005a Connect the Dots from Jeff Banman

Loura and Stephen will discuss their takeaways from the prior episode with Jeff Banman.
They will talk about the things they’ve implemented, the ones they want to try out and how Jeff’s insights are helping them embrace the exciting unknown.

Jeff Banman’s interview

Transcript

Stephen Christopher  3:24  

Hey, what’s up everybody, Stephen Christopher here with my awesome co host, Laura Sanchez for the exciting unknown podcast. Thank you for joining us today for an episode of connect the dots. We’re going to go back through, have a little chat, have a little conversation and see some of the cool things that we pulled out of the interview that we did with Jeff Banman. Laura.

Unknown Speaker  3:46  

Hey, what’s up? I’m good. How are you?

Stephen Christopher  3:48
  
Doing great doing great. So this is gonna be a fun one. You know, Jeff, Jeff has such a technical, highly skilled, highly trained Background and he’s been through so many different careers and a relatively short lifespan, right. I mean, you know, he’s mid mid 40s. And one of the really cool things that I love about him is that since he has been through so many different careers, with that highly skilled, highly trained background, you know, from being a CIA operator to a firefighter, to, you know, what he’s doing now, which is helping those that put themselves in harm’s way. And he’s still learning. He’s still learning all the time. Right. I mean, you know, a lot of the stuff we talked about, he said, You know, I really just started to learn this stuff in the last three to five years. Right, and look what it’s done for his life. And so I’m excited to chat about him today.

Unknown Speaker  4:50  

Yeah, you know, I think he

Unknown Speaker  4:53  

were the first things is the day after we recorded his session. was already using some of his, what did he call them?

Unknown Speaker  5:07  

Banmanisms

Stephen Christopher  5:08  

Yeah Banmanisms

Unknown Speaker  5:10  

his Banmanisms, I was already using some of those. And I was telling people about his foundation, people that are in, you know, our first responders, but particularly given the world today, and I was like, that is that was so amazing to me that it was just, it was a resource that I hadn’t had before that all of a sudden it was like, wait a minute, I can share this with people.

Stephen Christopher  5:31  

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So, you know, I mean, a couple things that I start to pull out our, again, you know, we talked about this in the Jon Vroman episode, way deeper than I would have expected, but that you know, the whole like, emotions, right, like, learning how to use our emotions, learning how to be aware of those things and use them for different different things that we experience and in life and leading into the exciting unknown. And it was really cool to hear some of the stuff he shared from somebody that has this, you know, super cool background, right, like CIA operate operator. I mean, just how cool is that right? And to hear that one of these, these guys that I would consider to be kind of like a total badass, right? You know, the man’s man talking about this stuff and how important it is and how important starting every day with these breathing exercises and how when they were in the field, and they would move as this small elite team, what they would do right before they like broke down a door, which was all take a second, take a breath together and then and then work as this unit. And I don’t remember the exact words he said, but basically, the person on the other side of the door was just like, Whoa, what happened? Shit.

Unknown Speaker  6:56  

Yeah, who just came through here, right? And recognizing that the energy wasn’t one person, right? And you think of when you think of that, like badass, I got a gun, I’m gonna push down this door, you think of it as that one person and he was really saying it was not it was so much more than, you know, five, five individuals it was that energy from the entire group of them being together.

Stephen Christopher  7:20  

Yep. So, you know, thinking about that, taking that into like a company, whether you’re an owner, your manager, your leader, I guess even taking it into like a small community event, right? So if you’re gonna lead a small group, what are you doing to get all of those people on the same page? I mean, I know it wit Ivan did a training on basically gratitude and meditation and stuff and when we did it, so we all did a meditation together. We did a meditative gratitude exercise when we came out of it. And everybody opened their eyes. I mean, everybody was connected. You could tell even though they all did their kind of their own little thing individually. Remember, when they’re opening their eyes? They’re like, Whoa, I don’t know what just happened. But that was crazy.

Unknown Speaker  8:06  

Right? Right. Yeah. And being able to capture that, like you say, whether it’s in your business or in your community or anytime you’re wanting to empower people to be more to do more, remembering the ability to kind of take that energy. And one of the things that one of his his sayings was, you know, knowing is from knowing is from the neck down. And knowledge is from the neck up, right? And that to me tied into that, the emotions and the heart, right, you know, something when you really feel it, and it’s deep down. And so, whether it’s meditation, or Anyway, you just choose to kind of connect into that individually and then as a group of people, that’s when you really know what’s right.

