Behind the Toolbelt
Behind the ToolBelt is a live, raw, and uncut podcast that brings real, unfiltered conversations about business, leadership, and the entrepreneurial mindset. Hosted by Ty Cobb Backer, CEO of TC Backer Construction, this live show features industry leaders, innovators, and experts sharing their experiences, strategies, and insights. From building successful companies to overcoming challenges, each episode offers valuable perspectives for entrepreneurs and business owners and leaders looking to grow, and make an impact.
Behind the Toolbelt
Unlocking Your Potential: The Journey Through Emotion and Leadership
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We are live. Welcome back everybody to Behind the Tool Belt, episode 271. I'm your host, ty Cobb-Backer. Thank you for joining us today on this Wednesday edition. Today we have another special guest. Stay tuned, and we will be back after our short intro from our sponsors.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Behind the Tool Belt, where the stories are bold, the conversations are real and the insights come to you live, raw and uncut. Every week, host Ty Cobb-Backer sits down with game changers, trailblazers and industry leaders who aren't afraid to tell it like it is no filters, no scripts, just the truth. Please welcome your host of Behind the Tool belt, ty cobb backer.
Ty Cobb Backer:Hey, hey, welcome back everybody on this magnificent wednesday. I hope it's sunny and sun shining wherever the hell you are today watching this episode. Today we have another great, phenomenal guest, uh, somebody who has been influential in my career after watching his content and meeting him at shows and just seeing what he has built louder than his words, you know. You know somebody who has used the roofing industry as his vehicle to have impact on, on, not just those that he works with and the creation of leaders and co-leaders and coworkers, but his community and our industry as a whole, and I sincerely mean that. Heath I, I think you're an amazing person and I'm excited to have you on the show again today, on our actual Wednesday, you know, singular, you know, opposed to being at a show and getting like a 15 minute, you know, little clip here and there. But today's the day you know that I feel is a very special day because you're here and it is Wednesday and it's 12 o'clock Eastern Standard Time. So how are you doing, buddy?
Heath Hicks:Wow, you know that's a big question. I've tried to practice in the last few years of my life that you know, when somebody asks me that question, that they mean it. So how am I? I am happy and sad, and in love, and brokenhearted, and rich and poor, and tired and excited and everything in between, everything all at once. That's kind of how life really works.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, I think the hard part is is differentiating those emotions and feelings, at least for me. You know I used to drown a lot of those feelings with substances and stuff and I couldn't, I couldn't identify what I was feeling, and mostly for me was, was fear based stuff.
Ty Cobb Backer:You know, my anxieties, my fear, my heartbrokenness, all that stuff, a lot of that resentment, all stemmed from, from fear. You know, and I think they say a human being only really experiences two emotions, and that's love and hate. I could be totally wrong with that, um, but uh, if you, if I thought and I have thought about that, it's kind of like, you know, I either love something or I don't really like it, you know and I don't know the right word that was that was used in that.
Heath Hicks:And I'm obviously, um, not getting it right, but I think that's the basic two emotions people feel. Yeah, I would agree that there is a basic list. For sure, big challenge for me, and that I've felt other people share, is being able to feel and acknowledge and sit with and experience all of them. You know, people have a short list of emotions they will experience and then they have a long list of ones they won't experience. They just refuse, put it in a box or drown it or run from it, or you know, especially the hard ones that are associated with hard memories.
Heath Hicks:A lot of times we buried those memories or experiences so far away from ourselves that we have an emotional moment in this moment that the emotions we're feeling are tied to a moment from 10 years ago or 20 years ago when we were a kid or whatever, and that memory is so far away and we've resisted processing it for so long that we don't realize that our current emotion is actually just that, one relived over and over again, and that's not the most healthy place to be. And I certainly came from a place like that and maybe around five years ago I got on a journey to try to figure that stuff out, unwind a lot of those things and release a lot of those emotions. But the reason most people are unwilling to do that work, I think, is because at some point your soul or your body realizes you're going to have to experience it again. If you're going to get through it, because you can't get around it and you're going to have to go through it again and the reason it's still sitting there is because we didn't really go through it the first time. We got near it and we dodged it or we hid from it or we drank it away or whatever, and we didn't let that emotion run its course.
Heath Hicks:But all of those emotions something I've learned is all of those emotions are meant to do something for us. There's a purpose behind all of them, and the one that I hid the most growing up was anger. I hid that one the most because that one got me in the most trouble. My mom was very abusive and anytime I was angry about it or anything else, it just made the abuse so much worse, and so I never got to experience anger. And then I was also taught by the church I was in growing up that anger is not right. You shouldn't make any decisions in your anger. You shouldn't listen to your anger. You should use your logical brain and work yourself out of that anger and then make your decisions.
Heath Hicks:But, honestly, I've learned that anger is a wonderful time to make certain decisions because it's there to help us draw boundaries. When people cross our boundaries, we're supposed to be angry about it and we're supposed to push them out of our world, or draw a line in the sand and say you can't do that to me anymore, or I won't do that again, or I won't allow a person like you around me, or whatever the situation is. But I was not very good at that because I didn't feel any of my anger at all, and so, shame. That's another one people really hide from, and that one's not as useful as anger, but, um, it still gives you a hint that there's something there that you need to understand or work on. So if you hide from it, you carry, you carry it around. You can't really get away from it. It just becomes a weight around your neck, you know.
Ty Cobb Backer:So yeah, so how? How did you unwind that so?
