All it Takes is 10 Seconds of Boldness
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In this engaging conversation, Shawn Langwell shares his journey from a corporate career in sales and marketing to becoming an author and confidence coach. He discusses the importance of maintaining a beginner's mindset, the process of writing and self-publishing his books, and introduces his five-step method for building confidence and overcoming fear. The conversation emphasizes the significance of taking bold actions, the value of accountability, and the necessity of introspection in personal and professional growth.
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Introduction to Sean Langwell and His Journey
The Journey to Becoming an Author
The Five-Step Method for Building Confidence
The Importance of Taking Action
Real-Life Applications of the Five-Step Method
Advice for Those Feeling Stuck
Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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Jonathan Mahrt (A):
This is on the Flywheel, a podcast where each week we talk to entrepreneurs and professionals about the practical things they do to build and keep momentum in their personal and professional lives. Hello and welcome to on the Flywheel. I'm your host, Jonathan Martin of Flywheel Consulting. And today I'm excited to have on the podcast Sean Languel of Northstar Communications. Thanks for coming. Thanks for coming on today.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Thanks for having me, Jonathan.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And this is the first time I've had a fellow podcaster on the podcast. So you also have a podcast as well, right?
Shawn Langwell (B):
Yeah, I just got through recording one about 40 minutes before I came over here of a first time podcast.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay, so you're, you're primed and ready to go, then you're in, in the zone or you're already worn out.
Shawn Langwell (B):
What's. No, it could be whatever you want. You know, I've been going since 2:00 clock this morning. No, actually 3:00 clock this morning. But no, it's a great experience.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Where we always like to start is I always like having the guests just give an introduction of themselves, where they've been, how they got to where they are today. And I know you've worn a lot of hats, so walk us through it.
Shawn Langwell (B):
It's an understatement. So my name is Sean Langwell. My company name is Northstar Communications. I have been in sales and marketing and advertising with an emphasis in advertising for the last probably 33 years. That's mostly been in corporate America for media publishing companies. In that process, I've studied a lot of self help books and just had a keen interest in wanting to do the best that I could as a salesperson. And we'll get into it a little bit later. But that has spurred this extra interest to want to be an author. And when we're ready to talk about these books, I'll share what that story is like. But in their interim, my experience in sales and marketing and advertising is segueing into becoming a sales leadership coach and a confidence coach, as well as a marketing mentor.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
That's really neat. You're also, I guess, the first author I've ever had on. So what I didn't do was make sure I read at least your most recent book so we could talk about it and take notes. I'm not Terry Gross who has time to read.
Shawn Langwell (B):
No, I'm just kidding. There's lots of people that have time to. They say that readers are leaders or leaders are readers, one or the other. So don't feel bad about it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, yeah. So I Think let's talk about. Yeah, let's just jump into the books because I think that's super interesting. I also think it'd be cool to talk about the process of writing a book and what it takes to get published. And so maybe we could start there. What made you decide to be an author?
Shawn Langwell (B):
So I'm going to start, and I'm going to show this in just the natural progression is start at the beginning. You know, there's this whole concept of a beginner's mindset. And anybody who's watching this episode, whether you're in business of any kind, maintaining that business mind or that beginner's mindset is really, really important. So the impetus for my first book, Beyond Recovery, was quite literally the culmination of probably 13 different spiral bound journals that I had written over a period of maybe 10 years.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And these are just like personal journals. Thoughts, feelings about things. Just like a standard kind of brain dump kind of thing.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Brain dump specific to recovery from addiction and alcoholism. So that's been my journey. I got sober in October of 1986. So I'm coming up on 39 years of congratulations. Thank you. And the impetus for this book. My wife had always wanted to write a book. She figured out how to be a self published author. She came out with her book and after she did that, I'm like, I want to do one. And I woke up from a dream one day and it was literally my deceased brother telling me that you need to tell our story. And I'm like, oh, shoot. You swear on this? No, I won't swear. But anyway, so that's what it was. And this became a six year process of reliving a lot of those harrowing, hard, tough life experiences and putting it into a book with the whole purpose of helping other people.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
That's. That's cool. That's. I mean, that's an awesome story. So what, like how. So that is a self published book then?
Shawn Langwell (B):
That is a self published book, yes.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And so how. What does that mean?
Shawn Langwell (B):
All of these are self published books.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay, so who. So you're doing that like through Amazon or how does that work exactly?
