A New Chapter for Heroes Brian Livingston on Life After Service

Jerry: 0:15

Welcome to today's episode of Enduring the Badge Podcast. I'm host Jerry Dean Lund, and if you haven't already done so, please take out your phone and hit that subscribe button. I don't want you to miss an upcoming episode. And, hey, while your phone's out, please give us a rating and review. On whichever platform you listen to this podcast on, such as iTunes, apple Podcasts and Spotify, it helps this podcast grow and the reason why, when this gets positive ratings and reviews, those platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify show this to other people that never listened to this podcast before, and that allows our podcast to grow and make a more of an impact on other people's lives. So if you would do that, I would appreciate that from the bottom of my heart. All right, welcome to Enduring the Badge Podcast. My very special guest today is Brian Livingston. How you doing, brian? I'm doing great. How are you doing, jerry? I'm doing great as well. We're going to touch on a subject that we haven't really talked about on the podcast before, so I appreciate you reaching out to me so we could talk about this.

Brian: 1:11

Sure, not a problem at all, anytime.

Jerry: 1:14

I mean, it's kind of like retirement right. This is kind of retirement planning. How do we want to phrase this? What are we going to talk about today?

Brian: 1:22

I really think. Well, I guess you can call it alternative career planning. I like that, if you want to look at it that way. It's anywhere from people who are already in the job of being a first responder and need to step away to those who have retired and are wondering what that next step is going to be for them.

Jerry: 1:45

Yeah, yeah, brian, do you mind if I ask why'd you retire?

Brian: 1:52

To understand really why I retired we can use that word, it will actually go with. It is what I did. But to really understand where I was at and I think it's a position that a lot of first responders get into but they don't talk about it is I remember, and it was over 22 years ago I had had a bad shift, really bad, and I was laying in bed. I'd been up all night and this was back before you had your cell phone clock right. So I'm staring up at the ceiling of my bedroom and I can still draw the water stain. The outline of the water stain. That's how well I remember this. And I was alternating between that and rolling over and looking at the red clock right that close in the dark, and just going how many more minutes until my next shift? And I just remember going through everything in my head and going I can't believe, you know, I can't believe that the people that I first spoke to when I became a cop because I was a former police officer and what were true and three things really stood out to me. The first one was you know, this guy walks up to me and goes quit now. And I just got into police college and this guy had about 10 years in and I was in my introductory week, just kind of getting shown around and this guy goes, get out while you can. And I was like, oh my gosh, whatever dude like sour grapes, right?

Jerry: 3:37

Right, right, and I'm ready to go.

Brian: 3:39

I'm going to take on the world, and you know so I was like whatever. And then the second guy walks up to me and goes so how well do you sleep at night? And I said, oh, I sleep great. I've never had any problems sleeping. He goes well, forget that. And here I am, like several years later, because I was only a few years into the job and now all of a sudden I can't sleep anymore. And the third one was something my dad said to me and he said as soon as you get in there, you pick two guys that you really think, have it together and model your career after them. Okay. And the first guy eventually became chief. Okay, phenomenal guy, great pick, okay. The second guy shot himself before I was one year in, killed himself and we had lockers right across from each other. He did it in our locker room.

Jerry: 4:41

Oh great.

Brian: 4:42

And you know, so there was the second one going. This is the guy that looks like he's got it all together but, there was something going on behind the scenes that nobody was aware of, but it was bad enough that he took his own life. And I'm sitting there going, laying in bed, going. My marriage is crap. My wife hates me. My two daughters my one daughter isn't old enough to hate me yet my other daughter, I know it is, you know starting to shy away from me, and it ended up that the day I quit, she actually walked up to me at the age of three and said daddy, I don't want you to be a policeman anymore. And it just. I remember sitting there going. I can't believe everything that these guys have said is actually true. And I'd had such a bad shift and I just said, okay, I've got to figure out a way to get out. So to say, you know, why did I retire it? Really, I'd hit that point. We had no mental health put together. They had no idea how to deal with me. It was just go and get some counseling. That was it. Counseling told me I should divorce my wife and I was like, yeah, that's not the option. I want to keep my wife, I want to keep my kids, you know. And so I had to make you know, start to make a plan as to where I was going to go and then, as a side note, I actually the career that I was wanting to get into. Next, I flew into New York, I kid you not, on September 9th 2001, for what was going to be, you know, potentially my next job, and well, that kind of you know that job was kind of put on the back burner.

