is and you understand your, your, um, your operational box of what you can do, then you can let your creativity take over.
Speaker: This is the same thing that happens in business where you lead with a real sense of clarity of the mission and people understand what their roles are, what they can and can't do. It's the same thing.
Speaker: ah Jesus does this too. oh He gives us the great commission and he gives us our our parameters like walk in the spirit. Here's what that looks like. Stay in this box and in like you're going avoid all this pain. Like he prescribes for us what, what,
Speaker: what life looks like, you know? And Jesus didn't, he never said, Hey, i the thief comes to steal, kill and destroy, but I came that you would have rules or, Hey, I came to give you life and life abundantly. Like that happens within the box. It's like, stay away from this stuff. That's just going to short circuit things.
Speaker: my design for your life where you'll be fulfilled and full of joy. And and so, man, you ever see somebody walking around? ah my my mentor, the the hog farmer, you know, he would say, you'll see these people walking around with big smile and sad eyes and nobody wants what they got.
Speaker: you know, that's what <unk>s what believers look like when they're just trying to follow rules. You know, they get into all this legalism stuff and want to argue over stupid crap that doesn't matter.
Speaker: You know, man, you see somebody who's actually living life Like, I came to give you life. And by the way, Christ is our life. And so what is life? It's yielding to Christ's life in us and allowing him to to live through us while we rest.
Speaker: and we show up, but the results aren't on us. You know, it's like we show up, show up, prepare, do our best, but the results aren't on us. I mean, that's the best gig in the history of mankind.
Speaker: who Amen. Amen is right. Yeah. right. So you get out and you you go straight to working with your dad. Is that right? The next day. Yeah. Come on.
Speaker: Before you like get go into that, I'm curious, like, cause, um, obviously your dad's entrepreneur, like are there, are there, is there signal early ah on in your life that you like, this is a path you're going to go and you've been avoiding it or to ah take us into that a bit.
Speaker: Oh yeah. So, um, Yeah, my dad's always been an entrepreneur and and I didn't really know, my mom was too. Like my dad was a commercial broker and a commercial developer and my granddad built homes. Well, my mom owned a Century 21 office and she was an entrepreneur as well. And, you know before they became believers, they competed to see who could out earn each other. It was real unhealthy and stuff. That's the context I grew up in. That's what normal was to me. They were taking risk and they had a tremendous amount of financial and time freedom.
Speaker: They didn't use it well early on, but then I got to see what that looked like on the other side of the cross. And I was like, man, this is, so I always, that always appealed to me, but I remember the first entrepreneurial gig I had, my dad hired me to dig out a ditch. He had developed a street and was this concrete ditch that ran behind, behind this street. And over the years it filled in with, with, ah you know, mud and it grassed over. And so i had to dig out this ditch, took all summer.
Speaker: And I was like, this sucks. Everything about this sucks. I was like, I'm gonna hire my buddies to do this and I'm gonna go more yards. And so I did. i hired some of my buddies, paid them double minimum wage so they were happy.
Speaker: And I went mowed yards. And i once I did the math, I realized i'm I'm only paying them half of what my dad is paying me. And so I'm getting paid to do nothing.
Speaker: and and then I can go do something else that's generating income. And it was like this aha moment for me. I was like, this is what entrepreneur, and then they quit at the end of the summer and there was still some time left. And so I also got to learn, hey, here's what happens when your team doesn't finish the job is it's still on you and you get to finish the job.
Speaker: And so that was kind of my first entrepreneurial gig. But yeah, I always thought, I'd end up doing something. Now, before the Marine Corps, I didn't want anything to do with the family business. I didn't want to live in Owensboro.
Speaker: I didn't, you know, that Sunday in boot camp kind of changed all of that, but I did. I always thought I'd do something entrepreneurial. I just didn't know what it would be. Well, and then you also, you you learned, you know, in the 9-11 event that you love the autonomy you know,
Speaker: being the decision maker and you operate well with a high level of ambiguity, which is, I think those things, you know, it here, go figure this out. It's never, you know, we've never done this before and you've got rubber weapons. Good luck out there.
Speaker: And I mean, I think there's so much in there. It's like, you know, some people when given that they crumble because they don't love operating in ambiguity. You know, they they like their their commander's intent to be super clear and the rules of engagement to be really tight.