Heath Hicks:how did you unwind that? Oh man, well, I had an experience in my life that was, you know, traumatic and tragic, and you know, I spent a weekend, you know, six years ago, maybe, trying to figure out if I wanted to be on the planet anymore you know, yeah, um, and when I got up from that weekend, what I understood myself was that everything that I knew up to that point had produced that weekend in my life.
Heath Hicks:And so if I didn't want another weekend like that, I had to learn some new stuff. And so if I didn't want another weekend like that, I had to learn some new stuff. And the me that existed up until that point would have just looked backwards a little bit and said, well, I'm supposed to be more disciplined and so I'll just try a little harder to be disciplined. So I'd reach over and grab the knob for discipline and try to turn it up a little bit and hope that my whole life was going to change. But what I realized in that moment is that whole machine with all the knobs of everything I knew on how to manipulate or change or alter in my life, that whole machine, that is what produced that weekend. The whole thing didn't work, and so I kind of went on a journey to learn things that I didn't know anything about, rather than trying to relearn things that I thought I knew that were the right things. I said, well, this just isn't working.
Speaker 4:So I got to learn things I've never heard before.
Heath Hicks:I can't just read a book about stuff I've already read about, maybe from a different perspective or something, or go listen to the same sermons I knew growing up, or something like that, because I'm sitting here as a result of those things and I don't, I don't want this, I can't, I can't make it through this weekend again. So I had to change, had to change some things and learn new things.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, no doubt you know it's, it's funny, yes, and you know, and this is so cliche, but through through, pain is is growth. But I guess my question for you is is obviously you are who you are today from experiencing that pain. Um, but you had mentioned something earlier and we we can, we can dive a little deeper into you know how you got to where you're at today through that that process that you had to go through. But you had made a comment that, um, anger is useful and let's dive into that a little bit. What? What do you mean? What do you mean when you say that like, let's elaborate a little more.
Heath Hicks:Okay, so well, we'll back up just a little bit, and there's a book out there that I would highly recommend, called King, warrior, magician, lover, and it talks about the four roles that we have in life, or the four archetypes of masculine. And no matter who you are as an individual, at different times in your life you're going to be in the role of king, or the role of lover, or the role of warrior, or the role of magician in your own life, and oftentimes, as men, that means there's other people involved too, but at its, at its core, it's you, and you're going to have to live in those roles. You have to know how to operate in them, when the moment is right for to be one or the other. Um, and you know, warrior and king both have have anger elements of how they operate warrior probably more so than king, but but as a king in your own life, one of the things that you do is you set the boundaries of what's acceptable in your life, or your kingdom, if you want to look at it that way your household or your business or whatever, and oftentimes you aren't able to set the boundary when you don't know exactly where it is, but you figure that out when somebody crosses it, right, sometimes you cross it, sometimes somebody else crosses it. But then you become aware, oh, this is the thing that's unacceptable. This is where I don't want to live. I don't want to let anybody else do this to me again and I don't want to do this to myself again or do this to the people I love again.
Heath Hicks:Oftentimes in that moment there's anger and that's your motivation to move that boundary stone from wherever it was before to where you want it to be right now. And then, when somebody comes up against that boundary, anger is the thing that pops up and says no, you're not coming across, you're not doing that to me, I don't, I don't, I'm not going to allow that. Now. I'm not saying you jump up and down and punch holes in the wall. That's not what I mean by anger. I mean the energy that rises in you to make a move or make a change. Tony Robbins says it's our motility, it's the thing that moves us. Is our anger? It's not the thing that drives us? That's not what I mean. Not your constant driver. That's very unhealthy, but in a moment when you need to make a shift, oftentimes anger can be the thing that's wanting you to make, that it's giving you the impetus to move that thing.
Heath Hicks:And when you're afraid of your anger or you disrespect your anger or you think anger is wrong, sometimes you'll go. You know what that person probably really they have a really good heart and I'm going to forgive them and I'm going to let it go and I'm going to overlook it and I'm going to forgive them and I'm going to let it go and I'm going to overlook it. And while you can still forgive them and assume that they had good intentions, you can also still set a boundary and tell them you can't do that again. That's where I was missing. I had lots of love and grace for people, but I did not have the strength to set boundaries and enforce them, and so I ended up letting a lot of people into my world that did not have good intentions, and so I paid a long price in my leadership for not understanding what it meant to be a king in your own life, because I never wanted to be a king.
Heath Hicks:I actually wasn't trying to do that at all when I started Avco Roofing. I was just trying to give the guys that I knew and loved an opportunity to make good money and take care of their families. I never anticipated it growing the way it did and then somehow me being sort of at the on the top of this pyramid of leadership. You know that had a bunch of people involved in all these families and all these lives. I was not prepared for it and I resisted it. As the company got bigger and I sort of eventually became more important than I knew how to be, I resisted it and I tried to pull myself down and push some other people up and kind of avoid some of that.
Heath Hicks:And that was, you know, in that book, king Warrior, magician Lover. That would say that was an immature version of a king. I hadn't matured into that and so in that I was kind of giving my power away to other people and I was trying to find other people to run the company and other people to make the hard decisions and things like that, because I just didn't understand my responsibility. But a part of that is just because it came by surprise and I didn't want it. I wasn't the one who wanted to be a king. I never wanted to build something so that people would know who I was or so that I'd be rich or anything, and so I resisted it and then, at some seasons of my life, I even kind of ran away from it.
