Curt Storring 0:34

This is the Dad.Work podcast where men are forged into elite husbands and fathers by learning what it takes to become harder to kill, easier to love and equipped to lead. Get ready to start building the only legacy that truly matters. Your family

welcome to the Dad.Work podcast. My name is Curt Storring, your host and the founder of dad work this is an episode with Nathan spearing, who spent almost 14 years in the US Army Special Operations and made the decision to leave giving up hopes of a secure government pension that secure is in quotations to spend more time with his wife and five children. Today he lives in a bus on 54 acre homestead in North Carolina owns and operates a construction and real estate company and hosts the life on target podcast where he encourages others to take the road less traveled, you can find everything about Nathan on his website spearing.co. That's SPE A Ri ng.co. You can also listen to the life on target, podcast and everything else you can find at the show notes Dad.Work slash podcast, David and I go deep today talking about why he left the military and financial security to spend more time with his family and importantly, how you could do the same embracing chaos making the next right step and trusting God's provide why men resort to idolizing their work, how Nathan and his family navigated buying dozens of acres of land and building a farm while living in a bus. And real estate starting businesses hard work and multi generational family leadership. Guys, if you want a role model for how to live your life as a husband and father and a multi generational family leader, I think you're gonna want to put Nathan in your in your sights here, because I left this conversation completely fired up to go and do exactly what he's doing for my family. And I really think you guys are gonna get this because it just takes and actually takes a lot of what we're talking about last episode with Jeremy Pryor and family teams as multi generational family ideal and puts a very practical spin on it. We get quite deep into the the so called weeds of Nathan's decision making process and his family's life over the last number of years. And I think that's very important. Because you often hear about this kind of stuff going like oh, yeah, that sounds so good. But how do we do that? And so here's Nathan, leaving behind this really secure gig just a few years away from getting a retirement pension. And he's like, actually, no, this is not worth missing time with my kids. And then he's going to navigate that. He's just taking it one decision at a time. And in hindsight, man, it's all worked out really well. But man, it takes some guts and some skill and a ton of responsibility to pull it off. So I think you guys are gonna get a lot out of this episode. With Nathan spearing. I know I certainly did. And if you want to learn more, like I said, go to Dad.Work slash podcast. That's where you'll find the show notes with links to Nathan and his company and his podcast, his Instagram and everything else like that. And guys, if you have been enjoying this podcast, please make sure on Spotify, you leave a rating star rating, and on Apple, leave a rating and you know when if you got 30 seconds, leave us a quick review. That is one of the best ways we can get this in the ears of more men, more dads who need this. And guys, I genuinely believe we save men's lives. We save families, and we eventually save society in the world by doing this work as men, husbands and fathers. So if you would like to pass that work on the easiest way to do is leave a review. Wherever you're listening to this I would very much appreciate that. If you're not signed up already make sure to go to Dad.Work slash challenge to get on our 10 Day elite dad challenge. Otherwise, guys, we're gonna jump into this episode with Nathan spearing. Here we go.

Nathan Spearing 15:00

love you anyway, I mean, they have just a tremendous ability to forgive, they have a tremendous ability to love in spite of what you fail at. And in some ways you try to go, Oh, I just can't forgive myself, like stop being so dang selfish man. Except that these people, these little people love you steal and just do better. And keep working at it. And and also be, you know, one of the things I've been kind of kicking around in my head about talking about is just the speed at which you admit you're wrong, I think is more important than never being wrong. And so instead of just doubling down and saying, you know, maybe I'll when I pray for him at bedtime out, maybe I'll just slide it a quick apology and, and kind of like, you realize you're being a jerk mid conversation, and you can stop. And that's been the the plotting or the prodding of a good woman, like my wife is is, let them see that you can repent, let them see that you can admit wrong, let them see as soon as you figure it out, you just admit it. And you say, Hey, that was wrong, should have talked to you like that you forgive me and the kids just yeah, of course, dad. And it's when you when you kind of grit your teeth and say because and I'm not going to give you in, and then I'm getting kids that are a little bit older, now they're starting to think. And so you can't just say because and slam slam something down on the table and build resentment in your home. And that's a wonderful thing to work through, into into. But I think a lot of guys want to continue to blame other things. So if you go go out on your own, and you fall flat on your face, you can't hide behind, you know, upper management, now, it's 100% on you now, and you can't lie to your wife about it, you can't lie to and so you're afraid of being exposed. And so and you and you're comfortable, and you just want to hang out. And if you you know, in your heart, that there's a better option, and you're just ignoring it, it's you're a coward. And, and you're not going to get I mean, I had to have a conversation with kids in our cold plunge in yesterday. And it's like literally the belief this is going to be uncomfortable. And I'm gonna do it anyway. Because I'm the one that chooses my actions, I know, this is good for me, we just got done with a workout, I know this temperature on my muscle tissue is going to be good for me, I choose that it's difficult, I do it anyway. And men just need to do that it's going to be difficult. And then you know, for us, ultimately, I know that my Heavenly Father is going to provide me daily bread, that I'm not going to go hungry that as long as I'm not being lazy. As long as I am working hard to take care of my family, we're going to eat. And ultimately we got clothes, we got shelter, we got food, we're good. And then the bottom is not bad. You know, living in a really, really tiny house, living out a car, catching food before it goes to the dumpster. Like it's not going to get worse than that you're not going to die. And it only goes gets better from there, it only goes up and that. And then ultimately, even the worst case is is very several orders of magnitude out of the likely possibility that actually happens. So sitting down, doing an honest assessment and being like, okay, as bad as it possibly could get is this. It's actually not that bad. What the heck was try it? Let's let's give ourselves a year, let's give ourselves two years, let's do an assessment. Where are we at? And and then, you know, I think people I wish I would have had somebody tell me it's going to take longer than you expect me to. Because it just it does take a long time. It takes consistency, it takes you getting better. And so a lot of people are thinking, Alright, I got a month's worth of expenses, you know, in the bank taking care of and savings. So I got, you know, I got 30 days to make this business profitable. That's probably difficult situation. I mean, ultimately to you may make it profitable in 30 days, if that's really all you run out of money. Like there's this ingenuity that exists inside of you that you may never have tapped into before in your cush white collar, you know, to a paycheck every two weeks kind of kind of situation. And so when it's on the line, and it's on you, and then even just learning to love that and be like okay, I have no idea. You know how we're gonna we just we got a pretty good sized tax bill coming up for our businesses. You know, we got new accountants, we went through kind of clean some stuff up that had been unaddressed the last couple of years. It's like, oh, that's a big check. You know, I guess I'm gonna go sell some more jobs. I guess I'm gonna make it you know, even if I don't pay it right now. It's gonna cost me some a little extra. It'll be okay. I mean, no

Zac Small 0:00

If you are the foundation of your family, you are the firm footing. They build their lives on. You carry a glorious burden and you never dream of laying it down. You carry it with joy and gratitude. You show up even when you don't feel like it. You lead, serve, love and protect. You are a father.

