[00:01.9]
Well, welcome back to Inside Personal Growth. This is Greg Voisen and the host of Inside Personal Growth. And joining us from the Seattle area is Dr. Rick Stevenson. And Rick had been on a show many moons ago with us.

[00:18.6]
Actually it was podcast 793, for a book called 21 things you forgot about being a kid. And I'm going to direct people to go there. Rick Caddadio, how are you doing? I, am grateful to be here.

[00:37.8]
I am grateful that you're here because my listeners are in for a treat. It's been, three or four hundred podcasts ago that you were on the show and things have just gotten better and better. So I'm going to actually let the listeners know a tad about you.

[00:55.3]
And you want to hold up the book that we're going to be talking about. I know you had it sitting right next to you. Oh, Greg, I happen just to have a copy. There you go. How to be a personal story mentor is that's the book we're going to talk about. Well, it's been three or 400 interview.

[01:12.4]
I need to write faster. Clearly. There you go. Yeah, write faster or you are a very articulate man. So you, you know how to get things out. So let me welcome you to the show. Thrilled to have you back, not only as a friend, we were just talking about some people we knew in common.

[01:32.8]
In, in for my listeners. Some of you may remember that podcast we talked about the 21 things you forgotten. You're being a kid. But today's coming back, as we said, to talk about how to be a personal story mentor. Helping people connect the dots of their lives using Story Q method.

[01:51.5]
And I think that's the important part. He's the founder of Story Q and the creator of the 5000 Days where he's interviewed over 5000 young people as they grew from children into young adults over a 14 year period.

[02:09.0]
Although this remarkable longitudinal study, Rick developed what he calls the personal story mentoring, which is this book's about, and the verbal journaling technique to help individuals unlock their emotional immune systems.

[02:25.0]
I love that we're going to get into that. Throughout his career, Rick has developed a powerful philosophy in that that is our personal stories, our most valuable assets. And boy, is that true. We were just talking about another gentleman who, directs a thing called Path north.

[02:42.4]
And his personal story is phenomenal. Through the Story Q method, he helps people discover, articulate and gain agency over their narratives. Ricks believes that by understanding and applying our stories, we can transform not only our own lives, but also positively impact the lives of others.

[03:04.7]
And in this time when personal reflection is in an all time low and social media dominates our attention, Rick offers methods of, doing this to create greater self awareness and emotional intelligence. And he, as he puts it, you own nothing more valuable than your own story.

[03:25.2]
Well, Rick, welcome back to Inside Personal Growth. Again, spending some time with us to speak about your new book, and also just really to kind of get an update about what Rick's been up to. I know you've been doing a lot of traveling, so tell me about your trip, in your.

[03:43.8]
What I would call philanthropic work and the work that you've been doing with the kids and now you're back here again. And I'd love the. I think the listeners might want to hear a little bit about that. Oh, my gosh. Well, I start out with telling you about my recent trip.

[03:59.3]
And that is, you know, I didn't know if I'd ever have a 25th wedding anniversary, just because I was a late bloomer, like age 7. I had this huge romantic life, mostly in my head.

[04:16.9]
Well, all in my head. Had these huge crushes on Jackie Kennedy and, you know, Julie Andrews. And I, I just had great. I had this great life about who I was going to marry and having kids.

[04:32.6]
And, I know where it came from. It came from the fact that my parents had this phenomenal love story. Three chance meetings set across the backdrop of World War II, or else I wouldn't be here. And, so from the early stage, I really, this was a priority.

[04:50.2]
Cut to 30 years later, I was no closer to finding that right person than I was at seven. And, I'd had a series of relationships. And finally when I thought, you know, I really need some help here.

[05:07.5]
I talked to a counselor named Donna Arnold who, had me go through those relationships. And she said, Rick, hearing about these people, they all sound amazing. And I said, they were.

[05:23.7]
I mean, they. I have good taste. And, she said, well, you know, what do they all have in common? And I said, they're women. And she looks at me deeply disappointed and says, go deeper.

[05:39.9]
I said, oh, well, I suppose me. And, she said, yeah, did you ever consider the problem might be, you know, something that was so obvious probably to everybody around me, it never even occurred to me. But it was empowering because, like, it's my problem, I could fix it.