Jerry: 6:47

Sure sure.

Brian: 6:48

On September 11th, as you know, especially being a firefighter, and everything that went on that day. So it was just a series of things, one after another, and finally I just I tapped out and I didn't even know what I was going to do at that time as a result of I thought it was going to be what was going on in New York, but that didn't come to pass. So I guess that's a long answer, but that kind of gives you an idea of where I was at and why I've now chosen what I do with and for people.

Jerry: 7:21

Yeah, I mean it's. I think we go through our careers and it's full of many ups and downs, right, and dealing with those ups and downs are very challenging and some of them just take the toll, like you say. You know over time that it's just. I found myself probably like you. It's just like it's just time to get out. Things are not getting better and they're just. I think my health is taking a toll from that right, and so it comes a time where it's just not worth it right To stay. But, as we were talking a little bit earlier before we start recording, like some people leave and come back, like they and people always ask me are you going to come back? I'm like I don't really know, I don't think I'm going to come back just because the circumstances I have at home now. I just I just don't think it's worth coming back. So, to tell people a little bit about, kind of like, what you do you do some coaching, right?

Brian: 8:25

And I do do coaching. I work with first responders to help them understand that there's first of all, being a first responder is such a small, small portion of what they are right and it becomes such an overwhelming part of their life. But when we sit down and we think about who we are as a person, we start to, you know, put that role of first responder back into perspective, to understand that there's so much more they can be, there's so much more they can do that's out there that they don't need to pigeonhole them themselves into a career that is literally ruining them. As you said, it's ruining them physically. I gained over 60 pounds while I was a while I was a police officer and then, even after that, I gained more. It wasn't like it was a one day turnaround the miraculously I was all better the day I left, you know. But you know so many, so many first responders get stuck because they go well, I know I've got to get out, but I need the income from over here. And so they keep going back to that income because it's they're safety net, even though it's not necessarily making them wealthy, it's not helping them to retire, it's still hovering the bills. Do you know what I mean? And especially once you've got a family right, you're locked into it even more, you know, because you're like, well, if I don't stay doing this, what's my income gonna be? And because they play such a high priority on this singular part of their life, they can't see anything outside of that. And so I help them to kind of reverse that tunnel vision outwards and let's figure out who we are beyond the first responder, and that's really one of the first steps.

Jerry: 10:48

Definitely needs to be one of the first steps. I'm with you there because you're like you said. This job becomes us. We've let it most of us be, you know, I hate to say always and everyone and stuff like that, but the majority, it really becomes us and consumes us and takes over our lives. Right, our lives function around it because of shift work and everything. It's just like it's just part of who we are, like it's just ingrained into us and then thinking about leaving, that is very challenging one financially and for sure. Right, I retired in July and it's been challenging financially, right, trying to figure it out after retirement. Even though you, like, you have a kind of a plan, plans don't always go as you know, as wanted or needed to go. So I think there's the one is like finances, for sure, and also like. The other one is insurance, which kind of plays into the financial role. And the other one is like these are my, this is my second family a lot of times. So like trying to like sort that out plus, right. And then the other thing is like what am I going to do to make an income or to make an impact in my life? A lot of people, when they retire. They just, they just want to be done. They just want to go suck shelves at somewhere and be done and never talk to another person Again. I was just told that, like a couple of nights ago, and I chuckled because I'm like that's not the person I am. I want to make an impact. So it's like everybody's trying to navigate themselves. So I think this is great. What you do is just bringing this out, and I think what you need to be done is to work inside perspective to look at these different areas, and I think that's really needed, because we do felt trapped and we stay longer than then we probably want to, or should.

Brian: 12:47

Yeah, no, it's one of the big things is it's your like outside of work. It's your social network, like you said, it's your second family. You know the Christmas parties are. It's with your shift and the way everything goes. The thing that I found really surprising was when I left, I had an overwhelming number of guys call me and congratulate me Like I was. I felt like I was weak. I felt like I was less than when in reality. Now that I look back on it and I let people realize, the strongest thing that you can ever possibly do is admit weakness Instead of trying to pretend that you are. Nothing affects you. You're Teflon right. Everything bounces off of you, and to be able to go in front of your, your alpha peers, right and go I need help is the strongest thing that you can do for you and the strongest thing you can do for your family. But the thing that I found surprising was so many guys who, like I can't believe you did it. I don't have the guts to do what you do. But you know, the problem that I ran into when I left was I had no mentor, right, I had nobody to say, okay, well, this is now your next step, right? My father was a real government guy, so he was get a salary, get a pension, that's, that's, that's your life. Right, right, right. And now, all of a sudden, I'm going well with my qualifications. There's, you know, nobody's gonna touch me with a 10 foot pole right In public service right now. So I had to move into business, but I had no idea what I was gonna do.