Heath Hicks:Away from it, um, because when you are setting those boundaries, uh, and guarding your borders, you're including some people and excluding other people and that that I was not very good at that in the beginning, telling somebody you got to go, you got to get out, not just firing them from their job but booting them out of our tribe. You got to go. I was really not good at that and so but a lot of what was missing in those interactions was a healthy version of anger, and so I've had to learn and give myself permission to be able to be angry and make the right decision in my anger. That is motivated by anger, but it's also the right decision that I wouldn't really make when I wasn't angry. And so you got to be able to plug into that and listen to that if you want to protect yourself and your, your tribe.
Ty Cobb Backer:Well, yeah, yeah, great explanation. I mean that that was so good, as you know, allowing anger and and, and reaffirming with yourself that it's okay to be upset, but harnessing that energy and in in a in a healthy way. I think that's where a lot of us, and even me I've been guilty of showing my butt on more times than one due to being angry at something. But, but learning how to do all that and use it. You know it's. You don't have to be mean, but mean what you say, and and and having confidence in your yourself and your abilities, and and I think a lot of it has to go into self. What's the word I'm looking for? Not not confidence, but low self-esteem. Okay, oh yeah, do you feel like you? You were suffering from low self-esteem, less less than I don't deserve this position.
Ty Cobb Backer:So I'm going to push other people up because maybe they really knew who I was kind of yeah.
Heath Hicks:Oh, there certainly was an element of not feeling worthy, for sure. But low self-esteem and high self-esteem are not necessarily opposites. They're both immature expressions of real self-esteem, right, so they're not necessarily opposites. They're both immature expressions of real self-esteem, right, so they're not necessarily opposites. It's not like there's a scale from low to high. It's just kind of an incorrect or immature expression of the value you should have for yourself.
Heath Hicks:But what's often missing in there, what was missing for me, is agency, the understanding that I can and should control all these elements in my life and they're my responsibility and I have the right to make whatever decision I want inside of my life. I don't have to consider everyone else first. That's not a true statement. Now, when you choose, as a leader, to consider others, that's wonderful, but you don't have to do that as an individual. You're not bound to this teaching that I grew up with, which was you always have to put everyone else first. That literally doesn't work and no one actually really lives that way, and if they did, they would probably have nothing and they would literally serve everyone. You know and I'm not trying to contrast that against the scripture that says the greatest of all is the servant of all. Jesus says that, but that, said in hyperbole, isn't meant to be taken literally. It's meant to express an idea that we should love and serve others. Right, but this idea that I have to consider everyone else before myself that I grew up with just isn't true. Your life doesn't work if you do that. If you don't love yourself first, you're not going to be able to love anyone else. Well, because you're going to love everyone else the same way you love yourself, which is why Jesus says love your neighbor as yourself.
Heath Hicks:And that's why that scripture never made sense to me growing up, because I didn't love myself. So how am I supposed to love someone else the same way you love yourself? I didn't love myself, so I didn't have a good example. I didn't know that scripture didn't even make any sense, and so that implies you have to love yourself first. Yeah, when you're good at doing that, then you'll be good at doing it for other people, and so the agency was a lot of what I was missing, not necessarily just self-esteem.
Heath Hicks:It was this perspective that I can and should influence my life for myself, and that isn't, it isn't just okay to do that. That's actually my job. My first job is to myself. That is my job is to take care of myself, and I never understood that. I was always giving and giving and giving and trying to give everybody else everything. And then, because I did that and because I had that expressed as a part of what I valued about myself, and it was also even things that I taught the people at my company. Anytime I made a decision that was for myself, it offended the group because I had set the standard that I'm not going to live for myself, I'm going to live for you guys.
Heath Hicks:So anytime I try to make a decision for myself, they'd be like well, what what, what, what you know, and then it would be, then I would feel bad about making a decision that was for me you know, instead of having.
Heath Hicks:But I had to set all that right and that book was a was a start of it, learning the mature and immature versions of King, warrior, magician and lover.
Heath Hicks:And then there's, like boyhood, examples, you know, and when you're a boy, you're not a king, you're a hero. Yeah, and it's an expression of the same idea, but it's very different when you're an adolescent. And if you tried to be a hero when you were a king, you would die needlessly on the battlefield, you would just run headlong into the next battle there was and at some point you would just die in a place where the king should be up on the hill making the strategy, running everything. But if you were still a hero, you're still immature. In that seat you'd make the wrong decision, you know. And so understanding that, because I never met my father, never had any kind of father figure in my life, so I didn't know anything about how to be a man and it's taken me a long time to learn it, and my boys have been a primary motivation of that journey for me because, I felt, and still do feel sometimes, like I am just missing the thing that I would like to be giving them.
Heath Hicks:I just don't have it sometimes, and so I've had to try to go and find it, and that book and the books around that topic have been really helpful for me.
Ty Cobb Backer:Wow, you know, you know, for for our viewers and listeners right now, you know, and anybody looking from the outside in right now, Heath would would say that you know you're. You're a successful entrepreneur, you know a wonderful dad and all of that personal. You know we all struggle with things, right, and it's not always been as pretty as everybody has has think or think it is.