[05:57.4]
And that's what I did. Over the next year, I put a ton of work into, you know, my IQ was reasonably high, but my EQ was on the floor. I just didn't understand. Had no perspective on my life whatsoever. I was just blindly going from one relationship to another, wondering why I wasn't meeting the right person.

[06:17.7]
Well, it's because I was. I wasn't being the right person. And, so once I realized that that was the issue, then, Then I, I really jumped into it. And I was lucky enough to meet Julie.

[06:35.1]
And Julie came prepackaged with Max and Maddie. And, then we had our birth son, Oliver. And then we adopted Leah. And suddenly, in the year 2000, 2003, I had everything I ever wanted. Awesome.

[06:51.3]
And so. And you're happy as ever, right? Well, I just celebrated my 25th anniversary. I took Julie to, London. And, yeah, it was really. So I've come off a lot of travel. This is the first sort of break I've had in quite a while because I'm one of these people who so love what I do.

[07:13.2]
Which I primarily do interviews and I run the Prodigy camp, those two things. So it's, just super fulfilling. And so this book rose out of the 5,000 days project that numbers up to 7,500 interviews across six continents now.

[07:31.4]
I'm sure it's grown since we've last talked. Obviously it's been years. Well, you know what's interesting about when you're telling that story, as I'm listening to you and I've. And I've heard it before, that you married later in life and you had two, kids that basically you became the stepfather to, that you then had a child of your own.

[07:54.4]
You know, it's all really interesting because it's on the backdrop of your parent story, which was this amazing love life. Right. And something that you had been seeking. And, you know, you described this story cue method as both a personal and collective tool for healing and discovery.

[08:14.0]
I mean, you know, unfortunately you didn't have the story cue method prior to you meeting Julie, but then you kind of found it. What was the turning point in your life that led to the creation of, like, the story Q Method? Because, you know, look, this book is about us getting our personal story out.

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Right. And us being a mentor. Yes, yes.

[08:41.5]
I think it was pure survival and self interest on my part. I. Survival in that I realized I was living my life like most of us do. Like, you're standing in front of 100 foot painting of yourself and you're one foot away.

[09:01.3]
Like, what do you see? Not much not much. And so what I learned through my own, work was the importance of being able to step back and look at the grand picture. And that is sort of what's driven my work of saying why isn't everybody doing this?

[09:19.1]
This is so essential to to live a well considered life instead of just stumbling along from one thing to another, not really understanding, you know, our place in the universe. And you find your place. The, the reason I feel like I don't care how much money you have or position, the reason I feel like your story is the most valuable thing you own is like it's, it's, it's, it's your roadmap to your place in the universe.

[09:48.9]
And a lot of us stumble in finding that. We start out as kids say it goes back to a discussion I have. My grandfather, I was closest to my grandfather than anybody in the world for the first 12 years of my life, including my parents.

[10:04.1]
I was very close to my parents. But my grandfather was the guy. 8th grade education, saw his first man killed at age 11 in a bar, started smoking at 13, was a gambler. My grandfather did everything and he was this incredible colorful character.

[10:20.9]
But in the end just somebody that was this loved me so deeply and I loved him back. And I remember you know, walking, going and visiting him up at his cabin on Lake Pendrey in northern Idaho.

[10:39.3]
And one night. And I've, I've actually put this story in a film. One night, age seven, I'm walking along the, the lake and I'm wondering why the path of moonlight is following me wherever I went.

[10:56.8]
And it was a great mysterious puzzle. I back up and, and I thought what's happening here? And at seven it occurred to me the truth and that is I had to be the center of the universe. You know, that of course and subsequently was disproven moment after moment after moment.

[11:18.0]
But I, to tell my grandfather about it. And he was on the dock underneath a canopy of stars and sat me down next and put his big old crumply arm around me.

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And he said, well Rick, you know, that could be true. You could be the center of the universe. But more likely you are the key piece in a puzzle that has billions of key pieces that goes to make up this universe of ours.

[11:50.4]
And your job is to find your place in the puzzle. So well put. And so you stumble through as a kid, like you do any big puzzle, like well, maybe we'll put it here or here, here. You know, that's pure luck. And that seldom Works.