Stephen Christopher  9:00  

Yeah, yeah. And and to piggyback on that, I like what he said how he’s like, you know, kind of find your own routine. And we’ve been hearing this a lot lately, right? And I’ve been talking about this, like, there’s no one perfect way to be connected with your higher self to lean into your emotions and using EQ to make decisions and leaning into even what’s next, which I would call like intuition. And that higher level of awareness and connectedness, there’s not this one perfect way to do it. You know, he doesn’t start his morning with some big long routine. He said, he starts his morning with coffee and breathing, right and right, but it’s doing the same thing for him as maybe somebody that that desires or chooses to meditate for 45 minutes. And I think that that’s just really important to pay attention to. It doesn’t have to be this exact regimen just because it works for somebody else. It’s really important that we start figuring out what works best For us,

Unknown Speaker  10:01  

right, which means you may have to try a lot of different things. You know, I mean, I was, you know, I learned from you and from you know, how Elrod the whole morning routine with savers and I did that for a while. And there was certainly benefit that came to me from that. But I also recognize that there was some of it that I was forcing myself to do, and it just didn’t feel right at the time. And so I’ve modified that. But you have to try things until you know, yeah,

Stephen Christopher  10:31  

yeah, completely. I used to teach. I mean, I used to teach that right. Like, you know, Hallo rod was the one that really got me started on morning routine and a lot of other really cool things. And now I do some version of that. But that version changes a little bit over time, based on what I feel I need right now. Sometimes I read a lot longer. Sometimes I don’t read even once a week. Yeah. You know, maybe I go deeper into the meditation part. So yeah, I think it’s just really important that we all are paying attention to that. There’s not this one perfect solution. And we’re seeing it over all the podcast episodes, everybody kind of has their own way of doing it. But you hear these common threads coming out around, you know, EQ and emotions and awareness and intuition and trusting that and honing that. And so I think it’s this journey of constantly feeling into what feels right. But at the same time making sure that we’re learning how to interpret our feelings so that it’s not just kind of a whim. It’s actually we’re actually able to truly feel them and use use that as more of a guidance system.

Unknown Speaker  11:37  

Yeah. You know, that really ties into what what hit me one of the things is the from all the different careers he’s been in and the research he’s done. You know, we didn’t get a lot into his data. He alluded to it, but all the data that shows that the one thing that all top performers have, no matter whether they’re in business entrepreneur in military They are leaders in the community, one of the top one of the things that they all have is that ability to control I’m gonna say control their emotions, and to do so when times are completely uncertain and they don’t know what’s happening. And to me, part of that is EQ, right is being aware of their emotions, enough to know that okay? others and what their emotions are all going to be impacted by how I respond. So, you know, he talked about, you know, being able to in the moment, be calm, whether that’s your breathing, checking in with that central nervous system and saying, okay, I can do this. I don’t know what the hell is about to happen. I don’t know what’s gonna be next. When I jump off this cliff or when I step through this door, I quit my job, but I’m calm. I’m centered. I know that I have the ability to do this. And I think for me, that was when The biggest takeaways is really learning how to do that in our own lives so that as we lead, we are able then to teach others how to do that. And to show people that it is okay to be uncertain it is okay to be scared it is okay to not have all the answers, but you can still be a high performer you can still be successful, you can still get what you want, even when in those situations of uncertainty.

Stephen Christopher  13:27  

Yeah, yeah, completely. And, you know, one of his sayings that I loved is you’re either the calm or the chaos. Yeah. And so which which one are you and I did a video on it right after we did the interview. And it was just a great reminder that when once we begin begin to have just enough self awareness to know Are you the are you being the chaos in the situation? Are you the calm, so once we can have enough awareness, if we’re being aware and we recognize Wait, I’m the chaos here. That’s kind of step one, too. Being able to decide what do I want to do next? Do I want to, you know, do I want to drop down and start to be more of the common this situation and really use maybe like a breathing technique or something like that so that we can then make better clear, smoother decisions that are going to much better benefit the situation.

Unknown Speaker  14:23  

That’s funny because I did a video yesterday about if you what you don’t change you choose. So if you add to that, right, like, Okay, I’m aware now, in this situation, your awareness of Am I calm or the chaos? And you may say, you know what I am the chaos. And I’m not going to change that. Or I can’t change that. So by making that choice, then you become the chaos forever in that situation. So funny how those two tie together. Yeah, connecting the dots, right?

