Doug: Hey, what’s going on? Welcome to the Doug show. My name’s Doug Cunnington. And today I’m talking to my good friend. Dr. Jordan Grumman. And we’re going to talk about purpose today, which is a little bit of a, it’s a deeper subject than what we normally cover in the show, but I think it really can come into play and can help us as side hustlers and entrepreneurs sort of make sure we’re not creating a life that we don’t really like, and that is a symptom that I see around.
I’ve gone down that path a couple of times myself, but we’re going to talk about purpose and the meaning of life and some deep subjects, but we’ll keep it light. Also. So Jordan, how’s it going today?
Jordan: It’s going well. And I’m excited to talk about purpose when it comes to side hustles and entrepreneurships, because I think it’s one of those places where we can actually do purpose, right?
And so not all the places, not in all our careers, can we, sometimes you just got to do something because it makes you money. But in side hustles and entrepreneurship, I think we can actually find that marriage of purpose as well as possibility of making some money.
Doug: Jordan, you’ve been on my other show a couple of times, and we’ve hung out many hours at different live events, which I’m a big fan to go and meet people in person and really Be able to sit down and have some time to chat and all that.
So I know, I know you pretty well, but for some of the other folks, can you give a little bit of an intro on your background and why you’re uniquely qualified to write a book about purpose?
Jordan: So basically when I was seven years old, my father, who was a doctor, died suddenly at a brain aneurysm. That set me off thinking that I should become a doctor, right?
I should cosmically fix this thing that happened to him. And that’s exactly what I did. That became my purpose and identity. I was practicing medicine. I eventually burned out when I realized that maybe I co opted my father’s version of purpose, but maybe there were other things that filled me up. I was lucky enough to also discover financial independence.
At the same time, I looked at my investments and my parents had modeled me great and, you know, great, great habits when it came to money. So I was lucky enough to find a way to extract myself from medicine. I started writing about personal finance, eventually podcasting, but the one part of being a physician I kept that still filled me up was taking care of people at the end of life, the terminally ill hospice care.
And so I was doing this as well as doing a financial podcast. And I found that a lot of the questions that came up in the financial podcast, like how much is enough money and what do we do with that money once we make it? I couldn’t find the answers in the financial world, but I often found the answers in the hospice world.
My dying patients would talk about their regrets, like, what did they regret not having the energy, courage, or time to do? Did they regret not becoming their best selves? And that in itself became a conversation that I had in financial circles. I actually wrote a book called taking stock where one of the main premises was that purpose should come before our financial framework.
But when I was marketing that book, I got a lot of questions about purpose. How do I find my purpose? Why is my purpose anxiety causing? Because I can’t figure out what I want to do. And so I did a deep dive and that led to the purpose code and between my hospice work, my financial coaching, my financial planning.
my masterminding, my podcasting, all of that experience together gave me a very unique version of what I think purpose should be. And it’s actually very different than I think what most people define for purpose to be.
Doug: And it gets serious quick when we’re starts starting to talk about like meaning of life and end of life and like what you’ve learned from, uh, you know, many of your patients that you helped out.
I want to go back a little farther and hit a couple other items. So you mentioned that You practice medicine for many years, and you realize that you actually had saved enough money because of a good foundation and good habits and, you know, a good Large Delta, I assume between what you were spending and what you were earning.
So we’re able to save quite a bit. Can you briefly talk about how you set yourself up well early on. So when you discovered financial independence and retiring early, you were able to rejigger things and, and pretty much retire almost right away. So how’d you do that?
Jordan: So I was really, really lucky because my parents modeled great financial behavior.
So growing up my parents saved 50 percent of what they brought in. They invested in the stock market. They were landlords. They owned like 10, 15 doors at one point. They were side hustlers. So my stepdad was the CEO of this major company, but he also sold coins on the side because he had a passion for coins.
