Nick Sturdifen on the Ripple Effect

In this  episode of Primal AF, we delve into the remarkable journey of Nick Sturdifen, a passionate advocate for change and empowermen. Nick shares insights on his experiences working in school systems, collaborating with superintendents, and his quest to engage today's Black community effectively.

1. The Power of Patience:
Nick highlights the importance of patience in his line of work, emphasizing the complexity of engaging with students while recognizing that learning is a continuous process for both educators and students.

2. A Mission to Improve Mental Health Services:
Nick's professional background revolves around human services, particularly in the field of mental health. He shares his dedication to making a difference in this vital sector, especially within school systems.

3. Learning and Adapting:
Nick discusses the humbling realization that despite his education and expertise, there's always room for growth and adaptation. He stresses the importance of continually learning and evolving.

4. Fighting for the Future:
Nick reflects on the necessity of advocating for the future generation. He acknowledges the responsibility to contribute positively to their lives and create a better world for them.

5. Preparing for the Unknown:
In a rapidly changing world, Nick underscores the importance of preparing the next generation for the challenges they will face. He emphasizes the need to equip them with the skills and knowledge to navigate an uncertain future.

6. Embracing Diversity and Open Communication:
Nick discusses the value of embracing diversity and open communication, emphasizing the significance of listening to and learning from people with different backgrounds and perspectives.

7. Breaking Generational Cycles:
Nick talks about breaking negative generational cycles, particularly in the black community, by providing support, guidance, and positive role models to help individuals achieve success.

8. The Role of Money:
Nick addresses the role of money in happiness and success, emphasizing that while money can be a tool for achieving goals, it should not be the sole source of happiness.

9. Happiness Through Empowerment:
Nick shares his personal definition of happiness, which revolves around empowering others, creating opportunities, and positively impacting their lives.

10. The Journey of Empowerment:
In closing, Nick expresses his commitment to the journey of empowerment, sharing his vision of building a community of empowered individuals who uplift one another and create positive change.

Outro:
Thank you for tuning in to this inspiring episode featuring Nick Sturdifen. We hope his journey and insights have resonated with you and encouraged you to embrace continuous learning, empowerment, and positive change in your own life and community. Stay tuned for more thought-provoking episodes in the future.
Find him on IG - @nicsturdifen and his Youtube Channel: The Ripple Effect

Transcript

JImmy: 0:10

Yo, welcome back to another episode of Primal AF. This is Jimmy Knapp. First and foremost, have you checked out the new intro music? This shit is fucking fire. My boy Jay Clark, also a Primal guy, hooked it up. So if you can, follow him on Instagram. Pretty cool dude. He's actually going to be on the show in a couple weeks. If you haven't picked up one of these hats, they're like 40 bucks. We ship them right to you. Primal AF, but next I have my guy, Nick Sturtefan coming up. Watch this.

Nick: 0:53

Yo, yo.

JImmy: 0:55

What's up, homie?

Nick: 0:57

Not much, man. How you doing? Man, I'm

JImmy: 0:59

doing all right. How you doing?

Nick: 1:01

Good, man. I'm loving that background. That background is tough. I had somebody help

JImmy: 1:05

me with it. I ain't creative, dog. I had somebody take the picture. Actually, it was, uh, it was AI. It was AI. It was AI.

Nick: 1:18

It's crazy what AI is doing now, man. And we haven't even scratched the surface of it.

JImmy: 1:24

It's about to do, it's about to do everything. Hopefully with a lot of integrity too. Like Elon's got to build like an integrity AI bot. Be like, Oh, hold up like little Superman, but watch too many movies.

Nick: 1:41

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Dawg, long

JImmy: 1:43

time no see. How you been, man?

Nick: 1:45

Good, man. It's been some time, brother. It's been some time, but doing good. Doing good. Staying busy. Staying busy. Life. You know, everything between then and now that kicks in, you know, how that goes. How about you, man? What's new in your world? A little bit

JImmy: 2:01

of everything. A little bit of everything. It's just, uh, just trying to get better and anything every day. It's a Gotten tension and just setting goals. Something that really I never used to have and being around the right people. But it's funny because like, I, I don't know how you jumped on the map, but it was like on Instagram, I saw one of one of the, uh, one of your shorts, I was like, dog, I played it like four times. I'm like. Yo, I need to holler at my boy now. I haven't, I haven't seen you since college, but I was like, damn, like, what the fuck have you been up to for real?