Curt Storring 4:06

All right, dads back to another episode of the downward podcast I am pumped today to be with Nathan spearing. And like I said, I heard you on my friend Will's podcast rent of man, if you guys haven't heard that, go listen to that. But dude, the first thing that I wanted to get into was just this idea of like doing things against the cultural narrative. Okay, this is like such an important thing when family is on the line, because I think I was just talking to Jeremy prior on the last episode. And when we try to optimize for what society says is right, it's often like putting lipstick on a pig, right? And we need to go all the way back. We need to go to baseline and fundamentally understand what we want out of our lives as husbands, fathers and family leaders. And I see that in your story. And so let's just start at that point of transition in your life where you had the career. You were, you know, six years away. I think it was from pension and everyone's like, Oh, do you just stay and it's fine. And yet you selected family over that. You want to just like warm us up with that. Little bit of bio to get up to speed in terms of like how that decision came and then like, Man, why did you how did you prioritize family over what society says to do. So maybe I'll just hand it off to you and see what comes with that.

Nathan Spearing 5:11

You know, I guess, first of all, normal, if you're looking around at society is not what you want. It's divorce, it's dysfunctional family, its inability to call a sex, the right sex, a woman, a woman. And so in a lot of ways, you know, wanting to be normal, if you're still married, and you get along with your kids, you're not normal. You know, and, and so, if you want to continue down that way, so I think that, I don't know, I guess, just fundamentally as men, if you're going to lead, you're not leading, if you're always lifting your finger and seeing which way the winds blowing, you are making decisions based on what other people are saying. And that's not leadership, you have to find something outside yourself that is bigger, that is not going to change the ebb and flow. And you know, a lot of people just like to say, oh, that's old fashioned. Yes. Something that's worked since the beginning of time, I'm about something that is a modern invention that has made our entire society depressed, reliant on pharmaceuticals, reliant on, you know, all these things, I don't want anything like that for my family. So that that kind of to as a long lead into, say, I had done almost 14 years in special operations in the US military, and I started to have kids come along, I did 12 combat deployments, and I started to have kids show up, I think it was the fourth or fifth deployment. And so I started to have to leave not just my wife behind, which is painful, but also these young people who, you know, the earlier on in lifetime matters more, that I think I saw something a while back that, you know, experientially in with perception of time, we've lived kind of the majority of our life experience wise that like 18 1718 years old, because as we get older time kind of goes by faster, the years bleed into more years. And it's so I just felt this really kind of negative feeling, as I was saying, by to, you know, my first son, my than my daughter, then my next son, and then you know, as the kids kind of need to come along, leaving on these deployments was more painful for me because I was more I felt like it was missing more and more, it was more life happening with me away. And ultimately ended up making the decision that worst case scenario, I gotta go be a barista at Starbucks, and I'll be the best dang barista ever. And we will not starve, and I will work, you know, work at Home Depot work at whatever and, and, and put the work in, and we're not gonna go hungry. And I didn't really know what the next thing would be. But I knew that it would just be me present me there for more dinners, me there in church with the family on Sundays. And, you know, not really knowing how hard that was going to be. But in a sense, not really caring how hard it was going to be. And knowing that at the end of the day, I mean, what I was saying is my son was seven years old, when I got out, we literally just February of 23 was the 20 year mark, when I would have received that pension. And I you know, my youngest son is seven, so he just snapped a photo, and my son, my son, my son's 14, and then my youngest is seven. So I can you can just literally see with two boys standing next to each other what I would have missed if I would have continued to point because my colleagues, my peers that haven't stopped, they're still getting they're still on the calling card for for the latest thing that's going on. And so I have this kind of now, rearward hindsight optic to say this is when I would have got the pension, and then also realizing that I've built businesses now in that seven years that eclipsed that pension, ultimately, and that and I knew that, in theory, that I could take my time and I could make it more valuable, I could get more skill, I could get more expertise in things, and that I would be able to own it. You know, because of the thing about the tricky thing about a pension from the government is when you die it dies businesses. That's not what happens. You can transfer this ownership over your kids can can run it, your kids can sell it, your kids can you know and there's an even starting to think about that and have these conversations with my 14 year old. What do you want to do? Are you going to want to try to do this? Are you going to try to move out on your own? Hey, you know, Dad's trying to get to the point where we have a family bank, and we can finance some real estate for you and your brother to do when you're 1617 years old and you can start trying to make this happen and creatively come up with ways to give our children's skill. Give them expertise in a mindset you even about how time is ultimately, every one of our most valuable resources. And the only difference between one of us that the person that's higher on the ladder income wise or even relationally is how they allocate their time. How do they spend it, how, how important are hard, they prioritize things in their life and focus more on that. And I think it's it's essentially God's joke on economics is he gave every one of us the same, we're all confined to that 24 hour day, that 168 hour week, you know, that 365 days a year. And every one of us has that, you know, our lives are different in span, obviously. But those of us that are alive, we're going to get the same number of minutes to allocate today, as as any other person. And so really being in the position for the last seven years to pick how I've spent every minute. And then also having to realize that how I spent those minutes have ramifications today, next month for my family's welfare as far as, as financial and relational, if I pick pick to work for the wrong client. And they're texting me nasty things at seven o'clock at night when we're sitting down to dinner, or if I was the idiot that didn't leave my phone out of the room and saw it. So when I'm sitting down to dinner, like these practices, these things that I'm doing every day, they impact for good or bad, but then just accepting that and saying, I'm in control. And I get to do that. And I didn't I would not get to do that. If I had stayed on the government. You know, I've jokingly call uncle sugar if I would have been working for Uncle sugar still, I don't get that. And so just let's that's it's going to be hard. Anytime I leave, let's go ahead and leave early. Let's leave when I still got energy when I still got my kids are still young, where I can build something real. And and then I can set myself up and future generations up in a way where we continue to build and continue to grow for generations.

Curt Storring 12:03

Man, that is such a good story for people who like I talk to guys all the time, whether it's military or not, like usually not for me at least I'm Canadian. So you know, it's not quite the same culture. But there's so many guys out there who are just like, oh, I can't, like I'm stuck. You're old and easy for you to say like, Oh, you've been in business like, oh, yeah, I can't do that. And I look at that. And I go like, Well, okay, I guess not with that attitude. But I see in you the same thing that I see in me, which is like this ability to self audit down to first principles, which is why do we even live here? Why do we run our days like this? Why do we send our kids to school? Oh, let's not actually in homeschool and said, Let's not live here and live where we want. Let's not work here. And do we want to do but what do you think it was for you that gave you that mindset? Because looking around and talking to guys, that's not actually that common. And I'm trying to put these resources out there to inspire guys to do that, which is good for their families and optimize for family. But do you think it was something specific with you guys, where you're like, oh, man, I see my kids, but so too, and so does every other dad? Right? So like, Do you know what it was in your life that actually made you think that this was a possibility? Rather than just assume they had to stay in for another six years?

