Do you hope to live your best audacious life? Here is how the BOLD Framework from Audley Stephenson can help you get there and live Beyond the Rut.
Table of Contents
Audaciously Live Your Best Life Now
Have you ever heard these three common myths about getting unstuck in life? Myth 1: You need to have all the answers before taking action. Myth 2: Success is only for the lucky and talented. Myth 3: Change is scary and should be avoided. In this episode, our guest Audley Stephenson will share the truth behind these myths and reveal the four-principle framework, The Bold framework, for unlocking your potential and living an audacious life.
In this episode, you will be able to:
- Get exposed to strategies to live a bold and audacious life, pushing beyond limitations.
- Explore The BOLD framework, an effective solution to break free from stagnation.
- Master techniques to navigate challenges and keep progressing despite odds.
- Adopt the courage to grab opportunities, transcending your comfort zone.
My special guest is Audley Stephenson
Meet Audley Stephenson, a seasoned leader and motivational speaker renowned for his unique approach to personal development and growth. This former commissioner for the National Basketball League in Canada turned podcast host, is captivated by the endless possibilities of human potential. Audley brings his diverse experience in leadership to the fore through his BOLD framework, a powerful tool for overcoming life’s obstacles and embracing audacious living.
Chapters
00:01:59 – The BOLD Framework
00:04:30 – The TENT Framework, and update for Audley
00:09:22 – Audley’s Journey to Becoming Commissioner of the NBL
00:13:29 – Taking Action and Starting a Podcast Again
00:15:25 – The BOLD Framework: Better Than Yesterday
00:17:21 – The BOLD Framework: Outlasting Adversity
00:21:46 – The BOLD Framework: Living Your Truth
00:24:28 – The BOLD Framework: Disrupting the Norm
00:28:06 – Encouraging Audaciousness
00:29:31 – Embracing Individual Potential
Gain insights into overcoming adversities and staying steadfast in your mission
Showcasing his resilience, Audley shares lessons from his journey in facing and overcoming adversity. This episode provides vital insight into how we can outlast tough times, maintain our direction despite obstacles, and find the tenacity to always get back on top. The narrative emphasizes the inevitability of challenges in life and encourages listeners to prepare for, navigate through, and ultimately triumph over these adversities.
Learn about The BOLD Framework to break away from life’s ruts
The BOLD Framework as discussed by Audley provides a clear, structured pathway towards breaking free from stagnation.
Composed of four key principles the BOLD Framework emphasizes the importance of challenging ourselves to be better than we were yesterday, using our adversity as a growth opportunity, and disrupting the norms that hold us back.
Discover methods to unlock audacity and potential
The episode focused primarily on how to harness the power of audacity to recognize and unlock one’s potential. Audley Stephenson emphasizes that everyone possesses the ability to live audaciously, but there may be latent fears or doubts that prevent us from tapping into this potential. He encourages listeners to lean into the discomfort of being bold and taking risks, asserting that the rewards of fulfilling our potential far outweigh the uncertainties.
Audley Stephenson, Host of The Audacious Living Podcast
Audley Stephenson is a fun-loving father of three who has worked as a credentialed podcaster for the National Basketball Association and now produces The Audacious Living Podcast. His BOLD Framework helps people get unstuck in life to create a life worth living in their faith, family, and career.
Born and raised in a culturally diverse community in Toronto, Canada, Audley developed a deep appreciation for different perspectives and a strong work ethic from an early age. His insatiable curiosity for life and encouraging and supportive nature led him to pursue life skills coaching certification where he’s made it his focus to help others develop their own inner audaciousness. The focus of his coaching practice will be to help men unlock the secrets of successful personal relationships while audaciously living life to the fullest.
Audley eventually decided to leverage his expertise and media savvy to establish his own digital brand called The Audman Media which was a platform created with the intent of telling digital stories with a particular focus on sports and urban culture.
Resources
Subscribe to Beyond the Rut Podcast on your favorite podcast player.
Follow Audley on Instagram, @theaudman.
Other episodes and articles you’ll enjoy:
The Audacious Living Podcast Ep. #168 – The Leader’s Impact Featuring Jerry Dugan
Live a Significant Life ft. Aaron Walker: The Power of Accountability – BtR 341
Achieving Your Best Life After Catastrophe with Jolyn Armstrong – BtR 318
Connect with me:
Leave a voicemail at (469) 608-0355.