[12:05.6]
And then as a adult you start to, or as a teen you start to try different things and start to find your people or your area or your colors. And you know, that helps. And then most of us at some point go, aha.

[12:21.0]
We're holding our peace. And we see the hole and we go, got it? And you've got to put it in the hole. And it doesn't quite fit. And then it's like cheap puzzle, you know. But no, you really still, still found the place. And this is why, like, we suffer from, you know, being just out of alignment with ourselves because we just don't have the self knowledge.

[12:45.4]
And so we're like Sisyphus, like pushing the rock up the hill. We're like running the race of life with our tennis shoes tied together. And that's why we get fatigued, that's why we get sick. And that creates stress and stress creates cortisol, which pours on our immune system which makes us more sick.

[13:07.3]
And it all adds up to the fact most of our problems is we haven't quite found our place. And I found the way to find your place is through understanding your story. It creates your roadmap to your place in universe, that, place that you care about most.

[13:24.4]
What do you, what do you think as somebody who's interviewed thousands of people at this point, including, you know, as you said, your 5,000 kids, which is now 7,500. What do you think the, the bigger blocks are for people?

[13:39.5]
Because look, the book is your personal story mentor. But what do you think the blocks are? Because as you were speaking, I was reflecting on all the characters and relatives that have been in my life. Right. And their stories and what I learned from them.

[13:56.1]
And you know, I was thinking about my uncle. It was really weird. We were talking about my, my father's brother and then my father whose stories really never got told, like how you try and do it, or through some relative.

[14:11.9]
Who's to say, hey, I want to leave this legacy or I want to leave this work of art so that people could appreciate it. How do you make all that kind of come together, through your organization?

[14:27.1]
I mean, you've got a beautiful website and I'm just going to tell my listeners, go to rick s-t v e n s o n dot com. There you'll learn about his projects, the books, the speaking. He also has another website. What's that website, that you want?

[14:44.5]
Storyq.com so the story, the letter Q. Right. So that's the other one. But if you want to learn about Rick and his philosophy and his, you know, as a cinematographer and what he's done to do this. But let's go back to my question.

[15:01.0]
I think that many of us go through life and we have amnesia around these stories. It's almost like we forget them. Right. How do you help people, create self awareness and awareness of how to bring that story to light and to do it effectively through your cinematography so that they then can share that with, generations to come?

[15:31.7]
I think the primary block people have, there's a series of them, primary block is that most people feel like my story is not significant. Right. And which is nonsense. I, mean year we're born, we immediately start taking, we take food, we take air, we take space.

[15:56.2]
What do we leave for this privilege of living? I would say the only thing we really can leave is our story. And yet 99.29% of us take it to our grave. And if you think of the amount of wisdom you gather during your life, I don't care who you are unless you're completely mindless, you have something valuable to share.

[16:24.1]
You have wisdom which you try to impart to your kids, which they don't seem to want to know at times, Believe me, they're soaking it in. So keep saying it. And, but I think it's first and foremost people, they feel like it's not my story is not significant, it's not important enough.

[16:46.8]
And that's not up to them to determine. It is important. It's a you, you've been given this gift of life. You need to leave your wisdom for humanity. That is vital. In fact, I subscribe to the, Tolkien view of humankind.

[17:03.9]
In one of his lesser works, he viewed all of humankind as this great choir that only reaches sonic perfection when every voice can be heard. That's, that's so, so profound.

[17:21.5]
Right. One of the things that you've said, Rick, is that you reframe the interview. And I think this is important for my listeners to hear as a sacred space of trust and discuss a discovery.

[17:37.3]
And you say it's very different from a job or a journalistic interview. Now you could kind of say, well, the job as a podcaster here is to get out of you what's in your book. And I'm more of a journalistic interview. I try to create a sacred space all the time to allow people to blossom.

[17:59.3]
And I think at times I do a pretty good job of it. At other times, I, think there is Time gets you. Just time. You know, how much time do I really have to sit here and actually speak with Rick to get the true story?

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So how can anyone become a better listener using this kind of mindset? Because I'm always trying to become a better listener. Well, I think, I think you're closer to the type of interview that I do than the journalist or the job interviewer.

