Gratitude "Podcast" Interview: Trevor Olson

Well, hi, everybody. It's David George Brooke, that gratitude guy with another special guest on the gratitude interview pandemic process or gratitude podcast, rather, I should say, in the interview for regarding the pandemic. And today I was thinking about my guest today that one of those people I've known a long, long time when he was just a little whippersnapper. And he's turned out to be such a fine young man. Of course, he'll always be a young man to me because I'm about

50 years older than he is. But anyway, Trevor Olson is my guest today

Trevor, welcome to the podcast. Hey, Dave, thank you. And you're not that much older than me

You're older, but not that much. Or as I was like to say, older, but never old

The big difference between being old and being older. I'm older. I mean, the number you threw out, it's like that fish story

The fish keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger. This keeps getting bigger. That's true

So let me start off with the question. I didn't tell you as much as I did some people about the whole purpose of these podcasts

I call them podcast interview, is to get some maybe tips and thoughts and things and people that I know that are pretty dynamic people

And that may help some people that are housebound, as I say, from time to time

So my first question to you is, what has been your best coping mechanism to deal with this pandemic

Probably not focusing on it. I like that. I mean, I've gone through and looked at things and looked at everything

But for the most part, for me, my life hasn't changed a ton because I've always worked from home

So you've got everybody that's trying to go through all the nuances of trying to figure out how to work from home

I've always done that. And my jobs moved forward. I haven't had knock on wood, haven't had any layoffs or salary reductions or anything

So probably the best thing that's I've done to cope with everything is just, you know what, just keep moving forward and not really focus on it. Yeah

I mean, I know we're going to get through it. And what is the saying

This two shall pass. I mean, we're all going to get through it

It's just a matter. And granted, everybody's in different phases where I just am fortunate enough to be financially set and not have to worry about it and still be employed

Yeah. Oh, that's cool. That's cool. Yeah. And when you think about my whole subject is that gratitude guy is gratitude and focusing on what you have versus what you don't have

Did you notice we're in about our sixth or seventh week of this now

Did you notice if what you're grateful for changed from where before this started to what you're grateful for now

Is that shifted at all? I would say it has in some ways I mean I grateful for the amount of time we getting to spend as a family Oh yeah I mean there a lot of things My son five and I don think I mean he learned how to ride a bike about three weeks ago

Oh, right. And honestly, I don't think had this happened, it would have happened as early

Oh, that's not. I don't think that would have happened. And so we've been out on bike rides every single day and literally family dinners every night and sitting down and hanging out

it's been good. I mean, and that all is, some of that stuff has happened, but it probably

wouldn't have happened had this not happened. That's really interesting too, kind of the return

of family dinner. I did a video, I do a lot of videos, and I did one on the 10-point gratitude

perspective on the coronavirus, and one of them was having dinner together and even look at the

technology we have today. You and I look like we're sitting, we're as close to being across a cup

of coffee at Starbucks, and it feels like you're just two feet away from me. And so there's just a lot of

silver linings. And I think I've heard a lot of people talk about reconnecting and so forth

So another question is being the kind of guy that's always been, I look at you and your brother

and just knowing your family as well as I do from Bob and Pam on down to you and Tyler and so

forth is always having a lot going on. And so do you have any sort of thoughts or tips or ideas

or how somebody may best take advantage of this time where they're stuck in their condo or

townhouse or home or what they might do that might be productive or whatever during this time

I mean, one of the things that I've seen out there and signed up for a few things

but haven't done them as religiously or as well as I should have, but like Fender has

Fender play and they're offering it free for 90 days. So learn how to play an instrument

Oh, wow. Or even there's learn a language. I mean, there's a lot of things you can do

I mean, I think from an educational standpoint, you'll see who's really. kind of taking this time to really use it effectively if they could and like learn something new

because I mean there's there's a lot of things you can do I mean you can only spend so much time

on Facebook and Instagram exactly look at looking to see what everybody else is doing inside

I like that I like that I think somehow that's so much better learning educating yourself

getting learning a new skill whatever versus binge watching some shows or whatever for hours on

I don't know if I quite understand that. But so even though Trev, you mentioned that you work out of your home

and so it hasn't impacted maybe as much as some people, this is going to officially end at some point with a vaccine

or getting back in place and people will get back where it be kind of behind this I guess Is there anything you thinking about now about now that when this is through I going to hit the ground running doing this Has it given you some time to think about here some things I going to do

when this is done or that maybe I'm going to do differently when it's over

I mean, I think we'll probably keep a lot of things that we've started in the pandemic

like having the family dinners every night and doing a lot of the outdoor activities

