Life22

Kevin Dougherty: All right. So gang today we have

Kevin Dougherty: Mr. Rick Walker, and we're going to go over his newest book 9 steps jeez.

Kevin Dougherty: I don't have it right in front of me. It's a pretty long one, Rick. You want to take it from here on the intro of your book.

Rick Walker: Yeah. Yeah. The book's called 9 steps to build a life of meaning, how to unlock your mind, happiness, power, and your enemy's demise.

Kevin Dougherty: Which.

Kevin Dougherty: like I told you, prior to jumping on here, I've I like 10 pages from finishing it. I think it's it's very enlightening.

Kevin Dougherty: So one of my 1st questions, when I, when I see a title like that, though, is like how enemies demise, how many people have enemies nowadays! And then you go to read the book, and that kind of got me into reading the book like, who is the enemy? What are we talking about here, you know, and and you go to read the book, and you find out that you've got to pick an enemy

Kevin Dougherty: which leads me into one of my 1st questions for you, which is, Who is.

Kevin Dougherty: how do you pick an enemy.

Rick Walker: Yeah. Great question, great question.

Rick Walker: The

Rick Walker: the pontificators and the theologians and the philosophers and the psychologists will will tell you from their learned state that you have to have a vision of. What do you want to happen? You have to have goals, you have to build up tactics and objectives, and I think that's fine for a lot of people. But I think for a lot of men that are sort of 25 to 45, Kevin, that we don't know what we want. We were never shown anything that we want, and so we got to figure out a way to to get to start moving, even though we don't know what direction we want to go.

Rick Walker: And one of my big thesis is that we have to pick an enemy like you said, but how do we pick an enemy? How do we get that? Get that thing that'll be willing to drive us?

Rick Walker: And I submit for your consideration that your enemy, the best enemy, is that one thing that breaks your heart the most

Rick Walker: that one manifest evil out in the world, that you see it may be that sex trafficking site.

Rick Walker: that pornography site, that traffics minors that doesn't respect them. It may be that the traffickers of humans, it may be certain types of drugs that are in our country illegally that devastate family members of yours. There's some manifest evil in each of our lives, and if we don't know what we want out of our lives. The best thing to do is to pick a worthy enemy that breaks your heart, and if it's a high enough enemy. If it's an evil enough

Rick Walker: enemy, and you're right hard enough about your attack of it. You will somehow, in some way. I can't explain how this happens, you will, you will receive divine resources more than you can fathom, and if you can cobble together the competency to go and fight that enemy. It'll revolutionize your life if you haven't. If you haven't, you know, seen an ounce of meaning yet, and that's 1 way that's step one of how to get some meaning in our life is, pick a word the enemy, and that's how you do. You look for the manifest evil you see around you, and you just go attack it.

Kevin Dougherty: Right, and that that makes a lot of sense. Because I was, gonna say, when you 1st started giving your answer there, the 1st thing that came to mind was, and I'm drawing a blank on his name.

Kevin Dougherty: Feel like his name was Tim. It was the the guy who did who was responsible for the

Kevin Dougherty: what is it? The sound of silence.

Kevin Dougherty: the the movie that came out through Angel Studios like last year the year before.

Rick Walker: Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Rick Walker: The actor, Jim Caviezel.

Kevin Dougherty: The the one that Jim Caviezel played correct. Yeah, the real life guy. I've watched him be interviewed by, you know, like Candace Owens when she was with the Daily Wire and stuff like that, and just the fact that his message and what he was doing spoke to me, and I'm sure millions of other people out there that saw his podcast

Kevin Dougherty: and to me, that's that's the easiest way. If you can pick an evil. You know an enemy that that calls out to the most amount of people as well like, I guess if you peak you pick a weaker enemy, I guess you're not going to get as much moral support from those around you.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's a couple. I call them kind of protected classes within the Judeo-christian tradition is, one is orphans. So children that can't defend themselves. They don't have anyone to take care of them. The other one is widows, you know, older lady that aren't married. Maybe they've got some kids. But the kids aren't taking proper care of. And so these are sort of 2 protected classes, and I believe that if you can, if you can come to the defense of one or both of those classes in your objective fight against evil

Rick Walker: like in that movie, you

Rick Walker: just you get a special type of energy, and you have more people that are wanting to come to your aid and help you. And I think there's there's more of a sort of reward for that for that work, for for doing that. And so that's I think that's what we're looking for. We're looking for the the greatest possible evil to the most vulnerable

Rick Walker: and within our society, and if you can, if you compare those 2 things up, then you've got some hope to be able to move. Once you move, you'll be able to perhaps glimpse a vision. It might come weeks, it might come years later. We can get a vision of what's possible for your life.

Kevin Dougherty: Sure, of course. No, that's now there is

Kevin Dougherty: So throughout the book, this is actually probably not not an important question, but like throughout the book you mentioned. Like, I'm speaking to you as if

Kevin Dougherty: not as a religious man.

Kevin Dougherty: but as and then you reference, you reference. But throughout the entire book. You reference Christ a lot. And then you say, Hey, you know, as Christ was not a religious man. If I think I'm quoting that right, as Christ was not a religious man, but He was.

Kevin Dougherty: but he found. You know you follow these. I now I'm stumbling so.

Rick Walker: Oh, yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah, it was. It was the religious that killed Christ. Right? If you if you go back, and you and you read the New Testament. It's always the religious people that Christ is fighting against. They're always the enemy.

Rick Walker: And so I think you know a lot of us start to think that you know we have to go with and find our religion while finding our religion is the same thing that sort of killed the the epitome of all of all the religions, the most perfect man that ever existed, sort of follow it from a philosophical standpoint, not even look at the religious. But look at the philosophical standpoint.

Rick Walker: And so I think that that's that's what it is. So we've got to get our. We have to sort of get our minds extracted from the idea that that in order to sort of get our lives in order, we have to follow a religion. It's more following a way. So we're not following people. We're following the highest possible person or master or objective that we can. We can get our get our heads around. And

Rick Walker: for a lot of us that have sort of fallen that out from, not from a religious standpoint, but from a psychological and also a philosophical standpoint. They all sort of point to the same same man.

Kevin Dougherty: Right. I was gonna say, because you and you and you point that out in the book, too, is what was it? Is it. Step 2, find you must find yourself a master.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: Look at that? I, yeah.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, yeah, so.

Kevin Dougherty: If you find yourself a master, that's you're speaking to people, you know, assumedly, men from 25 to 45, and I don't. You're not going to find too many 25 year olds that want to serve somebody else.

Kevin Dougherty: And and I think that's a tough concept. Step 2 is going to be a tough one to break into that industry.