[18:41.4]
Because you really aren't out to get people. You only feature work you think is worth featuring. So you already come with your brand of, This is worth talking about where a journalist may be after other.

[19:00.7]
Other things. A story. Well, when I say a story, depending on the accra lies everything. Trying to find out. Well, I mean, in our current environment, journalists are.

[19:18.6]
That's not everybody. There's some great journalists out there. But our current journal, the current environment, you know, the journalists are after anything that outrages. That's what gets eyeballs. You know, it's interesting. This, ex priest, you probably know him, Matthew Fox, he's very famous writer, written like 47 books or whatever.

[19:40.2]
He wrote this book and I was talking to him, he's 83 now. And he came to me and he said, you know, I wrote this book on Donald Trump as the Antichrist. And I, and I want to, I want to be on the show, not just to speak about that, but other books.

[20:01.0]
Yesterday four books came because I told him about the Antichrist. One I said, I don't know, I want to see that one first.

[20:12.3]
Well, I mean, it is, it's almost a joke, I think, within the Christian community that isn't, you know, solid on Donald Trump. Like, how can, you know, given the disparities in character and things like that.

[20:27.6]
And yeah, I've had all sorts of heard all sorts of crazy. There is like, like, because in Revelations, you know, that's exactly where the anti charismatic leader, a number of people will follow, experiences a head wound and survives it.

[20:45.8]
You know, the list goes on and on. I've heard all. Yeah, well, if you want to look up Matthew Fox, you will see he's very prolific. And used to be a priest and so came out of that priesthood, and has become a.

[21:01.6]
Just a prolific writer. So, you know, this sacred space that we're doing, you know, in your book, you state, you say we become the master of our issues instead of the casualty. And you know, when we tell our story, can you explain how naming our experiences gives us power over them?

[21:28.1]
Because I don't think I Name many of my experiences. I would think, like, okay, I had this issue in my marriage, I overcame it. I had issue with my kids, I had to really work on it.

[21:44.0]
But you, it's almost something and some of them are painful. And you, and you, and you don't want to really dive into him. I had this financial issue and I had to commit bankruptcy, whatever it might have been.

[22:01.5]
You know, if you go through all those stories in your life, how do you give power in the naming of these? That's a great question and it's probably best described.

[22:18.1]
And I don't know if I told you this story before, it's an old one, but I've never had a clear example of what you're asking. Then my interview with my then nine year old nephew Andy. And Andy wanted to be a 5000 days kid, his brother and sister in it.

[22:39.0]
And he asked me if he could join the project at 9. And I said sure. And so I just have the camera. He sits in front of me. I say, andy, you ready? He nods and he immediately burst into tears. And I said, andy, I haven't even asked you a question yet.

[22:57.3]
And he goes, I know, but I know what you're going to ask me. And I said, oh yeah, what's that? And he said, you're gonna ask me when's the last time I cried and why? And I said, well that's normally question seven, but you're, you're crying already. And he nods and I said, so you want to tell me about it?

[23:15.5]
And so he proceeds. Tell me about something that happened in his fourth grade classroom, three days before. And he got partway in the story, couldn't continue. And I said, andy, I'm here. I want to capture this, and I want to hear what, what the issue was.

[23:33.9]
And tries again. Second time through, doesn't it? Finally, third time through, he's able to tell me the whole story. And basically what happened was, he had been cast in the school musical, his teacher had asked him to stand up and sing his, his, solo.

[23:52.8]
He did that. Kids laughed at him, he burst into tears and ran out of classroom. The sort of thing that, you know, would put you in therapy as to why you can't speak in front of the Rotary club when you're 42, you know, that sort of thing. And just for stupid filmmaker reasons, I said, Andy, could you tell me the story one more time just so I have it clear?

[24:15.5]
Because most of it was, you know, this sort of thing. And so he tells it to me one more time. And he gets it. He gets it pretty good, you know, without a lot of the crying. And then I got this idea. I said, andy, do you trust me?

