Employment attorney Alan Crone was featured on The Living The Dream Podcast with Timmy Douglas where they discussed why Alan’s biggest passion is transforming the American workplace. Alan wants to be able to fight discrimination and sexual harassment to try to end that practice all over the country. He and Timmy go into detail below on how he wants to accomplish that. Check out the video of the interview below, and we have transcribed the interview underneath.
Transforming the American Workplace with Alan Crone Podcast Transcription
Timmy Douglas
Alright, what’s up guys? Welcome back to another episode of The Living the Dream Podcast. Today on the show, we have Alan Crone, who is an employment law attorney. He’s the CEO and founder of The Crone Law Firm. He’s the author of The Law at Work: A Legal Playbook for Executives and Professionals. And he is also the host of the Ask Alan! Podcast and does some speaking as well. Alan, how are you doing today?
Alan Crone
I’m doing great, Timmy. How are you doing?
Timmy
I am fantastic. Thanks so much for asking. And we’d like to jump right in. So, if you could start with just telling us a little bit more about yourself and what you like to do for fun, that’d be great.
Alan
All right. Well, as you said, I’m an attorney at a law firm, and I’m also a recovering politician. For many years, I worked for the mayor of Memphis as his Senior Policy Advisor, helped set policy for the city. That was a lot of fun. Now all I do is run my law firm and really enjoy that.
What I do for fun? That’s a great question. Unfortunately, they’re all very sedentary. I love to go to the theater. I love to read. I love the idea of playing golf. I’m terrible. They say that a lawyer who shoots 120 has no business playing golf, but a lawyer who shoots 70 has no business. That sums up my golf game.
Timmy
I got you. So, golf is a big client tool. Is that right?
Alan
Something like that. Yeah.
Timmy
Okay. And so, when you were setting policy for the city, and which city was that again?
Alan
Memphis, Tennessee. Birthplace of Rock and Roll and home to the king of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley.
Timmy
There we go. There we go. And so, when you were setting policy for Memphis, did you own your law firm then too, and you just had somebody else running it or did you start it after you were done setting policy?
Alan
Actually, I did both at the same time. In fact, that’s one reason I started my own firm. I needed to be close to City Hall. I moved downtown from East Memphis. Everything radiates out from the Mississippi River here, which is on our Western border. I moved downtown. I’ve had my own practice in one form or another for many years. I had an office in City Hall and I had an office at the firm.
To be honest with you, those four years weren’t great growth years for the firm. That was part of my reason why I left city government in 2020. I always like to say I left in January of 2020 and the whole world went to hell in a hand basket within three months of me leaving City Hall. Causal connection or just coincidence, I don’t know. You’d be the judge.
Yeah, it was very challenging to do it that way and probably one of the hardest decisions I’ve had to make because I love my job with the city, but I knew that my firm needed leadership. I went back and eventually became a full-time CEO.
Timmy
Yeah, I got you. When you’re thinking through policy, what are some of the things that go through your head? Because I feel like it’s such a complex topic that touches so many lives.
Alan
Well, it really is the best job in government, being a mayor of a city or working for a mayor of a city because you put your finger on it. You really can affect people’s lives, everything from whether their trash gets picked up and there are less potholes today than there were yesterday. Those mundane things, to providing economic opportunity for people, hoping you’re elevating folks out of poverty, at least providing the opportunity to do that and keeping people safe.
What my job was to be the mayor’s eyes and ears and attend meetings for him and really dig into the details of proposals and things that were going on. One of the things I’m still involved in is our Riverfront. I chaired a task force that looked at our Riverfront and put together a concept of where we wanted the Riverfront to go. Out of that has come some really great development ideas. It’s one of those things that I would come to work every day and would never know what was going to be on the agenda. I knew what I had planned, but there were always things that came along.
As I say, I did everything from helping folks figure out a zoning issue or where a driveway, how we were going to correct a driveway for a major employer in town to helping the mayor and his team take down our Confederate statues. For a political junkie like me, it was a great opportunity not only to serve my city, but play that chess game for real.
