Gratitude "Podcast" Interview: Scott Wetzel

Well, hi, everybody. It's David George Brooke, that gratitude guy with another gratitude

podcast interview regarding the pandemic. And today I have a very close friend of mine

have known Scott for many, many years out of Spokane, Washington, just a great guy. Scott Wetzel

Scott, welcome to the podcast. Thank you, sir. Glad to be on board today. You bet, you bet. So let's start out with my first question. In dealing with this pandemic

what is your best coping mechanism? For me personally, and I think for all the folks in my country

I tell them to just focus on what you can control. And that's yourself, first and foremost

And all these things going on out there, it's tragic, it's unprecedented

And at the same time, there's not a whole lot we can do individually about it other than just stay sheltered in place and then focused on being grateful

which you talk all the time about. And then I remember a comment that Tony Robbins made way back when I went through one of

his courses got just right after we left each other in order to

is he talked about, you know, people spend 90% of their time worrying about something that'll never happen

And then he said, what if you just focused 50% of the time on something that'll never happen

Think of all that time you'd have available up, freed up to go do something productive

And I've always kind of operated off that. So I just tell my people and even myself, it's like just focus on what you can control

And one of the main things you can control is being grateful. Just absolutely being grateful for what we have

I got a roof over my head I got food in the refrigerator We have heat going I have three boys that I love a Wi adore you know those type of things Yeah And speaking of gratitude and you just mentioned several really good things

Is there something that's the top of your list that you're most grateful for if you had to prioritize it

Number one, my relationship with God. And the second thing, not too far right behind it, almost 1A, would be my wife, Tracy, who I've been married to for almost 30 years now

It's just been just nothing shy of amazing. My three boys, so I always focus on that

In fact, you know, with your gratitude journal that I use, you know, the thing I do is I talk

about my relationship with God in the morning and then my wife and my three boys

And then I write a fourth thing, which is ever, whatever that is for that day. So I would say that fourth thing for me consistently is just all the companies that Trace and

I operate and the lives that we can touch and have an effect on in those companies by just

doing positive things for them to help them go do positive things for others

That's really cool. That's really cool. And I think with somebody who's obviously as driven as

you are and what you've done back when, as you mentioned, when you and I were in Nordstrom of the

different career paths that we both followed, clearly motivation and inspiration and being a

driver is all part of it. And that's one of the reasons I've always just enjoyed our relationship

And as a result of that, where maybe people don't have as good of an idea during a time like this

Do you have any sort of tips or thoughts or ideas for other people of things to do while they're going through this

Yeah, absolutely. You know, I talk about the fear factor, right? And people get so bogged down into fear And on one of my talks you and I were just talking about him we talked about Cortez when he went to the Spanish Inquisition and took over Mexico And when they landed on the beaches of Mexico he burned the ships right

He got rid of the ships and told the soldiers, there's two things that are going to happen here

We're either going to win and go back with their ships or we're going to lose. And they won

And so what I get people to try and focus on are the things that, again, that they have control over and that they can do in a positive mindset every day

whether that's reaching out to their customers, reaching out to family, getting outside, enjoying, you know, the outdoors, doing whatever they can to have a positive mindset, or what I like to call, you know, a growth mindset, not a scarcity mindset

I like that too. And I always think abundance is another word. I use growth versus a scarcity is really good, too

So last question is you look back on the Scott What's Old Life

And now, of course, going through something is very tough for all of us. do you sort of have a quote or a philosophy or something that you kind of has always guided you that's been through the tough times, the good times, it's maybe sort of a philosophy that you, it's maybe again at the top of the list

Yeah, it's, you know, it's super simplistic. I love how you say, you know, be grateful and never quit

Mine is super simple. Keep grinding. Oh, I like that. Just keep grinding

And it's amazing, David, that the total number of people that just don't succeed

because they just stop. Yeah. They just stopped doing what they were doing

And they don't even realize that they're this close to being successful

And they decide to stop. It like you know you run marathons yourself And me as you can tell I haven But but I you know it like Bloomsday It 30 straight years of Bloomsday

30 years, I'm not running it. But I look at these people, like, you would never run a marathon and just stop at mile 25

Exactly. I mean, and that's a thing. So just keep grinding. I like that

Keep grinding. And so much of it is that you heard the things about the guy that stopped two inches short

of the vein of gold. And they're just different ones. One of my all-time favorites is having always been a salesperson

like you and I, that's how we first started, is they said the average time it takes a salesperson to make a sales call is four calls

And the average time it takes a salesperson to get discouraged is two calls. Exactly

So I guess you're not going to make that sale if you stop it too. Exactly

Yeah. So those are good. Well, excellent. Well, thank you, my friend

I appreciate that. As I said, I'm kind of really taking people. they know really well and just kind of picking their brain

And if it just makes one difference, I know this when I get to do my talks, when one person and all the companies that you run

the feedback that you get, the same thing. If one person says, I'll never forget when you said this

you're the first person that took the time to say this. I always remember when you did that

it just makes your day. When you're impacting other lives, as you impact many

it is also something that's just priceless. You can't put a price on

It's just price. No question. It's what difference you made in somebody's life

if not how much money you made or how many cars you drove or anything like that

Exactly, exactly. All right. Well, thank you, my friend. I so much appreciate it and we will chat soon

You bet, David. Take care. You bet