Why Running From Yourself Never Works with Jon Katz

Mike Forrester: 00:00:00

Well, hello and welcome back, my friend.

Mike Forrester: 00:00:02

And this week I'm joined by Jon Katz.

Mike Forrester: 00:00:04

Jon's got an amazing story of just traveling the world, having, like, experiences that most of us would be like, "That's super cool." And in the midst of all that, then discovering that it's like, I need to work on me.

Mike Forrester: 00:00:19

And that's so many of us, right?

Mike Forrester: 00:00:21

We're going along, um, kind of looking for the distraction, and then Jon is the one who realized, "Hey, I need to do the hard work." And so that's what we're gonna see, see in his story, and super excited for this one.

Mike Forrester: 00:00:36

Jon, how are you doing today, my friend?

Jon Katz: 00:00:38

I'm good, and you hit the nail on the head.

Jon Katz: 00:00:39

You used two big words.

Jon Katz: 00:00:41

The first is experiences.

Jon Katz: 00:00:43

The second is distractions.

Jon Katz: 00:00:45

And after 20 years of pursuing both, I realize they are one in the same.

Jon Katz: 00:00:49

I've been lucky enough to have a lot of experiences that most people think would somehow liberate them.

Jon Katz: 00:00:55

But at the end of the day, they all just served to be very temporary distractions from more serious issues that I was running from.

Jon Katz: 00:01:01

So I'm glad we kicked it off with that.

Mike Forrester: 00:01:03

Yeah, absolutely, my friend.

Mike Forrester: 00:01:05

Well, let's start in, what does life today look like for you on the business side of life?

Jon Katz: 00:01:11

So currently, I have a number of income-generating projects, none of which I thought myself worthy of before I turned my life around, and none of which are even close to the money I was…

Jon Katz: 00:01:23

generate even close to the money I was making before I turned my life around.

Jon Katz: 00:01:26

So just for point of reference, three years ago, I was working in a windowless warehouse, a room without ventilation.

Jon Katz: 00:01:35

It was freezing during the winter and blazing hot during the summer.

Jon Katz: 00:01:38

And I laugh because, not because there's any shame in that, but I, you know, I think there's actually a lot of dignity in every job in the world if the person is dignified in doing so.

Jon Katz: 00:01:48

But I didn't really want to be doing any of that.

Jon Katz: 00:01:50

It was my first job back in New York City, having lived in New Orleans for many years.

Jon Katz: 00:01:55

And it was in local food, which is my passion, but it was pretty much the lowest rung, and I thought myself worthy of that.

Jon Katz: 00:02:01

And just to think back of where I was then to where I am now is, is laughable.

Jon Katz: 00:02:05

So, um, I'm an online coach specializing in helping folks get their mind and body right.

Jon Katz: 00:02:10

That's one income-generating project.

Jon Katz: 00:02:12

I also an- am an independent project manager specializing in getting homes sale-ready.

Jon Katz: 00:02:19

So it's funny, we were chatting before, but, um, I just recently finished a project preparing a old pre-war co-op.

Jon Katz: 00:02:27

Um, the deceased had passed on.

Jon Katz: 00:02:30

Her children were out of state.

Jon Katz: 00:02:32

And I handled everything from, uh, her unfortunate passage to turning the keys over to the realtor.

Jon Katz: 00:02:38

Um, this is an independent project that, that I specialize in, and it's what I do around town.

Jon Katz: 00:02:43

And then the third thing is I'm the director of operations for a local food brand.

Jon Katz: 00:02:47

Um, it's an all-natural food brand that's located in the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York.

Jon Katz: 00:02:53

So these are three very diverse income-generating streams that I had no access to because my self-worth was so limited.

Jon Katz: 00:03:00

Now I believe myself to be worthy of these business situations, and thus they're in my life.

Mike Forrester: 00:03:06

That's a heck of a transformation, man, going from, like, feeling you're at the bottom and kind of in a box to now you're making impact in multiple ways in, in various areas.

Mike Forrester: 00:03:20

That's, that's a huge change, Jon.

Mike Forrester: 00:03:23

Congratulations, man.

Jon Katz: 00:03:25

Thank you.

Jon Katz: 00:03:25

And I had to.

Jon Katz: 00:03:26

I mean, the way you do one thing is the way you do everything, and so once I started doing one thing, living well, then everything I did in and around that, uh, increased with me.

Jon Katz: 00:03:38

So I'm super grateful for every part of the process and everything I had to do to get here.

Jon Katz: 00:03:43

And the journey's just begun.

Jon Katz: 00:03:44

I mean, we're just getting started.

Mike Forrester: 00:03:46

Yeah.

Mike Forrester: 00:03:46

No, I'm, I'm excited to see where it launches off 'cause I'm like, three, dude, uh, I doubt that's the, the extent of the reach and the businesses you'll have in that area.

Mike Forrester: 00:03:57

Well, let's, let's branch over onto the personal side.

Mike Forrester: 00:04:00

What does life look like for you in the personal area today?

Jon Katz: 00:04:04

So with personal development and creating the person I admire, it's something I work on every day.

Jon Katz: 00:04:08

I have this daily process that I live.

Jon Katz: 00:04:10

This is the same process that I teach.

Jon Katz: 00:04:12

So that level of personal development has flowered.

Jon Katz: 00:04:15

Now, on the personal relationship side, I'm currently single, and that's by design.

Jon Katz: 00:04:19

One of the main issues I had when I was living negative and sick was unhealthy relationships with others.

Jon Katz: 00:04:26

It, it was the biggest source of my pain.

Jon Katz: 00:04:28

And because of that, I've been extremely, extremely intentional about pursuing interpersonal relationships.

Jon Katz: 00:04:35

My heart is opening, and I definitely will be partnered at some point in the future.

Jon Katz: 00:04:40

Uh, but for now I'm, I'm somewhat intentionally single.

Jon Katz: 00:04:44

There's a lot of… I still have some-- You know, we all have some growth to pursue, and the matters of the heart for me is something that I'm still working on.

Jon Katz: 00:04:52

I need to ensure that I am a better version of myself.

Jon Katz: 00:04:56

I, uh, we were talking before about perfectionism.

Jon Katz: 00:04:58

I'm never going to be perfect, but I'm interested in becoming an even greater version of myself before really putting myself out there 'cause I'm interested in attracting someone at the level that I'm at in all areas.

Jon Katz: 00:05:07

I want to raise that level.