Nick: 2:42

Yeah, yeah, man. Uh, just, just everything, man. Um, everything I can get my hands into, uh, that's, that's not going to destroy life, right? You know, anything I can learn, anything I can... Find a new venture. Um, you know, since, so I just kind of go back from Averitt, leaving after Averitt, once you, we graduated, I say we can graduate from Averitt and end up staying there, working in Res Life, doing that thing for a few years. I stayed like at Averitt between the master's degree program, working there probably a good three to four years, longer than I ever wanted to stay at Averitt, right? Couldn't wait to get away, man. And finally it worked out and ended up moving to North Carolina. Went through a few corporate jobs and different things. Learned a lot. Um, learned a ton, learned a ton, had good experiences, made a lot of money. Right. And then realize just how quickly money is not going to sustain you in terms of fulfillment, happiness. It's not going to be what carries you through the hard times in life, the trials and tribulations that you may face. And, um, so it got to a point, man, uh, at this point I was working with Verizon as an account executive, doing really well, and twenty six, making, twenty five, twenty six, making six figures and, you know, thinking I made it, right? And, um, but I realized I was only building my own kingdom. I was only benefiting myself. I wasn't helping anybody. Like I was doing at Abra. Um, I'd be at, at Abra. I wasn't making much money. Um, and I was like, yeah, look, babe, I think we need to jump out and do our own thing, start our own company. And, uh, you know, it's easy, you know, obviously Father Christ, I'm not about to get up here and start preaching. So don't worry about that. But, you know,

JImmy: 4:34

like... Hey, this is your platform, son. Like, I reached out to you because I, I like the passion that I saw in you. And I also like the one message that you had. And as eloquent as you are, there was a lot of thought behind it. Um, from my perspective, I was like, well, this is, this is a well put together. Um, but first, I mean, I know family is, is always going to be like massively important. So your husband, your father, what are your kids names?

Nick: 5:07

Uh, Nick and Elise. Yeah. We call him Deuce. Deuce, he's nine, Elyse is five. Okay. So he'll actually be ten next month and she'll be six in

JImmy: 5:17

January. Okay, cool. So it's like, it's an exciting, so it's like you're, you're, you're practicing with one and then one coming down the pipeline, but I bet they're so different because I got a ten and eight, two boys and so different. They're the

Nick: 5:32

coolest though. Yeah. It was crazy to teach you so much about yourself, right? You know, one of the hardest things about kids is it gets you off oftentimes, but then you get even more mad because all you're looking at is yourself, right? And it's like, man, I can't even get mad at you because you got this from me, you know, and um, and I'll tell you what changed, what really changed the game for me was having a daughter, my daughter, at least. You know, they bring out a completely different side, a softer side, uh, sometimes an irrational side sometimes. It's just really weird, man, and there's characteristics that you see in them, but coming from a female. It's, it's just, it's really cool to see, frustrating sometimes, perplexing at times, but um, definitely a blessing, definitely a blessing.

JImmy: 6:23

It's, that's a, that's such a great thing that you just said. Because I, I often find myself learning from my kids, from my 10 and my 8 year old. Um, specifically with my 10 year old, empathy. I learn empathy from him. I'm like, holy crap. And then with my 8 year old, I learned how to have fun in a competitive manner. Everything's everything's a party to him, right? Um, but what are some things that you have learned from your kids?