And so I grew up with all this wonderful financial behavior. I didn’t understand it, but when I became a physician and started making money, I did what they did, right? So I put money in the stock market. I started investing in real estate. I started side hustling, even within medicine, I was doing my medical job, but then I would side hustle as a medical director of things like a hospice where I’d get paid an extra stipend.
So I was making the money and I was investing and I was being wise about it, but I had no idea what enough looked like. I had no idea how you calculate your financial independence number. I had no idea how you decumulate, right? So I was accumulating like crazy, but what happens when you stop making money?
These were all things that I eventually went down the rabbit hole and learned through reading books and listening to podcasts and blogs. But what I found is when I burned out in medicine and started learning about personal finance, I didn’t really have to change or rejigger that much because I had done really smart things in my twenties and early thirties.
And so it’s really the power of compounding and some good habits. Which set me up to leave medicine and worry less about the income. Now, admittedly, I was also married to someone who loved their job in corporate America. And so she also had some income too. So all of that put together set me up to be in a very good place to start thinking about if medicine isn’t filling me up, how can I step away from it and start doing things that do?
Doug: How many years did you practice medicine before, you know, retiring and sort of, you didn’t retire all the way. You just did much less than what you were doing before, right?
Jordan: So I graduated medical school in 99. I finished residency in 2002, and I practiced from 2002 to 2014. So a good 12 years before I started pulling back.
It really took me to, from 2014 to 2018 to completely get rid of everything but hospice. And I’ve been doing hospice medicine since, right? So I’ve been practicing about 20, you know, 25 years total, and, and 22 years as a full fledged doctor.
Doug: I don’t know that many doctors, but it’s pretty common for doctors to spend a lot of money, right?
They, they worked very hard going through medical school. They have usually quite high salaries, especially if they’re specialized. And it’s very easy to, I guess, just go along with what everyone else is doing, right? But you already had a good foundation. Can you comment on Kind of going against the grain in, I guess, confirm or you know, disagree with my assumption that doctors do spend a lot of money.
Maybe get the fancy cars, vacation home, all that kind of stuff. Right.
Jordan: I think a lot of doctors do. And what happens is when we’re in medical school, we’re accruing debt and we’re living off of whatever we have to, to make it through, then you go to residency and you get paid, but not nearly as much as a doctor.
So again, you’re cutting corners and you’re skimping. So what tends to happen is you go from a resident. To an attending physician and your salary triples. And so a lot of people feel like they’ve been holding back for so long that they deserve to splurge. And a lot of people do, but not everyone. And so there are plenty of doctors who are also really good business people.
And so I was lucky in a few ways or maybe not lucky. It depends how you look at it. So my father died when I was seven. His life insurance actually ended up paying for my medical school. So I didn’t have any medical school debt. So that was one thing where I didn’t have to worry. So I wasn’t. feeling throughout medical school and residency that I wasn’t living a good life.
So I didn’t feel like I had to splurge to make up for it. That was part of it. The next part was, again, I kind of grew up in a family that knew how to deal with money. And so it wasn’t as big of an issue for me to go ahead and maintain that identity of being smart with money, as opposed to that other identity of being kind of a freewheeling doctor who’s spending lots of money.
Interestingly enough, When I left medicine, it wasn’t hard to step away personally from that identity of being a doctor and all that came with it. But what was hard is for other people to see me step away from that identity because my family had grown around me and had placed that version of purpose and identity on me.
And that was a little bit strange, I think, for all of them to see me step away from this thing that they always thought was so important for me.
Doug: So you were a doctor part of your identity. You’ve written now you’re at least your second book. Have you written more books?
Jordan: So I have a third one actually coming out in late to 25 about our healthcare system.
But right now it’s, it’s, we’re, this is number two.
Doug: You’re an author and a podcaster and what, what do you consider yourself now? Right. You’ve done a few things, you’re successful in all of them. So you can kind of pick and, you know, choose the identity.
Jordan: My most joyous is being an author. And so what I always tell people about being a doctor is I had grabbed onto that identity and purpose.
