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The Bigger Stage w/ Matt Stone is a conversation series about leadership, relationships, and the stories that expand influence.
Matt Stone sits down with CEOs, founders, leaders, and creatives to explore the human moments behind growth—how trust is built, how visibility changes responsibility, and how storytelling becomes a leadership skill as stakes rise.
This show is for entrepreneurs and leaders stepping into bigger roles, bigger audiences, and bigger impact—who want to lead with clarity, credibility, and connection, not performance.
The Bigger Stage: David Kalinowski
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[00:00:00]
Matt Stone: What if the key to success isn't about doing more, but giving up the right things? That question has been at the heart of my guest's life for decades. David Kalinowski is a founder, a CEO, and an author, and now a three-time author, and he's stepping onto a new stage with a book that is genuinely a labor of love and service.
Matt Stone: Over 30 years building a global company, he's navigated recessions, divorce, the loss of his father, and the daily grind of leadership decisions that cost something every single time. The result is The Sacrifice Paradox. 101 real stories about the trade-offs that shape our lives and a practical framework to help you stop making sacrifices by accident and start making them by design.
Matt Stone: This is one of those conversations that's going to hit you differently depending on where you're at in your life, in your business, and I have a feeling it's gonna hit you somewhere important no matter who you are. So David Kalinowski. Welcome to the bigger [00:01:00] stage.
Matt Stone: I really wanted to get into the, the inner game of entrepreneurship.
Matt Stone: A lot of people who watch this show, listen to this show are either entrepreneurs want to be entrepreneurs or have an entrepreneurial mindset, and I thought that our conversation hopefully will help them as they do that important inner work that you and I both know is the actual key to success. As my grandfather always said, it's all in your head. so that people can build great companies, but also have a meaningful life along the way. And, and I have a feeling that you are just the right person to do that. So thank you so much for joining me today.
David Kalinowski: Oh, it's my pleasure. Thanks for the invitation and I'm looking forward to the conversation and sharing my experiences and perspectives, to hopefully help some others.
Matt Stone: Now you are the co-founder and the president of a fantastic company [00:02:00] that is in the competitor intelligence, market intelligence world. I think that's, is that the accurate way to put it?
David Kalinowski: Yeah, absolutely. competitive intelligence, strategic intelligence. a little bit different twists than traditional market research. which tends to be more about, quantitative, survey driven type of insights. ours is a lot more qualitative type of work that directly impacts multi-million, sometimes multi-billion dollar decisions.
Matt Stone: And you've been at it for 30 years.
David Kalinowski: Yeah, I've been in the profession for a little over 70,000 hours of my life now. And the organization, we founded in 95. So we had worked with a small boutique consulting firm for five years, doing research, doing analysis, project management, sales, and then ultimately broke away from that organization.
David Kalinowski: And, there's a saying that I picked up years ago by, I think Burroughs, who was the, the guys that leap in the net wheel up here, right? And so we leaped and [00:03:00] took a little while for the net to show up, but, but we did. And here we are 30 years later, still, still moving forward.
Matt Stone: That's amazing. So I have a feeling there have been a few sacrifices along the way. You've written a book called The Sacrifice Paradox, which as you could see, I've, I've used up half of my little mini, 3M tabs here. with some of the amazing stories in here. We're gonna get to the Sacrifice Paradox a little bit later in the discussion.
Matt Stone: and. We're not gonna have a conversation about market intelligence per se today.
Matt Stone: And you And I both know that that's not the intention, but you have built a great company that's doing work worldwide. You're operating in a, in the world of ai, ai, I'm sure AI is impacting your business. There's no way it's not.
Matt Stone: so I just wanted to kind of ask a few questions to get your story about your journey before we get into the book
Matt Stone: and kind of go back in the, in the way back machine. And, I wanna [00:04:00] start off by anchoring this conversation for our audience in a quote that I read. Let's see if you could spot who wrote it, quote.
Matt Stone: Remember, the greatest gains often come from the most significant sacrifices. Embrace the paradox, and you may find that the act of giving up something valuable. Can lead to the most profound growth and success. Does that sound
Matt Stone: familiar at all?
David Kalinowski: sounds, sounds familiar. Might, might've been created, with these fingers and, and what's in between the ears right here. So, yes, I think that's a great quote to pull out. And, I think it, it reflects reality.
Matt Stone: Yeah.
Matt Stone: And, and that was at the end of the first part of the book as you're going into the other stories, and I, that really, that got a tab in, in my, in, in the book for me because, I thought it was a very simple, but not in the pejorative sense. it was such a simply plain language way of saying [00:05:00] there's a real opportunity here.
Matt Stone: So I thought we'd, we'd start off by going back to the initial young, young, not that you're not still young, but the very young David Kalinowski coming up in school. What were you interested in growing up?
David Kalinowski: Sports, interests me. I, I think, any team type of activity, where, where I had an opportunity to learn from others, but lead, debate, back to student council days from, middle school type of stuff all the way through college. I was on the intercollegiate debate team and my debate partner and I had some degree of success, going to nationals.
David Kalinowski: We were representing, Northern Illinois University that year in 1989 and, did pretty well. We ended up losing to the team that won the whole tournament, so. I'm okay with that. although I think we got robbed, but, but it was, a debate. I think, when I, when I got a little bit older than my teens and turned 21, my parents took me to Vegas for the first time.
David Kalinowski: So gambling is now, a part of my life from an entertainment standpoint. Of [00:06:00] course, I don't, risk my mortgage or anything like that. but, acting, I acting when I was growing a kid, I always imagined I, I might be, an actor, and I get to play part of that when I do workshops or I role play,
David Kalinowski: or if I am doing a motivational keynote, I, I get to bring some of that, that drama piece, I guess, into the mix. So,
Matt Stone: So you're,
David Kalinowski: hanging with my friends, hang, hanging with my friends and I, that's still to this day, my fraternity brothers, my high school, buddies, I still stay close contact with many of them.
Matt Stone: you work with any of them?
David Kalinowski: I do work with a couple that support me in terms of some external services that they provide to help the business. but not a whole lot of them. I don't, pretty much social.
Matt Stone: Yeah, absolutely. And I find with those kinds of friendships, they anchor me. because, when you meet someone, when you're much, much younger, when you see them, you also see yourself in them. You see your own growth as you see them aging and [00:07:00] growing and getting new
Matt Stone: experiences. And it's a very grounding thing, I think, to have long-term friendships.
David Kalinowski: yeah, for sure. And, and the other thing too, billiards pool, I, I used to play a lot. I don't play as much anymore, but I definitely remember the days in college where, I was going to a, a, a bar and people would, my friends would grab me right away. 'cause there was someone. who's thinking they were really good.
David Kalinowski: And then I ended up win winning drinks for the night for all my buddies, 'cause, I was pretty good when I, when I was serious about playing.
Matt Stone: What, what do you call it? The ringer, the, the person that when you come in and that you fool
Matt Stone: everybody. What's the name of that?
David Kalinowski: Ringer hustler, whatever you wanna call it, Yeah. You, you lose a couple initial games until they say, Hey, you wanna play for five hours? I guess we could try,
Matt Stone: all right. I, I'm up for
Matt Stone: a big risk today. And then you
Matt Stone: just
David Kalinowski: How about, how about, yeah. How about a couple drinks instead? You
Matt Stone: yeah, absolutely. And your gold watch.
Matt Stone: so listen, when did what, what did you after college, what were you doing right outta college? I mean, what kind of work did you do
David Kalinowski: nothing. it was most of us, you get outta school and you [00:08:00] try to figure out what you're gonna do. I had taken the lsat, I had intended to go to law school. I had taken my GMATs. I was gonna think about wanting to teach political science and, and pursue a PhD. and none of that really kind of worked out.
David Kalinowski: I, I ended up running into a buddy of mine at, at a social gathering, and he, and he asked the same question, what, what are you doing? Nothing. I'm, I'm back in with my parents right now, and, a lot of kids, intentionally do that. Now, I, I did not want to be there. I, not that I don't love my parents and all those things, but, I was ready to move on and, but he is Hey, you should come interview with us.
David Kalinowski: And so I went and, and he's do you research? I'm well, of course, I, I love research because as part of the, the debate team, you had, research the pros and the negative side of any. Resolution that you were debating for that semester or that tournament. And, and so I was come, come interview with us.
David Kalinowski: So I went and interviewed at this organization and, and Matt, I was so broke at the time. I had, I had no, I had no idea what they were. I was a young kid, I was just graduated. I was 21 years old, right. And, so I [00:09:00] found a white pair of pants I had and a white dress shirt. So I looked an ice cream man.
David Kalinowski: So I go to this interview and, and, it must have went well. 'cause a few days later, the owner had called me and offered me, $24,000 as a starting role for a researcher and, and, and 89 90 that, that was a decent starting celery for someone who. Basically no experience. I, I sold fire extinguishers before I had a newspaper route type of things.
David Kalinowski: I worked at a pizza place, right? It's a busboy. I've done all those kind of things. But, so I remember sitting in the kitchen of my parents', place and writing down 24,000, circling it because that was my way out. I was gone, And so I took it right away and that started my career. someone took a chance on me and I was there for about five years.
David Kalinowski: So, learned a lot, worked with mostly Fortune 500 organizations. And then, that led to my business partner, Gary Mag and I, departing. And we were sitting on. Some, [00:10:00] some green plastic, cheap patio furniture in the back of a house. I was renting at the time and Gary's always I, I think we, we should start our own business.
David Kalinowski: I'm I don't know, I just had a baby, Well, my, my ex-wife had the, I, I hadn't had the baby and didn't do much. so it just had a, a newborn and, it was August of, of 95. And, he's I, I think we should do this. I'm I don't know. It's a pretty big risk. And so we talked a bit. He goes, well, I'm, I'm gonna do this either way.
David Kalinowski: So he got up and left and by the time he got back to his house, he had an answering machine. 'cause that's what we had back then. And answering, we seen message from me saying I was in. And, October 95, we, we restart you. We were off and running and, scary and exhilarating at the same time. I had no choice but to make sure it was gonna
Matt Stone: What, let's get into your mindset. What was going on in your mind?
David Kalinowski: I.
Matt Stone: I mean, that gap between when you said,
Matt Stone: well, I
David Kalinowski: know
David Kalinowski: any, I don't know anything about running a business. I have no idea about how to [00:11:00] sell to people or, executives. I have no idea how to manage, manage cash flow. I don't know any, I don't know anything I didn't know about attorneys and lawyer, I mean, accountants or, or payroll or, bankers.