Speaker: Other people like the commander's intent to be way further down the line, the rules engagement to be really wide. And it and it sounds like you you operate well in that, which, you know, it entrepreneurship and the invitation and to follow Jesus are very similar. And, you know, and we don't all have same the same, ah you know, the same roles in the body of Christ in the same way. We don't have the same roles, you know, yeah in this earth or you're in a company.
Speaker: And so I'd love to, you know, tease into ah more of, you know, how you've seen that show up in your life, you know, in the past couple decades of you've, you know, you exited, you jumped in with your dad, family business has a, you know.
Speaker: ah it's a whole, whole world of its own. um You know, how have you operated there? Where have you seen the Lord show up in your life to use your strengths? And where have been some of the pitfalls that, you know, folks that are listening that have operated in family business or operated, you know, with their spouse, you know, Nuno works with his wife. I work with my wife. Like it's, it's the i did the greatest. And, and it also has, you know, it has hard times in there. So talk, talk a little bit about that. Where have you found some pitfalls in that? And how have y'all worked through it?
Speaker: Well, working with my dad was almost a universally great experience. hey That had a lot to do with him and who he is. In fact, we had a...
Speaker: with a close family friend who's actually ah a leadership coach for me now, he helped us with the transition when I was, when I was buying the company from my dad and he remarked that he's never seen it work better.
Speaker: And a lot of that had to do with just the way my dad handed the baton off. Like he actually let go. He championed Um, uh,
Speaker: he He freed me up to do things differently, to not do them his way.
Speaker: But there there are, like, I don't work with my wife. She actually helps a little bit with the business now because we're in kind of a transition, but that'll be a short-term thing.
Speaker: i open loops all the time. and And she can't sleep until all the loops are closed. And so us working together is a it's not a a great fit, um though i I'd love to have her in the office all day.
Speaker: I'd have a blast. She'd be miserable.
Speaker: But you know I started an insurance company one time and it failed. You got to watch out for those guys. Right. You know, insurance. That's a shot at me for a anyone in the audience who doesn't know. So we're covering insurance agent here. That was Todd's shot at Stephen. Yeah. I tried to be Stephen before I knew Stephen and it didn't work out. But here's here's what I found out. I thought, I've got all these commercial real estate clients and owners.
Speaker: I started an insurance company. I could get all their business. They could invest in the company and in almost, you know, benefit from the premiums that they pay. and And so we we put that together and I pulled in an insurance guy and he had 40 years of experience in the industry. He was the guy that actually knew insurance and and he was going to get the companies so that we'd actually have policies to write.
Speaker: Pulled in a an accountant buddy. So we were going to do taxes as well, kind of an H&R block component to the business. And I was like, this going to be great. So we set it up, sunk in half a million dollars.
Speaker: And the partner, the insurance guy, ended up being not who he said he was. And he wasn't able to produce the companies. So we had this company with nothing to write. I had the the properties, I had the demand lined up and we didn't have the companies to write and it failed really quick. And so I got to go home and tell my wife, I was like, hey I just lost a quarter of a million dollars.
Speaker: And you know, that was 2011, I think that was a lot of money for us at the time. It's still be a lot of money. It still is today. Yeah. and And I remember she looked at me and she said, we're going be just fine. You'll be able to figure this out.
Speaker: She just blew wind in my sails. You know, I was like, I can't believe I got to marry this woman, you know, and but I didn't vet my partners.
Speaker: I just, got this insurance guy, he was a client of mine. I'd done some work for him as his vendor, like as his real estate guy, helping him find locations and stuff. Dude loved Jesus. You know, it was a kind of a pastor on the side. And I was like, surely this guy wasn't going to be a bad guy. He turned out to kind of be a bad guy.
Speaker: And so I learned a lot about partnerships and how they can go wrong and what happens if you don't confirm what you think and, you know You skimp on due diligence. I did everything wrong on the front end there, and thankfully it failed fast.
Speaker: But that was a big, big lesson, and a lot of the money that I lost wasn't mine. And so I got to go to people I saw at church on Sunday and say, hey, look, I just lost all your money.
Speaker: and Give me a little time, but you'll get it all back. And then on the heels of that, Lord gives me the best brokerage year of my career. and And I was able to pay them all back.
Speaker: And my wife asked me at the end of the year, she's like, why don't we, was like, I thought you had a good year. i was like, baby, we did have a good year, oh but all that money belonged to somebody else. you know So the Lord provided, but my wife didn't feel it.