In many ways, because I thought it would fix what happened with my dad dying when he was little. So I co opted his version of purpose and identity, but it never fit. Like I didn’t have lots of close doctor friends, even though I trained with these people, some of them as much as 10 years. I hated hanging out in the doctor’s lounge.
And when I went to parties with my wife, I’d be almost embarrassed to tell people what I did for a living. And so I knew that this identity of purpose didn’t really fit. Fit me very well when I eventually stopped doing that and I started going to conferences like the ones that I’ve spent time with you At where I met podcasters and bloggers and authors.
I immediately felt connected to people And so I knew that that purpose and identity fit me more but I will tell you for me like one of my proudest days is when I went and googled my own name and the You know when you google your name, it says jordan grumet and then it gives you a category and it said author You And I was like, I feel seen.
And so I know that that identity and that purpose fits so much more comfortable than anything else ever has. And so for me, I think that’s kind of my most proud identifier now is being an author.
Doug: That’s awesome. How does it land, you know, at, at the parties, you know, doctor versus author now, is there much of a difference?
Jordan: You know, it’s funny. I still sometimes lead with doctor, but I kind of say, yeah, I do a little bit of doctoring, but I spend most of my time writing and podcasting and being an author and public speaking. And that feels much more comfortable. The funny thing about other people is they pretty much accept whatever you say.
Occasionally someone will say, oh yeah, tell me about that. But mostly it’s on to the next conversation. They’re worried about talking about themselves more than they are about you. So, um, and, and the crowds, the people I’m around who do ask those more probing questions are also the communities that I fit better within.
Right? So when I go to a conference that you and I may go to like a FinCon or a CampFi or something like that, and they ask me what I do and I say, Oh, I’m a podcaster and author and speaker. That doesn’t like sound strange to them. That sounds normal because in the communities I now hang out with we’re all kind of learning to identify ourselves differently and find a different sense of purpose.
Doug: So let’s jump into purpose and big P and little P purpose. So many entrepreneurs are driven by these big, ambitious goals. And you argue that the approach can lead to anxiety and burnout, which I’m thinking of just like social media to where some jokers on social media are like really pushing the big P purpose.
And like talking about how important it is to have that. So can you explain the difference between big P and little P purpose and why it’s so crucial to understand the difference and, and sort of steer towards the better one, which you’ll explain.
Jordan: So what I talk about in the book is that we’ve technically say, or typically talked about purpose is one thing, but it’s probably two.
And one of those things is probably more. Associated with anxiety, what I call big P purpose. And the other is associated with health, happiness, and longevity. And this has been clearly proven. There are tons of studies that show that having a sense of purpose in life leads to some of these really good things.
And so what’s the kind of bad version of purpose? I call it big P purpose and it’s very goal oriented. And we see this in entrepreneurs. A lot of time, it’s like, I want to make that first million or, and I want to make that first billion. The problem with big audacious purposes is very goal oriented.
And usually it’s very Difficult to achieve, right? In America, we say, if you can think it, you can build it. But a lot of times we can’t, we’re not the right person at the right time with the right skills and the right amount of luck to actually succeed. And so if that’s our version of purpose and it’s very goal oriented and we can’t reach that goal, and yet we spend every day doing things we don’t love in order to reach that goal, we’re kind of missing the point.
So. Failure is very possible with Big P Purpose and it’s very scarcity mindset oriented. You either kind of succeed or you don’t versus what I call Little P Purpose is process oriented. So it’s not about the goals, it’s doing things you love and enjoy. And so it’s very abundant. Think about the million things we could do that we enjoy.
Think about the millions of businesses or side hustles you could get involved with. That really light you up or exciting to you. It doesn’t mean that we don’t have goals. You can still have a huge goal for your business, but your joy in the process and your sense of purpose, can’t rely on those goals. It has to rely on the process and therefore it’s very hard to fail.
