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Overcoming Obstacles
131 Plays1 year ago
In this episode of the Uncommon Wealth podcast, host Philip Ramsey interviews Kevin Lease, a business consultant and coach. Kevin shares his uncommon journey and discusses the obstacles that people often face when trying to invest in themselves. He emphasizes the importance of belief in oneself and the need to overcome fear, self-doubt, and imposter syndrome. Kevin also highlights the value of being uncomfortable and embracing the process of growth. He encourages listeners to surround themselves with supportive people and to have a positive mindset.
Key Takeaways:
- Overcoming fear and self-doubt is crucial when investing in oneself.
- Being uncomfortable is necessary for growth and success.
- Surrounding oneself with supportive people is important for achieving goals.
- Having a positive mindset and believing in oneself is essential for success.
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Transcript
Introduction to Uncommon Wealth Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Everyone dreams of living an uncommon life and the best asset you have to achieve your dreams is you. Welcome to the Uncommon Wealth Podcast. We're going to introduce you to people who are living uncommonly. We're also going to give you some tools and strategies for building wealth and for pursuing an uncommon path that is uniquely right for you.
Meet Kevin Leese: An Uncommon Journey
00:00:25
Speaker
Hello and welcome everybody to another episode of the Uncommon Wealth Podcast. I'm your host, Phillip Ramsey, and I am solo today. Well, kind of solo. I'm interviewing a good friend of mine, Kevin Leese. And the reason why I wanted him, one, he has a super uncommon journey up to this point, but he gets to interact with a lot of business owners. And today what we're going to try to impact or unpack is why and what different obstacles do people put in their way or believe they can't overcome in order for them to believe and invest in themselves.
Embracing Challenges and Self-Belief
00:00:54
Speaker
If you're a long time listener of the show, thanks for taking the time again to jump on, but you know that I like analogies and my analogy on jumping off this proverbial uncommon bridge. And that analogy is that you have to at some point believe in yourself and you have to leave something that's very comfortable and you have to trust in the parachute that you have packed yourself. And that is your experiences, your life experiences and all the different ways that you got to this point. But,
00:01:21
Speaker
One of the big things that I really like is just if you got to wake up and do what you love to do every day, when would you want to stop doing that? And the answer is we'll never. And so that's our goal here at Uncommon Wealth is to try to get each one of our clients to a point where they absolutely love what they're doing every day.
00:01:37
Speaker
they get paid for it, uh, but they're not doing it for the money. So Kevin, welcome to the show. And I'm super excited to just unpack your life, dude. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it, fellow.
Kevin's Early Journey and Career Beginnings
00:01:46
Speaker
Yeah, man. Uh, so first, let's just start with your own uncommon journey because I feel like it has set off in a new path recently and you have jumped off a couple bridges, but this last one is the one that you're finally like, you know what? It's time for me to invest in myself.
00:02:00
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And first of all, I want to jump in and say with what you kind of let up with it, it gave me goosebumps just because it kind of brought me back to, you know, taking that proverbial jump off of the bridge or whatever. So yeah, so my path is pretty unique, unique, but not unique. So, um, so I actually had a baseball scholarship when I first, uh, went into undergrad.
00:02:25
Speaker
And I turned my rotator cuff, my junior year of high school, played my senior year, got to college one year. I thought, Hey, I'm, um, I had no idea about this. This is fascinating. So what college, uh, the university of Sioux falls. Okay. So, yeah. So, um, you know, it wasn't a full ride, you know, they don't really do full rides and things like that. So, um,
00:02:45
Speaker
But what I did is I was like, okay, I'm going to go in and I'm going to play baseball. And, uh, forgot that when you go to college, you're supposed to go to class, right? And that's one thing that they tell you you're supposed to do. So, um, ended up not going to class, spend too much time with baseball, ended up not being able to play just because of my shoulder. Um, got put on academic probation and my parents are like, no, they slammed the checkbook shut. They're like, we're done. We're not going to do this anymore.
00:03:08
Speaker
So, I made it through one semester, dude. One semester, and then I was like, well, what am I going to do now? And I thought, hey, I love golf. I'm going to go get my degree, my associate's degree in golf course management. Huh. So, I ended up going to Southeast Tech in Sioux Falls, got my degree in golf course management, and then the reason I did it is because I loved golf so much, right?