We'll keep those moving forward. but in terms of, I mean, honestly, I want to get back to the gym

I used to go to the gym every morning at 5 a.m. And I've been sitting on my ass for six weeks, I will say

Easy to move, though. Oh, yeah. But no, for the most part, I mean, just keeping a lot of the things that have been positive out of the pandemic

Like the dinners and the outdoor activities and doing stuff with my son and my wife

But for the most part, I honestly see it's going to be a long road

out of this thing personally is what I see. I mean, and so you can have plans, but I don't see us returning to, quote, unquote, normal

probably for a good year, year and a half. Yeah, I think you're right

So, right. No, that's true. And I think some things will return to some level of, I don't say normalcy

but I think you're definitely right. It will be a new normal and things will be different. And it'll be interesting to see what we've learned from it

I had somebody say the other day that, you know, you know, this, somebody said this is a once

a 100 year chance. And the guy on the interview said, no, no, no, this could happen again five years from now

It could be another virus from North Korea or another part of China or somewhere else

And the big question, are we going to be prepared the next time around when you're finding out that 79, 80% of the people in the country live paycheck to paycheck

and don't have $400 in their savings account for a medical emergency. So hopefully there'll be some good lessons taken away from it

Yeah, I mean, you know my stepdad very well and his financial

and advice that he's always given us throughout the years. And, you know, I was lucky

I mean, I have a job, but prior to it, I was on, I was about a year ago

I was out of work for about eight months. That's right. That's right. And luckily, had money sucked away

And we did eat into a lot of it, but still have some there

And it's there for a rainy day. But yeah, you're right. Being prepared is, I mean, is what you have to do

You just have to, you know, you don't need that other pair of shoes or that other. maybe that coffee or whatever it is

And it's interesting. Go ahead. Oh, just because this is a situation where you can sit there and not be stressed out about it and be okay

I think it's such a good point. You mentioned Bob your stepdad and a lot of the financial things that he passed on to you and Tyler and so forth and to me And I think one of the things I told Connor and Kyle my two sons Kyle 36 Connor 26 is always have some chunk of money set aside

You pick the number, 1,000, 5,000, 10,000, whatever the number you pick

But before you do anything else, get that in there and have it. And I think that's what Steve, the guy that mentioned the other day about this could happen

again in five years now. Hopefully people have learned some lessons so they're not so backed up

And people that are, I mean, today is, I think it's May 1st. So they say that half the people may not be able to pay their rent

And so hopefully we'll teach people some lessons for when the next time

It sounds like it will happen again. Well, it could be a lot sooner than five years

I mean, if you think about it. That's true. That's true. I mean, if you think about it, it could be three months from now, if they, depending on how much they were easy stay at home orders

Yeah. And then you never know, because as I understand it with the vaccines. I mean, these things are all different

It isn't one vaccine takes care of everything. So a new strain can be different

So Trev, last question is when you think about your life and how it sustains you, do you have like a quote or a saying or a philosophy or something that's kind of guided you and whether it's through normal times

You mentioned I remember when you were out of work and that was kind of a challenging time and now this pandemic

Is there any sort of philosophy that you use to kind of lean on through tough times to get you moving forward

Well, there's one thing that always comes to mind whenever anybody's kind of g or mo

or complaining about something, even when I even think about doing it. Somebody, somebody when I worked for Norses told me this quote, and I can't remember his name

right now. Oh, Bubba was his name. He worked in the Bellby store with me. And he always said, you know what

Somebody's always got it worse. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And so, you know what

I can be complaining that, you know what, I missed this or didn't see this or didn't

do that. But somebody's always got it worse. So it's like, no matter what happens is, you know what, accept what you have

and somebody's in a worse shape than you are. So I mean, I hear that or I think about that a lot

And it just kind of is like, okay, you know what? Keep moving forward and just keep doing

Yeah, that's a great point. I know when it first hit about six or seven weeks ago

I was pretty upset because in short order, I lost about four or five talks

I was doing in person for a fair amount of money. And I was bummed for the first few days

But then on the second or third or fourth day, it really hit me how many people are worse off than me

So that's such a great philosophy. And it's always to know that, you know, there's going to be people in front of you and behind you

But to be, well, of course, that's why I talk about gratitude, to be so fortunate for what you have

So, excellent, excellent. Well, listen, my friend, just some great tips as I thought

I didn't want to put a lot of questions on it. And I said, I want you guys to pay attention to what Trevor Olson has to say

because he's going to say some things worth listening to. So thank you so much for being a part of this

I appreciate it. Thank you. You bet