You love what you’re doing. And if you don’t love what you’re doing, you try something else. And so it’s very all or all as opposed to all or nothing. And so I think, especially when it comes to entrepreneur and side hustles, if we can find things that light us up. It’s a better use of our time. Cause even if you reach that goal, let’s say you do hit that million dollars of revenue or billion dollars of revenue a year, if you hated or didn’t enjoy the process of getting there, that’s where you spend 99 percent of your day.
You only spend 1 percent of your time where you’re actually hitting the goal and excited. And that eventually fades and then you’re off to the next more higher goal. So it’s not 1 million in revenue. Now it’s 5 million in revenue. And if the things you have to do to get there, you don’t enjoy doing, you don’t enjoy the process, then you’re spending a lot of time doing stuff you don’t like.
Doug: I’ve heard it explained as a goals and systems as well. And. You know, it just depends on the book or the framing or whatever, but yeah, it makes total sense because the goal is, is pretty much binary. And if you’re lucky enough to actually hit the goal, then, you know, you’re the dog that caught the car or whatever, where you just, okay, now what we have to make a bigger goal.
Now, just so I catch a truck and it’s yeah, it’s just, it’s a play. I’m glad I sort of figured it out. I don’t know, maybe in my corporate career where I was like, yeah, like day to day wasn’t great if you actually like got the corner office and you were director or something like that. Well, that wasn’t great either.
You were just paid a little bit more, but. Largely, it wasn’t basically, it wasn’t enough of a salary increase to account for the amount of work and bullshit that you have to put up with. And yeah, consulting where I won’t mention any specific companies, but management consulting, and you know what I’m talking about.
But, but yeah, the, the systems, cause like, that’s the journey. And we, we think about it in the fire community too, where it’s just like, you need to enjoy the journey. Cause like there’s a good chunk of time where you’re going to be saving and accumulating and you’re in the quote boring middle where you need to enjoy that process and it actually helps once you do reach your goal, because you know, the things that you like to do.
Jordan: Yeah. And I, I think. That’s really the crux of it is the messy middle is actually where the good stuff happens. And that’s why it’s so painful because when we, we feel almost stuck in the messy middle when we’re fighting out the good fight, when we’re in the arena and it feels really tough, but when you’re in the process, if you can enjoy that process, if you can enjoy the fight, then you’ve kind of already won regardless.
And you’re going to goals are transient. Right, they’re transient unless you don’t meet them and then they can be lifelong But then you feel frustrated because you don’t meet them. So goals that you can meet are transient But the process ends up being lifelong And if you don’t like the process of doing one thing if you don’t enjoy doing one thing Then you switch to doing something else
Doug: You mentioned it’s not necessarily bad to have like a big P purpose or a goal.
We just probably need to reframe it. So it’s like, um, a system or small P purpose where you can enjoy the process along the way. But I’m curious for you, Jordan, like, do you have a big P purpose that’s sort of in the background or a few, right? Like it could be a lifetime journey.
Jordan: It’s funny, I don’t call it Big P Purpose because by nature, Big P Purpose is negative.
And the reason why it’s negative is it’s not just a goal, it’s the goal as purpose. Meeting that goal. And so, the question I think you’re asking is, do you have big goals? And the answer is yes. I do like I’m writing a book. I’m getting this book out there. I’d love this book to sell thousands and thousands of thousands of copies.
I’d love it to be a New York Times bestseller, but here’s the difference. This is still little p purpose for me because I enjoy writing them. I enjoyed these conversations you and I are having. I enjoy the process and even if I never sell a copy or I never make it to any bestseller list, this was still joyful good time for me.
So I wouldn’t call this big P Purpose, I’d call this little P Purpose that has a big goal, but I’m kind of agnostic to that goal. Like, sure, I’d love to be a New York Times bestseller, But whether I hit the bestseller list or not will not change my enjoyment my sense of purpose And that’s why it’s still kind of little p it’s just little p with big goals.
And again, there’s nothing wrong with big goals It’s just if the goal ends up being the purpose like you’re not happy unless you reach the goal Or if you find yourself doing stuff, you don’t enjoy doing on a regular basis in service of this goal That’s when it becomes big p purpose. So goals are fine.
