Podcast Co-host and Guest: Jeff Wuorio: Jwuorio@yahoo.com
Transcription:
Kris Parsons00:00
Welcome to changing the rules, a weekly podcast about people who are living their best life and how you can figure out how to do it too. Join us with your lively host Ray Loewe, better known as the luckiest guy in the world.
Ray Loewe00:15
Good morning, everybody. This is Ray Loewe. I don't know if I'm the one. I'm the lively host, but I'm certainly a host. And I'm sitting here in scenic downtown Woodbury, New Jersey, with my engineer Taylor, and he's gonna make sure that this program runs really well for us. And our guest today is Jeff Wuorio. And Jeff has been on before. And we're going to do a really interesting show today because basically, we're gonna write the last chapter in a book. So good morning, Jeff, how are you today? I'm excellent. How are you? Good. So let me introduce Jeff a little bit further. Jeff is a writing and publishing consultant. He's also a ghostwriter. I met Jeff years and years ago when he was a writer for Money magazine. And we've kind of stayed in touch over probably a 30 year, timespan. And Jeff has been on our podcast as a guest. And if you go back to Episode 42, you'll find out everything you want to know about Jeff. So Jeff, good morning. And the subject today is a little different. Because Jeff, you helped us write a book. And we're gonna talk a little bit about that. So, first of all, explain to, our listeners, what a ghostwriter does.
Jeff Wuorio01:39
Basically, the term is very apt because it does kind of describe in its entirety, what a ghostwriter does. A ghostwriter essentially works with people to write a book without usually the requisite amount of credit that goes to writers, there may be a width, you know, he's with someone or something like that. But for the most part, we are behind the scenes largely. And it's a wonderful way to write because you meet remarkable people as a matter of routine, and help them express their thoughts and ideas to the best of your ability. So in that sense. It's like being smart, but somebody else is supplying the intelligence. And all you're doing is kind of massaging it a little bit so.
Ray Loewe02:43
Well, you know, it's a really interesting experience, because KC, who was my co-host for since the inception on this, changing the rules podcast, and I started this book, and then we got stuck. And we went to our friend Jeff, and Jeff got us unstuck. And I think it's kind of a two-way street. Because I think in one sense, you provide expertise that we don't have, you provided a flow for us, when we got stuck, you were able to make the words go together the right way. And so one of the things I would strongly suggest is that anybody who's got a book in their head, and has been thinking about trying to get it out that you use somebody like Jeff to get it out on the table. And we're mostly done with this book right now. And the interesting part of our podcast today is I think we're going to use it to write the last chapter. Yeah. Go ahead. Well, let me ask you a couple of questions. Jeff, I think this writing is a two-way street because we learn from you and I think you learn from us. So as we put together this book on the luckiest people in the world. What did you learn about the luckiest people in the world?
Jeff Wuorio04:03
It's really been inspiring, that, if any, if I gleaned anything from it, it is just how inspiring some people can be in living their lives in terms of going outside the norm and going outside the prescribed box that a lot of us are supposed to be in personally professionally and what have you and the creative and innovative ways in which they do that. It's just remarkable. How and when I guess one of the messages of the book is that there are so many avenues with which you can do this. That it's open to everyone who's willing to at least experiment to a certain extent.
Ray Loewe04:53
Yeah, and I think anybody can be the luckiest people in the world. But you have to want to do this. And I think a lot of times, we sit there and we're not inspired. Let me go back to my old financial planning days. And tell a quick story. We had a lot of people that were in their 60s, who had tons of money and claimed they hated their jobs. And yet they refuse to quit. And why? And that's a rhetorical question, I really don't want to answer it, we'll answer it in a minute. And, then we had some other people who were in their same zone 50, 60, 70 claim they hated their jobs. And quickly, as soon as they thought they had the opportunity runoff and, stop doing what they were doing. And I think what happens in here is two things, it's the same thing. And in both cases, there wasn't a plan, and there wasn't some thinking about where you want to go. And those who had the money and refused to leave just didn't feel comfortable with the future, they didn't feel comfortable with change. And so they tend to, stay where they are, and put up with the agony that they had and the dislike of their current situation because they didn't know how to do it better. And, many of the others that ran off, were unhappy with their jobs. And what we found out is after three or four or five years, guess what they were back to being unhappy because they had no direction as to where they wanted to go and what they wanted to do. And, you know, one of the things that we're trying to say in this book here is that the luckiest people in the world are those people who personally design their own lives, and then live them under their own terms. And the interesting thing is, these people are happy almost all the time, they're challenged and fulfilled, they know who they are, and what they want out of life. And they found a way to spend their time following what's fascinating and motivating to them without taking on obligations that they're not mentally or emotionally committed to. And when you think about this, and you think about the people that have been able to achieve this, you have to ask the question. So who wouldn't want to do this? Go ahead, Jeff.