Send an email to [email protected].
Loved this episode? Leave us a review and rating on Apple Podcasts.
Transcript
00:00:00 – Jerry Dugan
Do you feel like you’re stuck in a rut in life or in a dead end job with no progression? I’m Jerry Dugan, and welcome to Beyond The Rut, the podcast that offers you the motivation, inspiration, and practical tools to help you build a life worth living. Join me as I share encouraging stories and actionable advice on how to get out of your rut in life and create a vision for your future. Life is just too short to live stuck in a rut. Here we so what do you do if you feel like your life is stuck in a rut? If you follow this guest’s advice, you’ll take bold audacious action. We’re going to talk about what that framework is all about. My special guest on this episode is Audley Stephenson. He was the former commissioner for the National Basketball League in Canada. He’s also the host of the Audacious Living podcast, which I’ve been a guest of, and he’s also a father of three children. We’re going to be talking about his joining the National Basketball League, his passion for podcasting and broadcast. But more importantly, we’re going to talk about the Bold framework and how that can help you get your life unstuck and live it to your fullest potential. So grab a notebook and a pen because here we go. All right. Oddly, I’m glad that we’re able to jump on this call. How are you doing, Jerry?
00:01:22 – Audley Stephenson
I’m great, man. It’s good to be here, good to connect with you again. And, yeah, this is good. Long overdue. But we made it, right?
00:01:27 – Jerry Dugan
Yeah, we pulled it off. We had a bunch of different things come up throughout the last few months, but we got it, and, I mean, nothing was going to stop me, I think. I don’t know if you saw my last email. I was like, plenty of letters left in the alphabet. If we got to reschedule Joel, and.
00:01:40 – Audley Stephenson
You’Re like, no, I’m coming on right now.
00:01:41 – Jerry Dugan
Like, perfect, I’m here.
00:01:42 – Audley Stephenson
Awesome. Determination, my friend, determination.
00:01:47 – Jerry Dugan
Hey, fortune favors the bold, right?
00:01:50 – Audley Stephenson
Very nice.
00:01:51 – Jerry Dugan
Oh, hey, yeah, I didn’t mean to do that, but that worked perfectly. I love that. And everybody else, you’re going to see exactly what I meant in a moment. So Odly and I met through something called pod match. You guys have heard a lot about that. He had me as a guest on Show the Audacious Living podcast. We talked about serpent leadership, and when we were done, before we even done, I was thinking in my head, I got to have a mom beyond the rut. Got to have a mom beyond the rut. And so that’s why we’re here now. And I’m glad you’re able to make the time off.
00:02:17 – Audley Stephenson
Yes, thank you. No, really, again, I loved the fluidness of the conversation that we had. I thought you were very again, you’re a wonderful tourist. So you spoke beautifully and shared some really powerful stories, and I appreciate that. So the fact that we have an opportunity to do this again and replicate that is just a thrill. So. Thank you, Jerry. Oh, yeah.
00:02:40 – Jerry Dugan
My pleasure. And then that episode led to other interviews to talk about serving leadership. And you don’t know this, but I know this because I’ve experienced it. But since that interview did with me, went on a ruck march, I was thinking, know, what kind of leadership development workshops can I deliver? What’s? That one thing I can help leaders with? So during that march, maybe it was the delirium, the heat of Texas, I don’t know. But it hit me like, Jerry, you love camping. You got a lot of military stories you connected to in relation to servant leadership. What if you could communicate servant leadership in a framework that people could remember and apply? And it hit me like a ton of bricks. Leadership tent. Tent. The fastest and easiest way to prop a tent up is to stake out the corners first. And so if a leader comes in and approaches leadership with trust building, first empowering others through their voice and their decision making and actions. Help them navigate for success in their careers and then thrive together. Celebrate their wins, whether it’s in life or their career.
00:03:44 – Audley Stephenson
Love it.
00:03:45 – Jerry Dugan
If you approach leadership in that way, it doesn’t matter what exact tools or guidelines, props that you use to make it happen. Those four intentions around leadership are essentially serpent leadership. And I was like, yeah, I just got to debut that yesterday with a healthcare station. They loved it. And just when I was thinking, I wonder if they’re getting it or if it’s just really campy that I showed up with a tent and propped a tent up in the middle of this presentation. And at the end, one of the ladies said, I realize as we’re going through this tent framework that one of the things I want to do is just delegate left and right. But I haven’t done enough trust building to get people to believe in what I have set aside for them is for their benefit as well as the organizations I need to do more trust building. And when she said that, I was about to give her a hug in front of everybody.