It just can’t be the reason why you do what you do You
Doug: So can you give us some tips on finding the little P purpose?
Jordan: So I often tell people, we don’t find it, we create it or build it, but it is true. We need to know some of these inklings, some of these beckonings of joyful things. And what I call those is purpose anchors.
And so there’s several ways to start thinking about how you find. Figure out your purpose anchor so you can build a life of purpose around them. In the book, I talk about three or four really basic ones. One is to think about regret. I often deal with regret in dying patients. And at that point, regret is really frustrating because you don’t have agency to change or control anything.
You just don’t have enough time or energy. But. But regret in a young person, you can flip that around and turn it into a purpose anchor and build a life of purpose around it. So regret is a great way to start thinking about purpose anchors. The joys of childhood is another one. Think about what you love doing as a kid.
Often kids voyage into purpose without worrying about it. They get lost in games and having fun, but something happens as we become teenagers and adults. We lose all that joyful activity. So what were the trophies? What were the pictures in your room? You What were the posters? What were the drawings? All those things point to what felt like purpose as a kid for you.
Maybe that can be a purpose anchor as an adult. Another one is to look at work and subtract out what you don’t like. I call this the art of subtraction. Most people find their jobs to be somewhat boring or difficult, but they may find one small piece of that job. They love doing that. This is what I did with being a doctor.
I started hating being a doctor, but I liked a little piece of it, which is hospice work. So I use the artist subtraction. I got rid of everything else and found a purpose anchor in being a hospice doctor. And last but not least, if none of those help. I talk about the spaghetti method, throw a bunch of things against the wall and see what sticks.
That means trying things you don’t normally try, hang out with people you don’t normally hang out with, see how your day goes. And if you find it joyful, maybe there’s an anchor there you could start building a life purpose around.
Doug: So, when I got laid off in 2015, I, I think I did the spaghetti method. So, I was side hustling a little bit and had some like mild to moderate success and lucky with timing.
I think, I mean, we don’t give enough credit to just being lucky with the timing of whatever it is you’re doing or unlucky, but basically my most successful. Venture the little side hustle was like SEO and sort of outreach, but it was an agency, basically an art marketing agency. Turns out I don’t like working with clients, not at all.
And there were a couple other pieces, but it was, By far the most successful out of the like five things that I tried. So I, I just shut it down. I was like, okay, I’m winding this down, no more new clients. And then I did something else, something that I enjoyed more. Do you have a suggestion? On how people can sort of unwind whatever it is they’re working on and pivot when they realize they accidentally created a job that they don’t like.
Jordan: Yeah. I mean, I think it’s wonderful. Actually a wonderful place to test out your purpose anchors is inside hustles and entrepreneurship, but it is true. You have to have the courage to pursue these things and realize that maybe as you get into the midst of it, that it’s no longer bringing you joy. You’re not enjoying the process.
It’s not filling you up anymore. And then when you get to that point, you have a few decisions and it can be hard, right? Cause let’s say the thing that isn’t bringing you joy is making you money. And so you have to weigh that, but then you have some choices. Can you take that thing and start slowly changing it into what you would like it to be?
Can you use the art of subtraction? Maybe you like doing SEO, but you hate selling to clients. And so you bring on your buddy and he sells the clients and you do everything behind the screen and setting up the websites and figuring out the SEO. And so one way is to use that artist subtraction, keep that purpose anchor, but get rid of what you don’t like.
The other possibility is to wind it down. Just like you’re saying, say, look. This is making me some money, but I don’t enjoy it anymore. And I could build around a ton of other purpose anchors, or I could build a different activity around this purpose anchor and start all over again. And I think both of those are fine.
The key is to see the choices, the abundance, the agency, you actually have some say in control over this. It doesn’t control you. And that’s where I think the winding down can look like a million different things, depending on who you are and what’s important to you.
Doug: So all right, Jordan, you, you’re an author, which is a pretty independent thing. You have a podcast. It’s called earn and invest. People should check it out. We’ll, we’ll link to that for sure. Do you consider yourself an entrepreneur?