00:03:27
Speaker
But then I found out that, well, shoot, if I'm going to do this, I'm only going to be working on a golf course. I'm not actually going to be able to golf. And I was like, well, I don't want to do that. So I went back to the university of Sioux falls, uh, finished up my undergrad, uh, had to work through. I was on academic probation when I got there. Uh, I think I graduated with a three six, three seven by the time the dust all settled and stuff like that. So, uh, so that was kind of the kickoff to
A Banking Career and Unexpected Moves
00:03:50
Speaker
it. Right. Um,
00:03:52
Speaker
So that led me to, okay, I got a degree, got two degrees now. I got one in associates and golf course management. I got another one in business with a minor in economics. What the hell do I do now? So I go to my hometown and my dad and my mom had a family friend who was a bank president down there. And they're like, Hey, why don't you have Kevin come over here? He can do an internship. He can audit files, do all that crap. And so I went down there and did that. And I was like, I had no desire to be in banking.
00:04:22
Speaker
just something that was off for me. So I was like, well, Hey, if they're going to pay me, why not go do this? So I go there, I start working and the phone was ringing one day and I was like, why is nobody? And I didn't, I had never answered the phone before there. That was not my thing. But you saw a need. Well, I saw a need and I was like, Oh, okay. So I'm going to grab the phone. I pick it up. And I was like, Hey, first American bank and trust, this is Kevin. And it was a recruiter out of Minneapolis and they were recruiting for, at that point it was F and M bank, which then turned into great Western bank, which is now first interstate bank.
00:04:50
Speaker
Interesting. So they were like, Hey, we're looking for, uh, you know, a personal banker in Madison, South Dakota. Do you know of anybody? And I was like, Hey, sure. Why me? I was looking for a full time job, so why not take a look at it? So that started my banking career in 2001.
00:05:08
Speaker
Okay. 2001. So 2001 started my bank career, my banking career. And from there, um, also started my uncommon path. So I ended up working for, um, for FNM bank six, um, probably about six months into the job, not even six months into the job. It was much less than that. Um, the bank president there decided to move up within the organization to be there. Um,
00:05:33
Speaker
chief compliance officer. So they didn't have a market president is a ton of 6,500 people. There's like three banks and two credit unions way over banks, but they were like, Hey, we don't have anybody. Kevin, why don't you slide into that position? I'm like, dude, I, I know nothing about banking, right? I'm like, I'm just like college, what's happening? I'm like, okay, so here we go. So at that point, um, less than six months into my career in banking, I'm, I'm the interim market president. I'm doing, you know,
00:05:57
Speaker
business loans, I'm doing ag loans, I'm helping manage staff, doing all of those things. So it was kind of a trial by fire, drinking from a fire, all of the analogies you can think of, right? But through the process though, I was only given the opportunity to be the interim president. Even though I was doing a good job, I was managing and maintaining, I had hit kind of a glass ceiling.
00:06:20
Speaker
And I can't obviously time, right? Time is one thing that's so valuable. We can't get it back, but I can't speed up time to get more experience. So, um, I was like, I applied and they said, no, thank you. You're doing a great job. I just fill in. So that happened three different times when I was there. So it's like, okay, I'm done. I'm not going to do this. So, um, I go to California. I had a friend out there, which I kind of skipped apart where I lived out there for a little bit of time.
00:06:44
Speaker
But anyway, so I had a friend out there go out there and I was like, Hey, let's, I'm going to look at California. I'm going to go out and I'm going to start my, get my masters. So go out there. It wasn't a good fit. So, um, at that time my ex-wife and I decided, Hey, let's sell all of our stuff. So we sold our house, all our cars, sold all of our winter clothes. And we said, we're going to go to Hawaii.
00:07:02
Speaker
So we moved to Hawaii, never been there, bought one way tickets, had no job, had no place to live. Basically rented, basically rented, booked a room at the Sheridan Princess Kailulani and Waikiki for two weeks. So just short of 14 days.
00:07:20
Speaker
and looked for jobs, applied for grad school through Hawaii Pacific. She did the same for undergrad. And come the last day at the Sheridan Princess Keilani, we had no place to live. There was no hotels to book up, no rooms that night. Probably not so much money in the bank. Let's be real guys. Oh, yeah, dude. No, no.
00:07:38
Speaker
I'm pretty much burning through that, right? And that's when that's when old Mr. Credit Card or credit cards became our best friend at that point. So, dude, just a crazy story though. Not to make it overly long. This is fascinating. So, started out grad school there
Life Changes and Personal Growth
00:07:54
Speaker
two and a half year or just about two years. Didn't start grad school right away. It was their executive program through Hawaii Pacific. I worked for First Hawaii and Bank of Hawaii when I was there downtown. It's paradise, but it's,
00:08:07
Speaker
It was trying though. It's hard. Yeah. I mean, your closest relative at that time was in California. So you're still 2,700 miles away from any friends or family. Right. And just the time difference. Oh, yeah. Five hours. Yeah. Yeah. I have heard a statistic. I don't know if it's true. But they said about seven years is the average that people go over there.