Rick Walker: Yes, yeah. The idea that we want to serve ourselves is a common. I would see it as a misconception. I think we all assume that other people that we see around are sort of self serving the problem with that. And this is this is my argument is that we don't necessarily want to sell our

Rick Walker: serve ourselves. What we want to do is we want to do the ricky bobby thing we want to pray to the the God that we would like to have. I want to imagine. I want to pray to a baby Jesus, or the Jesus wearing angel's wing and singing lead for Leonard Skinner. I want to believe in the God that would never let anything bad like that happen to me. If God really existed, this priest would not have done that. We start inventing these gods that we would like to exist. Now some of us don't articulate it that way. Some of us live our lives in a way that

Rick Walker: if there was something really higher and something more supernatural beyond nature.

Rick Walker: that then we would expect conditions to be a certain way. Right? We're we're inventing the conditions that if we were God, that's how we would invent reality. Right? We do those 2 different ways.

Rick Walker: The problem is that is, if we don't. If we don't pick a mass to serve, the other half of that rule is, one will be thrust upon you.

Rick Walker: Pick a master, or one will be thrust upon you, and you will thrust it upon yourself by inventing your own God to serve. And the reason we do that is, we're looking for an excuse. We're looking for someone else to blame that if we set up this fictional god, this this God that would have created reality this way, without any pain, without any cancers for kids.

Rick Walker: You know a God that we invent on our own. We can then blame that God when things don't go right, and we don't take the blame ourselves

Rick Walker: because we're weak. It's it's worse than we expected. We expected it that we would be able to set up ourselves as gods, and that would be that that would be sort of the counterpoint to the picking the master. But it's even weaker than that we have to invent our own God, invent our own reality, that a God of our own invention would create. And we blame that person because we're too weak to accept the responsibility ourselves.

Kevin Dougherty: Right, and we subjugate our agency to some, to something else.

Kevin Dougherty: Right? That yes, and that makes a lot of sense. So and so, you know. I I struggle with this all the time. Right? That whole. That theory that

Kevin Dougherty: you can't do a good thing because it's selfish. Right? Does it make you feel good, that you just did a good thing. And I think you talk about that in your step 6 or 7, where you discuss, like donating the things that you own, but you almost want to do it anonymously, so that people don't know it's you, because it takes away that self.

Kevin Dougherty: that self gratification like you get the gratification, sure. But then other people don't know that it was you. So at least

Kevin Dougherty: you try to pull yourself back from the selfishness of it.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that step is concerning the idea that nothing that you have not given away will ever really be yours. That's a line from Lewis. I'll repeat that again. I'll repeat that again, because there's someone that's going to want to memorize that and quote it back to somebody else.

Rick Walker: Nothing that you have not given away will ever really be yours. It's the same story of every seed that's ever become a tree to give shade and fruit. It's the same story of every man that's ever made an investment with an entrepreneur to hope to outperform inflation right if he kept the money for himself. All of his money would get eaten away by inflation. But he's got to invest. He's got to give it away for a time.

Rick Walker: The other people to grow. This is the same story where men, the only way that we're going to ever build any confidence in our work, and what we love is to give it away. We have to give it away in practice to people that are least deserving. The only way that we're not going to become selfish like you talked about is to give it away, because whenever we give away the blessings that we have the money, the talent, the home that we live in. We. We allow other people to come in, and we welcome them as as great neighbors.

Rick Walker: Whenever we give that away. We prove to ourselves that a we don't need the money. And B. We prove to others that that

Rick Walker: there's that there's someone out there that actually cares for them that wants to take care of them. And you model that hospitality, you monitor that generosity out in the world. And if you can figure out a way like you said of doing that anonymously.

Rick Walker: You remove the ability for any gratitude to come back your way, and there's some good mechanisms for doing that. But you remove you remove that benefit. If you can do something entirely for someone else's benefit and not for your own benefit. And it's something that happens to hurt you. It removes resources from your pocket, you begin to take part in the divine

Rick Walker: experience of living as if you were God with infinite resources. It's it's a it's a self fulfilling prophecy that whatever you get you get back.

Rick Walker: it's also called the law of reciprocity as well. It comes in a number of different forms.

Kevin Dougherty: I was going to say. I've heard the story before, and I'm not much of a religious guy. So that's where I like. I falter on some of the Scripture and stuff. But I know that. What is it you give a man 10 shekels. Is that what it is? And it comes back at 500 or something like that, and it was an unintended. You didn't do it for the return on the on the charity.

Kevin Dougherty: but it does come back full circle.

Rick Walker: Yeah, so yeah, yeah, that's right. That's right. Well, it's also the pathway to love. Right? If if you never give your life to someone else. I saw one of the podcasts where you had. I think you had your son with you on your lap. You know, if you never give your life away to somebody else. You're never really going to have a life

Rick Walker: right like that. That's the nature of of an all-encompassing love like a love worth living for is is that you got to give your life in order to actually live one.

Kevin Dougherty: Right? No, for sure, and that falls into part of it. Some people say, Well, you're selfish, because you, you know, and that's the way of the world nowadays. Everybody wants to. Well, if you, if you go out in the world and you're capitalist like you're damn near crucified, you know, because it's like, Well, you're out there just making money for other people, for yourself. And it's like, Well, yeah. But charity starts at home. So first, st I'm

Kevin Dougherty: I'm doing this for my wife and my my sons and my daughters right? So I want to make sure that they're taken care of, and I want to do all these other things. And it's like, Yeah, is it selfish for me to, you know, to buy some beer on a Friday night, after a long week of work. Well, yeah, it is a little selfish, but you know what

Kevin Dougherty: to each their own right. But then the other side of it is that, like majority of my paycheck, goes to keeping my businesses afloat, keeping my ventures afloat because they are the spigot that sustains my family, and

Kevin Dougherty: that's the least selfishness. Part of it is that it's for my family. Yes, it's my family. Yes, that is a little selfish right? It's not your family, but it's still like, it's somebody else. Right? It's a master to serve. It's the how can you give your life off?

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah. So.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. I mean, if you can't take care of the people within your walls, how are you ever take care of the people outside your walls. And so, yeah, I think that's that's right. 100.

Kevin Dougherty: So yeah, and as my like, and I've noticed that as as my businesses have been getting stronger, I try to do these these little things for customers, and you know what I mean. People that seem to be a little bit like

Kevin Dougherty: less fortunate right? And that's and I. I didn't put it in to actual practice, like I guess I did put it into practice. I put it into practice just

Kevin Dougherty: unintentionally. Just it felt right. So I might just do it.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, that's that's the that's the way that's the way it works, because the more we can get our eyes off of ourselves, the better we're gonna be off. Yeah, yeah, that's right.