Nick: 6:57

One is patience, right? Um, so We have a we have a human services company. So we work with mental health human services. Oh cool We gain work. We're in the school systems. I'm working with superintendents Um, how to actually engage the student of today. And it's amazing and doing all this and having the education behind it and experience, you know, you know exactly what to do with other people's kids, with your own kids, all of that training without the one domain. All of it goes out the window, right? And so it, the biggest thing I've learned is that just like they're trying to figure this thing out, I'm still trying to figure this thing out. I don't care how much of a professional I'm supposed to be or whatever, whatever the world would deem me to be, whatever that is, but they're always teaching that you're still learning, like Nick, you're still learning, you don't know. You know, and. They've taught me that there is, there is a reason to fight for the future. You know, I've always taken the stance that, you know, the future will be what it will be and it will, but the, the need to influence it, to do your part in your sphere of influence is critical. Like they are the reason that I make these videos and I'm like, you know what? There's somebody I need to impact because their generation is coming up behind it. And it's cliche as it sounds, man. It's if you sit back and really think about it, it's like, okay. What are we really fighting for? I mean, I'm really fighting for it. I want them to have a better world and it doesn't look like they're going to go into a better world. So it's one of two things. Do my part so I can not be a whiner, right? Do my part so I can know at the end of my days, whenever I check out in this place, I've done my part and to, to make it a better world for them. And then the other thing you can do is prepare them. For what they're going to walk into, which I think the world's not even prepared for what they're actually going to walk into. And so, you know, they've taught me that you don't know, but you got to prepare for what it is that you don't know. That's a good point of view.

JImmy: 9:01

The great point of view, because I often feel that as a whole, people like to fix the whole general scope of the problem, but they don't make their own bed. Right. Make her own bed first, and then you go out and, you know, go one step at a time. And if everybody takes care of themselves in that manner, I mean, essentially how you make a big change. And, you know,

Nick: 9:26

that kind of segues, I think pretty well, you know, you mentioned the one video that I talked about, um, that's a passion that. I really want to drive home across the board, and there's things that people across the board are doing, but even people in the black community, which is what that specific video was addressed to. That was really addressed to everybody, but it really specialized in the black community, talking about being willing to listen and to hear from people that are outside of your community that are different from you, that look different from you, and they have different views or experiences from you. I think that's important, man, because where we're going as a society. In my opinion, if you don't know how to communicate and you don't know how to derive information from multiple different sources, I mean, you're going to be, you're going to be in a world of hurt. And when I look at the black community. Especially, you know, yes, there's things that we still struggle and we still feel the after effects from, I mean, from slavery and just years of oppression and things. I get that. I accept it. People, you know, I don't run from that. That's a reality. And I would tell anybody who says, Oh, that happened so long ago. There's no effects. I say you're fooling yourself, but there's a whole nother side of this coin where we are still holding these things, um, the things of the past. We're allowing them to keep us in bondage from moving forward. You know, it's, it's, it's, it's a real possibility to acknowledge and understand, and even accept what happened in the past and the effects that we feel from it today, but still move forward. So we're not stuck in that same spot, you know, oppression, uh, disadvantage, uh, disenfranchisement. Those are not licenses to fail and stay still. Right. And, and what I see is. Just like black people have progressed and have changed and have matured and moved up and their ability and their access to things, you know, people who are not black, they've progressed as well. And so the notion of we can't receive anything and we can't receive information from people who are not black, especially white people. That's the craziest thing that you can ever accept. Because I know a ton of, listen, we built it. I mean, we went to school at Avery, right? In Danville, Virginia. If you look up the last Confederate Capitol, Danville was a very segregated, very racially driven place. I built a business in Danville, a black man in Danville, Virginia, right? Well, there's arguably more Confederate flags than American flags, which that's a whole nother conversation on what that actually means. But in the context of what we're talking about, you know, I've actually done this. This isn't me just talking. I actually built a business. Where we have multiple offices across Virginia now, out of little old confederate, confederate, last confederate capital, Danville, Virginia. And you know, who are some of the biggest helpers in that process? White people. I had black people help as well, but white people who care and work and many cases harder than a lot of the black people, the black constituents that I have, then the white people work harder to help other black wives get out of their negative and impoverished lifestyles. Why do you think that is? I think there's a couple reasons. So one, the reality of it is if a community is going to thrive, you're only going to be, you know, the old adage, you're only as strong as your weakest link. Where Danville and where society in general needs to go and arguably wants to go in many cases, they understand they have to raise the lower level income, the lower level lifestyles. They have to be, they have to help. Otherwise, you're just going to have a bigger gap that has and have not to grow even larger, which is what we're seeing today. And people are recognizing this. And so for, in order for the system to not collapse, you have to try to fight and save some type of middle class remove, you know, the have nots closer to the haves that's one piece, just from an economic standpoint, but you actually have some good hearted people out here that are like, look, we recognize that you guys are starting back at the 20 hour line and we're starting at 50 hour line, right? They recognize this. And there's people that are like, look, if we want to create a better world, we need to try to make up for some of the wrongs. And then for some people, a part of that effort is giving information saying, Hey guys, look, stop doing this because it's causing this to happen. How will we know? Because we understand the system. So we're trying to help you. But when there's too many people right now, especially in the black community, and this isn't a blanket statement, but there's a large enough population. That's being affected this way, that's hurting the overall population, if that makes sense. And so there's too many people in our current population that are like, no, I don't want to accept this truth. I don't like that. I don't like the truth that you're giving me coming from you. All right. So fatherlessness coming from black communities, simple statement, fathers, if you stay in the home, your families have a much better chance. Of staying together. Your children have a much higher chance of not being killed, of not being incarcerated. That's a fact. The data is there, right? I can say that. And some people might say, oh, he's, he's being an uncle Tom or sellout. Well, let a white person say that same thing. Oh, he's a racist. And that's a problem because that ideology of saying, oh, this white person says something that was true. Now they are racist. That ideology is what keeps the people who need that information the most from progressing forward. And that's what I'm saying there, you know, and that's kind of a higher level, generalized level of, of what I was trying to say. Um, and again, there's, there is racism. There are effects. I deal with it myself too. But overcome, I'm not a victim of it. I just understand there's things that we have to maneuver and, and get around and figure out how to work through, but I'm willing to work through it because for every, this is what I truly believe. This is a personal thing. And for every person who wants to keep me down, let's be specific because don't shop away from conversation, right? Yeah, that's right. For every white person that wants to hold me back or keep me down, I firmly believe and have experienced. There's two that want to help uplift me, but I can't see the other two if I'm focusing on that one. That's right. So I'm not negating that there's the one there. But in this day and time, I've experienced this, right? I've done this, built a business, created jobs, helped lives. There's that too is much stronger than that one, but we want to focus on them.