00:08:28
Speaker
You know, like that seems like a long time. Yes. Yeah. I don't know, man. I, two years, you know, if, if everybody was there, your whole family, right? Different.
00:08:38
Speaker
But the two year mark, I mean, you know, no seasons or anything like that. You know, it's beautiful all the time. Right. Blood totally got thinned out because you don't have air conditioning and your body temperature never goes above 90 or lower than like 70. Right. So your blood completely gets thinned out. Um, so anyway, so I was there, decided my dad, um, ended up getting sick. So flew back like three or four times, um, in January of, I don't remember what year it was now.
00:09:08
Speaker
2020, 2021. So probably in 2002, 2003. Okay. So anyway, ended up moving back. I was like, I can't do this. It's too much. God's telling me that I shouldn't, I shouldn't be here. I should be back. So I come back, I fly in, lose my luggage. So I flew into the Minneapolis airport in flip flops, board shorts. We call them slippers in Hawaii, but flip flops, board shorts in a tank top, shaggy hair, dark tan, middle of January. There it is. They lost my bag.
00:09:35
Speaker
Oh dear. Problem. Problem. So I'm like, okay, everybody's looking at me like, dude, you got off the wrong plane. You're not supposed to be here. So that really kind of started the journey. So move back to Minneapolis. Um,
00:09:50
Speaker
Worked for TCF National Bank there. Got recruited back to South Dakota to work for Wells Fargo to be a business banker there. That's when I finished up grad school. So I went back to the University of Sioux Falls to finish up grad school. The roots. The roots. Went through that. Had my son, had our son, Maddox, moved down here. It's only been 11 years ago, November of 2012.
00:10:14
Speaker
That's when I moved here. Went through divorce two years after that. I was actually working for, I left banking, got out of banking. Went to work for a company doing and helping businesses going through transitions and succession planning and things like that.
00:10:31
Speaker
At that point, I was going through divorce and I couldn't be a father. My daughter ended up coming along during that time, but I couldn't be a father of two kids on a commission-only job. So I got back into banking. Yeah, right. Consistency. So consistency and things like that. So I mean, for me,
00:10:46
Speaker
Success is not linear and success is defined by each person, right? But what I found out is no journey is linear either. There's going to be ups and downs, trials and tribulations. And it's all, there's a lot of times where I could have just said, screw it. I'm just going to go get a $60,000 a year job and just lay it out. This is what I'm doing. I'm just going to, you know,
00:11:05
Speaker
sock away in my 401k and do my thing. Right. But, um, that's really kind of never been my style to do it that way. So, um, but yeah, so here I am in Des Moines, uh, 11 years later, um, right prior to the pandemic. Um, I took a position to be the market president for a bank here in town. We'll just leave it at that.
00:11:27
Speaker
Yep. And, uh, it was new bank in town and the bank that I was at before I had a non-compete, non-solicit. I left that started a 17 month journey of a, um, of a legal battle. I didn't do anything wrong. The bank that hired me didn't do anything wrong. Uh, so 17 months goes by and this was right at the cusp of the pandemic is when I went over there. So it was like February, January, February of 2021, 12 months comes around February of 22 or yeah, February of 21. I'm like, I'm done.
00:11:55
Speaker
I am burnt out of banking. Can't do it. I'm going to put the chips in on myself. And that's where we're at. And that's where we're at. I was the only earner of income and still am in my family. But I said, you don't want to know something. I have always, I don't want to say bent over backwards, but for lack of a better term, we always invest ourselves into a company that we're with.
00:12:16
Speaker
But you know that in the event that something happens
Investing in Personal Growth and Business Coaching
00:12:20
Speaker
to you, they are going to post for your position within a week. So I was to the point where I'm like, you know, do I have a lot of money sitting in the bank? No. Do I have investments that I'm going to have to tap into? Hell yeah, and I know that.
00:12:34
Speaker
but i wanted to invest in myself and not only did i want to invest in myself and put the chips in on myself i wanted to take that time to grow something that was unique to me because i knew i had a skill set i didn't know how to implement it but i knew i had a skill set and i knew that i wanted to show my kids that there's a different avenue sure so i've got three kids three nine and eleven so i wanted to show them that there's a different path yeah it's not
00:12:57
Speaker
that's not common, right? It's an uncommon path. It really is. Because it's easy for people just to stay with status quo. Right. So now you get a coach, and I would say encourage business owners. 100%. And to figure out what is their obstacles. How can they think of different ways to work through those? Yeah. So tell me about how that journey has been. And let's be honest, you've been doing this for quite some time. This is just the first part. You're doing it for yourself.