Shawn Langwell (B):
The publishing arm, it is published through Amazon, but there's another publishing company that you can do for on demand Publishing, which is called IngramSpark. There's also Draft 2 Digital, which is a combination of being able to publish on both platforms so that it has as wide of distribution as possible. Do you want me to walk through just a brief process? I could sit here and talk for hours.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
No, no, Just really high. No, yeah, just really. I'm just curious. I'm personally curious. Really high level. Just like. Yeah. What you have to do to actually self publish a book.
Shawn Langwell (B):
The first thing.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Guide for Dummies.
Shawn Langwell (B):
The Guide for Dummies. First and foremost, you got to have a story that's interesting, that is, that is you want to tell. And if you want to make money at it or you want it to get out there and people to buy the book, you have to have kind of an idea of what that sweet spot is in terms of your marketing, your genre. What lane do you want to be in? It's no different than what you do in consulting and trying to find your best customer. So that's in a broad, general 30,000 foot view. The details of this is write a good story, hire somebody to edit it. You have to do some self editing, but pay to have somebody make sure that it's as clean as possible. And there's a natural narrative arc there. And then there's a lot of other backend details. There's cover design, there's the book blurb, if you will, and all those little details to make sure that it gets seen and is relevant. When people are searching for a book of that type of.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
That's. I think probably a really important part is paying for an editor. I think I've read about that before.
Shawn Langwell (B):
It's like paying for coaching or paying for consulting. I mean, you can choose to do it yourself, but if you don't have that skill or expertise and somebody else does, it frees up your time to stay in the creative lane or whatever it is that you do best. And that will transfer into. When we talk about some of the other books of. Of making sure you wear the right hat. You do not have to wear all the hats, right? I do because of a financial reason of being able to do it. I wear a lot of the hats. But when it comes to editing and proofreading and cover design, I pay somebody to do that.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah. I mean, from a business consulting perspective, paying people creates leverage. Right. You want to try and spend as much time of your time in your sweet spot as possible. The things that you're both good at and passionate about. Because sometimes you're good at things and you hate your life doing them, and so you want to try to avoid those things, or you're really passionate about doing things, but you're not that good at them. And then you can just burn a lot of time doing it because you like doing it.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Yeah. I think they call those rabbit Trails or something.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Probably, probably. So I always recommend to people, it's like, yeah, if you want to, you want to delegate, what is it? Delegate, get rid of it or automate. You know, there's some fancier way of saying it, but that's the rough idea. So if you can hire someone to free you up to stay in that passionate and proficient zone, that's where you want to be. Absolutely, yeah. So walk us through the rest of your, some of your other, what else you got here?
Shawn Langwell (B):
So the other one that I wrote this book, I'm coming up on the 10 year anniversary and I'll just do a plug because this is going to be out there and in search land for a while. This book is celebrating 10 years in November of next year. It also coincides with, knock on wood, One Day at a time, my 40th sobriety anniversary. So I'm planning on doing a 10 year anniversary edition of this and a follow up book to it. But this coupled with the 33 years of marketing and advertising experience that I talked about, for those who aren't totally feeling whatever it is that they're doing or they're looking at a career change, you don't always have to change. Sometimes you just have to change the pair of sunglasses that you have on and look at things from a different perspective. So I have this experience, but I also have the experience of being in sales and marketing advertising for 33 years. And part of that is the self talk. Part of that is the motivation, the goals, all the things that are necessary for being a successful salesperson. And a lot of that internal stuff I learned in recovery. So what I did with 10 seconds of boldness was virtually almost an impossible task. I took 30 plus years experience here and 30 years experience here and somehow some way merged them together and came up with this simple five step formula. That's not rocket science and it's a formula for solving problems and building self confidence.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Well, let's talk about it. You want to walk us through the formula?
Shawn Langwell (B):
Absolutely. So in a super simplistic way, there's five steps and it's called the five step method. Call it Shawn Langwald's five step method. Call it whatever you want. The steps are the steps and they're totally dynamic. So the steps, number one is identify the problem or the opportunity. That's what we do when we're needs assessing with the client or any particular business that we're going to work with. The next one is to clearly decide what the heck it is you want to do. And that One is hard for some people because they don't know exactly what it is that they want. They have an idea and they're spending a lot of time on strategy, but they're not tying back that decision to what the actual problem is. The one in the middle. Number three is why? Why do you want it? And that can be five, six, seven layers deep until you get down to a real core, gut level, mission, vision, purpose, statement of what drives a business, what drives somebody's motivation.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Can we talk? I want to touch on number two real quick.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Absolutely.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Because you just talked about people not being able to figure out what they want to do. So how do people. Can you give us high level? Like, how do people go about doing that?
