If you’re the primary breadwinner or you carry the “provider” identity, Career ReInvention can feel impossible. The fear is real: If I change jobs, the whole system collapses. Mortgage. Bills. Kids. Expectations. Your nervous system starts treating reinvention like a threat.
In this episode, Chris and Todd unpack the Provider Trap – the hidden identity that keeps high-achievers locked into misaligned work long after it stops working. They talk about why “providing” is more than a paycheck (presence, energy, relationships, legacy), how fear and scarcity get passed down through generations, and why staying in the wrong career can quietly cost you the very family life you’re trying to protect.
They also get a bit personal with their own stories. Chris reflects on losing his dad when he was 25 and the conversations they had towards the end. Todd shares some personal challenges he and his wife are currently dealing with when it comes to the question: ‘What is a breadwinner – and what are we really providing’.
At the end you’ll understand why courage is the most important muscle that makes ReInvention possible – even when you feel like you have no room to fail.
If you’ve ever thought, “I can’t change – everyone depends on me,” this episode is for you.
If this conversation resonated with you, visit ReInvention.biz to explore our guided workbook and join a community of people just like you – people designing what’s next.
**Subscribe to the ReInvention Podcast to stay plugged into fresh ideas, frameworks, and real-world tools for navigating the future of your work and life.
Episode Transcript
Chris: I, the breadwinner provider said, Hey, I got you. You go do this. And then I went through this process of being like, wait a second, why am I saying that to the people around me? And look at what I’m actually doing to myself. I’m not doing that. And that was a real awakening for me.
Todd: All right, Chris, my brother. What are we talking about today? What is on the docket for reinvention?
Chris: Todd today we’re covering a big topic for our reinventors, especially the ones who have been the primary breadwinners or who hold the role of the provider.
And like a lot of times when you think of yourself as the provider, you feel this responsibility to continue doing exactly what you’ve been doing because you imagine yourself as the linchpin of the entire family process. Everything else can be figured out. But your finances and your job is the core around which everything’s built, the mortgage, the bills, the vacations, the nice things, all that stuff.
And you feel this sense of fear that if, you change the job, if you rock the boat at all, then the whole system is gonna come crumbling down. obviously the financial part is very important to support the functioning of the family. But you know, two points, it’s almost impossible for it to be true that there is no other way to provide for the family financially.
There are always alternatives. We see this every single day in our community and with the people we work with. And two, and this is what we’re focusing on today, is beyond the finances, what else are you providing for your family? What does that word provider mean? Because while you’re busy making the big financial contribution, what often gets overlooked is your social contribution like to the lives of your loved ones.
This is one thing we hear all the time in our culture, and we’ve heard this personally, Todd, no one ever says in their deathbed, I wish I’d made more money and spent less time with my family. Truly, that’s never anything you hear from people in that moment. So, are you fully present for your, the daily lives of your family? for events, big and small, right? And we see it as a critical feature of reinvention, that you integrate your work into your life in a way that supports and enhances your life, rather than being at odds with it or something you’re trying to fight this work-life balance.
And this may seem counterintuitive, but like when you really care about what you do, when it lights you up. It makes it so much easier to bring your fullest self to all the other moments of life outside of your work. Even if you’re working really hard and really focused on your work, the person you can be outside and around that work is fuller, is more of you.
And that’s a core concept we’re trying to help people get to with reinvention. So if you’re listening, if you’re the provider for your family, you’re the breadwinner, but you know something has to change and you’re contemplating perhaps reinventing your career. You’re gonna want to stick around and listen to this episode, ’cause we’re gonna give you the framework and the ability to think differently about your situation and understand that there are others like you going through this and how they’ve processed this and navigated this and launched successful reinventions.
So Todd, I, I know I just dropped a lot there. Bit of a mouthful, so I wanna let you react to that.
Todd: Yeah, no, I mean, it’s, one of the most important and maybe even the most unsaid parts about this notion of reinventing, because reinvention is transformation and it’s change. And when you get to that point, especially for a lot of the mid-career professionals that we work with, there’s been a trajectory and there’s been identities and foundations laid.
So you talk about the provider. It’s like that’s a very real thing, you know? And so just the notion of, having that shift it’s a huge thing that doesn’t only affect yourself and your own idea of self-worth, but also your family. So I don’t want to go into this so lightly. Because I know that it’s a sensitive subject for many, right?