00:04:33 – Audley Stephenson
I love it.
00:04:34 – Jerry Dugan
So thank you for having me on your show, because it eventually led to that.
00:04:38 – Audley Stephenson
Yeah. Well, no, you’re welcome. Just as planned. I can’t take care of that. But I do love the way you’re able to break something down in an easy digestible format. So it’s trust, empowerment, navigate and thrive, right? Yes, Ted. Really easy. I got it off the bat there. What I like about that is at the entry point, it can come at a different plate periods, right? And offside, it depends on where you are and what areas that you need to show up for yourselves. And all leaders are different. They’ve got different specialties interests areas that they want to improve upon. So to be able to work with that framework in that manner, I think it’s great. So great. Good job. I love it. I love it.
00:05:26 – Jerry Dugan
Thank you. And everybody, this is like the benefit of talking to somebody that’s over 25 years experience in leadership, odly just picked right up and had a conversation with me right there, having never seen this framework before. So you work currently with the NBL in Canada, so officially the first person on this show to have that background to go. And so you work as a basketball executive. Tell us about the NBL and what led you to the NBL in Canada. That’s pretty cool.
00:05:56 – Audley Stephenson
Yeah. There’s always a story, Jerry, right. Nothing never just happened. And sometimes that story is a series of steps and paths and decisions that have been made along the way. There’s an expression I heard very recently where when you live life forward, it’s an art. When you stop and look back at the science, right? Everything connecting with everything. I had to do this to get here. I had to do that to do that. But in the making, all we were doing in that moment was making the best possible decision with the information that we had, with how we were feeling in that. So but things, again, in life do have a way of coming together. In my case, NBL Canada, which is the national basketball league of Canada. It’s Canada’s longest running pro basketball league. Similar, sir, to, if you’re familiar with the NBA g league, the developmental very, very similar. In fact, we’ve got a lot of players that come from that league that want to come to and if you think about, know, having a basketball, a pro basketball league, so if you bear in mind the NBA is at the top, right? Like, that’s where everyone wants to go to. But then you got those next tiers of leagues, and oftentimes a lot of those leagues are overseas, right, in Europe and across the pond, if you will. And so having a similar league in Canada is very entertaining for individuals and inviting because you’re closer to home. So if you’re in the states and you want to be close to all the play pro basketball, it makes a lot of sense. And so we have a wide number of players from all over the world, quite frankly, that look for these such opportunities in 2011 is when the first year of the league, the league had gotten started. It was inaugural season 2011, and prior to that, I had dabbled in the podcasting game. In fact, the very first podcast that I launched was in 2008. These days, podcasts are like a business card. Everyone’s got one, right? But back then, it was a new technology. It was brand new. I couldn’t tell you what I was really doing. I’m sure if I dug up that very first episode, I sounded terrible, but that’s what it was, right? And so me and a budy of mine, we launched this podcast. It ran for five years. We covered the NBA in great depth. The cool thing with that podcast is that we were the first Media Credential podcast by the Toronto Raptors, which then gave us permission to go in the locker room and interview players and get the media scrums and do all these. For a hardcore basketball fan, that was a thrill. That was like, you can take me now, Lord, I’m good. Like that kind of moment, right? Because you’d reach the pinnacle, if you will. What I did know, there was so much more to accomplish. That wasn’t the top and that wasn’t the peak. And so in 2011, the NBA, it was a locker year for the NBA, which meant no basketball. And I decided to look at different things I can do. And I had all these newfound talents and skills I’ve been owning over the last five years or so, or in about that time, and I turned my attention to the NBL Canada, and I never, ever looked back. I came in as a volunteer, I said to them, hey, look, I can do this for you. And the reason why I know I can do it for you, because I was just doing in the NBA. And by the know, I’m the first ever Media Credential podcast by the Raptors. So you gotta give me some clout here, right? These are things that I sold them on, they loved it, they took me on, and again, I was a volunteer, but it gave me that opportunity to sort of get my foot in, if you will. And I worked hard, I was passionate about what I did, I put my skills and wares on display, and I was a benefit to the organization. And throughout that, and then so throughout my growth with NBL Canada, I was appointed to the position of Deputy commissioner in 2017. So six years later, they asked me, the deputy commissioner, and then three years after that, I was appointed the commissioner, unanimously voted by the board of directors. I was a commissioner of the Know. That journey is essentially sort of what got me to where I was and where I am now. Jerry I do a lot of talks at post secondary institutions, sports management programs, and the reality is, commissioner jobs, there’s not a whole lot of them floating around. And so the question I oftentimes get asked is like, hey, how did you get there? And how can I be a commissioner? And it just goes back to the Adage, nothing substitutes hard work, right? But it’s more than just hard work. It’s also that passion I talked about and how important that is to come in with your best and whether it leads you to commission your job or somewhere else, it’s important that you do that because quite frankly, you don’t know where things will go. You don’t know. But you take that risk. You take that chance, you demonstrate a bit of boldness and you try anyways.