Nathan Spearing 13:14

Yeah, I think that I had a conversation with a guest of mine on my podcast, a couple episodes ago just about how the stew a worst case scenario kind of analysis. And I think people that worst case, in their mind's eye is way worse than it really actually is in reality. So you start to go down in Canada in the US, you are not going to starve. Your kids are not going to go hungry. It's just It will not happen. Like there's just and I've talked about, you know, there's restaurants that are throwing away metric tons of food every single night. So if you showed up and said, Hey, I got five kids, and I'll do dishes, if you just give me dibs before you dump it in the dumpster. You know, and we're in a car, you know, and our family lives in a bus right now, too. And that's the reality of it is is your kids, a lot of people are will try to say, Oh, I'm just trying to give them the life that I didn't have, you know, which I think is a lie. You have this idea of what ideal would be and you want it, your kids don't care. Your kids don't care how much money is in the bank account. They do care if you have no money in the bank account, and it makes you a jerk. And so having to separate that from how you treat your kids. And that's been something that I haven't done well on as recently as a couple of nights ago. There's things that go on that you but that's your job, as the leader is to is to you know, in some ways, not let different departments struggle struggles in different departments bleed over into the home department and to be able to just take that upon yourself and realize that your kids will

Motivation. And so I think a lot of them out. I don't know we've I've gone around a lot if you want to jump in and and drill down on any of that.

Curt Storring 20:07

Yeah, no, that's good, man. That's really good. Because I think like, as I'm listening to this, as you're talking about, like the worst case scenario, I've done this as well, it's kind of, I think, maybe heard from like Tim Ferriss or something like fear setting. It's like, well, what's the worst that can happen? And when I hear that, it's, you're right, it's like, oh, well, like, I'm not gonna die. Like, it's, it's gonna be fine. And yet, I think that pride probably stops a lot of guys from even accepting that, like, oh, I would never live out of my house, or my car, I would never go and do that for, you know, the restaurant food like, oh, never man, I wouldn't let my kids wouldn't. And it's like, actually, that's just prideful. And I really liked what you said about selfishness in not forgiving yourself. And so there's these ideas now with pride in not being willing to do the thing which you need to do, regardless of how it looks, and then the selfishness of not forgiving yourself. And I'm like, Dude, I keep coming back to pride and selfishness over and over. And probably because that's where I sin most. But also, because I see this and men unwilling to take the plunge because of this. I don't know if you've gotten anything, or if that was just like a passing comment on the selfishness aspect of not forgiving yourself. But do you want to touch on that? Because a lot of guys only go like, Oh, selfishness is when I'm all about me. And so if I'm beating myself up, that's actually fine. I deserve to beat myself up. But I've recently understood that that is massively selfish and prideful. And I know it's not related, although we were just talking about but I made a note of it. Does that bring anything else up to dive into just before we go more into like, the practicalities of this?

Nathan Spearing 21:34

Well, I think it's the selfishness is kind of can be tied in with humility, as well. And I think it's CS Lewis that said, you know, humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less. And so ultimately, in that selfishness, and it's thinking about you and yourself in this and not really thinking about less about what you think and more about what's good for your fit your wife and your kids. And the reality is that your wife and your kids need you, and they need you around and they need you present a lot, a lot more than is normal. It's not, oh, you know, I'm going to do 40 hours a week. And I think a lot of men escape to work. And they get to live kind of a separate persona, or identity there, they get to kind of be an expert, or have a mastery in that area. And then that becomes their mental lollipop, like, I'm the man, because I'm good at my job. But I work 40 hours a week, which is a very marginal percentage of really what my whole life is, and the rest of my life is a wreck. And so you just keep going deeper into professional, and you keep telling your wife and kids that they're just demanding and don't understand how important you are. And I felt that a lot with military in the sense that I traveled a long ways away. I was with a small group of guys, we had great camaraderie, we had great brotherhood. But then, you know, in the end, it was it was heralded as a great thing in society. We're not living in a Vietnam era where they're spitting on soldiers, like soldiers generally on veterans are well thought of, by by the public so you get this, this kind of experiences kind of gratitude, just generally, with your vocation. And then, you know, being and we see this I think even more with if you have a mom, that stays home, and and you know, what do you do? Oh, um, you know, my mom, and I'm, you know, I'm a homemaker. You're one of the dumb ones, you know, that can't go be a corporate wage slave, and barely make more enough to do your, your childcare and take out childcare and taxes, what's your net earnings on that, and then who's educating your kids during that time and, and all that. So I think that that's a professional idolatry that exists. And it's easy for men to confine their identity in that. And then it's, it's very uncomfortable, to be bad at something as a man to be hat like you're in, that's what marriage is marriage is exposing your flaws, and your kids are emulating your weaknesses to you with less maturity. You know, my wife has jokes around she's like, Man, I really wish premarital counseling, I really wish they would have said, hey, you know, you're gonna get a lot of copies of this, this man you're marrying, but with a lot less maturity. And so you're just everything that may or may not, you may it may bother you about your husband, you know, times five, you know, and, and little kids. And so, anyway, I think that just dealing with that and saying, I have the ability to get better. And I have the ability to do that and to say that me getting better like the solution for your kids. If you're a jerk. It's not to be around them. Less is not to go We'll just make more money and pretend like you are doing the right thing by them because you made so much more money when really you're actually running from being adept, being present, leading, teaching them and, you know, education wise, is predominantly feminine influences on our boys. They're going off to class, the large majority of teachers and school system are women. And our boys need dads to be involved. They need dads educating them on all the other things besides the reading, writing and arithmetic. And, you know, we don't even have to open up why is it is that our boys are locked in a prison, you know, eight hours a day, every day of the week, until they're 18. And we wonder why we got issues with that. So we can we can open that that box too. But you the solution is and I, when I left the military, I was the biggest jerk I've ever been to my family because I like I said, I'm not talking about this professional idolatry to the listener. And I already had this figured out I'm just telling you how you don't have it figured out No, I lived it. I had, I was really really good at Special Operations stuff. And I was beat was good at being a dad part time. But I knew ultimately I was gonna get to do sexy stuff for eight months a year. And I only had to be a dad that other four months and it was punctuated. It was between trips, it was two weeks at a time. So it's like literally, I can suck it up and be selfless for two weeks before I go on this, this cool skydiving trip. And so when I was home 365 And there was no end in sight. This is like, Okay, I'm here. I reason I did this was to be around. Now I'm going around all the time, I'm even worse than I ever was. There's no escape, I'm here. There's no getting out of it. Oh, we're broke, as as well. And so it just stripped away all these false things in my life that I was deriving value from and put me I couldn't hide from anymore had to get better if I wanted life to improve, and so ultimately realizing like, Okay, I was a jerk, my kids still love me. And I can only get better, you know, from this, I know that this that the answer lies in me doing better. And I'm going to fix it. And I'm going to do it a little bit at a time. And when I don't, they're going to forgive me. And that's, you know, accepting that forgiveness. And like literally, they just, they don't even think about it's just it's so powerful, that they're like, no cool. I don't whatever, like, you know, even if you forget or you realize that you may refer to any, you know, their lead in and then they come back Hey, I just want to say I'm sorry for the they're like, huh, we talked about no cool, we're good. You know, can we go play? Let's do it. So anyway.