David Kalinowski: I didn't know any of that. So it was just a lot of uncertainty of the unknown. So, but it was also an opportunity to say, I have a chance to learn a lot. Because I was a political science major. I wasn't a business major, so I did not think I'd be going into starting a business. But, it was also super exciting.
David Kalinowski: It was scary because I, I, I, I had to make it work. we had a newborn, expenses everybody else has, I, I, it wasn't an option to fail. and so fortunately we had a non-solicitation clause, so I couldn't contact any former clients proactively, right. without violating that. So they had had to get the word out.
David Kalinowski: And then right away we had one of our clients contact us and we got our first project, which I still had the first [00:12:00] dollar framed from that and the first copy of the, of the payment. but then a, a, a few weeks later we got a bigger project. We got our first, project that was gonna give us some, some decent funds.
David Kalinowski: It was a $50,000 engagement in November of 95. And the client says, well, what though? we just have one problem. I'm well, what, what's the problem? They said, well, we have to get that paid this fiscal year here. I'm again, what's the problem? I mean, do you want me to hop on a plane and come get the cash from you?
David Kalinowski: so,
Matt Stone: A.
David Kalinowski: so at that point he asked how, how do I feel I went from worry about how the hell am I gonna. Pay my rent and how am I gonna pay the electric bill and all these things to, oh my gosh, we have some cash coming in to the business now to get us going. That was our seed money. Right.
David Kalinowski: And 30 years later, proactive worldwide is still here.
Matt Stone: Yeah. How, wait, so maybe I missed it in what you said, but from the time that you, said, I don't [00:13:00] know, and then you called your buddy, your partner and said, I'm in
Matt Stone: till the $50,000. How, give me a sense of the timeframe of that.
David Kalinowski: Yeah. So, so the, the phone call was immediate. That was, A minute after he left. I didn't even talk with my, my wife at the time about it. I just, pretty important decision. I think you'd speak with your spouse about, that you're gonna, depart and start a new business with no idea about do you have insurance?
David Kalinowski: We have, I mean, nothing. Right? And so at that point, it was the excitement and, and the nerves of, okay, this is gonna happen. I'm not backing out of it at this point. And then it was, what do we have to do? And of course, at the time I had support from my ex then, so that made it easier because without that it would be really difficult.
David Kalinowski: But then it's, so what do we need to do? And in one of the big bookshelves behind me here, I actually have the original strategic planning book that we used that outlined, a, a path to take. And we followed that. To creating our plan [00:14:00] and, and, securing the right partnerships in terms of, getting the, the key pillars, right?
David Kalinowski: The accountant, the banker, the insurance agent, and, and your lawyer, all open to run in. So that was a pretty rapid timeframe. It was really then a week later or so that we were getting ready to incorporate and we were, we were
Matt Stone: And then, but how long, so there's the pi, the foundational pillars of the business, the plan, the consultants, lawyers, your bank accounts, all that. And then when was that $50,000 deal made? Like was it.
David Kalinowski: from the time we started, before we got that, that was about four to five weeks, it moved fast. so we were up and running with the, incorporation and, getting all those partnerships within a week. we, we, Gary was actually staying on a little bit longer at the other organization.
David Kalinowski: And I was getting all that, that going, And then he joined in and we were already, had, somebody developing a, a website and doing the good again. This is when the internet really is just getting started too. [00:15:00] Right. So
Matt Stone: it? I mean, I remember that pretty well. I mean, I was in, in undergrad in, in 93 to 97 and then I was in law school later. But, so I've done the research trail and I was a history major. So political. It was either political science or history. I went history. So I remember going to the library and looking up books,
David Kalinowski: on microfilm and
Matt Stone: mi micro fic, remember that you're in there, moving it around, just trying to get that 1850, 18 53 article from the, New York Times or whatever it was.
David Kalinowski: I, I often tell people, When we started our work, the, the internet really didn't exist. So if you did research, you would have to call the, the organization of interest, request the annual report if they were publicly held, wait two weeks for it to show up to, to in the mail, flip to the back pages where the executives were and start calling 'em.
David Kalinowski: And that's, that's what you did. There were no databases, there were no AI tools, there were no websites to go to. so it was a completely [00:16:00] different approach to, to get your work done. I tell people now you got it easy. You got all this access to things. Now people are a little more savvy about what they share and what they shouldn't share.
David Kalinowski: Right. But but yeah, it was definitely a different point in time.
Matt Stone: Do you remember It's you and Gary? Yeah. And you. And you and
Matt Stone: Gary start the business. Do you remember your first hire, your first full-time hire?
David Kalinowski: Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. yeah, I could tell you who he, who he was too. but yeah, well, Joseph was his name and it's interesting because his mom used to cut my hair right back then, and he was in school, I think Loyola at the time or so, or, but, and so, it was three years later, 1998.
David Kalinowski: So the first three years was just me and Gary, get the work in, get it done, get the work in, get it done. And it was, 20 hour days, six days a week. you talk about sacrifices, I missed a lot in those years of things outside of work to get the business foundation established. but yeah, that was our first hire in, in 98.
David Kalinowski: And then shortly after that we got our first office space. here we are back in our houses [00:17:00] now. Right. But, but, that was quite the experience too. I remember going. with our real estate agent looking at places to rent and we get to this one place, it was good. It was nice size, maybe could hold four or five cubes.
David Kalinowski: Had three or four offices had a conference room. all right, perfect. And we go to do all the contractual stuff and the landlord's okay, you also have to sign this document. I'm okay, what's this? He goes, well, it's a per personal guarantee. I'm but we got the business. That's the first time I literally had someone laugh in my face.
David Kalinowski: I'm okay, you got your business. I still need you to guarantee that even something happens to your business, you're paying this rent. And that was my first lesson in business really fast. That doesn't matter that I got a business that's incorporated all this other stuff. I had to still personally guarantee that we're gonna pay our bills.
David Kalinowski: Right. so that that elevated the risk again, another level. Right? But, but. It was also, again, super exciting 'cause we hired Joey, who later become our managing director in, in Rome, who we had [00:18:00] an office out in Rome. but yeah, that was, that was our first hire back in 98.
Matt Stone: so fast forward, how many you, you, you've, you've gone global, you've got a, a team globally. Tell me, I mean, all these years later or 30 years later,
David Kalinowski: Yeah, I won't get into too many specifics as the privately held business, but we're, we're, we're still under 50 employees, right? 50 is always a interesting threshold because, family medical Leave Act kicks in at 50, right? So different parameters. so I always say if and when we ever get to that point, I want to interview that person, right?
David Kalinowski: To make sure that they are the right person. But, it's, it's been up and down all, all the years, right? There's years where we have really boomed and had a rapidly hire and build our contractor network for international work. we've done work in 62 countries, right? So, You need language skill sets, you need access to people in other regions of the world. and then there's times where 2007, 2008, where, the global financial [00:19:00] crisis, almost wiped us out, but we were financially disciplined enough. We made some tough decisions on staffing to get through that, to survive. And, that was definitely a critical point in our business in 2008, 2009.
David Kalinowski: And we had just built a new, a brand new, very large, 20,000 square foot facility in 2007, put about a million dollars into building this beautiful office, furnishing it all, and then the freaking market all collapses, right? So then we had to get out, work to get out of that arrange. We had a 10 year lease agreement, right?
David Kalinowski: Which again, I'm personally responsible for, but luckily we were able to get out of all that, not just sub light, but get out of it entirely within about a year and a half. And then. get a different play that was small and all those things, but, but yeah, there was definitely some, some interesting times.
David Kalinowski: And then you, we rebuild after that and then the 2012 recession hits and then you have, COVID hits. It's we're the definition mad of resilience.
Matt Stone: I can see that. Yeah. And, and, and the only thing [00:20:00] that's sure is that there's gonna be things you can't always predict that are gonna happen. So it's things are gonna happen.
David Kalinowski: a doubt.
David Kalinowski: Yeah.
David Kalinowski: And that's why you do as a business owner, have to make tough sacrifices that at that point, what do you do to keep as many people as you can? Right. Having to do layoffs or furloughs and, those are things you only learn when you have to go through 'em. You could read about it, you get guidance.
David Kalinowski: But man, to actually make those decisions, they're gut wrenching for me anyway, for a small business, big companies. They could lay off announced tomorrow they're laying off 30,000 people. And, those executives, I'm sure don't, don't worry about sleeping too much that night. if I gotta let go one or two people for non-performance issues or non-behavioral issues, it, it hits me.
David Kalinowski: I, I hate having to do that. but it is part of business, it's part of leadership, it's part of the tough choices that you have to make for the longer term, sustainable, profitable growth that you need as [00:21:00] a business.
Matt Stone: Absolutely. Yeah. One of the many, many sacrifices, and, and, trade offs that we have. And, so as you're looking, I mean, just knowing what I, my own experience in business now over decades, I've owned several different businesses. it's a wild ride. I mean, it is a wild ride. It's full of high highs and low lows, and then a whole bunch of stuff in the middle on the daily.
Matt Stone: And so I can only imagine how many trade-offs and decisions you've had to make over the years. We've just touched on over the last few minutes, we've just touched on a few. I'm wondering though, as you look back on your time building this company, what's the biggest sacrifice that you've made that has had the biggest payoff?
David Kalinowski: lemme share a, a, a business one and a very intimate personal one. the biggest one beyond the money piece, right? The beyond the giving up, at times certain parts of my own compensation to hire other [00:22:00] individuals or to make sure the business has enough cash flow, those types of things.
David Kalinowski: Because, I don't draw a massive salary. Most of my income comes when we're profitable, right? I mean, that, and, and, but I think the, the, the bigger sacrifice that I've made that ended up becoming right, was making, making compromises in, business growth desires, right?
David Kalinowski: That we're gonna grow exponentially, to just scale things at a manageable level, knowing that it might risk even losing some people because they want growth opportunities, right? And if you're only growing at a smaller click, it's hard to give people more money or bonuses or other benefits and, and chances to develop their own, career path more.
David Kalinowski: but to be able to make the idea that we're gonna sacrifice, that kind of growth and, and the, the idea to be able to build something faster. so that we can make sure we're around a while is, is probably the biggest thing, making some the tough choices of, of staffing, right?