Ty Cobb Backer:Right and how we're at, and it's the journey to be where we're at, that that's more important than than getting to our destination and and you know, and it's, it's just crazy about the amount of work that nobody probably realizes that you have put into personal development to be the human being that you are today, to be the father that you are today. But I think when we're going through those, those experiences right Of feeling less than or it's almost like a uh, an inferiority complex, um, I can't remember the other um uh, shoot the uh, uh, imposter syndrome, egotistical, um uh, inferiority complex or something like that, that we that we struggle with. But I think a lot of times we don't realize that we have a choice that we can remove ourselves from. You know, certain situations, certain people and I'm not talking about avoiding situations or feelings like that, but we're like like getting yourself in a position, in a mindset where it's like you know what, that, that that individual just sucks the life from me, our energies don't match, like we just accept that and and and don't realize that we actually have a choice today of like who we surround ourselves with, who do we want to be more like, who do we want to model, who has something that I want to be, you know, you know, and it took me a long time to to identify those things too.
Ty Cobb Backer:But the personal development aspect of things, you know, and it took me a long time to identify those things too. But the personal development aspect of things, you know, not living in that thing, and I think for a lot of us it's more comfortable to stay in a bad situation because of the fear of change, right, that grieving process that we might have to to experience that it's just easier for me to stay in a shitty relationship or be at a dead end job or whatever shitty relationship or be at a dead end job or whatever, because of that fear of change, knowing deep down inside that if I would leave this situation or relationship or whatever the case might be, that it is actually better for me, you know, mentally, physically and for my family. And then, on the other side of the coin that you were talking about, like where you conditioned those people around you, that you were leading, that if I actually did something for myself, that it was bad, right, and I that's what I believed, that's what I believed, and so they believe the same thing.
Ty Cobb Backer:That was the exact point that I was going to bring up was is that I think 50% of that horse crap is in our heads. Oh, totally, at least 50% of that. So how, what did you I mean outside of like reading books and and and stuff like that? Um, what like what? What do you do on a day-to-day basis, like when you said, like when you come up against a parenting situation, is there, you have a mentor or coach.
Heath Hicks:I've got a couple, I've got a couple and got a couple, and I think I'm gonna I'm gonna infer a little bit of your question here and go back a little bit.
Heath Hicks:Okay, on how to start a journey like that, because that's an internal decision. How do I, how do I start a journey that like that? And one of the key elements, I think, is being okay with being wrong, and that's why a lot of people don't make the decisions that you were talking about. There's there's a lot of elements in there, but a lot of times people don't want to realize that they were wrong in the decision that they made, and so to bolster that decision in their mind with the person that they picked to be in relationship with, or the job that they picked, or the career they picked, or the tattoo they got on their face or whatever, you know, whatever it is, they're going to bolster that decision. The guy with the tattoo on his face almost every one of those guys is going to tell you it's the greatest thing they ever did and everybody should do it, because they don't want to be like, yeah, that was real dumb dude, I shouldn't have done that.
Heath Hicks:I'm not saying face tattoos are dumb, by the way ideology or a false narrative where, once you do something, you start to tell yourself it was the right thing and it's really hard to stop and go. Yeah, man, I really fucked that up. And it being okay with being wrong, I think, is a big start of that journey and understanding that being wrong doesn't make you a failure. You know, even though you're uh, you might be failing you know I'm failing in several areas of my life right now. Um know I've failed in ways in my current relationship that I have and I'm facing that stuff as much as I can. You know I'm going to some, I'm going to retreat, coming up because I want to be able to face the stuff that I need to grow in and not run from it, you know. But if you can't do that, you're really not going to get on the journey.
Heath Hicks:So, trying to figure out whether you should meditate or read a book or have a mentor or whatever, you got to figure out first whether you're willing to be wrong, Because you could go listen to a mentor. If you're not willing to be wrong, you're not going to take anything they say, and if you're not willing to be wrong, you could read all the books in the world and you're going to throw half of that information right out. You are wrong. It doesn't mean that you are a failure. It doesn't mean that you aren't worth anything. It just means there's some information that you have, that you need, that you don't have, and when you have it, it'll change the way you operate. And so if you're willing, at whatever point you might be at your life whether it's right now, while you're listening to this podcast, or whether it's three months from now, when your marriage is falling apart or your addiction is overtaking your life being willing to be wrong can be the impetus to start you on a journey. Once you're on that, there's a lot of ways to do it.
Heath Hicks:For me, a big kickoff of it for me was I went to India for three weeks I stayed in an ashram, sort of like a temple, and I learned about things I'd never known anything about. I wanted to learn about God from a perspective that I'd never had before, because the God that I grew up with I'd heard about a lot, read a lot of books, went to college about it, grew up very involved in church, did missions all over the world and stuff like that Very, very involved, had a lot of information. But to me, once I hit that weekend in my life, I realized there were just some things missing. Whatever they were, and I could have even heard them before in that other seasons of my life I might have heard them and they just didn't land. And so I was like, well, I'm just going to go do things I've never done.
Heath Hicks:Other seasons of my life I might've heard them and they just didn't land. And so I was like, well, I'm just going to go do things I've never done. So that sort of was a kickoff for me, and since then I've done all kinds of things. I've had mentors of different types, I've had counselors and coaches of different types and you know, currently I've got two in my life that I see pretty regularly, one every week, one pretty often, um, that have wisdom beyond my current experience, that can listen to me and go here's something to think about or here's a book to read, or that doesn't sound true. It sounds like you're lying to yourself, you know, and without that outside perspective it would be difficult, I think, for me to move forward the way that I'd like to.
Ty Cobb Backer:So yeah, yeah, I know you touched on this a little bit. You know, with this, with the personal development and identifying, kind of like, what has bothered you and the things that you need to work on, do you think that this has helped you become, you know, not just a better parent, I'm thinking in terms of of a professional, you know, being a better leader through all of this personal development stuff. And if it has, how has that helped you?
