Jeff handled those situations.

Well, I wouldn't say enlightened.

I'd say on a path of growth Jeff, as opposed to unconscious, clueless Jeff.

The biggest difference between Jeff graduate, go, go, go, succeed, only to find out, 'cause my mentor asked me, that the reason I was working so hard was to prove something to my father.

That was an epiphany when I realized, "That's what I'm doing?" And then I was like, "Well, that can't be the basis of a career." And so then I had to really work harder to figure out, well, what then is a basis for a career? Big difference in what's in the book is have someone you can talk to who's not your best friend, the guy you know from the bar, somebody you played rugby with, your uncle.

Everybody has somebody at arm's length who has a certain level of maturity and wisdom that you just know is there, and it's such a compliment to anyone to ask them, "Hey, could I talk to you about some things that are not going the way I want in my work life?" You'd be amazed how much clarity you can get when faced with a fork in the road, some surprise of whatever kind, to just say, "All right, I'm gonna step aside for a second." You know, unless the building's on fire, there's very few decisions that need to be made tomorrow, and talk to somebody who has no dog in the hunt.

The most powerful thing I ever realized.

How do you think that affects what meaningful work looks like in this new era?

So talk to us through that, what it was like wrestling with that, and what ultimately made you take that leap.

Well, one thing I wanna point out is on reflection, looking back and as I wrote the book, uh, but even well before the book, I realized that my experience was not in any way unique to family business.

And my book isn't about family business, it's not about that environment.

It- it's really the dynamic that I went through of basically sort of doing what I assumed was what should be done, only to realize that I actually had no idea what purpose I was serving or where I was headed, and more importantly, why.

Um, that that was endemic among everybody who I talked to.

'Cause as soon as I started to realize I don't know why I'm here, then I wondered, "What about the people I work with?" And I started asking, "What's your dream? What's your vision? What's your purpose? Why are you here?" And they'd look at me like I had three heads as well, 'cause they hadn't considered those questions either.

And so...

Uh, what was the impetus for you writing A Work Life Worth Living?

associated

with.

So I was like the dean's turnaround story at the University of Richmond and graduated with honors and got into George Washington University Law School.

I didn't really know what I wanted to do.

A friend of mine who was a year older and was a bit of a mentor to me, he was going to law school.

So I thought, oh, that's a good idea.

In hindsight, I know I was just trying to postpone growing up.

Yeah.

So can we talk about the definitions of success and what truly meaning is in the work-life side of things?

Sure.

It's as good a place to start as any.

Yeah, let's do it.

I'll tell you a simple story.

I'm going like crazy.

I get out of a year of law school, not a good fit.

So talk about that or maybe anything else that you want to share about the book, about meeting spirits, about any of that.