You're only human so be kind to yourself on the journey.

Even though this podcast is all about pushing yourself beyond your usual limitations, challenging yourself to dream of and reach for more, and reimagine what your life can (and should) look like, that doesn't change one fundamental truth that applies to all of us:

We are only human.

We are only human by design.

Our limitations are not a bug, they are a feature.

Our humanity is what makes us special. 

And that's what this episode is all about. Yes, living a life beyond your default requires a lot of work, stretching, expanding, consistency, and challenging ourselves each and every day. But it will also require you to celebrate what makes you human, your limitations, and the importance of preserving your humanity.

You are only human. And that's a beautiful thing.

Creators and Guests

Host

George B. Thomas

A catalyst for growth!

What is Beyond Your Default?

What Is Beyond Your Default? "Everyone keeps telling me I should be happy, but I'm not." “I feel stuck.” “I have a calling, but where do I start?"

Right now, you have a choice. You can continue living within your default norms, playing it safe, clocking in and out every day, and scraping by to achieve what's supposed to make you happy hopefully. Or you can choose to accept the challenge of living beyond your default. Stop wishing to live your "best life” and start living your best life. Success leaves clues. And they're waiting for you to discover them.

George B. Thomas: 00:03

Look. I have written on my whiteboard, It's Your Life. Design It. I feel like many people out there might look at their life and the feeling isn't of a designer but it's of somebody being dragged through it. Feeling like they don't have control.

George B. Thomas: 00:21

Feeling like they have to live up to the expectations of somebody else. Feeling like they made a decision because they their parents wanted them to go to college or their parents wanted them to follow in the footsteps of the family business or didn't do something because they felt like it would be frowned upon, haven't been able to be themselves because they didn't feel like they would be accepted. Funny thing is, it's all bullshit. It's all bullshit. Like, you have to come to the realization, you are an individual human.

George B. Thomas: 00:55

You have the power to make the choices that you wanna make. You have the power to live the life that you wanna live. You have the ability to design your day down to the minute. It's just based on your choices.

Liz Moorehead: 01:14

Welcome back to Beyond the Default. As always, I am Liz Moorehead, and I am joined by George b Thomas. How are you this week?

George B. Thomas: 01:23

I'm doing good, Liz. How are you doing this week?

Liz Moorehead: 01:26

I'm doing fantastic. I'm very excited about today's topic because it features one of your absolute favorite words, human.

George B. Thomas: 01:35

Yes. Yes. We get to talk about the humans.

Liz Moorehead: 01:39

The humans.

George B. Thomas: 01:40

And the fact that we're just human.

Liz Moorehead: 01:43

Exactly. You know, that's one of the reasons why I'm so excited to dive into our conversation this week. Because over the past few weeks, we've talked about a numerous different topics, whether we're talking about starting lines or we're talking about time or all of these different things. We've talked about a lot of things that require metal, commitment, consistency. Concepts and ideas where if we're not careful, we can easily corrupt the system that is our own humanity.

Liz Moorehead: 02:15

And I mean that both in a in a metaphorical sense, but also in a physical sense. So that's what we're gonna be talking about today. This counterpoint to much of what we talked about is that, yes, go for it. What are you waiting for? What excuses are you making?

Liz Moorehead: 02:31

Where do you need to be honest with yourself? But I'd love to hear from you. Why is remembering the fact that we are only human so important as people are going through this process exploring beyond their own default?

George B. Thomas: 02:44

I think it comes down to the as humans, we're really good at being binary. It's a 1 or 0. It's black or white. It's this or that. And one of the things that I wanna cover, Liz, right at the get go, you know, episode 3 or 4, whichever this one is, is what beyond your default isn't.

George B. Thomas: 03:06

It isn't like the hustle your face off. Grind your body into the ground. Do everything you can do to kill yourself, because what good is that? Like, if you're trying to live a life beyond your default, you wanna probably be around for a while. And so is it hustle?

George B. Thomas: 03:25

Yes. But there's a there's a time in my life where I had to go from the hustle economy to the healthy hustle economy. What I wanna just throw out there is anybody that is on this beyond your default journey, listen, you're gonna have checks and balances. You're gonna have to have things that you're paying attention to beyond your default just doesn't mean financial. It just doesn't mean success.