Speaker: you know could it didn't Those dollars didn't come home that year. Hey, Bo. um um Just because, you know, of who who often listens to this podcast, I would love for you to just to speak through, like, if you were to slow down the game footage, like what were some of the the the things that, you know, you learned through that experience? What did you, you know, what did you ignore? What were the signs? What, you know, key can you walk us through that a little bit?
Speaker: Yes. And I don't think I had a lot of clarity on this until some of what I've learned through strategic coach, but our partner that ended up being the problem, he didn't have any kind of cash confidence.
Speaker: So me and the me and the accountant and and the then the insurance guy, me and the accountant funded everything. And as I look back, like if I were advising somebody else that were sharing with me this scenario,
Speaker: i mean, I'd be having red flags and lights popping off all over the place, but because I was in it, I didn't pay attention because i wanted it to work. So I fell in love with the idea of the future and I ignored the realities of the present.
Speaker: And that was a huge, huge mistake. um that i had to learn. i'm glad I learned it then and that there weren't more commas and zeros associated with it.
Speaker: But um one of the other lessons was we ended it well. in the sense that once we saw this wasn't going to work and once we finally believed that our insurance partner, uh, isn't who he said he is, but he is who he's demonstrating himself to be.
Speaker: Once we finally believed that we were like, okay, this isn't going to work. We got to shut it down. So we didn't try to ride it out. Like we recognized it was broken. and And it failed fast. That was a really good thing. And we owned our mistakes.
Speaker: And that was, and that was hard. ah like I'm a recovering people pleaser. And to go to these people and say, i screwed this one up. I really did.
Speaker: lost all stall our money. and And I thought that that was going to ruin my reputation and maybe my witness and my future.
Speaker: But what i what I recognized was it was a lot more like when my dad would fail as a father and come to me and ask my forgiveness, which he would do. and Those moments where he came to me and he was like, hey, look, I lost my temper.
Speaker: I shouldn't have done that. I'm sorry. And I asked for your forgiveness. And I want you to know I'm going to work real hard to do better at that. It's like, oh, man, it's like it multiplied my love for my dad. And I believed he was a real person like the rest of us, you know.
Speaker: And, and that's what ended up happening when I went to our investors and I was like, look, this what happened. I screwed it up. I'm going to make it right. It's going to take me a while and I'm gonna make it right.
Speaker: And I'm sorry, you know, and what that, that was, you know, that protected the relationship I had with those folks. And in some, in some respect, even reinforced it.
Speaker: That's beautiful, man. Um, the the person individual, on it like, and I don't want to, like, you don't have to get anything, you know, obviously person's not here, but I'm, I'm curious.
Speaker: Um, I know you said he was a pastor. I know of, you know, and I know you to be someone that generally just sees the best in people. i'm I'm curious if there were signs or signals before that, like, you know, have changed the way that you, you look at who you're going to partner with now or go into those types of relationships with.
Speaker: ah Something you learned about yourself? I mean, just curious. One is I've been really partnership since then. My other partner and i actually have remained really close and that speaks to really kind of his integrity. And we basically split up the debt and we both were able to eventually make it right. You know, um,
Speaker: But since then, I've had very few partners. With our new company, Hearthstone Capital, I've got a partner, a legitimate partner. We're 50-50. um and And what I did was I stretched out the time period before, like we dated, quote unquote, a long time ah before we pulled the trigger. And that's something I didn't do before.
Speaker: and I also, i played golf with him. I don't love golf, but I love what golf shows about what's inside of a person.
Speaker: And it doesn't have to be golf, but in this case, he played golf a little bit. I played golf a little bit. I was like, I'm going to come out to Arizona. We're going to play some golf. We're just going spend a couple of days together. Let's see if we actually like each other at the end of this.
Speaker: But I wanted to see what it looked like um when he had a couple of bad holes, you know, because what I've learned and you guys know this, but once you put somebody in a pressure cooker and you shake them up a little bit, what flows out of their heart is what's in their heart.
Speaker: And so you get to see, like, I wanted to see, does he throw clubs? You know, does he, does he hit a bad shot and scream a dirty word and get real mad and be pissed off for four holes? Like, I just wanted to see what it looked like when things didn't go well for him, you know?