Kevin Dougherty: And so I guess

Kevin Dougherty: one of my. So one of my other thoughts was, I guess, going back to that second question I had for you. Are you like? You seem to have a lot of like

Kevin Dougherty: knowledge into obviously the great, you know, the the

Kevin Dougherty: you know, the the Greek philosophy, the stuff that you know. Alexander the Great was he the student of? He was the student of

Kevin Dougherty: the student of Aristotle, right? He was a student of Aristotle, who was a student of Plato. Right? So that was. But you seem to have a lot of like Greek background. And then you reference a lot of Biblical things. And then in turn, Cs. Lewis, who what started as an atheist, and then found Christ, and

Kevin Dougherty: in towards the end of his career.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: Where does that put you on the spectrum? Because I noticed you make a lot of those references, do those?

Kevin Dougherty: I don't. I don't mean to get too personal with you, but I mean, are you?

Kevin Dougherty: I think, the last part I left off in your book. You were the Roman Catholics say this, which I am not, and so.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah. So you're not.

Kevin Dougherty: Roman Catholic.

Rick Walker: Yeah, so

Rick Walker: I I am someone that aspires to be a good Christian, but I'm not a good Christian.

Rick Walker: Just me me personally.

Rick Walker: I'm not very good at whatever at whatever I am.

Rick Walker: I think that you know, so I can. So this is my 1st book, and I and and you've probably read a little bit about my biography, but, like from the listeners that don't know I you know I was. I grew up very poor. You see that like right off the bat my dad and I were out of work. We're we're trying to hustle and make some money and.

Kevin Dougherty: It's a big portion of that 1st part of the book. Yeah.

Rick Walker: That's right, that's right. That's right. And so we're trying to figure our way financially in the world. And you know, in

Rick Walker: a decade later I've got 400 employees. I'd start with 0 400 employees. I scaled another business into 6 States, scaled a nonprofit

Rick Walker: the next decade in the 50 plus countries. But in that in that 20 year time period, 1520 year time period, I had to do a lot of reading a lot of thinking a lot of reflection, a lot of conversations with people that knew better than I, and realizing that there are other people out there that know better than you is probably half the battle right like, if you

Rick Walker: and so and so the more I studied, the more I read, the more I learned, the more I realized that you had all of these domains, whether it be not not just religion, not even like not even go look at, look at Hinduism, look at Buddhism. Look at Islam.

Rick Walker: You look at all those things, but then you go outside of religion. You start looking at things like like physics and gravity. And you look at ancient literature. You look at philosophy, you look at psychology, and they all seem to be pointing toward the same.

Rick Walker: the same sort of situation there, and it's the most.

Rick Walker: the strongest possible man becoming the weakest possible man to provide the greatest possible benefit for the most undeserving people

Rick Walker: like. That's what it all sort of boils down to, and I go back and like hell, I was trying to invent something I was trying to. I was thinking I was going to find something new by reading all these books. I go back, and it's the same. It's the same story that I learned in my parents would take me to Vacation Bible school when I was 5.

Kevin Dougherty: It's like, there's, it's like.

Rick Walker: I can't win. I can't invent something new.

Rick Walker: There's not so.

Kevin Dougherty: Isn't that the saying? There's nothing new under the sun.

Rick Walker: Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Kevin Dougherty: Exact thing that you just described, that that whole like that path actually sounds like what the job that Elon Musk just gave up.

Kevin Dougherty: the strongest man becoming the weakest man, becoming, for the most.

Kevin Dougherty: See the.

Rick Walker: Reserving, yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: The most undeserving people, the people that are trying to crucify him. Yeah, it's it's very just finding similarities there. I'm a big elon fan as well. So.

Rick Walker: Oh, yeah, yeah, I have 2. I have 2 Teslas. Oh, yeah. My wife and my daughter both drive both drive model. X's the one with the falcon wing doors.

Kevin Dougherty: Oh, man!

Rick Walker: Those are. Those are the best cars ever, too, because you never take them in for service. There's no oil changes. They used to make you bring it in once a year. Like to check the brake pads and stuff like that. Not anymore, they said, don't worry about it. I've got one. It's 8 years old, and hasn't been in for any service or anything in like 4 years.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah, see?

Rick Walker: The gas station? Nothing. Yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah, and that's I was telling the misses. I said that should be. Our next one is like the Cybertruck, and she's like, Oh, they just. She doesn't like the way they look, and you know I got to defer to her for the decor. Right so. And we have a construction company. We have a tool rental business. We have all these different ventures going on, and it's like, Well, I don't like trucks, but you know you've got to have an avalanche and a Ford F. 350 to haul tools and equipment around. You know you got to have the service vans.

Kevin Dougherty: I drive a 3 quarter ton arm. You know the the Nissan Armada, because I can fit my whole family in it, and I can still use it for work, so it's I. The Cybertruck would probably make sense. But I don't know what I would do about

Kevin Dougherty: I don't know what I do about a Tesla, you know, like a smaller.

Kevin Dougherty: Maybe that's why I told the missus, I said, you know what the best thing to do is, I'm going to buy one of those optimus bots when they release them to the general public, because I can get more use out of that than I would. You know a vehicle. That would just be my fun car.

Rick Walker: Yes, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. No. I think that. I think that's right. Like,

Rick Walker: it's tough to find like I bought. So I I drive a sprinter van for my daily driver.

Kevin Dougherty: Oh, there you go!

Rick Walker: Yeah. And that which is the classic work truck, right? I've got.

Rick Walker: Oh, yeah.

Rick Walker: passenger seats in it as well. But the wife is not happy about that. So, yeah, yeah. And when you drive something your wife's not happy with you, hear about it every day. So yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: Oh, everyday. Yeah, I've been telling her we need to get one of those big, big Mercedes big passenger vehicles. We'll take some of the seats out in the back. And we'll I was like, then I can just have my podcast on the go, Honey, she's like

Kevin Dougherty: just staring at me because, like this is more, this is my hobby. And so

Kevin Dougherty: she's not a huge fan of my hobby, but she knows that everybody's everybody's gonna have their hobbies.

Rick Walker: Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. That's right.

Rick Walker: Well, that's cool. That's cool. Yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah, so

Kevin Dougherty: man, so all right. So you're so from up coming from humble beginnings to writing your 1st book. I see Dan Crenshaw. That's what caught me, too. You put it on the cover. Dan Crenshaw did the forward for your book.

Kevin Dougherty: and that's because at 1st I was like, who is Rick Walker? Why am I getting this book?

Kevin Dougherty: And

Kevin Dougherty: and so then I you know you start reading it. And so you know, and and he does a pretty good job of introducing you at the beginning of your book, which I think is great, that, you know.

Kevin Dougherty: Like I said, you're a humbling guy. So I mean, even even a competitor in a political race is

Kevin Dougherty: is right in your forward.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah. How was how was your political race? I know you talk about it in the book. More lessons learned than.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah. A lot of lessons learned, you know, when you put yourself out there. And there's going to be a definite winner loss at the end of it, which is definitely what a political race is. There's always an election. There's a winner, there's a there's 1 winner, and there's a bunch of losers. You learn some lessons, and you work harder than than you would normally work for the most part.