George B. Thomas: 03:51

It means literally a holistic life in all the areas that need to be paid attention to beyond their defaults. I don't want people to kill their health or their marriages or their relationships just because I'm I'm trying to go beyond my default. That's not what I'm talking about. So I think this, like, hey. We're only human, and therefore, we have to pay attention to the way that the human brain, human body, just ecosystem around us as humans work.

Liz Moorehead: 04:25

And you know what's fascinating about this is that this is a lesson you and I have both learned the hard way recently, twice. What I find fascinating about this discussion and what I what I want to point out for listeners is that this is a conversation we are having, not because this is a lesson learned from you know, because you've shared stories about high school. You've shared stories about different parts of your life before you became a business owner. These are the the limitations of your humanity. You've been a velociraptor somewhat testing the fences when it comes to this idea.

Liz Moorehead: 05:00

Right?

George B. Thomas: 05:01

I'm hard headed. Right? And my my hopes, my prayers for the people who are listening to this is you can learn from me being hardheaded versus you needing to be hardheaded and just, like, listen. Here's the lesson. Here's what I had to go through.

George B. Thomas: 05:18

Hopefully, you don't have to go through that, and you can just take the lesson and roll with it. Whatever it looks like in your life, because I know that we're gonna get into kinda, you know, a couple different stories, Liz. And I just want people to realize as they're listening to the words that come out of my mouth, out of your mouth, it should be about how can I leverage this for me, for my life, for my betterment, for my family, for like, it shouldn't be about us? It's how can they take the things we're saying and then apply it to their own lives, their own limitations, their own humanity, if you will.

Liz Moorehead: 05:55

Well, let's talk about it. We've teased a couple stories already.

George B. Thomas: 05:59

Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: 06:00

Take us to when you were in the closet.

George B. Thomas: 06:04

Literally in the closet. You know, it's it's, it's a tough story to be honest with you because for years years years, I was trying to get myself beyond what I felt was the default. Meaning, just the ability to be successful financially, to build a career. Many people have probably heard the, you know, in 2012 Gary Vaynerchuk story. And in that story, it was literally like the hustle your face off, and I was hustling my face off.

George B. Thomas: 06:36

I mean, there was literally a hashtag in our community around HubSpot. There's hashtag GSD, hashtag GBT. Right? GBT gets stuff done. You can use a different word if you want.

George B. Thomas: 06:49

We won't on this podcast, but, you know, it's it's about hustle. And, I'll never forget when that changed for me when I realized, woo hoo, I am only human, and I don't necessarily not wanna be here. So I I woke up one morning and, I walked downstairs. I let the dog out, and I started to brew my typical daily pot of coffee. Got a cup of coffee, let the dog back in, walked upstairs, started to get ready for the day.

George B. Thomas: 07:21

You know, take a shower, brush teeth, all that kind of stuff. As I was taking a shower, I heard this, like, ringing in my ear. I was like, that's weird. Got out of the shower, was getting dressed for the day, and all of a sudden, I just started sweating. And, I mean, I have never sweat like this before.

George B. Thomas: 07:40

I could have been in Texas in a 120 some degrees. I had never sweated like this before. I remember kind of yelling for my wife. I think I passed out or maybe I knelt down. I don't know.

George B. Thomas: 07:53

All's I remember is I was on my knees. I was sweating profusely, and my wife said, should I call 911? And I said, no. You shouldn't call 911. Just give me a minute.

George B. Thomas: 08:05

You know, it's just the guy thing. I'm a walk it off. Rub some

Liz Moorehead: 08:08

dirt on it. Right? The paint man in the crib.

George B. Thomas: 08:10

Spit on it. Rub some dirt. We'll be good. I was like, just give me a minute. And, so she kinda walked away, and she was talking to one of our friends on the phone.

George B. Thomas: 08:19

And she said, where's your phone at? And I said, my number is over there. I realized I answered the question wrong, and so I said, hey. Go ahead and call 911. My daughter's standing there.

