G'day, leaders. In this podcast, we discuss somebody who I consider the happiest man on
earth, and the two choices that we have in life that will determine if you're going to
be happy in what you do. Enjoy.
Why do it count backwards? Are they? We're now recording.
What? Hello, Captain.
What do I say?
Come fly with me, let's fly, let's fly.
What are we going to talk about?
I don't know. So, leadership, life and everything else.
And we're live.
No.
Hey Michelle.
Hi Guy.
And what are we going to talk about today?
So, I was thinking about this. A few days ago, I drove past a pub near where I live.
It was during the day. And there was a guy cleaning the windows, and he had on his shirt
presentation team. And I thought, what a cool, like, role name or identity for someone who
cleaned the windows and potentially cleaned other parts of the pub. And just that whole
thing of, you know, renaming it and reframing it and thinking, actually, they are responsible
for the presentation of that business.
That's a great title, presentation team. I love that.
Yeah, even the shirt was like a really pretty blue. It wasn't your typical cleaner uniform
color, whatever that is.
Is there a cleaning color?
Yeah.
Presentation team. Just imagine how that would make people feel in that industry. You're
not a cleaner. You are the presentation team.
Well, I put a smile on my face and I wasn't even, like, I wasn't doing the role. But yeah,
that's right. So, reframing it and feeling like you had that purpose rather than cleaning
a pub, which, you know, 2am in the morning, if you've ever been in a pub, it's like, that's
pretty gross. But you feel sorry for the person the next day.
Exactly.
And so, that presentation team, you know, that is.
That's different mindset. It reminds me of a story about JFK. Have you heard this one?
JFK was walking through NASA and he was doing a tour of NASA and he walked through a corridor
and he saw a guy and he said, excuse me, sir, and what do you do? And the bloke looked at
JFK and said, Mr. President, I'm helping to put a man on the moon. And he was the janitor.
Yeah.
And it became one of JFK's favorite stories. I asked this guy, what do you do? And he said,
oh, I'm helping to put a man on the moon. He cleaned the bathrooms. And it was clear that
that janitor was connected to a purpose that was bigger than his job. And it became JFK's
favorite story, one of JFK's favorite stories. And I love that story because it shows that
you don't have to be just focusing on what you do. You can focus on how what you do contributes
to the bigger picture.
And well, any organization I've ever worked for where you felt like you were part of the
big picture rather than just that singular role, there's more dedication. You give more
and you're proud. It's kind of like a family almost.
Presentation team. And I love the fact that it said team as well. You're part of a collective.
You're part of a group of people that help make this place look beautiful.
Well, as a pilot, my role, my job was to operate an aircraft full of people and sometimes not
full of people to and from locations. But I remember when we first when I joined Regional
Airline and on our first day, we were given a bit of a pep talk and a welcome in our induction.
And they mentioned that, you know, the role, our role, not only to operate the aircraft
safely for the aircraft and passengers, but also just consider what we're doing. We're
connecting people and all of the different reasons and situations why people would fly.
So there's holidays, there's going to work, there's moving, there's going to funerals,
there's people that they're leaving behind, there's people that they're meeting, all these
different reasons. And it humanized the role that we did rather than just purely technically
operating an aircraft.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Giving you purpose.
Yeah, yeah.
That reminds me of somebody I met. I've always referred to him as the happiest man on earth.
And so I was running these team building workshops, and we had a real diverse range of people
in these workshops, because it was a team of people that worked in large buildings in
the city. So they looked after the, you know, the big buildings in the city. So we had security
guards, we had cleaners, we had asset managers, we had a diverse range of people who were
all on a very diverse range of salaries as well. And so we're running these team building
workshops, trying to get them to operate as a team to look after these assets. And I met
a guy who I call the happiest man on earth, and his name's Mario. So Mario was a cleaner,
yeah. And so he came into this team building workshop with all these other people, and
every activity we did, no matter what we were doing, how challenging it was, he had the
biggest smile on his face. And he was just one of those people who, when you meet, they're
just warm. They just, they warm the area around them with their attitude and their smile and
stuff. And he's only this little, little guy. And I insulted him.
How?
Yeah, I know. I didn't know that I insulted him at the time, but later on looking back,
like when I was looking back that evening, when I was kind of like debriefing the workshop
in my head, I'd realized I'd insulted him. So I went up to him in one of the breaks and
I said to him, I said, Mario, why are you so happy? Can you hear the insult? Yeah. So
here's the insult. Why are you so happy? Because you're a cleaner and you clean the toilets.