Rick Walker: But you also.

Rick Walker: if you keep it about yourself, which is what a lot of politics is. You begin to ignore people that you're supposed to be loving and spending time with, and I found that that was true with with my family, with my business, everything that I made it about me, and it was actually ended up being a benefit that I that I had actually lost it was probably the greatest

Rick Walker: embarrassment of my life.

Rick Walker: I received a you know, a text message from with a screenshot of Nbc. National news. And that's that's what I found out that I lost.

Rick Walker: And and so to lose on national news is a pretty pretty striking thing. It's not something that's typical. But knowing that you're you're definitely like, I am definitionally, literally a loser and trying to pick yourself back up from that. That's something that could either really break someone or it can really, you know, make you much, much stronger. And it broke me for a time.

Rick Walker: It broke me for a time, and it hurt my marriage because my wife's thinking, hey, we're going to move to DC. She's working on the Nanny. She's working on trying to find another house up there, you know. All the polling shows that, hey? We're, you know. We've got a good shot at this.

Rick Walker: and it just it just wasn't meant to be. And I think the practice of getting in there and making relationships, you know, asking for money, asking for people to volunteer for you. I think that was that was actually very, very beneficial. I owed a lot of favors afterwards, but it was definitely beneficial. But

Rick Walker: to be the type of man who's willing to take on a public

Rick Walker: loss like that like you're probabilistically. If you got more than one other person running it, you're probably going to lose. I think that I think that helps in the end. But you don't see it while you're in the midst of it. You don't definitely see it in the devastation afterwards. It takes some time before you're able to reflect back at that and see how that effect grew. You.

Kevin Dougherty: Right. No, I've had my fair share of politics. I was on the local Common Council for 5 years.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah.

Rick Walker: So those meetings on your Youtube channel? Yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah, yeah, I was the one I'm big on transparency. So I like to have the conversation. I like to have the you know what I mean. Let's try to bring honesty to the forefront. And it's like, what are we doing? We're just having these meetings. What about people who can't attend. Why is there no public record? You're expecting the local secretary to, you know the the administrator to sit there and hand type every single word you said, no, they're putting the gist down so they don't get to. And there's with text there is no

Kevin Dougherty: tone. You don't have that like. Well, you know, I've been in finance meetings where you get heated. You're screaming at somebody over public transportation. And then the next day you come back at it, and it's like.

Kevin Dougherty: We're perfectly fine, and you don't see that until you start recording the meetings. So

Kevin Dougherty: they record all of the local meetings since I've left but I was the guy that would just come on and just set a camera down a 3 60 camera and just said, Here, we're doing a public record if you need it, I'm foil able. You can foil anything that I have. But I'm posting it online so you shouldn't have to get a copy.

Rick Walker: Yeah, what? What was your biggest lesson from that experience?

Kevin Dougherty: It's never ending. But one of the biggest ones that comes to mind right off the bat is, it's it's never ending right like you try to like. You want to remodel your bathroom right like, but nobody ever thinks about

Kevin Dougherty: beyond that right like. Now you're using the bathroom, and 10 more years goes on, and then it's time to remodel the bathroom again. Right? It's like, I'm there for 5 years. What did I accomplish? Well, I did this, this, this and that. And then the problem is, things change. Houses get older. Blight comes back up in another neighborhood and the same tools. They just don't you know it's a constant battle, and like

Kevin Dougherty: you can only do it for so long like you could be a lifetime a lifer doing it. It just wasn't.

Kevin Dougherty: I love politics, but I'm not. I don't know. I don't know if I could just be in that seat every day. It's nice to

Kevin Dougherty: as George. Like as you talked about with George Washington. It's nice to just kind of relinquish the throne. Let somebody else have a turn at it, get some change. Get some things moving, you know, some fresh blood. So.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah. You know, I've met a lot of people that have had a lot of elected positions. I probably have, like in the last year or so I probably have had

Rick Walker: 20 members of Congress call my cell phone or text me. And and so, you know, I've had. You know, I've had. The Secret Service has been in this room 5 times like in this room. We're sitting right now. I've known some really powerful people that have some really high positions, and I don't say that to brag. What I say that to say is that there's a lot of people in politics that they like the politics, because they want to be able to serve others, and they also get a little bit of the

Rick Walker: the pride from being the one that's actually out there serving the person on the front line person that people see. I don't know if there's anything wrong with that, necessarily. But I can tell you that the overwhelming majority of them, no matter whether you're at the local level or the very, very highest levels of the Federal Government.

Rick Walker: they don't really enjoy it for too long. But a lot of them don't have marketable skills that they could go out and have a construction company or tool rental business to fall back on, and so they really have to stay. If they can't stay, they're just devastated.

Kevin Dougherty: Right, right? And actually, and that was the one thing I took with me because I stepped down from there. I still run the site. I still have my businesses, my investments, and the rental properties, and all the other stuff that I'm into. But I stepped down from that position to be the local Hvac technician for the city government.

Kevin Dougherty: And so, like, I took my skill set. And I was like, you know what the one thing was. I think I can. I think I can do better for the city, not making the decisions, handing the reins over to somebody else, and then try to fix

Kevin Dougherty: stuff behind the scenes, save our community money. Try to. You know what I mean. And

Kevin Dougherty: and at 1st it was, you know, you just run into all these other issues, though you see all the other people that are like, I'm doing it almost altruistically. Yeah, they're cutting me a paycheck. But that's so that I can do this and not have to go work another job and try to volunteer doing this.

Kevin Dougherty: And

Kevin Dougherty: there's not a lot of people that are that work for government that want have that same altruism. They don't want to do it for the same, you know. Selfless reasons. They're just. Nope. The Union gives me this job, and I have this job, and it's great, and they should pay me more.

Kevin Dougherty: and it's like, and then when they go home, it's like, Oh, screw that place! That's just the place I work for, you know, and you just get that mentality, and it's like

Kevin Dougherty: it. It just it drives me bonkers, but you know that's just me.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, I think the problem with a lot of us that are in that situation is, we think, too recent. We think we think about next week. Next year we think about the pension in 15 years. We think about all this all this near term stuff like we're thinking about the recent offenses recent use. We're reading recent books. But the further we can go back

Rick Walker: and read and study from the ancients like we talked about earlier, the more that's gonna help us to look forward to more distant future. So if you can think, instead of thinking about next year or your pension in 15 years you can think about your grandkids well-being in 50 years.

Rick Walker: Well, then, you begin to be able to make a life and think about things that will make your life more relevant because you start to live in a way that people that come after you will look back and have lessons learned. And so the more we can expand and look further in the future and further into the past, the more relevance we're going to have with our lives.

Rick Walker: But again when we we start thinking about

Rick Walker: reelection next year. Reelection every 2 years. It enclosed it, you know our view.