David Kalinowski: and maybe [00:23:00] that's not even my sacrifices, what I've asked others even to sacrifice over the years. during those town down times I've asked leadership team to take pay cuts, short term, right? I, I've asked to scale back things. I've asked to work with minimal resources and I know it impacted people being able to effectively do their job, right?
David Kalinowski: but many of those folks are still around me today, right? So, because of being transparent with them about what's happening. I, I think that helped deep, deepen the relationship. So, so yeah, I think, I think missing, missing all the, the kids' activities growing up, I, I try to be there as much as I can.
David Kalinowski: but, travel to see clients or, speaking at trade shows, that was tough. It was tough at a certain point to consistently miss being there. And, and not any business owner or even executives or, or managers in, in any [00:24:00] organization. but it paid off ultimately because, it may be appreci more the times than I was with my kids as an example, or, to be able to, have the house I live in or to travel on vacation and to get different life experiences.
David Kalinowski: those things do take money to, to accomplish. And so. having that security of stabilizing the business, was, was the biggest, I guess business trade off is sacrificing all those times because you don't wanna get to the point where your kids then stop asking you to show up. Or you do. I have a couple stories in the book, where, where some executives, put so much into the grind of work. They come home and the house is dark and nobody's waiting up, and nobody really is asking anymore about, their day. And, because they, they've lost interest because you seem to have lost interest in them, even though you didn't.
David Kalinowski: [00:25:00] But certainly that's the perception, you
Matt Stone: Right. Well, also people don't, you don't want to be hurt. If it's a hurtful thing, at some point you just, I'm not gonna expect it anymore because it hurts too much to expect it and then be disappointed
David Kalinowski: Yeah. Even if it, your intention, it, it does, intention does matter, but you definitely don't want to, intentionally go out to hurt someone, So that was kinda the business on the personal side, I tell you the, and this was, this was really personal, but in 2007, when I, when I, asked for a divorce, it was tough because my ex-wife, great lady, she didn't do anything wrong, wasn't, just, it just wasn't there anymore.
David Kalinowski: Just, and you can go through those motions and mask how you feel and pretend, right? Or you take the hard action of realizing I don't wanna find myself 10 years from now still wanting for, for something else. And, and my kids are younger, they're all adult. kids now. Right. But, [00:26:00] I knew that I wouldn't see my kids every day.
David Kalinowski: Then I knew then that, there'd be different visitation schedules all, I mean, we had a relatively amicable separation. There was never issues about you can't have the kids or there, or, it was whenever I wanted to see it and I always had access, but we had a fixed schedule.
David Kalinowski: But that was, that was probably the biggest sacrifices, the impact that was gonna have on my children. And, but the, how that paid off then was it made me a better dad. It really did. Because now when I had a few hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays and every other weekend as formal time, instead of working my ass off every night, every day, even when they're in the next room in their home and I'm not really engaged now, I found myself being with them.
David Kalinowski: Whether we went to play mini golf or bowling or whatever. Right. I took those three hours and I wasn't off working. Sometimes I had to when they were here. Right. [00:27:00] But it made me so much more appreciative and aware of the hours I had with them during that time that I, I think, I don't know if they'd agree or not.
David Kalinowski: I would hope they would agree that, I was an okay dad during that, that stretch of time as well. So, So that was a, a big 'cause it cost me financially, it, it cost me time with my, my kids. It costs, the stigma, at the time in particular of, oh, you can't make a marriage work type of thing.
David Kalinowski: It's it's not about that, but it would've been unfair, to myself, to my ex, to the kids, to, and I see so many people who just go through those motions, 'cause of the fear and everything else. but ultimately it was the right decision to be able to, catapult me in different ways.
David Kalinowski: I, I didn't see coming. That became more fulfilling.
Matt Stone: I, I mean, you're just talking about, just in the last five minutes, how many sacrifices you've covered, in thinking about a relationship, a relationship with your kids, your life, your [00:28:00] business, When did you start thinking of sacrifice as a topic that you would want to even delve into and write about?
Matt Stone: What, when did that moment happen and
David Kalinowski: Yeah. That was, that was in early 2019, maybe late 2018, but I started thinking about the concept when I was really reflecting on a, on a flight. Actually then it probably really started, yeah, it was 2008. I was coming back on a flight from Egypt. I had a client that brought me out there, which is awesome experience, right?
David Kalinowski: I wasn't gonna go, but they're but we'll take you to the pyramids and to the sps I'm in, I'm in. I didn't care about the money at that point. It's wow. So, but I'm flying back thinking about all the different trade offs in life. Some that were good, some that were horrible, some that regretted.
David Kalinowski: but then, in 2019, I started sketching out the ideas of this. And then I did a keynote on this topic for the Society of Insurance Research at, at their, at their annual conference. And it was my first kind of attempt at really teasing this topic out there. Because it is any other keynote, everyone's [00:29:00] always talking about their tactics and strategy and all this stuff, and this had nothing to do with any of that.
David Kalinowski: It was a life issue I was addressing about making better choices, intentional choices. And man, I tell you, the response was fantastic. so, and what really drove a lot of that in late 2019, my dad, 88-year-old dad, former Marine, had developed an illness and ended up ultimately suddenly, passing.
David Kalinowski: And, that made me think about a lot of the sacrifice. He was, he made, and my mom of course, who's still with us, 91 years old, but he worked on the railroad for 41 years. he was a car inspector, so he would be the guy walking up and down a hundred cars and making sure they're connected properly, weighted properly so they don't fall off.
David Kalinowski: And, so he did that for 41 years. And, middle income family, it's not coming from anything glorious and, but help me and my three brothers, our older brothers as much as possible, right? And so, so that triggered the idea about how much I've [00:30:00] sacrificed and, and when I went down there to help my mom when my dad was in the hospital, I had to make a really big sacrifice.
David Kalinowski: And I talk about this in, in the book a little bit, right? Of, of leaving my mom, knowing my, one of my brothers was coming, but leaving while my dad was, in the hospital, unconscious because I had a workshop, I had a lead back in Chicago. 50 people attending. They already were paid. They some most already were showing up.
David Kalinowski: It was my content. Nobody else could deliver it, So I had to have that conversation about leaving and to go do the work thing. And, and my mom's comment around, you were here when I needed you most. go, your father would want you, your work is important to, I'm man, I wrestled with that for months afterwards about was that the right decision?
David Kalinowski: but it upheld my purpose, which is to make a positive difference in the lives of others. And, and so because I had the conversation about it with my mom, it, it made [00:31:00] it okay, I guess, to do that. Then you got others saying, how could you do, why would you leave your dad's? for work?
David Kalinowski: I would never say there's more at play,
Matt Stone: Right.
David Kalinowski: than that.
Matt Stone: I read that story and the, the moment that it my heart activated was your mother saying that's what your father would want you to do. That's what he wants. And that really hit me because.
David Kalinowski: Yeah.
Matt Stone: It's still gonna be painful, but you have that know it. It rang true to me. There was such an auth, an integrity and an authenticity to that and a deep love in that statement.
Matt Stone: And your mom's amazing, obviously, for being
Matt Stone: able to communicate that to you.
David Kalinowski: she, she's, a hundred percent Italian, has their stubborn elements, if any of my brothers tell you. But, she, she lives with myself and my, my wife now. and it's a blessing, right? To be able to have that time. with her, and she still comes up with stories from 50 years ago they were yesterday.
David Kalinowski: So, still alert and mobile and all those, those fun things. But, but yeah, there definitely were sacrifices [00:32:00] along the way and that, so that sparked the idea for the book. And, and so I ran it by a bunch of friends about, would this be an interesting topic? And that's when then I really, it took me six years to fi finish that book because then I started accumulating the stories, the 101 stories.
David Kalinowski: I actually had more, but I had to have a cutoff point. Right.
Matt Stone: had to sacrifice. Some of the sacrifices had to be sacrificed.
David Kalinowski: well, initially I was only gonna do 50. Then my publisher was no, there's something about having 101 stories. And so, and I tried to have a mix of, of athletes and entrepreneurs and business executives and homemakers and students, and teachers and artists, and they all had sacrifices.
David Kalinowski: So as I was talking to people at airports or in conference rooms or social gathering. I really realized that, I'm not the only one giving up things. And that's why the, the whole idea behind the book, the ultimate question that I kept coming back to is, what if the key to success isn't about doing more, [00:33:00] but giving up the right things?
David Kalinowski: And I really built everything around that question because I really then started to hear individuals making sacrifices, but they didn't always know why they made them or they made them out of obligation, right? I have to stay work late 'cause my boss has to have this, or I have an obligation, right? So sorry, I have to miss your piano recital.
David Kalinowski: Right? And at that point, do you think your kid cares that you had your work to get done? Or are they out looking, in the audience and just realizing you're not there? And as I started reflecting more about that, that. I, I thought this could be a really powerful book and there really wasn't a whole lot written on this,
David Kalinowski: and I mean, because I'm not talking about sacrifice in, in the form of, killing an animal to please your deity. Right.
Matt Stone: I was gonna say.
David Kalinowski: Comey.
Matt Stone: I, I
Matt Stone: was looking at, the mythology around how much [00:34:00] sacrifice plays into all of our storytelling. I mean, from, in the Bible. I mean, my goodness, the Christian Bible's full of sacrifice in that, in that sense, and in in the other sense, Abraham and, and Isaac, sacrifice there.
Matt Stone: I mean, just on and on and on and on and
Matt Stone: on.
Matt Stone: and just to, you're gonna go into this now, but the definition of sacrifice that we're working with is more of that
David Kalinowski: yeah. I'd Steven Covey's definition and, it's giving him something good for something better.
David Kalinowski: Simple, right? You're giving up something that you value already, that you find favorable positive, but you're willing to give that up because you think you're gonna get something better in exchange for.
David Kalinowski: And a better doesn't mean more money necessarily. It could be just the fulfillment, the richness of your life that you get, the peace that you get. and, and that's why, and, and maybe we'll get into this, the sacrifice framework I created to help people think about how do you make that decision?
David Kalinowski: Because I find that so many people make short-term emotional [00:35:00] sacrifices from all my conversations. Very few actually thought about, what does this mean to you, though, a year from now or five years from now? and are you thinking about that? 'cause if, if you, if you take the, the future and bring it into the present, that will help weigh differently whether you should, should, should actually. implement, that sacrifice. And, and I think at Susie Welch, who talks about 10, 10, 10, right? She's how I feel in 10 minutes from now, 10 months from now and 10 years from now about this. And we put so much weight on what's happening now in making that sacrifice decision to not think about the consequences or the benefits that will feel from that sacrifice later.