00:13:24
Speaker
Right. Yeah. So let's talk about one, your journey just up, up to this point, just with speaking into, to business owners. What are some of issues that you get to like work on together, obviously with your business owner, but let's talk through some of those.
00:13:41
Speaker
Yeah. You know, for me, I think one of the biggest ones is it's fear, you know, it's fear to take that leap. Right. Um, you know, everyone, uh, I had a friend of mine who I was in banking with and I was trying to not convince him, but show him like, Hey, what I'm doing is something that you can do too. You also have a unique skillset that you can take to the market and be able to help people with. But.
00:14:02
Speaker
Ryan was a, he, he was comfortable just doing his every, having a paycheck every two weeks. He likes that comfort. And he likes that, you know, he's, he's a farmer farm kid background, um, in, uh, in, in Southwest Iowa, but that's what he did. And that's what he was comfortable with. And I was like, you know, Hey man, that's that that's you, that's totally cool. You do what you're going to do with that. But you know, I think overcoming self doubt, overcoming fear, overcoming imposter syndrome, overcoming just,
00:14:32
Speaker
getting in your own damn way. That's a good one, right? Yeah. I think that's what a lot of people find that they, you know, it's, it's paralysis by analysis as well. Do I have enough information? Have I done enough due diligence and they don't ever get to the point where they are confident enough in themselves to take the leap.
00:14:49
Speaker
that's good it's good because i mean i think a lot of times you know you've heard this and i've heard said this on the show find something you love doing and you want you won't work a day in your life absolutely that's such the worst thing to say like you find what you love to do and you work harder than anybody else does but you don't feel like you're
00:15:06
Speaker
working that hard because you just love to do it. Now your thing that you love to do would be like hard work for me. Like there's no way I'd do it. Or, uh, let's say the person loves to do paperwork on her team. Like I'm sorry, what? Like, but she like, I love to do it. And so we're all uniquely gifted. And so what is that one thing that you love to do, but that's unique to you. And then you can do that every day, day in and day out. And you work harder than anybody else does.
00:15:29
Speaker
But you just do it in such a different way because you actually like doing it. I think it's really good. And when you said that fear, it reminds me, I've been watching and coaching my son, but you just observe your kids. What I've found is that, and I see a lot of myself in this, so I'm speaking to my son, but it's really Phillip that I'm talking about. But he doesn't like to go 100% because he wants that flick of understanding like, oh, that's why I didn't succeed, because I didn't go 100%.
00:15:59
Speaker
And like, I'm telling you, I'm preaching to the choir because there's never been once in my workouts and all the different sports thing that I've done is like, I've gone to like throw up, you know, like that's all I got. I never do it. Like there's always a little bit left in the gauge for whatever reason, right? But I think we can psycho analysis that all day. But I see a lot of myself in my son and I, I'm like trying to pour into him like, Hey, there's a better way. Like,
00:16:24
Speaker
Do it different than I did and see what potential you could do, even if you fail miserably, but you gave it all you got. There's something so satisfying about that. And I think this is why I'm so passionate about the uncommon path for people is because you work so hard for somebody else to make a lot of money. Like how much money do you feel like you've made other companies? It's a lot of money.
00:16:46
Speaker
And so like, give me 10, 25% of that and you're going to be living better than you ever have. Absolutely. But we don't feel like that. We feel like, oh, this is the safe path. And I do think that something COVID has done in a positive way is they've shown even big companies, you're a number.
00:17:02
Speaker
You know, where it used to be like find safety in the bigger companies because you won't have, that was not the case in COVID. It was like the bigger companies were almost more exposed than the people were nimble of like, I can move around. What can I do? Um, but man, it's been fascinating for me to be able to see people and start looking like you are. We're like, wait, I have a unique skillset. I'm going to try it. I've packed my parachute for how long? Yeah. And now it's time for me to pour into other people.
00:17:28
Speaker
So let's talk about other obstacles that I feel, or like you've seen. I will give you one while you think, is health insurance. What am I gonna do for health insurance? And honestly, that's a valid obstacle. Because I remember when I went into this uncommon path, I remember that was one for us, and what I did the research on, it was about $1600 a month for my family of five. And I'm like, wait a second, that's more than my mortgage.
00:17:57
Speaker
How am I supposed to do that? And so that was an obstacle that we obviously got through. Full disclosure, we did this Christian care, not insurance. You know what I'm saying? That's what I always say. But that's what we did for our family. And it's been life-giving for us. I'm not saying that's for everybody.