Curt Storring 27:57

Yeah, no, that's hard to be selfish through that. Right? Like the selflessness has to come through when all that's on the line, and you realize, like you just said, and that's something I you often have to remind myself, it's like, don't you know, and what your kids love you. Like, have you ever as a father thought about that, if you're listening to this, have you ever truly thought about how much your kids love you like even today, most of the men I work with, they love their dad so much that they're still looking for his approval at 30 and 40. Like, dude, that is how much your kids love you now, but without all the baggage. And if you don't understand that, you're gonna beat yourself up more, you're gonna be more selfish, which is, like you said, thinking about self, rather than serving them and leading them and taking the burden of dealing with that emotional, whatever you're feeling because oh, I messed up like, okay, like, Yeah, but then like you said, Say sorry, move on, and just show up better next time. And like, that's, I think the so many guys need to get that selfishness aspect, at least under the microscope, because I don't think enough guys are even aware of it. And I certainly wasn't. And much like you. I've learned all this stuff the hard way. And I didn't even have like a cool military thing to fall back on. I was just like, let's have kids, let's not get a job anymore. We quit we started businesses. And then I was just miserable all the time. Because like you said, no money didn't know how to parent. All of my I love how you said that, by the way, like the worst parts of you magnify with no maturity. Man, that makes so much sense as I look around in my own children now, and I only hope that maturity will help them get out of that because it's not very attractive in me. Anyway, man, I want to talk a little bit more about like the story behind how you got from that decision into where you are today. Because at least the social media version of you seems to be really cool seems to be really inspiring. And so far as how you guys are intentionally building family, you're doing things differently than so called normal which we've already touched upon being, you know, not what you want to be optimizing for. And you're building business. I think you guys are homeschooling. You're living in a bus. You're building stuff like I saw videos on Instagram, I think of your kids shooting guns and doing stuff with Chickens and building stuff. Like, dude, this guy just is like living this, I don't know, salt of the earth sort of thing in a way that really pulls my soul. And so I'm curious how you went from, you're kind of like Grumpy now that you're here, you're not doing the cool thing anymore. You don't have a lot of money. You're trying to build businesses. What did that look like? And how did you go about actually implementing that which you now have not saying you're perfect at it, obviously. But I think it'd be useful for guys to hear, okay, if I'm gonna make this jump, what might it look like? For me moving forward? Can you tie us in a little bit from then to now?