Matt Stone: I think in the world of entrepreneurship there is sort of, a culture of, or a, or a common kind of worship, at least in our culture of the entrepreneur, is someone who's willing to put off the, [00:36:00] the sugar, the, the, the put off the, the wind for maybe even an extended period of time. There's almost a worship of the sacrifice that you make over a protracted period.
Matt Stone: 'cause there might be a big payoff. And it goes back to, I mean, with the gold rush in the 19th century, I mean, we have a long history of this kind of thinking in the United States. but I wonder. You talk about a framework of three different, first of all, you talk about an evaluative framework, and we'll get to that in a second.
Matt Stone: But first, before we get to that, you talk about three types of sacrifices and I, I guess I want to tie this together with maybe a young entrepreneur who's going, oh yeah, I really haven't thought about consciously the sacrifices and the trade offs that I've made, and I will likely have to make that might have bigger and bigger stakes the older I get, the bigger the company that gets.
Matt Stone: So walk us through your framework. It starts with, I believe, unconscious sacrifices.
David Kalinowski: There there's three unconscious sacrifices, misguided sacrifices, and [00:37:00] then intentional sacrifices. And the unconscious ones are ones that all of us live every day. Those are the hidden ones. Those are the, I'm gonna work a little bit later, so I won't be able to join you for dinner tonight.
David Kalinowski: they are the things that we do, all the time that just are part of our lives, and we don't really think that they're, they're having any kind of a negative impact until they do, until it does catch up with us, until eventually, we recognize that they are causing harm and we have to change something, right?
David Kalinowski: you see this a lot with, with students and, and that they're making sacrifice. Even now, man, high school students, the pressure of all these AP courses are taken, all these things. 'cause they want to get, it's man, they think they have to do everything. They have to be in sports or, or sometime events.
David Kalinowski: They have the extracurriculars, they have to, still be there with family. They say they're taking these intense courses do you, do you really. Need all that? Is it really going to get you where you want? And where is it that you want to go and, and [00:38:00] what can go, so the unconscious ones become really important.
David Kalinowski: The the second ones are the, the, the misguided sacrifices, right? And, those are the ones that we think will lead us to success, right? But they don't. So if I, if I work hard enough, I work long enough, I'm gonna get the promotion, I'm gonna get the raise, I'm gonna get the bonus. and then you don't, right?
David Kalinowski: They, the people confuse, busyness from actual meaningful work that you're doing, right? and, and so you, you're, you're, you're prioritizing a, a certain task that doesn't really get you to where you wanna go, right? So you're mis you're misguided in what you're seeing, what you're hearing,
David Kalinowski: the third one is really around intentional sacrifices. This is the money sacrifice. This is the most critical one, but also the most difficult. This is the one where I, I think you, you make a conscious decision to let go of something, to, to fit, fit and make room for what truly matters. And I find [00:39:00] that all these things change as your stage of life changes, right?
David Kalinowski: When you're in your twenties, Yeah. Work might be the most important element of your life, And, certainly you have your friends, you have your family, you have these other, um, uh, there's a wheel of life that's out there, I can't remember the name, individual, Murphy maybe.
David Kalinowski: but, that talks about, spiritual and, and family and social and work and all these, these different elements of what, of this wheel of life. And that changes the, the, the shape of the pies or the size of each pie in that wheel changes as your. Evolves, right? So once you do, if you have kids or family or wife or spouse, husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, whatever, that now part of your time is carved towards something else, right?
David Kalinowski: So I think the purpose that you set changes, as you move on, and, what you're willing to give up. I, I, I try right now to stay close with my [00:40:00] friends. I try to say yes more when they wanna get together or do something. 'cause we're not guaranteed tomorrow. And so making the intentional sacrifice, what, here a couple nights ago I was up till three 30 in the morning working.
David Kalinowski: I sacrifice sleep, I sacrifice comfort, I sacrifice little brain, power, uh, that, that I knew the next day I'd be tired, but I had a, I had a deadline. I had to get it done. and sometimes for me, my best thoughts come at midnight. I, I don't know
Matt Stone: Yeah. Hey, join the club. Yeah.
David Kalinowski: yeah, you right, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll wake, next morning my wife will be yo, man, you, you didn't even come to bed.
David Kalinowski: I'm I know, but I just got cranking. And she'll read something I'm writing to her, when I was working on this book and go, man, that's some of your, your best work. I'm I know. I said, thanks, but it's but anyway, yeah, you, you, you make those trade-offs that are simple. Again, comfort, sometime with others, but I, I, I, but I think the intentional, it's by designed, not default, right?[00:41:00]
David Kalinowski: You're intentionally choosing to do something or not to do something based on how it will impact you. How it will impact others. Ideally, you want it to impact both, but some sacrifices don't. Some sacrifices might affect me, but they don't benefit you. Some might benefit you, but it won't benefit me. Right?
David Kalinowski: And so getting people to think about, just pause, just even for a few minutes before you say, yes, I'll do that. then you go, oh, shoot, I forgot we got that going on tonight. I've already committed over here. If you just would've waited a few minutes, you might have made a different decision.
Matt Stone: The pause. Yeah. You're really bringing me back to my work and self-awareness and The Venn diagram of, of, of the self-awareness as a skill, as a practice, and what you're talking about is just almost an eclipse.
David Kalinowski: Well, well, people think we're, we're always available. and they act that, oh yeah, yes. Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah. and, and I [00:42:00] just reread the power of focus. I actually have it right over here on my desk. Because I'm even working that into my business about, we've been all over the place on certain things, we gotta get focused again.
David Kalinowski: we gotta get focused. Just when you're, you're trying to build wealth, there's a saying that talks about, focus, builds wealth, diversification preserves wealth, right? So we have to get really focused at different stages of our life. There are times when your family absolutely is most important, without a doubt.
David Kalinowski: Certain form of years of your kids growing up, or an illness that's happening, or whatever it might be for you, where you say work has to wait. And there's other times where family has to wait
Matt Stone: So I
Matt Stone: think, I think what I'm hearing from you is there's this natural flow of, of a life and especially a life that includes. a business where you go into modes of extreme focus to to grow your revenue, to achieve a certain [00:43:00] thing, and then you diversify. But I also hear you saying that we go back into that focus and then back we kind of go, we modulate.
Matt Stone: At least that's my been my experience. You do kind of go between those states and that the more that you are aware and conscious and making intentional, conscious choices about those trade-offs, the better choices that you're going to make
David Kalinowski: A hundred percent. Let me give you a simple everyday example, right? you want, you wanna be healthier, you wanna be more fit, right? I mean, I have that in my set of goals. You may as well, most of us, have some version of that. Am I doing all that it requires to make that happen? Hell no.
David Kalinowski: am I, am I, binge eating? Am I eating junk food? Am I eating sugar still? Am I missing my workouts? Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. so how important is it to me? I mean, I am consciously putting my hand to the potato chip bag, right? I know I'm doing it right. so how important is that [00:44:00] to me?
David Kalinowski: It should be more important, and, and when I look at my wife, she's super fit and she's, working out at five 30 in the morning 'cause she's a kindergarten teacher, so she gets that in. She's disciplined about her eating all this type of stuff. Not that she doesn't have her days, right.
David Kalinowski: She, we we're, she eats other stuff, but I'm man, she's just got an amazing discipline I don't have for stuff that. Right. can I take the spare hour I have and do I watch, Briton, and do I, do I watch some, some Netflix show to or do I use that hour and go work out?
David Kalinowski: Right. What sacrifice, what trade off am I making in that moment? So those are the intentional things that I'm talking about of I could choose one over the other. And I know that if, boy, if I want to come summer, take my shirt off at the pool and actually have a chest and a couple abs, that's just, I can't wish that to happen.
David Kalinowski: I can't, um, but I'm not, I'm choosing not to put the time in to do it. [00:45:00] Maybe I'll start choosing differently, soon. But, it's a conscious choice.
Matt Stone: is, it is a conscious choice and it's a struggle, of course, as we age, I mean, I can already tell it, it, it gets even harder. The sacrifice feels even harder. I, that's not that we shouldn't do it. I'm
David Kalinowski: I, but I will tell you what, what, what's helped me, real quick. so my daughter, had a son a year ago. So my had my first grandson and first grandkid at all. And. Just turned one in December. Now that has sparked me to make sure I get a lot more aware of my health because I want to be around to see him grow up.
David Kalinowski: I want to be part of that. I want to be able to, uh, engage in activity, so those are the moments I see in here, or even with my dad when he was going through. Those are the triggers. Sometimes that snaps me back for a short time. I do all the stuff I need to be doing. It's just the discipline then to make it a high enough priority among all the priorities,
David Kalinowski: 'cause, [00:46:00] because then you, you get committed. It's building a business, right? When, when I made that a priority, I committed, I did anything and everything I had to do. There were no exceptions, no excuses, nothing. But yet I seemed to make them for me
Matt Stone: Yeah.
David Kalinowski: and other things.
Matt Stone: And, and that is the game. and also you mentioned, it, it did, it does help when, not that you burn the ships, but there is sort of a burn the ships element to it, which is, cutting the crutches or the safe spaces for you to jump back to and just being all in. And then it's an imperative.
Matt Stone: And then you're, you kind of, well, let's talk about the framework of, of making these intentional sacrifices. 'cause you actually offer some tangible tips in the book. You go from the three types, which is kind of building awareness to, okay, now what do I do to evaluate a situation with a framework?
Matt Stone: And you have a nice XY axis. Can you walk us through that
Matt Stone: and how we
David Kalinowski: if I,
Matt Stone: it on the day to day
David Kalinowski: sure. [00:47:00] So, so imagine a two by two square, right? And at the bottom of that, anybody, listening here, you can write the words, impact the others. And along the, the, the side axis, you can write impact to self, right? And on, on the bottom left quarter, it's, it's, it, it won't hurt is the legend name.
David Kalinowski: And, and the upper corners, it, it, it will help, right? So if you think about it won't hurt, somebody and or will help, it won't help. And it will help, right? So my sacrifice will help or it won't help, right? To me or it will help others. Or won't help others. That's kind of the about and the top right, you have sacrifice.