George B. Thomas: 08:32

I'm on my knees. I'm sweating profusely, and I hear these words, daddy, I don't want you to die. And I said, whoo. I said, baby, daddy's not going nowhere. I started to crawl from my closet through my bathroom and through my bedroom.

George B. Thomas: 08:49

And at this time, because I weighed, like, £320 the time of this story. My wife is, like, freaking out. What are you doing? And I said, I'm not expecting anybody. Carry my big ass down these stairs.

George B. Thomas: 09:03

So I I slid down, you know, on my butt down the stairs, and I'm sitting there. And I'm waiting for EMS to get there because she did call 911. And, you know, my daughter's, like, kind of freaking out. She's there, and the other kids are like because I worked obviously at home, remote, and so everybody's kinda there. Everybody's a little bit on edge.

George B. Thomas: 09:23

EMS shows up, and they start taking my blood pressure. And they look at my wife, and they're like, did he just have a stroke? And she's like, I don't think so. And the one dude looks at me, goes, did you just have a heart attack? And I said, not that I know of.

George B. Thomas: 09:39

And my my blood pressure was, like, 243 over 161 or some crazy crap like that. So they they got me on the, you you know, the little gurney that they roll you out on. And, Liz, I'll never forget this moment because as they were rolling me out of my house to the ambulance, I looked back at my wife and I said, I don't have time for this. I have a meeting in 10 minutes.

Liz Moorehead: 10:03

Are you serious?

George B. Thomas: 10:04

They rolled me out to the ambulance. I'm I'm dead serious. George, you didn't get yelled at me. That's part of the

Liz Moorehead: 10:09

story. Is it because you knew I would yell at you?

George B. Thomas: 10:13

Well, no. I was hoping I wouldn't get yelled at. I've trust me. Trust me. I've yelled at myself enough for that moment in time because in reflecting, I realized how just ignorant that statement is.

George B. Thomas: 10:27

And and what's interesting though is it was the starting point of something for me because as soon as my wife heard those words, you could tell that there was a, oh. I got you, bro. I got you. Because I was in the hospital for the next three and a half days, and she wouldn't bring my laptop. She wouldn't give me my phone.

George B. Thomas: 10:51

She's like, you are not looking at one device talking to 1 human doing one thing. I have already emailed your boss. I have already emailed your clients. I have already put out a Facebook post. You are laying your happy ass right in that bed until they figure it out.

George B. Thomas: 11:07

And it took them 3 and a half days to basically get my blood pressure down to what they just called acceptable. And so that was a lesson to me. This is a moment in time where I was like, well, 1, I need to probably start eating better. 2, a pot of coffee a day is probably not a good thing. 3, I should probably start being a little bit more active.

George B. Thomas: 11:26

And this is, like, one of the first attempts of me trying to, like, manage my expectations of work, my expectations of diet, and then also not being the guy who doesn't go to the doctor all the time because, yo, they literally think that my blood pressure kept getting higher and higher and higher and higher and higher until it just finally hit a breaking point, and I'm like, well, we don't need to do that again. So let's keep an eye on this machine, this body, this, you know, vessel that gets to carry around the spirit, the soul on this planet. Let's make sure we can do tune ups and keep this bad boy rolling as long as we can because, listen, to hear my daughter say, daddy, I don't want you to die. Yo. I don't wanna hear that ever again.

Liz Moorehead: 12:18

No. I I can't imagine. These are challenging questions that I'm gonna be asking you because it does require us to go a bit into the lead up of how you got to that moment, you know, because I think that's so easily what can happen to any of us. You know, because you've gotten the text from someone who is related to me about me being laid out. I have gotten the text about you when you have been laid out as well.

Liz Moorehead: 12:48

And it it makes me wonder, what were all of the signs that we ignored leading up to that point. And when I say signs, I want you to think about it from this perspective. Sure. We could think about it from the, oh, when I felt that particular physical symptom, when I felt this particular whatever. But that's when the alarms are starting to go off.