Jeff Wuorio07:28
Just a quick thought, who wouldn't want to do this? Well, I think one thing that's, you know, for better or worse, we're all creatures of habit. We defer to the familiar. And I think that's a kind of a compelling reason why people, you know, this is the way it is, this is the way it was for my parents, my grandparents, that kind of thing. It's just the natural way of how things are and going outside of that is unnerving for a lot of people just because it's a break in habits, a breaking routine, and it's a breaking the status quo. And that can be very, very unsettling for a lot of people you know.
Ray Loewe08:15
Yeah, and you hit the nail on the head here because to, make changes, you actually have to change. And, you know, we talk about changing the rules on this podcast all the time that, we get, ensconced in everybody else's rules and past situations, and a lot of people say, you know, the reason I hate work is because it's supposed to hate it, no, that's why they call it work. And the fact is, you don't have to do that. But you really do have to make change, and you have to want to make change, and you have to be able to implement those changes. And that I think, is what sets everybody else apart.
Jeff Wuorio09:01
Yeah, I'm working with a gentleman now, who basically one of his essential messages that he's trying to convey is that we are always unhappy or unhappier than we need to be, when we let you know, forces outside of ourselves dictate how we live our lives. The dictum of, you know, you go to school, you go get a job, you get married, you know, all these kinds of things that are external forces. And if you fall victim to them, as he says, you not only are going to be less happy than you can be but all the more important, you're going to be a whole lot less fulfilled and successful. however, you define success in terms of how you live your life. So it's not just touchy-feely, good kind of things. There is a pragmatic and practical element to this because you're more successful in what you deem an important component of success by not letting others dictate what you do and why?
Ray Loewe10:09
Yeah, and so this is what we tried to do in this book. And, Jeff, you did a masterful job in helping me lay this out. But we talked a little bit about this definition of the luckiest people. And we, have tons of stories in there about people who do this in their regular life, who have the mindsets that are necessary to feel lucky and be lucky. And we laid out what those mindsets are, and you know, often is still not quite enough. And that's what we kind of want to do in this last chapter that we're going to try and write today while we're on the air. And, that is that people tend to need support, that you can kind of want to be the luckiest person in the world, you can kind of try to be it. But it's a lot easier, it's a lot more fun when you hang out with other luckiest people in the world. And, and we have a community that has been forming over the last umpteen years of the luckiest people in the world. And what we've been trying to do is to try to do some things to support that community. So what we found is that change keeps occurring, that the world doesn't stay static. So one day, we feel like we're the luckiest people in the world, and then we get hit by COVID. And all of a sudden, the world shuts down. And those people that really are the luckiest people in the world have found a way to handle it and change. And usually, they do this because they have other friends that they can talk to other people that they can listen to. And that's the purpose of the podcast that we're doing right now. It's to kind of put in front of people, other people who are the luckiest people in the world, and allow you to sit there and say Why? Why are they? And what can I learn from them? So one of the things we've been trying to do, Jeff is put together a community and we actually have several things that we do to support this community. One is this podcast, where we try and put in front of everybody, a whole series of luckiest people in the world. So that you can sit there and say, Wow, this person did something that maybe I can do to or I can never do that in a million years. They don't all work but in there somewhere is something that will work for you if you listen to enough of them. And we also have this thing called coffee and conversation that we do and cocktails and conversation. And every Thursday, we get small groups of people together. And we try and have a conversation about what's going on in the world, and how we can feel luckier, and how we can learn from other people. We do a conference a couple times a year, and that conferences are either virtual or their real life, where we bring in some speakers to talk about how to feel luckier. And you know, one of the big things that I want to try to talk about a little bit before we get off the air today is .travel. And the travel connection that we put together because traveling is a great way to meet new people and to see the world through the eyes of other people. Unfortunately, we couldn't do that for the last year and a half. But we're getting back into the concept of being able to travel together. So what we hope to do is to invite people to join our group of the luckiest people in the world or form your own, whichever works for you. So go ahead, Jeff, I'm monopolizing this conversation, as I often do.
