#17 So there I was—Crazy stories and important lessons

hey guys this is Greg Denning and you are in the school of awesome sauce where I share with you Amazing Stories and strategies to help you live an extraordinary

[Music] life hey guys so there I was it was a cold dark night no I'm just kidding it wasn't a cold dark night but I was there I was up in uh Lake plaid I told you that story about how I got up we took a Greyhound bus all the way up to Lake Placid stopped in Albany walked around went all the way up Lake placid's right up by the Canadian border and there was so many trees up there and beautiful mountains and like snowed one morning in June and it was summertime we were going up there and I I gone up with my older brother he was going to train um for Olympic ski jumping and I was just going to try to live life and and we were up there and I tried to find work couldn't find a job in this little town and then I went and talked to the school to see if I could get into school and they would not let me man how messed up is that they literally would not let me into the school because my parent wasn't there to sign I mean I don't know in some ways you guys the system some some parts of the system are broken in ways that like keep people down man and and somebody who wants to make progress doesn't get a chance so if you ever you guys if you ever had a chance to lift somebody up and help them out like make make that possible it's I know we don't do it intentionally but sometimes I think we inadvertently set things up in a certain way or react or act in a certain way or follow certain little thinking patterns or mindsets that actually keep people down anyways side note there they wouldn't let me in school um we're just trying to figure out so I'm like man now what I can't go to school I can't get a job I mean things were things were looking rough and so I called my buddy who lived in Dallas and that's where we we had moved from from Dallas and I called him I'm like and he he had had a kind of a a tougher goal he was um I think he was already out on his own as well um and he's just like man I'll I'll just drive up and get you I was like what I mean how awesome is that right how awesome is that I still feel so grateful he was like no I'll just drive up man I'll drive I'll drive you know over to the east coast and see some friends and then I'll drive up to Lake placa and get you and so he literally drove from Dallas Texas all the way to Lake pla New York to pick me up and then he and I did this road trip um and I may have told I may have told you a little bit about the road trip already I think but we went down went down to um I mean the trees there's endless beautiful trees in in New York so went over to Niagara Falls and into Canada which is super cool Niagara Falls amazing and we drove down it was all just a blur and man I tell I can't remember where I tell the story so if I rep if I already told you the story I'm sorry but like this it really impacted me we're we're in Arkansas we're almost back you know we made it all the way down there and we were just going to push through I don't even know if we had we didn't have money for hotels or anything we're just pushing through and we're both just falling asleep we're just kind of nodding off and and just so tired and so we roll down the windows to stay awake and we're you know pounding the music and just like just trying to stay awake we put on like Metallica or something just just to try to stay awake the windows are down we're freezing like oh my gosh we're freezing roll up the windows and we're just dozing off and he was driving and and uh and I'm like dude you good he's like I'm good I'm good I'm like I'm falling asleep I'm falling asleep and I'm like I'm trying to stay awake for him right it's probably like 1:00 in the morning morning and we somewhere in Arkansas and I'm like I'm trying to stay awake and I just couldn't and I and I dozed off and the next thing I remember is I wake up and there's like dirt and grass and weeds just flying over the hood in the windshield and I'm like John wake up and he just Yanks the car back onto the freeway like who he just he just Yanks right like we didn't even know which we didn't know where we were we he' just drifted off he'd fallen asleep and was still going you know 60 M an hour or 70 M hour whatever I me just and we gone off the median into this grass field and just and he just Yanks it back on and like how we didn't roll how we didn't hit anybody else I mean how we didn't die it's a miracle man it was insane and we were both just so terrified like and like oh almost died it was so crazy I still can see that in my mind just the dirt and the weeds and the grass flying over the hood and the windshield and look over he's out cold just we are just going through this grass filled 70 M hour man so he gets back on and that you know the the fear and the adrenaline woke us up for a little bit but then we started noding off again we're like oh man we better pull over so we pull over into this rest area and we go and we just lay on top of the picnic tables to try to sleep for a little bit and that didn't work because it was so cold and uncomfortable um and so we kind of kept going and ended up getting back and man what a wild crazy adventure that was but it ended up um hitching a ride with some people that were moving um I had I think I had like two or three boxes and I ended up getting a motorcycle somehow and