But one that we want you to delve into today with us, right? Because this idea of reinvention is different than just a career pivot, because we’re also wanting to look at the total picture and get a holistic view of what’s really important for your life, okay? That’s what reinvention is about.
You may end up doing the same thing. You may end up getting a similar job as you’re in transition, but at least give yourself this opportunity to ask some of these bigger questions and give yourself an opportunity to maybe even align your work and your lifestyle with the things that are most important.
And I think that’s getting at. So I think this conversation is an opportunity for some spaciousness, because you mentioned when you’re on your deathbed, and I think I’ve told you this before. When I was in my twenties, I spent about six months working in hospice. And hospice is where, you know, people have six months or less to live with their life.
And you know, I was working with a girlfriend of mine at the time and she was a nurse practitioner. And I would go in there and I was helping out and I couldn’t help myself, Chris. I was always interviewing people. I was curious. These people were literally facing death. And I would ask them questions and they wanted to tell me.
I was like this young guy, and they would tell me, and, and you’re right on. They all said the same thing. We’ve heard it again and again. Don’t sweat the small stuff. Don’t sweat money. Relationships are the most important. Heal your relationships, have good relationships, and enjoy the people in your life.
And these were people that were saying this to me, you know, a 20-year-old kid, and they were facing their ultimate demise. And I always took it to heart. And now we’re in this culture that is spinning so fast and a lot of us have gotten to the situation where, financial security is on the table, and this is very real stress.
I’m not saying this to demean that, but it’s an opportunity to open yourself up to looking at what’s really important. Right. So those are the things that we can go into, that’s what hits me when you gave that intro,
Chris: you brought me back to a very heavy moment in my own life.
I mean, my, father was in hospice before he died when I was 25, he was 53. Very young for both of us. Right. And I remember a conversation I had with him while he was in hospice where he said to me, and I don’t know if this was a, a male coded thing or whatever, it was like provider to future provider type of code.
But he was like at least with the mortgages paid off you and your sisters can go to college or like, you know, at least this, he kind of went down this list of things like, at least I took care of these financial type of things.
I don’t remember if I said this to him in the moment, but I definitely thought it, dad, we don’t give a shit about any of that stuff, man. I’m glad we had a bunch of catches. I am glad that you were there for us at our sporting events and our, concerts and like, we’ll figure that shit out, Like, That’s not it. We are missing you. We’re heartbroken because we’re losing you. The person.
And you know, I knew he knew that on a fundamental level, but this is one of those things, like this persona, this identity of the provider, the breadwinner runs so deep in us in this culture that, he viewed as value in this very capitalistic or materialistic way, and that’s not how we viewed him at all, even though we were the people that he was providing for.
I probably denied that dynamic for a long time in my corporate career, but that’s really front and center for me in my mind and in my heart in this conversation because, it really, recast the idea of what are we really doing this for, in terms of our family, in terms of the people around us. Like what are we really providing to them and what matters.
Todd: Yeah, man, and thank you for bringing that in, man. And my heart obviously goes out to you when you share that story about your dad.
Crazily enough, I think I was 25 years old when I was doing that volunteer work in hospice, and I am almost 53 right now. Just those two ages that you mentioned. We’re at that age right, where these things are coming into play and I’m, like I said, I’m 52 now and look, I have friends that have passed, and have had illnesses.
And as you move forward in this life, you start to realize, wow, this thing is short. This really is just a blip in the matrix. Yeah. so that’s why when you know, we have this issue on the table and there’s someone very, particular I’m thinking of on this issue, someone that we’ve helped coach who’s that provider and is in a place in his life where he is trying to figure out, well, how can I reinvent and also still be the provider?
And really in this exploration of, I wanna believe what you’re saying, that I can recreate my future and have it aligned with the things that I most care about in my lifestyle and make money so I can still be the provider. But I’m scared shitless about how to do that, and I’m scared that I won’t work.
Almost by default, let me close my eyes and go back and just play that role. Right? Which is the decision that I think a lot of people make. Unfortunately. You know, let me just close my eyes and this is the role I’m playing. This is the commitment I made to my family. This is the commitment I made to myself.