Stephen Christopher  15:00  

Yeah, great point. You know, really, I think for me, and I already touched on this a little bit, but I just want to reiterate it again because I was thinking about it. And it’s just so impactful. Like, again, this is somebody who’s been through stuff that very few of us will ever have to see in our entire life and ever have to experience in our entire life. But what he mentioned in there is that the feelings and the emotions and stuff like that, in the situations that he was in, you know, working these like counterterrorism things and, you know, 23 different countries, the feelings and the hard wiring and the biology and the response is the same as it would be for taking a step. Taking a step out into the unknown and starting a business or, you know, starting a you know, I don’t even know maybe a conference With a potential partner potential relationship partner, right like absolutely that, that, that the biological response is almost the same, if not identical to being in the middle of a firefight,

Unknown Speaker  16:16  

because the concentration it comes from within. It’s not based upon the external definition of that situation. It comes totally from within. Right? I mean, I’ve had people in my life that are amazingly calm when they fire someone, right? They just whatever is in, in their central nervous system, they have taught themselves or they have learned how to control those feelings and those emotions, and they’re fine with it. And I can remember every time I’ve ever had to let someone go, I’m a wreck. Sometimes I’m more emotionally robeck than the person I’m letting go. Right. And it feels it’s the same response, but two different people in the same situation different responses. Yeah. So it’s all based upon your internal where your how you see it where you’re coming from?

Stephen Christopher  17:08  

Yep. Well, you know, something interesting comes up for me around that is a powerful person doesn’t need to prove that they’re powerful. And I think at least for me, what comes up is specifically around like letting somebody go, that’s always challenging. But in the beginning, it was much more challenging than it is now. Because now I know and even Andrea and I wait, we go through this little mental checklist of, have we done absolutely everything that we possibly can for this person. And as long as the answer to that is yes, then that, you know, it’s their decision. Ultimately, they’re the ones making the decision and choosing to go down the path that they’re going down and we’ve done everything we can from a coaching side to help them So now, we know that they are actually going to be better served by no longer being with us. Because they’re not serving themselves as high as they could, they’re not fulfilling our values, they’re not serving the company. And that just means that there’s going to be some other greater opportunity for them to learn from somewhere else. And so, you know, yeah. Are they always excited about it? Not necessarily. But a lot of the people that we’ve parted ways with, I still keep in touch with and, you know, even though it may have been tough in the very beginning, they still come back and say, Oh, my gosh, you know, like, thank you for this thing. This thank you for this. And they’re doing a hell of a lot better.

Unknown Speaker  18:34  

Right. They’re happier. They’re moving on in their career. Yeah,

Stephen Christopher  18:38  

yep. Yeah, they got something that was more fitting for them, but they took what they learned here and applied it to next so they so it’s a stepping stone, as opposed to how some people see being let go is, Oh, you’ve got it, you drop down and you’ve got to start again here and start again there. That’s not how it is. It’s all this perspective of you know, how do you see Like with my mortgage company, right, I could have looked at that and said, Okay, well, you know, crap. Now I got to start a whole new company, and I’m in debt and all this, but it was actually a big stepping stone that taught me more about business than I ever could have learned, you know, even running a successful company for

Unknown Speaker  19:15  

years and years. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I wanted to touch on one other thing that we we talked to Jeff about kind of at the very end, and that was about fun. And one of the things he said was, you know, certainly he, he wishes he would have had more fun. I think many of us can relate to that, right? It’s like, gosh, you know, I worked for 20 years, I’ve worked for 30 years, and I look back and I didn’t have a lot of fun. But then he’s saying you know, you have to define what fun is for you. And you know, I think usually when we say oh, let’s go have fun, we think of something about Let’s go play let’s go you know, motorcycle riding. Let’s go travel. Let’s say we don’t necessarily think of fun in In the context of maybe what we do for a living, or something that is more business oriented, so I have a question for you what things are fun for you? How would you define fun in your world right now?

Stephen Christopher  20:19  

I think there’s a lot of different ways that, that I could define it, right? Because I’ve become more aware about how to have fun in more moments. And so actually, here’s how I’ll answer that. I recognize when I’m not having fun, and then I can choose to have more fun in that moment moving forward. So if I feel a lot of like resistance, and oh my gosh, I don’t want to do this, or, well, yeah, I just, you know, I don’t want to do this. I wish I wasn’t here. I wish I was somewhere else. That’s resistance. And so when I recognize it now, I can choose to start having more fun by just allowing it to be more easy allowing myself to choose or to find the spots of learning, growth, gratitude, and things like that. So a lot of times we’re already in a situation, right? And we’ve already agreed to it. So we’re kind of there, whether that’s in business or life, or friends, or whatever it is. So we’ve already agreed to it. So at that point, it’s like, Okay, well, hold on. I’m not happy to be here, right now I can feel it. So what could I choose to be happy about right now, because I’m already here. And I’m probably going to stay for at least some period of time. So that’s what I’ve been working on is learning how to find fun and fulfillment in these other moments. And then, on top of that, like, what specifically Am I doing right now? I mean, help this like, I mean, the podcast. This podcast was purely for fun, right? Like we have no intention, other than talk about the things that we really want to talk About lean into the exciting, unknown, and hopefully help a couple other people kind of do the same thing, so that they can have a more fulfilled life. And so this is kind of, I guess I would call it kind of business. But just remembering that this is fun, and it’s not, it’s not a job. It’s nice doesn’t have a perfect end result that we’re looking for. And so remembering to have fun with things like this, and then I mean, other than that, you know, right now like we’re looking for a piece of land up in the mountains to go put a little tractor on to just play in the dirt like a kid.