Timmy
Yeah, I got you. Tell us a little bit about what type of law you specialize in. Employment law, I feel like there are a lot of employment laws.
Alan
That’s right. We represent employees, executives, and entrepreneurs in legal disputes or matters that affect their ability to make money. We do everything from wrongful terminations, compensation issues such as overtime and minimum wage, commission disputes, disputes between business owners. Two partners get differences and they either need to have a divorce or they need to figure out how they’re going to go move forward, those types of things.
Timmy
Okay. Tell us a little bit about the book, The Law at Work: A Legal Playbook for Executives and Professionals.
Alan
Well, it’s 12 chapters of hopefully helpful information for executives who have an employment issue themselves and they don’t feel like they can go to their company’s lawyer to discuss it. It provides some high-level information on what everyone’s basic rights are and provides some stories to help illustrate those points.
Also, if you’re an executive or business owner and you want to make sure you’re in compliance, it’s a really good starting place for that. It’s not meant to be a legal treatise or anything like that. I really tried hard to make it readable and relatable to non-lawyers and try to just put employment law in a context that people can understand and use.
We start with the basic premise of employment law, which is the employment at will doctrine, which means as an American worker, you have no rights. Every right that you have, a court has given you or the legislative body has given you, or you negotiate for yourself in a contract. We go from there on how to navigate the waters of just trying to make a living every day.
Timmy
Yeah. Man, that’s a strange concept. As an employee in America, you have no rights and it’s either been given to you by a court or negotiated in a contract. I feel like if, one, I’ve never heard that, and two, I feel like if a lot of people heard that, it would have rubbed them the wrong way the first time they heard it.
Alan
Yeah. I sit down with folks very often, and the same people that may be opposed, that may be in favor of tort reform or limiting tort rights and the rights to jury trial, when they find out they don’t have any rights in their employment, they get very, very frustrated. I always say that concept started in medieval England. We used to be a part of England in the United States, and we inherited a lot of their common law and always say think, Lord’s and serfs.
That’s where employment at will comes from. It’s a legal concept that co-existed for hundreds of years in this country with the concept of slavery, which was also legal in America. That’s where the American worker starts. The idea is if you hire me, then you’re free to hire me. You’re free to fire me at any moment for any reason, and I’m free to quit for any reason.
But that’s doesn’t reflect the economic reality of that relationship. I may have the freedom to quit, but do I really have the ability to quit. In that situation our negotiating power may not be equal.
In 2023, I would argue that is changing because of the economy, the fact that people can make money now in alternative ways that people couldn’t 20 years ago.
20 years ago, I couldn’t get on Twitch and play a video game and people would pay me to watch me play video games. I know people that make 70-80 thousand dollars a year doing that. If I’ve got that as an alternative, or I can drive an Uber, or do lots of other things to make money, then maybe I have more economic power when I negotiate with a traditional employer. And I think the needle has moved toward the employee, but only slightly.
So, what happens is, people come to me and they have been fired or demoted, the law calls it an adverse employment action. That’s not just getting fired, but also being schedule for the third shift instead of the first shift maybe as a punishment.
Unfortunately, I have to say, “that’s unfair, it’s unfortunate, it’s bad business, but there is no law against being a jerk.”
You got to fit it in one of the protected categories or protected activity. I think that causes its own issues down the road. But it creates this strange gap between employees and employers that we have to deal with.
Timmy
Tell us about your motivation. What gets you up and going every day?
Alan
My professional mission is to transform the American workplace. It’s an ideal that I’m probably never going to get there because we live in a fallen world, but I would love to see every business be efficient. I want to see it make money for its employees and stakeholders.
I would love to see the stress and anxiety of an unfair or arbitrary workplace disappear for folks. So they can come to work and do their job, and become self-actualized. There are so many artificial barriers that we put between us and that ideal every day.
I want to transform the American workplace by putting people first, one case at a time. That’s what we do. Sometimes those people own business, so we help them with their business, but that’s what gets me up. I see my job as mentoring lawyers, and making the lawyers in my firm better. By doing that and helping other employment lawyers be better, I can have an exponential effect on that mission.