00:18:13
Speaker
But again, these are small things that you have to understand. What's your risk tolerance? What's your fear factor? What's your biggest fears?
The Role of Support and Community
00:18:21
Speaker
And is that probable? And if that's probable, then you have to go the other side of it. But what if the other side is true?
00:18:28
Speaker
this is better than my wildest dreams. Like I feel like sometimes people forget that, but the realist side of things are like, well, I need to know my big sphere, which are, you know, worst consequence. Okay. And then let's talk about it. But just kind of mapping that out and giving people a roadmap is helpful. So that's one thing health insurance. What's another one? Well, one of the first things I'll say is, is that if anybody that, you know, anybody that's listening to this or everybody that's listening to this that hasn't gotten to the point where they want to take that leap,
00:18:56
Speaker
You have to know that there is going to be, you're going to be uncomfortable because it's not something that you have done every day. And what you've done every day is you've found a way to become comfortable in your routine. This will be a new routine. This will feel uncomfortable. You, unless you, and I don't, whether we dive into this or not, but if you don't have a plan in place,
00:19:17
Speaker
for yourself, you're going to get up every day and go, what do I do now? Yeah. I have this great idea, but what do I do? Okay. Well, that's not, not a business plan necessarily. Like you have the idea, but a plan of like, what is your plan of action? What are you going to do each and every day to move that needle forward? Right. But it's going to be uncomfortable. So be uncomfortable as hell. So, you know, other things, you know, yeah, health insurance is a big one. Um, you know, you know, know your competition, you know, what is everybody else doing out there? Right. Um, you and I met, I don't know how many years ago now, Philip.
00:19:47
Speaker
We met through a mutual client of ours, former client of mine, current client of yours. And the thing that I love about you is you don't view wealth management, investment, retirement the way that everybody else views it. And what I love about how you're doing it is that everybody socks all this money away and they're like, okay, I'm gonna hit 65, 70 and okay.
00:20:13
Speaker
I made it. Now I can live. Dude, you're going to try to live and do all the things you want to do when you're 65, 70. I'm only 45 and I'm already starting to feel like when I wake up in the morning, I'm way more sore than when I went to bed and I'm like, when I'm 70, I'm not going to be able to do the things I want to do. I'm not going to be able to go downhill mountain biking. I'm not going to be able to go white water rafting, go hiking for however many days. I want to be able to enjoy things now because tomorrow is not guaranteed.
00:20:46
Speaker
So the things that I look at with these things are being comfortable and the uncomfortable, getting over self-doubt, there's health insurance, there's skilled workforce, especially depending upon the industry that you're in. Do you have a demand for your product, financial concerns? There's all of these different things that are out there. But the one thing, and I know you said you talked about health insurance, and I think that those are all important things.
00:21:13
Speaker
The most important thing for anybody out there who's looking at starting is belief in yourself.
00:21:20
Speaker
If you have like my wife and I know that your wife is the same way to have us, uh, whoever your partner is to have a strong support system at home. And if you don't have a partner or, you know, anything like that, find yourself a mentor, find yourself a coach, find yourself others around you that can help support you in your journey. Because if you have like-minded people that are around you, they're going to help push you and keep you accountable.
00:21:47
Speaker
and if you've been successful, you will be successful. And if you're doing it with your heart and if you're doing it
00:21:55
Speaker
to better other people and you're not just looking at, okay, is this my golden ticket? Is this my silver bullet? And if you're looking at it from that perspective, you can't go wrong. You can't go wrong. I love that. I love that you say, because I want to talk on this for a little bit, just being uncomfortable. And I want the listeners to stop and think about this. When in your life were you uncomfortable? When in your life? And it can be a long time ago. It could be yesterday. I don't care.
00:22:24
Speaker
But then think about the most growth in your life and it will be close to that time when you are uncomfortable.
Pushing Beyond Comfort Zones
00:22:31
Speaker
And we all want to be growing, but we all don't want to be uncomfortable. Does that make sense? And so even when we're younger, like everything is uncomfortable because everything's new, yet you're growing at such a tremendous rate. Like where, when does that stop? There is this innate,
00:22:47
Speaker
feeling that we want to be comfortable, but yet we also want to be growing. And I feel like for us to be truly growing, we have to be uncomfortable. We have to set ourselves off in this section where like, I don't feel great about it yet. This is where I love that you kind of brought this in. Like, how are you going to enjoy the uncomfortable today? Yeah.