David Kalinowski: You make the sacrifice. And that is if a sacrifice is going to help you, Matt, and it's gonna help me then make the sacrifice, it's good for both of us, right? So that's the top right of the quarter sacrifice. Bottom left is not no sacrifice, right? So that is a, a a, a sacrifice is going to hurt you or not help you and not help me.
David Kalinowski: Why would I do [00:48:00] it? So when ask you to do something, say. That, that's not gonna help the team. It's not gonna help the company. It's not gonna help me. Well, why would I do that? Right? But most of us live in the gray zones, and that's the top left and the bottom right of that two by two, right?
David Kalinowski: Something that will help me. So up in the top left, it, it's, uh, it's a maybe and the bottom right is a maybe, right? Because you have to think about the short and long-term consequences and benefits to you or to the other person as you're thinking about if you should make the sacrifice. So the top left is a, maybe if it's, if it's gonna, help me, what, but what's the consequences that I might face if I, if I do this?
David Kalinowski: And same thing in the bottom right. it, it might be a benefit, to me, but what's the consequences to you? So you have, you have to be able to think about those elements. and I find a lot of people don't. They just don't, in the moment, they don't think about the short and long term.
David Kalinowski: Mostly the short term. They don't think about the long-term benefits or consequence of that decision here. And they make an [00:49:00] emotional short-term charge decision to, to, to make that sacrifice. even something as simple as, Hey, you wanna go to movies tonight? no, it's Friday. I don't really feel going out and I just want sit and watch TV and your, your buddy's doesn't, doesn't want, or you want go shoot some pool, you wanna grab a drink and catch up?
David Kalinowski: No, it's been a long week, I'm just gonna relax. It's okay, that's totally fine. I'm not trying to judge that, that's their decision. But the consequence is when I, when I asked you now four or five times, and each time I get the same answer, I'm gonna stop asking to hang out. I, I'm not, I'm not important at all to have or, or to say, and I'll say, I can't do it tomorrow, but what, how about I can't do it tonight?
David Kalinowski: Can we do it tomorrow? I mean, you're not offering anything, so you're making the sacrifice of our friendship, our relationship. So you could sit on the couch and, and veg for a couple hours and, and that's fine. Maybe you need that, maybe your mind needs that. But, but I'm just suggesting that if you don't think about the long-term impact [00:50:00] of you consistently choosing that, you're gonna lose a, you're gonna lose a relationship.
Matt Stone: Yeah. And in business, I mean, that can go, that, I can see how that could play out and does play out in business all the time, especially if you're more in the un unconscious or misguided lanes and you're not really nurturing the garden of your choices as you're describing. you could just be kind of bumbling your way into failure, artificially propped up by some other factors, and then eventually, your, your train is way off the track.
David Kalinowski: Yeah. And if I may, I'd to, let me share a quick story. With you, that, the reference in the book, related to, since you brought the business, a former employee who had they applied this framework, again, top right sacrifice, bottom left, no sacrifice, maybe is in the gray zones, thinking about the impact yourself and to others.
David Kalinowski: Short-term, long term benefit or consequence, right? Just weighing those themes. But somebody who'd come to me, and said, Hey, I need you to give me $10,000 more [00:51:00] in salary. I said, okay. I said, well, help me understand what new value you're gonna add to the business for $10,000 more a year. Oh, well, well, nothing.
David Kalinowski: I'm gonna keep doing what I do, but I need $10,000 more because, I got another company that's looking to hire me, and that's what they're offering me. I wanna stay here, but they're offering me $10,000 more. I said, well, if you can't articulate the additional value you're going at, you're already paid.
David Kalinowski: Pretty competitively, for, for your role and the position, you're already at the, the higher end of the scale for that role. we could talk about how you could develop some skills maybe to be considered for the next band, for another, No, no, I just need 10,000. I say, well, unfortunately I'm not, I'm not gonna be able to just hand it to you.
David Kalinowski: I said, but before you leave, let me just caution you around all the other non-financial parts of your compensation. I just want you to think about that. I'm not gonna go over 'em all with you here, but I want you to think about that. So, no, right now, I just need, I need the extra money. So, okay. So they [00:52:00] left, just, upsetting.
David Kalinowski: They were good, good. They weren't necessarily great, but they were good, competent, capable, meet expectations, team member. So they left and about four months later, they had contacted a coworker that still worked there and said, I made a mistake. what do you, what do you mean? He's yeah, I got here.
David Kalinowski: And, number one, I. I don't get as many PTO days. I, I, I, I should have asked more about that when they hired me, because at our firm, you get three or four weeks of vacation time depending on how long you're here. We have 11 holidays that they get off. You have five, six days.
David Kalinowski: We have a, a volunteer day off. You get your birthday off for pay. Right? And then the last two weeks, a year, we shut down the business. No. they don't have to use their vacation time. That's incremental. We shut the entire business now for two weeks so they can go recharge and have time with friends and family, right?
David Kalinowski: So it's about, eight weeks, nine, seven, depending how the, longer you're here and this person, had had, five holidays and two weeks of pay and that was it, [00:53:00] right? So they realized that extra time off is way more valuable than I thought it was. And the money, they also didn't their manager and they didn't the culture. And that's what I was alluding to about making a short term, impact. You're making a decision and you're sacrificed all that for the long term now. So you get what you netted another 600 bucks a month, 7, 6 50 a month. was it really worth it to you? So, but when people think about only the short term emotional now, right?
David Kalinowski: That's the trade off they feel later. But had they really thought it through, they may still have made the same decision. I don't know. But it wouldn't have hit them blindly later.
Matt Stone: So if I could summarize two really tangible tips for people to take away in terms of how they can activate this in their own lives. One is to pause. Buy [00:54:00] yourself a little bit of time. Don't make the decision immediately. Just give yourself time for your emotions to calm down or to separate your thoughts from your feelings.
Matt Stone: And then the second part of that that I'm hearing you say now is that in some cases, especially when the stakes are higher, moving to a different job, that's a pretty high stakes thing.
Matt Stone: At least in the short term could be even in the long term, very high stakes. really evaluate what you have the value of the asset that you currently hold, the opportunity that you have, and it may require a more rigorous evaluation of its value in order for you to get the true sense of what the trade off is.
Matt Stone: That's,
David Kalinowski: Perfect, Perfect, Two points and, and I think it also requires patience. I mean, some of the things you want, you can't get overnight. you can't accelerate certain things. it's I tell people, if, if it's Thanksgiving, you're making a, a Turkey, and you want to eat sooner, [00:55:00] well you can't turn it up to 600 degrees so that it'll cook in two hours.
David Kalinowski: I mean, you can, but it'll be horrible. Right? It's a Turkey takes what it takes to cook, and, and so it's four and a half hours. I'm 3 75 for a 20 pound Turkey, and that's it. and, and so same thing here. It's sometimes I see the cur, the younger generation, want things so fast and the next level, certain skills, they take time to develop.
David Kalinowski: 'cause you have to have failures along the way. You have to have the experiences and you only get those by doing, you know, and, and having the ups and downs, you said, the high highs and the low lows. If you don't have those, how are you gonna deal? Adjustments and how you gonna deal with resilience and how are you gonna deal with different levels of stress?
David Kalinowski: You have to experience those,
Matt Stone: Yeah.
David Kalinowski: to be able to live, you know, and, and I think the, the other thing I would add to your pause and, and to this, and the, the second tip that you shared, it would be realize that every has a no, [00:56:00] right? Every time you say yes to something, you're saying no to something else, you know?
David Kalinowski: 'cause again, your time, your energy, your bandwidth that you have, your mental capacity is only so much. So what are you willing to, to, to give up? So if I'm willing to volunteer on a day somewhere, I'm giving up certain work things or other family things or whatever, but in that moment, that's what's most important to be able to help out in the community or feed starving children or whatever it might be. Nothing else matters at that point.
Matt Stone: That's
Matt Stone: right. I mean, you and I both said yes to this and thank you for saying yes, by the way. And we did it consciously because. we gave it priority and I want to thank you for giving the priority to having this conversation. 'cause you could be doing a whole bunch of other stuff yourself, but we've made a
Matt Stone: conscious choice and then we're all, and then once we've done that and we accept that we've made a trade off, we can be all in.
Matt Stone: That's the beauty of the
Matt Stone: consciousness of it is, yeah, I know what [00:57:00] I gave up and it's worth it. and then it, and then it makes us, it, it, actually appreciates the value of what we chose to do.
David Kalinowski: a hundred percent. And there's so many examples in my head, everything from, I went to the bearish playoff games right. Against the Packers and then against la and the tickets were not inexpensive, right? So I, I sacrificed some, some cash, right. The time. It's an eight hour day by the time you get down there beforehand at the game, driving home after, right.
David Kalinowski: All that stuff. But man, the life experience I created for myself and my buddy that I brought with me, Was, I'll never be able to replace that. Right? And one we won against the packers. One, we had a heartbreaking loss, but man, the experience was, was, was awesome. But there's trade offs to, to, to do that.
David Kalinowski: But you're right, once you decide that, then you get behind it. that's why the pause is so important. It's in business you could debate and discuss and have dialogue about even a toughest topic, pros and cons and argue. But as soon as the [00:58:00] decision's ma made, you better get behind it.
David Kalinowski: Everybody better get behind it. Right? We're done debating. Same thing here. which is why I also talk to the book, how it is so critical. That when you're going to make a sacrifice, it's going to affect somebody else. Your kid, your spouse, a coworker, whatever it is, you gotta have that conversation with them.
David Kalinowski: Hey, listen, I'm not gonna be able to stay late and work on this project with you tonight. I have to be at my kids' event for these two things I've already missed. Two, I'm not gonna miss this one here. I know that might set us behind a little bit here, but this is the reality of what we're going to go through.
David Kalinowski: And when people understand how they're gonna be affected by your sacrifice, then they don't regret it. You making your choice so much. Right. And they understand because they're gonna be in that situation themselves at some point. Right. That conversation I had with my mom about needing to leave to, to go back to Chicago, if I didn't have that, she might've resented me forever if I just [00:59:00] said, I gotta go by, I, I gotta get back to work, man, how insensitive that would've been.
David Kalinowski: Right? And, and I'm not the most, rub your back sensitive kind of guy for that type of stuff. But man, people will resent you if you don't talk about why you have to make that sacrifice right now. And not everything is urgent and important, so to pause, just to reflect on that.
David Kalinowski: And that's why, I wanna talk about the reflection questions at some point too, because that was probably, that's probably the most valuable part of the book.