Liz Moorehead: 13:08

That's when your humanity system is already overloaded. So when you take a look back at how you got to that moment, This isn't where I'm asking you to answer, well, if I could have done anything differently, because we we can all Monday morning quarterback ourselves to death. It's more about when you look in in hindsight beyond the moment of your daughter, beyond the moment of crawling out of the closet, beyond those things. When you think about all of the micro moments leading up to it, where should you have paid more attention to your humanity?

George B. Thomas: 13:42

I think, by the way, I think this boils down to a healthy dose of disrespect or not respecting things in life. One of the telltale signs is I didn't respect a good night's sleep. It would be 3, 4 hours back up, back at it, late into the night. We're talking these were back in the days when I'd stay up till 2, 3 o'clock in the morning working and then get back up and roll. Not like today.

George B. Thomas: 14:08

Today, 10:15, baby. This homie is checking out. I'm going to sleep, and I'll be up early in the morning ready to rock and roll. But, you know, there was a a disrespect to the amount of downtime, sleep, recovery, rejuvenation that just being human that I needed. The other thing I think that there was a healthy disrespect or not paying attention to was levels of stress.

George B. Thomas: 14:37

Right? Just going after it. And by the way, it was pretty close to the point where I made one of my largest business mistakes that this was on the backbone of, by the way. I have not really shared this story with a ton of people, but this was back when I worked at the sales line for Marcus Sheridan. And one of the things that we did is we put on workshops.

George B. Thomas: 15:03

For the probably first time, I had tried to put on a workshop, and I had put down a deposit, and nobody signed up for the workshop. I'd put a deposit down for the, like, the hotel and the food and that kind of stuff. You know, it gets a little stressful when you lose $12,000 ish of somebody else's money. And so I wasn't paying attention to maybe where the brand was at that point. I wasn't paying attention to the stress that that was putting on my body.

George B. Thomas: 15:37

I've already talked about I wasn't paying attention to the sleep or rest that I needed. If I'm working that hard, honestly, there was a disrespect to my family. I wasn't paying attention to them. I was so busy grinding out of the hole that I was trying to get them out of. I wanted them to live a better life.

George B. Thomas: 15:56

I wasn't in the day to day. I wasn't in the present. I wasn't enjoying the gift of life that we had already been receiving from the historical hustle that had been happening. And then what I'll say is there was a massive, massive load of disrespect to what I put in my mouth as far as food and beverages and, you know, the fact that I let myself get to the heaviest I had ever been in my life. And and what's funny is, at that point, it was the most successful I had ever been in my life.

George B. Thomas: 16:30

It's a really weird thing to think about where I was at that point. The things that I was disrespecting or not paying attention to, and compare them to where I am today and what I have ultimate respect for, what I pay attention to at a granular level, but because of being through that kind of war zone. And then, again, I would hope that listeners would be like, oh, maybe I need to get more sleep. Oh, maybe I need to pay attention to what I eat and drink. Oh, oh, maybe maybe I need to pay attention to my fam.

George B. Thomas: 17:03

Maybe I should go to the doctor and get a checkup. Like, these are things that I hope when people are listening to this, they're like, yeah. Okay, George. I hear you.

Liz Moorehead: 17:14

Well, the interesting about thing about this conversation, though, is that it requires 2 things. 1, it requires folks in many cases to confront the fact that we are mortal humans.

George B. Thomas: 17:26

Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: 17:27

And that that's always a fun little mental exercise that can sometimes make us go, oh, no. No. No. No. What does that mean?

Liz Moorehead: 17:35

I'm not living forever. But the other piece of it though that is and this is what I find fascinating. You were at the peak, quote, unquote, of your success.

George B. Thomas: 17:44

Yeah. What I thought was. Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: 17:46

And in my head, I had that question, you know, of of at what cost, though. And it makes me wonder who taught us that success required such a level of sacrifice. Where did that come from for you?

George B. Thomas: 18:01

I don't think anybody taught me that. Now don't get me wrong. Well, I gotta be careful. Oh, wow. Okay.

George B. Thomas: 18:11

So this is weird. And, like, and by the way, I I'm gonna leave all of this in because I want people to understand on this podcast that I'm also going through a journey. My immediate answer to you, Liz, was gonna be, I don't think anybody taught me that. However, I I immediately went to 2 things. 1, when I was growing up, both of my fathers were all about, like, be a hard worker.