And there’s a nobility in that that is not bad. You know, it’s like I don’t want to dismiss that as being a negative thing.
But there’s also this notion of. Kind of selfishness being a good thing, you know? And it’s kind of a controversial thing to say, but I help people with this and I tell them, I’m like, look, this moment in time of reinvention of self exploration and like trying to understand what’s really important is selfish in a way.
Like you first for a moment, okay. Take yourself and your dreams seriously, because, and you alluded to this in your intro. The other question we have to think about is what legacy, what story, what narrative are we handing down to our families and our kids and our grandkids, right?
And the people that we touch, the people that we mentor, because we wanna be handing down not just this I suffered and sacrificed so others could do well. We also wanna be thinking about handing down. I went for it in this life and I was brave enough and courageous enough to look into myself and say, Hey, am I really happy doing what I’m doing?
And can I have it all? Can I actually break out of the mold of what I’ve perceived to be the truth and started to look at things differently and like just that question opens up the heart a little bit because when we did this with this particular person, started to see pretty quickly Yeah, like what narrative am I showing my kids here?
Like, am I training my son and my daughter to work really hard and sacrifice life and spend 90% of my time doing things that I don’t love just so I can be the provider. And it’s a very, very interesting dynamic and question, which I love that we’re getting into this. And I think that a lot of people that are in career reinvention or pivoting, they don’t go to this level of self-exploration, but it’s absolutely necessary because I think within that inquiry holds the seeds for maybe a better answer, a better life.
Go there. Right. So what comes up for you when I shared all that?
Chris: First of all, I know exactly who you’re talking about in our community. I remember very specifically when he was saying these things, I didn’t connect until this moment echoed the way my dad was talking when he was on his deathbed.
He passed his value within his family in terms of what he earned and what he provided from the corporate predictable roles that he was in. And his self-worth was very tied to that in the way he was presenting it. I mean, of course, like we know this guy a little bit, right? He’s a wonderful, great person.
There’s so many great things about him. He’s gonna figure this thing out. He is figuring this thing out.
Todd: Mm-hmm.
Chris: that’s not who you are as a person. That’s a thing that you do. And to your point around, selfishness or maybe let’s call it self-care, taking care of yourself first in a way that you can contribute to your family and, and be present for them.
Mm-hmm. Your kids don’t learn to treat themselves the way that you treat them. They learn to treat themselves the way that you treat yourself.
Todd: That’s right.
Chris: That’s the model that your kids see. And for me personally, as I’ve gotten to this point of in my forties, reinventing my career, doing something that is off the path from where I was on for so long and taking a risk, but showing my kids, I believe in myself.
I know I’m figuring this thing out. I know I’m doing something different that’s off the beaten path, but it’s aligned to who I am and I care about it. And you feel the joy and excitement in me as I talk about it. Mm-hmm. Talk about legacy. Like I believe that just by doing that it doesn’t matter whether I make $50 million or $5 doing it, the doing it as a model for my kids as to how much they can love and care for themselves and do what’s right for them in their life.
I mean. Pretty proud of myself as a dad for just taking that action.
Todd: Think about like 20 years from now your kids listening to this podcast episode. Just hearing you clearly stated with such awareness because
Chris: Yeah,
Todd: you know, you’re embodying courage.
Like courage to explore myself, courage to go off the beaten path and actually think about lifestyle. In addition to financial security and moneymaking. And then trying to figure out, well, can I do both, right? Is there a way that I can then go ahead and do both? And that’s why reinvention is a process that has some level of predictability around it.
You know, we’ve talked about in previous episodes. The stages of reinvention, when you first have that moment and that moment could be you got let go or you’re just incredibly burned out, or you know, the writings on the wall in your career to some extent. And that, point in time is like stage one.
We call that stage one reinventors. It’s a lot of fear. Like, what am I gonna do? Alright, let me listen to these guys in this podcast. Let me get some ideas. Like, I gotta pivot, you know? And, and you’re not really in that place of. I do wanna think about what is important to me long term, right?
And so that’s why what we always talk about, well get clarity, start asking yourself those bigger questions and see where that leads. And then you get to this next stage of reinvention when you start to believe and see, ’cause others have done it and are doing it now that, yeah, I actually can create a future that has money making and lifestyle connected, that’s actually a possibility for me.
