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Energetic Radio with Dale Sidebottom & Paul Campbell is a fantastic tool for people looking to bring fun play and happiness into each and every day. Listen along as Dale interviews world-renowned experts and shares his own experiences with you in this weekly podcast.
Welcome to the Energetic Radio podcast. This episode is brought to you
by the school of play dotco, hosted by Dale Sibonham and
Paul Campbell. Each week, we'll bring to you tips, strategies, and ideas
on how you can bring more joy and happiness into your life, and those you
share with. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the
energetic radio episode, episode 338, I
believe it is. That's the one, mate. I'm pretty excited about today because, I'm new
to this gig. And today, we've got our first guest or my first guest.
You've had numerous guests, Sadie. But, today we've got my first guest
in the podcast studio. And not only is he a bloody good human being, he's
a bloody good mate of mine. And, yeah, but I'll introduce you in a second,
Hasty. But we always like to start with some awesome stats.
Oh, I like that. And it gets through a hard drive. Like episode 33, it
gets really hard to find some stats, but I reckon I found some of these
few blokes last night. Oh, man. Episode 338, some
statistics. So 338 is the angelic number.
Its meaning is to embrace self belief. It signifies an abundance and
encouragement on your life path and encourages you encourages you to
remain optimistic and continue working diligently towards
your life goals, and the universe will reward your efforts. Why?
Boom. But why? I have no idea. That's a number. I have no idea. But
338 is known as the angel number. Did anyone know that? Did you just
make that up? No. They didn't know that. He didn't have. No shit. Research it.
I did not make it up. 338 is the angel number. Alright. Step number 2.
I hope they get fed up. They get a little bit better.
I'm looking forward to 339. Oh, yeah. 338. Julius
Maddox was is an ex convict and he's now turned himself
towards the ultimate bench press machine and he holds the world record for the
heaviest bench press 338 kilos.
That's bloody impressive. Oh, that's pretty good. I wouldn't be able to roll that
down a hill. No. I I know what I'm thinking now, though. It's probably about
70 kilos, I reckon. That's better than your first one. That's better than the first
one. Thank you. People are still listening, which they may not have been. I've got
the first one. That's better. You got
more? I love it. Got one more. And this one in in the, in the
studio, ladies and gentlemen, I'm currently looking at about 3 cricket bats, and my,
business partner, Dale Sibodom, is mister cricket himself. Haven't seen you
hit a ball yet, but he reckons he goes alright. And the
old Don Bradman. So Don Bradman Does he know it
already? Oh. Do you know anything about Don it's a good question, isn't it? I
know I know that he didn't make, enough to get his average to a 100.
That's right. I know. It's 99.85 or something. Yeah. You're correct.
It was 99.94. Wow. Because he's test average over 52
games. And he had that average over 338 innings. Oh,
there you go. Oh,
thank you very much. I was very it was I was a bit worried there,
to be honest. The first one was a bit star sign like. Wasn't it? Yeah.
It's like There we go. Well, I just kinda felt as though 338
and all the things that signifies is right in line with our podcast
and our business. Right? Like, it's all about optimism, embracing yourself,
love, and and your efforts will be rewarded, the universe will reward your
efforts and blah blah blah and all that shit that we talked about. It's tattooed
on me, Riz. Alright. I will hold you to that. Ladies and gentlemen, you heard
that here. I'm gonna put a bet on side. He'll probably on the golf course
next, so I'll probably get him. Whoever wins whoever loses has to
put 338 on them somewhere. Alright. Without further
ado, the, our guest name, mister Michael Aikerman, otherwise known
as Ace. Nobody calls him Michael Ackerman. I don't know why I introduced him as
that, but he's, he's known as Ace. But a little bit of an intro. So,
what I love about this guest is we haven't got someone famous on. We haven't
got someone rich on. We haven't got someone on who's got a 100 people working
for him, no way pairs at home. He's just an average dude. Alright? He's an
average man, but the way that he lives his life and his his outlook on
life and the way he goes about things is bloody unreal. And if he can
do it, then anyone can do it. Right? So he's a man of the people.
But, anyway, a bit of an intro. So he's loving husband.
He's an amazing dad, to a little baby girl called Q, Quinnie, and he's
got a second one on the way. He's a mop. He's a man of the
people. I like that. He's got an incredible amount
of knowledge in so many different areas. He's literally a jack of all trades. He's
a dog whisperer. He's got one of the most positive outlooks on
life that have ever come across. He's got a shit ton of discipline and
commitment to whatever he puts his mind to. He's built a business from the ground
up. He's a firefighter and a bloody good looking one at that. And
he's recently just been accepted to become a station officer
at the young age of 42, and he's got the willpower of
Eric Weihenmayr. Boom.
Now do you know who Eric Weihenmayr is? No. I don't think I do. One
of the main reasons why I'm lab having this pot is his willpower. I spoke
to Saudi about this. This this guy's got unbelievable willpower. Eric Weinmaier,
at the age of 13 became blind. Okay. Lost his
vision, and then decided he's not gonna let it hold him back. And he decided
he's gonna learn how to rock climb. And not just rock climb by,
like, you know, tether myself to someone else and let them put me up the
mountain. Literally, rock climb the 7 highest peaks in the
world unassisted, fully blind. And he
does it by feeling the vibrations and the rocks and feeling the hand holds,
etcetera, etcetera. He's he's summited Everest
literally without being tethered to somebody else. He tied a bell to the
backpack of someone in front of him so he could gauge the distance of certain
things and then bloody scaled Everest in the scale, the 7 highest peaks. And
then he put it all down to his willpower to not let his blindness define
who he was. Yeah. Wow. Holy dooly. Yeah. That's impressive. Now is
this podcast about you, Kemba? Or He just he just stole Eric
Wando or whatever his name is, he stole my thunder. That's
pretty impressive. It did, but that's very impressive, isn't it? So
when I was researching you literally, I was researching who has the most willpower. You've
done a lot of research. You've done a lot of research. I was just been
busy. Was Ace second? He he I reckon he's up there. Because literally,
when I think about Ace, I think about willpower. Right? And I think about commitment
and those sort of things. And, yeah, that's what inspires me about Ace is his
willpower to bloody just stick to something. Very kind words. Very
kind words. My my pleasure. And, yeah, when I researched that, he popped up and
I'm like, he's got the willpower of Eric Weinmeier. Oh, I love it. And you
may now for every known as Eric.