JImmy: 16:14

It's crazy It brings up that questions like where how do you? Overcome a belief system that big where you're taking a whole community and a whole belief system But it seems like the actions that you're taking are answering it because if you take If you take a belief system, you have a whole community or hope let's say a whole neighborhood that believes one thing Right you take you one person You do a different action than the beliefs. Once they see your success, you start changing beliefs. Now, that's a very small scale to work with, but what you're doing, but you get enough of the Nick Sturdivans and start doing the same things as you're doing, you're essentially creating a fucking, you're creating a movement. Right. Right. Like, so, and, and that's,

Nick: 17:04

yeah, go ahead. And that, that's the goal, right? I mean, that, that's what I want. I'm not just up here talking because I want fame. I, I'm, I'm not interested in fame, be honest with you. I prefer not to be famous. I like my privacy. Mm-hmm. but I also understand like I have a bigger mission. And here's the, the cool thing. You mentioned, the movement. I would say that movement is being created. I can't tell you how many times I've had people in my inbox, shoot me a text message, call me on the side, email, say, Hey man, I love what you're talking about, man, you say exactly what I've been saying. That's what I did. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but here's the difference. Here's the difference. You, you heard that and you took action and here we are today. Right. You graciously provided me with a platform to even talk about this. But you took action to do it. It's the difference between what you did and what all the nice messages, which I appreciate, but people say behind closed doors. You see what I'm saying? They don't have the, many of them don't have the drive, desire, don't want the smoke, I guess you would say, to step out there on the limelight and be like, look, what this guy is saying is actually right. But not

JImmy: 18:11

everybody has a podcast, Nick. How do they take action?