Nathan Spearing 30:34

Yeah, so one of the reasons we were able to leave the military is from when my son was was, I think, a year and a half old, the one that's now 14, and my wife was pregnant with number two, we did real estate on the side, we did DIY, we bought a old house, we lived in it, we fixed it up, we sold it, we did it again. We did it again. We did it again. So at the time that I left the military we had live in remoulded one took us about three years. And you know, so I think for a guy that wants to leave, I had been at the time I left, about seven or eight years using my marginal time or my time that was not allocated towards my primary work towards stuff that added value. I was remodeling bathrooms, you know, the military gives you 30 days of leave a year, you get federal holidays that are oftentimes a four day weekend. And I didn't really travel for a lot of time, because I had this Fixer Upper House. So I'd get two weeks off, everybody be gone, I'd be local, and I just be working on my house for two weeks straight I'd get for a weekend. So I do a Friday, Saturday, Monday, where I was working on the house three days, you know, solid, and I worked 1012 hours on that, in all my discretionary income, the stuff that we didn't, you know, when you have your bathroom completely torn apart, and your wife's like, hey, we need this bathroom back online, you're taking every spare cent to buy tile to buy tools to buy the stuff that you need to get that bathroom back online. And then the reality is that bathroom is worth four times what the actual materials cost, because with remodeling, it's so much labor. So I didn't have a master plan. I'm going to be a real estate guy, and I'm going to flip and I'm going to wholesale, and I'm gonna do all these things, and I'm gonna have, you know, 90 apartments and I'm gonna get this, you know, like, it's that's a lot of the real estate that's on social media. But the reality of saying, I gotta live somewhere, why don't we buy a house that's, you know, it's kind of dated, it needs work. And let's work on it over time, using whatever free time that we'd usually just be binging the latest stupid Netflix show. And let's lay tile together and then build value. So, you know, we, we bought our first house for $175,000 We sold it for 277 Five, you know, three years later, and probably half of that gain that 100,000 that we got was materials that had spent been spent over that would have been wasted, you know on something stupid if we hadn't put into a house was literally like a savings account. We got it all back. At the time of sale we had already bought used the military reenlistment to buy a duplex, so we had kind of hadn't sold the one. So we got that $100,000 Put a new roof on the duplex because leaking in seven places moved into a friend of ours house for four months that was deployed, we worked really hard around the clock to get the back of the duplex fixed up moved into that remodel the next part, but then right before getting out, cash out refinance the duplex that was renting and we're living there for free essentially, because the back rent, we bought it so cheap, the back rent was paying the front, we cash out all the equity, we got 260,000 or 240,000 out at a 3% interest rate because it was our primary home you know and so now we had all this money and we bought the historic mansion that we still own. We sent sold the duplex, but it's kind of a longer term, you know, three houses and I'm working on some some ways to package that kind of play book of just three a house every three years. You know there's in America, if you live in a house for two years, you can sell it tax free up to $500,000. So there's like this money that that value you created out of thin air is also not taxable, because it was your primary home. And so and like I said it wasn't a master plan is literally like we want to live in this cool part of town. Everything that's fixed up is super expensive. And this one is is rundown and is a little scary, but I think you know we can work on it for two or three months till our apartment lease is up and doing that over and over and over again. And it's kind of hard with real estate right now, but there's still deals out there. There's still houses that scare the majority already have people to buy. And if you have skill, to be able to take that house and expertise to understand really what the situation I walked the house with a friend of mine recently, and I can walk up and down and I can see all the problems, and I know what to do and assess the real estate of things. So just look for ways to do that. Now, while you're working a job, while I was still deploying six, eight months out of the year, we were building value with that additional time. And that gave us runway. And for the way that it worked out for us was I had a bunch of money in the bank. And in some ways, I was like kind of thinking like, you know, we just we bought this mansion for we had to put 110 grand down on that. So but I still had, you know, 80 grand left 100 grand left as I was getting out and, and then found out that the military had given me bonuses to kind of stay in and I ended up getting out early on that bonus. So we found out kind of just put $110,000 on a house bought that needed a lot of work, I was like I still got about 80 grand in the bank, it'd be okay, then found out how to write a $40,000 Check my last day in the military. So the way that I hindsight look about is God knew I was going to be a little bit lazy, even habits, I was like 80 grand, that's a, you know, a good year salary. If I don't do anything for a year, and I just work on this house, and I whatever, I'll be good. So what ended up having to happen was, I had to work on that house, but I had to also knew that there was a timetable. You know, now having 40 grand, I decided to buy a truck, I started the construction business because I was like I need to, I've been doing houses, I'll figure out this construction business stuff on the fly while I'm working on this house. And then realizing there's this whole massive I mean, a way that I've said it multiple times is I thought 80% of the construction business is technical expertise, and then 20% business and I was like I got 80% I understand that I've done it for houses. And I'll figure out that 20% As I do it for clients when it's really the reverse. It's about 20% technical 80% business and understanding how to communicate and actually price stuff. Right and and there's so much of that. And it was very difficult. And that's the reason why is now I have you know, two mortgages, the duplex we moved into the mansion so that we didn't have any central heat and air. I just cut out all the original 1934 plumbing and all the bathrooms. So we had my wife jokes, we had one one working toilet, we had a kitchen sink that was online and a shower that was in a different port. So added together, we had a full bathroom, but it was in three different rooms. And you had to walk out that hall bath and wash your hands in the kitchen sink and and then there's one shower and our kids would you know which bathroom can I go the bathroom, you know, and they'd be running but even then we're looking back the first winter we slept all on the same end of the house with one fireplace, we got some gas fireplaces, and and then our kids but the reality was our kids like we're doing that again this year, you know, when we finally got the heat turned down 18 months later, whatever. And the next winter was coming down. And we're like, No, we got heat now guys, and they were like, Oh, we thought we're gonna get to have you know, slumber party in the master wing, you know. And so anyway, even just those experiences that adults would look at and be like, that's crazy. Our kids were literally had no idea that daddy had no money, that daddy couldn't figure out how to start a business that clients were being difficult that there was a lawsuit that there was, you know, they just, they're playing outside in the dirt. You know, they're still playing outside in the dirt. And ultimately, we ended up we've built kind of enough equity and operating capital and stuff that we were like our dream for our family is land, and our kids playing in the woods and on the creek. And my family moved to 10 acres when I was 13. And my son was 12. And I was kind of like we got to like, it was almost too late for me at 13. You know, I'm about out of the fort building age. I'm about to start thinking about cars and a job and women and all that stuff. And so I'm like, I want my son to be able to experience land life. And so we started looking but you know, everything had a house on it that wouldn't work or the location or the creek. So we basically like let's just find land. And let's get a barn out there. We had actually already bought the bus for kind of a vision of traveling the US and going a bunch of national parks. It was underway, like okay, well we could build this by this piece of land, pull a bus out there, and life will be good, you know. And so that's ultimately what we did. We found a parcel of land, we wrote a check for it. We pulled the bus out there we had a barn partially built no roof on it yet. We actually lived in the bus for three weeks, maybe four weeks off grid. And I was going into our rental properties and filling up to under 50 gallon tank with in the back of my pickup truck and then we were you know, siphoning it out to the one next to the bus and using a water pump and car batteries with solar panels and all this kind of stuff and in incense I was kind of like man the way that the world's going Let's figure this out, you know, let's, let's just uh, we know that we're going to get the power trench down, we already had the work order from the power company. Thankfully, the septic got installed, like, the week before we pulled the bus out there because I was literally expecting I was going to have to take tanks of sewage back to our rental property in town. So at least I didn't have to do that we had a place for those sewage to go water tank. You know, and it was March time a year for here it was very nice type of weather. And, and we just, you know, we, the kids were in the creek, the kids are playing, we got photos of, you know, the construction sites, just a muddy mess. And my boys are just covered head to toe in mud. And as happy as they possibly can be, they don't care that you have a big house, they don't care that you drive a nice car, they want to be in the dirt, they want to be in the woods, they want to be just they'll make a they'll, they'll make a place into a fort. And they'll you know, we have the barn that we have has this loft. So they got Legos up there, if it's pouring down rain, they're up there in the loft, it's a ladder to get up there. And they you know, and my wife is like, I only want to go up there only know what it looks like up there. And I'm like, Yeah, you don't want to go up there, they got paper everywhere, they got blankets, you know, they built forts, and they're just, they got space, and their imaginations are going crazy, and their love in life. And so, you know, seeing that, in that reality. And we went back and lived in the mansion for a couple of weeks, when it was really cold. So we didn't have any, it's a rental short term rental now, but then the kids were so excited. So, so excited experience house life, but then they're kind of like, going back to the land. You know, let's get back out there. You know, let's and so it's just, I just think that that is when you when you put it down on paper and you say what is the best case scenario for your kids? What do you want for them? How do we execute 80% on that now, and let's get going. And that's kind of what we did, we wanted, you know, we wanted to get hundreds of acres, you know, and have the massive, you know, and a lot of people the reality is like that, that land will be too much for you. It'll be too much work, it'll cost you too much. It'll make you way outside of town. So thankfully, we ended up finding 20 acres, five minutes from church, five minutes from my office. And initially, we're kind of like 20, only 20 acres, you know, and so we walked the land, we're like, this pretty cool, this is good enough, this will work. And we can get the kids out here now. And there's parcel next door to it. And so we ended up getting 34 more of that. That's an interesting story, too. We ended up selling our duplex had enough money to build the house cash. And and then we had opportunity to buy this 34 acres next door. And my wife said, let's get the land, you know, and I said, you realize that if I buy this land, I don't know what I'll be able to build your house, you know, we got all this, we got a couple $100,000 You know, here I can build a cash would be good. And we bought the more land not because I want it but because I want to give my kids land, I want them to have a house, I want them to have a place if they want it. I'm not going to be clingy, you know stage five clinger parents that are like, you have to live in my backyard. And you can never launch and go do anything. Like whatever God has for them I want but I also want them to have a vision of building a home and living there if they want to and into the building community such that they're not trying to get away, they want to stay, they want to be a part of it, and to be understanding how to make money and to grow and to say hey, like actually, if I stay here, I work with that I work with these other men in the community. Like I know what I'm going to do. I got the skills I've been training since I was knee high to a grasshopper, let's go and be on fire to do that. And I just don't think a lot of men are thinking how can I set my kids up to where they're not starting from zero. And there's this I think it's ridiculous. You know, cultural wisdom that your kids got to figure it all out themselves. I've pod bootstrap today, whatever it's like, know what your kids like. Okay, I got a $25 million business I want my kids to take the 250 million you know, because they know the skills you know my business is not 25 million maybe that sounds like but hopefully I'm at 2550 100 when they're coming online and starting to run the family office and stuff and and we're just going to take bigger and that I'm going to want them there because they are going to have unique things that they're good with good at and they're going to be able to actually offer value to the business there may be going to have been in crawlspaces worked on the line with guys and understand how to talk to people and then groomed and grown but be part of of what's going on and or even have a supporting business that's adjacent to it that is, as part of it, you know, it's like hey, what do you guys want to buy an excavator, you guys want to start, you know, putting some fences in, you want to get this trenching machine, we can do these, these, you know, skills that I need in my company, and you guys can have the rig, and you guys can do it, and let's figure it out. And, and so anyway, it's, it's, it's very, very much new in its implementation, we got 54 acres, we got a bunch, we got a barn, we got power, now we got a well drilled, we got you know, 50 plus chickens, we're picking up pigs, at the end of this month, my wife's getting on to me about building the enclosure, we're going to try to put a bunch of fencing in in the next year, so that so we can get some some cattle out there and start, you know, this regenerative, mutually supporting agriculture where we're moving rotational grazing, and we're using the kind of the symbiotic nature that is just kind of works together, and, and manage it well and learn the skills and then they'll maybe be kind of economies or profit centers that certain kids will cover down on and want to manage. And so that's kind of, I'm excited to do construction, you know, in the nine to five, and even getting to the office really early, so I can do content stuff and media, but then even realizing like, okay, it's okay for me to leave at two or three o'clock in the afternoon, and go home and work on the barn and have the kids there or move the chickens or, you know, let's let's do these kind of maybe not money producing yet, but infrastructure and enhancing the value of the land and teaching my sons skills and even just learning to, to let them use the tools and not jump in there and try to take the drill because it's taking a little bit longer and having them make the cuts and having them go get the things out of it just setting my expectation to be I'm going to be nice, I'm going to make this enjoyable for for them and I'm going to let them put their hands on the tools and then do the work and if we get a bunch done great. But the being here together them them getting some reps in however many ends up being is valuable, and is giving them agency and in and what's crazy, is I'm coming home now and maybe I'm missing the tool but there's been some repairs to the rabbit coop or hey, I drilled this I tighten this or I put this in my son's are starting to just take scrap wood and and fix things that have gone wrong, you know, and even on the bus like changing out propane cylinders and and getting the you know trickle charger on the pump and you know, just wire in the circuit for the well in, in all these things that they're starting to see kind of how systems work together, they're able to put their hands on it, fix it themselves. And and just, you know, we're not always I don't think we're always going to be able to just call and have every aspect of our life fixed in in minutes, and just having some of these Renaissance skills having some of these this ability to understand how things work. Ultimately, is it going to make money is the farm going to be this profit center? I don't think so we're making great money and construction. This is this is the laboratory where I teach my kids resilience where they grow, where we enjoy time together, we can shoot guns out there, you mentioned that I just recently went and bought each of my son's a Glock 19 pistol because I'm like you guys are old enough. They're all we're all going to have the same multiple versions or multiple of the same gun. So you guys can when you guys put your hands on, all of them are going to be the same. You guys are going to have gotten reps in and just realizing like we're going to we're going to start Dr. Fire and we're gonna work. I'm trying to add that into our we're doing lunchtime workouts, my wife goes to the gym, I go home, we work out together and say alright, let's do you know, 50 dry fire reps as well, let's get some of this, these competencies and these other disciplines that that will round us out as as people and and it's it's a blast man like I I literally cannot imagine