No name, Bonnie. I love it. Eric De Eel. Eric De Eel. Eric De Eel.
Eric De Eel. Eric De Eel. Yeah. He probably had a fair bit of willpower
as well. He would have He would
have had a lot of willpower. He did. Yeah. Love it. Anyway,
on our on our pod, when we have guests, we wanna ask a question. So
we're gonna kick off with just a simple question. What's lit you up in the
last 7 days? What has lit me, mate? It's the
simplest answer ever. My daughter, every single day,
she does something where I think she's an absolute legend. She
achieves something new. She has a crack, she cries at something and then goes, nah,
I'll try again or something like that. That literally inspires me. And I
absolutely love it. You mentioned the other day where
you said when you have a kid, something changes and you've got a 1 and
a 3 year old size. So it seriously does.
And you know, I'm inspired by a lot of things. I listen to brilliant podcasts.
I try and do a lot of different things. I've got mates that are fantastic
that I learned from them and I, I engage with them and that helps me
pot being positive. But number 1 is my daughter every single
time and my wife and I are the same. We high five each other every
day going, what a effing legend. That was a city. She's just a
ripper. She's fun. She's happy. She's smiley. And hopefully, it's
because we're being the role models that she deserves. Yeah. And learning along
the way, Diane, like, you know, she she stuffs something up and I started up
just beforehand because I'm like, I look like the legend because I'm teaching her how
to do it. But, yeah, it's, it's unbelievable. That is easily my number one every
single week. Love that. Father's day. How was father's day? I was a
ripper. I was actually a little dusty cause I'm a big music fan. I went
out to see one of my favourite bands the night before with 3 mates from
work and we had an absolute ripper. Who's your favourite band?
Trophy eyes. Ozzy band rock. It was at the forum,
which is a classic shoot. And mate, we hadn't caught up for a while.
So I was 4 of us there. One bloke, typical him rocks up
and I go, have you been listening to him? And he is, I listened to
one song yesterday. So he's not as, you know, not as red hot
as I am, but he had a bloody ball. He was dancing around and loving
it. Didn't download the set list. Then you download the set list and make the
play. Drone players because you commit to everything. You probably create a drone playlist. I
I messaged to mate saying, dude, this is the set list. And he's and he
said he's more fastidious than me. He goes one step ahead of you. I've already
made the playlist, and he sent it back. Oh, wow. So, mate, we had a
ball. So but father's day was brilliant. We went and I caught up for
coffee and lunch and, and I felt like it was just me presenting
Quinnie to my family every single time. And she just has a
ball and she's takes a while to get into it. And then once she's engaged,
man, she is just entertainment personified and loving it.
And she was really well behaved and settled and because she
felt safe in her environment and, had a ball. Well done. What'd,
what'd you get? I got a Velcro
golf ball thing where you hit it, like in your little, garage where you tonk
it and it stands, sits on a number or something like that. And you have
a little challenge. So very playful. Very playful. Oh, very playful.
Go that in these next to how many mansions. My wife knows that,
pretty much it's funny being on this podcast, but she knows that everything
I want or do has to involve play. So
we might not use the word play, but it's it's fun. It's adventure. It's
mucking around. It's it's it's been silly. It's been joyful, that type of thing.
But, every single thing we do is mocking around. I cooked dinner
last night, on the little camp stove outside,
on the, in the backyard As it was way more fun than cooking
inside, and she looks at me and she goes, why cooking outside? I go, because
it's fun. So she she just goes, yeah. Okay. Cool. And then
put the aid on the lawn. It was great. And memories. Right? Like, when when
you mix it up and you do something different, it's something so small. It's memories.
Yeah. Crap. Yeah. I love that. So what did you get for Father's Day? I'm
actually wearing them. I I must admit, a pair a pair of Crocs. Oh, wow.
New wheels. A pair of Crocs? Is is are these Virgin Crocs? Yeah. They are.
They're first Crocs and they've got the You got the widgets? The widgets. The widgets.
Oh, is that what are they called? I think they're called widgets. I think they're
called giblets or something. Are they called giblets? No. I'm not. I'm not. I'm not.
I'm not. I'm not. I'm not. Anyway, for a long time, I, bagged people that
wore them. But, obviously, I've been given to by my boys, so I
will wear them. Lovely. Still sorta coming around a little bit. Not gonna lie. You
haven't gone to the supermarket yet? No. I've worn them from the house to the
studio here. You'll grow. You'll grow. But, yeah, I've got some crocs. You're a croc
man. I'm a croc man. Really? And I've never been one of the little thingies
you put on them until I got Queenie. Yeah. Or we had I didn't pick
these Ace if you Queenie picked them. You know what I know what? I walked
in and I saw this. You got that? Queenie picked that for me and that's
that and a pineapple are the only 2. Sorry. I got 3. A
pineapple, a banana, and a lightning bolt. So A green banana?
Serendipitous. That's unreal. That's unreal. That's sweet. Yes. I loved it. One
thing is I loved about being part of the footy boy, we all started sharing
what we got for father's day. Oh, just the pictures and the list that came
up was unbelievable. I don't think I did it right. I only score on a
a hero dad hat. Oh, nice. And my son picked for me from the primary
school Father's Day store and wore it proudly all day Sunday. Nice. One
day wear? One day wear. Yeah. I wore it all the day. 400 other hats
now. 100 at the end of the day, he's like, dad, you love that hat.