Speaker: And, uh, And so kind of golf, that's probably not the big takeaway from the episode is go play golf with somebody before you're your party one of the most successful entrepreneurs. I know that's all he does is literally golf with the people that they're going to hire in leadership. And really, I won't name them because i mean, like he's in, if, if they cheat, if they like, you like,
Speaker: Foot wedge it. I mean, like he is watching. I mean, it's ah it is the most fascinating thing. And you know what? He's he's really, maybe some people would say he overscrutinized, but you can't deny the results of the quality of people he's put around them.
Speaker: And he doesn't care about whether or not the person's actually any good at golf. He cares about all the other stuff. Sure. Right. You know, like, is this guy going to be super competitive? like I'm pretty competitive, but you can take that too far, you know.
Speaker: But really, I just wanted to see one. Does he have the integrity? I think he has, you know. What happens when you shake him up a little bit? And at the end of spending three, four days together, like ah do we still like each other?
Speaker: You know, man if you're going to do work, even going employ somebody or partner with somebody, it's like, do they do great work? Right. Are they a good fit? Do you like them? Like, do you want to actually spend time with them or not?
Speaker: And, you know, in Kentucky, we call that passing the beer test. Like, would you want to just hang out and have a beer with them, you know?
Speaker: That's awesome. Well, go ahead. As a leader, you know one thing we say around here at WayForward is like every policy has a name by it. you know We started as a super small organization with a really small policy manual. And as we've grown, it's like, well, you can't do that. you know This person's name is next to that that policy. ah you know and And as you're explaining about, you know you you approach this future partner, current partner,
Speaker: ah you know differently because of what happened in the past. And I think so much of life is that way. You lead because of either mistakes you've made in the past or great examples you've had in the past. you know Who are you today? you know If you had to give some some ah you know leadership ah you know mottos of who you are today based on what the Lord has done in your life in the past.
Speaker: Oh, what a great question. So I've got a leadership coach and this guy's been my dad's best friend since I was like 10. So this guy's seen me grown up. He's seen all the, all the mistakes.
Speaker: He's seen it all. Okay. And this is what, uh, he submitted for my consideration about a month ago. And I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. And it's, um,
Speaker: Matthew 23 verses 1 through 11, it actually basically makes the case that there's only one leader and it's Christ. I've never really paid attention to that before. If that's true, and it is, then any kind of leadership that we have is really a stewardship.
Speaker: And I've never really thought a whole lot about stewardship outside of like my time and and and money. I've never really thought of it as's as much about leadership and influence, but can consider this. Psalm 3.3 says, Thou, O Lord, are a shield about me, my glory and the lifter of my head.
Speaker: right Famous verse. I'm sure you've heard it before. Lord is a shield about me and a lifter of my head. Galatians 5.1 is like my favorite verse, the freedom verse. You know, it's for freedom that Christ has set you free. Don't go back to all that crap, basically, right?
Speaker: And then Isaiah, was it? I'm looking at my notes here because I was just thinking about this before we jumped on the call, but Isaiah 61 and Luke 4. So Luke 4, Jesus goes into the temple and he reads from Isaiah, right?
Speaker: And he basically, where was it? He says, Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He sent me to proclaim release to captives.
Speaker: to recover the recovery of sight to the blind and is set free those who are oppressed. So if leadership is a stewardship where we're being led by Jesus and we're stewarding that leadership and and influence, then as leaders, we should be lifters of the heads of those we lead.
Speaker: We should be about setting the hearts free of those we lead. And we should be about the business of life giving to those we lead.
Speaker: Because that's who Jesus was. And if Jesus is the true leader and the rest of it is just stewardship, then then that's our model. And and so and I'm thinking about 20 some odd years in business.
Speaker: leading my family. And if I run it through that grid, man, I'd like some do overs, but like that's, can you imagine being led like that all the time?
Speaker: Like all of a sudden, you know one of your employees comes in and and they're just down and you're like, man, I, today I'm lifting heads, you know, Or, you know, somebody come in, they're bound up with something and and you get to help set them free from that.
Speaker: You know, maybe it's with perspective or some truth or just a hug or whatever the need of the moment is.
Speaker: and And freedom. And I remember this, by the way, going back to a little bit of a strategic coach shout out. I'm in coach, I'm in the signature program, Steven's my coach. and we're in And you were telling a story about how you had a certain number of conference rooms and how you're like, I don't have an office anymore.