00:23:07
Speaker
and how are you gonna make that your new normal? Where, okay, it's always uncomfortable. Like, everything's uncomfortable, and let's be honest, we can always be thinking of times in our lives where we're like, oh, this part doesn't feel great, you know? So there's always gonna be some things in our life that doesn't, it's not perfect. But if we can make our life, and this is something that I've been really trying to focus on, in the circumstance, can we have a good attitude in it? Can we still go on vacations? Can we still enjoy our life? Because I feel like a lot of times, people on the more
00:23:37
Speaker
comfortable journey or the common path, have this understanding that when I retire, life is going to be better. And what I have seen in my 10 years of doing this business is not true. Like you have to condition yourself to live the way that you want to live in retirement early because not a lot of people can just go from zero to 60. Like, Hey, I want to play pickleball every day of my life when I retire. Well,
00:24:01
Speaker
Are you playing pickleball now? No. And so when retirement hits, that's such a dumb example, but you get what I'm saying. Like, Hey, I want to serve people in Afghanistan. I want to serve people. I want to, well, what are you doing now? Well, nothing. I don't have time. Well, who like, what is that small step that you can do to start pursuing these things that you're excited about? And when that time comes where hopefully you have enough cashflow or whatever's happening in your life that you don't have to worry about money.
00:24:28
Speaker
then you can continue to pour yourself into something that you already have been doing because it's been so passionate about yours. So yeah, I love the uncomfortableness and I feel like that's a charge to everybody is like, what ways are you feeling uncomfortable now? And if you can't think of any, I feel like the comfortableness can eat you alive. I mean, you brought it up earlier and for anybody that's listening that has kids, how many times do you tell your kids to do things that they're not comfortable with?
00:24:54
Speaker
Like every day, right? You had already brought that up as well, right? So I work with my three kids that being comfortable is not where it's at. You have no growth when you're comfortable, right? You have to push yourself, whether that's your mind, whether that's your body, whether it's spirituality, whatever it is. If you don't challenge anything, if you don't challenge yourself, how are you ever going to grow? You become stagnant, right? You as a person can atrophy.
00:25:22
Speaker
Yes. You can atrophy because you're not, you're not changing. You're not, you're not doing things that are different. Um, you know, you're gonna be uncomfortable. You need to learn to enjoy the process.
00:25:34
Speaker
In the process, you're gonna have ups and downs. Again, like I said, it's not linear, right? Your success is not going to be in a straight line from point A to point Z, from start to end. It's going to be all over the board. You're gonna have good days, you're gonna have bad days. But if you can stick with the process, and I tell my kids this every day, if you can learn to be 1% better,
00:25:55
Speaker
Every day. And I know that's everybody knows that, but if you can be 1% better every day, if you can do one thing a little bit better today than you did yesterday, like my daughter struggles to sleep in her bed, right? She still sleeps in her closet. She's going to be 10, which I'm not, I'm not shaming her for that. There's other things that are going on with that. But what I'm saying is like, Hey, if you can stay in here for five minutes today and then it's
00:26:16
Speaker
Five and a half minutes and then it's six. Yes. By the time you're up to 30 minutes, you're like, well, gosh, this isn't as hard as I thought I was going to be. Sure. But it's incremental gains. It's what I just did a post on this on Instagram. It's, it's finding ways to have micro wins because if you can't find a way to have micro wins, if you say, well, I want to start a business and I want to grow it to a million dollars and I'm going to do it in 12. Dude, that's not, that's not going to work. Yeah.
00:26:37
Speaker
If you don't have, you're setting yourself up for failure, but if you can say, Hey, I want to have certain things change in my life. And if I get to like, you can have this number in your head, but if you can find ways to have micro wins along the way, it keeps you engaged and you see wins along the way. It gets you excited. People are going to see that around you and there are things that you can share in your process and you're enjoying the process. If you don't do that, you're not going to enjoy it. You're going to be right back where you started. Yeah. So good. It's just going to happen.
00:27:06
Speaker
So I like to say because you said something that was like profound. You said you will be successful. And like I think a lot of people are fearful that they won't be successful. Or their success won't be exactly how they thought it through their mind. And I would say you're 100% right that it might not look like your success when you start.
00:27:25
Speaker
but you'll be grateful that you have taken this journey for what you have learned and pushing yourself outside your comfort zone. And to me, that's success, right? When we're constantly learning, constantly growing, and we know more now than we did yesterday. And this is why I think it's fascinating. And again, I've managed people's money, that's what happens, okay? But first, I wanna make sure that they're on a trajectory that they love. And at any point, they can take any of their money and go after that, go invest in that, no problem.