And I'm like, son, it's my favorite hat in the whole world. Well, you've got
it on right now, don't you Paul? 100%. 100% it's all right now. But, no.
You gotta love those little gifts you get from your from your kids and wonder.
Right? And we're all in we've all got young children and we're all in for
we bought another 10 years of some amazing gifts that have stuff given to us
when we're teenagers. We've probably got 10 or 11 more if they're around our
age. You like stats, some of those stats. So, you know, you get
12 Christmases, you get to be Santa 12 times, you get to be, you
know, you go to 1 Deb, you go to 1
breakup or whatever. So all those different statistics that you think. And it's all about
time. We've all got coming. Yes. Yeah. So I think we've spoken about that. Someone
said you've got 15 summers and kids in it and then they'll leave you for
some time and then they'll come back to you in twenties. But I heard that
on a ripper, podcast. How are the dad's
dad? Yeah. Really good. So whatever
I do and you guys do as well, you get right involved and you
bring that energy and you start researching hence the stats, man.
You're very search. You continually try and learn about it. And
when I became a dad, the lead up for 6 months was just listen to
every podcast I can about dads and how to parent and just learning and
have more conversations with my mates already, dads and whatnot. And one of
the really good ones they did on that, I think it was Glenn Close. And
he talked about how he had to go away for work for 2 summers
in a row. And he realized that he's just eaten into say the 14 summers
he's going to get with his boys because eventually they're going to buzz off and
play with their mates because it's far more fun, etcetera. So he sort of broke
it down to how many times a year do you get those things? And summers
are a perfect one, especially with that shit weather. You know, like if
the summer's not even good, you might miss one anyway. So every single
time you get one. Yeah. Oh, great. That was a windy, you know,
44 degrees summer where we had to stay indoors.
So but you gotta use them. I guess that's the point. You do. And I
wanna I wanna bring us back to play. And we've got our script here, people.
So I wanna bring us back to play and what you spoke about earlier. And
I was thinking this the other day, I went and watched Inside Out 2, with
the kids on father's day. And anyone who hasn't seen it yet, go and see
it because it's a bloody cracking movie and especially if you're a parent. Yeah. Like,
if you're a parent and you haven't seen Inside Out 1 and Inside Out 2,
even if you don't see it with your kids, bloody go and watch it because
it's a really good eye opener and a really good sort of I guess it
just imparts few lessons on you as a parent. But one thing is loved about
that was playwright and how important early life experiences are for your
kids between parents and kids. And they form like
what's called family Island. And every time the parents are playing with their kid
and and their kids giggling and that that's positive interactions through play,
family Island grows and it starts going off tap. Right? And it starts to build
their character and sense of belief and their confidence, like that sort of things. And
so hearing you say it before that you just turn something as simple as dinner
into play and made it fun and just mix things up a little
bit, don't underestimate the impact that's gonna have on Queenie. Huge.
Right? It's just something so simple. So if you're out there listening, you're like, right,
how can I spice things up? And honestly, the other day, like, I love rolling
my socks up, and I throw it at my kids all the time. Right? Like,
if I'm Clean or warm? No. It doesn't matter. To be honest, they haven't care
what they are. Sometimes they straighten the dogs me out, but because Andy loves to
work Andy loves to work with a pair of socks, and maybe I should find
she's a bloody elite sock finder. And, hey, it doesn't matter. Just if I've got
a pair of socks, even if they're on the I would roll them up and
I'm just walking past them. Boom. And I'll just throw them from nowhere to hit
my kids. And the laughter they get from that, right, and the giggling. So it's
just a simple little They will forever think that socks are funny as well. Yeah.
You've introduced that play every single time. Yeah. A 100%. But just something simple.
Just form your little connections with your kids. Right? But don't underestimate those little things
that you can do in your life just to bring a little bit of fun
and a little bit of play into the household. I think so. Is unreal. So,
yeah, if you sit at home, go think have a think about it. Go right.
What have I done that's fun in the last 7 days? Yeah. And some little
bit of quirkiness and let your guard down a little bit Yep. You know,
and do something at home and make that your mission. You know what I mean?
Well, there was like Tom. Let's plant little seeds in people's brains in this pod
and make your mission. Like, for sure. Fun with the kids. Do something out of
the ordinary. Throw a bloody pair of socks. And it's not hard. It was so
it's so simple for you to do something like that. Quinnie's 2 and maybe 2
months, 3 months. And I have it down pat where I can give her a
look and a slight move and she will giggle and run. And
it's like, I don't have to do anything and I'm playing with her. Right. I'll
just go. And she squeals and runs and it's just bang. So, so
far this morning, we've read about 8 books. We've had a swing. We rode around
and did some laps at the table. I live in a small little 2 bedroom
joint, but she does not know any difference. She absolutely blows. Table. I live in
a small little 2 bedroom joint, but she does not know any difference. She absolutely
loves it. We've probably done 7 things that were play already. She
helped mom make her brekkie. She's had the best day ever and
it's 9 o'clock and, and I was the one that facilitated that. And that is
just forever. Every single morning, every single lunchtime, every single night time. That's my
goal for her. And you think about it, it it doesn't cost anything. You
know, like, so often, you know, parents are like, what can I do to
advance my kid? What can I help them with? What can I play with them?
Simply just giving them the gift of your time and being present. 100%. Like, there
there's no other it doesn't cost you anything. And I think that's probably the hardest
thing sometimes because it's sometimes easier to go and
pay or Of course. You know, it's easier than actually giving your time. Yep. Because
time is something that is so hard for people to actually give.
Have you found that's changed since obviously Quintin? Yeah, definitely.
I, I have a, so my, I don't work Monday, Friday 9 to 5. I
do shift work as a fiery and, it allows me to
have really good times where I've got big chunks of time for
her, but also I have to go away at 5 o'clock for night shift or
whatever it might be. So I found it pretty challenging. Like you were saying the
other day, I find being a dad hard,
but so enjoyable and fulfilling, that
I absolutely love it. So there's nothing wrong with something being hard and loving it
at the same time. So my goal with that is just to be consistent.