Heath Hicks:Well, I think the first thing to clarify is it's all the same being a better leader, being a better business owner, being a better spouse, being a better parent, it's all the same. It's just being a better version of you, and oftentimes when you're just trying to solve that one specific problem, I just want to be a better leader at work, you get hyper-focused on things, you get very informational, you get really in your head and it doesn't make any change in your heart and when you go to work, you're like what is it? How am I supposed to say this again? And you're like you look at yourself or look at people and so, instead of like hyper focusing for me on, you know, I want to improve this one singular area of my life.
Heath Hicks:My focus has been I want to be the best version of myself, which, for me, it took me a lot of years and wisdom to be able to have the freedom to even say what I really want, cause I, in the beginning, I had to.
Heath Hicks:I had to frame it with I want to be the best version of myself because it sounds it sounds like to other people. I'm getting better and everybody wants to be better, so that's okay. But what I honestly really want, ty, is I just want the freedom to be me without worrying about what anybody else thinks about it, and then, if I can be me as much as I am, as much as I want to be, as much as I'd like to be, then I'll find freedom and contentment and peace in the middle of that process, regardless of what my circumstances are, because it is very clear that circumstances do not dictate whether you're happy or whether you're sad or whether you're depressed or whether you feel like you have enough or don't have enough. Your circumstances have very little to do with that. But when we're not doing inner work, we're always focused on what can we change a little bit on the outside? You know, yeah, yeah.
Ty Cobb Backer:No, that was good man, that's so good. He thought, and that's this is why I was excited to have you on the show, because I know that brief, that brief moment we had at Wind and Storm, I think two, maybe three years ago now. Yeah, I could tell that you were very deep and very intellectual and have worked really hard on yourself over the years. Do you think was it your personal relationship or do you think it was your professional relationship that really brought these things to surface, that like, look, I got to do something different with my life.
Heath Hicks:It was personal stuff, for sure you know. The professional side of it definitely was a crucible, for sure you know. Because when you're, when you're sort of at the top or whatever it is of that, the group that you're in man, that's a hard spotlight man In your group doesn't even have to be very big, because everything you do is seen, everything you do is judged, everything you do is weighed and measured and it's real easy to mess it up because everyone is watching everything you know. And that's not what I had desired, that's not what I signed up for, I was not trying to be that guy, but, um, you know, there I was in the middle of it and certainly didn't handle all of it, while there's no doubt about that, um, fraught with mistakes and, um, uh, inexperience, you know, but um, yeah, I'm going to shift gears here a little bit.
Ty Cobb Backer:Um, okay, so you're, you're still a part of Avco roofing, correct? Are you still the CEO over there? Okay?
Heath Hicks:I still own it, but I don't work inside of it.
Ty Cobb Backer:Okay, okay, so good, good, good, okay. So, um, you guys are very successful roofing company out, you know, out of Texas and and you know we've talked about that, I've talked to Ronnie, your partner, and stuff. You guys are just crushing it over there and have for for a long time and you know so, and I think about this quite often, especially when on these interviews, but I've never really been able to articulate this question. But until now this morning I was actually thinking about it. But from going from like a bootstrapped startup business to a mid to high, eight-figure roofing company, tell us about the mind shift that had to take place and what you had to do mentally and physically to prepare yourself for that. Obviously, I know there was a lot of mistakes and a lot of lessons learned and stuff, but cause I I think about my journey from just a Chuck and a truck to employing, you know, several people.
Heath Hicks:Yeah, oh man, mindset shifts, gosh. There's been so many, so here's one, that's. It was a very intense lesson for me. When I started Avco and purchased it, I was the only one selling roof, so I was really just purchasing my own pipeline, really. But the company had a little name and had some history and things like that. So my stated goal was to provide opportunities for all the people that I knew and loved. That was my goal. I could have left. I had opportunities to move to Dallas or Denver or somewhere in a bigger market and sell commercial and high-end residential and stuff like that and make a lot of money and probably have a lot simpler, more straightforward road. But at the end of the day, I didn't want to leave all my friends behind, and so my stated goal was to provide opportunities for the people that I knew and loved. And, lo and behold, I succeeded.
Heath Hicks:But the lesson I learned that didn't show up until much later is that inside of that stated goal, there was nothing in there for me, and so I ended up accomplishing it wildly and then not really getting much return on it myself personally or financially. I had a stated goal of basically giving giving a lot to everybody else and I did charities and then sales guys and you know pretty high commissions in the beginning that I had to figure out how to get a hold of. Over time and for a long season of Avco I didn't really recoup very much return, but it was eight and a half years into the process before I realized why. It's because I didn't intend to, I didn't make that a part of what I was looking for, what I was measuring. It wasn't what I was working for. And while I don't want to be driven by money and I'm still not if you're going to do something this hard, you should be at the center of what you're doing because it's really hard. And so because when you're doing it for other people and then you're also not getting a lot of reward for yourself when it gets really hard, you're like why am I? I don't want to do this anymore. This really sucks and that's a big lesson. Do it for your family, do it for yourself and that's okay. Balance it, of course, with other people's interests and helping people and being generous and all that. But I was doing it for others and you know other people got a lot of reward out of it and I didn't. And so my mindset is to shift a lot of reward out of it. And I didn't, and so my mindset is up to shift.
Heath Hicks:The measurable success in business is the dollars that your company retains at the end of the year how, whatever else you want to say, that's the real measurement how much money is left in the bucket? That's why you do business, and I wasn't doing business for that reason. So there was not very much money left in the buckets because it wasn't what was driving me. It wasn't driving my decisions, it wasn't driving the things. I was measuring and I wasn't paying attention to things, you know, because that's not why I was working.