[24:32.1]
He says, of, course. And I said, okay, go with me. Last time I'll ask you to do this. Tell me the story one more time, but this time I want you to sing it. And he looks at me strange and goes, I was in my class and the teacher asked me to like, and immediately burst out laughing.

[24:55.4]
And I saw in the space of six minutes, something that had been so dark and frightening and inexplicable, something that had been like a cancer growing inside him.

[25:10.8]
I. I saw him barf it up, hold it in his hand, expose it to the healing, you know, source of air, and laugh at it. And that is when I realized that when we tell our stories, we gain power over them.

[25:30.1]
Yeah. And for biblical spots, scholars out there, if that means something to you, the Old Testament. So first. First thing God asked. First, first thing God gave to Adam and Eve is like, name the animals.

[25:47.9]
That was his first instruction because you gained power over it. And, you know, whether you're a biblical scholar or not, you simply will have examples in your life of when you have the courage to actually go through that process and be weak and be emotional and be needy and be frightened.

[26:07.8]
When you have the courage to do that. You've climbed the mountain. And I have. You wouldn't believe the number of people, Greg, that I have interviewed that have done incredible physical feasts, like climb great mountains that can't climb the interior mountain.

[26:25.8]
Yeah. And I think this is where men really struggle, because we're told from early age that, being emotional about something is a weakness, when actually learned is an incredible strength. And real courage is not just climbing a mountain.

[26:42.3]
Real courage is climbing that interior mountain. Be able to talk about your pain. And if we all did that, we're all more open about the things that are locked inside of us, we'd be so much healthier. Well, and frequently individuals, like that Rick, are still trying to prove something to themselves and others.

[27:05.2]
And I think it's. When you can let go of actually attempting to prove to anybody anything about yourself other than you are okay just the way you are, including the person, you're worth that. Then you can open up to.

[27:21.5]
You can open up to this. And. And I think that what you do through creating this, I've watched your trailer, and every time I watch the story about the little Boy talk about, you know, the sickness of his grandparents dying and then he gets very emotional because he didn't know that they were going to die.

[27:43.5]
And the questions you ask and the pause is in between giving the child time. It always just struck me, you know, I, I look at that trailer every time and I'm like super emotional about that work that you've done and the healing that occurred.

[27:59.8]
You could see it in, in that little boy, you know, you could see it, that it was okay because at the end of it he knew that's what's going to happen to everybody. Right? Yeah. So you kind of gave an insight there about like, hey, death is part of life.

[28:16.1]
I have to accept it. I have to, I have to learn how to be okay with this. That doesn't mean that I'm still not attached to my grandparents. It just means that I learned something here about what life has.

[28:31.4]
I think his grandmother got cancer, whatever it was, and, and, and passed away. Right. So you know the story better than I do, but I, I will. Oh, she didn't. Oh, okay. But, that little boy, who is now 16, his name's Matthew.

[28:48.4]
He's amazing. He is extraordinary. He's, you know, he's a 40 year old caught in a boy's body. He's, he's got such maturity, it's such thoughtfulness and it is, you know, what I've found is that I.

[29:05.2]
Kids are struggling with two things that they're willing to get emotional about. And that is normally the death of a family member, particularly a grandparent or death of a pet. Yeah. They're also struggling with a whole bunch of other things that they don't feel like they're allowed to get emotional about.

[29:25.5]
All, sorts of struggles that they have. But that's a perfect example of Matthew being able to reframe the emotion that he was feeling uncomfortable with. As I said to him, you didn't see that whole interview, but I said to him, you know, grandparents die every day.

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Why is this so tough for you? Well, because I love them. Okay, so you dared to love them. And so the cost of loving somebody is that when you lose them, which you will lose everybody at some point, everything ends.

[30:07.7]
Cost of loving them is this pain. And so if the product of love is also, is not only joy, but also pain, how can that be bad? Right. Is this good pain?

[30:22.8]
Because I, would worry about if you weren't sad. That's what would be a flag to me. If you dare to love someone It's a major. There's nothing we can do better in our life than to love. We. One of the things you mentioned was that you, you brought it up very early in this interview was that hundred foot painting.

[30:42.6]
And being so close to it, the metaphor, that we couldn't see the forest for the trees kind of thing. Right. How do you see yourself in it? How do your interviews help people step back to gain this perspective?