Mike Forrester: 00:05:10

So- Let's touch on the other side of that as well.

Mike Forrester: 00:05:14

Like you're wanting to improve yourself, and in our conversation earlier, we talked about like that whole perfection thing.

Mike Forrester: 00:05:22

So it's improve, improve, improve.

Mike Forrester: 00:05:24

But how do you then also kind of keep that balance where you don't hide and say, "I'm gonna continue improving"?

Mike Forrester: 00:05:34

It's like, at what point do you say, "Yeah, I've improved enough to step into this area"?

Jon Katz: 00:05:39

Well, it ain't easy.

Jon Katz: 00:05:40

You know, I've made, I've made a few attempts.

Jon Katz: 00:05:43

I'm an all-in dude, for better or for worse.

Jon Katz: 00:05:46

Thank God now it's better.

Jon Katz: 00:05:48

So everything that I pursue, I am all in.

Jon Katz: 00:05:51

And, uh, I have made some romantic entreaties since getting healthy, going all in very quickly.

Jon Katz: 00:05:56

The fact that they haven't worked out, no skin off my back.

Jon Katz: 00:05:59

But I know that there is some danger in pursuing some sort of perfect ideal Jon before being willing to go all in.

Jon Katz: 00:06:07

So it's more like my attempts at becoming partnered have been more staggered and less far-reaching and, and wide-ranging.

Jon Katz: 00:06:15

Uh, but there's some pain there for sure because, you know, when you present a certain type of energy and isn't returned, well, that's where the, that's where the desire leads to suffering.

Jon Katz: 00:06:24

Um, I, I like that we started this one with the discussion of, of the personal situation.

Jon Katz: 00:06:29

It's not something I typically get into.

Jon Katz: 00:06:31

Uh, yeah, I was in some unhealthy relationships.

Jon Katz: 00:06:34

In fact, the dissolution of an unhealthy relationship was the catalyst for me to reach essentially my rock bottom and, and turn my life around, you know, and drop all the nonsense and, and start living right.

Jon Katz: 00:06:46

Um, but it's, you know, it's something that I see in so many guys that they struggle with is this way of being present in their relationship, and I certainly wasn't.

Jon Katz: 00:06:54

So now that I am present in my life every day, I am so eager to finally at some point in the future be willing to bring this present, accountable, abundant, loving, self-loving individual to someone else.

Mike Forrester: 00:07:07

So when we're in relationships, I know I was guilty of this before myself, and I've seen other men that, that do this as well.

Mike Forrester: 00:07:15

We'll often excuse, you know, negative behavior that we're receiving or, you know, kind of participating in it just to normalize it.

Mike Forrester: 00:07:25

How did you get to the point where you're like, "Hey, this isn't healthy, and I'm able to be aware of it"?

Mike Forrester: 00:07:32

Like, you can see it and call it out for what it is and not just accept it because you're desperate for, you know, being in a relationship.

Mike Forrester: 00:07:41

Oftentimes that's, that's where it's like, "I'm not whole unless I'm in a relationship with somebody." Does that make sense?

Jon Katz: 00:07:49

Yeah, I mean, that's a false narrative.

Jon Katz: 00:07:50

That is being externally defined.

Jon Katz: 00:07:53

A man's worth comes from being internally defined by the conduct, how they conduct themselves every day.

Jon Katz: 00:07:58

If we let external things define us, whether it be being in a relationship- Economic status, perception of others, then we'll be a servant to that.

Jon Katz: 00:08:08

If we define our value by the way we feel inside, uh, the force we bring to bear on our own life, then we'll be internally defined, and we can always define it that way.

Jon Katz: 00:08:17

So for me, I was often externally defined.

Jon Katz: 00:08:21

I would partner with very physically attractive individuals that I was not really there for, that the connection wasn't really there in a way that either party wanted, but I was receiving such a massive ego boost due to my scarce mindset and my low feelings of self-worth.

Jon Katz: 00:08:37

If folks listening or watching check out my before picture, you can see that that individual probably would have received a massive ego boost from being partnered with someone that society would consider attractive, but the attraction there was predicated on being externally defined.

Jon Katz: 00:08:52

I didn't often seek partners I had a lot of common…

Jon Katz: 00:08:55

in common with, values-based or any sort of deeper connection.

Jon Katz: 00:08:59

It was more being validated.

Jon Katz: 00:09:01

It was very negative.

Jon Katz: 00:09:02

In my last serious relationship, you know, there was a lot of rifts.

Jon Katz: 00:09:07

There were a lot of obvious issues between us that I did not pay heed to because I was getting such a benefit, uh, from, from the relationship.

Jon Katz: 00:09:15

And I finally realized, you know, the, the, the cracks became chasms, and man, then we, we broke up in pretty interesting fashion.

Jon Katz: 00:09:24

And then I realized after working on myself that the next relationship I enter into, it has to be so much deeper than just some surface-level attraction

Mike Forrester: 00:09:34

Yeah.

Mike Forrester: 00:09:35

And I think that's often what we'll accept because we're just kind of of that mindset of, hey, this is the best I can do, or, you know, this gives me validation, right?

Mike Forrester: 00:09:45

So let's, let's jump back because you've talked about, you know, different things that kind of got you to where you were, you know, mentally as far as feeling, um, low self-esteem and just kind of not seeing that, you know, you have that worth.

Mike Forrester: 00:10:04

How did, like, your childhood upbringing feed into that?

Mike Forrester: 00:10:08

Because too often I don't think we take into account what we've experienced can determine who we see ourself to be and what we- we're, you know, like, worthy of receiving or being in- involved in.

Mike Forrester: 00:10:24

Like, what did you go through that, that got you to that space?

Jon Katz: 00:10:29

Yeah, I did not have the most… I did not have the best relationship behaviors modeled for me.

Jon Katz: 00:10:36

My folks, I think, due just the way things were back then, they didn't really have access to the information we have now about being intentional and being present and being abundant and all of that.

Jon Katz: 00:10:47

And they never really worked out some fundamental challenges they had between themselves, you know, in their relationship.

Jon Katz: 00:10:54

And so that inability to fully form a mature, long-lasting, fully dedicated relationship there showed me kind of poor fashion the way to go, and, you know, I wasn't really aware of what was going on, but we typically model the first relationship we observe, and so I definitely did so by being somewhat absent in…

Jon Katz: 00:11:16

Not somewhat, by being absent in my relationships.