Shawn Langwell (B):
You know, the simplest way is a pen and a piece of paper. It's called brainstorming. Do the Ben Franklin method of what you want or what you don't want. Start there. Here's what I want. Here's what I want to get rid of. Here's what works for me. Here's what doesn't work for me. Here's what I like to do. Here's what I don't like to. Here's where I want to be. Here's where I don't want to be. And that simple exercise is very. I don't want to use the word cathartic, but it is revealing.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Clarifying.
Shawn Langwell (B):
It's clarifying, right. It helps you define and have the clarity that you need moving forward. Because if you're going on a trip, everybody out there has gone on a vacation. I'm sure at some point you have an idea of where you think you might want to go. It might be the continent, it might be Disneyland, it might be whatever. So once you make that decision, then there's a series of actions that you take to make that goal or that dream or that vision a reality. And that's common sense approach. But the second step, people aren't totally sure. Do I want to. Do I want to write a book in this area or do I want to write a book in this area or do I want to be XYZ for my career? I mean, there's tons of decisions we're faced with. Do we want to expand our business now in this market or do we want to expand it in a different market?
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Does that. Does that. I feel like that also causes paralysis as well because people can't make a decision.
Shawn Langwell (B):
It does. And what ends up happening oftentimes is rather than doing the introspective part, which is tied into the Why? I mean identifying what the problem is is an introspective exercise that's a self assessment and a self evaluation of knowing really what your situation is, the decision and the analysis. Paralysis deals with human nature in our own inherent biases and beliefs or lack thereof in our self esteem issues. And not everybody wants to take a look at that because admission of I don't know is not acceptable in most business arenas. You're expected to have an answer and if you don't, you better darn well find one out because I'm paying you money to find out what the answer is and to deliver results. So there's that pull and that's kind of what's going on in that Step two and that's where you to follow up on your question really is that's where imposter syndrome has an opportunity to leak in. Am I qualified? I want to do this, but the second guessing happens. Am I worthy or qualified to follow through with what it is that I think I can do?
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So yeah, that's man, I, my experience is I feel like a past. First off, imposter syndrome I think happens to everyone at some point in their life. Especially when you're trying something new that is not in your standard wheelhouse. Like maybe it's related, maybe you're perfectly, it's perfectly reasonable for you to be tackling it, but it is like, do I belong here? I even felt that way about starting my business. But I found the best thing to do is to just start even if you're not exactly sure about like what the right thing is or if you're doing the right thing. Because I got, you know, there's been some situations where it's like, well, I've self analyzed this as much as I could. I've written the list, I've done everything. I still don't have an exact, exact answer. I have an idea and I'll start here and just start doing it. And then hopefully as I do it then I can course correct and say, oh no, I don't actually like this or oh, this other thing came up that I actually like more. I'm going to start heading towards that direction.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And that what you just mentioned is, is a deeper layer there. And that's very, it's inherent in that second step because the analysis paralysis happens when we need, we have this many people have this false notion that we need certainty before we can act. And what you just described is actually the pivotal decision that needs to be made in facing our fears of any new endeavor. A Lot of people stay in this static spot. And it's not until we find the 10 seconds of boldness to take that step forward through, over, around, under our fears and become willing and comfortable enough to not be afraid of failure. Failure is not something that is good, bad or indifferent. Failure is a teacher. And oftentimes our paralysis, if you will, keeps us in this state of that's safe, it's secure. And there's tons of books out there that talk about imposter syndrome and getting out of your box, think outside the box, all that. It's great to have the theory, but what you just described in starting your own business recently is you don't know until you take the 10 seconds of boldness to go do it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And when you make that decision, that is the number one decision of anything worthwhile in life. Whether you're going to choose to be an actor on a screenplay, start your own podcast, start your own consulting business, write a book, whatever it is, ask somebody to marry you. That is a bold decision.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And so that's the impetus for the title then, is in terms of 10 seconds of boldness, is that the amount of time it takes to actually do something? What is the inspiration for it?