George B. Thomas: 18:34

You give it you all. You be a good worker. This is how you survive in life. Very blue collar. 1 was a logger, was in the military, was, you know, rule out postman for, like, years.

George B. Thomas: 18:51

1, steel mill worker for almost his entire life, Harley Davidson driver, like, blue collar. You just work hard. But then, Liz, the oh moment for me was I went back to my grandpa because I never really unpacked this until you asked that question. But I'll never forget one time when my grandpa was in the hospital, and he had surgery. I think it was on one of his veins in his neck or something.

George B. Thomas: 19:17

He was he had heart issues, and he had this surgery. And my mom and I showed up at his house, and I'm talking the day he got out of the hospital for the surgery. He was out in his driveway, and he was raking, he had like, instead of gravel, it was like this broken up tile, and he was raking tile in his driveway. And I remember my mom freaking out, like, you just got out of the hospital. And, you know, he made some snide comment about as long as I'm not 6 feet under, I'm gonna continue.

George B. Thomas: 19:48

And I I never really thought about that, but if I do look back at the men in my life, it was a matter of if you wanna get from here to there, you work hard, and it's okay to sacrifice yourself to get from here to there. You're gonna get bruised. You're gonna get bloody. You're gonna like, it was just a it was an accepted thought process. Never really taught per se, like, okay.

George B. Thomas: 20:17

Here's the chalkboard. Let me give you the 5 note bullet points of, like, how to kill yourself as you hustle through life. It was just a thing.

Liz Moorehead: 20:26

Well, let's be honest, though. In some cases or in many cases, I'm gonna assume folks who may be listening to this, they may not be on a solo entrepreneurship journey or a business owner journey. They may also be dealing with circumstances where I mean, hustle culture is something that is talked about often in our society. And there is this expectation, especially now as technology has enabled it, like, you are available 247. The pandemic made it increasingly difficult to set clear boundaries between your personal life and your work life.

George B. Thomas: 21:02

But you have to.

Liz Moorehead: 21:03

And I know for me personally, when I think about, you know, I had I collapsed from exhaustion as something that people probably saw coming from a mile away. When I think about what led me to that moment, I think about things like whether it was true or not true, feeling fearful throughout my career at different moments of, well, I can't appear unavailable. I can't appear like I can't do everything. Do you know what I'm talking about?

George B. Thomas: 21:32

I do. I I call it the I can't f this up mentality. Like like, by all means necessary, I will know everything, be everywhere, and everybody will be happy until I die. Yeah. Like, I I totally do understand that thinking, and, actually, what's funny is it's one of the things that I battle against as a business owner, you know, solopreneurship.

George B. Thomas: 22:01

Liz, I'll never forget. I I love stories, by the way, but I'll never forget some of the advice that I refuse to take. When I was leaving agency life, I had an individual who told me, you'll not be able to take a vacation with your wife and kids for at least the first two years. And I was like, wait. That's that's not why I'm making the decision that I'm making.

George B. Thomas: 22:23

I'm making the decision I'm making so that I can go on a vacation with my wife and kids whenever I damn well feel like it. I refuse to live your reality. And so I have been again, but I had that historical story that we just talked about. Right? So I have been like a dog on a bone of, like, okay.

George B. Thomas: 22:43

Let's take this weekend off. Okay. Let's go on vacation for this week. Okay. Let's make sure we you know, next quarter, we have a week that we're going on vacation.

George B. Thomas: 22:52

And the funny thing is I think I designed my life that way to fight against exactly what you were talking about, Liz, because I had to prove to myself that when I got back, the clients would be like, hey. How was the vacation? Tell us all about it. And not, yeah. Now can you get back to work doing our stuff?

George B. Thomas: 23:10

Which, by the way, none of them ever have said. They're all like, yeah. Yeah. We're not gonna email you. We're not gonna call you.

George B. Thomas: 23:16

We want you to take the time off. We want you to refuel. We can't wait to hear about it when you get back. So, like, sometimes I think we run these narratives around this, like, gotta hustle, gotta know everything, gotta be all all places. Like, you gotta be this superhuman, and it's your own expectations.