Jon Katz: 00:11:18

Uh, growing up it was also somewhat of a chaotic home environment, so I internalized a lot of that chaos and it replicated itself inside of me.

Jon Katz: 00:11:25

You know, kids are quite sensitive.

Jon Katz: 00:11:27

They'll always absorb the energy and thoughts and actions of the people around them, and I definitely did so.

Jon Katz: 00:11:33

And this external chaos that I absorbed became internal chaos, and then my actions and my relationships with others and my relationship to myself was quite chaotic through drug use and partying and these experiences and world traveling and all this, all these distractions and, you know, the coupling of that external chaos and the internal chaos created a real serious struggle with mental illness.

Jon Katz: 00:11:54

Very serious.

Mike Forrester: 00:11:56

Now, y- you mentioned here, like, you had some amazing, you know, opportunities and experiences.

Mike Forrester: 00:12:03

A lot of times people look at us and go, "Hey, if you're having this kind of life experience and living this lifestyle, that should make you feel okay." How is it that from, like, what you experienced, that it's like that chaos internally still continued to, to be present with you wherever you went, whatever you did?

Mike Forrester: 00:12:26

Like, how did that play out and- Like the experiences.

Mike Forrester: 00:12:34

Was that a way of trying to medicate and hide, like the, the chaos internally as well?

Jon Katz: 00:12:41

Absolutely.

Jon Katz: 00:12:42

The world traveler is someone that is not at peace with themselves.

Jon Katz: 00:12:46

The drug user and the Burning Man attendee, I went twice, is someone who is not okay with themselves.

Jon Katz: 00:12:52

If I had been okay with myself, I wouldn't have sought to travel the world.

Jon Katz: 00:12:56

The thing is, wherever you go, there you are.

Jon Katz: 00:12:59

The naive individual, the individual I was, believes themselves to be able to escape themselves.

Jon Katz: 00:13:04

Such a thing is patently absurd.

Jon Katz: 00:13:06

The apartment in which I got healthy, uh, was about three hundred and fifty square feet.

Jon Katz: 00:13:10

It's not the apartment I'm in now.

Jon Katz: 00:13:12

Um, and I traveled farther in that space for the months it took me to become the version of myself that I could be proud of than I had the many years I spent traveling.

Jon Katz: 00:13:24

I worked for years around the world on various agricultural projects.

Jon Katz: 00:13:28

It's where I fell in love with, uh, producing, distributing, cons- consuming food locally, small scale agricultural projects.

Jon Katz: 00:13:35

And these projects were brilliant, and I pursued them because of my love of local food, and I don't regret any of them.

Jon Katz: 00:13:40

I love them, and I learned a lot about the earth and myself on them.

Jon Katz: 00:13:44

But the true motivation for those projects was not anything having to do with ecology.

Jon Katz: 00:13:48

It was having to do with running from myself, fleeing.

Jon Katz: 00:13:51

If I just go to this country Maybe I'll find peace from my, you know, away from my past.

Jon Katz: 00:13:57

If I just spend this amount of time, maybe I'll find peace, uh, and be able to come… And I wasn't even interested in coming to terms.

Jon Katz: 00:14:04

On the contrary, the man who is running will never come to terms with himself and his past.

Jon Katz: 00:14:08

The man who is present, physically present, non-moving, will be able to come to terms.

Jon Katz: 00:14:12

And it was only when I stopped fleeing, physically fleeing.

Jon Katz: 00:14:15

I, I, I met up with a friend, um, who's in AA.

Jon Katz: 00:14:19

I'm not in AA, but we were talking about survival tactics and running tactics, and he said, "Jon, what you are doing in AA is called doing a geographic."

Jon Katz: 00:14:27

So I love that.

Jon Katz: 00:14:28

So I was doing a geographic to New Zealand.

Jon Katz: 00:14:30

I did a geographic to Spain, to France, and I had all these wonderful experiences.

Jon Katz: 00:14:34

I was trading my labor for farm, uh, I was trading my labor for room and board, labor on these farms, and I would have all these wonderful experiences, but I still had that pain within me.

Jon Katz: 00:14:43

I still had that unresolved BS in me.

Jon Katz: 00:14:45

I still had all the traumatic experience I saw as a, a kid within me, and I never came to terms with them until I stopped doing a geographic and started to heal in a tiny fifth-floor walk-up in Lower Manhattan.

Jon Katz: 00:14:58

It was, it was truly brilliant.

Jon Katz: 00:14:59

The travels I took within trumped all of the years of travels I went around the world multiple times.

Mike Forrester: 00:15:05

What got you to that point to just say enough is enough and- I was

Jon Katz: 00:15:11

thinking, I was thinking about suicide.

Jon Katz: 00:15:13

I was seriously considering removing myself from this plane of existence.

Jon Katz: 00:15:17

I was so sick of my own self-destructive behavior, my own self-sabotage, my own pain, my own disrespect of others, my own unhealthy coping patterns, my own unhealthy pursuit of women, my own unhealthy pursuit of pleasure, my own fat gut.

Jon Katz: 00:15:35

And you know, I would wake up in the morning and just look at myself and say, "I hate you." You know?

Jon Katz: 00:15:40

I was so upset with my body because I was upset with my actions.

Jon Katz: 00:15:44

If you look at yourself and you're not okay with what you see, it isn't because you don't like what you see, it's because you don't like the actions you took to get there.

Jon Katz: 00:15:53

Everyone knows what they've done to put themselves in their situation.

Jon Katz: 00:15:56

That's where the r- the regret comes from.

Jon Katz: 00:15:58

The regret comes from, "I can't believe I look like this because I know I did all of these things to look like this." And the powerful individual that takes control of the situation says, "I love the way I look."

Jon Katz: 00:16:09

Not even because of what it looks like on the outside, but I know every decision I had to make to get there, and that's where the power comes from

Mike Forrester: 00:16:16

So, like, what, what things did you go through as far as, okay, you're at the point of contemplating suicide.

Mike Forrester: 00:16:28

Like, what did you do that said, "Nope, that's not an option.

Mike Forrester: 00:16:32

How do I change these things so that I do love myself, I do like myself?" And, and getting on the path to, to where you are now.

Mike Forrester: 00:16:40

Like, how… What happened within those, you know, those four walls?

Jon Katz: 00:16:44

The first thing was to realize that my life was to be lived for others.

Jon Katz: 00:16:48

You know, I was living it for myself, and that's what drove me to the brink of self-destruction.

