CJ Finley: Don’t Just Survive, Learn to Thrive

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After the death of what would have been his future father-in-law today’s guest talks, how that loss gave him a gift for life, life, hacker podcast, host, and entrepreneur here to motivate you to make the most of life. Please welcome CJ Finley, you ready to grow your business? And I love helping entrepreneurs find success.

So let’s do this. I’m Damon Burton Forbes contributor, author of the search engine optimization book, outrank and president of SEO National. I’ve been featured on Forbes, entrepreneur and hundreds of websites and podcasts for helping big businesses grow bigger and make more money by showing up higher on search engines, including shark tank, featured businesses, NBA teams, and Inc 5,000 companies.

I’m bringing my successful network to you here@learningfromothers.com. Whether success to you means financial freedom, freedom of time or freedom of the soul. We’re in this together. Welcome to the learning from others podcast.

Ready to show up higher on search engines for words that you can monetize, but without paying for ads, download your free copy of my SEO book outrank. If you visit www.freeseobook.com today. CJ family. Welcome learning from others. Thank you for having me. I’m super excited for this. Yeah. Um, so as, as we were both talking the stars aligned and you’re inspired by my guitars in the background, you’re going to learn and you’re, you’re in, you’re just amazed my skill set.

And then I told you that I don’t play guitar. So I don’t know what, I don’t know where that, where that leaves us, but I, I hope, um, I hope we can still be friends. Yeah, of course. And yeah. Looking forward to, uh, potentially putting a guitar to use in 2022. Um, so I’m going to hold you accountable as well.

After this episode, I will take that because I need to pick it up. So, all right, CJ, uh, you know, the drill two questions, question number one is what are you good at? What are we gonna learn from you today? So it’s funny that the guitars that you have in your backgrounds, uh, that you aren’t using, uh, one of my greatest strengths and skills is coaching and holding other people accountable, uh, to their life and what they want to get out of their life.

And that’s really what led me down the path of creating the brand thrive on life. And it all stemmed from me not being happy with where I was going with my own life and realizing that every single day kind of felt like Groundhog’s day. And I wanted to leave. Mark. And unfortunately, some things happened in my life, which sped up that trajectory where, uh, death illness, and some other things caused me to really reflect and realize that I was not making every heartbeat count.

And today I sit here just trying to inspire other people and not just trying, actually doing, uh, inspiring other people. Just live a better lifestyle, mentally, physically, and spiritually. And I do that in a bunch of different ways through my podcast or fitness videos, through community events, uh, teen entrepreneurial education, a bunch of different, uh, outlets that I choose to kind of get myself involved in, but the ultimate.

Mission behind all that is just to make people realize that it is a blessing to be alive and that at any given moment that can be taken away from us. And I think if everybody went into every day realizing that they would go about their day a little bit differently. Yeah. There’s, there’s a lot to dig in there.

Um, but until you ask question number two is what do you suck at CJ? Staying focused on one thing. So if you ever read the book, the one thing that was massively helpful for me. So just answering the first question I like to do a little bit of a lot. I don’t like to bucket myself into this is what I do type of thing.

This is not, I don’t have a job technically, uh, like to adventure pump adrenaline. Learn new things have new experiences. And that comes with obviously our biggest strengths can sometimes be our biggest weaknesses. So what I suck at doing is like waking up sometimes and realizing what do I need to let drop to the floor and be okay with that?

And then really double down on the thing that is my favorite. Um, most fulfilling, passionate. So that’s interesting that you say that because then it kind of seems like a contradiction. So how do you balance where on one side you hold people accountable, which means focusing, and then on the other side of it, your, your, your vulnerability of an inability to focus or some of those things where it’s like just you, but everybody else you can take care of.

I think it’s an ego thing. Um, I’m a human, we all have ego and there’s good sides of the ego and there’s bad sides. And when you’re a coach, because you’re so. Into helping everybody else. A lot of the times, all the flaws for yourself, go on like the rocks get unturned. So you don’t really have to focus on your, your, your shit as I would say, because you’re worried about helping other people around you and helping their life get better.