So I think with everything, you know, like, your message in
this podcast is to try and give kids and adults alike the toolkits to get
better and better. The one thing that is true to
that is consistency. So no one's strong to start with. Right. They get good at
it by doing it over and over and over again. No one becomes a master
builder until they do it over and over again. I'm not a good dad yet.
Right. But my goal is just to be the best frigging dad I could ever
be. And I'm just going to do it over and over and over again. I'll
have ripper days. I'll have good days. I'll have pretty mediocre days.
But the point is that consistency of constantly doing it. And the way that I
do that is with play. I just make sure that everything's fun,
Teeth time's fun. Dinner time's fun. And every single time I engage
Queenie in that fun time, it's sweet. It's a ripper. Yeah. You
know, I make sure that my tone's good. I make sure that my tone's a
funny tone. I look like a dickhead 90% of the time and she's
giggling her butt off and I love it. I didn't care. And it doesn't matter
if it's in the supermarket. It doesn't matter where it is. I understand what
I need to do for her to have fun and to play. And that's how
I engage with her and connect. And I still do that with my mates. You
know, I'll happily be the butt of the joke if it's going to make my
friendship group laugh and have fun and connect.
Love that. And every single time you're playing
in that sense, wherever it might be, you're not thinking about your to do list.
You're not thinking about life outside of the house. You're not thinking about work. You're
not thinking about stress. You're not thinking about all that kind of stuff. Very, very
true. Literally just present. Right. And you're, you're honoring that moment and you sit there
having a bloody good time. So yes, you're giving to others, but you've given to
yourself as well. It's, you get a lot from notion, isn't it? That
presence you talk about and how you, the other day, when you guys discussed
putting away that to do list or whatever, my house runs
with a structure. We are consistent.
We have lists, we have this, but when we're in the moment, we make sure
that we're in the moment. And sometimes I don't do it that well. And I
know I'm thinking about what time I have to go. I looked at my clock
watch 3 times on my phone or something like that. And I know that I
didn't commit to that. So I just try and make sure that I do it
next time. You know, as you said the other day, it's 20 minutes, half an
hour. It's looking at them in the eyes when they talk to you,
it's brushing your teeth with them and actually being there, not on your phone, things
like that. They're not hard things to do. You just have to consistently do
them and practice and you get better at them and you
can see the feedback and the engagement that you have with your kid, with your
parent, with your classes. I was saying to you the other, just before
Sizi, when I used to teach first aid, I found it quite challenging to
taste that course curriculum, which was just a set PowerPoint,
man. I would go off on frigging tangents because I would see them getting engaged.
And I'm like, right, I've got them. And I've been telling a story how we're
on a 3rd story building and some guy broke his hip and I'll just go
with the flow because I'm engaging them and I'm getting them to connect. And I
guarantee you, they learn more from that, making sure that I harp on about the
main points, but they learn more from that over time. And so do your kids
Storytelling. Yeah. Storytelling. Isn't it? It's a kicker. You get engaged
and that's why you're friends with who your friends, you guys have obviously gelled
so well together because you are willing to listen to
someone's story because it inspires you and then it makes you better.
No one's good at anything to start my career as a fiery. My goal was
to be the best fiery that I can be. I think I said that in
my interview, it would have sounded so cringeworthy, but my goal was to be the
best firefighter I can be. Cause I didn't know anything else then. Right. My goal
now is to be the best leader that I can be and make sure that
other people have the tools to be the best fiery they can be. And even
in life as a friend and as a parent and as a husband and whatnot.
And I learn a lot from them, but I make sure that I'm the best
leader that I can be. Cause then it helps out my job, my role. And
it means that in the downtime we have more fun. We can play more. We
don't stuff up as much. We reflect every single failure turns
into a lesson and then we get better at it. So I love it. Yeah.
I love that. That's so true. In my intro, I said, I said, when I
introduced you, I said, you've got one of the most positive outlooks on life, right?
You're super optimistic. And I kind of looking at, I think, I
think one of the reasons that is how well connected you are in so many
different avenues of your life. Just explain to the people that are
listening. Like obviously you've got an amazing mateship, right. And you've got a huge friendship
group that you work your ass off to maintain. Right. And then you've got
your fires and those sorts of things. Just explain how important you think, like being
connected to different groups on how you, how you go about doing it. Like how
do you go maintaining those things? I lead by example.
So I, I know that if I walk into a room, I want
someone to stand up and acknowledge me and come over to me. So I make
sure that I do that every single time. Every time I greet someone, I
try and do it positively. I look at them. If I walk past somewhere in
the street, I smile. It's creating those little connections and over time they grow.
So the phone calls you talk about the messages, you talk about the notes, the
videos and all that. I think it's important to consistently try and do that.
I'm really lucky in the sense that I'll, I just find legends who have
energy and I seem to have energy and we gel and we continue to
keep going and going and going. And then, you know, I, I can't be asked
going for dinner with the boys on Thursday night, but I just go cause I'm
like, that's how you build that connection. Sometimes I don't want to go on a
Sunday when I've had a few beers and I before to go and have a
father's day thing or whatever it might be because you're a bit dusty. You go.
All right. That's the hard part. You know that the challenge of actually
continually showing up. Because for me, the biggest thing is showing up. So
it's interesting to hear people say you've got willpower and commitment and whatnot.