Jordan: I do. But I don’t really support myself that way anymore, but I have been.
So even when I was running a medical practice, I eventually started a partnership and ran my own medical practice. So I definitely was entrepreneurial in being a doctor. Now I have several entrepreneurial ventures. So the podcast is one being an author is another, I do some coaching. Um, I guess I consider myself a little bit different in the sense that the goal of all these ventures is not necessarily to make money because I have that piece covered.
So the goal of these entrepreneurial ventures is to fill my life with a sense of purpose and enjoy my. Activities that I spend doing every day. In fact, the one part I like least is actually running as a business, because then I have to look at the accounting and I have to look at the payroll and I have to look at all the things that I don’t want to spend time doing.
So I think I’m an entrepreneur by accident because the things I love doing happen to generate money and I have to then. You know, deal with that money.
Doug: It’s funny. Yeah. I’m looking at a couple of things in a similar way where I’m like, just want to earn just a little bit more than what I need to cover the cost.
So it gets me to show up and pay attention and, you know, do a good job. But yeah, it’s a, it’s a sort of a delicate balance. So, okay. Very interesting. A lot of entrepreneurs, and I think I fall into this where I didn’t deal as well with management, at least at the companies that I was working at. Are you a pretty good employee? You know, I, I hear there’s a lot of politics working in hospitals and in the medical field, right?
Jordan: There is, was I a good employee? I was so, so, I mean, I definitely complained when I didn’t agree with the way things were going but I generated lots of revenue. So as a doctor, when I did work for a company, I ended up having tons and tons of patient visits.
I had lots of loyal customers slash patients. So I think I, I was good for them.
Doug: Okay. And I’m, I’m jumping around a ton here, but I was just listening to an audio book the revenge of the tipping point, Malcolm Gladwell, Malcolm Gladwell. And You, a lot of authors like read a ton. Are you a big reader?
Like what kind of stuff are you reading these days?
Jordan: So I am not a huge reader. Well, I am a big reader, but not in the way you’d think. So first and foremost, for my podcast, I ended up having to read tons of books. And so I’m reading a number of personal finance books a month. And then I don’t read self help.
self growth, any of that. But I do read like crime novels and things like that. In fact, I usually get them on my phone, on my Kindle app, and I read them so quickly, I forget even which author I’m reading or which series I’m in the middle and literally will find a series that is 10 or 15 of them and just read away.
Doug: Gotcha. Yeah. I remember one of our early conversations You mentioned you read a lot of the Jack Reacher series. Yes. Yes. I read through
Jordan: it. I’m, I’m sad that there are none left. Cause I read through all of them, but I’ll, I’ll typically find a series like that like the Michael Connelly stuff. I read all of his like, uh, detective stuff in LA Bosch.
Yeah. I love those. And so I try to find. I try to find stuff like that.
Doug: Very nice. Okay. Let’s see. So moving back into purpose. So many side hustlers and entrepreneurs struggle with limited resources. Often. I mean, people are working full time. This is what happened to me. I was working full time. I was trying to, you know, make some of these projects aside hustles work.
And so time was limited. I didn’t have a lot of money to invest into it. What advice do you have? For those folks facing those constraints while still trying to, you know, go towards this little P purpose and make sure they’re not doing stuff they don’t like doing.
Jordan: Yeah. I mean, so first and foremost, everyone talks about time being an issue, but the Bureau of Labor Statistics does the U S time survey every so often actually finds your average human has about.
Five hours of free time a day and people in lower socioeconomic classes actually have a little bit more. And so this idea that we don’t have enough time, I don’t know if that’s completely true. The other argument I always hear is you don’t have enough money. But what I always tell people is money is a great tool to pursue purpose, but it’s only one of many tools.
And so you also have your youth, your energy, your family, your community, your skills, your passions. Those are also tools. And so, you know, you got to try to utilize some of those other tools when you don’t have money in abundance. So let’s say you’re in your early twenties and you’re working really hard and you don’t love your job.