Nick: 18:15

Right. That's, that's good. That's good. Take action by physically going out. One social media for those, everybody's not a student and it feels comfortable speaking like that. I get that. But if you do put your voice to work, but you don't even have to be, you don't have to put your voice to work. There's plenty of organizations out there where you can put your hand to the plot and you can get out there and just, if you're a male, right? The easiest thing you can do is find another male. There's plenty of males out here who are fatherless. motherless, pretty females who out there who are fatherless, motherless, you know, and tell excuse me, just tell me a lot. Go spend time, go spend time, push, push a narrative that's different from what a lot of the music and what a lot of the TV shows and a lot of what a lot of the media is putting out there. Right. So instead of, let's say as a black male, I take pride in as a black male, you know, been blessed to have nice cars and stuff. And I like pulling up in a nice car around another bunch of group of black males. And what they don't hear is when I open up the door or as I'm pulling up, they don't hear profane language coming out of my stereo system. They don't hear things that are actually negatively talking about this community or the world or females. That's not the first thing they hear. They see a male, get it out. He's dressed appropriately. His pants are below his butt. Just the, just the little things, right. Who can still relate to them, but uphold a standard. And I don't have to say a word, but I know they like nice cars. I've been blessed to have a nice car, right? I pull up and this is what the presentation they get and what it happens every single time. What ends up ends up happening is they want to connect. They start talking, Hey man, how'd you get that? Hey, what do you do? Hey, who are you? And then now we're engaged in conversation. And they're like, hold up, this dude is doing it, this dude is doing it right now. He's finding, he's finding success. He's talking, he's not, he's not looking over his shoulder. Nobody's trying to take him out. Right, he's actually here to help us. And then at the end, I always say this. Hey guys, y'all be safe, I love you guys. And a lot of times, I can't say every time, that's the first time they've heard that from another man. Right. So it doesn't have to be an extravagant podcast, which I love your podcast man, it doesn't have to be that, it doesn't have to be shorts. It's just a matter of how are you conducting yourself out there? So then the question has to come, what if they don't know how to conduct themselves? What if, and there's a lot of people who want to do right, but don't know what right looks like. That's a real thing because now we're talking about generational breakdowns where you're on the second, third generation with no father alone. They've never seen what a, a two parent household looks like. They've never seen what a steady relationship looks like, you know, so they, they know they want to do better. They want to do different books. They don't know what to do. We've got to push information to them. You know, this is the information age. Google is a powerful thing if you use it the right way, right? I mean, I learned a ton of things by Google, YouTube, University, as I call it. I mean, there's a lot of stuff that there's, there's outlets, there's ways to do it. If you want to find out how to do something right way, you just have to take the action to find it and you can do it. And there's resources that are out there to point people in the right direction.

JImmy: 21:42

What do you think was, I mean, this is a pretty big and heavy movement that you're, you're in. What inspired you or what was the catalyst for you to get started with this

Nick: 21:53

initially? When you work in the field of human services and mental health long enough, you see some disturbing things, right? And then these disturbing things you start to correlate back to areas in your own life. That you saw growing up, maybe not directly experienced. Maybe you did experience, maybe you saw it, maybe you were around it. And then it starts making sense what the ripple effects is, which is why I named the channel that my YouTube channel ripple effect is, is. You get to see how the ripple effects go and they come out and then they cross over generations and they cross over, um, uh, segments, business segments, uh, sectors, you know, it's crazy how it works. And so in seeing that, I was like, okay, why, why is there such a demand for what I'm doing? You know, why is there, why is everybody talking about what they want to get done, but it's not actually happening? What are the ripple effects that are causing this? And seeing that man, um, from a broad perspective, that sounds like we've got to do something. And, um, on a personal level, I just think about growing up from from Newport, New Virginia. And seeing the different things and growing up in an environment where I saw more and that's, let me be very clear, my parents are the reason I was able to break that cycle, right, to get out of that mindset. So I want to give credit and honor to them. But also I come from a community in Newport News and even a lot of my family members where. We had that same mentality, that broken mentality, but I'll be honest with you. I was always proud to be a black guy. I am proud to be a black man. I wouldn't, I don't want to be anything else. I'm very proud of that. I love our culture. I love our, you know, who we are. And, but I remember growing up and I was a big soccer player. I play soccer. I love soccer. Right. So especially as a kid in our generation, probably the only black person on the team. In most cases, soccer wasn't as diverse as it is now, at least in America. And, um, I remember just sitting back watching and looking at white people saying, man, they're so happy. Like they're happy, not all, but like the people that I was around, I was like, why are they so happy? You know what I'm saying? And, and a lot of times in the black community, what you'll see is people who are, have money or who we assume have money or perceive that money. And especially who are white will say, oh, no, that's just the rich white folks. Right. I had to ask myself the question. I said, okay, maybe other rich white folk. Okay, cool. Let's say that's what they are. How did that happen? Right. How did that happen? And how does it continue to happen? What are some of the behaviors? So I started looking at the behaviors and listening to some of the things that they would say. And I'm like, Hmm, but they actually said it made sense, but I'm not hearing this in my community where I am. Right. So I'll pay attention to those things and I will see the people who were successful and I'll watch the people who were unsuccessful. I said, Huh, there's a pattern to this. Okay. A method to this whole process. And from that point, I would say then from that point, whether I realized it or not, that's when the, the journey really started for me. And then once I graduated and got into this field, um, I was like, huh. I really started to see it more. And, um, and just learned the, the process and the pattern, and then I applied it my own life. I saw that it worked and I saw that I could do that process pattern in a way that. One, push myself and my family's lifestyle up, but I can also bring up long people with me, you know, and create jobs and things. And so it's like now that I've done it and I'm doing it, why don't I take the responsibility on passing it forward and helping people do it as well?