Jerry: 14:50

Yeah.

Brian: 14:51

And that's where I work with people to let them realize, you know, I help, mentor them because there are so many traps and pitfalls that I, you know, tested. All those are the same, you know, and exactly, I successfully fell a bunch right and it was more of the learn not to do type situation. But you know, I want to be able to help those people to go okay, I've done that. That doesn't work, right. This is actually what works. This is how we're gonna help you build something successful out of this afterwards. Like, I ended up running into a guy that I knew from my business and he was an officer and he quit. And I ran into him one day and he'd actually gotten hooked in with a guy who I was not a fan of. Okay, I felt that I personally felt the guy was just really scummy, you know, and so I told him I said, listen, here's where you're going wrong. Like, if you want to listen, let's go for coffee and let's have a talk. And you know, now the guy runs a business that is makes 350K a year and you know, back when he was a cop, he was making 60. You know, Like, you know, and he's like, you know, I've got better work hours, I got time for my family, I, you know, and he's like, and all of that happened because, you know, and he credits a lot to me, but he was the one who had the drive to build the business right. I was just the one that helped him lay out the plan to go no, you're already heading in the wrong direction. Like, you don't want to go this way, and so, yeah, so it's really just helping guide them so that they do have a plan. And the fact, Jerry, that you're saying you had a plan right. Well, you're 99% of so many others that, because they don't, right. And that's the worst part of this, and that's where you know they're so lost. So so many first responders are lost because they just they don't have a plan and, as a result, they stay stuck where they are. And what a lot of them don't even consider at the time because it's very much about them, right, and to them it should be right. You know, but you're a risk to your shift partners. You know, like you really are, because at a key moment if you haven't slept in two days, you know and you've got to respond properly at a key moment there's no guarantee that your brain's in the right mind, that you're gonna do what you need to do and, as a result of that, that could be fatal to one of the people that you're working with. And I think that's one of the things a lot of people in the administration don't realize either, because there's so much about retention. They've got to keep the people that they got, because they don't want to retrain them right. There's costs to retraining and you know, and there's also a cost for losing that experience. But I personally would rather lose someone with experience than have somebody out there that I'm trusting to make the right decision when they're not in any mental state to do that.

Jerry: 18:36

Yeah, and to kind of like go a little bit further with that is also like for me. When I decided to retire, I didn't want to like stay too long. Right, I didn't want to stay pass. My passion for the job is still there, I love my crew and everything like that, but it was just getting to be too much. And then I just like I need a break, I need to leave, I need to go. But when you don't have opportunities to leave and you're kind of what they call it retired in place type of thing, you're not good and I definitely did not want to be that person. I did not want to go out that way. So I mean, that's also. You know, people say they retire in place because, right, they have no, they feel like they have nowhere to go and you're in a lot of times our job skills don't exactly transfer out to the public sector for another job. You have to be very open and very, you know, pivot on a lot of different things and willing to learn new things.

Brian: 19:44

Well, and you know, and sometimes you know it's tough, and you know, because people are like well, find your passion right, and that's great if your passion can make you money. Do you know what?

Jerry: 19:57

I mean, but I do. I'll tell you a little story after this. Sure, go ahead Now. It's like my passion is really is helping people and doing the podcast, but the financial commitment right, to do the podcast is fairly high. And so you're just like is that like, can I sustain that passion Like I really love to do, but it doesn't make me any money, right? So it's just, I just put out the money because it's my passion, if that makes sense. So, right, like all your passion is gonna make you money.

Brian: 20:32

Yeah, and that's you know. Obviously you know behind the scenes that's something you and I can work on, jerry, but you know it's. You know you've got to figure out what that plan is gonna be. You know, preferably before you take that next step.

Jerry: 20:51

Agreed.