a more fun life in existence right now. Like I can imagine having a nice house and not being in a bus and my wife can imagine it better than I can. We may have had to have a come to Jesus talk this morning about like, Hey, where are we at on this? You know, like, let's but we're drawing it ourselves. Like we're having date night. You know, I got the laptop open. I'm drawing the CAD files for that. We're trying to get all the roofline design, right because we're designing it specifically to be all to entertain our friends and to have hospitality and it to be small enough that it's it's not as hard to maintain but still can do what we want to do and that's it The reality and we're going to be, hopefully, in about three months or so, my sons and I are gonna be building it. And I'm hoping to kind of do the daily rhythms such that that's my big job that the construction company is doing in a sense, and I'm spending the majority of the week at home, you know, we're gonna subcontract out some of it. But I want my boys to have been intimately involved in my daughter's as well to be intimately involved in every phase of the build, and to and to have it last for a really long time and have something that when there's family reunions, or whatever, they can be like, Yep, I remember, we built this, you know, in the same way, that's how I learned it originally, with my family house, I was 13, we added on to it. So I'm wanting to replicate some of those things from my own childhood that enabled me to start a business that enabled me to have this agency and skill to go and build a barn from scratch and remodel of us and pull it into it and design and build our own house and it's in my kids are gonna get to be part of that. And I'm just, it's, it's so much fun. And so those of you that are listening to that, and thinking, oh, man, I wish it's like you can, you just gotta break it down into steps, and you got to do it. And, and you got to accept some discomfort along the way, but ultimately, even just, you know, talk to somebody other night, like, the fact that we're in the bus for a year we're in the bus for two years, is not going to matter. When we finally get the farm built out, like it's going to be a blip. And, you know, if we would have just said only 20 acres and built the house cash and would have been comfortable in it. And honestly, as a guy, I was like, Man, I kind of would rather just have this money and build the house and not expand the border. Because, you know, now I got all this land, and I can't build a house yet, you know, I'm almost ready to start, and then we're going to start chipping away at it, but it's like, Man, I gotta get to work, I all that money that could have just been put into something I could have just taken a year off, and I could have built this house. No, to actually build this multi generational vision, I'm gonna have to work a lot harder, and I'm gonna have to stay on the gas, I'm gonna have to sell these construction jobs, I'm gonna have to do work with clients, I'm gonna have to do these things that aren't sexy. But, you know, I'm gonna have to stay on the gas, if it's going to happen. It's me, you know. And so anybody can do it. It's just, it's going to take 10 years. And if you could think about it, it just really is. So I would rather I for sure can get there in 10 years, it's going to be harder than I expect. But then I'm going to get there. Or I can just suck it up and think about how I wish I could have, you know, for the rest of my life, you know, and so, you know, they say the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, the second best times now. And so break it out, how much money are you wasting on dumb stuff that really doesn't add value to your life that actually makes your life more more difficult, because now you got to maintain all this stuff, you got to you got to take care of it, you got to store it in the mini storage. I don't know if Canada's the same as America. But the Mini Storage business is huge in America, people have to have one or two, three mini storage units to just store their junk, you know, and get rid of it all. It doesn't matter, you know, and when we sold the duplex, I had to bring in a dumpster and just throw, I had a three car garage building in the back. It just allowed me to accumulate junk, you know, and ultimately, I was like mad. Some of the stuff I've moved to three different houses now, you know, and I didn't use it. And I was like, we're going out to this land, it's I don't have a place to put all this junk. I'm throwing it all away. We're getting rid of everything, but maybe one or two things. We're giving this bike away to a friend, we're getting all this let's let's shed all the crap. Let's streamline our life. I mean, it's what's crazy, is each of my kids has a Rubbermaid for all their clothes that they need day to day, you know, and I do too, I have a little basket have a couple pair of shoes, we'd still do have storage at our other house. So our church clothes and our out of season stuff, we have the ability to kind of stick it there. It's not you know, I like to have a nice clothes I think it's very important to dress well as a man as as, as you know, it's not effeminate at all, to have have nice suits to dress well for church to do these things to be in business. But what you need from a day to day perspective, you don't need as much you don't need all that stuff in it's just having lived out of a bus now. It's like man, I don't miss those 27 other pairs of T shirts, you know, I got a couple T shirts, you know, like it's all I need. I got these shoes and it's freeing me up to do a lot of cool stuff. It's It's It's creativity, it's bandwidth in my mind that I can I can think about business. I can implement these plans and I can do things that are going to last instead of just moving jump Correct. Yeah,