George B. Thomas: 23:33

It's nobody else's expectations. In a really weird way, you've allowed yourself once again to be your worst enemy living inside of your brain.

Liz Moorehead: 23:43

So let's debunk that a little bit. I'd love for you to speak directly to the listeners, and I'd love for you to have a one of your patented George b Thomas interventions here. What are the myths that people need to debunk once and for all when it comes to this conversation, when it comes to how they talk to themselves or think about themselves or put in necessary boundaries or limitations for themselves.

George B. Thomas: 24:09

Look. I have written on my whiteboard. It's your life. Design it. I feel like many people out there might look at their life and the feeling isn't of a designer, but it's of somebody being dragged through it.

George B. Thomas: 24:26

Feeling like they don't have control, feeling like they have to live up to the expectations of somebody else, feeling like they made a decision because they their parents wanted them to go to college, or their parents wanted them to follow in the footsteps of the family business, or didn't do something because they felt like it would be frowned upon, haven't been able to be themselves because they didn't feel like they would be accepted. Funny thing is, it's all bullshit. It's all bullshit. Like, you have to come to the realization, you are an individual human. You have the power to make the choices that you wanna make.

George B. Thomas: 25:06

You have the power to live the life that you wanna live. You have the ability to design your day down to the minute. It's just based on your choices. I was making choices that almost ended me on this planet. Now I make choices that are hopefully extending me on this planet.

George B. Thomas: 25:27

You listening to this may have made historical decisions as the human you are based on the humans you're around. Stop it. Just stop it. Like, I need you to find a big oak tree out in the middle of field somewhere, and I need you to just sit down and go, why in God's name am I doing what I'm doing? Why am I in a relationship that isn't healthy?

George B. Thomas: 25:53

Why am I working at a job that drives me nuts? Why why why why? Start asking yourself why, which, by the way, I'm not saying everybody listening to this has a terrible life, and, by the way, I'm not saying you should quit your job or quit your relationship, but when we start asking why, we can start fixing it if it's fixable. We can start designing it. We can start moving it.

George B. Thomas: 26:17

Too many people look at their life like it's a set of bricks that have been, you know, fashioned into some type of shape, and that's it is what it is. We've gotta deal with what we got. Instead of life being just this great piece of clay that you can form into whatever shape you want it to be. And trust me, I lived a large part of my life with just this, that is what it is. These are the bricks that I got.

George B. Thomas: 26:47

And one of the unlocked moments was like, oh, oh, that's not a brick at all. It's just a block of clay that I haven't taken time to shape into what it needs to be for me. And so I just ask the listeners to start shaping their lives, start designing their lives, start asking the why questions, the who questions, the what questions, the where questions, like, all of it sounds so simple, but if you start asking yourself those questions around spirituality, about your professional life, about your personal life, about your relationships, about your history, and about your future, you'll come up with some really interesting answers, the building blocks to what you don't wanna be and to what you do wanna be as this mere mortal human that's walking the planet.

Liz Moorehead: 27:38

When did you finally start telling yourself this and listening?

George B. Thomas: 27:42

It's funny. Again, I'm hard headed. I mean, listen. I almost died in the military. I almost died on a motorcycle accident, which I'm sure sure will tell the Faith Ranch motorcycle accident at some point in my life.

George B. Thomas: 27:55

I almost died in my closet, but I think this really started to happen about 4 years ago, and it no. I didn't almost die again, but I was diagnosed with RA, rheumatoid arthritis. I went from being, like, my age to about 90 in 3 weeks. I was like, what is going on? And I tried everything.

George B. Thomas: 28:19

I tried stopping to drink coffee. I tried, you know, everything. CBD oil. Like, if if you got a if you got a snake oil, give it to me because I couldn't even get out of my chair. I mean, it was like I was 98 almost overnight.

George B. Thomas: 28:33

And, again, my wife, she's, the infant, you know, she's just smart. I love how she just knows how to say things to me. She's like, why don't you take your happy ass to the doctor? I went to the doctor. I got diagnosed with the RA, and here's the thing they said, here's what you should do.