Brian: 20:53

Right, you know you've got to sit down first of all, in your head. You've got to get your money straight. Right, and you know that's one of the biggest things is okay, how much am I really making? Right, Like I'm actually dealing with this with my dad right now. Right, in terms of you know, he's starting to get on in years and my brother and I are having to start to take more and more care. So I'm sitting down and going, okay, well, where are your expenses? How much do you need to be making each month? Okay, and people look at it and they go well, I've got my pension right. Or, you know, I've got this right, I've got that. I've got my wife's salary, if you're married, or your spouse's salary, whatever it's gonna be, you know. But we've got to sit down, we've got to figure out what those numbers actually really are. Right, you know, like, talking with my dad, he's like, well, I think it's around this much. And I'm like, well, I think it's around, it's not helping us. Dad, you know what I mean. Like, well, let's figure out. Okay, so you've got this much going out, so we need more than that coming in. Okay, so where are we gonna draw that from right. And so then we go okay, well, we've got a discrepancy of at least X dollars. Okay, so then what are your skill sets? Right, and we sit down and we have them go through everything that they are. Okay, not just. You know, I'm former fire, not that I'm former police or whatever. Okay, yeah, I was a cop, right. Okay, I'm also a published writer and traders mag Europe. You know like it's. There's so many more things that you are than just you know an ex first responder, even a current first responder. You're you could be a father, you could be a wife, you could be a mother, you can be a, you know whatever it is. You know you're a son. You're you know those don't necessarily make you money, but we have you list everything that you are, and so that serves two purposes One that makes you go only Crow, look at what a small part my job actually really is out of everything I am in life, right. And next it makes me go okay, there are other things that I'm good at. Like the first thing people say is well, I'm, you know, I'm former fire and I apologize if I'm not using the right term for-.

Jerry: 23:37

No, you're good, you're good, you're good.

Brian: 23:39

You know, you know, I'm former fire, so therefore I have to do something that was related to my career. No, you know, I've got a buddy of mine who has a massive house that backs onto a lake Okay, massive, I think, it's like some like 13,000 square feet or something like that. And you know what he does Snow removal and lawn maintenance. Okay, well-.

Jerry: 24:09

Down the niche right.

Brian: 24:11

You know what I mean. Like, I guarantee you he did not go to school for that, Like you know, but it was just something that he went. Okay, I'm gonna start this up and I'm gonna grow it. And now he's got a massive number of employees that work underneath them and he's living this dream lifestyle. So what you may end up doing may not be anything in relation to what your career is, you know, but we've also got to look at what your physical restrictions are right. Like myself personally, I've got blood pressure issues. I can't go mowing along. If I'm mowing along for more than five minutes, I'm gonna be underneath the lawn mower. You know what I mean. You know, so we put-, yeah, there's a variety of things like look beyond what you think you are to realize what you really are.

Jerry: 25:05

Yeah, that is really important and really really good advice. You just kind of backing up to maybe some of my personal experience that you can kind of expand on a little bit. So when I made the decision to retire, it was about three, four months before I actually retired. I had some other jobs, you know, lined up and stuff like that. That didn't work out kind of the way I wanted to. But if I went ahead, that like looking like kind of a plan in place, I would have probably been like a lot of other people I know is like I'm gonna change my retirement date until something comes up and just keep pushing it back. And even when I did have that plan and it was in place and I felt fairly comfortable about it, there was still a massive breathing process to leave, just Incredible grieving process that I was like not really prepared for. This is something I had been doing basically 34 years of my life. So there was just a lot of like Grieving and part of the grieving I think it's just the unknown, even though you kind of have a plan like, oh, I'm going into this Totally different, I'm going into the public sector. Right, I've been in the government sector for so long. You know things I was would be thinking about on my mind that seems pretty silly is like I don't want to have to commute, right, I like I don't like commuting, I don't like traffic. You know it's like. And then I'm like how do people get time to work out? You know it's like. You know they work these 10, 12 hour days and you know they don't get really much time to work out. And then they got to sacrifice these things and you know it's just like. You know. You know doing shift work here, like oh, I'm gonna go change but get my tire fix on a Wednesday because no one's at the tire shop. Well, oh, now I got Friday and maybe, or Saturday, just like the normal, normal people right in the normal working sector. So I thought it was a lot of kind of funny to look back. I did about 30 different videos of all these things. I was like our Changes, there's gonna be changes in in my life and I'm gonna have to either navigate those or just a you know in some form, or just Accept them and just, you know, move on.