Matt Stone: Well, let's, let's talk about that because most of these stories end in a powerful reflection question, and which is why I
Matt Stone: think this is really a daily reader. I mean, I.
David Kalinowski: I.
David Kalinowski: I, I lo I, I love that you said at first when we, you and I talked before and you said that, I had to think about that, but I'd read other devotions every day. One devotion. Right? But you're so right. It, it made me think, it was a buddy of mine who read the book. He goes, oh yeah, I knocked that thing out in two days.
David Kalinowski: It was a great read, easy read. I [01:00:00] said, well, I appreciate the feedback. I that it was an easy read. I said. So what did you most take away? What did you reflect on most? He's I, I don't know. I just, at the time, it was really hitting me and I said, go back and read it again. Slow down. I said, read one or two stories a day. I said, you got a year worth of material there. because, because Matt, each reflection question, those took me the most time to write those took me those time to pressure test, right? Because that's the heart of that book. That's the, the whole, you could understand my concept, my framework, the whole idea about being intentional, your choices.
David Kalinowski: But each one of those chapters has a completely different message, even though the themes of several of the stories might be the same, to really get you to sit back and, and reflect on that question or que questions I pose at the end of each story.
Matt Stone: Yeah, and I think if you read all these, I'm looking at one here, this is just from page 94. This is from, the Mother's [01:01:00] Relief. what's the professional milestone you've had to let go of and what did you gain instead? I think if you just went through all of these reflection questions thoughtfully, slowly, you would end up having so much more self-awareness about
Matt Stone: your patterns. About, I mean, it would just, this book really to me is the, is is a, an incredible development guide, self-development guide for being more aware of the sacrifices that you are faced with and the way that you're making your decisions. And you,
David Kalinowski: Well, thank
Matt Stone: you're gonna make better decisions moving forward.
Matt Stone: Go ahead, sorry.
David Kalinowski: well, you don't only. You nailed it. I think it's all about relationships that we're in. Right? And, this gets you to think about again, the choices you've made, how they've impacted those relationships, their stories obviously about people who've been saving their whole life for retirement.
David Kalinowski: and then they have a, a, a, an issue that comes up with their summer son or daughter or, or their parent that requires to give up [01:02:00] everything they've been planning for their whole life to be able to be there for that child or be there for that parent. Right? Wow. Now, there's others that have been the opposite side, that they've had a, there's a story in there of somebody who had a, a, a parent that lost their, their spouse and they wanted them to move in with them.
David Kalinowski: And they had just gotten married this couple, and it, it was the guy's, mother, and it's no, we're, we're getting our own groove. And they made the choice to. To not move in with the mom who was grieving and all this stuff, because they're trying to build a life for themselves, right? And they got their routine going right now.
David Kalinowski: And the, the trade off the consequence. Mom was pissed a bit, right? Mom felt hurt. it strained the relationship, but eventually mom knew that love can be shown in other ways. calling every day or, or coming to visit though, they didn't have to move in with mom, right? so, so there's stories of people who, take the promotion, uproot their entire family to go move [01:03:00] across country for a job with a more prestige and responsibility and money and all these other things, but it meant the kids having to lose their friends and the, the spouse moving, moving their job, and their community was gone and starting fresh.
David Kalinowski: And there's others who said, no, I'm gonna pass on that promotion. Because I'm not going to have my family sacrifice, so I'm sacrificing not getting the prestige, not getting the extra money. Right. But by pausing and thinking through that, they realized what was most important to them at that stage in life.
David Kalinowski: Right. I got a buddy of mine at his dad, worked at the auto company. He is a big executive. This is years ago, but he had moved, I think it was 14, maybe 15 different cities all throughout school from fifth grade through high school, constantly moving. And, and I told him recently, I'm man, I am just, I admire you so much for, for how you adjust it and, and adapted to [01:04:00] that.
David Kalinowski: That is not easy for an adult, let alone a kid to have to go through that. And I wonder how much, and at what point did the dad ever really stop to think about the toll that's having on others and when enough is enough.
Matt Stone: Look, I can, I can relate to that kind of childhood. That was, that was mine as well.
David Kalinowski: Hmm,
Matt Stone: A lot of moving and big geographical moves, including international moves.
Matt Stone: So,
Matt Stone: and I was, I always felt I was an outsider. Every school I went, I was always the new kid in school. And, and, but the flip side of it was, and maybe I was, had the grace of being a severe extrovert, but that strength of enjoying people and, and being a fairly good interpersonal communicator meant that I honed the skill of building trust quickly
Matt Stone: and now I'm in.
Matt Stone: That's been my whole business. But it
Matt Stone: is a toll and it is a sacrifice. There is a benefit to being in a stable one place for a long period of time. No question [01:05:00] about it.
David Kalinowski: well and, and high performers, which I consider myself to be, and I expect. Folks in my company to be. I think a lot of people, want themselves even to be right. But, even in the example of my buddy's dad, right, a high performer executive at a major organization, they don't avoid sacrifice, right?
David Kalinowski: They, they, they choose it intentionally. And it's hard for people to understand why, though we do make that choice, to make that kind of sacrifice where they're I would never make that. Well, okay, that's, that's for you. That's good. That makes sense, that, it works for you. It aligns with your purpose and all these other factors, right?
David Kalinowski: So that's why I try never to judge anybody about the sacrifice they make or don't make. I don't know. But I, I what I, what I judge on, if they reflected enough that it was the right one. So those, those reflection questions, I think you're right. It, this is a guide even in the far back of the book. I, I put some topics that, [01:06:00] depending on what topic you're looking at and how you should combine the stories and combine different reflection questions to really help you through a, a great season you're going through or a tough season.
Matt Stone: I am telling you, man, this is a guy. This is a book that you don't, you don't just read through it and stop. This is a book that you, you pick up again, you read the story again, and it resonates with you. The second or third time you've read it completely differently because of where you're at in your life, because of whatever's going on.
Matt Stone: So,
Matt Stone: I will sacrifice reading other books with this
David Kalinowski: Well, I, I, I hope this could be part of book clubs, right? I really see this as something that could be part of book clubs, universities where students really, who are under so much pressure these days, can realize it's okay to not do everything and to give things up. It's, that is not the worth, the trade off of your health or your mental anxiety.
David Kalinowski: it's just not. And, but they don't, they don't necessarily have something that's [01:07:00] challenging their thinking on that. And this book, I think, does that, if you're really candid, if you're really deeply honest with yourself and how you answer those reflection questions, you're gonna come away with a better sense of what your purpose really is, what your values are, and what sacrifices you're making if they're truly upholding and moving you toward that, or if you're just drifting into other stuff.
Matt Stone: And that's the thing, it'll, it'll help you course correct. if you do drift. 'cause we all drift. We all make sacrifices that we go, God, that. That actually wasn't, a smart bet in the end. I probably should have chosen the other path, but as, as long as what I'm hearing from you is as long as you're really nurturing your self-awareness and using these tools and becoming more aware of your choices, you're gonna make better choices overall, and you'll, you'll end up going in the right direction.
David Kalinowski: Yeah, learn from it. learn from it. But it does take time to sit back and reflect whether you're driving in the car for 15 minutes or you're, you're waiting to pick somebody up, or you're in the doctor's office, and whatever it is, just take those moments, because [01:08:00] it doesn't mean you have to reflect for an hour on something.
David Kalinowski: it might be five minutes, but five minutes is a long time. If you really sit and think about something for five minutes, it's longer than you think.
Matt Stone: Well, and in some contexts, even one minute is a very long time in certain contexts, in a conversation, if you were to stop for 15 seconds instead of saying something, you might be making a sacrifice in a moment, in a conversation that you, that you
Matt Stone: regret later.
Matt Stone: I, I, I wanna bring up.
David Kalinowski: I, I don't, ha and yeah, I was just saying I don't have it all figured out, but I could just tell you, during the five years of writing this book, I've met with a lot of people, lot of different backgrounds. And, I do think the stories that are in here will resonate with, with everybody because there's something in there that affects or relates to something someone's has gone through or is going through, or will go through.
David Kalinowski: And, and that's why I'm most excited of, of the three different books I wrote, this one I'm most excited about. 'cause it appeals to the masses, I just want to continue to get the message out [01:09:00] there about it.
Matt Stone: Yeah. do you have time for three more questions?
David Kalinowski: I got, I got plenty of time.
Matt Stone: Okay. There's a couple of real world examples that we talked about in our previous conversation when we met and we were preparing for this conversation and we talked about UPS's decision with
Matt Stone: Amazon. Right.
Matt Stone: And so if you don't know, UPS has decided not to have their exclusive contract with Amazon continue their
David Kalinowski: Well, the number one customer, right? Their top customer, biggest revenue generating customer. And they're parting ways with them, for the choice of say no, we want, higher margin, lower volume business, and so the effect is 30,000 people are losing their jobs.
Matt Stone: Yeah. Not a small
David Kalinowski: more facilities are closing, or 24 more facilities are closing right on top of what they did last year, but.
David Kalinowski: part of their strategy, their initiatives, and, and shareholders are responding well, I mean, they're, their stocks starting to rise again. Right. but yeah, that's a big, [01:10:00] big, big decision to make, to to to part ways with your biggest revenue customer. Right. And be okay with that.
Matt Stone: Which may, sound crazy, but then when you look at it, no, that's a real trade off that has a a plus side to it as well. And I, I remember years ago in the agency I worked at, we would, we would have leadership team meetings where we discussed sacrificing certain clients because they were so high maintenance that it was not necessarily, it was profitable in the short term, but not in the long term.
Matt Stone: It drained us as an organization so much that it, we just decided to let certain clients go.
David Kalinowski: Yeah. You get, I mean, everything from burnout to, the sense that you definitely could get gra gratification or satisfac satisfaction because it's no matter what you do, it's not good enough. Right. And who wants to. Who wants to work in any environment where that's, that's the daily feeling you had, that your work's not appreciated, because then you do all this work, but because of accounts still losing money, you can't even reward the [01:11:00] team that's doing all the work.
David Kalinowski: Something's messed up there.
Matt Stone: Something is messed up. And I, I just wanna say, so I think when you think about the tool of using the book and what you've started here in this sacrifice revolution maybe is, giving leaders, an opportunity to think individually about their own decisions and then apply this also to their team and their organization as a framework.
David Kalinowski: Yeah, there's definitely a section in it there that, that is designed for the corporate environment. and you see all these companies talking about culture, right? But are they really in their values, right? Are they really taking the action to back that up When someone goes on vacation, do you let them go on vacation?