Speaker: I'll just go use whatever conference room. And I thought myself, I've got conference rooms. It's like, what kind of freedom could I have if I just had the office in a backpack and I just used whatever conference room and I was a little bit mobile ah and And the idea of that I hadn't ever considered because what I saw from my dad was we work eight to five and then we're home for dinner. i My dad was not a workaholic and he didn't allow people to be a workaholic. like there was a lot of But the structure of the workday was in stone for me.
Speaker: And then Marine Corps reinforced that. And then, you know, I work for my my dad for a good decade. Then I go try to do a few other things. I come back to the business, end up buying him out. And then, ah but I'm still trapped in this like wooden structured work day. And then Steven says, man, I just use different conference rooms. And I'm like, I can do that.
Speaker: You know, like I don't have to have my company see me in that office before they get to work and and like, And the whole idea of that freed me up.
Speaker: And now I've got this little leatherworking hobby, which becoming a little bit of an obsession. And I've sold the brokerage company. We've got this new Hearthstone company, but there's nothing that says i have to spend all day at the office.
Speaker: And so now I'm starting to experience this freedom that i i didn't really understand what was possible so sometimes i'll go home at like one or two o'clock in the afternoon because i got done what i needed to get done and somebody's waiting for me to make them a wallet or something or a something and it's like i'm home more i'm with my girl more like my wife and my daughter my my youngest daughter is the only one still at home and i'm i'm just spending more time with the family And, and I didn't realize you could do that until Steven says, i just work out of conference rooms, kind of got the mobile office.
Speaker: And it was like, what? You know, it's like my dad was always in the office. You know, I have to always be in the office. People have to see me in the office. And that's, that's not true. So the the whole idea of freedom, like we're freedom and we're, well,
Speaker: you know, just being followers of Jesus, we're were're free to walk in righteousness. We couldn't do that before, even if we tried. and And life is just better that way. It's not always easy, but it's definitely better.
Speaker: But we have the freedom to, you know, spend our time the way we feel the Lord leads us, and it doesn't have to be based on cultural norms or anything like that. So I you I'm just rambling now and I don't remember what the original question I would love to pull that. I'd love to pull this conversation into something you dropped as you were talking about it. Right. So um because it's something feels very real time. And I um imagine there's some lessons with it. So you joined your business your dad's business. You spent time with him in the business, left the business temporarily, came back, they ah ah ultimately bought him out.
Speaker: Right. There were lessons. Obviously, it was really great. You bought him out. just transitioned well, and now you're starting Hearthstone Capital and you're like, you're you've you' you've exited. the the business that you were a part of with you know with your dad on a certain level. So I would love to just you know dig into that a little bit because I mean, it was you and your dad 20 years, right? Like you have these these habits that are be baked into you. Many of them probably served you really well for a long period of time, like show up to the office every day a certain way, right? So I'm curious, like ah what walking through a big transition like what that was,
Speaker: You've shouted out to your dad multiple multiple times. How did he handle you built up off the business from him? And then now I'm selling the business, dad. Just if you could bring some contact in that, because I think we're all face. We're all facing those types of ah choices right now in our own way. Things that maybe we're being called to set aside ah to to to have that heads up freedom and growth.
Speaker: Yeah, so I called my dad one day and i was like, hey, want to run something by you. I realize I don't need your permission, but I really care about what you think and and I need your wisdom on this.
Speaker: was like, I'm thinking about selling everything. All the the properties, the business and and recasting all that into this new company, Hearthstone Capital.
Speaker: He's like, all right, tell me about that a little bit. So i just shared with him kind of the vision of what we thought Hearthstone could be. Hearthstone is a fund of funds. And you know so I'd go from being a commercial estate brokerage owner and a syndicator and kind of investor to a fund manager in some respects, where we raise money and we invest in other people's commercial real estate deals.
Speaker: That doesn't sound very exciting. But with Hearthstone, we're trying to solve the the tension that a lot of believers have, lot of high net worth believers that on one hand, they're called in Matthew 15 to you know be the good and faithful servant who takes the talents from the the Father and and invests them well. you know I want to be good and faithful servant. I don't want to be the guy who buries the bag of gold in the dirt because he's afraid of his boss. you know um But at the same time, we're called to give generously.
Speaker: And if you think about those on a surface, those things seem to be in opposition. Like, and I want a steward what the Lord has blessed me with well and continue to grow it. But the same I want to give generously because it's not mine in the first place. When Hearthstone, we're trying to accomplish both things at the same time and not at the expense of one or the other.