JImmy: 25:44

That's awesome. I'm going to trigger you a little bit because you were looking at people with money. Do you think that money equals success or that money equals happiness?

Nick: 25:54

No, but it helps, right? So, I mean, you give me a room of 10 rich people and 10 people in extreme poverty, poverty, and you tell me who's happier, right? You have those, you have folks that are, oh, you know, you learn to be happy with what you have. I get that philosophy, but I also live in reality. Yes. I have 10 in my pocket and I'm hungry walking down the street. I know I can go to McDonald's and get, you know, some food. I don't have 10 of my feet in my pocket and I'm hungry. I'm walking on the same street. What am I going to do? It's like a fast. Yeah. You're fasting, you know, you get hope you're in your innovative fasting going or something. Right. So that's just the basic reality of it. And so, no, I don't think money equals success or happiness, but I also understand that money with the right perspective does create that or does help create that. When you see money as a tool to get to another means, a goal, that's when you can get into the fulfillment, the happiness, the success. But when you see money as the entity, money itself as an entity of happiness, that's when you, you, you run into problems and people get that, uh, conflicted a lot. They really get that confused. Uh, so directly to answer your question, no money does not equal happiness or success, but money, when it's seen as a tool and as a vehicle. That's how you can get closer to happiness and success. I

JImmy: 27:20

might've checked up on some of your, um, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Your videos. That's where I got that from.

Nick: 27:27

Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

JImmy: 27:30

No, I mean, that's, I feel, I feel the same exact way because I think you, you mentioned this when we first got started. And you probably experienced it a lot earlier than I have when you, when you grow in and you're growing your family money is it's almost like, that's the thing to go do is like, we get a bunch of money, but then we re you know, say we, we are successful and we get up into making a bunch of money. Is that when we're happy? And for me, the answer was no, because there are some other things. You know, I got tunnel visions like all right family kids I mean, there's the you know There's so many different paths that we have success in but if it's just focused on the career and the money then Nobody else is happy. You might have a bunch of you know, a bunch of money in your in your bank account But nobody's happy,

Nick: 28:19

right? I mean they don't publicize it but a lot of your suicides are from people who are before right you think about the 0708 crash Suicide rates for people, people who were close to the 1 percent were outrageous, you know, because again, their money was a source of their happy, you know, um, you can't, you can't do that. You know, one of the greatest books in the world and to me, or it says cash, the glance, their riches, and they're gone, you know, they'll sprout out, uh, wings and fly away. And so, you know, you cash, you cast a glance at riches and, and they can be gone like that. So that can't be a source of happiness. You know, um, I'll tell you what's happiness for me. And I use this as a tool. This is from using money as a tool. Happiness for me is having, you know, multiple people on your team who are sub 20 or excuse me, sub 30, who are, have been at six figures for years, you know, um, who have created more jobs and more opportunities for people coming out of college to have good paying jobs, you know, coming out of college in Danville, Virginia, in Lynchburg, Virginia, and rural Virginia areas. Coming out of college as a 22 year old, you know, making 60, 70 grand, you know, to start off out the gate now, good money is relative, right? So good money to one person may not be another, but I can tell you if I came out of college making 70 grand, that would have been a good day for me living in Danville. Yeah, that would have been a good day to start off with and to give them a foundation to excel from. That's success. That's happiness. The house, cars, the ability to do different things, you know, trips, that's all well and good. And it's something I'm thankful for, but that's not success. That's not happiness. Um, happiness is bringing, for me, happiness and success is bringing others along with you. And being a man enough or a woman enough to stand up for a cause that you believe in, that's rooted in helping other people. I think that's the big thing on my end, and I give grace to God and thanks to God for that to happen, because that's, that's the core of why everything is working. Absolutely. Well,