so I had a motorcycle couple boxes I threw it in their moving truck and went with them and moved to another place and just just just trying to figure it out I mean I it's hard it's hard to explain but like when you're trying to survive at 16 and 17 and 18 even on your own like trying to find work trying to get things done without you know a parent signature permission trying to figure things out um you know just just life like I mean it's a serious reality check of like oh you got to pay all these bills and like all the little things you don't think about until you actually have to do them and set things up and try to survive on your own and and then you know trying to drive a motorcycle in the snow because it's the only thing you have and you know and trying to get getting a motorcycle's license and then insuring it and and all that stuff without a parent right and all this stuff I me it was it was it was challenging it was it was pretty lonely it was very lonely and I was you know new place no friends trying to make friends you know just wrestling through all this time period in my life and and there were some tough challenges um and and things things got got hard at one point again and and actually I mean there was there were some times I was pretty pretty discouraged and and even depressed and I mean and there were some good moments too or you'd have some some exciting good days but for the most part it was it was pretty hard pretty judgy it's like waking up waking up to Darkness every day waking up to the rain cloud and the discouragement and just like ah gosh and maybe you guys have felt this before right maybe you had those times where you just wake up and and you'd rather go back to sleep because because your dreams are better than than your reality and man just to keep going well and that leads me to another story so another around that same time period now it's hurting the same friend that came to pick me up he came up um and we went on this road trip uh actually CU he wanted to go visit a girl so he's like hey let's go for a road trip so we we drove again and we we crossed this bridge you guys and it's down by Lake Pal and it's this massive bridge over the Colorado River and we drove over like man we should jump it but it was huge like ridiculously huge and so when we stopped we looked over like this is it's so it's too big like this this is insane it's too big um and they're like let's do it and we we figured it was it was well over 100 feet maybe even close to 150 feet and I'm I'm even hesitant to share this story I hope none of you will ever do anything this stupid but like literally that's as I think back I'm like I was at this place in my life where it's almost like I didn't care if I died I just even remember thinking sometimes like a what's the point man what's the point of living it's just it just doesn't work which of course is erroneous sinking is never ever ever the answer like can never the answer to end your life because it can always get better we can make changes make improvements there's always hope my friends that's why I say awesome is always an option no matter what's happening or how bad it is awesome is always an option it's always an option and but we have to we have to act on it we have to have a vision so we we we climb over my buddy jumps in he he CL so you're this this bridge is so huge we climb over the fence we climb down on the eye beams and so the these metal these iron eye beams that are holding up the bridge are like six feet tall so we're standing on the lower lip of the ibeam holding on to the upper lip right so that tells you how massive this thing is and you're standing down there and you just it's terrifying because you are so high up and it is it's so terrifying and so my buddy jumps and he want you know you wanted to hit the water straight pointed so you kind of go into the water and so he went pointed right out the way but by the time he hit his body has had rotated a little bit and he hit at an angle and just totally messed him up he he came up on the water was like help and so my other friend had jump in like pull him out I mean it was so it was crazy just stupid oh man it was insane and then he had gone and I was like well I'm going to go which again extra stupid and I I climb over on the ey beam I'm standing there like this is insane and I I ended up counting to three probably 10 or 15 times but finally I just let go I it's falling and and you know that falling feeling where you're just trying to catch your breath because your stomach's up in your throat and just like and just I was kind of swinging my arm just trying to stay balanced to not do what he had done and I just fell and fell and fell by the time I hit the water man I was like hitting concrete and I hit in like a c like kind of in a sitting position with my legs kind of squatted and my arms out to balance myself and just The Slap of the water from that height all I had iend I had I ended up with bruises all the way up my calves all the way along the back of my legs and my butt and smack my tenders bruises all underneath my arm I mean just so much pain and we got a picture so I got proof of this thing man it was ridiculous and so dumb but I was I was just at this crazy point in life where like I didn't and care and I should have cared and I was careless and and wild and and became I really was leading to just becoming an adrenaline junkie so I don't even know why I'm telling you