Jon Katz: 00:16:51

As soon as I thought about my family and the people that would be harmed by my self-removal, I realized it's time for you to live for others.

Jon Katz: 00:17:00

And that's when I understood that this life is not about me anymore.

Jon Katz: 00:17:03

You know, living it about me made me not want to live.

Jon Katz: 00:17:07

Making it about others made me want to live.

Jon Katz: 00:17:09

And so I found a coach.

Jon Katz: 00:17:11

I found an online coach that had been through the darkness, that had been through extreme levels of negativity and gotten through the other side much stronger and more abundant.

Jon Katz: 00:17:19

Not only that, but who had coached others and had results in getting other people fit, uh, sober, healthy, ripped, positive, more abundant.

Jon Katz: 00:17:28

And, uh, I signed up with him, and he gave me the blueprint to turn my life around, which I did, thank goodness.

Jon Katz: 00:17:36

And, uh, some months later, I had a six-pack for the first time in my life.

Jon Katz: 00:17:40

You know, this is a man… I was so scarce that I not only cursed myself for my behavior, but I actually cursed my ancestors.

Jon Katz: 00:17:47

I told myself, I had convinced myself one of the worst lies I hear all the time, which is that I had the wrong genetics for a six-pack.

Jon Katz: 00:17:53

I mean, this is wild.

Jon Katz: 00:17:55

The weak man cursing everyone, including his own forebears, the people whose existence allowed him to come into this plane of consciousness.

Jon Katz: 00:18:03

These are the peop- men and women I was cursing.

Jon Katz: 00:18:05

And it was hogwash, of course.

Jon Katz: 00:18:06

If you look at my after photo, you can see very clearly that my ancestors gave me everything I needed to get a six-pack.

Jon Katz: 00:18:13

And once I achieved that level of self-actualization, I realized that there was a new path for me, and this is the path of online coaching.

Jon Katz: 00:18:23

The same path that I had walked to get myself healthy, I am now walking to get others healthy

Mike Forrester: 00:18:30

What was like the first step that you took from that point?

Mike Forrester: 00:18:34

Like-

Jon Katz: 00:18:35

On coaching or on the path to get healthy?

Mike Forrester: 00:18:37

On the, on the path to getting healthy.

Jon Katz: 00:18:40

Oh, I had to be honest.

Jon Katz: 00:18:41

I had to realize that I was the cause of all of my issues.

Jon Katz: 00:18:45

Stop blaming others.

Jon Katz: 00:18:46

There's no one to blame but myself.

Jon Katz: 00:18:48

That was the biggest thing.

Jon Katz: 00:18:50

That was the first and most important thing, that I was the cause of all of my issues, all of them.

Jon Katz: 00:18:56

And that's the biggest hurdle for people because as long as they're able to blame someone else, healing is impossible.

Jon Katz: 00:19:02

"Well, this person did this to me.

Jon Katz: 00:19:05

They weren't there for me.

Jon Katz: 00:19:07

I have these issues because of them.

Jon Katz: 00:19:09

I have this health condition because of this other thing.

Jon Katz: 00:19:12

I can't lose weight because of this glandular issue."

Jon Katz: 00:19:15

It's always something outside of ourself.

Jon Katz: 00:19:17

"I don't have enough time. I can't wake up early." What else do I hear?

Jon Katz: 00:19:21

"I don't have enough money." That's a great one.

Jon Katz: 00:19:23

That's my favorite one because that's the first step.

Jon Katz: 00:19:26

If you don't have enough money, you've already failed.

Jon Katz: 00:19:28

If you're too much of a broke lowlife to put down the bottle, which costs you far more than a coaching program, put down the cheeseburger, which costs you far more than a coaching program, and start to live your life in a way that would actually save you money by stopping you from destroying yourself with drugs and booze, which costs you a lot of money, then you've already failed.

Jon Katz: 00:19:46

It's a self-screening mechanism.

Jon Katz: 00:19:47

But I've heard every excuse under the book, and it's always about what other people have done to us.

Jon Katz: 00:19:52

Once I put down those excuses and realized that nobody was coming to save me, nobody could do it for me, that self-sabotage is the only way to lose, I was like, "Oh, wow, I'm actually in control.

Jon Katz: 00:20:04

I can actually control my life and my destiny." And in bringing that control to myself, that's where the self-control comes from.

Jon Katz: 00:20:09

You know, the drug user and the boozer and the dating app person is out of control.

Jon Katz: 00:20:15

They're- they have ceded their control to these things.

Jon Katz: 00:20:17

I, I put a reel out today that sobriety is power.

Jon Katz: 00:20:20

The, uh, drunk individual, uh, the substance-reliant individual, even the overeater, has ceded his or her power to these things outside of himself.

Jon Katz: 00:20:29

As soon as you cut those things off and you take the power back yourself, I was able to say, "Jon, this is all on you." And once it became all on me, that was it.

Jon Katz: 00:20:38

Then it was just clear the internal debt, karmic debt, and I had a massive mountain of karmic debt.

Jon Katz: 00:20:44

You know, I'd be in tears every morning, sobbing, seeing the faces of the people I disrespected, the, you know, the cheating I had done, and all that horrible interpersonal stuff I had done.

Jon Katz: 00:20:54

Thinking about all the drugs I had done, all just the people I had harmed, it was awful.

Jon Katz: 00:20:58

Clearing that karmic debt and realizing that I had caused all of this karmic debt.

Jon Katz: 00:21:02

I was in pain because I had caused other people pain.

Jon Katz: 00:21:04

Nobody had put me in that situation but me.

Jon Katz: 00:21:06

I'm glad you asked that.

Jon Katz: 00:21:07

It's about saying, "It is up to me to change."

Mike Forrester: 00:21:12

Yeah, 'cause often I think we give away our power.

Mike Forrester: 00:21:16

And, you know, it, it…

Mike Forrester: 00:21:19

I think there's a fear of, "Hey, I am more powerful," and in order to get past that, we'll often just relent, give it away.

Mike Forrester: 00:21:30

Um, how did, how did you handle… 'Cause you were talking about you were, you were doing medicating, you know, leading up to it, right?

Mike Forrester: 00:21:39

You, you had done drugs and different stuff.

Mike Forrester: 00:21:42

How did you go, "Hey, this is my responsibility.

Mike Forrester: 00:21:45

I'm in control.

Mike Forrester: 00:21:47

I'm the one that can decide yes or no"? How did you then put those things that had helped you, how did you just stop them and put them off to the side and say, "That's not the answer anymore.