JImmy: 30:31

I mean, it seems like... You have done a lot. You've, you've had to overcome some kind of challenges or a moment that has been extremely challenging. What do you think that's been so far? Maybe since college?

Nick: 30:47

Yeah. Yeah. Um, it's easy. So for the first step was, you know, in college is when I made the decision. But the first step, the real step was, and the most important step was really committing to live for Christ. Right? I don't, and I don't mean being this Bible thumper walk around. No, that's not what Jesus was about. If you ask, if you actually read the Bible, um, that's not what Jesus was about. Um, and if I have one subgroup that I have the biggest beef with, that'd be frustration with it's the Christian population. Because we're so full of religion and that relationship, which is what the Bible calls. Half the people didn't call themselves Christian. I'm not going to say half, but a lot of people that walk around and call themselves Christians have no idea what the Bible actually said. No idea because their mindsets are completely. Opposite to what the Bible actually talks about. So the first piece was the first, I won't say struggle, but the first obstacle I had to really commit to was, okay, Nick, are you going to be a man that's going to stand for Christ, even through all the ridicule and even through the new age times now where people say, people believe in God, you're crazy, God in the sky, whatever. Cool. I can live with all that. That's cool. I had to make that decision. Um, that was the first piece, but it was the most critical piece because I would go through struggles. Um, you know, the process of starting our company because, you know, we were, we were living large, man. I was doing well at Verizon, had money in the bank, had, we're saying all the right religious Christian stuff. All guys got it. When we do it, all the stuff people throw out there. Right. And so we jumped out, went, uh, jumped out and went into full business for ourselves. And I'm watching this bank account just dwindle down, dwindle down. You know, go from six figures to five figures to four figures, three figures down to 768 or 86. Excuse me. It's my name was a newborn child. My son was just born a mortgage student loans, which again, if I had all that money, why didn't I pay off my student loans? Right. It's not that we don't talk about, um, mortgage newborn. I mean, all that stuff, car payment, 786 or name. And I remember having the conversation. I was like, Noah, God, your word tells me that you're a guy that you can't lie. So at this moment, if you don't come through, that means you've lied and you can't lie. That was the first time in my life I ever held God to his own word, which is what we're supposed to do when we pray. All prayer is, is just saying his word back to him because he's a king, right? The Christian faith is a kingdom. It's not a democracy. Right. That's what the American public has a problem with. They don't understand. Like, we don't like something we voted out. Now, when the King speaks, is it this or this? And that's just what it's going to be. Right. And so I understood that. So I said, you said this, so you're bound to your own word because you create the system to be that way. And so I said, if you don't come through, you lie. So my family, everything that we're dealing with is not responsibility. I've done what I'm supposed to do. It's on you now. And from that point, business exploded. And it created other businesses and would lead to other businesses and consultant business in a trucking company to now a baseball team. Right. And so it's, that was the big piece and during that journey. And during that journey, man, it will be other obstacles. Um, and, and, you know, my heart goes, I feel that in a different way, man, when I say this, you'll resonate, but you know, mother was diagnosed with cancer. Um, so going through that process, um, and unless you've gone, I don't wish that on anybody. But unless you've gone through that process, like it changes you, right? It changes you. It changed the way your perspective on a lot of things, including family. And so going through that and still pushing through and, um, you know, going through that process and by the grace of God, she, she was able to pull through, um, but the process. It's different. It's unspeakable. And we sell on anybody. Yeah, it's it's it's real man. Um, and so going through that and maintaining your sanity and maintaining your grounding and losing some of it at a time. Right? I mean, let's be real here going through that and still bouncing back. That was, uh, that was a big deal for me, man, and losing friends as you elevate, people think they think it's sexy to be in entrepreneurship and business and be successful and more people will hit on you for being successful than they will for you being poor or popular or not, or, you know, broker or whatever you deem success in this case, in this context for being successful financially and resource wise, people will find reasons to try to hit on you for that, um, it won't bat an eye at you when you're in need or in lack.