I can’t transform the American workplace myself. I look for opportunities every day, like this great podcast, to get out and tell that story, and get people thinking about things we take for granted about our roles in the workplace.
I think the more people think about those things and put good practices in place. We can get to a point where we can get rid of a lot of the nonsense in the workplace.
Timmy
So, what are some of those imaginary barriers you believe exist? And do they just exist due to the human issue, or do you think there are other factors at play>
Alan
I think everything is a human issue. Right? We are all people. One of my favorite lines of trading places Eddie Murphy says, “that trader is just trying to get the G.I. Joe with the kung fu grip for his kid for Christmas”.
That’s what we are all trying to do. We’re all trying to put food on the table. We are all trying to get a better life for ourselves and our families, and get where we need to be.
When I said reduce artificial barriers, there’s a normative ingrained concept that if you’re my boss, then I have to do what you say. That’s a two-way relationship, right? You think it’s my way or the highway maybe or all of the responsibility for success lies on you because you’re the boss, and I’m just a tool for you to accomplish a goal.
I think we need to rethink that relationship on a fundamental level. As a boss, one of the things you should be looking for is to make me look good and help me achieve the mission of the organization. A lot of times you go to work and you really don’t know what your mission is. Why am I going to work at this restaurant? Why am I going to this office? What am I trying to do every day? The question you asked me, Timmy, “why do I get up in the morning?”. We don’t ask ourselves that.
If you’re my boss, and you don’t know what our adjoint mission is, then a lot of your decisions are going to be arbitrary, made on an agenda that has nothing to do with our business, and that’s going to cause rifts between you and me.
Now I’m not talking about some egalitarian utopia where we all get together and collaborate on a ten-year plan. The buck has to stop with somebody, and everybody has to have their role and accountability. That notion of us vs. them and me vs. them is the primary thing that has to come down. If that does, then the biggest barrier to be eliminated is miscommunication.
This stuff is hard work. I think a lot of times in the workplace, we don’t consider the human element. We don’t consider the relationships that we have with each other. We have got to have empathy with each other to accomplish those missions.
Timmy
Yeah, for sure. So right now we got, transform the American workplace by seeing every business be efficient and make money for all parties involved, see the stress and anxiety of an unfair workplace disappear for people, and rethink the boss/employee relationship by understanding the joint mission. That’s what I have for dreams and goals right now. Is there anything you want me to add or subtract from that?
Alan
That sounds pretty good! That’s a lot.
Timmy
Yeah, that’s pretty solid. We said the human issue, communication, talked about that boss/employee relationship. Are there other aspects of the human issue that we think we can talk to contribute to a healthy workplace? If you could add two more, what would they be?
Alan
That’s a great question. I’m going to sum it up in a purposefulness. There are a lot of companies ahead of me on this issue. I think a lot of people start a business, get into a business or organization, and aren’t purposefully of what they are doing.
I’ll give you a good example of this that’s kind of mundane in job descriptions. Most operations people that I talk to when you mention job descriptions a lot of times their eyes roll and say, “that’s just busy work or something my HR people or consultant wants me to do.”
If we’re purposeful about those job descriptions, it’s one of those things that if we correct an issue there it has a wide-range effect across your organization. You can’t have a good job description unless you actually understand what that job is, what it accomplishes, and how it fits into your organization.
A lot of people just don’t. They know they need a Financial Clerk in Accounts Payable, but they really don’t drill and figure out what will make this person successful. What does this role really contribute to the overall effectiveness of the company. So they just pull a job description off the internet, stick it in, may or may not be accurate, and just hire someone with “accounts payable experience.”
Well, that person may have been really affective in that prior role because it was a different role. Now you are putting them into a role that is defined by a job description that may not reflect my expectation for you.
Now I’m just checking things off my list. I’m hiring someone that has a great recommendation as an Accounts Payable Clerk, but what they were doing in that previous job is not fully applicable to what I’m expecting. I’m giving you a job description that I’m not really bought into, and I’m not really giving you any training because you have been an Accounts Payable Clerk at the Acme Portable Hole Company. So you should know the expectations that I have even though I haven’t told anyone, and you’re just going to have to figure all of that out.