Now, this leaves you burned out. You don’t have a cup to pour from, and I’ve really went from. A world of, I was living in the corporate world where you kind of sacrificed 40 hours to then work 80 hours. And you’re like, what the heck am I doing? Because now you’re living this life of, instead of just worrying about my bills and what I have to do, I’ve switched over to, wow.

Now I have five, 10 community of people that I want to help. And I’m constantly thinking of their shit and how to improve that, which at the end of the day, the best of me. Is kind of dwindled down and then I reflect on, okay, what is it that I want, where do I want to go? Versus I need to flip that script.

And on the good days, I do have that flip switched where I’m focused on me and what my goals are. And then on the bad days, it’s, I’m running a rat race in my mind. It was like, I gotta get this done for this person to do this for this event and do that. Um, so the accountability. To answer your question in one sentence systems, I’m a systems engineer by trade.

That’s what I went to school for. I have a really good system for other people to follow, and really it’s just at the end of the day, attention, as long as you’re paying attention and giving attention, people seem to move the needle forward within that system. But again, that takes me, I probably have to hire a coach, which I hope to do one day.

I’m still seeking somebody that can really fulfill. The opposite end of that spectrum for me. Um, so I’m just reminded kind of on a greater cadence each and every week, you know, I, I had a client one time, tell me a story about his woodshop teacher, way back, like junior high, high school kind of thing. And they were talking about careers and.

Somebody brought up being an entrepreneur, a business owner, and the woodshop teacher said, yeah, that’s great. When you own your business, you only have to work half days. You just have to decide which 12 hours you want. Uh, yeah. Your brain. Yeah. I mean, and I love it. Like, don’t get me wrong. Anybody listening to this?

Like I never turn off. So entrepreneurship. I want to preface with, it’s not for everybody, but if it is for you, you need to go into it because it changed my life for the better tremendously. And it’s because I don’t turn off. So I’m always. Going, and I like that. And when I do turn off, I feel depressed and anxious.

Um, when I’m kind of like a forced turnoff where it’s just like, um, maybe an emergency happens or things like that, where you just kind of have to reflect a little bit, that kind of shakes me a little bit, but for people out there, if you really like, um, working on multiple things and with multiple people and having multiple experiences and every day is kind of different entrepreneurship is the world for you.

And you will thrive in that. That’s it. That’s an interesting point. You bring up. So it gave you an outlet to put that, that 24, 7 energy. Yeah. Yeah. I was a kid with a leash when I, my, when I was like four years old, three years old, so it never stops. And I played four sports as a grown up, like, and then I got into the corporate world and I was like, oh my God, this is it.

Like, what do I do with all this time? Like, most people are like, I don’t have time because you have the nine to five, but I’m like before nine. After five, I mean, as a collegiate athlete, like I was waking up at five or six in the morning, going to class, studying all day, going to the gym. Then we had practice seven to nine at night.

So it was like, that was my lifestyle. And once I got into corporate, it was a shock to my system in the opposite direction. And that’s where I was like, I can’t do this. This is not. Yeah. So let’s talk about the transition where you kind of learned, um, you mentioned two things. One was holding people accountable is kind of your superpower.

And then two, um, that kind of started from you realizing you were being happy. And then you had a couple of things that accelerated that. Now I’ll let you go in as deeper as, as little as you want into the specific details, but like how big of a timeframe was it? Where, where you started to go, oh, I’m not happy to things happen to then you felt like you were on a new trajectory.

That’s a great question. And I want to dig a little bit into that accountability. That you mentioned earlier and why, like the other reason I’m good at holding people accountable is because in a lot of lanes, I’m very disciplined and good at holding myself accountable, which is like my health and wellness.