Heath Hicks:Well, if you're going to be in business dumbass, you got to make that the goal. That just has to be a part of it, because the business itself has to have that to sustain itself. And if you're going to be a good place to work, then you got to be around. Closing your doors after three wonderful, great, explosive years doesn't help those people after that. And so I didn't have a very clear goal in that and I had to shift that mindset and it took a long time and you know, I missed a lot of opportunity, but I learned a lot of good lessons, so there's a big mindset shift for you.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, well, ok, so let's dig into this a little bit more here. What, what did you have to do once you discovered like, hey, I don't want to do this anymore? And then discovered, like, okay, well, I'm doing it. You started out with all intentions, intentions, uh, purposes of the right thing to do, right, like, of course, taking care of people, but I understand going from being way too extreme with that. Like, I totally like you, you're freaking telling my story right now.
Ty Cobb Backer:Okay, um, seriously, like, that's why I started out like it was all, even the podcast, like we started it, this was for something else. And now here we are doing it and still not getting freaking paid to it. Um, but that's a whole nother pike. But like, so, okay, you discovered like, oh crap, I'm losing my ass, my family's suffering, my health is suffering, everything's suffering, and now everybody that's around me in the company is also suffering too, because there's nothing left in the buckets. So what, what did you do and I know it was probably a grueling effort and it didn't just happen in a month, like, but what, what did you do and I know it was probably a grueling effort and it didn't just happen in a month, like, but what? What did you do? What track did you get on and what? What resources did you bring in to help you get back on track or on track?
Heath Hicks:Well, I had to learn the idea that it's okay to put yourself first. That's okay, and really it's actually more than that. That is your job. That has to be primary, um, even inside of your you know family relationship. If the truth is, is true, that you're going to love everyone else the way you love yourself, which I believe that I've explored that in a lot of ways in my life That'd be true. And so if I want to be good at loving you know, my partner or my kids, I have to be good at loving myself, which means that's where I learned, that's where I practice how to be a good lover of people.
Heath Hicks:I start with myself, and you know, I didn't really have any value in myself in the beginning, so I didn't know how to do that. But as I did that, I realized okay, I have value and I should be working for myself, and then then it's okay to work for myself. Then that kind of you know poured out into all the other parts of my life. Does that answer the question? Did I miss the person there?
Ty Cobb Backer:yeah, no, no, no, it's okay. I mean you could have gotten a little deeper on, like I had to bring in an entire team and hire oh yeah.
Heath Hicks:I mean, we, we ran out of money and we had to fire a bunch of people and that was really hard. And then, in the middle of all that stress, a bunch of people left the company and started their own company and took all this stuff and did all the story. You hear all the time that happened and so we almost went out of business, for sure, and we bootstrapped it together. Ronnie and I figured it out, made it through there and then had another tough season not too long after that and had to shift and change again and change the way we hire and train and recruit again and change the way we hire and train and recruit. But all along there those were actions that were helpful, but the things that were really changing was how we saw ourselves.
Heath Hicks:So when we saw ourselves as valuable as a company and individuals within the company, then we started being able to suddenly be able to sell retail jobs, because before we couldn't sell retail and we couldn't sell upsells, we could barely collect deductibles because we thought we were supposed to be doing roofs basically for free for everyone, cause we're out there to help everyone. Well, when the idea shifted from I'm here to help everyone to I'm here to provide for my family and my tribe. Then the value on ourselves went up and then our ask to our customers went up and now my sales guy sat at a table with confidence to ask for an upsell and to switch from an insurance to a retail job. We were going to charge $5,000 more and do a lot more work and deliver a lot more value but also make more margin. That shifted, as our understanding and mindset about ourselves individually and collectively changed that if we want to serve ourselves individually and then serve ourselves as a whole as a company first, that's going to change the way we deal with our customers.
Heath Hicks:We got better at providing service, more committed to providing service, because we had to justify the value we saw in ourselves, which was reflected in the price that we were asking, which we were able to. Now ask for more money and a higher price because we delivered better service, because we believed we were worth it. All that is mindset Necessarily. There wasn't like a coaching difference or a better CRM or whatever. There was an understanding of who we are and our place in the world and suddenly we had more salespeople and they were better.
Ty Cobb Backer:Come on baby. Come on baby. Yeah, might be him. There you are, can you hear us?
Heath Hicks:I don't know if you can hear me, but I lost you a little bit, yeah no, but that would listen.
Ty Cobb Backer:That was a great response, great, great, great answer. You know, finding more value in yourself, and I think a lot of people might think that sounds a little selfish, but I always say this if I'm not eating, I can't feed others, right? And ultimately, at the end of the day, you know, I have to make sure I'm taking care of myself physically, mentally, spiritually. So then I can. It's almost like I need my cup to be overfill or however you say that like over full, overfilling, right? So then there's extra to go around. Now, you know to, to to a certain extent, and I know I I totally butchered that up too, but I know exactly what you're saying and and I again you're, you're speaking my language, you're telling my story without me actually having to say it, because you know we've gone through it.