Mike Forrester: 00:22:00

My change, my growth, that's the answer"?

Mike Forrester: 00:22:05

How did you just walk away from the stuff that you had, um, medicated with?

Jon Katz: 00:22:11

I had to replace negative behaviors with positive ones.

Jon Katz: 00:22:14

I, you know, I was a negativity addict.

Jon Katz: 00:22:16

If I was addicted to anything, it was negativity.

Mike Forrester: 00:22:20

Can you explain that one a little more?

Jon Katz: 00:22:21

Absolutely.

Jon Katz: 00:22:22

I had created a persona that I was so closely attached to, it was seeking comfort in pain.

Jon Katz: 00:22:29

I know this sounds wild, but I guarantee you a lot of people listening and watching know exactly what I'm talking about.

Jon Katz: 00:22:34

I created a narrative, a persona, a personality that was this pained individual, unhealed, traumatized, broken, bereft, empty, angry, bitter, resentful, and this was who I was.

Jon Katz: 00:22:47

So how on earth could I be anything else when I was this thing?

Jon Katz: 00:22:51

So when you strip all that away, there's a big void.

Jon Katz: 00:22:53

Taking away a negative doesn't create, only create a positive, it actually creates a void in the person that only knows how to be negative.

Jon Katz: 00:23:00

So I had to fill that void with positive acts, and this is habitual construction.

Jon Katz: 00:23:04

The man that you are speaking with today, that everyone can feel the energy of right now, has been habitually constructed on the ruins of the old man So your new life is going to cost you your old life.

Jon Katz: 00:23:16

So in creating this new life, in habitually constructing this new man, I had to discard all of those old things.

Jon Katz: 00:23:21

Uh, sleeping in, done.

Jon Katz: 00:23:23

I now wake up early.

Jon Katz: 00:23:25

I presently wake up at 4:00 AM every day.

Jon Katz: 00:23:27

When I started, I think it was just pre-dawn, you know, for some weeks.

Jon Katz: 00:23:30

Um, the old person never worked out, couldn't get a six-pack, wasn't a gym person.

Jon Katz: 00:23:35

I train every day, sometimes multiple times a day.

Jon Katz: 00:23:38

The old person was at the buffet eating whatever he wanted and hating himself after.

Jon Katz: 00:23:43

The new person eats in a conscience-congruent manner so I don't wake up with a fat, massive gut again.

Jon Katz: 00:23:50

The old person used drugs and alcohol to avoid doing difficult but necessary emotional and internal work.

Jon Katz: 00:23:57

The new person does not use any substances at all and understands that the reliance on self trumps the reliance on these external things.

Jon Katz: 00:24:05

So I'm happy… You're asking some great questions.

Jon Katz: 00:24:07

What was I able to do by taking away all these things I'd become accustomed to?

Jon Katz: 00:24:11

Well, I had to add new things that I wasn't uncom- accustomed to, extremely uncomfortable things, extremely difficult things.

Jon Katz: 00:24:17

I couldn't do a single pull-up, not one.

Jon Katz: 00:24:19

I could not do a single pull-up when I started this.

Jon Katz: 00:24:22

I was cursing myself, my heaviness.

Jon Katz: 00:24:25

I was almost 200 pounds.

Jon Katz: 00:24:26

It was, it was awful.

Jon Katz: 00:24:28

But through habitual construction, becoming a man who does these things, you have to do them.

Jon Katz: 00:24:34

If one wants to become a person that cares about their life, they need to care about their life.

Jon Katz: 00:24:38

You can't… There's no other way around it.

Jon Katz: 00:24:39

You have to take the action that builds a person that has the habits that will then construct the person that is more positive and abundant, and is going to make more money, is going to be more loving, is gonna be more present, and that's what it is.

Mike Forrester: 00:24:52

And yet oftentimes we'll look at, like, what you're talking about with the habits and those decisions and, and, you know, having goals as those are the constraints, and yet everything you listed out is the freedom that we're wanting, you know, the end objectives.

Mike Forrester: 00:25:10

Um, I want to kind of go back to talk about, you know, you were talking about habits in there.

Mike Forrester: 00:25:19

Oftentimes when people are making change, they may backslide a bit.

Mike Forrester: 00:25:24

How do you get beyond that where it's like, okay, I was able to do a pull-up, and now I'm s- you know, that was on Monday.

Mike Forrester: 00:25:33

Now it's Wednesday and I'm struggling to do a pull-up, and you're frustrated with yourself.

Mike Forrester: 00:25:37

How did you

Jon Katz: 00:25:38

continue to move

Mike Forrester: 00:25:39

forward?

Jon Katz: 00:25:39

There's two things here.

Jon Katz: 00:25:40

The, the first thing is progress is never linear, ever.

Jon Katz: 00:25:43

Mm-hmm.

Jon Katz: 00:25:44

Never.

Jon Katz: 00:25:45

Anyone that tells you otherwise is lying to you.

Jon Katz: 00:25:48

Secondly- Failure is the down payment on success.

Jon Katz: 00:25:53

I've never heard anyone else say that.

Jon Katz: 00:25:54

Something… You know, there's plenty of adages that, that a lot of people use.

Jon Katz: 00:25:57

This is one that came to me recently, that the successful person has bought that success with so many failures.

Jon Katz: 00:26:07

When you work out, and there's a style of working out where you are doing reps to failure, you are pushing yourself to failure.

Jon Katz: 00:26:13

So the typical individual would think, "I failed. I'm a failure."

Jon Katz: 00:26:16

When you are pushing yourself to failure, you are showing yourself that you are willing to push yourself to your maximum limits.

Jon Katz: 00:26:22

And actually, when you go to failure, you push past your limits.

Jon Katz: 00:26:25

Whatever you think that your limits are, you are pushing past them to go to failure.

Jon Katz: 00:26:29

So I don't view… There are certain backsteps that are pretty unconscionable.

Jon Katz: 00:26:33

Like, if you want to set your life back a- and you are, you know, living a certain way and then one night you decide to go out and buy a bag of drugs and a bottle after not having engaged in that for a very long time, and you do that, you're really harming yourself.

Jon Katz: 00:26:49

But human errors and cause these small issues of…

Jon Katz: 00:26:53

And that's the issue with perfectionism.

Jon Katz: 00:26:54

We were talking about perfectionism earlier.