David Kalinowski: I mean, do you, do you really leave them the F alone? Right. Or are you ping 'em, oh, hey, where's this file? Well, can you just hop on this quick call? It's only an hour out of your time. And all of a sudden, the person is, is not resting and recharging and having the time. and then that's what resentment, that's what all the things kick [01:12:00] up.
David Kalinowski: it's let them go do what they need to do. Just when you're here at work, then work, so I think that companies talk about this cultural stuff, but are they really enacting things? Are managers. being realistic about, that balance and about allowing people to, do what they have to do.
David Kalinowski: So, yeah, I have to sacrifice part of this deliverable because my, my spouse is in the hospital, it seems on the extremes, right? There's a more, there's understanding more, something that or a death or whatever. but we don't live in the extremes. I mean, that's 20%, everything else.
David Kalinowski: And the bell curve is, is our normal everyday stuff. And so it's you want me to sacrifice for the company, whether it's compensation or, or sacrifice. My time, my energy, my brain power, my family. I'll go on this business trip to go to the conference and work the show, giving up time with my, my friends or family or my own leisure time, right?
David Kalinowski: Great. It's part of the job responsibility, but then it works [01:13:00] both ways. You gotta, you gotta sacrifice stuff that the business might need from me so I could go do other stuff.
Matt Stone: Yeah, that's right. That's right. Okay. Now there's a more of a pop culture, but I think it's actually really relevant to this. There's a story in the news that I stumbled on that I, I wanted to run by you, so I want you to put your coach hat on.
Matt Stone: Okay.
Matt Stone: and I don't know if you've read this story. I, this is published all over.
Matt Stone: I just chose People magazine's website 'cause I thought they laid it out pretty simply. Blue Bloods, Jennifer Esposito, she's an actress, holds back tears revealing she has to move out of home. She mortgaged to finance a movie. So. No one wanted to make it. I couldn't even get people to read it. Esposito said during the press tour for Fresh Kills in 2024, and, so she's been sharing her sadness that she's having to leave her home.
Matt Stone: she took to social media, on January 30th to reveal that [01:14:00] she's moving outta the home. She mortgaged in order to finance her film Fresh Kills. And at first I thought, when I first read this headline, I thought she had made an intentional sacrifice, for, because of a different headline that she had basically chosen to take money from her home.
Matt Stone: and which she did do, but I think she never anticipated it actually going badly. Is what is what I'm reading into this. So now she's saying, she's kind of crying about, and, and I, and I would be too, she put out a post on Instagram. Do we owe each other anything? Maybe that singular question is the one to ask regarding every single issues.
Matt Stone: I don't know, there's some bad grammar here. Forget the systems that delivery keep us at one. Each other's throats And survival is now a basic every, she's just kind of going on after the fact that she did. She feels she was not supported in the film. And I'm wondering, I mean, I can kind of empathize with taking the risk.
Matt Stone: It's an entrepreneur, a film is an entrepreneurial [01:15:00] enterprise. she backed it and now she's feeling, almost resentful that she's now out of her home because of that calculation, because of what happened. Let's backtrack to her decision making. How could you have helped, this person
Matt Stone: making this decision in the beginning? So she
David Kalinowski: I would've asked is, is, is, is, why? Why is making this film so important to you? What need is? What need is that filling? what, what, what are you trying to, is it for status? Is it because you have a story to tell and you want, you think you're gonna make a windfall from? Why is you making this mill this movie so important?
David Kalinowski: That's the first thing I would say. The second thing would be, why have so many others not financed it? what, what are, what are they seeing that you're not seeing? what's the blind spot? Why are these people who are also in the business of making movies for profit, not attracted to your script and not attracted to what you think is a home run?
David Kalinowski: Have you had the [01:16:00] conversations and really picked up? Now there are certainly lots of stories of people who have went to studio, to studio, to studio to studio, and then it becomes this major, major hit. Right? Okay. But still, for you, if you're gonna now choose to self fund it, my next question would be, have you assessed the risks?
David Kalinowski: You brought that up. It's what if it doesn't go well? You, are you willing to lose your home? Are you willing to be broke? Are you willing to go homeless? Are you, are you willing to have the stigma of, that you tried something and it failed, right? I mean, I would have all those kind of discussions and if still everything is yes, yes.
David Kalinowski: Yeah, yeah. It's okay. But then it's so you understand the consequence. So now there's a, a sob story of, that, that is not any single, and I hadn't, I'm only say sob story based on just what you said. I haven't read it. but it's no different that every single sole proprietor. Thousands of individuals go through maybe at a different scale, but I know there's people who sowed their car so they could get [01:17:00] their money to start up the business.
David Kalinowski: I know people who have fa sewed their house so they can, they go into a smaller apartment so they can have seed money to start their business. Some have worked out, some have not. Right. So it's just a different scale that, but I would definitely be asking those earlier questions about why it's so important.
David Kalinowski: Why does this matter to you? why haven't you been able to get others to help support you or find what you say, I haven't been getting support. what support are you looking for? Emotional support. You looking for financial support. you, you had a venture that went bad, so what do you want a GoFundMe page to have everybody reimburse you of everything you lost for your decisions.
David Kalinowski: That's crazy. why, why am I responsible for your, your decisions, So I would, I would encourage somebody that to, before they. Got to a point where something's irreversible. I, I'm sure there were, there were points along that whole process of making the film and getting the actors lined up and, getting the [01:18:00] con whatever there were, sure, there were out clauses in these terms.
David Kalinowski: what would've triggered that at earlier to, to, to eat your losses, right? To have the sunk costs so you don't lose your house. Then what's the, that demarcation point that says, boy, what, I've given everything, I've sacrificed 10 things. If I get to this 11th one, I, I can't do it. And it doesn't sound they had a dose of reality to just stop and pause to say, all right, man, my intention to go the ambition, my energy, everything was there.
David Kalinowski: Just the results aren't there. I, I can't do it.
Matt Stone: I,
Matt Stone: I,
David Kalinowski: doesn't sound anybody had that conversation with that person.
Matt Stone: It does to me too. And by the way, we're not picking on this person. I mean, I, I actually really
David Kalinowski: No. It's a story that everybody,
Matt Stone: not picking on her. This is just so relatable. It just happens to be in the context of a Hollywood film. But I thought to your, I was thinking the same thing you were, I was oh my goodness, this story plays out in a million different forms all the time.
Matt Stone: People that sell their [01:19:00] car or, cash out their 401k to, to start the,
Matt Stone: the cookie company that they always wanted to do and
David Kalinowski: even if it's not to start a business, but they have to pay medical bills or do something else, right?
Matt Stone: Right, right. And I, I, I'll just read you this from, and again, we don't know these articles. They could be misquoting, there could be, so again, David and I are not here judging anybody, but the situations relatable as reported in June of 2024 during Esposito's Press tour for this film. she revealed her passion for the project, actually led her to mortgage her home.
Matt Stone: Quote, this town tells you what you can be and what you can't be for so many years. I was just over that and thought, why am I asking the world to believe in me? I have to believe in me, so I'm going to put my money down. She said in an interview with KTLA
Matt Stone: quote, at the end of, at the end of my life, am I going to be happy that my house was paid off, or am I going to be so happy that I gave myself the opportunity that I've been waiting for, for [01:20:00] far too long?
Matt Stone: So I thought, I'm going. And I just think that moment, what I relate to is that moment of passion. I believe in myself. And at the same time, if you haven't really owned the full trade off, if you don't pause to consider it, you may feel very resentful and hurt on the other end when the, the bill comes due.
Matt Stone: So it's
Matt Stone: worthy of, of considering it.
David Kalinowski: Yeah, I, and I, I can't, I was, I was looking at the table content, my book for, but there are two or three passion project stories in, in the book. And again, such an admirable thing to take that risk in this case, put something behind it, beyond just their energy. Right? and that's all fantastic.
David Kalinowski: And, and I applaud that effort. I mean, that not everybody had the courage to do what this person did or what other business owners do. we just have to think about. Were was, was she or others prepared for the [01:21:00] consequences of the what if it doesn't work out the way in your head, you have it mapping out what what are, what are, what point does it stop becoming a passion project and now it's impacting the sacrifices so far, gone that now it's affecting your health or your ability to have a place to live or all these other things.
David Kalinowski: Where, where does that trade off? Have to stop? And that does take some reflection. And, again, you see it in businesses all the time. They invest millions of dollars in innovation, or pharma companies and new drugs over, over millions and millions, tens of millions. And then it doesn't pass clinical trials.
David Kalinowski: Right now they happen to have billions of dollars
Matt Stone: I was gonna say
David Kalinowski: sitting on. Right, right. But, so maybe not the best example,
Matt Stone: Facebook and the, Metaverse, that's the one I
Matt Stone: think of. Billions,
David Kalinowski: yeah. but you look at Bezos, he, at Amazon, he talks about how much, he sacrificed for so many years. Right. And Elon Musk too, by not taking money out and all this stuff.
David Kalinowski: Now obviously there's some tax [01:22:00] reasons for some certain decisions, right. But. All these folks who are way high powered now, they all gave up stuff tremendously earlier to get the longer term gain. And maybe this, she wouldn't have any of this if the movie was a huge success, right? It'd be see what happens when you take the risk and you bet on yourself and look at this windfall I got now.
David Kalinowski: But it, it actually is a great story and a dose of reality. that even the best intentions, even those we have, the skill sets, the capabilities, the knowledge, the network, the strengths, it still may fail, and she may be happy that she still gave it a shot, but then it's hard to hear somebody then talk about all the downside. Just focus in on the fact that you gave it a shot. You, you, you knew that the downside could come, you know? So
Matt Stone: And, and it sounds like what the, the media's catching her when she's going through the emotional process of accepting that
Matt Stone: it didn't work. And, and that's gotta be hard [01:23:00] for her. It would be hard for anyone not judging her, but learning from her experience. And I think this goes back to something I alluded to earlier in a question that I, we explored a little bit, which was we just noting that in our culture around entrepreneurship, we have this kind of glorification of sacrifice that is not always.
Matt Stone: healthy in the sense that, we glorify, oh, you gave up absolutely everything, all your friends, you walked away from everything to do this. And we love a rags to riches or a, we love that story. I mean, it's, it's sweet and sour. It's got all the elements of a delicious dish. At the same time, if you're not really conscious and as you put put it, thoughtful and, and intentional about your sacrifices, you may end up feeling very hurt on the other end when it didn't play out the movie that you watched.