[30:59.1]
Because I know many times we feel lost. It's like we're. We're not so lost in the story. We just feel lost in our own emotions. To actually be able to express them and to do that on camera is even a different thing.

[31:16.3]
Right. It's one thing I know maybe it was you that told me this. It's like when you write a book, and I'm almost certain it was you that said this, Write the book as if you're sitting in a movie theater with your best friend having a bag of popcorn.

[31:33.6]
Right? And the reality is, it's like there's. When I'm watching a movie, I literally think about that all the time. Because people want to get up front impersonal, and they want to feel that through a book or a video.

[31:56.0]
Well, it's the magic of storytelling. You can. Whenever any of us go to a conference, the guy can be talking or, the woman can be talking about the most brilliant theory ever. But the minute he or she goes.

[32:13.4]
And when I was with my son who decided. But the whole audience moves forward because we communicate through stories from the oldest campfire time around the campfire. And so it's no mystery as to why our story and getting it out there is so vital and being learned and being able to learn how to tell it.

[32:37.8]
And so what I do with the interview, it's really just story cue. Method is basically, Socratic dialogue or conversation that instead of using psychology or philosophy, it uses story, which we all have access to.

[32:52.8]
So a lot of people, I mean, I think psychology is brilliant and vital. And, especially there's some extreme sicknesses that only psychology can deal with. Philosophy the same way has a great role. But everybody has access to their story.

[33:10.6]
And I think that's the magic of the story. Q Method. And so becoming a personal story mentor or receiving the services of a personal story mentor is. Starts with your, earliest memories in your childhood. I have discovered.

[33:25.8]
For instance. Well, let me ask you this, Greg. What was your earliest memory? My earliest memory was as a kid when I lived in St. Louis with a dog by the name of Tippy and our backyard, doughboy pool, during the summer times, where Tippy would kind of run around the pool when my brothers and myself were in that kind of doughboy pool in the humidity and the heat and whatever.

[33:59.1]
But I definitely remember Tippy. And then I remember Tippy. She had puppies, and I didn't know where those puppies came from.

[34:11.5]
So, your good buddy Tippy was a girl? Yes, it was a girl. It was. Right. And what emotion do you associate with that memory? Togetherness. Okay. You know, like just this strong bond of the family doing something together.

[34:31.7]
And I'm not saying we didn't do stuff together, but frequently, it didn't seem like it happened frequently enough. Like, you know, like, just even the 4th of July events where it's like, okay, we all got together and we cooked, up hamburgers or whatever we did.

[34:50.4]
And the, the conversations we had as a family, or even if it weren't conversations, the things that we did together, participate in. We go to a parade or did we watch a movie, or did we do something like that? So I would argue in interviewing you and asking you that question, that that has largely informed your worldview, that you see the world as basically a generous place with possibilities, which is probably why you do what you do.

[35:26.7]
But I find that people's earliest memories,

[35:33.0]
tend to dictate or be a reflection of. Because who knows what your first memory is? Did it come off a pick? You know, who knows? But tend to dictate or reflect your point of view of the world. Perfect example, I was interviewing a homeless guy.

[35:52.8]
And he was 43, but he looked early 60s. I mean, he'd been on the street a long time. My son Max, my oldest son, was, filming, and I was doing the interview and I asked about his earliest memory.

[36:11.6]
And his earliest memory was age 10. Most People, it's three or four, but he was at age 10. He said, oh, earliest memory is probably my best memory. He said, I was at a company picnic with my dad and he put his hand on my head.

[36:38.5]
That was his best memory. And that speaks volumes about his life and his longing and what he missed. And, the fact that that was the highlight of his life. I like that. I like that question about the earliest memories.

[36:54.8]
And obviously those are some of the things, you know, you do. I go out on the streets and shoot videos because my Compassionate Communications foundation helps the homeless. And I literally have hundreds of hours of videos.

[37:11.1]
But my question usually to them is, how did you get out here on the street so that I could hear their story. What were the set of circumstances that got you out on the. And I'm just shooting with an iPhone. Right. But the reality is, is that it's always interesting to hear the variations of stories about the incidences that actually.