Jon Katz: 00:26:56

Using those small setbacks and slip-ups as a way to give up on your program is a way of not doing it in general, because then you can use this perfection ideal which doesn't exist as a way of saying, "Well, I slipped up.

Jon Katz: 00:27:09

I guess I'm a failure now." No.

Jon Katz: 00:27:11

One of my mantras, and I actually do tell myself this, is whenever there is some impediment to my progress, I think to myself and I say, "Well, guess I'm obese now." And that's not a lie.

Jon Katz: 00:27:21

I, I… That's what I repeat, and that's a way of laughing at whatever the situation is.

Jon Katz: 00:27:26

The subway isn't running.

Jon Katz: 00:27:28

Something occurs.

Jon Katz: 00:27:28

I lost my home in an apartment fire.

Jon Katz: 00:27:30

We can talk about that as well.

Jon Katz: 00:27:31

But my mantra for that and everything else is, "Well, I guess I'm obese now." And of course I wasn't.

Jon Katz: 00:27:36

If we're in control of ourselves, it doesn't matter what happens around us, including an apartment fire.

Jon Katz: 00:27:42

We can get through it.

Jon Katz: 00:27:43

So yeah, small setbacks, issues, it's gonna happen.

Jon Katz: 00:27:46

Just don't beat yourself up about it, don't make it any worse than it already is, don't give up, and keep pushing.

Jon Katz: 00:27:52

Like, h- I always ask my clients when they have setbacks, "How long do you plan to be alive?" Most of them are in their 20s, 30s and 40s.

Jon Katz: 00:27:59

So if they say 40 years, okay, so are you gonna let this thing that might set you back…

Jon Katz: 00:28:05

I don't even know.

Jon Katz: 00:28:05

I don't even try to think about time.

Jon Katz: 00:28:08

It, it's, it's, it's wild.

Jon Katz: 00:28:09

But, um, yeah, people take it way too seriously.

Jon Katz: 00:28:12

They need to take the process seriously, not the result.

Jon Katz: 00:28:15

That's another thing that holds people back.

Jon Katz: 00:28:17

They only care about the result and they don't care about the process.

Jon Katz: 00:28:20

That's a great way of short-circuiting your progress.

Jon Katz: 00:28:23

When you care only about the process and you don't care about the result, you'll fly towards it.

Mike Forrester: 00:28:28

Well, if I'm understanding, like- If I was focused on the result only, the experience that you gained, like the knowledge that you gained from, uh, you know, like the farming, that would be somebody that's looking at it like, "Well, that was a waste."

Mike Forrester: 00:28:45

But you have instead flipped it on its head, and this is something that is not only beneficial for you, but now it's in a benefit for those around you.

Mike Forrester: 00:28:55

So even though we may have challenges along the way, those experiences and the knowledge that we've learned, we can turn into something good.

Mike Forrester: 00:29:03

Is that accurate for-

Jon Katz: 00:29:04

100%.

Mike Forrester: 00:29:05

Okay.

Jon Katz: 00:29:05

It's all a be- it's all a bonus.

Jon Katz: 00:29:08

Let's say I had been kicked out of every farm, I didn't learn anything, and it was a colossal waste of money, and I came back destitute and sick.

Jon Katz: 00:29:14

Well, it's still a bonus because I learned how to not self-destruct.

Jon Katz: 00:29:18

I wasn't programming then, but let's say I did that now, and I lost all my money, and then this home burned, and everything was taken away from me, and I woke up the next day, and I continued to be an abundant individual.

Jon Katz: 00:29:28

What that shows is that through mindset training, you can deal with any external pressure, so it's all a win.

Jon Katz: 00:29:35

To the strong mindset-having individual, it's all a win.

Jon Katz: 00:29:39

To the weak mindset-having individual, it's all a loss.

Jon Katz: 00:29:41

So which one does one want to be?

Jon Katz: 00:29:43

The person that looks at every situation and sees how it isn't benefiting them, or the person that looks at every situation and seeing, sees it how it is benefiting them?

Jon Katz: 00:29:52

Even if you are taking a loss or something negative occurs, and you can learn a lesson from it, well, that's a benefit.

Jon Katz: 00:29:57

I bought this lesson for this amount of money.

Jon Katz: 00:29:59

I bought this lesson for this amount of time.

Jon Katz: 00:30:01

I bought this lesson for this amount of pain.

Jon Katz: 00:30:04

That's why I train so hard because every time I do physical training, I learn a massive lesson.

Jon Katz: 00:30:08

I learn an enormous lesson every time.

Jon Katz: 00:30:10

I find my answers every time.

Jon Katz: 00:30:11

I've been doing Muay Thai.

Jon Katz: 00:30:13

I had to find something else to do since I got hired at this as the director of operations and my game stepped up in the professional sphere.

Jon Katz: 00:30:21

I had to step up in my personal development sphere.

Jon Katz: 00:30:24

So I thought to myself, "What is the most challenging thing you can do to build yourself that you have no knowledge base in?"

Jon Katz: 00:30:30

And I found a Muay Thai gym near my place, and I started Thai boxing a couple months ago, and I am getting my butt kicked literally and figuratively every day.

Jon Katz: 00:30:39

You go in there, and you are struck very violently, and you strike others very violently.

Jon Katz: 00:30:44

This is coming from someone who had zero martial arts training, who hadn't started working out until he started this program two and a half years ago.

Jon Katz: 00:30:51

So I found literally the most difficult thing for me to do physically, and I went to do that, and every time it is brutal.

Jon Katz: 00:30:58

I trained this morning.

Jon Katz: 00:30:59

It was brutal.

Jon Katz: 00:31:00

I mean, these people are really intense.

Jon Katz: 00:31:02

And every time I'm so grateful for it because it shows me that my limits are all self-imposed.

Jon Katz: 00:31:07

If I had just taken this new position and accepted the increased, uh, comfort- I would've become more comfortable, and I would've fallen off.

Jon Katz: 00:31:15

Uh, you only lose in your winning season, right?

Jon Katz: 00:31:19

So why not inflict more adversity so then you're essentially forcing yourself to win and push yourself and push yourself?

Jon Katz: 00:31:25

And that's the mindset I have.

Jon Katz: 00:31:26

Whenever my life gets upgraded, I know a test is coming, so I have to make it more difficult for myself.

Mike Forrester: 00:31:33

Yeah.

Mike Forrester: 00:31:33

I've often heard that people will kind of build a business or build their career to a certain point where they feel like they've attained success and then kind of back off or, you know, quit putting their, their foot to the gas.