00:27:55
Speaker
But what I tell people is like, if you give me your money, the only thing I can guarantee you if I put in the market is a hundred percent loss. That's the only thing I can guarantee you, right? This is like going to compliance nightmare because like, oh, he's guaranteeing things. Okay. That's the only thing I can truly guarantee you. And if that were to happen where you gave me your money and it goes poof gone zero, like what have you learned not to give your money to fill up? Like that's pretty much what that's going to be. Also like you,
00:28:24
Speaker
There's just not a lot of growth and learning from that other than my money's gone. What happened, right? But if you've taken that money and invested in something that you wanted to find success or whatever, trying to find a new thing, and it doesn't go well, like think about how many things you've learned along the way.
00:28:43
Speaker
Dude, let me tell you this right now. Priceless. Yeah, 100%. So the pandemic started what, 2020? Yep. Okay. So I went to work for a new bank in 2020 to be the market president.
Entrepreneurial Ventures During the Pandemic
00:28:54
Speaker
I left that job that paid very, very well in February of 21. So still pretty much in the midst of the pandemic. I left that job, had no other income coming in, started two businesses, one's a franchise, one was my own consulting firm, right? Okay. I had nothing there.
00:29:12
Speaker
In that time, so since 2021, my wife and I have bought a business, sold a business. I've started two businesses. I've consulted for banks. I've helped other businesses who are struggling. Some of them are still working through things. The amount that I have learned, so I got my associate's degree, my bachelor's degree, my master's degree, and I went to the graduate school of banking at the University of Colorado. And what I've learned in the last two-ish years is more than I ever learned in that entire 10 years that I was in school. For sure.
00:29:42
Speaker
for good and bad for sure, which is also valuable. It's valuable. Right. And I would not change if I could go back, you know, cause I've, you know, Maddox and excuse me, Maddox in London. Um, my two kiddos are always talking about, you know, what I want to do when I go to school, what I want to be Maddox, like an architect and all these things are like, I was like, Hey guys, if you decide that you don't want to go to school, that's okay. That's okay to do that. And if you do want to go to school, maybe we try it a little bit more unique than what, than what everybody else is doing right now. Right. So I think that, you know,
00:30:12
Speaker
if you're young, if you're listening to this and you're, I'm 45 and I'm still trying to, you know, do different things. It's never too late to start. Um, first of all, when you talk about time, right? And when we were talking about the process and being uncomfortable, um, I wrote this down based on a comment that you said, Phillip was if you go into it with the mindset that you're going to fail, you're going to fail. Right.
00:30:39
Speaker
you have to have a mind shift to say, and everyone's like, well, it's so easy just to say, you know, you just have to have a mind shift. Well, yes, you do have to have a positive mindset. And if you don't have a positive mindset, you have to have a mind shift. Because if you don't have a positive mindset going into it, whatever you are thinking, whatever is your inner dialogue will end up being what you produce. Right. Yeah, it's crazy. And here's the thing that I think to edify that because I feel like
00:31:06
Speaker
Yeah. So when you have a perspective and perception where you're going to fail, everything that's negative that comes out, you keep reinforcing like, well, see, I shouldn't have done it. Or, you know, but when you have this mindset of like, no, it's there's going to be bumps.
00:31:22
Speaker
Absolutely. But let's talk about the successes. You start seeing more opportunities where you're like, wow, that was really cool that that just happened, right? So it's just a way to be able to see and through different lenses, what lenses are you looking through today? Yeah. Is it optimistic? Is it excitement? Or is it like, whoa, I'm in a bad place. Good to know, right?
00:31:43
Speaker
And honestly, that's why I think coaching or getting around like a community where they can speak truth of like, Hey man, you're doing a lot of good things too. I need that, right? I think we all have this moments of like, Oh boy, what's happening? And that's what I would say at the end of this, this uncommon journey is kind of lonely. And that's why it's so amazing to have a brand to be like a beacon of hope of like, no, there's other people like me.
00:32:06
Speaker
that I can get around that like is also believing in investing in themselves and they want me to win just as much as I want them to win. So how can I serve them today? How can I be an encouragement to somebody else? And I just did a podcast. It was a simple step of like, what opportunities are we maybe missing in the, just the mundane day to day to be able to encourage somebody else? Because right now I'll cling to those people, like a life raft, those people are like, Hey, you can do this. Like,
00:32:32
Speaker
I believe in you and I've been in a tough spot. You can get out of that. I love that. Yeah. And to your point, and like you said, to finish, you know,
00:32:40
Speaker
that thought, if you find yourself in that you're surrounded by people that are questioning what you're doing or they're kind of throwing water on your fire and it drags you down, I encourage you to step back and do a mental inventory of the people that you have in your life. And I actually commented on, somebody had an Instagram today that was talking about this and they said, you know, you shouldn't cut people out of your life that don't bring you joy or don't help you in your path. Now,
00:33:10
Speaker
I think you go both ways on that, but I do think that everybody should have a mental, um, should do a mental inventory and say, okay, who is here to encourage me in my growth? If they're not in there to encourage you in your growth, your circle shrinks. Right. And that's good. Right. That can be a good thing.