I commit to most things that I do. I fail at a lot of them,
but I learn and I get a lesson from them. But, the one thing that
I do is I'm open about it and I'm honest about it. So when I
was trying to become a boss or am trying to becoming a boss,
becoming a boss soon, I'll do the course soon. A lot of the time
that is kind of done in the background and people study in the background and
I'm just such a team player. I love my team at work and my crew
work that I got everyone involved and they harnessed my
energy and they helped me like you wouldn't believe. So, I'm really grateful
that they can help. And, and those connections are built through that. They were with
me while I was trying, I've got a good example where,
a leader that I've got at work, Borshi, he's been a
brilliant boss for about 8 years and he is in one of the hardest roles
in the fire brigade is so busy. We're a busy station. He would come to
work every morning. We muster, we line up and we, get,
allocated your roles and you have a chat about what you're doing. So Campbell, you're
driving the a, you're on the B, etcetera, etcetera. Borshi would give us
a speech every morning and he would come with this energy that was just
absolutely contagious. Right. And we would fire up like you would believe. And
by 8, we will start at 8 o'clock at 10 past 8. We're losing our
shit. We're so pumped. We're ready to go. You know? And it's because that constant
energy and he's playful, he's vulnerable up the front and he would often give us
this thing. And one of the things we had to do is, and you talk
about your why, which is really interesting. And he would talk about that a lot
as well. And he got us to write 3 things many years. We did this
and you choose 3 things to write throughout the year. And sometimes I
would write things like connection vulnerability.
Other times I would write things like adventure, playfulness,
learning, contributing, things like that. So over the years I've had
all these different things and he would check-in on us and be like, how's your
post a note going? And it'd be on our locker and he'd be like, how's
your post it note going? Have you called that mate to get that connection? Have
you gone on that adventure? And all those types of things I try and implement
with all of my different groups of mates and it's challenging, you
know, and probably sometimes I can't be asked doing it, but
the hardest part showing up, I make sure that I show up for my mates
when they need me because I need them at certain times. So I think that's
a really important thing, but it's also learning from that leadership
that has just helped me have the tools to be able to do it
myself. And then people find it contagious and they want to be around you.
I think of my friends and my family and all these
amazing interactions I've had when I'm not with them. And I fucking love it.
I get excited and I'm like, man, that was fun when we went on that
golf trip or man, that was fun when we climbed that mountain or, you know,
I was, I was shaking a mojito in the kitchen with my wife and spilled
the thing and our entire kitchen had liquid
syrup all over it. Like it sucked at the time, but we laughed
our asses off, you know, like, I hate those things and they're fun. It's unreal.
And how good is that? Right there where you explain these gratitude. Right? And you're
you're you're practicing gratitude nonstop without actually thinking about
practicing gratitude. Yeah. And that just comes from habits. Right? And and and practice and
being consistent. You're talking about consistent before and doing it on a consistent basis.
And that's the thing we're trying to get a few episodes ago when we're talking
about gratitude. It doesn't need to be boring. It doesn't need to be writing things
down in a journal. Yeah. You're right. Just try to make it an orientation in
your life where you just constantly try to reflect upon and think about For sure.
Awesome stuff you've had going on your life. Awesome stuff you gotta look forward to.
And it doesn't matter as morning's significance, like, you know, shaking up a mojito and
making a spray for it, but he's smiling right now thinking about it. Sunny as
hell. If I tell my wife about it, she'd laugh her ass off as well.
Yeah. I think the important thing with that as well is Cambo is that everyone's
different. So people, you know, some people aren't as
energetic as say I would be if I walk into a room, but I probably
wasn't 15 years ago. I just know the tools. And I know that this
will, you know, you are the environment you're in and you be the person in
the room and you create that environment you want. So I know that,
some people don't want to mention the words of vulnerability or gratitude, or they don't
want to write in a journal and that's completely fine. You can still
do so many things that practice those things. I'm not a big,
I don't say the word vulnerability much, and I don't say the word gratitude much.
I try and do it and I try and use my actions to do that.
And I hope that comes across. I know that I still have to work on,
on being, but, I guess that openness and that
vulnerability that I've got is my honesty. I'm the same
99% of the time and the 1% that I'm not, I probably had a bad
day. So I think that's a huge thing and it's not the same for everyone.
So you just have to be a little bit open that everyone's different, but what
helps people get there is that fun environment, that play, that
engagement, that connection. You know, it doesn't matter if it's a principal, doesn't matter if
it's a, I guess a station officer or a
person you're teaching first aid or anything like that. You can still connect
in a way that helps them become more vulnerable, have more gratitude
is a bit more conscious in their thoughts and things like that without specifically
writing in your to do diary. So true. And every other thing you just mentioned,
it's gotta be fun. If something's not funny in life, it doesn't matter what aspect
is. You ever want to do it? Yep. So talking more about leadership and obviously,
you know, you're going through a leadership course. What do you think like the qualities
or qualities of a good leader are like, or what do you want people to
sort of think when they think of ACE, what qualities do they want to
associate with you? Yep. I it's, it's interesting. I had to
do a lot on leadership. And we had a interview where we had to
discuss it and I learned a lot, from my mates and we talked about it
in 5 regular, but I think capability is a huge one. So I want people
to think that I'm capable. I want people to think that I'm honest and that
I'll have their back. Because I know that in my moments throughout
my career, when I've needed someone to be that leadership or that role
model, when I've had a challenging time, they've stood up and
I go to that cause they're consistent. They're capable. I know they're good at their
job. You want someone at a job when we call it a job, it might
be a car accident, a fire, a false alarm, a smoke alarm, whatever it might
be, EMR emergency medical response. You want
people to look at you and know that he's going to smash it on that
day. He's going to do his training right. He's going to get it right. He's
going to deal with the public in a really confident manner and he's going to
be, I guess, a leader and a role model. And that's
what you strive for. And I've been lucky enough to have that in my career.
And I, you just, you're drawn to them. You're drawn to each other because you're
both leaders and you want to contribute. So I think that capability
and consistency is a huge one, and, and definitely honesty.
You know, I know, I know that people can come to me for help at
work after a difficult job that might be traumatic or whatnot
and that they know that I will listen. They know that I will
offer feedback if required and have their backs. So they're sort of big
things for me from a work perspective and that flows on into your life. Yeah.
I was going to say, put, put the business card away. And we often talk
about this, don't you? You're not who you are on your business card. That's not
who you are. Right. That's, that's, that's not here as a human being.