And like I ran two miles before I even jumped on this. I’ll work out later today. I eat very well. Um, I take good care of mental health meditate. I read books like, so I’m very disciplined and accountable in those ways. Um, so holding people accountable to living a lifestyle, Is a process of getting the results that they want to achieve.

And this started at a very young age. With sports I, and this isn’t being cock shore or anything like I, every sport that I was in was one of the better players on the team, because when I wasn’t on the field, I would go practice at home alone. And nobody saw that. And that ultimately led to earning, being captain of the team, earning scholarships and different things, different things that were the results of the process of holding myself accountable behind closed doors.

When I dive into that accountability, what it really was was just a passion and a love for the process, because I had found my thing. And that’s where I think a lot of people that I coach struggle with accountability and discipline because they haven’t found their thing, that they love so much, that they’re even willing to do it when it sucks.

And you have to try a lot of things to do that. And that’s where today, when I mentioned the accountability. I kind of struggle with the focus because there’s so many things I love to do. And we were just mentioning like with the guitars, like you wanted to do it, but then so many other things pop up. And as an adult, you don’t have unlimited time.

When I was a kid, I could try one thing one day and the next thing the next day, but you’re making these commitments and you realize that there’s a sacrifice to these commitments. So some of them just get pushed away and that can be overwhelming and stressful. And that’s where. If you have 50 good things versus two, when you have to, you can go left or right.

It’s kind of clear, but when you have 50, you’re like, oh wow, this is overwhelming. Um, so to answer that, like the accountability stemmed from childhood and then bled into, when I got to the corporate world, I was the guy that would either train before work or after work, which ultimately led to. Uh, the people next to me saying, Hey, what are you doing?

We’d love to get involved. Like we’ll pay you. And that’s what led to my entrepreneurial journey and the transition, because I learned really quickly that the market will tell you what it wants. And a lot of people sitting next to me to the left of the right, wanted to lose weight, get in better shape, not sit as much at a desk all day.

And I was already doing it cause. And athlete. And then I got certified, got nutrition certified, and just started solving that problem for them. And didn’t think anything further. I had no idea I’d be sitting here today, podcasting or doing any of that. It all started as I was an athlete. I wanted to help other people become more involved in athletics and becoming healthier and happier.

And I didn’t think anything above that, but it stemmed from the accountability of myself. No matter what every single day, just continuing to show up, you bring up a couple interesting comments. Um, one is like on the guitar and th the let’s talk about the super power of focus a little bit, because you, you are right where it’s, it’s a lot different decision when you have two good opportunities versus 50.

And so the guitar is something that’s super interesting to me that I, you know, that I want to pick up and it’s not so much. I don’t have time. I could make time for it, but it’s, I know the commitment, like the length of commitment that I’m walking into. And so for me, I got, I’ve gotten really good at saying no.

And, um, I think we all know that there’s the importance of saying no and focusing, but, um, for whatever reason, for the majority of us, it’s super hard. So what, what’s the hang up between? But do you have any comments on why that is so hard and or is this what you see consistently is, is, you know, a big part of focus is really just saying, no, it’s, it’s hard for us as we get into adulthood because we have a lot of things pulling at us at the same time.

And what I mean by that is you have bills you have to pay, you have. Maybe you have friends and family that you’re supporting, you have your own happiness. You have a job where you have coworkers that might depend on you or employees that might depend on you. You have. Going off the happiness, you have your own interests because I kind of consider that different is it’s like learning in the moment.

Something might be difficult. It might not, you might not be super joyful doing it, but you know that this is going to lead to something better for your life. Um, and that’s like running as a great example where it’s not always fun. It’s not going to be fun, but you’re so obsessed with that process and what that fulfillment gives you.

Afterwards that it’s a hundred percent worth it. And I think people struggle for two reasons. One of the main reasons is we live in this world where social media exists and we fear being a beginner. We don’t remember what it’s like to be a beginner. And that commitment is like, I’m going to have to, I’m going to have to commit this to a year and I’m still going to.