Rick Walker: our vision just just collapses on us.

Kevin Dougherty: Right? Right? Yeah, that's no. That's

Kevin Dougherty: for sure. And you know what the other biggest weight was of that. Now I think about is something that you were dealing with right where you talked about like your relationship became strained. I was constantly trying to run a business. I was self-employed at the time, and I'm still giving my local municipality. There's a lot of guys that just go to the meetings right? So they're 2 HA week, 3 HA week, and I was putting in like 20 HA week.

Kevin Dougherty: just taking phone calls. My wife would come into my office and I would be on the phone with a guy who's a little wackadoo, you know. But they're constituents. You gotta. You gotta answer the calls. And yeah, and I'd be on the phone with him for an hour and a half every week, and it's just one of those like

Kevin Dougherty: like nobody else was taking this guy's calls like I was his only friend, and and you have that, and you know there's not a lot of people that do that. And so

Kevin Dougherty: I'm putting in that effort, but, like you mentioned in your book.

Kevin Dougherty: that takes away from my available resources my scarce resource, which is time to spend it with my family, to spend it with my kids, which is an age-old problem, too. Right? Like

Kevin Dougherty: the man goes out and works and provides the bread. And you know you miss. Your kids grow up, but it's like the trying to feed them is very difficult, and it's something I still struggle with. I think I've gotten better at it. But it's just.

Kevin Dougherty: Is there something you could say to? You know you have any. You have any like thoughts on how to overcome that.

Rick Walker: Yeah. Yeah. So

Rick Walker: I suspect in your in your real life, like the the life that you live day in and day out like me. This is the way I think about my real life.

Rick Walker: that if if it involves someone that's not even going to show it to my funeral.

Rick Walker: I'm not. Gonna I'm not going to sacrifice your relationship to someone that lives with my walls. Right? So I'm always going to prioritize my wife and my kids over anybody else to do that. But

Rick Walker: we have to figure out a way to play defense in the home and play offense outside the home. That's the role of the CEO. But it's also the role of the husband, the father, the provider, whatever the scenario you're in, or you hope to get in. So this is a this is a great way to think about it, even if even if someone's watching that maybe hasn't even found love yet like you're in your mid thirties, having found love yet. This is what a woman wants. A woman wants a man who's gonna take care of

Rick Walker: her and the kids inside the home, no matter what. But then it's going to be just ruthless outside the home.

Rick Walker: That's what that's what a woman wants. And in the end. If you read the book you'll discover

Rick Walker: that that is actually the only way that a man can live a worthy life is is if he is

Rick Walker: hateful of what is evil and clean and loving, and accepting and embracing and sacrificial for what is love inside the home? That's 1 of the ways that we're able to gain relevance and so trying to figure out a balance through that is require you to make some sacrifices and what you do not do. What you put on your do not do list is more important than what's on your to-do list

Rick Walker: like. It's what you don't do that matters not what you do do necessarily. I mean, it's not talking to that guy. It's not going out to the bar and hanging out with those friends. It's not trying to start up this 3rd or 4th or 5th side hustle. It's what you don't do. Put the emphasis on what you don't do for a year or 2, and see how well your life turns out. It's what you don't give your attention to. That allows you to give your attention to what matters.

Kevin Dougherty: That's yeah. That's that's great advice. Yeah. Because that is that does pose a problem, for you know. And maybe even just being cognizant of it is still just, you know, steps above right. I was. I was not cognizant of it until it was, you know.

Kevin Dougherty: arguably an issue, you know. And then it's like, Wow, where did the time go? I don't spend it up, you know, and it's

Kevin Dougherty: leads to a lot of late night fights.

Rick Walker: Yeah, it does. It does. Yeah, I've been. I've been there. My friend, I know. Yeah, yeah.

Rick Walker: And I think that that's also as well. It's a vicious cycle, because you have to always continually return to that, that you prioritize those within your walls more than you prioritize those without outside your walls. It's the same thing I've been married for, I think, 23 years now

Rick Walker: it's the same sort of thing. I've got to reinforce that my love and my commit, my dedication, my provision, my protection for my wife and my and my kids more than those outside the walls, and whenever I go and focus on those outside the walls for too long, and I don't come back, or I don't reinforce what's happening in my own home. That's when I start losing.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah, I actually did a whole bunch of

Kevin Dougherty: I don't. I don't read books. I don't, usually because I'm always on the go. So I try to listen to them. And so it was nice that they were able to accommodate an ebook. The downside is that they encrypt the hell out of those things so you can't put it on like. So I'm stuck with the software that it came with.

Kevin Dougherty: And it sounds like listening to the paperclip. Talk to you

Kevin Dougherty: like from Microsoft, word from like the early 2 thousands.

Rick Walker: Yeah.

Kevin Dougherty: It's robotic, and I made it through it. And that's why I was like, you know, what I got to do this. I gotta make it through this book.

Kevin Dougherty: There was a point to this.

Kevin Dougherty: and I've lost it. So I made it through the book, and one of the one of the greatest one of the greatest. No, so that's that's the point, was the point was because I was listening to it on an ebook. I was able to screenshot different things that I like. I would hear something, and I'd pull it out screenshot it with the highlighted words. And so I've got a whole list of them, and one of the 1st ones that I did

Kevin Dougherty: was you had a list of

Kevin Dougherty: I think it was. If somebody was harming a child, I think it was your child. Oh, I think it was a. It was a story that you told of somebody who did something

Kevin Dougherty: nefarious with a child, and if you were the father like

Kevin Dougherty: what was the quote? The quote was like, your family

Kevin Dougherty: needs you to be loving at home and dangerous outside the home. And then you went into that story about how you would kill a thousand men or whatever. And I think later on the book you reference back to that that I would kill a thousand savages for my daughters, as you you named all 3 of them. I think that's a point that really needs to be driven home nowadays.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, it you must.

Rick Walker: You must live lavishly on the extremes of love and evil.

Rick Walker: Don't send one, rose when you can send 100. Don't send one bullet when you can send 101 bullet would have got the job done. But 100 bullets is what's right. One Rose may get the job done. But 100 roses to your wife is what's right. And so we've got to live lavishly on the extremes of love and evil. And if we can't figure out a way to do that, we're not going to have a story worth telling with our lives. And I think that's what you're talking about.

Rick Walker: The the fulfillment of love is hatred against injustice. No man who doesn't hate evil that doesn't hate injustice can really can never really properly love. And this is this is a little bit about what that 1st step is about

Rick Walker: in the book. You've got to pick one worthy enemy, that one worthy enemy has to be something that that really just breaks your heart and breaks the hearts and breaks the lives of those that are within your care within, within your, you know, within the walls of your home. And a dangerous man can a man, unless these dangers can never really love, and because he'll never be able to have the love that's worth worth having.