Brian: 27:12

Yeah, well, I think definitely the the, the grieving process is. You know, it was a little different for me because there was no grieving in terms of leaving Cuz. Like you know, I had to right Um, I was grieving. The miss salary there was Definitely was um, you know, and, and sometimes those plans don't work out right, and then you're right, what happens is people do start pushing it back right Because they fall back into that. You know that thing that really they realize they needed to get out to, but they get drawn back in. You know, it's kind of like Pacino. Every time I try and get out, you know, and that's kind of what kind of what you're dealing with. So you know, honestly, good for you that you got out. Part of, I guess you can say, my grieving process was I wrote Because of you know, I left 2001. So you know, part of my grieving process was starting to write a book of 101 reasons why being a cop sucks, and and I had that was the actual title we had probably got through both 12 or 13 chapters before I finally went Okay, I've got that out of my system now let's, let's move forward. But you know it's plans don't always work out, but you still have to have one. Yeah yeah, that's, that's the big thing, right, because listen, I forget who it was one of your guests said you know so that we don't just kill over and have a heart attack. We're done, right right. Where we were, it was very. That was very prevalent in the area where. I was at that. You know the, the lack of adrenaline or whatever it was. It was that shift. And all of a sudden you read a funeral right, he retired and he's literally dead. So, like you, kind of joke about it, but there's actually, you know, data that backs that up.

Jerry: 29:28

Yeah, yeah, wait, way too many, way too many first responders. You know Three to five years. It five, you know, is five years, kind of pushing up for a lot of the statistics. But yeah, you work so hard to make to get this pension right. We talked about and and retire and do do whatever it is your next career is gonna be, or no career, right, like maybe set yourself up perfectly and just retire and do do whatever it is you want to do. But yeah, it's, it's challenging.

Brian: 29:57

Yeah, well, that's why, having you know the more time that you can give yourself, like if you're at the point that you know you need to get out Right, like if you can work through it with your counseling and everything and you can stay in and you're staying in and your head is right Well, good for you and good for everyone.

Jerry: 30:21

Yeah, yeah.

Brian: 30:22

That's the first thing if you can't. But if you can't, okay, then we need to make as long of a plan as possible. Okay, you've got sick days, you you know. You've got earned days off. You've got bank time, you got holidays, you know. Figure out what all of that is gonna be, whether or not you can take a lump sum paycheck, right, get a big payout and go. Okay, well, this big payout that I just got is gonna buy me a business, right? Right find a business, that that you think you're gonna like, and let's buy it out and then let's grow it right Like literally my own business. Last year I grew by 260% that's awesome. You know, and it was already the biggest of its kind when I live, and we still just bam and it's gonna go even more. So, you know, if you want, if you're buying a business still doesn't mean that you don't need to be mentored, right? You know like it's, you know. But let's figure out what that plan is. If you've got no money and you know you got three ex-wives and you know, well then we've obviously got to come up with a very different plan because you've got a different budget. Yeah, so we need to approach things differently, but you need, you've got to have a plan and you've got to have your head right about your money.

Jerry: 31:54

Yeah, yeah, if planning I don't, I think that's could be a weakness for first responders. Getting out right is the planning without having someone to To kind of mentor or coach them or to, like, maybe see different things? I mean, we don't know what we don't know. So or we just go sit around the coffee table, right, and then we just get filled in by other first responders of true, true, real facts about everything. Right, because all first responders know we can solve all the problems in the world around the coffee table.

Brian: 32:26

But yeah, oh yeah it's.

Jerry: 32:29

I think that's the. The key is really like you're talking about is is the planning and looking at that overall, overall picture that Maybe important to have a mentor to help you with. I Think that's this key I really like. That's what you're what you're doing and you've been doing it for for some time now.