And I I see you as a leader amongst our group mates, and that might
embarrass you a little bit. I do. I see you as a leader amongst our
group mates. And, how do you go about leading your feet? And I reckon when
I see you in track with your family, like, I've been in numerous family geeks
with you as well. And, you know, you, you, you're like the center of it.
You let your, your strength of that family. You know what I mean? So how
do you go about things with your mateship group and your, and your, how do
you go about leading there? Look, it's interesting. I think you just gotta
be true to yourself, you know, like I bring what I bring and I know
it's different to what other people bring, but I am confident
in what I bring to the table and I'll bring that honesty. I'll, I'll
tell you the truth. I'll try my ass off. I will try really, really
hard. I'll have fun while we're doing it and I'll try and make everything fun,
even if it's not that fun. So for me, I think if I bring that
to every environment, people thrive off that. I don't necessarily
go and become the leader or try to become the leader. I just make
sure that I'm true to myself. And if I do that, I tend to
go towards that direction similar to yourselves where you do
become a focal point of what's going on. It's
taken years years years to be able to do that in year 12. I'm not
like that in year, you know, 10 years after high school, I'm still not like
that every single time I grow and develop and I get better at it. And
sometimes I stuff it up, man. But I know what makes me feel comfortable
when I'm in a room and I don't care if someone's loud, quiet, shy,
confident, as long as they're themselves and they have a crack and they show up,
I think that's important. So I try and do that in our mates groups and
we've got a lot of different type, characteristics in our
mates. And, and, you know, the first time someone meets me, they might be like,
what in the holy hell is this? But then 3
weeks later, they're like, he doesn't change. He's just the same every single
time. And he's just, he's energetic. He's, you know, so I try and
bring that. And I think that people see that honesty and that very
genuine, that authenticity. And I
think the more authenticity we have, the less
barriers we have to have, right? Like I don't find certain things that other
people find hard because I'm willing to look vulnerable and
cop it. And I just don't mind it. And in, in my, I learned so
much from my work environment where if I don't stand up and be a leader
at work, who's going to do it right. We've got standards that we
need and they've got to be upheld. And if you don't know what that standard
is, who's going to tell you, I'll tell you, I'll tell you what the standard
is. Cause the guys before me told the standard and that standard
doesn't drop off like this. It continually stays the same
or gets better. And I think you do that with your friendship group. Yeah. I
love that. Oh, that's so true. One thing, obviously, the line of work
here in Ace, it you know, there's some positive things, but I'm guessing you
see some pretty horrific things. Well, I'm not guessing. I know you would. How do
you shut that off so you have a horrible day? How do you
somehow turn that off and turn into the house, see Queenie and just forget
it? Yep. Like that that must be bloody hard. And and it is really challenging.
It's not it's not a turn off. It's working out and it's very similar to
what you guys do with these children and these, adults and principles and
whatnot. You have a toolkit that you use when you need
it. So you don't turn off, you might see something that's challenging,
but you take out the positive from it. Did I do a good job? Can
I learn from it? Did I help someone? Did I contribute? Then when you go
home, you've taught the people around you how to
deal with you. If you are reserved or quiet, or there's been a tough job,
you try and be open and honest about it, maybe leaving out certain details,
but just let them know that, you know, you might have a quiet day or
2. If I'm quiet, there was a tough job at work. That's a thing. If
I'm not coming home and jumping around, it might've been a tough day at work.
I've got my team to support me and I've got all these tools that allow
me to make sure that I continually keep my bucket. You know, you
don't want your bucket to overflow. That's an analogy we're using the fire brigade where
you don't want your bucket to overflow. So we have to be really important about
that, but you make sure you work on yourself. You know, I'm a huge, believer
in the more you work on yourself, the better you can give to anyone else.
So I will force myself to go and have a cold dip in the
morning. I'll go for a walk along the beach before night shift that night. And
this is a funny story, but I used to, we had a tough 2
weeks at work and I would go for a walk along the beach before work,
work in South Melbourne. And I'm wandering along about probably
4 times I've done this. And then all of a sudden I hear this tote
and I'm like, yeah, it's a mate. And he's about to come up to work
with me. And he jumps out of the coast like, can I walk with you?
And he's, his enthusiasm was contagious. It snapped me out of my
mood straight away. We had a nice beach walk. We talked about some life's
problems. He's like, why are you doing this by yourself? And I explained to him
and he sort of understood that that was one of my coping mechanisms and whatnot.
So it was really good to see that, but no, you've got a team around
you. And I think that's really important. You've got to lean on the people that
love you, in those times. I hope
that I can teach Quinnie and Eddie and everyone around
me to be able to deal with scenarios that are challenging from what I've learned.
But you have to understand that you're not invincible and early on
it takes a lot of time. Everyone's different. Some people, things don't affect them.
And then one day, 30 years later, it'll affect them. You just have to be
aware and kick in those little self help things, whether it be fitness
connection, meeting up with a mate for beer. I've met up with plenty of mates
for a beer just to have a catch up and a chat and help
with my mental health. And even like you were talking about the other day, I
also encourage Eddie to go and do that as well. I encourage you to do
that. I might be helping them some days. They are helping me the other days.
And I think that's the, that's the whole point. Right? And they're probably my
tools. And you've got the strength to do it. You mentioned during that little comment
about you force yourself to go and have a cold dip, but you force yourself
to go for a run or whatever it might be. And that that stuck with
me just saying, because it's bloody hard to write sometimes, but you've gotta it's
easy to do nothing. Yep. That's easiest in the world to do, but you've
gotta have some grit and then you gotta push yourself to do
something that bloody sucks. Do something we've got at work. We just, we
constantly say to each other and we're ribbon each other, but we're like, do something.
And that is like the kicker for everything. You just got to do something. Right.