Jeff Wuorio13:48
By no means, I think in terms of the group, just the fact that there is such a group or there are such groups, I think helps mitigate that fear of doing something different because if nothing else, you realize you're not alone in doing this. There are other people who have considered this and have done so successfully. So you don't feel quite so singularly adventurous as it were, you find out there are other people doing the exact same thing, and here's what they're doing. And that's comforting and supportive. And I think the another thing to bear in mind is that when we say you know, the luckiest people in the world, it doesn't have to be a wholesale 100% other revision of your entire life. You know you don't have to be working on Wall Street pulling down $5 million a year. And then you chuck all that to become a pearl diver or something like that. There are gradations and there are levels of change. That can be very, very rewarding. And it doesn't have to be a complete redo of your entire life, even if just a component or two is changed, and make a world of difference in how you see that, how you feel, and how you view everything else.
Ray Loewe15:12
You know, that's a really good point. And I've got a couple of examples. But let me quantify this a little bit there, tend to be three groups of people that need this kind of a community. There's a group of people out there that have made up their mind somewhere that they want to feel luckier than they are that they really want to take the time and design their own lives and live in the way they want. But they're stuck. They don't know how to do that. And a lot of times, they're stuck by circumstances, you know, they feel closed in they need the money that they have because they have a family, they've got kids that are going to go to college. And so they can't just chuck their job like you said. So how can they become lucky? So hold that thought for a minute. The second group that we get in here, are a group of people that say, you know, I used to feel like a lucky person in the world. But now for some reason, I don't. And I've gotten into this Limbo status. And it could be because of sickness or illness, it could be a change in family, it could be something like this COVID thing that we went through. And the idea is you fall off the wagon, and how do you get back. And one of the best ways of doing that is to have people to talk to, and maybe a mentor to help pull you out of that abyss that you're in. And the third group that fits in here are those people who truly feel like they're the luckiest people in the world now, but they don't want to fall off. And they're always looking for more, you know, if you stay status quo in life, you're usually going to wind up back where you were, at some point in time, you have to keep moving ahead and keep looking for what you want and how to expand and we have a whole bunch of people who are actively looking for how do I steal the next best thing that you're doing from you? Because I want to do it too. Okay, yeah. So I took some time before this podcast, I called up a couple of the people that are a show up all the time in our luckiest group, membership group. And I was talking to a guy by the name of Bill Hughes, and Bill is an executive coach. And he's been in the financial services business for most of his life. But one of the comments that he hit is this goes back to what you were saying before, it's not an all-or-nothing thing. And he finds that a lot of people get stuck because they're busy. You know, it could be a housewife that's got two or three screaming kids at home and is trying to work a job and take care of the family and do all these things. And when Is there time for me? And he said he uses something called opportunity days all the time with his clients. I think it's a wonderful thing. Where you know, you take a day off once a month, and you say, I'm going to find a way to create a day for me. And then I'm going to use that day to start to work on this, how do I get lucky? Or how do I get more control over my own life? How do I move forward? Okay. And then that one day maybe becomes two days a month, and then three days a month, and before you know it, it takes over and becomes the norm. So thanks to Bill Hughes for that comment, because I think it solves this issue of this all-or-nothing thing that you were talking about before. We had a young lady on our podcast not too long ago, her name was Lourdes Nichols. And Lourdes has a full-time job. She likes her job. She does advertising work with some of the newspapers in the Greater Chicago area. But she had an event that took place years ago when she was in high school and she found out that her mother was born in a Japanese internment during World War Two. And she was so horrified by this experience of people just losing a portion of their life. When maybe they didn't deserve it. You know, there were a lot of reasons why these camps were, put together. Most of them not good. But anyway, if you find yourself in that kind of situation, what do you do? Well, what Lourdes has been able to do is she said, I'm not going to quit my job, but I am going to take this cause I am going to make this cause part of my life's work. And I'm going to get engaged in it and I'm going to be fulfilled by it. And she's created this portion of her life for herself without quitting her job. Again, all of this comes from being able to listen to podcasts of what other people are doing, being able to talk to other people and find out what's important to them and how they're managing to do this stuff. You know, I think one of the people that we wrote about in our book, Ruth Kinzler. Ruth had a stroke during a summer event down at the Jersey Shore, and all of a sudden found herself partially paralyzed. So what did she do? She quit her job. And she started doing what she loved to do baking and cooking for people. And it just created a career for her. And it's, you know, how do you find out about these things? How do you get motivated to do these things? Well, I think you listen to podcasts, you talk to other people.