Rick Walker: It's like IA woman needs a man that's worth that that's going to fight for if you're not the type of man that's ever going to fight, you're just going to roll over and be a Patsy. Well, hell! No one's ever going to want your love. It's not going to be worth having.

Kevin Dougherty: Right, yeah.

Rick Walker: That's that's what you're talking about.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah. Oh, of course, no, that's and it's the thing that it falls on deaf ears with, with, like the male species nowadays, right? Like, because we're all toxic. Remember, we're we're this, this, we're this violent caveman that's just over here, which is, which is healthy. And I mean, like

Kevin Dougherty: even like Dr. Jordan Peterson, for example. We'll talk about that, you know, like everyone has a dragon, everyone has demons. But it's your job as a man to to break that demon and harness its power. And you know a man with a tame dragon is nothing to be is nothing, is a force to be reckoned with. So

Kevin Dougherty: yeah.

Rick Walker: That's right.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah. And so you talk about picking a master. And I think we've talked about this. So we

Kevin Dougherty: is. There.

Kevin Dougherty: Is there a series of master like is there like? I guess I'm kind of. I struggle with the idea of not just like I've I've understand the idea of having to like

Kevin Dougherty: have to be subservient to something right? You have to serve a master, or one will be forced foisted upon you. But

Kevin Dougherty: do you have multiple masters? I guess that does that. Does that jive? You know what I mean? Like, I'm struggling with the concept.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah. So I think you can take this in building blocks, for instance. So let's say, I want to become a master electrician. Well, I'm going to become a journeyman first, st and I'm going to learn the trade from another master there, and

Rick Walker: if I want to learn how to build a construction company. I'm going to go to someone that has a successful construction company, and I'm going to intern there. I'm gonna work on the sales desk. I'm going to do the other little things to learn how to be someone that's that's competent enough to own a construction company. And then from there, if I'm a construction company. Maybe I want to develop a development company. I want to own my own assets, my own real estate. I want to build my own real estate. And so I'm going to learn from people that know how to put equity together. I'm always going to someone that knows better than I.

Rick Walker: And this is the this is the problem. This is the poison of the prideful man

Rick Walker: who this is the the Mashlin man that the

Rick Walker: the man who thinks that he's got it all together. Is you never are humble enough to learn right in order to learn something you have to realize there's something that you don't know right.

Rick Walker: The the man that knows everything can never approach that which he doesn't, which is the unknown because he doesn't. He doesn't admit that exists.

Rick Walker: and so I have to approach what I don't know. I have to realize that that thing that I don't know actually exists, and I have to be humble enough to learn from someone that knows better than I. And so, whether it's me becoming the best electrician, me becoming the best owner of a Construction Company, me becoming a general contractor or someone that builds my own buildings.

Rick Walker: I have to. Then I have to kind of move up that ladder of competence and integrity to be able to learn and be able to grow. Mastery only comes from masters. That's the only way that you get mastery

Rick Walker: in order to have a master, you have to be mastered.

Rick Walker: Only a servant or a slave can be mastered. You have to willingly humble yourself.

Rick Walker: And so this, as we saw at the small levels of Electrician and Construction Company, and and build our own buildings and building up a portfolio of buildings. We learned the different skill sets that are necessary from people that know better than us that have higher competency, higher integrity than us. But all of life is also the same way. That's why I you know, if I was Catholic, that's why I would go to mass, because I want to learn from a priest who's closer to God that knows better than I do

Rick Walker: right. But I'm not. Gonna I'm not going to go to him to learn about electrician or pulling wires or.

Kevin Dougherty: So for every facet of life you have a different master, if you will.

Rick Walker: That's right, that's right. But the thing is certain, things accrue down so so that I

Rick Walker: so if I if I want to learn how to, you know. Build my, if I want to learn how to be a Gc. I can figure out how to be electrician, right? I because I'm already hiring people and employing people that that understand those trades. The the higher thing cascades down to the lower things. If I understand the higher thing, I can understand the lower things. Eventually, I can figure those out

Rick Walker: right because they're being done everywhere.

Rick Walker: in, in whatever I'm in charge of.

Rick Walker: But and so so eventually you've got to figure out, what is that higher thing? Is it the? Is it the priest at mass?

Rick Walker: Does he? Does he understand better how reality works, and how these different laws of how human nature works better than the man. That's the journeyman electrician. Probably he doesn't understand one of the wires, but he can figure that out because he knows how to deal with people. If he's a good priest, he knows how to keep people happy, knows how to educate people and teach people.

Rick Walker: and he also gives people the vision of something higher that's possible with their lives. If you have a vision of something that's higher. With possible your lives. Then you can be able to figure out all the other things that come down.

Rick Walker: And what I say is that if you could set the highest possible vow. All the other responsibilities in your life will cascade down from that vow the highest possible commitment that you make. Maybe it's to your wife or to your kids, or to your sick parents. Those things will cascade and put all the all the rest of your life in order, or they'll banish them to other things.

Rick Walker: And so for for me, I suspect that the highest possible thing to to get in order beyond your education beyond your job.

Rick Walker: Is is to realize that you go to people that are experts in that specific domain. I'm never going to go to the electrician to learn about my health.

Rick Walker: Right? I don't want. I don't want the electrician, German electrician to tell me I have cancer right. That's that's not going to be. But people

Rick Walker: figure out how those domains work. But then, if you could kind of figure out, is there a master of all the domains?

Rick Walker: Is there something that is there someone or something, or philosophy that could put all the other things in place where you see all the value of all the great literature, all the great physics of of everyone that's gone and fought against evil that's thought about, you know, assassinating Hitler.

Rick Walker: It's kind of place. There are all these things that they all kind of tie together, and there's some sort of mastery to be had there, and if you can find where that point of mastery is and focus on that. Then all the other things fall into place like it's easier for me to to go and raise capital like I'm developing

Rick Walker: 180,000 square feet about 100 yards that way right now, and I got to put the capital in place. I got to hire the architects, the civil engineer all that stuff. But it's easier for me to do that, because I know what I'm going to do with that money whenever I sell the asset

Rick Walker: because and I know that if I do that one I can do 5 more at the same time, not because not because I've got money to be able to do that. It's because I've got the competency, and I've got the competency for a reason. My why puts into order all my! What's

Rick Walker: and the why of your master, the master that you serve. That's the kind of the tip top of that mastery hierarchy. It's God for most people for a lot of people. It's God whether it's Allah or Siddhartha, or whatever it might be, that God form.

Rick Walker: But if you can get that in in proper focus. Your whys begin to take, take care of all the lower things, all the job and all the personal relationships, and that

Rick Walker: make some make some things start to click in your life.

Kevin Dougherty: Gotcha.