I didn't realize that that was the subtext in my comment at the time. I was young and
stupid and didn't, I wasn't as self-aware, hopefully as I am now. And I'm sure I've got
a long way to go, but I said to him with like an intrigue, how can you possibly be so happy?
And I'll never forget his response. And it was just beautiful. I'm going to do a very,
very bad attempt at his accent. But he looked at me and he said, Guy, why wouldn't I be
happy?
Is he Russian?
He's from Argentina. You couldn't have been further away on the planet. I'm great at accents
as you can tell. But he looked at me and he said, Guy, why wouldn't I be happy? I catch
the train to work every day. I sit on the train for two hours. I'm not going to do his
accent. I sit on the train for two hours every morning and I just look out the window and
I look at this beautiful country that I now live in and I think about my children. I think
about my football. You call it soccer. And I get to work and I clean this building and
I'm very good at it. I make the building look beautiful. And it's not hard. It's easy. It's
easy for me to do. And I'm trying to do his accent again. And whilst I'm cleaning, I can
think about my soccer and my football, my family and my children. And every month I
send money to my family in Argentina and they think that I'm a god because I do this for
them. And then I catch the train home and again I think about my soccer, my football,
my family and my son. Guy, you tell me why I shouldn't be happy.
Great perspective.
Wasn't it? And in that moment, I didn't realize I did in the moment, but I'd been given one
of the best lessons anyone's ever given me. He'd figured out life, right? He figured out
life and I call them the two choices. The two choices are you can either find what you
love doing and make that your career or choose to love what you do. And Mario had chosen
to love. I'm sure he didn't grow up thinking, I will clean toilets and that is my purpose.
But he wasn't cleaning toilets. He was creating an environment in a building, a clean, beautiful
environment where the tenants of that building would come in every day to this beautiful
environment that he made beautiful. That's what he focused on. So there's two choices
in life. You either find what you love doing and all of the motivational speakers all over
the internet tell you to do this. Find what you love doing and make it your career. Well,
there is another choice. Whatever you do, decide to love it. And take the example from
Mario.
I've read somewhere that you've got a hundred things going through your mind and 99 of them
might be positive, happy things and there's one negative and yet we tend to focus on the
negative and disregard the other 99. So it's that, and if you look at it, statistically,
why aren't we weighted towards the happy or the better, but we somehow still tend to gravitate
to the negative. So it's that conscious decision to look at the positive.
Well, I guess the negative is where the danger is. And so our brains are designed to look
for danger so you can protect yourself from it. And that's why we probably gravitate to
the more negative aspects of life. But yeah, I loved, I loved meeting him. He really shook
my brain up that day. I didn't realize it at the time. It wasn't until later on that
evening, excuse me, looking back on that day that I'd insulted him and I felt really bad
for doing it. I didn't even understand at the time that I did it, but then he gifted
me instead of being offended himself, he gifted me one of the best lessons I've ever received.
Why wouldn't I be happy?
Well, part of, we mentioned in a previous podcast about the curiosity and I like, we've
been doing some coaching, business coaching recently. And one of the things we asked was,
what do you do? And what's one thing curious thing about you or something that nobody knows?
And I remember Sam, she was saying that for three years she was a truffle farmer.
That's right. And she taught me that white truffles are better than the dark truffle.
That's right. And to look at her, you'd not know that at all. There was nothing. And I
joked with her, you know, your nose is so clean for a truffle farmer.
She had a dog that did the work. She wasn't down there trying to find them herself. Hey
Sam, shout out.
But there's so many things about people that you can't tell on the surface or what they're
currently doing, what their backstory is. And people are like, you can learn so much
from other people. So never be the ones that think like potentially you did when you were
younger that you're somehow better than. It's, you never know the lesson that someone else
can teach you.
Yeah. I got one the other day. I just popped it in my head when you were saying that. So
firstly, a big shout out to the field service guys at the city of Charles Sturt over in
Adelaide. So I've been working with them for over 20 years. And it's one of my oldest and
loveliest clients. And some of the guys that were in the room, I met over 20 years ago
when I first did some training there. But one of the guys came up to me and said, guy,
do you remember what I said last time we met? And this was probably 10 years ago. I said,
no. And he said, oh, you said you love this quote. And I said, can you tell me the quote
again? And he said, yeah. He said, a setback is a set up for a comeback. Oh, how good's
that?