Jeff Wuorio20:54
And I think to, again, the group in its various forms. If nothing else, it just gets I hope I and I believe it will just get people thinking a little bit, if nothing else, in terms of maybe it's never crossed their mind that they could do something else. Or maybe it's never crossed their mind that they could keep the job that they like, and yet have this adjunct element of their life that they find incredibly rewarding. It's just a Kickstarter for creativity and thinking in ways that perhaps you never have before.
Ray Loewe21:30
Yeah. And again, you need help you need somebody to seed the idea for you, because we, unfortunately, can't think of all these things that are out there. And then how do you make it happen? How do you take little chunks and make those chunks bigger and bigger and bigger? You know, one of the other people I talked to prepare for this podcast was a young lady by the name of Bonnie Shay. And Bonnie is a professional organizer. And she specializes in photo organizing, and she's on all of these, she listened to all of these podcasts. And she said, You know, I've realized that I was brought up by my parents to be self-sufficient. They told me and I guess, parents like to do this, they want to raise you. So you're independent, and you can do whatever you have to do. And she said, By listening to these things and talking to other people, I realized that this is really a strength-based world. And I have certain strengths and things that I'm really good at. And when I do them, I'm happy. And when I do those things, I can't do very well, I'm not happy. But there are other people out there that can do those things for me. Yep. Yep. And part of this collaboration. Go ahead, Jeff,
Jeff Wuorio22:45
just interject very quickly, a very dear friend of mine that I see often here we play music together after he retired from an engineering post, began a financial planning practice, because he'd always wanted to do that. And he's enjoying it like nobody's business. It's wonderful. And when we got together this weekend, he as it happens, he said, I'm going to be hiring an assistant in the coming year, and I said, Well, that's great, you know, you're growing, you'll need some help. And he goes really that and I want to really clearly delineate what I do versus what I want my assistant to do, I want to do the things that I enjoy doing that I am good at that I value. And I do not want to do the things that I'm not particularly good at or don't particularly enjoy. And that's going to be the function of my assistant. So I can really focus on what really resonates with me. And it really parallels what you were just saying,
Ray Loewe23:46
and see this is how you craft your own life. This is you know, if you're gonna do what you want to do, you have to realize that there are a whole bunch of things that need to be done. It's just that you don't have to do them, you have to figure out how you're going to put this together. You know, another comment that Bonnie made to me, that was really interesting. She was sick for a while she had to get some radiation treatment for something and she was radioactive and she wasn't sick, sick. But she couldn't see other people and she said, You know, I had people delivering meals to my door because they knew I needed help. And you know, I would never think about giving a meal to somebody because it would have had to be perfect. And all of a sudden she realized that these meals that she got weren't perfect. They were just gifts and she appreciated them so much that she realized now she can give this gift other people don't have to be perfect. All right. So all of these wonderful things come from sharing and they come from talking to other people and they come from learning. So this is what we want people to do. It's if you want to be the luckiest one of the luckiest people in the world. You know you got to have the right mindset, you got to have the right kind of plan. And then you have to surround yourself with people who can support you.