Shawn Langwell (B):
I'm glad you asked. The inspiration, the quick story on this was I've been in sales for a long time and my sales were in the toilet. And I'm sitting here. I started this book as a goal setting book because I've studied goal setting and been really good at setting and attaining goals all my life. Okay, I'm gonna go teach the world how to set goals. Well, in the middle of writing it, about two years into it, I couldn't hit my own goals. And the integrity is like, how can I do this and talk about setting goals and accomplishing goals? Setting is one thing, accomplishing them is another.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
That's true.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And in the middle of the pandemic, just before the pandemic hit, my sales were in the toilet and I literally grabbed a post it note and I wrote with the Sharpie those words, 10 seconds of boldness. And I put it on the wall in my cubicle at work above the phone. That 10,000 pound thing that most salespeople say they, they're okay making cold calls, but they're really not, to be honest. And I had to go search for new business. And I let that post it note sit there and stare me in the face for about two and a half weeks before the need became greater than my fear. And I'm going to repeat that when the need or gift of desperation became greater than my fear. Then I chose to pick up the. And do some online research and start reaching out. And that process during the pandemic resulted in my sales increasing 22%. The very first year of the pandemic, in one month, I actually exceeded my year over year comps by 57%.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Wow.
Shawn Langwell (B):
From that simple post it note in this five step plan.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And so 10 seconds was literally the idea of picking up the phone and calling someone.
Shawn Langwell (B):
It's that decision. It's not overthinking the decision. It's a 10 seconds of I'm gonna do it. I got an idea. The 10 seconds, do a quick research here online, here's who I'm gonna call, scan it. Boom. Pick up the phone, do it. Yeah, just do it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, that's cool. That's cool. I think, I mean, that comes back to like you were saying, the. Just. The idea of just, just doing it, just being bold and taking the step. And. And I think it's also interesting that you called desperation. Was it a gift?
Shawn Langwell (B):
It's a gift of desperation. Because so much of our psyche, Jonathan, is we think that something should be either good or bad. And fear is bad. Boldness is good. Neither one. They're agnostic. Fear is one of the greatest teachers there is. Yeah, and so is failure, because. Especially failure, because that means that you took a chance on yourself to start something and you found out one more way that didn't work. And this stuff is not new. I mean, you know Edison, when he was doing the light bulb, Everybody's heard the 10,000 trials and experiments that failed. And then he got it right. At the end of the day, if he gave up at 9,999, maybe he would have been a failure.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, that's true.
Shawn Langwell (B):
You don't know, but you just keep going and trying. And eventually if you're. If you're. We'll go into this number three. Now if you're. Why is big enough. The facts of what it takes to get there don't matter because you're driven by something bigger than all of the other external noise or internal noise, the noise between our ears that drives you and propels you forward. And just real briefly, so we don't run out of time here. Steps five and six, make a plan and work the plan.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
What are we getting?
Shawn Langwell (B):
4. Step four is make a plan.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Write a plan, create a plan, whatever the plan is.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Gotcha.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And step five is work the plan.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay?
Shawn Langwell (B):
So you execute. You put it into action at every Single one of these five steps, identify the problem and opportunity clear to decide what it is you want to do, why you want to do it. Make a plan and then work that plan at each and every one of those. They're totally dynamic. They don't always have to be sequential. They don't always have to be completed before you go on to the next one. Ideally, there is a progression there, but the dynamism and dynamic qualities of this is six step, that's not there. And I purposely don't include a six step because that's iterative. That's what we just talked about. You start something, you fail, you adjust, you make, modify, you make adjustments as you go along until you get to your own formula that works.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Maybe you might even call that a flywheel to build momentum.
Shawn Langwell (B):
When I first met you at the Chamber of Commerce, you're absolutely right because tell I'm not going to do it. What is a flywheel?
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Well, now, I'm not prepared, but yeah, I mean, a flywheel is just a mechanical, you know, it's a mechanical device that helps, that uses. I'm not going to, I'm not a, you know, scientist or a physics person here, mechanical engineer, but basically it uses, I think, centrifugal force to help, to help you things speed up and stay.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Stay moving in perpetual motion.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yes. So that's, and that's the idea of, of what I'm trying to help people do in their businesses is like make those changes that help, you know, the systems and processes, like help you grease the wheels and keep things moving in your business so that things flow more easily and, and you build momentum and, and so you can focus on the more important things in your business. And that's kind of what you're describing here is it's, it. That is the process is you, you make a change, you see if it's working, you readjust, you make a change, you see if it's working, you readjust.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And even when you do find the plan that works, don't be so tied to that plan that if it's working, if it's not broken, just keep doing it, or if it ain't broken, don't fix it type of thing. And the other side of that is don't constantly keep tinkering with things just because you want to get it perfect. And I'm going to repeat that again. Don't keep tinkering with things because you want it to be perfect. And I talk about this, it's going to tick some people off, but in most Major decisions in life. 80% is enough to start. Yeah, 80%. And you may attest to this. You don't need to have the whole map, right?