Unknown Speaker  22:39  

That’s fun, right? Yeah. Yeah, but but at the same time, so is this.

Unknown Speaker  22:45  

Yeah, yeah.

Stephen Christopher  22:45  

You can find fun and fulfillment and, and pretty much every moment and I think I’ve said it before, probably a couple times. fulfillment. It’s not about finding something that fulfills us in the future. Write like, oh, when I have a business that’s doing this or when I have this many employees or when I have a company that I don’t have to go to every day, you know, those are great things to aspire to. But Phil fulfillment is about finding fulfillment in the moments right now. That’s what fulfillment and fun is about. And it’s not always easy. Like, you know, if I’m tired, and Katie wants me to walk the dog. And I don’t know, I just don’t want to like, that’s not always fun, but I’m learning more and more each day, kind of like Jeff said, he’s learned a lot in the last couple years. Same here to be like, Okay, what could I find fun in this?

Unknown Speaker  23:42  

Mm hmm. Right, whether that felt

Stephen Christopher  23:46  

good. I was just gonna say think about, like, Well, you know what, Hank seems to be having fun. So, I’m helping him Have fun and that’s fun.

Unknown Speaker  23:55  

Yeah, yeah. Or it’s, hey, I’m gonna step outside and I’m gonna get to like, just really pay attention to where I live now, or the color of the sky or something. And that is fun for a few moments, and it makes them walking the dog and the chore fun.

Stephen Christopher  24:13  

Yep. So now you get the question, what are you doing for fun?

Unknown Speaker  24:17  

back to me, um,

Stephen Christopher  24:20  

you know, you’re not going to get away without that.

Unknown Speaker  24:22  

I don’t know, I thought maybe I could distract you enough that, you know, you’d go down a different road and you wouldn’t ask me the question. I think for me, it’s a little bit of the same, but it’s more of acknowledging that there is fun in like, one of the things I really love to do is I love to facilitate a group discussion, right? Whether it’s at a company or it’s a group of friends, I, you know, I have this reputation if the friends are together, who’s probably going to ask questions, Laura, right. That’s fun for me because I want to get people engaged and I want to hear what they think and I want to sometimes push the envelope That’s fun. I like that I don’t have an attempt. I mean, it’s not like I like want an outcome. I just like the environment of doing that. So acknowledging that some of those kinds of things are fun to me, is one of the things that I’ve been working on. And it’s bringing a lot more joy than in those moments because I get to purely say, Hey, you know what, I’m doing this just because it’s fun. So that kind of ties into this podcast as well, right, which is, we get to try anything we want. And like, we didn’t play on that I was going to ask you a question. And all of a sudden, this was beginning to become an interview of us. But you know what, okay, we’re just gonna see what happens. So I’d say that that’s probably where I’m focused most with in fun. The other thing would be, I have tended to be a all or nothing, go big or go home kind of person. And so if I was looking at, oh, well, what do you do for fun and I’d say, Oh, I want to travel Well, I want that to be something Something amazing, right? I want to, you know, take a month off and go to Mexico or I want to take a sailing trip around the world. And I’m trying to say, Okay, wait a minute, it doesn’t have to be all or nothing or big. It can be fun simply to say, you know what, I’m gonna go to Estes Park for the night. And that can be just as fun as that other was. So that’s awesome.

Stephen Christopher  26:27  

Yeah, looking for fun opportunities everywhere. Yeah, no matter what the settlement. Awesome. Well, you heard Laura, if you feel like you might need to be asked some really good questions to be challenged. Reach out to her. She is very, very good at that. And so definitely help you realize things that you might not realize about yourself. I know that she’s done a ton of that for me, so

Unknown Speaker  26:52  

well. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah, it’s fun. Right.

Stephen Christopher  26:56  
​
There you go. Awesome. Well, hey, thank you so much for listening to This episode of connect the dots where we recap our interview and went on some tangents. From our from our interview with Jeff Batman, Jeff is an absolutely amazing person. If you haven’t checked out some of the stuff that he is doing to help those who choose to put themselves in harm’s way for us, please do so. He has some really, really cool stuff and he’s doing some absolutely amazing things, especially everything going on in the world right now. So, thank you again for listening. We greatly appreciate you and until next time, embrace exciting and unknown.