Jeff Wuorio25:10
I also think it's important to point out that this does not necessarily focus specifically on older people, for, however, you care to define that the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, that kind of thing. This group and this mindset is for everyone, and, to a certain extent, you know, and again, to, it can be difficult for young people, you know, if you're just married, and you know, you've got a new mortgage, and you've got a baby on the way and things like that, you can say, oh, I've just got too much on my plate. But even if you can carve out a small amount of time, to have this, this element that really you value most, you're incredibly lucky, then because you're, you're gonna jump on something so important than something so wonderful that people, older people, like myself, didn't get to until later in life. And it reminds me of the story of in the book that you share about going to the Antarctic and going to see the penguins and one of the members of the group so that we couldn't go see the penguins because we were no longer physically capable of doing it. illustrating that, you know, if you put this off too long, you may not be able, to accomplish or even experiment with something that is of true value to you. So it's a call to action for everyone.
Ray Loewe26:41
Yeah, and it's a call to action that everybody should take, because why live in a state of unhappiness for a period of time. And let me just give you another example, I have a friend of mine who's 40 ish, okay. She's got a great job in the standpoint it provider with a lot of income and a lot of money. And she's got two kids at home. And she realized that her job is just not fulfilling. It's, great from the standpoint of making money, she's doing some good things, but she's not doing those things that she feels passionate about. So she took some time during this whole COVID thing when she was forced to stay at home, and went back to school and an online version and started taking courses. And those courses now are giving her the ammunition to start opening up maybe a new job search or new thinking about what she wanted to do and where she wanted to go. So it's all there. But we need to get those ideas thrown at us we need to feel. Find the passion, you know, one last story, and then we're going to kind of have to wind up. But we used to do these trips all the time with our clients. When I was in the financial planning business and uh. We're doing them now again, with the luckiest people in the world is a group. And we'll get active again, now that COVID is pretty much under wraps, and start traveling. But my wife, Sandy, and I did some traveling on our own. And it was great because we got to share experiences with ourselves. And we got to dictate where the trip went. But we also did a lot of traveling with other people. And we found out that when we traveled with other people, we not only saw the world through our own eyes, but we got the chance to see them through other people's eyes. And not only that, but the other people shared other experiences with them. And all of a sudden you sit there as you check countries off around the world that you've been to now. And every time I check off one country Jeff, I wind up with three or four new ones, because I'm getting the shared experience of other people. And they're just getting me excited about life and what I can do. So this is this is
Jeff Wuorio29:04
In our experience, too. And travel my wife and I, a couple of years ago before COVID went to Scandinavia for a month. And yes, you do see how other people live. And you talk to them. And it's wonderful to see different value systems, different priorities, different lifestyles, things of that nature. But it's also reciprocal in that. I remember meeting these two young Italian women on the train with my wife, and they were just fascinated to see, you know, as fascinating as we were to hear what they how they lived. They said tell us about America, you know, what is it like, you know, you know, what stereotypes Do we have about America, but I'm not entirely accurate. And so it's a very reciprocal kind of benefit. You know you gain a lot but you also give a lot?
Ray Loewe30:02
Well, you know, unfortunately, Jeff, we're at about the end of our time over here. And I think the idea is that we've got this book ready to go, which should be out in the next couple of months. And we're excited about it because it shares how you can become one of the luckiest people in the world. But one of the big parts, and it's going to be the end of this book is that it's much more fun to do it with other people. And it's much easier to do with other people. And finding the community where you can get excited about life and people keep you there is really a great thing. So uh
Jeff Wuorio30:40
I look at it is to say, You have nothing to lose and everything to gain.
Ray Loewe30:45
Yep. any last comments before we cut off Jeff?
Jeff Wuorio30:48
know that that I was saving that pearl for the end? So let's wrap up with that
Ray Loewe30:52
So okay, we'll have to back up. That was the end. All right. So everybody, stay with us over the next couple of weeks. We're gonna have another great podcast next week. And we'll try and give you more and more ideas about how you can be the luckiest people in the world and be part of that group, and enjoy life more and more and more. So thanks for being with us.
Kris Parsons31:19
Thank you for listening to changing the rules, a weekly podcast about people who are living their best life and how you can figure out how to do that too. join us with your lively host Ray Loewe, better known as the luckiest guy in the world.