That's good. A setback is a set up. Set up for a comeback. Yeah. And I remember, when
he said it, I remembered the first time he'd told me, but I'd not written it down. I hadn't
given it the energy that it deserves. And I hadn't brought it into my, you know, teachings
or even just my everyday thoughts. But when he said it, I looked back and I thought, wow,
yeah, that was a beautiful gift. And so he'd learned it in a book. He'd read it. And he
said, oh, 10 years ago, I've got one for you. I've got something. You know, but he reminded
me of it. And so, yeah.
I like that.
I love that.
Great way to reframe that adversity.
It is, isn't it? Yeah. And that would be a Mario way of thinking.
Yeah.
Mario thinking. Let's label that as a thing. Mario thinking. A setback is a set up for
a comeback, which ties into the anti-fragility message that you give in your keynotes.
That's good.
I like this. Okay. So the happiest man on earth.
Mario.
Yeah. Maybe that's what we call this podcast.
Yeah. I like it.
Yeah. The happiest man on earth. You have two decisions in life. You can either choose
to find what you love doing and make it your job, make it your career, and then you'll
never have a career. You'll never work. But actually on that, right, I have met people
who have done that. They've gone down that path. They've chosen what they love and then
they made it their career, but then they made a decision to not like their work anymore.
Yeah.
So they took the enjoyment out of their passion. Yeah. But then the other choice is just to
choose what you love doing. And it is a choice, isn't it?
It is.
Yeah.
How you frame it.
Because you're making a beautiful environment for other people. You're part of a presentation
team. That is ultimately a choice.
Yes.
And we choose our careers. I don't know too many people who had a gun held to their head
in high school.
He will be a doctor.
Yeah. Mind you, they're precious from families and whatever, but yeah, you have a choice.
You do.
Make it your passion.
Yeah. Make it your passion. Choose what you love.
All right. Bollinger, where are you?
Yeah. Bose.
Bose. Come on.
Hello. Yes.
Bose is another company that they've... Chanel.
Lindt chocolate.
Oh yeah. They're one of our... they are our favorite chocolate.
I know.
Oh, okay. Tell people about the experience.
Okay. So we were booked on a flight to go to Darwin and at 4 AM in the morning, it was
an early flight, two sectors up to Darwin from Sydney. 4 AM we got up and woke up to
a text message that our flight had been rescheduled to the next day.
Yeah. A day later.
That was the day that you needed to be there to do your keynote. So we thought, okay, up
early, go to the airport anyway and we'll sort it there.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
And...
Because there's got to be other flights that can get us to Darwin.
That's right. There are other ways.
Yes.
And we managed to, whilst in the line to the help desk, booked another flight on...
A different carrier.
Yeah.
And it actually worked out faster and cheaper.
Yeah.
We got there, but we weren't where we would normally be seated.
Yes.
The cabin crew...
Are you saying that we get nice seats? We're not in the point of...
No, we're not in the point of...
We just get a little bit more leg room.
But...
Because we fly so often.
The cabin crew were amazing. They... when they came around with the cart to offer some
meals, not knowing that airline's particular menu, I said, look, I'm not familiar. Could
you tell me what they are, please? And he very kindly...
He was great.
He was extra custom service. And he kept saying, oh, look, you know... and it was like I'd
never flown before and he's helping me.
He would never clue that you're an airline captain who's flown millions of miles.
No, I try not to tell people.
Yes.
And it was amazing. And then at the end of the flight, so it was a four hour, 10 minute
flight.
Yeah.
Comfortable, you know, we watch shows, et cetera. And then just before top of descent, he came
through the cabin and he gave us a sick bag full of Lindt chocolates.
Lindt chocolates are our favorite chocolate.
I know. It was like gold.
Yeah. But I reflected on that. It's because you inject energy into every interaction you
have with human beings, Michelle.
You make people feel better when you leave them.
You always do this. So that was a reflection on you. But he gifted us with our favorite
chocolate.
I know.
So Lindt.
Yes.
Okay, Lindt, if you're listening, we like Lindor, the balls. Our favorites are the white
ones, but we like the milk, we like the dark. So if you want to reach out and sponsor this
podcast, Bollinger haven't come into the party yet. Neither have Bose.
Not yet.
Not yet. Not yet. But you know, I'm sure that they'll all come rushing and they'll be fighting
each other for who can sponsor us first.
Yes.
More dogs.
More dogs. World of your better place with more dogs.
Yeah. If you want merch with more dogs on it and Captain the Clown on the back of the
t-shirt, come to our website at CaptainTheClown.com and great talking to you again, Michelle.
Fantastic. Thanks, guys.
Cheers. Bye.
Bye.
Well, that was fun.
That was fun.
You're such a clown.
The clown.
Lady captain.
And who's going to listen to this? Maybe our mums.
Thanks, mum.