And that hurts people. They, they get into this mindset of chasing the carrot and they like the carrot when they get it. So we go down this one path, maybe a job, or maybe a passion or an interest, and we get better and better and better at it. And at some point for some people, a lot of people like myself who start losing that energy to put towards that, it starts to becoming unfulfilling.

And we don’t know what to do in that moment. Most people will stick it out. And that’s where you see people sticking out careers for decades and jobs. They don’t like. And in relationships they don’t like, because what they don’t know is scarier than what they do now. And then the second reason is they don’t see a path to profit.

And what I mean by that is not just money, right. They can’t reverse engineer down how this will affect my life in a positive way overall, if I just do it and just kind of detach the feeling of sucking in the beginning. So what I mean by detach the feeling and emotion is when you show up, like I want to learn guitar, cause I know it’s going to help me.

I do a lot of media in podcasting, video pictures and I know and writing and I know. Learning music is not something I’ve ever done. Really? What is my life missing? Because I don’t have that extra piece. So I’ve never learned that extra piece. That until that uncertainty actually excites me. So what I do is I start with, okay, I’ve gotten better at, instead of saying no commit at the lowest of levels.

So what I would associate it with, if we’re talking sports is instead of going right to playing every single weekend or three times a week. Just getting on an intramural team that plays 30 minute games and it’s once a week. That’s how I look at. It’s kind of hard is like, how do I go to, uh, uh, uh, somebody in person once a month and really have a good experience just to see if I can unlock this other thing that I don’t, that I’m uncertain about, but that, that scares most people because they’re like, well, how’s this benefiting my life versus I’m like, I know this is going to benefit my life.

I just don’t know how just yet. Let’s talk about the emotion side a minute. For a minute, you had talked about inspiring other people and you have different forms of medium that you do at one of them being a podcast. I want to talk about that for a moment, because I’m sure you can relate where. The, the part that keeps me interested in podcast.

Like a lot of other people will do podcasts because they either can monetize it on the front end or monetize it on the backend. Or they have a specific agenda like mine. I don’t have an agenda whatsoever. And, and most the, the biggest driving factor is I just like new conversations and meeting new people and hearing stories.

But what’s been interesting after doing it for a couple of years is like the wild card. And so I’ll give you two examples, um, that I’ve had. And then I want to say. If you kind of have the same experiences. So I had one gentleman that sent me a private message. He went, found me on Facebook and he sent me like this huge novel, first first message.

I don’t know her. And it was this big, no of gratitude and how he was so grateful that I put my story out there. And, but then he transitioned into stuff. I didn’t even talk about. He talked about, um, like he had an eating disorder and, uh, he, he overcome being anorexic and things. Like, I’ve never, I’ve never gone through that.

I didn’t talk about anything even close to that, but whatever my story was on that show was parallel to how he interpreted his story through his eating disorder. And so I get messages like that. And then I had one just recently where. This one caught me off guard too, because he said he was getting a divorce after listening to like following me for awhile.

And I thought that was weird because I always talk about how much I love my wife and how we’ve been together for 17 years. And we have three kids and like, how do you balance work and personal life and all this stuff? And I said, I said, oh, I don’t remember my exact reply, but something like, oh, sorry to hear that.

Unless that’s a good thing, you know, I’m trying to get clarification on why that inspired him. And he came back and he said that he realized in the way that I show affection to my wife and he was giving that, and my wife reciprocates his wife wasn’t reciprocating. And so he realized what opportunity is out there.

And so I get, I get something like that. A couple times a week, definitely couple times a month. Um, and those wild cards of gratitude are kind of what keep me pushing out and doing whatever it is that I do. So do you run into things like that and is that like a motivating factor? First off epic stories. I love hearing that.