Curt Storring 55:01

yeah, dude, I'm like, on the other screen right here, I'm already looking up land. Because let's go man, like, I'm just gonna listen to this part of this conversation every morning in like my sleep to just put that into reality because the one thing that I wanted like everyone to get from that everyone's probably reading right now like, oh my goodness, what I just hear there was chaos, it was not at all perfect and there's like all these new things you kept adding and adding and adding. And that stresses me out so much and yet I need that in my life so bad man. Like I love being able to hear that you just kept taking on more, because my mind and I'm constantly struggling against this. It's like, well, I got to know everything right away, I need to know, like five years from now, you know, 10 years from now. And because I can see the vision, like, well, I might as well just have it now. Like what do you mean, I gotta put the work in overtime and be uncomfortable. And like, I'm really good at being uncomfortable with a lot of things. But a vision like that, that's next level. That's so inspiring man, like, that is exactly I was I was gonna say, this is like exactly what I want to see, in my family, I gotta find a way to just like, talk to you more often. Because I want to know exactly all the things along the way, because that was incredible. And the chaos that comes into that. And the like the ball is the resilience to be able to handle all of that coming through. That's just going to have to be what it is. And one of the things you talked about as well as being in the arena, right, like doing, I think one of your posts and might be verbatim I'm not sure. It says doing what is required, despite what your emotions are saying, and that they'll get in line when you execute. That's like the core thing that you have to have for all of what you just said to take place. Like, I don't know what your time is. I know we're just couple minutes over. If you got a couple more minutes, do you want to just close on that resilience piece? And then we'll find out where people can find you. Because man, I'm, I'm so fired up? I'm gonna go start a farm right now. Like, let's let's go, let's finish this off on resilience.

Nathan Spearing 56:48

Yeah, well, I think that people will make a false assumption that their thoughts are true. And I think Jon Acuff has a book called soundtracks. And that's how he kind of he articulates the metaphor that he uses for thoughts in this book, but realizing that you have these thoughts playing, but you're in control of them. And sometimes we are passive about the thoughts that come into our head, or we just kind of let them wreak havoc, those those worst case scenarios, those, you know, my the thoughts about your childhood, or thoughts about what your kids really think like, this is not actually what your kids think of you, or what your wife thinks of you. This is what you think your kids think of you, or what you think your wife thinks of you. And those are false, you know, and ultimately, as a Christian, that the father, the devil is the father of lies. So whether or not that is your mindset of your flesh, and the weakness of us a man and these thoughts coming in, or it's the accuser. It's somebody you know, we read about when Jesus was fasting in 40 days that the devil showed up the Son of God, and he's tempting him, and saying, giving him power, giving him food, giving these things like the actual take conscious control over what you think, and realize those thoughts have ramifications and that you are in control of them. I think Gary Vee says, like, you tell you what to think, like, so start telling you what to think. And then the other side of it, is emotions are our own AR real. There's a chemical composition going on inside of you, there's a physiological thing I have daughters. So there's actual like, I understand that you feel this, that is real, that is not true about life, like it is not really the worst day ever. It it's a good day, it could get worse, you know, Dad's been to North Africa, it can get a lot worse, you know, you don't understand that. So when you say and we use these absolute terms that never or always, or whatever, it's like, just let's be precise about our language. And I can't remember the song. But this is one of our family mottos is, you know, speak truth in your heart. And so that is what I'm always saying to my kids is that the truth speak the truth in your heart, your your, your soul, your mind, your mindset, so, and you can take control of that. And so when, when when the business is going terrible when the end, you know, and that's ultimately kind of how I ended up hacking through the business stuff. And I still do, I would say, Oh, I'm not getting shot at. Well, my wife loves me. Well, I got kids, like, Oh, if they take everything well, you know, we'll live here like, I figured it out before we'll do it again. Like, and just have this overwhelming, it's not fake. You know, looking at yourself in the in the mirror and saying, I'm the most amazing, it's like, no, I have what I need, I know what I need to do now. And I'm going to do it. And then I'm going to do it again. And I'm gonna do it again. And I'm not going to stop until I die. And I think that there's this belief that it's gonna get easy eventually. And and I'm gonna, it's just gonna fall on my lap or it's going to, you know, like, rubbish. It's never going to get easy. It's going to be if you're live really living to your fullest potential if you're as strong as you're going to be if you're as, as good at businesses you're going to be it's a lifelong commitment. And you can't stop. And and if you want to stop at some point, so I got what I did, I ultimately, I don't think that you're, you're going to always have that, oh, wonder if I could have, you know, in a lot of these Pete high success, high earning people that sell their primary business and exit and have all this money go crazy, you know, like, we just see, it's like, you actually are gonna be happier, when the work is hard. You're gonna be happier when you don't know what but because the other side of it is when it works out, when you are profitable, when your business is actually making money, when you have ability to write a check for land when you can sell a rental property and buy more acreage. And when you can go get it in the middle of the day, go buy some pistols and go shoot with your sons. You're like, that's, I can do that. Because I've what I've did, I've done, I did all these things, I made these choices. And now seven years after getting out of the military, I have these businesses, I'm making this money. Now. Is it just infinite margin where I can just sit around and do nothing? No, is that margin? Can that margin be reinvested in this up to creating something bigger? Yes, and it should, and I'm gonna keep going. And so I guess that's kind of round around the loop. I also want to add one thing about land, if it's listed for sale, it's too late. In some ways, like a lot of people that can't find land, I can't find a house can't find whatever it's like, find the one you want, and go offer somebody to buy it from, you know, like, walk up and knock on the door. I mean, in the US, you can look up the tax records, you can find who owns any property. So that's what we did with our land. It wasn't actually on the market. And I friends of mine were like, Yeah, we went and walked it, but we, you know, try to talk to him about there's actually a for sale sign that the business partner of the guy had put out there wasn't actually really on the market. And when we said it offers, it never even got to the actual owner. So we didn't hear anything. So I'm like, Well, I'm gonna figure out the tax records. And I went to the guy's office, and I'm like, hey, I want to buy this land. And he's like, not for sale. And I'm like, ridiculous, bro, everything for sale. Let's talk, you know, and I brought all my kids sometimes. And then we showed up with our kids, I got a picture of it, where we have a sad loaf of sourdough, you know, and, and he, he actually blocked my number. And so I called his secretary. And I'm like, hey, it's just I'm like, I'm not spamming. I'm not a weirdo. Like, I got five kids, we got a loaf of sourdough here. You know, we want to buy this land. And it turns out, she's a part owner of it. So he owns it with his wife, and they're in his one of his business partners. And so there's three of them. So little that I know, I'm Dr. She's like, Oh, my house is dying, and you bring the bread down here. So I'm talking to a part owner of this land with five kids and my wife, and she's like, this is what we want to do want to build a farm here. And when we found out that the guy was a farmer, the guy had grown up with dairy cows. He's Canadian guy actually, that immigrated here, he's got dairy cows, so we're like, we want to farm this land. We're not trying to subdivide it, we want to grow our we want our kids to grow up here, we want all that, you know, and he's like, I say a little bit of it, you know, so it's like, Alright, that's good enough. And then he sold us a little bit more. And we're about to put the remaining parcel under contract. And it's just it's little, little steps. And it's and it's realizing that the best deal or the thing that you want, you may have to be unconventional about it, you may have to go out and take it. And and if it's on the market, everybody can see it. You know, we literally took the map out, here's where churches, okay, let's look for all the streams. Let's look for all the ponds, what parcels are developed, and we found the ones that we wanted, and we started going and asking, and we started meeting with people and hey, do you know this? And, and so you know, that's what people will be like, oh, man, how'd you get that? I was like, the final actual thing happened. The guy sitting in the barber's chair, he walks in, he had been ducking me, I showed up. He was I was like, asking his mechanic like, when's the guy show up, you know, and he's like, give you here at eight o'clock. 830. He's gonna give all the instruction shots showed up. So I will talk to him. I will talk. He's like, kind of, you know, and he's busy. He's a businessman. He's doing things I get it. Well, then I fill out the contract completely leave the price bright blank, and I'm about to drive it out there and I'm in the barber shop. And I'm like, he comes in and he sits down in the chair after I get out. And so I text my wife and we you know, believe who just sat down in the barber chair. I have my barber cell phone number. So I'm like, don't let him go anywhere. So I went back and got my wife and my, my cutest youngest son, and like, he's in the bar. He's gonna have to sit here for 30 minutes while I pitch this dude on this thing. And and then I just walked in, I said, Hey, you know, Rob, I just want to introduce you to my business partner discussing things she's gonna say to you. You know, and I just step back and and my wife is like, we want to farm we want to raise our kids. You know, she's got the my seven year old the six years all the time on her hip. You know, we want the kids to grow up on the Land wanna do this, this is our vision for it. And he's just like, you know, obviously, like the whole barbershops full, you know, we're just like, alright, pitch deck, here we go. And I'm like, I got the I got the contract right here, all you got to do is write the price, let's do it. You know, he's like, alright, it's gonna be raining tomorrow, you come by my come by the office tomorrow, you know, so I took two or three sons out there. And he's also a 20. You know, and, and like I said, we were like, ah, you know, we want it all at three. Why the heck, that's not going to be a lot, you know? And, and, okay, well, let's go walk it, let's check it like, this will be okay, this is good enough. And, and it's, it's not, you know, we don't have millions in the bank. So we get don't get to be perfect. But then at literally, I have 34 more now, a year later, you know, and he's actually at the point where he's like, I want you to have the rest, you know, and I'm going to work with you. And that's, you know, Proverbs says, The king's heart or heart is like channels of water, the Lord turns in wherever he wishes. So it's he, it's he understands people. And when you have your intention set on something and your heart posture is right, and you're trying to build something that is literally supposed to be for you, he parks, the Red Sea, he makes it happen for you, but you have to be working, you have to be trusting, you have to be always searching is this for me is this for the right thing. And if it is the will of God, that you have land that you grow, and you have this business and you have these things, then it will happen. And if not, it's for your good, it's going to turn you into the right person. So being kind of out there, where it's kind of on God to take it one way or the other, and that you don't have control over the results. But then the results kind of continue to happen. And that's why I feel like so many people don't even understand God that are employed, that are playing it safe. It's like you don't you don't let it I literally have a video of myself before we bought the store before I was like I'm about to go ask them for it. I have no idea how we're going to pay for it. I just feel like I'm supposed to ask him, I see some survey stakes going out there. And I literally just don't know, I'm gonna pray about it. And we're gonna see what happens. And then he literally was like, you know, you have some assets, you got to choose which ones you hold on. And we're like, oh, we never even thought about selling the duplex sold the next weekend, you know, everything went through, we were able to close and get the answers. Like, we couldn't have imagined that it would happen the way that it did. But we just did the next thing. We had the next conversation and we prayed the whole time, you know, and, and it's just cool your your kids have been praying with about the land. And what's crazy as my kids are praying now for the 2000 acres behind our you know, fit before and I'm like, Whoa, you know, that is that might be a little bit but they're like, no, no, we're gonna get it. Like we're praying if we got the 20 We got the 34. Now the 2000 like it's gonna happen to have, you know, it's like, okay, you know, let's do this. Anyway,