Ty Cobb Backer:If you've been in business for any certain amount of time and if you're a first-generation roofing contractor like myself, like my daddy didn't have this for 50 years and then handed it to us and had everything already figured out. And even if that was the case, I'm sure they would have had ups and downs and ebbs and flows, and it seems like it comes like about every three years where you kind of need to go in. At least from my experience, you have a correction year in there, about every four years or so. Sure, you know, once the dust clears in the, in the smoke settles, it's kind of like, okay, we, we broke this, now we got to fix it. But but you know, having you know the courage you know to to step up and keep fighting like you did, Heath that that I commend you for that, because I know this isn't easy, because you know, for me, I'm very self-conscious, right Like I. I do care about what people think of me, regardless if I pretend that I don't. You know, because and it's tough, especially with social media nowadays like it is so hard and we talked about this earlier like streaming live, they could take one episode to ruin my entire career here.
Ty Cobb Backer:But I was saying something really dumb, you know, and I'm a glutton for punishment. That's why I think I do this every single week live, you know, um, and I just kicked the shit out of myself, but I love how you said you know, we, we, we had to, we had to tighten some things up, and most of it was, was personal development. It all starts here, everything starts here. It, it's what I'm not doing in the ring, that that has made us a champion, right, it's, it's, it's the workouts in in in the gym, and you know metaphorically, right, but. And and also, you know, you know realistically too, but you know, I, I love that.
Ty Cobb Backer:So, okay, so, and I wanted to talk to you about, like you know, your vision then. Right, your vision was to feed as many people as as you possibly can, and I guess this could go into and I'm sure you didn't have a mission statement and and core values and stuff like that. But like, what is your vision today and mission? And and you don't have to get too deep into the core values and stuff like that, but like, tell us how that's changed and what is it today?
Heath Hicks:Yeah Well, the core about uh, the mission statement for Avco is protecting homes, strengthening families and building community. Nice, we have done a good job of that and I'm really proud of that, and that has stayed a big focus for what we do. Personally, the mission that I'm on I stated it a little bit earlier is finding a way to feel free to be myself fully, and you know that includes a lot of layers of things. That means I want to make myself better, to where I can be proud of the person that I am, but I also want to be able to be the person I am, regardless of whether else anyone else is proud of me or not. That's a whole other layer, you know, and so I'm trying to find that and failing a lot along the way, but now I can see it and experience it differently, and so I'm getting a lot out of it, even though I would say it hasn't gotten easier, but it has gotten more rewarding. And so my mission now is to figure out, you know, where my potential really lies.
Heath Hicks:What all could I really do, and are there things in my life that I'm not doing that I'm built and meant and destined to do? Because if I don't find those things and fulfill those things, I'm not doing that. I'm built and meant and destined to do, because if I don't find those things and fulfill those things, I'm not going to feel alive the way that I want to and it doesn't really to me at this point, it doesn't really matter if it's even, if it's making money or not. If it's something I'm supposed to do, I want to figure out how to be able to do it and share whatever that is with whoever I'm supposed to share it with and feel that life. You know that comes when you're in purpose and on mission and fulfilling your destiny.
Ty Cobb Backer:You know, yeah, I love that, I love that and and thank you for planting that seed for me. You know, being okay in my own skin, that's definitely something I haven't thought about for a while, you know so. So thank you so much for for planting that seed for me, because a while you know so. So thank you so much for for planting that seed for me because, you know, I I felt like I was on to something. You know, I always feel like I have like these different sets of scales, not just one, right, and when people talk about this balance and stuff like that and you know, I'm still kind of on the fence with that, but sometimes I just feel like I have all of these. I got this scale at the house that I need to balance. I got this scale at work that that I need to balance. And, like you, I'm I'm the owner of a couple of different companies and two predominantly right now lead scout. I've been at the helm of that Me and my partner, chris.
Ty Cobb Backer:Chris Hofstra, um had has just uh, you know, it's just two of us now. We had four of us and I was kind of a silent partner, but now I'm, I'm doing shows Like I'm seeing you at, at, at, um, you know all these events, you know with the catch, all you know and you're out there, um, which kind of leads me to my question that that I wanted to ask you before we got off here. Um, but thank you before I go to the next question. Thank you, because that's definitely something that I think you helped me. Sum something up, like my mission was because I'm not seeking balance, because I think whatever I try to balance, something's going to suffer ultimately. So I just need to be where my feet are. If it's five minutes at home, if it's five minutes at work, or if it's five hours at home or five hours at work, I need to be where my feet are. To me, that's good enough, balance Okay.
Ty Cobb Backer:And being super intentional about that, but I have to be okay with me and just wanting to just be me around, no matter what circle of people. Right that I'm around, even though because this is the thing that I've struggled with is that I went on a mission to surround myself around a lot of smarter people than I am, heath and, and so every now and then, reality or moment of clarity or whatever fear. Fear kicks in and it's like I say to myself I am the dumbest person sitting in this room right now and insecurity starts to kick in, and I think and that's been happening more so lately than than it has especially with this whole lead scout, acquisition and stuff like that, because now we're dealing with code writers, engineers, and Chris has been at the forefront of this and he's so smart at the forefront of lead scout for for the past five years and I've been involved with it for three, but only as a silent partner. So, as far as UX, ui, code, all that shit, man like, forget about it. I can barely operate my Google calendar some days. Okay, so being and that's what exactly my, my life is planned by design, but then I also realized that I'm the only one that can screw this thing up by my insecurities and be just being finding that where I'm OK with myself all the time and that these people like me. And yeah, I'm the chief energy officer, I'm the CEO, that's what I consider myself from from John Gordon's book. I'm the CEO. I put that in my signature, on my email too, and I'm okay with that, that. I'm the guy that brings the heat. So this is actually a good segue into.