I go to the beach in the morning. We all go before work on day
shifts and we jump in effing freezing it's,
but the second we're out, it's the best thing we've ever done. It's 8 o'clock
we've already gone for a run and achieved so many things throughout the day. We
did it as a team. You just got to do something. So I always had
this. I remember I love jumping into water and no matter what, I can
always just jump into water. It's frigging freezing when I'm in there, but jumping in
is the funniest thing you've ever done. Right. So it's that constant thing. If I
just force myself to do things, knowing that at the end of it,
I'm far better for it. It wasn't that bloody hard, you know, a lot
of do a lot of fitness and stuff like that, and especially for the job.
And what's the worst that's going to happen in a workout that's hard.
What is the worst that's going to happen? Nothing. Nothing. Correct. You're just
gonna be knackered. Right? Nothing like, you go, oh, gosh. It
was really hard to run a little faster or jump a couple. And then you
recover. And then you go, jeez, I'm pretty glad I'll be back. Yeah. Geez. I'm
a good rooster. Yeah. Mate, you walk out with your puppy and, you know,
So you just, you force yourself to start. Once you start, you start getting better
at it. You get better, better, better, and you continue to learn and grow from
it. So, you know, you don't do it every single time, but you, you
try to do it every single time. And I I'm happy to throw my
hat in the ring for anything. Yeah. Because it's how I learn and grow and
get better at things. Love that, Ace. Now let's talk about the serious stuff.
The calendar. Have you ever this is all you
want that
Paulie's looking. What's he doing right now? I'm like, where did he come this time?
I got a picture of me this night just like he's just
stirrup's zed in. I got a guy at the gym, mate. Now Nick Shaw, and
he showed me this photo. And I was like, that's not you, is it? Like
insane. They had a few overall Yeah. Just Places on. Out of
abs. Yeah. They're insane. Have you ever been on the calendar
before I'm on the calendar? There's probably been a few precarious photos or or
maybe, you know Real oiled up with the hose. A little bit of butter. A
little bit of butter or something like that. No. He's a AAFE is a
massive CrossFitter back in the day. And if buy so so put together
a fireman with a CrossFitter and an insane willpower and
commit to everything. Do you reckon he had abs? I wonder
you made the most of it in the calendar. No.
Because you there's one thing you'll never do in the 5 brigade. You'll never live
it down. If, if we have this thing where, when we,
know, we get new recruits all the time, you know, and man, if that one
recruit would just make one slip of the tongue or something like, he'll have that
for the rest of his career. If you come and introduce yourself and you go,
g'day mate, I'm Sagi. They'll go
and they don't want to call you Soddy. You're done for the rest of your
career. They'll call you lefty. So you're, we just stick to
it. We're silly. We have fun with bloody everything. So yeah, the
calendar was always one of the scariest things you could ever do, girl. There's already
pictures of us put up all around the the That's all I wanna know. That's
all I wanna know. That's all I wanna know. That's my anyone. Yeah. Thanks. I
appreciate it. I'd love to see that. The butter. Give me some Give me a
Give me a few months, mate. I just had surgery. So good. So
good. Alright, Eric. So, that's it. I
don't wanna be called that. Done. The rest of your career. Alright. What's your money?
I love it. Next week, next week's pod,
we're rolling into, we're gonna discuss all things that inspire you.
Alright? And we wanna we wanna sort of focus it on all things that inspire
us just in 2024 so far. I've got an epic list on the go so
far. I'm gonna kick start his ass this year. Keep telling me about it too.
What are you bloody doing? I I want to know what's
inspired you this year. Okay. So
bit of good timing, but, one of the things that inspired me was, I've
got, I'll go twofold. All right. I'll go the everyday inspire. And then the
bigger, the huge, the holy shit, man. Everest. So, a couple
of boys I work with, when we decided to go for this, we're really
comfortable at work. It's our great mates where we absolutely
love it. We've been working together forever. Change is hard, right? Change is really,
really hard. We're going to split up now. We're not going to be working together
as much and whatnot. And I've been with these guys my entire career, 16 years.
And, it was literally the hardest thing ever to go. All
right, we're going to do it and we're going to commit to it. I may
have been pushing them. That's the type of person I'm where I'm like, boys, we're
doing SOS. And one of them goes, okay. And the other one's like, darn
man, we're doing so convinced him, convinced him. Anyway, they inspired me
with their efforts and their work. And, and look, I was hopefully inspiring
to them with my efforts and my work. And we've all got families, all got
kids and whatnot. It takes a lot. We had other guys saying, we've
never seen people work this hard to get on the SOS course. Now that's fine.
And I wish sometimes I wish I was that person that didn't have to work
that bloody hard, but I didn't want to not get on. So I just
absolutely busted our balls, tried to be the driver. Had another guy
where he was fantastic as well. So these guys really, really, really worked
hard to get on this course. And there, there was effectively 3 stages that are
terrifying because if you fail, every single person in
your job knows it's a, it's a broken system where,
your, I guess it's, it's more scary to fail than it is to have
a crack, but I didn't want to act like that. And I said, I told
everyone we're going for it. And we just had an absolute,
struggle doing it. And it was just struggle town, struggle town hours, hours, study, study,
but we ended up getting there. And it's funny because every single person you tell
that you're doing it, they go, man, how can I help? How can I help?
So we had 50, 60, a 100 people trying to help us get on these
course on this course. So it was really inspiring to see
them work that hard and also be open about it. The
Everest style one I've got, have you heard of Ross Edgley? No. Okay. So
Ross Edgley is a mad man. Lots of good
stats. You guys are dropping names.
Sorry. You guys, so this guy does some unique swimming
things. He used to be a gymnast or something like that. He's a Pammi fella.
He he does some insane things. He's you know, he swims from bloody he tried
to swim Loch Ness. Right? The big lake in Loch Ness. And Oh, Johnny Van
Weis is about to do that. Is he? Yeah. He's doing that. Other
podcasts, and he's going to do that. It's like pitch black. Yeah. Pitch black the
whole time. Sorry to interrupt. That's alright. Yeah. I thought it was crate. I'm like,
it's freezing. It's freezing. And it's pitch black. You can't see. Hypothermia.