And secondly, I love hearing that the reason behind your podcasts, more people, I hope that are listening to this. I hope you start it doesn’t have to be podcasts can be anything with that type of mindset. Um, a similar way. Like I started the podcast on a rooftop at a whole foods with a lav mic in my phone because my friends were just like, you need to do this.

Like you, you. Conversation and learning new things. This is the best way to do that. So it started as a selfish way for me to learn. And then I was like, oh my God, like I can get people’s stories out there that have never been on a podcast before or new ways for people to connect. So I, a hundred percent am just thankful that you’re, that there’s other people out there that are doing it for that reason.

Um, Yes all the time I have this, here’s a trick for people. Um, I have a, and I could show you this offline. I have a, an, uh, an iPhone group. Uh, photo thing, it’s an album that says that the title of it is my motivators. So people will reach out and say things like they said to you. And they think that I’m motivating them.

I screenshot every time that someone reaches out and I put it in the album and anytime that I’m feeling. Sticky point in my life or some something traumatic happens. I go right back to that album. And I just read through all the messages from all the different people. The most recent, recent one that I, uh, got really hit home with me because it was it’s from somebody that, uh, I really think.

Potential in this world too, to really make a big impact. And he kind of relates to my story, but what he, what it came down to, what he said was listening to my podcast and reading some of the things that I write and watching some of my content has made him more confident to show up in his life in a better way.

And he specifically said public speaking. And I think public speaking is a fear we all have. And he said something very interesting. He said, I. I used to be really weak at public speaking, but after connecting with you and chatting with you and looking at all your content, and now don’t fear it anymore and I’m not weak at it anymore.

And I came back with a question as a lot of times, I do. I said, where are you weak at public speaking? Or did you expect to be great at it when you first started it? And it was really interesting because I always bring up the story of Michael Jordan. On a lot of the content that I do because not a lot of people know this and I want people to know it, that he didn’t win a championship for seven years to come seven years.

You imagine you manage them working so hard for something, it takes you seven years. Like people go to college and party for four years, but like putting your head down and working extremely hard for seven years and you don’t have the thing that you want. And then finally it happens. And then you win at six times and MVP six times.

Everybody in today’s world wants it right now. And that’s where those motivating factors I ever going to relate. This are so important because they remind me that this is a journey. This is a process that just keep going. These, these motivating little tidbits are worth more than gold to me because they make that reminder of, Hey, I’m five years in my journey.

I’m not a millionaire yet, but I will be. And with that result, I’m going to be able to help make a bigger impact on even more people and continue to scale, uh, that legacy of, of helping people thrive in life, as I would say. Yeah. Yeah. There’s, there’s a lot. I agree with the, the Michael Jordan documentary on Netflix is interesting.

Um, Because obviously we all know his accomplishments, but I, that documentary, I found more interesting for him as a person and made me appreciate him more for his personal willingness to commit to his craft. What, whether obviously in this case, it’s basketball, but whatever that craft is for anybody like that level of dedication was cool to see the backstory behind it.

Like. I don’t want to cut you off, but when he cried, when he wins that championship and he literally looks like a baby crying with that trophy, it made me reflect and say, where in my life can I focus on something that would make me feel like that? Yeah. And that’s what I’m trying to find. And podcasting is one of them.

Like you take this away from. And it would, I’m just trying to get better every single day. So again, thank you for having, yeah, it was interesting. You talked about taking screenshots because I do that too. Um, and I’ll use it for a lot of times. I use it for slightly different. I’ll use it for, um, you know, sharing some of those stories to continue to inspire other people to.

But like you said, even though I put it out there on the front end to inspire others on the end, it’s what inspires me. And I’ll even tell those people when they send it and send these little messages of gratitude, I’ll say, Hey, thanks for sending this. Um, you know, these are the things that keep me going.

So it’s interesting. Um, it’s cool to hear somebody else do that in a very comparable way. Um, let’s talk about when there’s been a couple things where we’ve slightly touched on, uh, Like loneliness, uh, at different levels of success or aiming to get successful. Um, I’ll give you like a, an example. So a lot of people hear that when you, when you get a certain level of success, you know, it’s lonely at the top is the saying.