And that shift going from complete uncertainty and fear oh my God, I just need to stay in the programming and the trajectory of my former self even though it’s been suffering and miserable. Like I, you know, I just gotta do that. ’cause that’s all I know. Over to a new series of possibilities about your future is so big.
And once you get to that stage two, this is where it becomes a little bit more fun. Right, where you’re like, okay, there’s things that I can do. There’s people that I can learn from. And that’s where we get into like some of these other things that we talk about, well, who can you model? How can you learn new skills that are related to these potential reinventions?
Like, how can you find a community and get accountability and listen to a podcast like this so you can get ideas about ways to make money, and marketing and sales, and all these various things that we talk about. But this conversation, Chris, is foundational because we’re talking about belief and we’re talking about identity.
And we’re talking about the idea that wherever you’re at in the reinvention process, take a moment and be self-aware about where you’re at because this life is short and you want to think about others from the context of not, are you just showing them financial security, but are you showing them courage. Are you showing them the values of, man, I gotta go for it. And resilience. You know, because even doing what you’re doing right now isn’t always easy. Is it, Chris? It’s not like you decide to become a coach and you got certified at NYU and it’s like so easy. No. Like, you’ve been on a journey.
Chris: Money’s not raining down as soon as you decide.
Todd: 20 years, man, I’ve been doing this shit. And it’s constantly a journey. But what I do know is that at the end of the day, I’m gonna be one of those people that feels like I left it on the table.
Like I left on the table and I failed a bunch, man. I failed a lot. You know, I’ll be honest, I’ve succeeded sometimes too, but I failed more than I’ve succeeded. Okay. but I’ve, gotten back up and I’ve dusted myself off and have I gone forward again? That’s the energy that we all need to be embodying right now in this day and age of AI and everything that’s going on.
This is a personal thing right now that we need to have a personal mission to explore ourselves.
Chris: In avoiding failure or the perception of failure for so long. That is what has held me back from creating the life of my dreams in to some extent.
Todd: Mm-hmm.
Chris: Right. I mean, we talked about in our community, I had my word of the year for 2026 is courage, right? Because I don’t think it’s talent that’s held me back from the things I want. I think it’s courage. I think it’s fearlessness or preceding. Damn it. I said fearlessness, Todd. That’s your word.
Todd: That’s my word.
Chris: But courage to proceed and to do the best I can and to reach the limits of my talent. And I don’t criticize anybody because the system is set up to instill a fear upon us so that we stay in these, whatever we end up in for a lot of people. Mm-hmm. And we cling to that stability, but. It really is worth this step back to take a look and say, man, if I proceed with courage, not knowing what’s ahead of me knowing it’s probably a less safe, scarier route, but at the end, the potential of the payoff is what I really want in this life.
You’re gonna be happier if you try and fail that than if you don’t try and you succeed at whatever the hell this is.
Todd: Yeah.
Chris: Guaranteed.
Todd: Mm-hmm.
Chris: Right. Listen, the irony of this for me as a, you know, the provider, the breadwinner, the father, the husband, the dad, whatever. The irony is, it’s very easy for me to encourage the people I love to do what’s right for their life while I’m not doing it for myself, or at least while I wasn’t.
Right. Like I strongly encourage my wife to pursue a PhD in her forties I don’t wanna take credit for her PhD, like she wanted to do it, but it’s in the conversation we’re having, she’s like, is it too late? Am I too old? Am I gonna have the right length of career afterwards? After like all these things.
And I was like, fundamentally, the only thing I cared about was you wanted to do this for a while. If you don’t do it, you’re gonna regret that you didn’t do it. Do it. We’ll figure it out.
Todd: Oh Good for you. I love this.
Chris: And, and listen, don’t make me the hero. ’cause I also said, Hey, and I’ll keep my stable job while you do it.
Uh, it’ll be fine. And then I, you know, two years in was like, oh, awkward. I’ve gotta probably launch an entrepreneurial career from zero. Oh.
You know, that’s a whole other conversation. But I do think there’s something in that where I, the breadwinner provider said, Hey, I got you. You go do this. And Then I went through this process of being like, wait a second, why am I saying that to the people around me?
And like, look at what I’m actually doing to myself.
I’m not doing that. That was a real awakening for me.