I’m really purposeful about that. I think through all of those things. You got to start with the mission. Take me for example, I’m a plaintiff employment lawyer. Even at an Account Payable position if that person isn’t bought into that. If they think that people who bring in lawsuits are for the take and trying to scam somebody, and they really don’t believe in fairness in the workplace.
They aren’t going to be aligned in my mission. They’re not going to be able to pay my bills they way I want them paid. Even if they are the best person to be my Account Payable person. That will be a toxic work environment through no fault of my own.
You’ve got to be purposeful about what you’re doing in the workplace. Especially if you’re talking about making it a better place for everybody. You also got to look at HR compliance as not something that you have to do, but it’s just good business to treat everyone fairly. It’s good business to pay them fairly. It’s good business to have clear agreements with people.
We got to embrace the law because it’s a reality. There may be a law where you say, “I wish that wasn’t a law.” Well, it is. So, you have to comply with it. At the same time as you look to comply with the law, how can that help you advance your business.
Timmy
I love it! Well cool, let’s go ahead and jump into how we can transform the American workplace. What are the top one or two skills that you feel you need to develop to make some of these dreams and goals come true.
Alan
Well I think the first virtue that every CEO needs and that I definitely need is humility. I think you got to approach that job with humility. Anybody that knows me will tell you that humility does not come naturally to me. I’m a lawyer. I’m a politician. Those are occupations where you have to know who you are and you got to have a lot of confidence. Sometimes if you feed into that, that can feed into arrogance.
So, I have to work really hard to be humble. I think that it’s one of the keys of success to life. And by humble, I don’t mean having a bad self-vision, but realizing that I’m not the center of the universe and understanding that my job as a CEO is not to have people stand up when I walk into a room. But that my job when I come to work, is to make everybody else look good, is if I put their needs ahead of mine. More importantly, if we all put the needs of the mission ahead of our own needs, then we’re going to be very successful.
And you got to hire people that are smarter than you, that are better than you at the task that you’re hiring them for. And once you realize that it’s the old saying, you can accomplish anything as long as you don’t care who gets the credit. That’s one of the great things about credit. It is elastic and abundant. And by giving you credit for something that doesn’t diminish my role in whatever success it is, being humble, I think, is the first thing you have to bring to the table. Second thing you have to bring to the table is discipline. As humans and as Americans particularly, we can all be very undisciplined.
We ping back and forth between one shiny thing to another, or we just say, to heck with it and have that extra piece of cake or skip the gym or whatever. But being prepared, doing the hard work, developing good habits, and having the discipline to enforce those habits, I think is key.
And the last thing I’ll say, I’ll put two words together that I think in German. They have words this long because they put all kinds of words together that have a specific meaning. But accountability, ownership or accountable ownership, I think is the third virtue that I would say is if you’ve read Jocko Willink or some of those guys, you just got to own what you can’t. And this goes back to humility.
You can’t be pointing the finger at somebody else when things go wrong, particularly as a boss. I’ve got an army of people here. Why can’t we get anything done? Well, it all comes back to me as the boss. If somebody fails, it’s because I haven’t trained them right. I haven’t given them the resources. I put them in a wrong job, maybe, where it’s not their place of highest competency.
I’ve got to assume that I did something wrong and not throw people under the bus. And if I own my role and I’m accountable to it, then again, I’m going to be a lot more successful. And if you look at those three things, those are virtues that as an organization, any organization, needs to excel at. And if you excel at them, I guarantee you, you will have less legal issues, not just in employment law, but all across the board.
Timmy
Yeah, I love it. So typically, we ask what character traits you most need to develop. I wrote all three of those down for character traits because I think those are some pretty solid you called them virtues, right? Pretty solid virtues to have. Can you think of any daily actions for you specifically right now that are going to tick the needle forward towards transforming the workplace and seeing these dreams and goals come true? What are the most important daily actions for you right now?