Speaker: So. But we wanted to create this company in a way that we're not creating ourselves a new job. Because both of me and my partner, Brad Arns, we love Jesus.
Speaker: We've got kids of a certain age where we value at this point the time freedom to really pour into the lives of our kids more than like how fast can we build this business?
Speaker: And so we've outsourced a ah number of things. our Our model is such where, you know, once we get this thing rolling, know, there'll be periods of time where you know it's going to take a lot of hours. But once we get it up and we're launching our third fund in a couple of weeks, like maybe 20 hours a week should be should be what's required. And we've built it that way so that we have the margin in our lives to always say yes when the Lord leads. And that's kind of the, that's the benefit of having financial freedom and time freedom and and the other strategic coach freedoms of relationship and freedom of purpose. And you have all those four freedoms. It allows you to say yes when the Holy Spirit leads you to do something.
Speaker: If you don't have those freedoms, sometimes you get to say no. Like, I don't know how to pull it off or, you know. So that's kind of how we're trying to structure Hearthstone is just so there's the margin in our lives to be able to say yes and be a part of some awesome stuff. yeah and so digging in you call your dad right i mean and so is this a freedom from or a freedom to move like is this when you had the vision you felt a calling and you move towards it or is this like hey i'm 20 years i bought it from my dad uh this ain't the thing like i'm i'm curious no it was a freedom it was a freedom too um and so when i shared all that with my dad he was like
Speaker: Sounds great. Do it. i mean, he completely released me from any obligation to our history as a family or the company. and And now and he's he's always held things loosely like that. So I almost expected that kind of response. But, you know, we're investing in commercial real estate deals where the operators of these deals have missional aspects to their business. We're trying to have global impact and reach for the gospel through investing in real estate.
Speaker: And, you know, it's it's just a bigger scope and potential impact than what I could do owning some properties in Western Kentucky, you know. And so we just felt like that's the So I pitched it to my wife. She was like, that sounds good.
Speaker: She didn't necessarily care about the details, but she's got a finely tuned gut that I've learned to listen to over the years. And so she saw no red flags. I pitched it to my coach. He's like, sounds pretty sound to me. Pitched it to my dad. He was like, do it.
Speaker: I'll ride with you. So like, he's one of our investors, you know? So it's, I got a lot of confirmation through that, but yeah, he's, my dad's pretty great.
Speaker: Sounds like it. It's incredible. what ah what What are your hopes for the next 10 years?
Speaker: I'll tell you, I'll give you that answer in a couple of different ways. Through Hearthstone, we want to see people following Jesus and discipling others on every continent because we invested in some real estate deals.
Speaker: you know like We want to see that kind of reach and impact. which is pretty exciting on the family front. You know, my kids are 23, 20 and 17. My wife and I been real intentional with building relationships with them of safety. Uh, or I should say in the, in the sense that our kids feel safe in coming to us, even with their mistakes. It's good stuff right there. And man, Bo, I think, you know, one, I mean, just honesty about, you know, where you've been is, is refreshing to people, to entrepreneurs, to folks, you know, listen to the podcast. And also, man, the, the, the idea of presence is, I think it's the, it is the one thing we are missing. I don't want to say more than anything else, but gosh, it's towards the top of the list. And,
Speaker: It's just that idea of like, if we're not in the current moment, man, we're we're living in a different world. We're not giving our families the best gift we have to offer them. We're not giving our spouses the greatest gift we can offer them. And it's, you know, it's what Jesus brought. It's like, what did Jesus really do?
Speaker: Man, he showed up. I love the the the message. He moved into the neighborhood. He just brought his presence to the world. And and he said, I'm going walk with you. He could have, he could accomplish it in three days, but he did three years. and just walking with folks and living with them and caring for them.
Speaker: And I'm, man, I'm excited with, a you know, the ah the things you've done in life earn you credibility, yet, you know, you're moving into a place where you have more opportunities to be present and, you know, to to show up in your daughter's life at two o'clock in the afternoon, to to be present with folks in their business deals and help them see perspective. It's not just about how much you make, but it's about the you know the impact we're making in the world. Well, it's been a blessing, man. Thank you.
Speaker: Again, Bo, and I can't wait to see God continue to move and what what is going to do in your life and the lives of those that you lead. Thanks for your time. like Thank you.