And, um, I’ve found that the more successful you become, the more it changes other people around you more than yourself. And that amplifies the feeling of loneliness loneliness a lot of times. And I have a really recent example. Um, so. I joined this mastermind, you know, Russell Brunson, ClickFunnels world.

Yes. I just had somebody buys traffic funnels book like a day ago. Yeah. Yeah. So. Yeah. So I joined his inner circle. And so there was, um, there was like 80 of us at this little private thing up at Boise last week. And, um, when you get in these environments or even like you and I in the podcast, we talk about these certain things.

You can’t talk to everybody else about. And then I go to this group and everybody’s successful. Everybody’s made at least a million bucks. Everybody’s done like all these cool things. Everybody gives back. Everybody impacts other people everybody’s driving factor is like, give, give, give. And so like, that’s my world.

And then I go there. And then it’s like, yay, there’s other people. And like, you know, there’s other people, but you don’t see it at that scale on a consistent basis. And so we had like three days where it was just this private group together, and then I leave and I’m all excited. And then the second day I was home, I was frustrated because then I was.

I don’t have that today. And so it’s like, it’s like this other side of success and entrepreneurship and growth that, um, anybody outside of it must go, you know, I was like, oh, must be so horrible. You know, it’s a sad story, but then when you’re in it, like, you don’t understand it until you’re in it. So, um, I didn’t leave you with a specific question, but I’ll let you chime in on anything on that.

I think it’s very, it’s a very interesting topic to go in and I think it stems from, we are. We are pretty real ruthless as human beings mean, meaning we try to say one problem is, is worse than another. We’re very comparative to other people and to situations just because you’re killing it and to the outside world, to somebody else doesn’t mean that deep down that you have this feeling of fulfillment and abundance and.

The greatest, I’m a big stats and data’s guy, I mean, suicide is a, is a raising percentage in this country. And a lot of the times it is people that are quote unquote, better off than what we would think right on the outside you would say, well, that person has it all. So I really think about this a lot and I think it stems from the loneliness.

That we don’t feel accepted as much, but also from, we don’t know how to interpret that as how do we build that around us. And I think that comes from the individualism that we’ve really created in this world. Where for you, like, you got this really fulfilling feeling at this one space, and I know that feeling deep down, fortunately, I have a wife that.

Both of us are kind of like aligned on this feeling. So we could spend all day every day together and like, kind of give us that need. But the second thing that I kind of did to give myself that feeling all the time is how do I create communities, where I build up those other people. And my day is almost like that every single day, I don’t need to be around millionaires to feel like a millionaire every single day.

So I kind of got obsessed and this is different people, different vibes for different tribes. Right. Um, I. Someone that is considered like in the early stage entrepreneurship game. Meaning I like to sit with. People that are in the corporate world that want to start an idea that are in college that are trying to start a side hustle.

I love seeing people bring something that they thought in their brain to reality. And then they got something from that, whether it’s money, whether it’s gifts, whether it’s new, a new network and resources, the fulfillment from seeing that as something that I don’t even know how to describe to other people.

And. It was a very lonely path to that though, to kind of describe what you were, what you were feeling. It took me some time to figure out that feeling because when I was an athlete, I’ll give some. Practical descriptions. When I was an athlete, I studied engineering. I was the only athlete on the team that was doing engineering.

I was also the only engineer that was playing sports. So I felt very alone because in the classroom, I couldn’t relate to anybody on the field can really relate to anybody. Then I get into the corporate world. Again, it was the same thing. Like everyone, I was into tech, but I also was going to the gym every day.

I was like all over the place and I didn’t really know anyone else doing that until I got into the world of entrepreneur. Fortunately, what I started doing is, well, where’s a hotbed for entrepreneurs and people that are like this Austin, Texas is one of them. So to wrap this kind of story up for you, it’s a lot more difficult.