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
100%. I think that's the biggest reason people don't start. I mean, it comes back to the idea of just starting that I was talking about before, is that you're never going to have 100% of the facts in order to make a perfect decision about what you should be do. What you should do is much better. Much better to just start doing something as long as it's decent, right? I mean, if you're clearly creating or doing something, that's just absolute garbage because you haven't done sufficient preparation, that's one thing. But really it's, it's about, it's about saying, okay, at some point this is good enough. Like, let's, let's ship it and see and learn from it. Because if you never take that step, you just. I mean, I just know so many people that think about doing things. There's. I feel like everyone has a friend or more than one friends or a family member that's always talking about some new thing they're going to do or something that they're going to start and they never do it. And then the next time you see them, it's another thing. And the next time you see them, it's another thing. And no, nothing ever changes.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And that's a big part. I mean, I wrote this as a goal book. It is inherently, it's a goal book. It also draws a lot from my recovery experience. But that mental madness that we all suffer from in some form or fashion. And I'm not, I say mental madness, not. I'm not a psychologist or psychiatrist or a doctor. But there is a natural insanity in our brain when we think that we have to do things perfectly. And it's just, it's. We could talk for hours about what some of that neuroscience process is I talk about here. I interviewed, I interviewed a handful of people that are experts and those are included in here. So it's not just my opinions. There are some expert opinions in here of people who live and breathe and do this stuff. But the point is, if we don't make those decisions, we're never going to know.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Right.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And to hold off, what you were talking about is we just chased this next thing. People, People are addicted to strategy, Jonathan. People are addicted to strategy. And I call it Shiny object syndrome. I don't call it. That's what it's called. It's shiny object Syndrome, I can keep chasing this extra little thing because by chasing this and studying it and learning it till I'm blue in the face, I don't have to make a decision.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, it's, it's easier than actually doing the thing. I mean, I find cop out. Speaking of like goal setting and productivity and personal development stuff, I think that's a real trap, is that people busy themselves trying to get better. But then the whole reason you're doing those things is to actually like be better at like whatever your primary thing is. But if all you spend all your time just like on like productivity hacks or whatever it is and never actually doing the work, then what's the point of it?
Shawn Langwell (B):
Well, there's an old saying, don't confuse activity with accomplishment.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Exactly.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Don't confuse execution with productivity. I mean, you can slice and dice it all the different ways you want, but at the end of the day you got to do something. And if you're afraid of doing it, that's why I came up with this title too, is just all you need is 10 seconds. 10 seconds of boldness. Has anybody ever jumped off a diving board the first time in their life or jumped off a little cliff into a pool of water or done something? Every single one of us knows what this 10 seconds of boldness is. Knowing it and doing it are not the same thing. And you don't fully grasp the gravity of, no pun intended, but you don't fully grasp the gravity of what, what that decision of taking and choosing to decide that I'm going to have 10 seconds of baldness. Regardless of what might happen, regardless of what I think other people are going to think of me. And there are variations. I mean, 80% isn't enough for a neurosurgeon, a brain surgeon, or an air pain plight, or anybody who's got other people's safety. I mean, that goes without saying. You need to have 100% or as close to 100% accuracy as possible. But in terms of basic decisions that we make as human beings on a day to day basis, 80% is enough.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think that's really insightful. So I'm curious, do you have, can you share any anecdotes about how your book or your method has actually helped people? And I'd love to hear some examples if you have any that you can share.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Most of this has been self reflective work in my own work and the personal antidote, because I'm just now dovetailing and taking my own experience and sharing that with other People to apply in a business sense. So as far as having a list of folks, I will have a list of clients who apply these principles. The interesting thing about writing a book, a personal growth and development book that delves into confidence issues is I'm not going to lie, I still struggle with confidence just because it's not a set it or Forget it. So 10 seconds of boldness is something that could be used in anything. And I'm not going to do it right here. But there are times where it's like, I need to do this. Oh yeah. And I go in and flip this over. I wrote about that. Wait, wait, wait, wait. What do I need to do? And I start getting into that mental madness of looking, the shiny object syndrome, all the procrastination games that I play and it's like, oh yeah, I already wrote about it. So the personal antidote, if you want to have the ultimate accountability partner, write a 400 page book on how to solve problems and build self confidence. Because your own answers are staring you right in the face. And there's a bigger message behind that. Most of us, if we really stop looking outside for solutions and we just take a beat and we ask a friend or, or a close relative or we look in the mirror, most of the answers that we're trying to find out here we already have. But where coaching comes in and consulting and books like this is we need that extra little guide or a hand to say, you know what, I've been there before, let me help you through it. And that's what people pay coaches for is, is that extra accountability and that encouragement because it is in there. And a good coach will actually coax that and lead that person back to that part in them. So that's what I'm in the process of doing right now. I'm applying it to myself and I get to practice every single day.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