Alan
Well, for me personally, the most important daily action is prayer. Is get up in the morning and pray. Morning prayer in the morning, evening prayer in the evening, and try to stay focused on my faith all through the day. St. Paul tells us to pray constantly. And I think one of the things that that means is a lot of people hear that and they think, oh, I’ve got to be on my knees praying constantly. Well, that’s not a bad thing to do, I suppose. But I think it’s also a mindfulness that God is in your life and always trying to be in tune and listening to that.
So, to me, for me personally, that is a critical part of any successful day. And then this is incredibly difficult for me, and I think for a lot of Americans, and that is to be mindful, to be in the moment, to live in the present. Living in the future is kind of the job of a CEO.
Timmy
Very true.
Alan
But you got to stay out of the past other than brief moments of going into the past for experience, because experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want. And so, you go into the past to say, okay, I did this thing once, I’m not going to do that again, or I’m going to do a little bit differently.
But you got to get out of the past very quickly, get back into the present and execute for the future. And I think if you’re doing that along with all the other stuff we’re talking about, for me that’s the important thing. The latter is extremely difficult to do. Living in the present is extremely difficult.
Timmy
Yeah, no, for sure. I am right there with you. And specifically, so I think it’s interesting. We often talk about the past, the present, the future, and I guess this is pretty much focusing on the past. But when you get the negative self-talk loop going in your mind, it’s kind of like a dead man zone or no man zone, because you’re not always thinking about the past. When you’re in that negative loop, sometimes you’re just beating yourself up in the present.
But I wouldn’t say that’s being present. And so, it’s an interesting thing of like, don’t think about the past, don’t beat yourself up over the past and then be present and experience the world around you, experience the people around you. It’s a hard thing to focus on.
I’ll be in a conversation with somebody sometimes, and they’ll start rambling for like a minute, and in that minute, my mind has gone somewhere else and come back to the conversation. And it’s just a really wild experience to actually be present for a consistent amount of time. So I agree.
Well, if there were one or two people that you can meet right now, this could be a specific person or a type of person, and they’d really help you take that next step towards your dreams and goals. Who would they be and how would they help you?
Alan
Wow. Yeah, I read that question and I’ve been thinking about it. I love meeting people. I guess if I had somebody like that, I would love to spend some time with Dan Kennedy. I’ve listened to a lot of the stuff that he’s done, and I’ve read a lot of his books, and I’ve got a lot of follow up questions.
So, I think that Dan would be someone that I’d love to spend an afternoon with and just talk about business and talk about how to attract business, because I think he’s got a lot to say when you really read his stuff. It’s really a lot about how people relate to one.
So, he’s the type of person that I would like to spend some time with, that I enjoy spending time with. I’ve got a lot of friends like that, that I’ve met either on the speaker circuit or just in my professional life who really get that life is all about relationships. And I think the more relationships, true relationships, not transactional relationships I think that’s what always kind of soured me when I was a younger person on networking, because the people that I thought were net workers and I didn’t know this at the time.
This is something, upon reflection, I thought about and I realized what was off putting about it is they seem to me to be very transactional. I’m going to this Chamber of Commerce meeting to get business cards because I may be able to sell them something, or they may be able to do something for me someday. And that’s networking on a certain level.
But the best kind of networking is networking where I’m building relationships that may be mutually beneficial, but that are long term and that aren’t transactional. And I think those are the kind of conversations that I like to have.
Timmy
Yeah, no, absolutely. I’m a big fan of the genuine, authentic relationships too, and the community side of things. The transactional relationship is like it’s networking to an extent, like you said. But I’ve kind of been thinking about this a lot too, and not just what gets me about networking, but what gets me about relationships in general as an adult.
Because I just came out of college. I was in a really tight knit Christian community about two years ago and I mean, we were just living life together, spending so much time together, our lives looked basically identical because we went to the same college. We’re doing the same type of ministry. And so, like, 60 hours of our week, we were eating at the same places. Because you had the food spots on campus. Like 60 hours of our week was together doing basically the same thing.
So, it was really tight knit community, and you get into the real world and it’s hard to see somebody weekly, regularly. It’s a whole schedule Olympics that has to happen, which is understandable. You get more responsibility. But I think the biggest thing is that our lives aren’t really intertwined anymore once we get out into the adult world and we start focusing on our own lives.