Mike Forrester: 00:31:49

Um, so what you shared with the mindset, I'd love to apply it, um, to your experience with the apartment fire.

Mike Forrester: 00:31:57

Um, but if you would first like share like what happened with the fire?

Jon Katz: 00:32:03

Oh, I was an idiot.

Jon Katz: 00:32:04

Like, like all things, this, this is a classic one.

Jon Katz: 00:32:07

I left some incense burning like a complete fool.

Jon Katz: 00:32:10

Like let's not… There's no other way.

Jon Katz: 00:32:13

I mean, everything is on us, but this one was especially on us.

Jon Katz: 00:32:16

Now, I'd done this many times before.

Jon Katz: 00:32:18

That doesn't mean anything.

Jon Katz: 00:32:19

It just shows that I had been an idiot many times before, so let's make that clear.

Jon Katz: 00:32:23

I had been an idiot, let's say, 100 times before and taken this idiotic action, and on the 101st time Set a fire to my place, total loss.

Jon Katz: 00:32:34

Fire department came, busted through the windows and the ceiling.

Jon Katz: 00:32:36

It was wild.

Jon Katz: 00:32:37

It was… You know, it was… I came back to the place, it was like a movie.

Jon Katz: 00:32:41

My- One of the neighbors called me and said something's wrong, and I went back and it was, it was tough.

Jon Katz: 00:32:45

It was the middle of the summer, August 1st of last year, so coming up on a year.

Jon Katz: 00:32:48

Eh, about, you know, 10 and a half months ago.

Jon Katz: 00:32:51

And I lost, lost everything.

Jon Katz: 00:32:53

I lost nothing, 'cause everything I had was inside.

Jon Katz: 00:32:56

And the next morning I woke up at 2:45.

Jon Katz: 00:32:59

So knowing that, you know, I was in some crappy hotel in Brooklyn.

Jon Katz: 00:33:03

I had been kicked out of my place.

Jon Katz: 00:33:04

Like, the Red Cross had been by there, the fire department, police department.

Jon Katz: 00:33:07

My place was taped up.

Jon Katz: 00:33:09

I didn't know what I was gonna do.

Jon Katz: 00:33:10

All my stuff was soaked.

Jon Katz: 00:33:11

It was the middle of the summer.

Jon Katz: 00:33:12

I essentially had no sleep.

Jon Katz: 00:33:14

And my mindset dictated that, "Jon, you have to give more today. You have to be more abundant. You have to be more present." So instead of my normal 4:00 AM wake up, I got up at 2:45.

Jon Katz: 00:33:24

I did a bunch of burpees, and I hauled myself to my apartment pre-dawn.

Jon Katz: 00:33:28

It was dark.

Jon Katz: 00:33:30

Everything was boarded up.

Jon Katz: 00:33:31

It was extremely humid.

Jon Katz: 00:33:32

I had nothing but my camera light, and I packed up what I could and hauled it up to my parents' house.

Jon Katz: 00:33:38

And man, that was, it was pretty intense.

Jon Katz: 00:33:41

I mean, you can imagine.

Jon Katz: 00:33:42

I was living on… This is the place where I got healthy, a 350 square foot apartment, the fifth floor in a walk-up building on the Lower East Side in the middle of summer.

Jon Katz: 00:33:51

No power, no air, just muggy.

Jon Katz: 00:33:54

Seeing my life's possessions totally soaked and waterlogged and smoke-logged, and I had to do what I had to do to, to, to make it through.

Jon Katz: 00:34:01

I knew the people were coming through tomorrow.

Jon Katz: 00:34:03

The place is all taped up.

Jon Katz: 00:34:04

It was a crime scene.

Jon Katz: 00:34:05

There was a whole situation.

Jon Katz: 00:34:07

But had I not been training my mind for so long to react to all stimuli with the same abundant mindset, I would've…

Jon Katz: 00:34:14

This is what drives people to asylums.

Jon Katz: 00:34:16

This is what drives people that are really in dark places to really take that step, go back to using, go back to drinking, finding coping mechanisms.

Jon Katz: 00:34:25

But I knew that none of that would work And so I went in and I used my internal coping mechanisms, physical exercise, sending love no matter what, no matter what, sending love.

Jon Katz: 00:34:35

And, and I was able to do so.

Jon Katz: 00:34:37

And I lived with my folks for many months, and I was abundant there.

Jon Katz: 00:34:42

I started helping them out, coaching them, brought up some trauma that they hadn't processed from 60, 70 years ago.

Jon Katz: 00:34:50

Like, that's the point I had gotten to in my own abundance.

Jon Katz: 00:34:52

I was able to coach my folks through some really deep-seated pain.

Jon Katz: 00:34:54

Like, did some serious one-on-one coaching with them, and also, like, a group coaching session with both of them.

Jon Katz: 00:35:00

Worked through some serious issues, and one thing led to ano- another.

Jon Katz: 00:35:04

You know, my economic circumstance was pretty good, and it was improving and improving, and then I was able to buy this place.

Jon Katz: 00:35:08

Like, and I was only able to buy this place because my other place burned.

Mike Forrester: 00:35:12

That, that's one of those sometimes the things that happen, I don't think we see them as a blessing in the moment.

Jon Katz: 00:35:18

It's all a blessing.

Jon Katz: 00:35:19

Because…

Mike Forrester: 00:35:20

Yeah.

Mike Forrester: 00:35:21

And we just go, "Oh my gosh, what am I gonna do?

Mike Forrester: 00:35:24

Woe is me." Um, not stepping in and, you know, stepping up harder to say, "Okay, what's good about this?

Mike Forrester: 00:35:34

What does this allow and enable me to do that I couldn't have done necessarily before?" It sounds like you got a kick in the butt to kinda, "Hey, take the next step." Is that accurate?

Jon Katz: 00:35:45

I had to.

Jon Katz: 00:35:46

I had to.

Jon Katz: 00:35:47

It was an extreme motivator for me to step my game up in every way, to become abundant enough to make this next move, and also to be able to bring that love.

Jon Katz: 00:35:55

My folks got COVID shortly after I moved in, both of them.

Jon Katz: 00:35:59

I didn't, but both of them did.

Jon Katz: 00:36:01

They're in their 70s, so it laid them low.

Jon Katz: 00:36:05

They had adverse reactions.

Jon Katz: 00:36:07

It was highly unpleasant.

Jon Katz: 00:36:09

And had I not been there, it would have been even more unpleasant for them because they were essentially bedridden.