Kevin Dougherty: that's there's there's just so much that you have in this book to try to wrap your head around, you know, and

Kevin Dougherty: so I guess, back to like your. So like, you're developing real estate right now what you you mentioned that you built a business with 400 employees, and you ran non-for-profits, I mean, what category were these were these like, you know, aid relief, non-for-profits. Were you building, you know? Did you go from real estate to habitats for humanity, building building houses and kind of staying in the same category. I mean, what is

Kevin Dougherty: what was the early life of Rick Walker.

Rick Walker: Yeah. Yeah. So when I was in college, my mother, who I talk about in the, in the, in the book where she took a loan out to pay the 1st month's

Rick Walker: payment plan for me to go to the private college. That, mother, right, we're all.

Kevin Dougherty: Who was it? The the Jesuits.

Rick Walker: Yeah. Yeah. The good nights were going.

Kevin Dougherty: The minute I.

Rick Walker: You're going to the same school. Yeah. Midnights. I mean, they're basically Quakers. I think you're very, very conservative.

Rick Walker: They're yeah. They're Western Amish. Is that is that? Yeah.

Rick Walker: yeah, yeah, pretty much pretty great people. But I was going to school with them right? And so it was a. It was a good place to be stayed out of trouble. But she she loaned me a thousand dollars. I don't know if she went to the bank and borrowed a thousand dollars. I never knew her to have a thousand dollars growing up because we were so kind of hand to mouth, and she loaned me a thousand dollars to go start the 1st business. When I was in college I was in school in Oklahoma City.

Rick Walker: and I lived in Corpus. That's where my parents were. It's 9 h drive, 9 h drive. So I started 1 1 summer and I started going and doing maintenance at different buildings. So I would offer, like banks and schools a flat fee to go do all their maintenance. So this is like light bulbs need to be replaced, air filters.

Rick Walker: cleaning, waxing the floors, power washing all that kind of stuff. I gave him one monthly price. And I it was kind of an all you can eat type of thing like I'm going to do everything for you. So the summer's up. I've

Rick Walker: hired my 1st and 4 employees, and I've got to go back to school to finish school 9 h away, and so I would go to classes Monday through Thursday.

Rick Walker: Thursday night I would drive the 9 h back to Corpus Christi on Fridays I would see clients. On Saturdays I would train the staff, and then Sundays I would drive the 9 h back. So this is 18 h of driving

Rick Walker: every week for a year and a half

Rick Walker: to keep the business going on summers and breaks, I'd be able to spend a little more time down at Corpus.

Rick Walker: picking up new clients, that sort of thing. And then over the over the years that grew up that grew in. When I was 26. We were counting w twos one time, and we had over 400 w twos, so I think we had 426 W. 2 S. When we were counting to send out, which is kind of crazy. We didn't really realize what we had, but I started that business. My dad helped me quite a bit, and then, about 3 years later, I was able to hire my dad away from his employer to come and help me full time, and that's when things really got going.

Rick Walker: But we were basically just taking care of buildings because I didn't have anything. I mean, I could come up with a thousand dollars to invest, put together a website, had email, got a cell phone, bought some vacuum cleaners, bought some light bulbs.

Rick Walker: you know, in a power washer, and that's about all I could do, and so got out there that slowly became us, being able to take care of other parts of the building we were doing Hvac work we were. We began doing leasing, and then we got to be able to get bigger buildings like like High Rise office building and hospitals.

Rick Walker: very, very large hospital buildings like for the Federal Government.

Rick Walker: and we were doing other sorts of like life safety work. We spun off an elevator business. That was the business that is currently in 6 States spun that business off. And so we slowly grew it. But we didn't have really much to work with. And so we had to do the really difficult, you know, labor intensive work 1st on to get to the sexy stuff, to get to the leasing and investment, brokerage and the private equity.

Rick Walker: But you had. I had to learn how to take care of these buildings early on, if I was ever able to own my own buildings that I was going to take care of one day, and that's slowly how it progressed.

Rick Walker: Over, you know, over. And it's been 25 years.

Kevin Dougherty: They're great. Their buildings are great training. If you, if you own one, you, you learn everything about it, because if you hire it out

Kevin Dougherty: in real estate. Everyone, always. I always have to kind of correct landlords in the local area and say, Hey, you know, guys, what are you doing? They're like, Oh, well, I've got all these rental properties. I make a ton of money. It's like, no, you're not rental properties. They're a long game.

Kevin Dougherty: if anything. They're they're more of a teacher than anything else. You, you learn how to work on them. You fix them. You learn the intricacies of of tenants as crazy as they can be, and then you take them as just a humbling experience, really. And

Kevin Dougherty: my rental properties are essentially my retirement fund. That's how I look at it, they're going to be an income stream when I go to retire.

Kevin Dougherty: and they're my non-linquid assets that I can borrow against. So that was kind of.

Kevin Dougherty: But you see, all these people on Youtube. And it's so easy you can just get into real estate. You don't have to have a full time job. You don't have to have much knowledge.

Kevin Dougherty: and they make it look so sexy. And it's it's not.

Kevin Dougherty: It's yeah.

Rick Walker: Yeah. And I think one of the one of the big, a lot of people that probably are doing sort of

Rick Walker: manual types of trades like, you know, like we're involved in, and they're trying to figure out, well, how do I get capital like? How do I get money to be able to go and make investments like that. What happened for me? And this is just an example. And so we were taking care of these high rise buildings, and we started taking on buildings that were owned by family offices, so wealthy families that had private staff that would manage all their investments, which include real estate.

Rick Walker: And so there was a family that we did just a really really great job, for we leased up some buildings we created about 15 million dollars in value. Now we made a few $100,000 off that they increased their property values. 15 million in about 2 years. Just did a great job, and the guy came to me one time, he said, Rick, I've got some other family offices that we invest together. We want. We want to back you and whatever you're investing in we want to invest in.

Rick Walker: I'm great, I'm great. And so we went out and started buying buying buildings together. We put together a fund together, put in, put together an operating business together. And that's really how things got.

Rick Walker: Kind of put it in acceleration mode, because I could take, you know, for every dollar that I had, these guys would come in, and they would match it 9 for one or 10 for one.

Rick Walker: and so all of a sudden I was able to get scale. But how did I have access to that? It was competency. I had to figure out how to do my job really, really well, and number 2 integrity like I had to be trustworthy. I had to be above board about everything. I had to give them free services. When I wasn't happy with the quality of services

Rick Walker: I had to do a number of things I had to be, you know. Be generous. I had to meet with their kids. I mean, these are older men that have kids that are struggling, you know, meet with the kids, go, have lunch with the kids and talk to them about life, talking about marriage, talk about family sort of be a big brother, uncle to them, not because I was getting paid to do that because it was the right thing to do. And so eventually your competency and integrity, they become your identity.

Rick Walker: And so that's what happened. That's how it happened for me. So I think there's an opportunity there. If you do something where you have access, where, if you do a good enough job. Someone wealthy will notice, don't point it out to them. Just do a really really good job year after year after year, and be high integrity, and at some point you'll have an opportunity.