00:33:27
Speaker
Uh, and I shared that with you maybe six months ago and I said, Hey, I had this circle, but now I'm shrinking that circle because people that I thought were there to advocate for me and to encourage me. And I was doing for them. Wasn't what I thought it was. You know, there was all these question marks of, well, why would you do that Kevin? Well, why would you versus saying, Hey dude, I think that's a great thing to do. Have you thought about this? It's even in the approach of how you communicate that to someone too. So if you, if, if anybody is listening to that or listening to this and they're, they're finding themselves that you're having some naysayers that are out there.
00:33:56
Speaker
just do an inventory of your circle. I think that's good. And your spouse is your biggest advocate. If they're not on board, like I wouldn't go down this path because it is going to be hard and challenging and without them to be able to support you. I mean, it's a bleak, lonely world. And like you said, like there are people out there and I feel like I am too a little bit like somebody's like, you can't do that. And I'm like, hold my beer, you know, right?
00:34:21
Speaker
100%. Don't challenge me. Yeah, right. That's not your play. And people know I'm competitive, so that's hilarious. But I do feel like overarching, you have to have those people in your life that are like, I'm your biggest fan, right? Or like, I love this definition of mentorship. Somebody who sees potential in you and is willing to prove it to you. Like those people who are like,
00:34:43
Speaker
If you need me, I'm right here. You know, like, oh man, let's go. Because I feel like I have the world at my back to support me kind of moving forward, even through the hard times. And I'm really like begging to say, like, even through a hard circumstance, is my attitude strong? Is, am I positive? Am I being uplifting to the team and the people that are helping me paddle this life preserver down the whitewater? And so,
00:35:08
Speaker
That's the coolest part, right? And I think that's why I wanted you on the show is because you have this beacon of like hope that like I've been through a lot and I want to bless other people with some of the bad things that I've done, some of the good things to try to get through this whitewater faster so they can pursue what they want to do and be excellent. 100%. It's so easy to just, it would be so easy just to give up.
00:35:31
Speaker
I've suffered from health anxiety for 37 of my 45 years and I could have given up a lot of times along the way, but you find ways to persevere, you find ways to say, I'm not gonna let this beat me or I'm not gonna let what that person said define me or get in my way of growth.
The Importance of Self-Investment
00:35:48
Speaker
So if you put your mind to it that it's something you want to do and you're gonna be comfortable being uncomfortable,
00:35:57
Speaker
Anybody can do it. It's just, you know, the belief has to come within to start with. Right. That's good. Well, Kevin, you are a wealth of knowledge. Thank you so much just for blessing us with just the wisdom that you've had up to this point. And I'm grateful to have you in my circle just to be able to encourage me. And I'm also grateful that you're impacting others. So thank you for your own uncommon path. I'm grateful that you get to walk through that. And then I'm glad that you're helping people kind of walk them through their own because
00:36:22
Speaker
Again, we need more people to invest in themselves. We need more people to be able to come down this uncommon path because that is where I think people get uncomfortable, but they get used to it and they get used to the growth that happens and they know that, oh, I am successful.
00:36:38
Speaker
Although be it maybe different than what I thought at first, I think this path is so life-giving that it's worth pursuing. Absolutely. Absolutely. And thank you for having me. I really do appreciate it. Hopefully this brought some value, uh, to your listeners and things like that. So thanks again for
Connect with Kevin Leese
00:36:54
Speaker
having me on. So if our listeners wanted to reach out to you in any way, what's the best way to do just go to Instagram it's at K and then lease L E A S E M as in Mary B as in boy, A as in Apple. So at Kaylee's MBA.
00:37:08
Speaker
on Instagram, shoot me a DM on that. It's the easiest way to follow me and find me. Perfect. And he's putting out a lot of great content. So I would definitely encourage our listeners to follow, follow you and reach out if you have any questions, but you've been listening to the uncommon wealth podcast. I've been your host, Philip Ramsey. Until next time, go get uncomfortable. Thanks for listening.
00:37:27
Speaker
That's all for this episode brought to you by Uncommon Wealth Partners. Be sure to visit uncommonwealth.com to learn more about our services. Don't miss an episode as we introduce you to inspiring people who are actively pursuing an uncommon life.