JImmy: 35:32

Dude, sometimes family. I mean, sometimes family are very close friends, but you're right.

Nick: 35:38

Yeah, family and close friends are the worst, bro. Because you hold them close to your heart, man.

JImmy: 35:45

I mean, you got family members who can be like, Hey, go back and drink with us. Remember when you used to drink all the time?

Nick: 35:52

Yeah, it's kind of a gift and a curse sometimes, right? So like sometimes when you hit certain levels of success and you're in different circles, you look for opportunities of just what I would call normalcy. Well, sometimes like when I go back into, I'm around my cousins and stuff, I love it because they just know me as Nick, my younger cousin, older cousin, I'm just Nick and it's a blessing. But at the same time, sometimes you have to check family because. They don't see you as that professional. There's times you have to change your lenses. You're not talking to Nick, your cousin, son, brother, whatever it may be. You're talking to Nick, the president of this company. And so I'm looking at something at a different vantage point and that part is tough because just because you moved doesn't mean everybody else has moved along with you.

JImmy: 36:38

Which is, again, it's sad but sometimes just a it's like a harsh

Nick: 36:45

reality. It is, man. I like harsh reality. That's what it is. But you have to be willing to accept it. Otherwise you'll get stuck, that crab in a barrel mentality and generations later you're in the same spot. Dog,

JImmy: 37:03

you, you're, I don't, I wouldn't say like you've made it, I would say probably you're on your come up because you ain't done yet. Your book's, your book's not, you know, it's not your last chapter. But, um, I mean, what's, um, what's coming up in the future? Like, where can people find you? How do they follow you on social media? Like, give us all the, all the details there, man, because... Like the word that you're speaking right now, again, more people need to hear that.

Nick: 37:30

Right, right. I, I, first of all, I appreciate the platform and, um, and invite me on it. I love what you're doing. I was listening to the other episode and they're awesome. It's just, it's good stuff. And, um, you can find me on a YouTube ripple effect, one, four, three, that's by design one, four, three. I love you. Um, I believe, and you got to share love. You know, um, ripple effect one, four, three and YouTube ripple effect on Facebook. Uh, Nick Sturtevant, I have ripple effect on Instagram. I haven't pushed it that much. I've just been pushing everything out on Nick Sturtevant. I'm an open book. I have nothing to hide. So Nick Sturtevant on Instagram. Um, you can find my books at, on Amazon, Barnes and Noble. I would say the best way to go about it is going through outskirtspress. com. Um, it's outskirtspress. com slash 5PHE for the five phases of human engagement. Or, uh, outskirtspress. com slash the center of influence, which is the first book I wrote back in 2015, I believe it is. And yeah, you can get those there. Um, you're going to see a ton more videos. The big one's going to be on YouTube. That's my big push right now. YouTube and Instagram. Uh, and I'll share it on Facebook as well, but YouTube and Instagram is the big platforms I'm really going after. And, um, yeah, man, I'm excited. Got some speaking events coming up. So you'll see some footage from that. It's, it's, I'll say this really quick. What's cool, man, is 20 seconds is What's cool is, you know, in a couple weeks, I'll be speaking at the Virginia superintendent's conference, you know, so I'm about changing systems and getting in front of systems. So to have a large population of Virginia superintendents in one room when you get to talk and influence them and let them know that you understand what they're going through and what their world looks like and how we can help. Like, that's what it's about, man. It's the positive influence that's going to help others. That's, that's where we are, man. They need

JImmy: 39:20

more of you, Nick. I can't, I can't thank you enough. I'm glad we were able to reconnect, man. I'm so glad you're doing so good, man. I love your movement and, uh, we need to hear more from you, man. I say we follow up in like six months, brother.

Nick: 39:34

Let's do it, man. I'll be glad. Just look, you know, where to find me, man. I'm here, bro. I feel you. I

JImmy: 39:39

appreciate

Nick: 39:40

it, brother. All right. Hey, great to see you, man. You're looking well, man.