That's awesome. I think there's to speak to the accountability part of having a coach that ends up not something that I realized when I was starting my business, but something that's become apparent as I've. As I've gotten more and more business is that part of what people are paying me for is just. And I think we might have talked about this when we met the other day is just accountability. Right? And that's part of just coaching and stuff. It's not that you can't do these things on your own in theory, but sometimes it's easy to kick the can down the road with those hard things. And when you're Paying someone to say, hey, are you actually doing this? Are you picking up the can and actually doing the thing? It's a lot of value in that.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And it's collaborative too. You're not just coming up with the turnkey program. You're gonna. It's a conversation to get to that. Right. So there's some buy in from the client side. So it becomes a collaborative effort that both people are accountable to and the coach or the consultant is accountable to helping keep the client accountable. But the plan going back to here, the plan is the plan.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And you know, it is incredibly important to have that extra validation to make sure it takes some of the level of risk out of it is really what it does. Cause it's not all me. You involve somebody else, whether it's a coworker, a colleague or a coach, that minimizes some of the risk. And it also helps have another set of eyes and ideas looking at something. So it's not just you relying on it, because that's the ultimate risk. If you're not asking somebody else for help, it's all on you. The buck stops with you.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Absolutely. And I think there's an element of experience that comes with it. That's what I found people. Another part of the value that I end up providing people is they don't know if something is a good idea or a bad idea. In my area of expertise, they generally know they should go in a direction, but they don't know what questions to ask. They don't know if they're being screwed over. There's so many things about when it comes to coaching that you're also paying for, like a reasonableness check.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And that's a fair, a fair statement because you have, depending on where you're going to specialize, you've got a family, you grew up in a family business. As we talked about, you have a.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Certain level of expertise and listeners know. I've talked about it before.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Of all, all and anything. Wearing all the hats from milking the cows to running the business. Basically. Right.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Not cows.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Not cows. I'm sorry.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
It was chickens picking up the eggs. Sorry.
Shawn Langwell (B):
I see so many cows. Petaluma was and still may be part of the chicken capital of, of the world.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
There's. There are more. Well, I don't think actually in terms of numbers, there's probably not more cows. But the dairy business is bigger than the egg business in Sonoma County.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Still huge.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
But wine's at the top, grapes are at the tops.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Yeah, yeah. And people are continuing to buy more acreage and expand their vineyards. Which. Which is great.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, yeah.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Before we. How much time do we have?
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
We got another, you know, 15 minutes or so. So keep chatting through it.
Shawn Langwell (B):
So when I did this, I knew that this was going to be a tome. And the hardest thing of writing this book is include personal stories from here and from work so that there's some relatability here. What separates this book, without sounding like a sales pitch, but what really separates this book from some of the other self help books that are out there are personal growth and development book is that I've done every single bit of advice and wisdom either was from a first party interview with an expert or my own expert opinion and experience. Not an opinion, it's based on lived wisdom or lived experience, if you will. And while writing this, I knew that this was going to be a lot. I already planned to take us about 30 to 50% of that and put it into a workbook so that it's a little bit more manageable. So there is a corollary workbook. Some of the stories are still in there, but the workbook is super easy and it's appropriate for anybody in any industry. I did that by design. I did not purposely niche this down. The next step that I'm working on now is to create some niche publications that are for sales, that are for consulting, that are for coaching, et cetera, et cetera. Real briefly, this is the book. I just published this in March of this last year. And this book is basically a guided journal if anybody out there does guided journal work. I wrote a book called Today is the Day and it was very short snippets that were literally just stream of consciousness off the top of my head. Some of it pulled from here just from my experience and tightened up. And somebody says you need to turn that into a workbook. So the blurb on the back of this for anybody who's doubting themselves is are you ready to stop doubting and start believing yourself? And here's my pitch that he asked me at the beginning. I spent a lot of money from a coach to do this. Hi, I'm Shawn Langwell. I'm an author, marketing mentor and confidence coach on a mission to empower you to break free from self doubt and live boldly. I don't just teach these strategies, I live them and I get real results. Using my proven five step method, I help you overcome limiting beliefs, habits and patterns so you can step confidently into your true potential if you're ready to be inspired, encouraged and transformed. I am Here to guide you every step of the way.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I'm sold. I'm gonna do the workbook.