George B. Thomas: 28:52

You know, you could don't eat these things. They cause inflammation. You can eat and drink. These things would be better for your body. You know, turmeric, cumin, coconut oil, you know, omega 3, 6 nines, you know, less processed foods, more of this.

George B. Thomas: 29:08

And I had a choice. We all have choices. I could either choose to change, pivot, transition into a new life with the way that would make me feel better, or I could stay stuck where I was and just be in pain. Let's do this whole transformation. COVID also happened, and what's funny is I would watch people online talk about the college 15 or the college 20 because of COVID.

George B. Thomas: 29:36

And when I got diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis and we went through COVID, I went through a period of my life where I lost £79 in 7 months, and I realized this demon that has been on me my entire life, my weight, my relationship with food, I was actually able to beat it if if I had a plan and I made a choice. And so I just started to think about how many things in my life would become true if I just had a plan and made a choice. And now don't get me wrong. Like, I stopped walking as much as I want to when I started the business. I've probably been eating some of the wrong foods that I shouldn't be.

George B. Thomas: 30:23

I've probably gained some of the weight back that I lost, and I know that I'm like, okay, George. You gotta get back on track, But I have yet to design a plan and make that choice for the day that I am at today because I can't fall back on the historical plan because I'm a different person. Every day, I'm different. The same trigger that affected me then isn't affecting me now, but that was the moment in time when I was diagnosed. And what's interesting is, Liz, I was telling people, like because they were asking, what are you doing?

George B. Thomas: 30:58

How have you lost so much weight? And I said, well, I was diagnosed with rheumatoid. I'll never forget. I was talking to one of my coworkers. I said I was diagnosed with RA, and I chose to do this, and she started crying.

George B. Thomas: 31:11

I said, why are you crying? She goes, my dad has RA. He chose not to do those things. It's a choice.

Liz Moorehead: 31:20

Wow. You know, it's interesting that you bring up the word choice because the question that is just ringing through my head so loudly is that why do you think it takes so many of us being laid out or confronting a mortality to make one simple choice, because the choice we're really talking about here is, you know, the title of this episode is you're only human. And we're talking about confronting the limitations of humanity. But in reality, what we're talking about is the simple choice of choosing ourselves. Why do you think that's so hard?

George B. Thomas: 31:54

I think it all falls back to some things, and it's interesting that we did already, you know, we talked about time. I think part of it is that we're we're really bad with time. Why do we not make decisions that benefit us early in life? We have not become wise enough to understand the bad decisions and how they will erode where we're at. But we when we get there, we see it.

George B. Thomas: 32:19

We wish. Oh, I wish I woulda started that earlier. Same reason we get to the age of retirement, and we haven't been saving money. I'll do that tomorrow. Tomorrow never gets here, by the way.

George B. Thomas: 32:32

Tomorrow is fake. There's only today and yesterday. We see tomorrow, but it's it never gets here because we're always just putting it off till tomorrow. So we're just really bad with time, and we're really bad with understanding. You know?

George B. Thomas: 32:47

And and you got all these dumb sayings. When is the best time to plant a tree? 10 years ago or today. Great. Great story, bro.

George B. Thomas: 32:55

But you didn't plant a tree 10 years ago? You didn't plant a tree 9 years ago? You didn't plant a tree 8 years ago, but you sure planted a tree when that tree would save your life. You planted a tree when you realized, oh, shit. I'm in trouble.

George B. Thomas: 33:11

I don't know. There's something about for most of us now somebody's out there listening to hear this, and, I don't have that problem. Well, that's great. But for most of us, we are just really bad at seeing what today's actions do to us in a year, 5, or 10 years from now. That doughnut is amazing until we've gained £20 over the next 2 years.

George B. Thomas: 33:34

And, again, that's a stupid food, like, analogy. Right? But, man, smoking that cigarette is great till you got lung cancer in 20 years from now. We're just really bad at it. We we have this feeling that we're superhuman, that we're especially the younger we are.

George B. Thomas: 33:53

I mean, I was the man of steel when I was, like, 19 to 24, invincible till I wrecked my motorcycle and almost died, but, again, totally different story. We'll tell on a different, you know, episode that we do. We're really bad at understanding how quickly we can be broken, and I mean physically, mentally, spiritually, financially. It's a, and you're broke. We're just bad at understanding that.