Brian: 32:50

Yeah, yeah, no, I have been, and it's you know, as we were talking before, like I've. You know, I coach a variety of different businesses and you know I work with first responders. I work with with non first responders. But I was asked to really, you know, niche down and go. If you had to pick one area, which area do you want to focus on? And Even though there could be more money made working with, you know, larger businesses, that type of thing, I said, well, the biggest place where I want to make a difference is working with first responders. That's really where I feel that well, I relate to them and. They really need help and you know the, the departments. You know, at least now, a lot of them, not all of them, but at least you know some of them now have an idea of having something in place as someone runs into some mental health difficulties. Yeah, yeah, you still run, run into the admittance problem, but at least there's more stuff in place than there was back when I was going through my stuff. But that's as far as the department goes, right. But the or even when you're retiring the department doesn't go okay. Well, here's some planning ahead courses. You know, for the next stage in your life, we've got to get you ready, right. You get your gold watch, or you get your badge encased in plastic or whatever it is that they do and they go. Thank you very much and wish you the best of luck. Right and so you know, regardless, you're sitting there going okay, now what Right and that's where I think the departments really dropped the ball is the now what for for the all the officers that need to, or Are our need to, leave her, our retirement.

Jerry: 34:56

Yeah, I think some of the best advice that I've heard and and and taken is kind of like Look at an exit plan. You know, when you start, like when you start these careers in the first one, start looking at an exit plan, you know and that doesn't mean, you know, be absent from your job type of thing. You know, mentally or physically it's just come up with some planning, right, some long-term planning. And I know so many people that don't have a plan and they're like I Talked to a person like they don't even know anything about the retirement, like, oh, I just been doing whatever I did when it first got hired for the last 12 years. I'm like Well, have you looked at it? Do you know how much money's in there? Do you know how much money's not in there? Do you like, do you know, like you should know these things? Because you might find yourself like, if you're not putting enough money away, you might think I'm at to say, 30, 40 years to be ever to retire.

Brian: 35:51

It's funny you bring that up because I think back to what happened with me and I was. I was 26 years old and Went through all the training and then I show up the first week and one of the guys walk up to me and they handed me a little like you know, those note cards people have when they prepare for their speech yeah, yeah, that big. And it's they handed you a minute ago. What's this? And they go oh, it's how you're gonna direct your pension, because we had a self-directed right and I Don't know anything about this. And so so my training officer goes Well, pick 50, 50. That's what I did. So 50%, you know, stocks, 50%, bonds, like, and income, right. And I look back at that now and I go I was 26 years old and I put 50% of my investment into fixed income when I should have been putting 80 to probably 90%. That's my personal opinion. Yeah, the growth at that point right. But then as you're getting older and everything and you're getting ready to retire, depending upon where the market is, you're gonna be wanting to move that growth into income. But you know he talks to those guys and I guarantee you go. So where's your pension? I know, that's 50 50. You know it'll be the box that they checked off, that they had no clue about and They've never made any changes to it. Like you said, how much money is in it I don't know. You know, like it was funny when you said to our guys, because we had a matching 7 and 7%, right, we kick in 7, the force kicked in 7. And if you said to the guys, you know how much does the force match and how much do you put in, they're like I don't know, you know, like they. Just you know. So you're right. I think that's a great rule of thumb to go. You already need to be Planning your accent when you get in, because you're gonna need to make changes to that right over time, you know. So whoever gave you that advice though that was great advice I wish I would have gotten- that I mean.

Jerry: 38:05

One other thing I personally did was Like I stuck to at least putting in 10% right into a 401k or 457 at least put that in the whole entire Well, I shouldn't say the entire time the last like 15 years, I always made sure I had at least 10%, you know, going into one of those two accounts and then if I would get a raise then I would raise that up just a little bit more. So I just wanted to make sure that I was not getting used to like having the money right, because I go, oh, I got a raise and I have this money, but I'm like that's great, but I need, if I can, put some more money away for the future. That's really where it needs to go, not just into my pocket right now, because it may be hard financially right now, but when you retire it's going to be quite a bit more, can be quite a bit more challenging, unless unless you have Brian here, you know, helping you pay the way to do something better and some more success.

Brian: 39:06

Oh sorry, go ahead Jerry.

Jerry: 39:07

Brian, do you think maybe people should be like reaching out to someone you or someone like you mean a year or two before they retire, or when would be the appropriate time?