Shawn Langwell (B):
I'm gonna give you this as a gift for having this show. So using this workbook, there's a warning. Using this workbook might change your life.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
That's great. I love that.
Shawn Langwell (B):
You could be my first case study. But the thing is, it's fun and exciting and what drives all of this is an inherent care and compassion to want to help other people become better. My mission statement. This is a very well crafted mission statement. But at the end of the day, if somebody asks me on the street, the elevator pitch is my whole mission is really to help people find the courage to believe in themselves so that they can live the lives that they want to live. That's it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I mean, isn't that what everyone wants? At the end of the day, it is.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And that's why I do what I do.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And where I can help, I'll share that. And where I can, I'm going to point them in a direction that I may be able to help them that way. It doesn't mean that I have to be all that to everybody.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So what advice? So for someone that feels really. I mean, we kind of walk through the steps and maybe the answer is just, hey, how do the steps? But I'm thinking of a person that like working kind of a dead end job or they're just not happy in what they want to do. They're not living the life that they want to live. What kind of advice would you give to them?
Shawn Langwell (B):
Go back to the first step. You know, it's a friend of mine who I had on my podcast, I've known literally since he was four and a half years old. Musician, African American and black man. Not that that matters about anything, but he's a business owner. He just started Black Bee Hot Sauce four or five years ago, Test Kitchen. We had a conversation on air and he had a conversation with somebody else who was a business owner. And I'll just relay this third party, because this is kind of how the world works, is somebody knows somebody who knows somebody. And he went to this other person and said, I want to start my own business. And you ask them a couple questions. What do you want to do? What's in the way? What's your first step? Those are the simple questions that we tend to want to make way more complicated than we need to. So it goes back to the first step of the five step formula. Identify the problem. Is there a need or an opportunity out here? And then decide, ask those introspective questions of what it is that you want to do, what you're good at and why. You get into that why. The why and the what are cousins. In some respects one precedes the other. In others, they're two twins doing a three legged sack race. I mean, you can't separate the two of them. So the easy advice that I could give somebody else is spend a little bit of time writing out what you're good at and what you like to do and then put another column over here of what you think you might want to do. And the fourth thing that I interviewed a high school friend and coach from NCAA basketball, coach by the name of Steve Lab. And he told me his formula and that's in this book, what he did because he wanted to be a head coach for an NCAA basketball team. And he ended up landing a coach at UCLA for a number of years and then St. John's he's now doing USD. He told me on a podcast interview that was about two hours long. It wasn't a podcast, it was just an interview for this book. Exactly what he did. I share a lot of that formula in there. He went and got to be around the people who were leaders in his industry. So that's the importance of identifying what it is that you want to do. Then you have to go immerse yourself in that environment and ask the questions, the hard questions of those who are there, who are where you think you might want to be, be. That's a risk that's getting started. And out of those conversations you're going to find out real quickly if this is something that you want to do, you might want to do. You're not totally sure if you want to do. And you can make pivots. The thing about the career shifts is it depends on your financial situation, depends on your life situation, it depends on your gifts of desperation. What do you need to do? You know, if push came to shove and I needed to get my mortgage paid and I had to go literally pedal these doors, these books door to door, I'd have to be willing to do that. There was a time where I lost a job and I was in between jobs and I literally had to go door to door to businesses selling a certain product. And I came back and the owner of the company is like, how in the world did you do that? This is before I wrote this book, but that's the experience that I bring in there. I said, I just asked.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, I think that it just builds on what we've already been talking about in terms of being willing to just start doing something. I also think you had a good insight there in getting around people that are doing the thing you think you're interested in, or the direction you want to go, or the place you want to go. Get involved in that community somehow and just start getting exposure to it and starting to get to know people. A, that gives you maybe you know, it's all who you know lots of times and get in, finding opportunities. It's just about building a network. But B, it's also about getting an idea if you actually really want to do that thing. Because you may start getting exposed to something, it's been your dream for 10 years and then suddenly you realize, oh, this actually isn't what I want. And either I'm more content than I. Maybe I actually am content where I'm at, or maybe where I wanted to go is a completely different direction than I originally anticipated. But you wouldn't know that unless you actually started doing something.