Todd: That’s fascinating how you’re so altruistic for the people that you love and the people in your life, but then you weren’t applying that to yourself. It’s really fascinating.
Chris: This isn’t like Chris is an awesome hero. This is what like a lot of people are doing,
a lot of people out there are doing this for sure. And it’s this archetype of the provider, the breadwinner. You know, in some cases it might be masculine coated, but that is not necessarily the case.
Todd: Well, I’ll tell you this, it isn’t in my case in some sense, right?
You know a little bit about, my wife has a very corporate job.
she’s worked in the aerospace industry for 23 years, basically for the same company. And that industry is just, I mean, it’s a beast, you know? It’s a beast in a lot of good ways. I mean, we just go take airplanes around the world and we fly to Japan and it’s no problem. But behind the scenes, that’s a pretty tough industry, especially in the area that she’s in. And her job is just putting out fires all day, you know? And right now as we’re recording this, I’ve been in this conversation with her because she’s been working like 14 hours a day. I mean, I give her so much credit for how seriously she takes this and how responsible she’s for her team and like what it means to her in her life. We’ve been on a journey with my relationship with her career, since we’ve been together.
But I accept it as something that is really important to her and she loves it, and it gives her a lot of, mastery. It gives her a lot of purpose, and that’s all wonderful. But lately it’s been a lot. Just as an example. The other night, it’s like eight o’clock at night and was up since five 30 in the morning on the phone.
And you know, my kid is sitting there like wanting to get her attention. She’s on her computer eight o’clock at night, you know, and it’s very hard for me to say something. I mean, you know, the dynamics of marriage, like this is not a moment for me to say you’re doing this wrong at all.
Right? And that’s not my message either, but later I did sit her down and I had a conversation, you know, as gently as I could where I was like, what are we teaching our daughter around work? What are we teaching? You are modeling something for her, as am I, and I’m not saying I’m doing it better than you, but you know, lately it’s been a lot in terms of what she’s seeing you do.
And I take that really seriously, Chris, because when I look at my role as a father part of this is like I’m helping to shape a soul. I love being a parent more than anything. What a fun thing to be able to do is to give your best back or what you know, or your wisdom back to someone so that way they can then take that and do whatever they want with it.
You know, she’s gonna have her own life, my daughter, right? But, I had that conversation with my wife and I think it was a little bit of a wake up call because she’s similar to a lot of people. We don’t realize what we’re doing and how we’re holding our work and how we’re holding the financial stability part.
While there’s some good elements, there’s also some other teaching that’s being handed down to others that maybe you were not aware of. And so I had that conversation. It was a hard conversation. She didn’t love everything that I was saying, but I wanted to say it because I love my daughter and I want.
to give her the best shot to live a balanced life. You know, one where she’s thriving in a bunch of ways. So I think, you know, I’m in that mode right now because I’m just like pie in the sky here. Like I’m dealing with this in my family right now. It’s a question that’s up for everybody right now.
How are we reacting? What’s our relationship with work? As we’re in this changing world.
Chris: And the fact that you had that conversation with your wife is why you’re podcasting from your backyard right now.
Todd: Absolutely, man.
Chris: All joking aside, it is so important to have these open conversations with your spouse, your partner, whoever the people are in your life that it’s going to affect in all these directions, right?
It truly is about balance, we’ve gotta make money in this world.
Todd: Yeah.
Chris: We’ve gotta make money to pay bills and keep the lights on and pay the mortgage and the rent and all that stuff.
Right? This isn’t like fantasy camp where we’re just like, quit your job and you know, go play the pan flute. That’s not what this is about. Mm-hmm. But it is about dialing in, well, what do we really want outta life? And I think that’s a great concept that you brought into that conversation?
Todd: Mm-hmm.
Chris: Is like, let’s look at this. What do we want for ourselves? What do we want for our children?
Truly, really, I was just listening to our own episode about the financial planning, the intro to financial planning and about the money. And I think this really ties into this, is people get very anchored to the numbers coming in or the lifestyle that they have and this is that deep psychology of loss aversion, not wanting to lose what they have.
Todd: Mm-hmm.
Chris: And I think we really are getting to some fundamental questions because it’s like, do you really want what you have?
all of it? I have friends who have the second house and the this and the that, and it’s like, stuff’s fun.