that story but just don't do crazy stuff man don't do it's not word that life is so good it can be so good but we have to remember that and we have to make those decisions that that bring us bring us the goodness and the results we want so often we're going through life and we're creating all all these terrible results and we don't want those results right but we we we don't often we disconnect our own our own actions with the outcomes and so we have to you guys we now let this sink in this is huge we have to want the consequences of the things we want like sometimes we we want to have free choice without consequence right so there's there's no uh consequence or result a tied to our choices we just want to choose something without any consequence and and I came up years later I came up with this metaphor of the you the crazy neighbor who who's out there screaming yelling freaking out at his garden and you walk over you're like what what's up man what's what's wrong he's like what look at all this corn I hate corn and like oh wait a minute what did you plant he's like well yeah I planted corn but I don't want corn I don't like corn and you're like well why on Earth did you plant corn well I don't want corn no I don't want cor I don't want and and it's it's just like it's like the the you know the totally neurotic we plant a corn seed and expect Tomatoes or zucchini or something else right and we all do this we we all go through we have these mindsets and these these actions and these limited skill sets and limited beliefs and and bad habits that produce the outcomes the end result the consequences they take us down a path to a place we don't want to be and yet we keep doing the same things that keep producing the same results and all we do is complain about the outcome right it's just totally neurotic like you can't you can't keep planting corn and expect to get something else it doesn't work like that and we we all do it we're all guilty of this like we want to be we want to be more educated but we spend our time watching TV and we want to have better relationships but we keep you know losing our patience saying mean things you know spending time with our Hobbies instead of our loved ones and we we all do this and so we're we're like the neurotic neighbor who's making these crazy decisions but not wanting the outcome and so we have to get to this place where like I want the consequence I want the outcome I want the result of the thing I want right and and and so we have to look at everything you're seeking because look when we choose our path we have chosen our destination so look at every path you're on because sometimes you think I just want to I Just Want to Have Fun I just want to watch TV I just want to play video games I just want to you know I want to go to the bar I want to drink I want to have a you know smoke break I want to try these drugs and see what happens and and you know you see all these things all these these vices and you think oh it'll be fun it'll be cool try to experiment won't hurt anything and then you don't see the end result like I have I have uh I have family members who've been addicted to drugs and alcohol for a long time and it has literally destroyed their lives totally destroy their lives and of course they don't nobody wakes up and wants to be addicted to meth or heroin nobody wakes up and like I should destroy my life today nobody nobody wants that nobody wants a destroyed life but they they they lack this end result thinking of do I want the consequences that are attached to this Choice most people don't think that far ahead and that's what I'm challenging you to do think through the consequences think through the the end result of where if you go down that path where is it taking you because you will get down there and you'll be at a destination you better you better want where that's leading you because you'll get it Whoa man this stuff is important and and Powerful we got to we got to be able to think clearly like that so I go back um I I told you about the the family that ended up taking me in cuz I was about to drop out of high school I was at their place and they had gone somewhere they'd gone out of town or something and one afternoon and I was just sitting there I went in I sat down on the couch and all of a sudden I started to feel crazy sick and my throat started to swell shut and I couldn't breathe and it was just it was it was I was suffocating and my eyes were swelling shut okay and I was having this reaction my body had never had before and and I'm like what what what's going on I couldn't couldn't breathe in a short breath and my eyes were starting to swell shut I couldn't do anything I hurri I ran over found a phone and I dialed and um my sister was nearby at the time and I dialed her and I was like come get me I can't breathe I can't see like come get me come get me and so she books it over there Finds Me by the time she gets me my eyes had swell and shut swollen shut and I could barely breathe and she like guides me out to the car and at this time I was I was over 200 lb I was big muscly guy I spent all my time in the weight room and uh she was Tiny she was just a petite tiny little thing she gets me in the car books it to the emergency room right nearby by the time she gets the ER I'm losing Consciousness I'm just barely hanging on so she throws open the the passenger side door grabs me by the back of my shirt and literally is dragging me