George B. Thomas: 34:20

I I don't think we understand the thread in which we're actually walking on during most of the life that we're living.

Liz Moorehead: 34:27

I think the other thing too as well is that depending on where people working or who they're surrounded with, they may be in a situation where they are being conditioned to believe that the limitations that they wanna set for themselves aren't realistic.

George B. Thomas: 34:43

Don't even get me started on the circle that you surround yourself with. The humans that you allow in your ecosystem, my god. I wish I wish that somebody would have told me when I was younger the reality to the fact that you will become the 10, 8, 12 people that you hang around. That you will become that. You are what you surround yourself with.

George B. Thomas: 35:14

You are what you focus on. What they focus on is what you focus on. The type of people that I choose to hang around with today are dramatically different than the people that I would hang around historically. And I'll even say this, the amount of people that I'll choose to hang around is dramatically less than the people that I would have hung around back in the day because I understand how vitally important it is to keep that inner circle healthy, to keep those people who are around me, the people who truly do have my best interest at heart, just like I have their best interest at heart. The type of folks that I want everybody listening to this to understand they should be circling themselves with our humans that are pushing themselves to live a life beyond their default because then you'll be more inclined to live a life beyond your default.

George B. Thomas: 36:19

I want you to surround yourself with people who fundamentally care about being good humans, who are focused in gratitude. It's another dumb saying, but one bad apple ruins the bunch. Ladies and gentlemen, these sayings, they came up because of a real life principle. There's somebody that was really smart figured out, and then we've had these sayings for so long. We're just like, oh, that's a that's a fun old saying.

George B. Thomas: 36:51

No. No. No. No. You don't understand how truthful some of these sayings that you hear are, And I'm a tell you, I have had people in my life that I can historically look back on and go, if I would've let them go years ago, I wonder where I would be because it wouldn't be right here, right now.

George B. Thomas: 37:16

Now, I'm not saying that about right here, right now, which by the way, great, great Van Halen song. I'm just gonna I'm gonna throw that out there as a little mix for people right now. Anyway

Liz Moorehead: 37:28

Nice way to bring down the temperature on this conversation. Talk about Yeah. Stuff with the people you surround with. Also, Van Halen.

George B. Thomas: 37:35

Yeah. When it gets too deep, you gotta bring out the Van Halen or some other band quote. You know? But but it's just like I'm gonna stick with the kind of fruit tree analogy because it's something that I just didn't really pay attention to, but over the last 5 to 6 years, I've really paid attention to. If you want a tree to grow and bear better fruit, you have to prune that tree, and I would ask you, when's the last time you pruned relationships in your life that weren't healthy.

George B. Thomas: 38:08

And I mean, you know, pruned people who are clingy, bad attitudes, don't think the way you think, but for some reason, just let them hang out because it's better to hang out with them than be alone. I'll let that sink in for a minute. Better to be with them than to be alone. No. It's not.

George B. Thomas: 38:28

You just gotta teach yourself that it's not.

Liz Moorehead: 38:31

When you think about all of the different things that we've talked about throughout this conversation today, what is the one thing if somebody remembers nothing else from what you've shared during this episode? What is the one thing they need to take away from this and why?

George B. Thomas: 38:46

Treat yourself with kindness. So many of us are walking on this planet through this life, and we might be great at blessing others. We might be great at showing up, doing what needs to get done. We might be great at telling the folks that are around us how awesome they are, and, you know, they can do it. You can kill it.

George B. Thomas: 39:10

You got this. You got this, and then when we get into our quiet spaces, we wanna say, man, why are you so stupid? Why you keep doing that? Why can't you get your life right? Listen, one of the things that I have had to battle with is truly being able to love myself, all of myself.

George B. Thomas: 39:34

Loving yourself and being kind to yourself might be one of the largest unlocks for you as a human. And so if you take nothing out of this, just start to be kind to yourself, Start to love yourself. Start to be the same cheerleader champion to yourself as you potentially are for those around you.