Brian: 39:19

You know, honestly, whatever they want to like. First of all, the you know, the the my first thing is if you're going to reach out to me and I'm not a therapist Okay, so don't be coming to me with your what do you think I should do? You know, if you're not already going to therapy, I can't help you, okay. But if you want to, if you want to plan for your future, okay, whether it's going to be, you know, we have one introductory phone call because the phone calls free. You know I don't bill anybody for that, but you know, I think as much lead time as possible is always good, good to have. Now, you know, obviously. You know a guy who's day one in and wants to go hey, brian, let's sit down to talk about my retirement and 25, 30 years. Well, it's going to be okay. Well, you know, get your money right, right, like that's. Set goals for yourself Right, always have goals for yourself and get your money right, and that's going to be the biggest advice I can give. But, you know, if you're starting to feel you need out or you know you're leaving, then yeah, reach out and let's have a conversation and let's get you figured out. There might be a fit between us. There might not be. Right, you know like you might just go, you know. No, you know, brian, I appreciate the call and you know I don't think that's a fit. Or I may say, you know, no, this isn't, I'm not what you need.

Jerry: 40:58

Yeah.

Brian: 40:59

You've got everything nailed down. There's no reason for you to need a mentor. Well, you know, you may already have a mentor and you just want to confirm, or you know whatever it is, but it's a free conversation. You know what I mean? Yeah, so whenever you feel you need that, that's when I start to come into play.

Jerry: 41:20

Yeah, personally I think that would probably. I mean, I would love to see people do it two or three years before they think about going, because they can just start working on different things and maybe start to feel like really comfortable about, you know, retiring and where they're at and maybe ease off some of that pressure of like I've got to stay, I need insurance, I need the income, and so you know, I think those play into our role of our mental health. Right, I mean worrying about finances and things like that play into our mental health. It's another stressor.

Brian: 41:54

Yeah, yeah. So if we can help eliminate that or reduce it, you know, and some of the you know, some of the guys that I'm talking with and working with, they are still currently at the job, you know, and I'm like okay, well, especially with shift work, you know. You know, five days on, five days off, we were five, five and four right, so we're in a 28 day schedule and you know so. You got 14 days right Out of the month where you're not. As a result, you're not doing nothing, you're running errands. You're always full of time, but you've got time to start a sidekick.

Jerry: 42:30

Yeah.

Brian: 42:31

Right, let's work on that and see you know, what can we grow that to? Because the more we can get the second income growing so that it can actually take over the first income when the time is right, we may even be able to get you out of that sooner than you planned on.

Jerry: 42:51

Yeah, right.

Brian: 42:53

You know, or we may need to escalate that plan quicker, depending upon situation. But you know, like let's, if you think you might need to, let's get a plan going. You know you own a mower, you know, like you know, we can figure out something that you can get and do it. And, like I said, if we can make that passion translate into income, then that's an even added, greater bonus.

Jerry: 43:21

Right, definitely, brian, before I let you go, like what actual advice would you give to like what kind of a listener today?

Brian: 43:31

Well, obviously, get your money right. Right, get your money right, get a timeframe set up, Get a plan set up. And if you want to reach out to me, you definitely can. I don't know, jarif, you want me to give them a number, or it's just wait here, because I have one specifically just for this. So it's 587-971-8369.

Jerry: 44:04

And Brian, are you on social media anywhere that they can kind of follow you and see what's going on?

Brian: 44:08

I am I'm on Facebook just Brian Livingston, look for the bald dome guy and you know they're more than willing to. You know they want to reach out through Facebook. You know Messenger, anything like that. I think it's important that we keep it confidential, so I would recommend that you don't reach out to me where other people can see, just so that you know you're safe that it's a confidential conversation you know.

Jerry: 44:41

Yeah, yeah, I can see that, brian. Thank you so much for being on today. Thank you for the great advice and I hope the listeners that are maybe toying with the idea of like leaving or staying, you know, can at least maybe reach out to you for that free phone call and decide. You know what to do and where to go next.

Brian: 45:01

I really appreciate the time, jerry, and I appreciate you helping me get the message out there.

Jerry: 45:06

Yeah, I appreciate it. Yeah, thank you so much.

Brian: 45:09

All right, Take care everybody. Thanks again for listening. Don't forget to rate and review the show wherever you access your podcast. If you know someone that would be great on the show, please get ahold of our host, jerry Dean Lund, through the Instagram handles at Jerry Fire and Fuel or at Enduring the Badge Podcast, also by visiting the show's website, enduringthebadgepodcastcom for additional methods of contact and up-to-date information regarding the show. Remember, the views and opinions expressed during the show solely represent those of our hosts and the current episode's guests.