Especially when you start raising your own kids. Lives really aren’t as intertwined anymore. Just because it’s like the closest people I have right now are the people in my small group at my church for my daily life. And I have my work colleagues and work colleagues. You don’t really bring personal stuff into work as much, and so you’ve kind of separated that life. And then with the small group, I’m seeing them once or twice a week for a couple of hours.
And so, honestly, it took me like a year and a half to even like them. I’m like, I’ve seen you four weeks every week for the past year and a half, and now I finally like, you, like, six months in. I didn’t care. Everybody could have moved away and my life would have been exactly the same.
As opposed to a scenario where it’s like, we’re doing things together and meaningful things, not just sitting on the couch watching TV for 60 hours, but, like, going out and doing the work that we have to do for our lives, serving where we need to serve, eating together where we need to eat. Just the real intense fellowship and intertwining your lives in the most vulnerable spots on multiple points, I feel like that creates genuine relationships.
So bringing it back to my first point of the networking side of things. When it’s just transactional, there’s a certain level of intertwinement. There. Like, everybody has this financial burden. And when you do a transactional relationship like that in the networking sphere, you’re bearing that financial burden together, which has merit, but only to a certain extent. And after repeated times of only doing that, it can feel unnatural because as we start to become closer with people, we want to intertwine more of our lives. And the buck usually stops based on certain spheres.
So, in business, it stops with finances. You don’t really get that personal with that many people unless you’re like business partners for a long time, then you start to see those genuine friendships. And on the personal side, you don’t really go into financial things together. Like you talk about God or you talk about the hobby that you have in common, but you don’t really talk about investing as much or what does your financial future look like.
And so I’ve just noticed how the buck stops in all these areas, and it’s like segmented. And that’s kind of irked me about relationships in general post college. Anyway, sorry for the rant.
Alan
That’s all right. Relationships are tough. They take a lot of work.
Timmy
Yeah, they do. And I thought I was going to be that person who was never like, oh, let me check my schedule. I’m the first person now to be like, I really check my schedule because I’m working. I’m doing the podcast. I want to make sure I’m spending time with my wife. And yeah, then it’s like, got like two to 3 hours. Want to make sure I’m working out. It’s like, when are we going to hang out? So it’s just crazy to you know, there are pros and cons to every stage.
Alan
That’s right.
Timmy
Well, cool. Alan, let’s go ahead and jump into our thriving three. So, first question. What’s your favorite book, movie or podcast? Pick one of the three.
Alan Crone
Um, my favorite movie is School of Rock. I bet you’ve never gotten that answer.
Timmy
I have never gotten that answer.
Alan
I love that movie, and I’ll tell you why I love that movie. I love stories of redemption. And that’s a story of redemption because the main character figures out how to take his passion and move on in his life. And I just love the joy of that movie. The music is great, and I know what it is about. My kids really kid me about it, but I love School of Rock.
Timmy
And what’s one way you’d like to take care of yourself?
Alan
There’s an old saying that most lawyers treat their cars better than they do themselves, and most of their cars need oil. So, I think one of the ways that I really try to take care of myself is to carve out a little bit of time each day either for reading or prayer just to kind of stop and be still and be quiet for a little bit of time. And it always feels very selfish to do that. And I was kind of brought up with the work ethic of you’ve always got to be doing something.
I can feel lazy if I’m not actively advancing the ball on something, but I think that’s something we all need to do is to take some time and be a little indulgent, just to bring down the stress level a little bit.
Timmy
Yeah, I got you. And what is one action step you can take right now or continue to take if you’re already doing it, to meet and chat with Dan Kennedy?
Alan
I could probably send him a fax and introduce myself because that’s the only way he communicates. If you know Dan Kennedy, he doesn’t take phone calls, emails. You have to send him a fax.
Timmy
I was about to say a fax?! I don’t think I’ve ever sent a fax in my life.
Alan
You’re very young.
