At Sea with Justin McRoberts Justin McRoberts

Another episode with producer, Dan Portnoy, marching through the book Sacred Strides. We're going to dive into Chapter 3 today - Staying In My Lane.

We are doing a series in and by which we're digging back into and through the book Sacred Strides - chapter by chapter talking about the dominant themes in the book or extras on top of the book what you know what it looks like to apply some of the things that I get to in the book. Dan, who's been a friend for a long time and has produced this podcast from its beginning, has a really unique perspective on my work and on me as a worker. And so it's fun to talk about my stuff and have Dan poke around a little bit at, "Hey, what's behind this or underneath this? What's after this?" And so we've enjoyed doing this podcast series up to this point and we expect to continue to, and we think you are as well, judging by the numbers, the metrics. So this is chapter two of the book Sacred Strides, and will you please welcome Dan Portnoy to the microphone? Let's dig in.

Producer, Dan Portnoy and I are doing a series of podcasts focused on my book. Reintroducing folks to the book Sacred Strides. We began last week with an overview of the book before it got into the introduction.

Welcome specifically to this new series. It's going to be a deeper dive into the book sacred strides, which I released earlier in the year. And I get to spend some time talking with my friend Dan Portnoy, who is also the producer of this show. So if you've been around the ATSI podcast for any amount of time you have benefited from and enjoy Dan Portnoy his work, I deeply value him as a friend and really add value him also as a work partner. So what's gonna happen is instead of me just talking about the book, or trying to interview myself in some sort of like, like comedic Monty Python style, although that was, that was an that was an idea entertained. Dan's gonna ask me some questions beginning with this first episode, talking about some of the history leading up to the release of the book, why it was important and what I was hoping to do with it.

Several years ago, six-ish, I think I don't really remember. Years ago, I started making myself available to artists, to ministers, to entrepreneurs, folks who had worked in fields that I had worked in, and I started doing so for free. And I wasn't calling it coaching. At the time, I was just making actual meetings to answer questions, and they were questions that had been coming up. And if you've been in an industry for long enough, this happens to you, as folks start asking you, Hey, how did you get there? Or what did you do about this? Or hate if x happens? Do you have a solution for scenario questions begging for some sort of wisdom from someone who's further down the line?

I used to think the phrase, everything in moderation sounded like wisdom. I mean, it was the piece of wisdom folks would dole out when we talked about work-life balance and we talked about alcohol. And we talked about video games, everything in moderation, everything in moderation seemed like the thing that one would say that the goal would be to find the correct balance between all of these things. And that meeting in the middle of all things is still his dominant value. I just got an email, actually, from a work friend with whom I'm putting together this project. And there are differing opinions about how to spend the time on this retreat. And one of the participants said, Well, we will meet in the middle where everyone is happy. It says the notion that somehow there's this middle space between all things, and if we can just find the middle space between all things. Everything in moderation, we'll all be happy.