You might not have a lot of money, but you probably have a lot of free time. You might not have a mortgage yet. You might not have kids yet. So. Going and doing something purposeful on a Saturday and Sunday might be really easy for you. Whereas me in my fifties, I don’t have nearly as much energy. I’ve got a mortgage to pay.
I’ve got kids to worry about. I don’t have as much time and energy. And so we got to utilize some of those other tools I think we have. It’s not perfect, right? We’re going to be hustling out there because that’s who we are, right? We’re going to hustle to make a living. We’re going to hustle to make the family work.
We’re going to hustle for all this kind of stuff. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t have some time and some space. We just have to figure out what tools we have available to us and start using them.
Doug: You emphasize the importance for community. And I’m, I’m curious as far as like side hustlers go, do you have any tips to build communities for those, uh, that are basically behind the keyboard and often they don’t have any.
And like they’re learning online, they’re, they’re watching YouTube videos. They don’t have anyone in their immediate community that they know of. How could they figure out this community piece?
Jordan: Here’s the thing. When you pursue things that feel really purposeful and joyful to you, it lights you up and you normally attract people.
So yes, you might be behind a keyboard, but what online communities are you going to, to ask for help? If you’re starting to learn things that other people don’t know, how are you putting that knowledge back out in the world? So. Are you finding people who are doing things similar to you? Are you forming mastermind groups with them?
Are you giving advice back and forth? The key is when you start doing things you really like to do, it makes you attractive because you are lit up and that’s going to attract other people to you. So the key is to then be available to go to those places and be around those people who also dig the kind of things you dig.
And once you do that, you will automatically form communities. And so there’s. There’s always communities of people who dig just about everything. So whatever it is you’re doing, no matter how obscure or boring you think everyone else thinks, but you love it. There’s got to be other people out there who love it too.
And so the key is how do I find those people? And there are tons of online communities. They’re in person communities. There are people you work with on the same projects. All those are going to be people who could possibly become
Doug: part of your community. Can you talk about the first time you went to one of the personal finance events?
Jordan: Oh, it was amazing. I mean, Again, for a guy who was around doctors all the time and never felt like he fit, to be around people who spoke the same language, who were excited about the same things, who you didn’t have to explain yourself to was amazing. And again, it’s a joint sense of purpose and identity.
When you get around people who love the same things you do the conversations become easier, the connections form greater depths you just connect in a whole different way. Bye bye.
Doug: And which event was it? Was it a campfire wearing one of the t shirts now?
Jordan: Yeah, I went to first campfire in 2018. I went to a campfire in Minnesota and it was actually the campfire that finally gave me enough permission to really a hundred percent leave my practice and only do hospice work.
And I mean, you know, a lot of times we figure it out, right? You read the blogs, you listen to the podcast, you figure out who you want to be. The problem from that figuring out stage to actually taking action and doing it. Is a huge step. And so you have to start building momentum towards action. A easy way to do that is surround yourself with other people who are taking action, who can help you support you through that momentum building.
And that’s what happened to me. It’s like, I knew all the right things. My brain had already calculated everything out, but knowing is not the same as doing, but when I went to this camp fi. I actually got the support from people who are already in the midst of moving themselves. And so I could start creating and building my own momentum.
And once that happened, it was all downhill from there.
Doug: Do you have any insight on why it’s so hard for people to take that action? You’re a successful, smart guy. You’re confident, you know your shit, but it’s still, you needed to see some other real life examples. Yeah. Yeah.
Jordan: Change is hard. I mean, the problem is this.
Most of us think magically we’re going to keep doing the same thing and yet have a different outcome. We think magically that just knowing that I want something different in the world is going to cause that change. And I can keep doing the comfortable stuff. If I just keep doing the comfortable stuff, all of a sudden my life is going to change.