00:11:10 – Jerry Dugan
Yeah, I love that you just saw the opportunities when they opened up and said, either a, this is the right thing for me to go after, or that is not a good thing for me to go after. It sounds like you didn’t just chase any old opportunity that popped up. You saw the opportunities and weighed what they could do for you and your life and your career and then made a decision from there. And I know a lot of folks, they’ll choose a career because, oh, the pay will be bigger or better. And then they get there and they’re like, oh, this job sucks. That’s why they’re offering more pay. They needed something to bring you in and now they got you got to figure out where to go from there. Or it’s like, oh, man, I’m working long hours. But it’s the title I want, and it’s a company car, and that’s not always the best thing to do. It sounds like you’re in a great spot and you’ve been on this nice trajectory for the last over a decade where things just fell into place. But I have a feeling that it’s because you have this dedication to live an audacious life. Like current podcast is named and you’ve got this framework bold. Bold. And I’m not saying that for you, Odly. I’m saying that for everybody else listening.
00:12:19 – Audley Stephenson
Yes.
00:12:21 – Jerry Dugan
Walk us through how did the bold framework come to be and how you apply it to your life every day.
00:12:28 – Audley Stephenson
I’m going to take a step back because, again, the origin stories are always important here, Jerry, and understand how we have come to be. And so I’m on this path, right? As you said, I’m on this merry path, and I’m enjoying myself. And in 2020, when we all know what happened, march 2020, when the world stopped because of this thing called the Pandemic. And I remember having a very difficult time, having a form of depression, not being able to do the things I love. The thing that got me gets me jumping out of bed. It was taken from us and it was taken from me. And that’s exactly how I felt. And I remember some days just being very lethargic and not knowing what to do and not really having a lot of energy. And it was through that process of talking about it with a friend of mine going, yeah, I don’t know what’s going on, but ever since I didn’t do basketball and they’re like, oh my gosh, that’s what it is. This thing that I love was taken away from me. I can’t do it no more. And the thing that fueled me and that got me excited is gone. It was almost like, we identify the problem. Okay, so what can I do about it? It wasn’t I was going to accept it and roll over and go, okay, I’ll wait for things to get better. It’s, what can I do about it? And I really thought I said, you know, what I can do is I can podcast again. I enjoyed podcasting. I liked it. Let me look at that. But I wanted to be very deliberate, very intentional about what I chose the podcast about. Sure, I could talk about basketball. That’s easy. I previously had a Leadership development podcast. I could talk about leadership. Once upon a time, I had an old school hip hop podcast where I interviewed hip hop artists like Young MC and Tone Loke and Coolio. I could do that too. But instead yeah, there you go. But instead, I wanted to try something different, and I started to do an analysis, and then I did this deep dive. I sort of look back at my life. Okay. And the thing that was apparent to me, that red thread that exists is that in every success accomplishment, every victory I had, it was because I demonstrated some sort or some measure of audaciousness. Right? It was pretty audacious to go to a brand new basketball league and sell them on what I could do for them. I had no idea. I had no idea if I could do it or not, but I did it. That’s how I became commissioner. And so that’s what started the journey of this audacious living podcast. And through that podcast, I really started to key in on some key elements, some aspects of how we can live our best audacious lives ever. And similar to the Tent framework, I developed the Bold framework. Bold. And the Bold framework allows us to identify the specific areas that we can focus on. And again, similar to Ted, right? Where some people, some areas of the framework, there are strength for them, and maybe other areas aren’t as strong. It’s very similar with the Bold framework. So we’ll start off with B, which is better than yesterday. All that’s about is it’s focusing on self improvement. Getting better is an ongoing process. You don’t pick a book off the shelf, read it, and go, all right, I’m self improved. I’m good. Right? There’s always more layers we could add to it. Recognizing that the top of today’s mountain is the bottom of tomorrow’s, it’s an ongoing process. I remember reading a story. I’m a big basketball fan, as you probably figured out by now. I remember reading a story, the late Kobe Bryant, and there was a