But if what they have to do to maintain that is spend 12 to 14 hours a day doing onerous work that makes them feel a knot in their chest all day, is that really worth having the place that you go to every other weekend and so you can have like more access to a nice hike?
Todd: Yeah. Over 20 years I’ve sat on a Zoom call, an intro coaching call with somebody who on the outside has it all. And then they come into a call with me and they’re like, you know, really struggling in a bunch of different ways, some really painful ways, you know, and so that’s why I just have a universal belief that how much money we have is not a direct indicator of how much fulfillment and happiness we have at all.
Okay. Now money’s also a pretty awesome thing, you know? Uh, yeah. It’s great. I mean, right. yeah, let’s make money, let’s have abundance in our lives. Let’s have that be part of it. But it’s not a direct line as an indicator. And to close the loop on the situation my wife and I, the one thing that we’ve done, I think really well, which is one of the things that we recommend here is we do have a long-term vision for ourselves. That’s bigger picture, like where we see ourselves and how we see ourselves spending our lives and our lifestyle. That’s a little bit different than it is right now, but that’s also very exciting to us.
And I think like the communication part of this is so important. ’cause we’ve alluded to a little bit on this call, we’ve done some episodes on how to communicate your reinvention with the people in your lives. And we’ve given scripts on that. You know, this is really important because you’re not just in an echo chamber.
You are dealing with partners, you are dealing with coworkers, you are dealing with children, family members, mother-in-laws, like all kinds of people that are gonna be mm-hmm. Judging you and coming down on you, and we’re affected by that. And so how you communicate this part of what we’re talking today, like it’s a very challenging thing because I can imagine the, you know, client of ours that we were talking about before having this conversation, let’s say with his wife, who for the last 20 years has also been relying on him as being that provider. That’s a, that’s a tricky, nuanced conversation to have, like there’s a way that you need to enter into that conversation so that way it can be fruitful for both parties.
Okay, but this is a time to turn towards that, Chris. Like people need to be first honest with themselves and open to seeing what’s really on the inside and taking an assessment of how happy and fulfilled am I really, and then being able to gently and wisely share that with others in a way that you can build a team and a mission and a positive mission around what’s possible.
And I think that’s the point of this, we need to be able to let go of these identities that haven’t served us and start to look at new identities that can, you know, and I think that’s what you’ve been pointing to in this episode you’re not just a provider, you’re the provider in a bunch of different ways.
So now let’s take a holistic view on who you really are and what’s really important. Right, brother. that’s what we’re trying to get at here.
Chris: For sure. You know, you mentioned mother-in-law’s, right? I’m blessed. My mother-in-law is so, so sweet and so supportive. It’s really my wife’s mother-in-law, who’s the problem.
But we’ll let people unpack that. It’s my mom.
Todd: Oh, I got it.
Chris: Different episode, Todd. All right. Uh, no, in, in all seriousness, the thing that really came up for me a as you were going through that, thinking about the people in your life is, going back to my own experience of it, not taking it head on, not turning towards it.
Mm-hmm. And, and trying to sort of hold down and suppress the bad feelings of this career I was in. That was misaligned for me. Not only was I not showing a good example to my kids and to my family, I also started, honestly, Todd, to resent them a little bit.
Todd: Mm-hmm.
Chris: Which is not fair to them because these are choices that I was making.
Now in that, I want people to listen to this. When you’re in that you might not think you’re making a choice. You might think you have no choice. You are making a choice every day. If you’re going to some job or doing some job that is making you feel bad every day, you are making a choice. And for me, I started to resent them a little bit because I’m like, well, I’m doing this for them,
Todd: Right.
Chris: I’m going to this place and I’m making this money for them. They didn’t ask me to do that. They didn’t ask me to do that. They never did. And in fact, my wife, this is actually a, bone of contention with my wife and I, because from the beginning she’s like, dude, I’m not asking you to do that.
If you wanna do something else with your life, we’ll figure it out. if you wanna go live in a cottage somewhere, we don’t have to live in New York City. She has been very consistent since day one about that. And I have been the one who said, yeah, which she doesn’t really mean that she wants to live in the Upper East Side and the, you know, like that whole thing.
That’s my identity.