Ty Cobb Backer:My next question is like how long did it take for you to figure out what lights you up and where you feel more productive in your companies? You feel more productive in your companies, right? Because I think we all kind of hit that crossroads where, at least for me, I kind of started to feel obsolete, like my team doesn't even need me anymore, but they do, because I've stepped away a little bit and it's kind of like oh shit, I need to come back in here. You know what I mean. But like there are certain things that I think we do in the position that we're in right now is like are certain things that I think we do in the position that we're in right right now is like there are things that I'm not so good at that I don't really enjoy doing, but these things light me up and I'm really good at it and it brings a lot of value to not just myself but those around me.
Ty Cobb Backer:How long, and what is that for you? What was that? Yeah, the question. One more time? Yeah, so how? Okay? Thank you for asking me to repeat that, because that was kind of long-winded there. So, how long, and what is it? How long did it take you to discover what lights you up? Right, and what is that that lights you up that you're bringing value to, to your companies? Did that make sense?
Speaker 4:yeah, what value? I mean, I'm not understanding how long it took, but there's also, for whatever reason, static when you talk yeah, same here, yeah same here, yeah yeah.
Speaker 4:Okay, yeah, the value that I feel like I bring, I guess, as a general definition for anything specific, would be you know, everyone, I believe, has a certain genius about that. No one else has. So Ty has genius that nobody else has. It's innate, it's in there somewhere. Sometimes it takes us a long time to discover, but sometimes we figure it out quickly. Sometimes we never figure it out, I guess.
Speaker 4:But that and the genius is where we want to operate the things that gifts that naturally flow out of us, that are often easy for us when we're a genius. It's usually not hard, it's very natural. It's the thing that we want to be doing. It's the thing that also has a lot of impact when we do it. And so finding ways to stay in that pocket and not mess with the other things can take a lot of discipline, depending on your personality.
Speaker 4:But if you don't do it and you don't stay disciplined to stay in those things that are your genius and your gifting, uh, you'll start to mess a lot of stuff up. You'll also get really tired and you'll probably be pretty frustrated. People around you might also be frustrated. So those are good signs, maybe that you're not working in your genius or you're getting um, but I try to figure out what those things are and I really only want to contribute those those. There's certain levels of conversations about certain things that I don't even want to be in because I've trusted those things to people that I trust more than myself.
Speaker 4:What's that? I think I have to finish this thing. Sorry for that. That's okay. Yeah, so I think figuring out the genius, figuring out the gifting side, what it is you're meant to contribute to those companies, will keep you alive and fresh, can keep you involved in it for a long time. You start slipping out of that and you get tired and exhausted and frustrated and your timeline might be limited there. But if you still have things in your gift to contribute, you'll always be relevant. You know of things in your gift to contribute.
Ty Cobb Backer:You'll always be relevant man. Good, good, good answer. He's damn. You are so good, dude. Thank you, seriously.
Ty Cobb Backer:You planted another seed, you know and this is what's crazy about this podcast is is most of these questions that I ask our guests that come on here are very selfish questions. Right, you know things that either I'm dealing with or struggling with, or just just responses that I want to hear. You know, and and and, and. Then in turn, we're, we're, you're dropping nuggets for all of our viewers and our listeners, whether they're listening now or on the replay.
Ty Cobb Backer:And this is why I wanted you to come on the show, because one of a couple of reasons that you are just such a an inspiration to me and, like I said, the you, I'm not saying that you're a, you're an influencer. You know the whole guru thing that's going on right now, but you have had influence, you have influenced me, okay, um, since I'm that first conversation we had it went to storm two or three years ago I was like this dude, this dude's on a good journey right now, that I would like to kind of hitch a ride on. You know, and I think I might even have said that like dude I, I really want to stay in touch with you, um, and unfortunately I haven't um, and that's on me. So, um, thank, thank you, um. I know you got to get going here um to read that book, that we talked about.
Heath Hicks:Um, and then there's another one that came up when you were talking about being wherever your feet are at. There's a book called where. Wherever you go, there you are, and it's this idea that we can't escape ourselves. You know, we're always where we are and there's nowhere else we could be, but right here, no matter if I try to go over there, once I get there, there is here. I'm always here, I'm always the thing, I'm always the center. I'm always what's creating these outcomes I'm experiencing. It's always me, it's it's never the circumstances outside of us.
Heath Hicks:Uh it's us, and so you know a big majority of what we experienced. I guess never is a strong word I shouldn't have said never but the vast majority of the time, what you're experiencing is the situation that you created because you needed it for some reason. Most of the time we create a situation we need because we need, there's a lesson we need to learn, so we got to mess it up somehow in order to figure it out. Right? But that book, wherever you go, there you are, I dare you to read it and do the exercises in the in the last. Just just do it every day. Just do it, I dare you, and then call me again and we'll have another talk challenge accepted.
Heath Hicks:And it doesn't even have to be a podcast. You just call me and tell me about your experience reading those two books.
Ty Cobb Backer:I will, I will. I'm going to get it as soon as we get off here.
Heath Hicks:Man, thank you so much, dude You're the man keep, keep killing it.
Ty Cobb Backer:If you ever need anything, let me know hey brother, I appreciate that yeah, thank you, and thank you everybody for joining us. If you know anybody that could get something out of this, please share this with them. If you haven't liked love, subscribe or share, please do that and check us out on the replay. If you got in here late until next week, take care of each other and we will see you next week on episode 272, behind the tool belt, peace out, bye.