across the entryway into uh the ER and so they see her and they run out they grab me run me in there and they just load me up with um uh well I found out later they hit me with a whole bunch of um adrenaline they literally gave me injections of adrenaline and the doctor told me later he's like I had to give you adrenaline there injections I think he said three or four injections of adrenaline just to keep my heart pumping because my my heart rate was dropping everything was dropping I was having this major reaction so I SW shut you know suffocating Airway and I'm I'm I'm like dying and then they didn't know what it was and so they gave me four or five full IV bags of basically a benad dril and antihistamine to to fight off allergic reaction to something I mean crazy and the only thing we we could think is where I was living at the time we had seen some brown recluse spiders and I had this bite mark on my left arm near my elbow it was just this kind of red nasty swollen bite mark um and that was the only that was the only guess that we had of what might have caused that reaction and so like I'm holy cow that was scary and then then uh the nurse comes in and after a while I was there for a while my sister stayed with me and they pumped me full of all this antihist me until I started reacting you know better and then nurse comes in it's like okay we had to give you a ton of that stuff we had to give you adrenaline to keep you your heart pumping keep you alive we had to give you tons of bad drol cuz we didn't know what you were reacting to so like look you you literally can't drive for the next like 72 hours it's like there will be an effect okay I'm like okay no driving she's like you good I'm like yeah I feel good she's okay you're free to go um and so they they swung my feet over and had me sit up on the gurnie I'm like yeah I feel good she's like okay so I stand up you guys my feet hit the floor and I stand up and I literally have no no motor controls and I fall straight forward onto my face I couldn't even catch myself bam like I'm laid out on the floor and this nurse of course feels horrible like ah what have I done right like scraping me off the floor like just I just went straight over I had nothing I just was so pumped full of full of this medication that I was done and so they uh they're like oh I'm so sorry I'm so sorry oh I'm so sorry and they put me in a wheelchair will me out and and I ended up being fine but man what a crazy experience and to face face that kind of fear and have that kind of reaction of like man what in the world is happening to my body it was crazy super crazy oh but um and that that wasn't that wasn't the last time I was um you know had some crazy experiences like that and where life and you guys it's a wakeup call I hope I hope you don't have to have those experiences and I hope I hope your loved ones don't have to but man we can remember how precious life is and how fragile we are as human beings and how fragile life is I hope we'll we'll all like take care of our bodies and take care of you know not not do crazy stupid things like I did and and uh you know be healthy and well and and just enjoy each moment of life it life is so precious and so good good and I hope we'll I hope we'll enjoy that right get up every day and in so many ways it really is just a choice it's a choice to choose to choose happiness to choose goodness to choose to be excited and alive and and choose to enjoy life and so we can wake up even in tough circumstances and I eventually learned how to do this even in hard times even when things tough I could wake up like force myself to smile and still be excited about life and about really living so I hope I hope every day you can wake up and choose that choose that emotion choose that mindset choose to enjoy and like if you're if it's hard right now you guys if if if times are tough for you just be grateful literally learn to focus on what you're grateful for right just get up start looking for things and some days it's hard you're like I got nothing but that's not true even when things are bad we there's so many things we can be grateful for so get up focus on what you're grateful for focus on the good things you can do that day to feel happy and excited and alive and and and do that and just make it through that day excited alive and and and the more we do that the more life is a great and wonderful Adventure we can alljoy so remember awesome is always an option reach

upward hey everybody thanks so much for listening to this episode I hope you got aot lot of value out of it and found some things that you can apply to your life right away hey I'm I'm being totally sincere when I say I I live to help you live your extraordinary life so I hope you'll reach out to me if you have any questions or let me know how I can help you in any important area of your life and in fact you know this this podcast is brought to you by the school of awesome sauce monthly coaching program take advantage of that get in there if it's the best way to get a breakthrough to the next level so you can level up your health your spirituality your emotions your mind your relationships your finances business every part of your life just get in there where you have a a coach and a mentor you have a supportive Community to make things happen so so jump in there take advantage of this try it out get in there with us and level up your life see you on the inside reach upward [Music]