Did you, did you hear how Italian I got? As I started to say that? ’cause that’s actually, that voice, literally that voice is a multi-generational scarcity voice. There is a little sicilian man from 1901 who came over who’s like, you know, we must be a butcher and we must make enough money to support the family that’s in me.
And I think that’s what is speaking out in that moment because she’s like, dude, I love you. I love our family. Let’s go do this in a yurt somewhere in the mountains. Like I, it doesn’t have to be this lifestyle. That’s my baggage Todd.
Todd: Man, that is so powerful, Chris. ‘Cause this is the real stuff right there.
Thank you for sharing that example of just yourself, how much we are the ones that have entrapped ourselves a lot of the time. You know, it’s like very humbling to realize that, which is why we’re doing this podcast, which is why we have a community on this because unpacking. This old identity and this old trajectory goes way back.
I mean, you brought us back to 1901 man, like turn of the last century. But it’s true, that identity lives within you and so does my heritage in a bunch of ways. And what I learned from my grandparents and parents and you know, we are all just part of a process, part of a system. Now we’re in this moment in time.
I mean, the world we’re in is really changing. Things are being disrupted in a major way. We all know that. We can all feel it. And so the call right now is to like, stop the madness, stop the trajectory, and just breathe for a minute and do this work, this reinvention work, and just start to ask yourself some questions that can have you thinking maybe a little bit differently.
It’s funny, I just go back to when I first met you, right? And if you don’t know, you got to this point in this podcast. We met on TikTok. Like I DMed. This guy slid into his dms on TikTok. I was like, I like what you’re talking about.
and you have this whole thing about, well, why do you wanna go into business with me?
You keep embodying it on all these calls, you’ve literally gone through this process and you did it well, but you did it by yourself. And I’ve been helping people go through this process of reinvention and career transitions for a long time. And I was like, man, you speak to this so well because you went through every stage of this, you know?
So I just wanna honor our partnership, I just love the conversation so much. Man. I’m grateful that we’re doing this and I think this is a big one, right? I think we unpacked a lot of stuff here, personal stuff.
I think we unpacked a lot of like how to think about this, and if you love what we’re talking about, definitely follow us along. What are you gonna say, I know you had a
Chris: Believe me, if you’re where I was 10 years ago and you’re like, man, I gotta get out. I don’t know what’s going on I can’t keep doing this.
listen to this episode again if you need to. Yeah. I mean, play this while you’re running and going to the gym a couple of times because need to realize that you have options and you can make a choice. And I’m telling you, you’re gonna be happier if you lean into this and you go towards it. Like Todd said, take a step back and look at the big picture.
What do I want out of the rest of my life? What do I want out of this life? Because you only got one. This is important.
Todd: Yeah.
Chris: And Todd, I just wanna say, listen, thank you to you for overall the stuff we’re doing, but in this moment, I mean, this was like a therapy session for me a little bit. Yeah. This was therapeutic.
Yeah, me too. And I think this is gonna resonate for people because I know people are feeling this pain. I mean, it’s still, as you said, it’s still recent. I remember this. Mm-hmm. It’s recent for me. It’s, it’s still fresh.
Thank you brother, man, appreciate you.
Todd: You’re doing great. Yeah. I appreciate you.
I take that in, follow us along. Like I said, we’re gonna be doing this hopefully for a long time because I love these conversations. I love this concept of reinvention, Chris, because it is deep, you know, it’s a deeper exploration. Like yes, we’re talking about careers and practical stuff here, and we do a lot of that tactics here on this podcast and in our community.
But really at the end of the day, this is a human thing. This is a moment to become more self-aware. And that’s the call here. And then from there, a lot of stuff gets uncovered and unpacked as we’ve been talking about. But allow yourself the gift to do that. And that’s the call. And I know we know it’s hard for people, especially in midlife to start doing that when they haven’t been accustomed to doing that.
But that’s where the gem is. That’s where the seeds are, that’s where your glory and your happiness and your fulfillment and your money making are. So do it right. We would be honored to walk that walk with you, in any way that you want us to, even just listening to this podcast hopefully is, helpful for you to do that. And so, again, totally grateful for this great episode, Chris. And, uh, we’ll see everyone next time.
Chris: Take this on, people.
Todd: Take it on.