Timmy
Yeah, I think I had to, one time. I just literally didn’t know how to use the fax machine. And I was like, I don’t want to take time to figure it out because I don’t think I’ll ever have to do this again.
Alan
I’ve been through the whole gambit. I’m going to be the old guy right now. When I first started practicing law back in my day, I was a young lawyer right out of law school, and I worked for this large firm, doesn’t exist anymore, called Armstrong Allen. It was a great old Memphis law firm. And when you would get a fax, the idea was so new, they would literally bring it to you on a silver tray. There was a tray that they had that they would put it on the tray and they would bring it to you. It was a big deal. You have a fax, Mr. Crone. And they called it a telex. Wasn’t a fax, it was a telex.
So, I went from that to getting 20 faxes a day and sometimes missing them, because just of all of back in the late 80s, you didn’t miss a fax because it was so rare and it was a big deal then in the they were coming at you fast and furious. So now I don’t get any faxes. We have a fax machine at the office, but most of that stuff comes in now, scanned, email or text.
Timmy
Yeah, I got you. Now it’s just email that gets blown up that you miss. Right, right. It for sure. Well, send him a fax then. There we go.
Alan
Maybe I’ll do that.
Timmy
Solid. And now we got our final section of the podcast. First question, what is a limiting belief that continues to pop up in your life, if any?
Alan
Limiting belief. I think that it’s hard to pick. I probably have a lot of thought distortions that limit me because of assumptions I’ve made about the world that aren’t true. I think it’s just that… Sometimes I let challenges appear bigger than they are.
We set a business goal, and I think, man, there’s just no way. There’s just no way we can do that. Then you sit out and you do it and you realize that mountain was really just a speed bump, but I blew it out of proportion. I think that’s a thing that limits me.
Timmy
I got you. Where do you think that comes from?
Alan
Oh, I don’t know. I think it’s a lot of factors. I’m going to plead the fifth on that. I don’t know. I probably ought to do some work on that, but I don’t know.
Timmy
I got you. Do you have any limiting actions or inactions that reinforce that there’s just no way of limiting belief?
Alan
I think hesitation. I think that thought distortion leads to hesitating and not committing to the action. Sometimes that can manifest itself in, well, let me just research this a little bit more, or I need to get this in place before I can do that.
There’s a fine line between due diligence and procrastination, I think often. I’ve got a long fact finder line in my personality profile, and maybe that’s part of where that comes from, is I want to look at every angle before I do something.
I think it manifests itself in hesitation, and sometimes hesitation is a good thing. But more often than not, it limits me.
Timmy
Well, if you were to change that limiting belief into an abundant phrase that really speaks to your heart in the way that you need to hear it, what would that phrase be?
Alan
You can do it.
Timmy
There we go, what thoughts or actions do you resort to in order to reorient yourself, take back control?
Alan
I just try to turn that tape recorder off. When I start to have those thoughts, I really try to be mindful of it. I start to say okay, I’m turning this recording off because it’s not legitimate, not real. It’s a thought distortion, and I need to think in a different way.
I have a habit that I doesn’t have to do with business, but I have a habit of when I come in to my house I go and open the refrigerator door. I don’t know why I do it, but more often that not it leads to eating something.
So lately, I have been replacing that impulse with a pint of water. Just filling up a pint glass up with water and drinking it. I think that’s what you got to do. You got to have a thought that triggers an action that you don’t want to take, in this case mindlessly eating.
You got to replace that with another thought and another habit, and it all goes back to discipline. It takes vigilance. You got to recognize it when it happens. In business that may be, I can’t hire for that position right now because there is no money in the budget, but man if I did that would solve a lot of problems.
You hear that and you have to think, is the money really not in the budget? Is this something I need or something I want? Once you make that decision, you just got to be disciplined with your decision.
Timmy
Solid. Last question, what is your favorite belief about yourself.
Alan
My favorite belief about myself. That I’m young, thin, and attractive.
Timmy
Hahaha
Alan
It is not true! But that is my favorite belief about myself. That I am all of those things and the master of the universe.
Timmy
I love it. Well awesome, Alan that is all we have for you. Thank you Alan for coming on the show.