Matt Stone: so
David Kalinowski: Yeah,
Matt Stone: something to think about. I,
David Kalinowski: be, you have to have greater clarity, in, in those kind of moments. And, but, but you're a hundred percent right in, in what you [01:24:00] just said. I, I think that, when, when you choose to make the, that that kinda sacrifice, understanding, the, again, the pluses and minuses that could come with it.
David Kalinowski: And I, I, again, I think sacrifice isn't accidental, it shouldn't be anyway. and just my experience is those that can be more intentional. this article, this, this person was clearly super intentional, right? Just probably didn't think about the out. Or, or think about at what point, am I putting way too much at risk?
David Kalinowski: me, talk about gambling and liking gambling, right? It's I, I hate if I go and, and lose even a couple thousand, right? I walk away, I'm well, I could've done this, or I could have invested this. I could have paid this bill. I could have bought a new suit, or whatever the hell, it's oh, it, it, but I don't go to the point where oh my gosh, I'm gonna risk losing my house.
David Kalinowski: I can't make my mortgage payment, or I lost my whole paycheck. Or it's you gotta, you gotta [01:25:00] know, right? So you, I'm, I'm really to sacrifice certain things to a point. and, and a lot, whoops. A lot of us have to really think about, what is that point? Where is that sacrifice line, which is actually the name I almost call this book The Sacrifice Line, about when will you cross that line?
David Kalinowski: And then as I talked more with my publisher and a couple others, we named it The Paradox. 'cause really that what it is, the, the idea of giving up something that we do value already might seem a loss or a setback, but the fact that it does actually lead to something more fulfilling, that's the paradox part of it.
Matt Stone: I've even found where I thought it was a sacrifice and then realized it was a mere trade off. That, that actually what I let go of wasn't I had created, I can, I have created mythologies in my head about the value of some things too. So that's, sometimes I'm
Matt Stone: delighted by that choice because I realize, oh, wow.
Matt Stone: After I let go of it, it was no, that wasn't really a thing to let go. It wasn't really [01:26:00] that valuable in the
Matt Stone: first
David Kalinowski: it's most people when, when they have kids, right? It's I always ask 'em Don, do you wonder now what you used to do at your time? Right? Because they're always so busy, there was no time to do anything. Now all of a sudden they, they, they have their child and they realize, my gosh, I guess I had a lot of time before do all kinds of things before, but you're willing to give up all that to be able to have that, that new human, in your family.
David Kalinowski: huge sacrifices when people decide to become parents.
Matt Stone: Yeah. Yeah. And you've got stories in the book that, touch on, on that a lot. And I think, I love how the, the stories traverse between family and business and just all the different aspects of life. Because if you're in business, you, your personal life and your business life are they,
David Kalinowski: Yeah. They, they're integrated.
Matt Stone: they're very integrated. Yeah.
David Kalinowski: Yeah. That's why I always thought my, my friend Matthew Kelly, who's an author of about 35 books, most of 'em, New York, best time, best sellers, but one of 'em he is got is called Off [01:27:00] Balance, the Myth of Work-Life Balance. And he is talking about professional and personal satisfaction.
David Kalinowski: You have not balance, you're not gonna have 50 50 balance. Right. Sometimes, your personal life's more important. Sometimes your professional life's more critical. Right. but it depends on for you what you're satisfied in doing more. I sometimes when I'm working 70 hours a week, 'cause I love what I do and I'm, and there's other times where I don't wanna work at all that day, so, we, we,
Matt Stone: It goes with
David Kalinowski: just, have to adjust, along the
Matt Stone: All right, I'm gonna drop a massive bomb before we close. Okay? This is a big question, and
Matt Stone: maybe you just give a headline answer and then we talk about it another time. But our society right now is, as we all know, very fractured. There's a lot of heartache in our society, a lot of, a lot of people who don't see eye to eye.
Matt Stone: I wonder how, how the sacrifice paradox can play a role in us healing the divide in this country.
David Kalinowski: Well, that's a, that definitely is a [01:28:00] big, big question. and requires a fair amount of discussion, but to me, I think it comes down to, Understanding, again, purpose and intention, and why, why do certain things bother individuals more than others? Right. why, why do people, have certain beliefs, on things?
David Kalinowski: A lot of that stems all the way back from childhood, right? How, how you're raised as a parent, who your educators were, how you were influenced socially, a lot of those things, how you were personally treated growing up even all that has impacted and shaped who we are and what we believe and how we believe it.
David Kalinowski: And, but yeah, I think, I think, realizing that, there are trade offs to have freedom, as an example, and taxes as an example. Nobody that I know wants to pay taxes, and I'm, I'm in a pretty high bracket and I hate it. It sucks, right? But, I, I guess I'd rather keep.
David Kalinowski: 50 cents on every new dollar, then not [01:29:00] have the other dollar. I, I, I don't know. But, but yeah, things cost money and, to be in, in our society, and there are trade-offs all along. And, and it, it is, people have different philosophies of, we're, where do, law and policy as an example.
David Kalinowski: rule and governed versus, human nature, those are tough, tough questions. I think it all starts with people just understanding what, what's the conflict? what's the, why does something bother you or hit you that badly? And then are you that on every, your intensity level that that with everything?
David Kalinowski: And why and why has it changed? You look at some issues that are going on in society right now, certain parties or, or, or factions believed totally different 10 years ago or 15 years ago. On, on certain issues. there's recordings and videos of, of people saying one thing that so totally supports action that's happening today.
David Kalinowski: And then now all of a sudden, because action's happening, in, in [01:30:00] whether it's under a different leadership or in a different way now, now the, the, the story's changed, right? So that's, that's just a, an interesting self-reflection issue of why did that not bother you 10 years ago? And if it did, why were you not speaking up the way you're speaking up now? Why now? Right.
Matt Stone: Yeah, and
David Kalinowski: I don't know how sacrifice could help with that. Not other than, making it more visible about the intentions and why does it bother you so much?
Matt Stone: Yeah. And I, and just to put it in shorthand, what came up for me as I was reading the book, as I thought about it personally and in my business, and then my family and my friends, and then societally, what I, what came up for me, David, was are we really calculating the sacrifice that we are making by digging into hardcore positions and refusing to treat other people as human beings and the sacrifice of being right.
Matt Stone: there's a lot of people who dug in that have [01:31:00] to be right. And, that there's a sacrifice when you have to be. Right. And I go back to our mutual acquaintance, Marshall Goldsmith, who said he had to let go of always being right in order to become successful. And I feel that's kind of
Matt Stone: what's going on.
David Kalinowski: statement. It's a powerful statement, and I think you had one as well about forgive people, for being who they are. Forgive yourself for expecting 'em to be someone they're not. and, I, I think you're right. that people will, and I find myself having to be right.
David Kalinowski: whether it's, with my spouse or, or kids or coworker or, or my mom, right? It's certain point. You gotta show No, you're, and end of the day, that could destroy relationships, and you just have to pick and choose when it's important to be. Right. judges, ruling cases have to be as right as they can on interpreting the law.
David Kalinowski: And, and, you're not supposed to have subjectivity in, in those areas, but do they, I'm sure. but yeah, I, I think, the balance between the, the, the human element and beating firm enough to execute, the [01:32:00] law as the law plays out, you know, and, and that's always tough.
David Kalinowski: And look at our military, I mean, right. I mean, those folks make the big biggest sacrifice that any of us, they're willing to give up their lives for the freedom and safety and security of others. People they don't even know. Right. And that you still have groups that will rip on. Soldiers or military, it's man, it's there's bigger picture stuff at play here.
David Kalinowski: It's easy to pick one set of actions out, right? but no, I definitely have enjoyed the conversation and, grateful for the dialogue. I can't believe the amount of time it's already gone
Matt Stone: I can't believe it either. I, I,
Matt Stone: so I want to ask you a closing question, which is. You're talking to that young, up and coming entrepreneur, or a more seasoned one who's at a crossroad trying to make a huge decision. Just give them a little piece of advice for how to move forward. I.
David Kalinowski: I think, [01:33:00] think really about what matters most to you, and are you willing to put in what it takes to achieve that? so whether it is walking away from something that's been part of who you are to, to then change your lifestyle or to change your, your current situation, it's somebody who leaves in a battered relationship at home, right?
David Kalinowski: they, maybe they, they have security with money and a house on, but man, they just, they leave it all because of the turmoil that's causing, and it's hard for a lot of folks in that situation. So, so whether you're an up and comer, a student coming outta school or somebody having a tough season, just really thinking about what it is you want and nobody else can influence that.
David Kalinowski: It's what are you looking to do or not do? And then thinking about are there things you need to give up intentionally to get you there? Even if it's things that cause more pain or hardship, emotionally, financially, whatever it is [01:34:00] short term to, to get you to that peace that, that you're seeking.
Matt Stone: Great advice, sacrifice Paradox by David Kalinowski, your third book as you previously
Matt Stone: noted.
Matt Stone: but more personal and highly actionable for the general public. I think your first two were more in your industry and also I'm
Matt Stone: sure very good. thank you for being of service to me, to our audience. if someone wants to get in touch with you, I know you do keynotes, you do speaking engagements, you do trainings.
Matt Stone: You're, you're a man of many. You're the ego of, consumer intelligence, market intelligence.
Matt Stone: How do they get in touch with you and how do they get the book?
David Kalinowski: yeah, two, two ways. They could go to thesacrificeparadox.com if they wanna read more about the book in there are links to Amazon and Apple and a couple places to get the books. Certainly, Amazon, Kindle and, and the soft copies out there, under the Sacrifice paradox. But you go to the sacrifice paradox.com.
David Kalinowski: That's the best way. alternatively, in terms [01:35:00] of, reaching out directly, to me, davidk@proactiveworldwide.com, I don't mind sharing my email. That's my work email. You could reach out to me if you've got business related stuff in particular. but otherwise, I would encourage folks to, to pick up the book and, and give it a read.
David Kalinowski: And more importantly, apply, apply the lessons and really spend some time on those reflection questions. because again, the whole idea is around what if the key to success. Isn't about doing more, but giving up the right things,
Matt Stone: Well, I gave up the right things to have this conversation with you, that's for sure. I'm as did really grateful to spend this time together and I'm looking forward to our next conversation. Thank you, David.