I would say like you have, you have three kids. Like they, you haven’t, you have needs that go beyond your own personal. Business and stuff like that. Like that is the number I look forward to that actually one day where my wife and I are planning kids, hopefully we were blessed with them in the future. Um, but right now I was flexible enough to say I’m just going to move to where the highest concentration for the most part of, uh, social and mission-based entrepreneurs are.

And I believe that’s awesome. So I’m here now. And there is a lot of people that I get to just work with every day. And they give me that feeling that you described before that though a hundred percent relate and anyone listening, if you have that feeling, you just got to go to where that you can get as much of that feeling every single day.

Cause it’s going to motivate you to be more, uh, achieve more and then give back more. Yeah. Yeah. The, uh, yeah, that’s a good point. Um, I think it, it made me, uh, Well, I want to join a couple more groups because you get to a certain level of success and you want to be around people that can bring you up even further.

And so the further you go, um, you know, the less options there are, but there are certainly a lot of options out there that I, that I need to look into. Um, and you ought to check out, uh, I’m not saying move away from Austin, but maybe come spend some time. Yeah, it’s on my hit list. Um, um, I work closely with a brand called Rhone, which has men’s apparel, um, their Austin captain, and one of their businesses.

One of their, um, facilities is out in Utah and your salt lake city. So it’s definitely on the hit list. Uh, I describe Utah as a public secret. It’s like, everybody knows about. The magic here, but nobody talks about it unless you talk, it’s like fight club. Like nobody talks about it unless, you know, your, you know, kind of thing, but there’s, there’s freaking everything here.

I mean, like eBay has been here forever. Adobe’s here. Um, Facebook’s here just like podium here. Like all these billion dollar companies. It’s not, where are you located in Utah? Uh, I’m in Northern, you’re talking about 30 minutes starts in salt lake, but all the magic’s about 10 minutes south of salt lake.

Yeah. All right. So as we get closer to wrapping up, um, I’m going to ask you, I keep seeing, I keep seeing your tattoos. What’s your favorite tattoo? You’re going to do this to me. Uh, that’s so tough. Uh, favorite tattoo or one with a good story. Okay. So they, all the thing about me is they I’ve was very careful, um, with getting tattoos and.

They all have a really big meaning to me. So I’ll just talk about, I have sporadic ones. Um, but I’ll talk about my sleeve because that was the one that was like the most thought out. Um, and that, that took me until my mid twenties to really like decipher what I wanted. So on the inner side of my arm is, uh, a realistic portrait and you’ll be able to see it because we’re on video of a Wolf.

That kind of represents my personality, where I like to be a pack animal, but I also could survive alone and thrive alone as like that lone Wolf. Um, it’s also, um, wolves are, are docile and can live in multiple climates and multilateral things. And I look to be that type of human being, um, and reliable.

The next thing is I have a city skyline of Philadelphia with the love symbol, and it really is just remembering my roots and, and that grit that my parents and everyone around me who supported me growing up. Gifted me a life that a lot of people are not as fortunate enough to have. So just always remembering where I come from.

And then the love symbol is the city of brotherly love is this from reminding myself that don’t lean too much into the side of a aggressive entrepreneur, like remember to slow down and be loving and compassionate and kind. And then the last part of it, uh, the other three are, I have a world map because I want to travel the world.

So it’s all. Stemmed on a map. So all these things I’m describing are just on a map. Um, and then for my wife, I have a succulent that is a more, I would say, detail oriented. And then mine is very spiky. So it kind of shows how opposites kind of attract. She’s a lot more introverted than I am. More like just feels the world at a different wavelength than I do.