So the so this one this bloke just did was the Yukon River,
Canada. You know, bears, currents, ice,
hypothermia, all this stuff, different stuff. He's an absolute madman. So he
swam 510ks non
stop. He didn't hold onto a boat once
He floated and ate, and then he went down this route
510 k's. I think that's 300 plus miles or something like
that. And it took 3 and a bit days. So he he's an adventure
guy that just pushes the absolute limits. And man, this guy's
attitude is unbelievable. He didn't sleep. He didn't
sleep. I'm just picturing like an otter sleeping on their back. He got
some of his things over the time, his he got
so swollen to the last events he did, all the things he tried to conquer
were canceled because he was going to die. They're like, they had to drag him
out of the water, etcetera. So when you're talking the Everest things, this guy's just
an animal, but what is most impressive about these guys' feet are
his frigging attitude, man. Yeah. He's positive about
it. He he's playing the whole time. These guys are
feeding water. The guys on the boat, the crew are shitting themselves that this bloke's
gonna die, and he's laughing in the water. And he's just done 2
and a half days of no sleep swimming the whole time. Like
unbelievable. So Ross Edgley is a, is a man, on a mission to
do all these amazing feats, but he does it with his positive attitude
and he's playful the whole time. I absolutely love it. It. So he's my
probably inspiring thing of the last little while that I absolutely love. Have
to up the game for next week because that's that's a bloody good one. That's
that's made me a bit anxious. Like, thinking, like It's terrifying the stuff that
he does. That is insane. Yep. He's got a few different things. It was a
world record. Surely no one's ever done that. But that's No. It's a world record.
I've never heard of anything like that. No. He did one where he, swam with
a a giant log from one part in England to another part, like a
log. Like, he's a psychopath. Like, he's just learning. Oh, it
wouldn't make anything go on and carry a log. Literally. And he just loves pushing
the boundaries, I guess. And, and it's cool. Right?
Because he either learns from them, you know, if they fail, he learns from them
and he gets a lesson from it or he achieves it. I guess that's the
point, right? If you have a crack, you'll learn something from it or
you'll get this wicked sense of achievement and pride in yourself for actually doing
it. And most times it's just happened to crack. I didn't care what the time
is or whatever, you know, for us mere mortals, it doesn't matter. You know, you
go play your footy on, on your Sunday and you had a crack. That's the
main thing. It's not the fact that you didn't get a world record or whatnot.
You just showed up. So they're my inspiring things. Also
you 2, are very inspiring. I'm
late on the, on the podcast listening, but but I've listened to a heap of
them and especially this little series. And it is just inspiring to listen
to a couple of lads, have a crack and try and make other people better.
You're effectively impacting not
only the parents and the adults and the teachers, but the kids and men, you
know, now that you're a father, I went to
school, I gravitated towards the people that would be able to connect with me
and the teachers that would alter the curriculum and be able
to make things fun. And they're the ones that I gravitated towards. And
I hope that schools have these teachers in them now. And I'm glad that you
guys are in this area actually doing that because you know, one day Quinn is
going to be at school. And if she's teaching what you guys are talking about,
which is playfulness, connection, engagement, and
energy, I'll be, I'll be stoked. Well done. That's it. And
that's a good one to round out. Well done. It's been awesome.
Yeah, a few things that I took from this is just your mindset, right? A
few, the, the common thing throughout today, I think even your, what inspires you is
that mindset, right? And just to have that mindset of get shit done,
show up, be consistent with it, have some fun along the way, and
and that will lead to a to a pretty bloody good life and and and
some smiles. You know what I mean? I got I got one more for it.
Go for it, mate. Go for it. Yeah. Obviously, you said, you know, when you're
18, you weren't the person you are now. Yep. If you could go back to
that 18 year old ace and from everything you've done from work,
kids, you know, life connections, friends, what bit of
advice would you give yourself that 18 year old age? That's a really, really good
one. I think being curious
would be a good one. Sometimes I've, I've, I think back
to when I was probably a little staunch in my
attitude. And I know now that being curious
and vulnerable and whatnot really, really helps me grow as a person and everyone
around me. So maybe be a little bit more curious. And when, you
know, when I say curious, I mean, I probably mean vulnerable and
open to everything and anybody because I'll learn
from it. Whereas now I am, and you know, people, different walks of life. I
work with so many different people. I have so many different mates that do different
things. They have different challenges. When you're a little bit more curious, you learn a
little bit more about people and you, you understand that everyone's
different and everyone's going through their own shit. So, you know, sometimes you might be
a little judgmental. I try to be a little less judgmental back in the
day. I think, that's great advice. I, I would say
I would say the same thing. I don't actually think, I don't actually think you
could. I think that's something you learn over time. I think so. Yeah. And I
think it's a lesson learned. 100%. It's a lesson learned if you want to. Obviously
some people don't want to and they never will. But yeah, I love that answer,
mate. Yeah. I think just to cap that off, Sizi, one of the
biggest things that I do is I surround myself with
legends and it just always works.
You put in the time for great mates and great family and whatnot, and it
just works. Right. It just creates this continuous thing and you meet a new person
and you put in time and effort and you just surround yourself with good people
and good things happen. So that's a big one. Butter, calendars, that's all
you need, Lars. All you need. I
love it. I love it. Up there tomorrow. That'll be up there,
mate. That'll be up there. AC, thanks, mate. We really appreciate it.
Chatting. Chatting. Little drops of gold in there. Everywhere. Everywhere. It's
all been in Sovereign Hill. Let's be honest. It's gold everywhere. AC AC is a
man of mine that sends me numerous podcasts to listen to. He's a he's a
podcast fan, and, and it's been unreal to be able to be in the studio
with you and actually do one together and and and send this out to the
world for people to learn from. And I'm very honored. Thank you. Thanks, Al. Very
honored. Take care.