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Absolutely. And that's. And it's less risk. I mean, if somebody is. Case in point, my bosses already know that I have plans to make a shift sometime in the next 12 to 18 months. It may take a little bit longer, but sometime, somewhere, if it becomes from a time perspective and a financial perspective, more beneficial for me and what my goals and dreams are to make the shift from selling advertising, which I've been doing for a long time time, to being a full time coach, teacher, mentor, marketing mentor, all of that. Author. That time will come. And that time I know will come because I've done it for decades in my work life. I've done it for decades in my personal life. But the shift, when you're in a space where it's not a desperate situation to test a few things out, that's safe.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Check it out.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Go to an event that's in an industry, go to a trade show, go to whatever it is to get immersed in that environment to see if it's something that you're really interested in.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I think, I think there's a lot of truth to. I'm not going to say it correctly, but there's a. There is a saying out there along the lines of like, you know, having a paycheck every two weeks is the worst possible thing. I'm not saying it right, but the idea is having a paycheck is kind of a dangerous thing because it makes you super comfortable because you know that you have money coming in every two weeks and that's a lot easier than going out and trying something new where money is not guaranteed immediately.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Comfort brings complacency.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Maybe that's more what. Yeah, that's exactly it.
Shawn Langwell (B):
I mean, the comfort is complacent and it doesn't mean that we have to be living on the cutting edge. There is absolutely nothing wrong with somebody who is content to put in 40 hours a week, have a comfortable living if they're happy with it, if their dreams. The issues with the coaching and books like this where that creates a rub, if you will, or tension is when you know that you're capable of more. You have dreams and aspirations and you're not willing to go pursue those for fear of what more might or might not happen. And in that situation, you choose to stay comfortable. And that's what I would, you know, to go deeper. That's what I meant by the gift of desperation. Sometimes this door gets slammed shut without your control and you're forced to have to find another way to adapt. To put food on the table, to put a roof over your head, to put clothes on your back, to be down at the survival level. For others who have grander aspirations of creating a legacy or living a life of significance, who may have worked in corporate arena for 20, 30, 40 years, who want to do more, it's a similar mindset shift. I've been doing this for so long, I don't want to go out there. Nobody's telling you what you need to do. But what I am going to say is don't let fear stand in the way of you realizing your full potential. Because, folks, life is way, way too short. Short to just settle for. I mean, the back of my business card, it says, be bold, Be bold. Because life is too short to let it be ruled by fear.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I have nothing to add to that. That's incredible. So I think that is a great place to wrap it up. And I think if people get nothing else away from this, it's that right there, that life is too short to allow fury to stop you from doing what you want to do.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And to take that first bold step.
Shawn Langwell (B):
And the bold step too, because it's time. When's this episode going to be out?
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Sunday.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Okay, so because of that, I am not a local celebrity, but Copperfield has been very, very good to me. And on the 29th, we'll call you a local celebrity.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Celebrity. How about that?
Shawn Langwell (B):
On the 29th. August 29th at 77 to 8pm I am getting an author event at Copperfield in Petaluma.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay, great.
Shawn Langwell (B):
So come by, we'll talk about this. I'm not going to talk about it on air because I'm going to save that for the, for the event that they are hosting me at.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Maybe we'll have to have you back on to talk about this one at.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Some point if you want. And yeah, we can do that. Why not? There's going to be more. Have me back with that. We'll do the next three or four. I've literally got five or six more books outline that I need to do. But to go back to what you were saying so you can put a nice bow on this, what I said was be bold because life's too short to let it be ruled by fear.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Amen. I want to give you a chance real quick to let people know where they can find you online. And yeah, so feel free to throw that out.
Shawn Langwell (B):
The simplest thing, if you're a business owner or you're an individual who has goals and aspirations, just check me out. It's Shawn Langmol. S H H A W N L A N G W E L L dot com. That's my website email. I'm responsible by email. I'll give you my personal email. It's Sean Langwell, writer, W R I t e r@gmail.com.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay, that's. That sounds great. And I am once again your host, Jonathan Mart with Flywheel Consulting. You can find my business at flywheelconsulting Co. You can find this podcast wherever podcasts are found and find us on socials as well. So thanks again for being on, Sean. It was pleasure.
Shawn Langwell (B):
Thank you, Jonathan. It was great.