And I’m more of like the go, the go after everything. I want, uh, adrenaline junkie type and we balance each other out because we’ve learned that we need a little bit of both and she helps me make a lot of decisions that I kind of overlook and vice versa. So I got two tattoos or remind myself that, um, Yeah, that’s us and they’re succulents because succulents again, can thrive in a lot of conditions that can go a lot of time without water.

And it was another thing where I consider her and I, our relationship, um, very entwined in thriving, wherever we’re at, throw us a problem, we’re going to handle it and we’re going to handle it together. And it’s something I don’t want, inspire other people to do as well. And that last things are, I have a.

I’m obsessed with kind of outdoors. So I have the ocean sunset and then mountain, uh, with the moon. So the trees right here, it’s kind of upside down right now, but, uh, with the moon. So it’s a 24 hour cycle and that connects to on my hand is the clock with the heartbeat. So most people think that time is got 24 hours in a day.

Uh, it’s numeric versus in my eyes. When you’re born, you have a finite amount of heartbeats. Nobody knows them. Right? So the heart comes from the heartbeat comes from my wife’s father, died of a heart attack in the spin class at the age of 53, I believe. And. He was in great shape. He was an All-American soccer player in college, and he just kept doing that.

He was playing with 30 olds when he died and unfortunately had a massive heart attack and she never saw them again. And what that led to was me writing her an email. Cause I’ve known her since we were 10. I was in New York and she was in Houston, wrote her an email that just gave my condolences. And then we started emailing back and forth for like two and a half years.

Just about jobs and checking in on each other. And that led me to go visit her in Texas, reconnect and look myself in the mirror and say, I’m not happy with where I’m at with my life. How do we make a bigger impact? Well, how did I get here in the first place? Unfortunately, somebody gave their life and kind of started this chain reaction from the universe.

And that’s kind of how I got here. The tattoos again, the one that I ended on on my hand is because even with a long sleeve shirt on or suit or whatever, I looked down at my hand and like, I never forget, uh, how I even got here in this moment, because if that never happened, I have no idea. To be honest where I’d be.

Yeah. That’s, that’s cool how it all ties together. And, um, you know, I appreciate you sharing those and it’s it’s, uh, I was going to ask you about your, why. So in, as in CJ’s kind of show notes, he said his wife rejected him at age 10 and he had chased her for throughout school, years and everything. So it’s kind of funny to hear that at the end.

That’s cool. Um, all right, well, I appreciate your time, CJ. I wanna give you the last few moments to tell our listeners, um, maybe a little bit of what it’s like to work with you and how they can find out more. Yeah. So again, just thank you for having me on here. Every time I get a chance to just learn new things about other people and, and be inspired is, is a gift.

So I’m walking into this Tuesday, have a little bit more pep in my step. So I just want to thank you, Damon. And anybody that listened to this, the easiest way to find me is that CJ, CJ dot Finley on Instagram, I have multiple different accounts. And that’s why I’m just pointing you at the one that’ll kind of show you everything.

I’m up to. My passions are health wellness, mindset, uh, and entrepreneurship, and the people that I work with right now, I’m actually going to be starting a coaching bootcamp program in 2022, where it’s more focused on the person that is really committed to spending an extra five to 10 hours a week on something that they do want to.

Turn from a side hustle or passion into something that they’re monetizing and. Really reflective of where I’ve been in my life, where I never intended to become an entrepreneur. I just had a full-time job. And I was passionate about personal training and made some money on the side and then really realized, wow, I could, I could do this.

And it’s more fun and fulfilling them, my actual degreed jobs. So my whole goal, I think in 2022 is to build a podcast, go check out, thrive on life podcasts, and then help other people realize that they. Have more potential than, than they think. Yeah. Yeah. I think most of us do. So you do your family, everybody.

Thanks for jumping on learning from others. Damon Burton here. And thank you so much for listening to the learning from others podcast. I sincerely hope that today’s guest helped you learn something since 2007, I’ve generated millions of dollars for businesses like yours. Ready to show up higher on search engines for words that you can monetize, but without paying.

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