[37:35.0]
Or the circumstances that led up to homelessness. Yeah, right. How did you get here? Right. Like the rent was too high, or I was a drug addict, or I stole something, or I, you know, my current parents kicked me out or whatever it might have been.

[37:52.9]
Right. But then there's always more to the story. Right. That's the circumstance then it's how they feel now being out here. Right. So I, I love what you were saying this because his earliest memory was 10.

[38:09.4]
I find that many of those people on the street because of their. Either drug addiction or their alcoholism or whatever it may have been. That it's true. They don't have the recollection of, you know, digging deep back in.

[38:24.8]
But that's very poignant, what you said about his dad. Putting the hand on what I thought, what I found. I turned to Max and we both had like tears in our eyes, the fact that this was the case. But I mean, I can tell you story after story.

[38:41.4]
One guy, you know, his first memories being yanked out of his room because his room was on fire. You know, there, there's literally one thing after another. But when it comes to your homeless, series, all of the questions are important. They're all building blocks to understand.

[39:00.0]
Helping the person look back and see their journey and understand maybe why they feel the way they do about things, why they have the point of view on things, why they feel trapped in certain ways and. Well, what I find so phenomenal about what you do with your phone is I remember speaking at a conference once with a fellow speaker who had been homeless.

[39:24.0]
And he said, and then he was like, famous because he'd written this great book and whatever, but he said the most, the greatest struggle with being homeless was being invisible. Yeah. They, you hit the nail on the head because not very many people take the time to put them on camera to ask them their story.

[39:47.9]
And the fact that they even have someone asking, it's almost like it's the easiest question I could ask is like, how did you get out here? It's like they all want to share because they've never been asked to share. Right. So.

[40:02.9]
And that leads me to this, that, you know, how you decide to ask the right questions in the right order in the right setting, is for the. For some given interview. Can you share an example where the alignment of the stars all lined up and it made a breakthrough possible?

[40:24.5]
Because it doesn't always happen with every interview. And it doesn't. I mean, I wish it did. Yeah, but it hap. If you do it right, it happens in the majority of them. And it's, The answer to the question is quite simple.

[40:39.8]
That is, you start, you know, my first book, 21 things you forgot about being a kid. The whole basis of that is that we're all suffering from arrested development in every various areas of our life. Like, a lot of people at 13 get arrested in the romantic area of their life, you know, or bowling at age 10 or something like this.

[41:00.4]
And, I always would come home from interviews, and my wife Julie would go, you always come home so animated, you know, after having done an interview. Like, what? Why is that? I say, I keep figuring out stuff about myself when I'm interviewing a kid, and, you know this, and I suddenly understand something.

[41:28.9]
It opens a door that had been shut, and. And I was like, oh, my gosh. Do I have thousands of kids around the world helping me work out my issues? And, the answer is yes. Yes, you do. You're very, very fortunate to do the work you do.

[41:48.4]
I mean, I'm reflecting on you, speaking about how you had very high intellect, but your emotional intelligence was in the gutter. You said prior to marrying Julie, or at least you. That's the way you observed it. I'm not quite certain that's 100% true about you, Rick, because now your EQ is about as high as they come, because of the numbers of hours you spend on the other side of the camera listening to other people's stories.

[42:15.3]
And I think, as somebody who has an organization that's focused both on philanthropic work and on work to allow people to get their story out. And I kind of want to wrap up our.

[42:30.6]
Our interview here with a question for you. If. If you were to whisper one truth to every person out here who's listening to this interview, struggling to understand their story, what would it be?

[42:49.6]
And, why now more than ever, is the truth so important to be told? Right. Because the question is, it's like, now I'm seven. I'm going to be 71 in July. I don't know about you, but the point is, is that as you age and you look at finitude and you look at legacy, I'm sure many of the people you interview, especially for the personal stuff is like, hey, I want to leave this for my family.

[43:18.9]
Right. And. And you don't have to be extremely wealthy to do this. You know, some people may think that it's only reserved for the wealthy to put all their story on a, on a thing. Tell us a little bit about it and why now and why more than ever should people get the truth out?