Jon Katz: 00:36:13

So then I became their valet and, and I, I stepped into a role that I wished to have, which was reliable, abundant, you know, strong.

Jon Katz: 00:36:24

I didn't get COVID, but I was around them like crazy.

Jon Katz: 00:36:26

People were g- like, "How on earth?" I haven't been sick in two and a half years.

Jon Katz: 00:36:30

I've not gotten sick, truly sick in a way that's incapacitated me since I stopped making excuses for my behavior.

Jon Katz: 00:36:36

When I was living sick, I was sick all the time.

Jon Katz: 00:36:39

I would get colds and fevers and like sore throats and runny noses and all these back pains and like awkward chafing situations and rashes.

Jon Katz: 00:36:47

It was horrible.

Jon Katz: 00:36:49

It was horrible.

Jon Katz: 00:36:50

And after I got healthy, I became extremely strong.

Jon Katz: 00:36:53

When you live your life a certain way, things that used to affect you aren't even… There's so much psychosomatic, there's so much mind affecting the body in fitness and in health and all that, that I just, that stuff doesn't affect me anymore and didn't affect me.

Jon Katz: 00:37:07

And the fire obviously affected me in a way, but not in the way it used to.

Jon Katz: 00:37:12

I was shooting long form YouTube content at that time, weekly videos about food and culture, some philosophical musings and, and editorials and stuff like that.

Jon Katz: 00:37:21

And then after the fire, I started shooting essentially coaching and more metaphysical hard-nosed stuff, and I put out a, you know, some dozens more videos after that.

Jon Katz: 00:37:33

Now I'm mainly focused on building my, uh, content on IG.

Jon Katz: 00:37:36

But the c- the content that I was, 'cause I was YouTubing, uh, relatively frequently, the content really, there's a dividing line between who I was before the fire.

Jon Katz: 00:37:44

I mean, in my life there was, there is, 'cause it also showed me that it can all be taken from you.

Jon Katz: 00:37:48

Whatever things we all think we have can all be taken from us.

Jon Katz: 00:37:52

And although I'm in a much better spot materially now, those changes are largely meaningless because I know I could lose this in an instant, and it's why there are so many rich and miserable people in New York City.

Jon Katz: 00:38:04

They have everything that people who are not rich believe will make them happy, and yet they aren't happy.

Jon Katz: 00:38:10

So it's actually doubly worse for the rich people because they have what society tells them that they should be happy from, and they aren't.

Jon Katz: 00:38:18

And it's because their habits suck, and it's because they don't love themselves.

Jon Katz: 00:38:21

It's because they don't love their kids.

Jon Katz: 00:38:22

It's because they're ungrateful for their life.

Jon Katz: 00:38:24

And so I actually advocate for every rich person in New York City to have an apartment fire.

Jon Katz: 00:38:30

I'm not saying I was rich.

Jon Katz: 00:38:31

I am saying that the apartment fire made me grateful, forced me to be grateful in a way, uh, that I could not have been before.

Mike Forrester: 00:38:39

So as you got coaching and you are coaching now, what do you see that for, um, you know, like people that are coming through when it doesn't feel right- How do you guide them in being able to move beyond that barrier of this doesn't, you know, align with what I've thought?

Mike Forrester: 00:39:07

Almost like when we go… You know, we've been playing golf a specific way, you know, having our swing there, and then a golf coach comes through and goes, "Yeah, that's not the right way. Um, let's try this," and it feels unnatural.

Mike Forrester: 00:39:21

How are you helping people to move beyond that this doesn't feel right or this doesn't make sense?

Jon Katz: 00:39:27

Well, I ask them to look at the results they have in what they're doing.

Jon Katz: 00:39:30

So if the results they have in what they're doing before we work together put them in a place where they're interested in changing their life, clearly they're not happy with those results.

Jon Katz: 00:39:38

So they have two options.

Jon Katz: 00:39:39

They can go back to doing what they used to do, which made them overweight, poor self-talk, negative self-worth, uh, issues with body, uh, anxiety, depression, resentments, guilt.

Jon Katz: 00:39:50

You know, they, they know that.

Jon Katz: 00:39:52

So they can return to that.

Jon Katz: 00:39:54

Or they can try the coaching program that they signed up for, which states that discomfort and growth are synonymous, that we have to break the patterns in our life by breaking the patterns of what we do every day, that what you do every day matters, and to follow the footsteps of someone that has results in the field.

Mike Forrester: 00:40:12

Yeah.

Mike Forrester: 00:40:13

Absolutely.

Mike Forrester: 00:40:15

Well, Jon, there are a ton of different questions and, and directions I would love to continue to go but, uh, man, how can, how can guys reach out and connect with you outside of this podcast if they're like, "Hey, this totally resonates with me. I get Jon and where he's coming from, and I'd love insight"?

Mike Forrester: 00:40:35

How can guys connect with you outside of the podcast?

Jon Katz: 00:40:39

They can shoot me a message on IG @nycfoodways.

Jon Katz: 00:40:42

That's N-Y-C-F-O-O-D-W-A-Y-S.

Jon Katz: 00:40:47

If folks listening are interested in just absorbing knowledge and understanding way to live a healthy lifestyle, I post content every day around physical fitness, mindset tips, recipes.

Jon Katz: 00:41:00

There's lots of food content 'cause I care a lot about, you know, what I ingest.

Jon Katz: 00:41:04

It's actually the cornerstone of my coaching philosophy, is what we put into ourselves is what we put out of ourselves.

Jon Katz: 00:41:10

And, um, yeah, I highly encourage everyone to check me out on IG to just get a feel for what I'm doing and why.

Jon Katz: 00:41:18

And if you're interested in changing your life, because we all should be, shoot me a message @nycfoodways.

Mike Forrester: 00:41:25

Absolutely.

Mike Forrester: 00:41:26

And I'm like, yeah, we all should be 'cause ev- you even shared, hey, you're stepping up your professional level.

Mike Forrester: 00:41:32

You need to step up your, you know, personal level.

Mike Forrester: 00:41:36

So it's like it absolutely makes sense that we should be continually striving to, um, improve and get out of our comfort zone.

Mike Forrester: 00:41:43

So Jon, thank you so much for joining me today, sharing your story and the progress and, and just transformation you're making in your own life and in the lives around you.

Mike Forrester: 00:41:53

I appreciate it, my friend.

Jon Katz: 00:41:55

Thanks, Mike.