Kevin Dougherty: That actually is something I talked to a client about this this yesterday. I believe it was just one of those things. It's like, you know, because he he brought a client to me and was like, well, it's like I wouldn't do the job for him if you don't have all the money up front because I don't trust him, and I'm like you don't trust your client, and it's 1 of those things I was like, you know, the one thing about me is, and I've explained this to my guys, too, because they're like, How can you just go to a bank like some of my guys struggle going to a bank to buy their 1st home, or whatever it is. It's like

Kevin Dougherty: because the bank has to trust trust you. You have to have that working relationship.

Kevin Dougherty: I go to a bank. The local bank doesn't even ask me for a tax return.

Kevin Dougherty: like I'm sure, Federally, they were probably required to, but they haven't asked me for one in like 10 years, and it's 1 of those like, what do you like? Because the bank knows me? They know I've never missed a payment.

Kevin Dougherty: You know it's 1 of those

Kevin Dougherty: you give people your word you have that integrity, like all the local vendors for our construction company. They know that

Kevin Dougherty: if I were to ever go belly up like a major credit card might not get paid, but the local vendor would like. There is a hierarchy, and they know where they sit on it like.

Kevin Dougherty: yes, you know. And even even when I put deals together it's like, hey? Listen! I'm going to buy this. If it ever goes through, it goes belly up. It's a hundred grand.

Kevin Dougherty: a hundred grand. I will pay you back before I die like it might not be on the same amortization schedule. But if something bad were to happen, you would not get a notice that you're going into bankruptcy to relieve the debt, because I wouldn't do that, and it's 1 of those. If you don't have that integrity with people, you don't go anywhere in life. You're one of those guys that's

Kevin Dougherty: out there, you know, shady dealing. And yeah, those contractors, right? You've seen we've all seen them fly by night. They they, you get them. You give them the money and they never show up. They put a shovel on the job site so they can say they started. And I've seen I've seen that too many times

Kevin Dougherty: finishing driveways, you know. So yeah.

Rick Walker: Yeah, yeah, that's right.

Kevin Dougherty: So you you got anything, Rick.

Rick Walker: You know I just appreciate you having me on Kevin, you know, hopefully, this has been helpful, you know. If I if I said one thing that was helpful to just one listener. I think that it was definitely worth it. I know there's a lot of men out there that are that are really struggling. And I know that that's part of the reason why they listen. They listen to your podcast. And I think I saw a week or 2 ago. I guess you went 9 days without posting anything, and everyone's wondering, where's Kevin? Where's Kevin? It's Kevin.

Kevin Dougherty: Right.

Rick Walker: But to but but to be but to be needed, and for people to actually miss you, I think that's part. That's part of what it really means to be alive. And so I think that

Rick Walker: if there's people men out there that are sort of struggling, looking for a way forward. They haven't found love. They haven't found a career. They're sort of, you know, kind of confounded by what? By what's taking place, everyone promised them success. Where's all the success that everyone promised me? I can tell you 2 things that that person you and me we're aligned because, like for that for that man. I'm speaking directly to that man in the audience that you know what you most need.

Rick Walker: Is, you need your potential to be unlocked, and what I most want is, I want to

Rick Walker: rip away the comfort now enslaving that potential.

Rick Walker: So what you most need, and what I most want to rip away the comfort now enslaving your potential are the same things, and so the same things. We can work in the same direction to go forward. And I know Kevin wants that for you. I know that I want that for you, and then I and I know that there's a way out of that, because there was a way out of that for me

Rick Walker: years ago, and I haven't forgotten where that's been, and I don't want to pretend to be a Guru, but that we're just 2 students sitting in the same classroom taking notes of what's worked and what hasn't worked. And I just happen to be the 1st one to put what's worked and what hasn't worked into into some pages. I have an audio book, too, for people like Kevin that want to listen. But I you know I just.

Rick Walker: I appreciate you having me. If it is, even if someone can't, can't afford a book reach out, I'd be happy to send you. Send you a book at no, at no charge. I just want to be as helpful as possible for the men that are struggling, and even the women that are kind of living with, with

Rick Walker: with underperforming men in their lives, that.

Kevin Dougherty: That's a difficult book to hand off if you're the woman handing a book to your husband, but sometimes it has to be done. I was actually on that I was actually gonna say, I've I come across great books that I read, and I will find people that need them like, I want to say I've handed out

Kevin Dougherty: John Gray. He's the doctor that does the boy crisis. And

Kevin Dougherty: that was a great book, and I handed it to a group of people that I knew as soon as I finished reading the book, and I have a group of people. Once your book gets released, that I will be that I'll be handing it out to, because I know that they'll greatly benefit from it. So.

Rick Walker: I appreciate it, and hopefully the audiobook will be ready by then. I finished my stuff on the audiobook, and I'm waiting for for the big companies to finish processing and get it out there. They need 30 days to process an audio book. For some reason it's crazy. It's crazy.

Kevin Dougherty: You know, with AI, you can write a song in like 10 min.

Kevin Dougherty: Yeah, exactly.

Kevin Dougherty: They can even duplicate your voice. I'm surprised they don't just have you say a bunch of words, and then it just processes. But.

Rick Walker: They should they should. They probably already know what I'm thinking. They probably written the book for me.

Kevin Dougherty: They did right. Yeah, there's there's Rick Walker's next book. AI did it so so.

Kevin Dougherty: But I appreciate it, Rick. We're excited to see the book release this, podcast will be released the week of your book release. So yeah, so, and then we'll be able to go from there. I hope to have you back on in the future

Kevin Dougherty: and and check in with you and see how you're doing, and see if we've got any more insight. Once I finish the book, I'm sure I'll have questions. So. But I've got your email. So.

Rick Walker: Yeah, we'll do a follow-up conversation. That'd be good. Yeah. In the book. The book's available. Amazon, Walmart, Barnes, and Noble. Just search my name Rick Walker. My website's rickwalker.com. So I do a free newsletter. So if you kind of like the sort of things that we're talking about, but don't

Rick Walker: necessarily need a whole book. I'll send you an email every week or 2. It's it's really easy to to. It's a 3, 2, 1 structure. So I'm gonna give you 3 quotes. I'm going to give you 2 videos, one sort of teaching and one sort of an interview series like this. And the other thing I'm going to give you is either an essay or some some hard hitting questions, some reflective questions that'll be every week or 2, and that's free on my website, rickwalker.com. If anyone wants to get a jump on on that over the book.

Kevin Dougherty: Okay, awesome, awesome, Rick.

Kevin Dougherty: And so everybody out there don't forget Rick Walker's book. You can find it anywhere. Books are sold right anywhere. We're gonna we're not just going to go with Barnes and nobles and and Amazon. We're going everywhere. Books are sold, and we'll catch you guys next time on life. 22.