Truth of the matter is. If you want a different outcome, you have to do things differently. And if you’re going to do things differently, you have to step out of your comfort zone and by stepping out of your comfort zone, you immediately are placed in a space of discomfort. And that’s hard. It’s hard to knowingly put yourself into an uncomfortable space, but it is part and parcel of growing.
It’s part of building that momentum. And if you don’t do that, you’re going to always get the same thing. Do the same thing, get the same results.
Doug: Is there anything right now that you’re working on that’s just outside your comfort zone?
Jordan: Oh, everything is. I mean, so I’m launching this book, but then I just decided to start working on with a PR firm, which is completely out of my comfort zone.
It means that I’m going to get pitched to Bigger periodicals, bigger TV shows, bigger news agencies. And guess what? Fear among fear. Maybe some of them will actually want to highlight me. And then I’m going to have to show up at these bigger venues and I’m going to have to face all the imposter syndrome, all the difficult stuff, you know, It’s failure is scary.
You know, it really is scary success. Success is incredibly scary. And, but, but that’s exciting. I mean, that is stepping into that discomfort and saying, this is new and this is different, and yet I’m not going to let that stop me. And I think we need to do that in so many places. I sign up for public speaking all the time.
I love public speaking, but every time I get in front of a crowd, I get anxious and nervous and scared every single time. It feels like I’m stepping out into the abyss, but I don’t know how you grow if you’re not willing to do that.
Doug: How many talks do you do like throughout a year? Typically,
Jordan: it’ll depend somewhere between 10 and 15.
Like I do a lot of smaller talks for like camp fi. I do a lot of mastermind groups where I’ll come on and give a 30 or 45 minute presentation, and then I’ll do maybe four or five big stage talks every year where I’m. Around a few hundred people or a little bit less. I love public speaking, but it, it’s never easy.
Doug: Yeah. It’s tough. You’re, you’re a great speaker. I’ve seen you on stage a handful of times and I know you take it very seriously. I mean, like, what did they say? Like the nervousness, the anxious, This it’s because you care a lot and you want to do a good job, but I know you, you rehearse and you practice and like, it’s a job for you.
Jordan: Yeah. And I think so again, one of the most amazing public speakers I interviewed helped me with that reframe. He’s like, if you’re not anxious and if you’re not nervous, then you’re probably not going to give a good talk. You need to start thinking about that as actual excitement. You’re like, I’m going to go out and teach these people something they’ve never even thought about before.
So of course you have energy of, of course, your heart is racing. Of course, you’re breathing fast. It’s actually the sign that you’re ready to go up and do that hard, exciting thing. And so, yes, I take it very seriously. And speaking about side hustles, you can make a lot of money actually giving, doing public speaking.
So, um, it’s, uh, something that I really enjoy and it also creates some revenue.
Doug: Very cool. Well, Jordan, it’s always fun to catch up with you. Can you talk a little bit about who exactly the book is for?
Jordan: So the purpose code is really for people in the midst of the messy middle. It’s people who are like, I kind of am figuring out my finances, but I have no idea who I want to be.
I know that there’s a version of purpose out there for me, but it feels so big and overwhelming and I don’t know to grab onto it. If you are struggling with purpose in your life, this book is for you. The idea is to go from the pie in the sky, I have no idea how to approach this purpose, to the very down to earth, these are the steps I take, this is how I build purpose into my life.
You should finish this book and have a very good idea of how to start pursuing purpose today.
Doug: Very
Jordan: awesome.
Doug: All right, Jordan, where should people find the book out there?
Jordan: Easiest places to go to jordangrumet. com that’s J O R D A N G R U M E T dot com. And you can find links to both my books. They’re taking stock as well as the purpose code, as well as links to all the places I create content like the earn and invest podcast.
Doug: Very good. We’ll link up so people could find that really easily. And yeah, good luck with the launch, man. This’ll be pretty cool. I think I’m going to order a few copies, help you out. And I I’ve already read it. It’s a great book, but I can give a few out to some friends and that sort of thing. So, well, Jordan, thank you.
Jordan: Thank you so much for having me and thanks for giving out some books.