[43:39.0]
It goes back to my original thing that it's, I feel, our duty as human beings. If you care about the future, if you care about the world, leave your wisdom. And people that have done this get back to me all the time saying, my family said they'd never received a greater gift.

[44:02.1]
So being able to share that. Did you get your grandfathers on tape? No. Nor did I get my parents. Oh, yeah, this is my restitution, doing this project. No, I was just curious if you did, because, you know, as you said, your grandfather sitting on the end of the dock with his arm around you, give you such a worldly view about your place in the world.

[44:29.3]
You know, you said eighth grade education. No, he had a master's degree in life, right? He had a doctorate in life. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No matter how crusty it was or how many people went through the bar or how drunk he got or whatever he did.

[44:45.9]
But the reality was, you see, he had a master's degree in life. Yeah. And, you know, I think. I think you'd asked me blocks to doing this, and one was, people don't feel their story is significant. The other is really straightforward.

[45:01.7]
People are just afraid to feel. Yeah. And yet when you allow yourself to go there and. And the thing I do, they're can complete control of their story.

[45:18.6]
That's like they can break out into some rant they never want anybody to hear. And that doesn't end up in their film. If they don't want it in their film. You know, this is their chance to just vomit up what they feel and then put it together in a way that they think represents who they are.

[45:40.3]
And I think there's just nothing better you can do for your kids, for your grandkids, for their kids, because there's a lot of brain science around that. When people. When kids have a sense of where they've come from, and it builds resilience, it builds confidence.

[46:02.6]
And it allows them to realize they already have a place in the world. They've just got to find it. And as you said, it used to be that to do a personal documentary, it'd be, you know, 150 to a hundred thousand dollars higher.

[46:18.3]
Filmmakers come in, we do it for just a fraction of that and it achieves mostly the same thing because we use this interview as the structural piece building from childhood to reveal the person the way they want to be revealed.

[46:38.9]
And the great thrill, as you said, is asking a question the right way, in the right order, in the right setting, the right manner to help them get to their right answers. And you do that by asking the questions that at some point reach in and make a difference to them and, and, and touch them emotionally.

[47:09.1]
Well, you're, you're kind of like while you're speaking. I was like, man, is he the psycho cinematographer? Because the reality is it's, it's kind of, it isn't psychoanalysis because there is no analysis about it.

[47:24.5]
It's actually story telling. Right. And I want my listeners to know again, that Rick offers this service, both individuals, and for the story.

[47:40.2]
Q. Right. And he's got his personal website which links to that as well. It's just Rick Stevenson. S T E V E N S O N. It'll be in the show Notes will also have the link, to how, how you can, if you want to make a video about yourself, your family, we'll have the link to be able to reach out to him to do that as well.

[48:06.4]
And Rick, can you hold up that book again? Because, yeah, reading this, if anybody wants to write me, just like my website is very cleverly. Rick stevenson.com. right.

[48:21.7]
My email is Rick at Rick. So, we work really hard, lots of marketing and there's the book and go to Amazon and we're going to have a link at Amazon for that book. And I think that's a great place for people to start.

[48:39.5]
So if you have any questions or you have any hesitations, go get Rick's book first. Go get this book first, read this book, then contact Rick, if you believe, you know, like you said, he's now up to 7,500 stories with the kids, on his project there you, can learn about the, his speaking as well.

[49:05.6]
He's got a little button there. You can push him about getting him to speak for you. But Rick, it's been an honor having you back on again, to speak about this new book. And I'm going to do everything I can to help you, get people to understand more about what it is you do, why it is you do it, and why it would benefit them.

[49:26.8]
I think the key is, is you know, what are the benefits here? It isn't just about getting, your mug on a video, speaking about it. It's more about what you can actually have your family make a, I'm going to say a transition as a result of this or a transformation.

[49:50.0]
Right. In their own personal growth, in their own way to kind of start to express story. So the story cue method, is it? That's what Rick does. Rick, any last words before we exit our little interview here?

[50:07.6]
I think probably just reminded that you own nothing more valuable than your own story. So do something with it. Very well said, my friend. And again, thanks for being on the show one more time, and we will certainly make sure people go out and get your new book.

[50:26.7]
Thanks so much. Thanks for having me. Bye. Bye.