Curt Storring 1:07:51

man, Nathan, you just don't everybody's excuses. Like, there's not a man listening. Now he's like, Yeah, well, well, he doesn't understand me. It's like, Dude, you just harassed a guy, the barber chair with the kids. So good. Like, man, I was so convicted by that. Like, yeah, I'm just, I'm full of excuses. I'm full of excuses, because I don't want to be that uncomfortable. And yet here you are showing the way. And particularly I mean, just personally, as a new Christian, I'm not sure how God works. And so to hear this, to pray on it and just do the next step. Like, dude, that is so good. Because like I said, I'm always looking for that end goal. And I'm always looking for it to happen right now. And if I can't see every step of the way, I don't know how it's gonna happen. But it's not up to me. And that mindset shift is so important for me spiritually is how am I going to get there? Like, dude, don't worry about it. Trust, just trust in God, surrender. And if it's the right thing, it's gonna be the right thing. Man, this has been a massively edifying conversation. Thank you so much, dude. I feel like probably got through like three questions out of like the 10 or 15 I had to do around to some other time. But man, thank you so much. Where should we send people? I don't know, if you want to send him to business or social media or like all of it. I'll put all that stuff in the show notes Dad.Work slash podcast, but if they're listening, where should they find more about you?

Nathan Spearing 1:09:03

Everything's on the website, spearing SPE a are ing dot C O and then so social handles are along the top I'll keep those updated with the ones that I'm active on there's an email list that you can subscribe I'm actually right before his podcast was seeing how you got an email list and you got like kind of this 10 day thing and and so I have had a sign up I've sent like maybe two emails out in the last three years so I'm looking to do more on that because you know how all these these platforms are just ridiculous sometimes so having a little bit more autonomy there and then the the life on target podcast is on any any of the podcast platforms but all the links to that all the social profiles all that are@spearing.co

Curt Storring 1:09:47

Nice. Okay, guys, I like one of the very few podcasts that I listened to occasionally because I don't listen to a lot is Nathan's podcast of life on target so highly recommended awesome conversations on there and I don't like if you just want to be fired up. How could you not want more of this? I'm so gonna go right now. Anyway, thank you so much. I'm gonna let you go and we'll connect. See what thank you for the wisdom on this.

Nathan Spearing 1:10:06

Awesome. Great to be here.

Curt Storring 1:10:09

Thank you for listening to the Dad.Work podcast. That's it for this episode. But if you would like to stay in touch between weekly episodes, why don't you go over to Instagram and follow me there because I draw up a number of things throughout the week that are related to what we talked about on this podcast but usually go a little bit deeper, provide some tips you can find me on Instagram at dad work dot Kurt. That's da d w o RK dot c u r t. And please, if you have been getting something out of this podcast if it has touched you if it has improved your marriage, your parenting or your life, would you please leave a quick review on Apple or Spotify, leave a rating. If you have a few extra seconds, leave a quick review. That's the best way that we can get this work in the hands of more fathers. And I truly believe that we change the world, one father at a time because each father that parents better that loves better raises children who do the same. And in just a couple of generations. I feel like we could be living in a world much better than the one we live in today. Your review will help along that path. And I thank you so much for being here to listen until next week. We'll see you then.