game in which he scored 81 points against my Toronto Raptors. I’m a Toronto guy and so I support my Hopetown raptors and he scored 81 points, which was the second highest point total NBA history, only second only to Will Chamberlain, who scored 100 points. Well, Colby Bryant scored 81 points, and the next morning, he was at practice. You think about that, you put up a point total like that. You don’t got to go to practice right before I put up 81 points. But the next morning he was at practice. And what that tells you is the high achievers, they’re never satisfied with what they’ve done. It’s what they’re about to do and what they can do. They adopt that better than yesterday’s sort of mantra, and they move forward. Yeah, the o in the framework is outlast adversity. And adversity is something that we’re all going to face. We’re all going to be challenged, we’re all going to have difficult times, we’re all going to feel crappy in moments. Things are just going to happen that don’t make us feel good, we’re going to feel challenged. It’s incumbent on us that regardless what it is that we experience, that we have to keep going, we have to push through. We don’t stop and roll over and say, okay, I’ve done my part. I oftentimes use an analogy of the hills and valleys, right, where life is a series of hills and valleys on the top of the hill. It’s great times, the successes, you’re enjoying yourself, we’re partying, life is grand, right in the valleys, the valleys will come, because again, life is that hills and valleys. So in the valleys, it doesn’t feel good, it’s unpleasant, it hurts, might cause us pain. It could be a whole host of things. The reality is that we’re not meant to stay in the valley, and we need to make it our goal as quickly as we possibly can to get out of that valley and get back up on top of that hill where we can celebrate. And that’s why it’s so important that we have to outlast adversity adversity. I oftentimes use the analogy of the boulder in our path and we need to find a way to go up, over, around, through, and get to the other side of those adverse moments because we need to get back on top of that hill and celebrate.
00:18:28 – Jerry Dugan
And that makes sense because I used to have a real estate career, business years ago. My wife doesn’t want me to talk about it, but it fits here. Sorry, Olivia, I love you.
00:18:40 – Audley Stephenson
I made you do it. I made you do it.
00:18:43 – Jerry Dugan
It’s for the greater good, everybody. So something I’d learned because I was in real estate as a realtor from 2006 till about 2011, so that’s when the real estate market tanked. And something that was brought up to me is that all the folks that we saw really successful before the seller’s market and that boom prior, they actually were made not during the boom, the seller’s market, they were made at the previous buyer’s market. And they learned with systems and persistence and resiliency how to succeed in that valley. And because of that, they not only thrived through that situation, they had the foundation that allowed them to really succeed when the boom years arrived again, and then when the next valley hit, which was in 2006, they were already prepared. They knew to set aside certain things. They already had the systems in place. They tightened up, they knew what information to look at and metrics, and they were just ready for the next valley. And they knew the valley was going to pass. That was probably the biggest difference, was that a lot of us who are newer to real estate as a realtor were like, oh my gosh, I got in. This is horrible, this is horrible, somebody lied to me. And then you see all these guys drop out. But the seasoned folks who’ve been through valleys before were like, you know what, this is going to pass. It’s going to be about a year or two and it’s going to start climbing again. And all we got to do is just keep plugging away and keep tightening up our systems. We’ll be even better when this thing climbs out again. And those guys, they were doing even better when we had this most recent real estate boom and reconnecting with them on LinkedIn and Facebook, and it was like, wow, that dude’s a multimillionaire now when he started because we both went to school at the same time to get real estate license. Oh, that guy is ready to retire. He doesn’t even actually show properties or write contracts himself. He has a whole team of people to do it for him, and he’s just living off of that. I’m like, they all learn to thrive and outlast those valleys. That Adversity. Sorry to throw you off.
00:20:49 – Audley Stephenson
No, I think that’s fantastic. It really is, because Adversity again, Adversity is going to come, and I think that’s a really good illustration as to when we do that. The greatness is on the other side. It’s there, it’s waiting for us, but it’s not going to be an easy pathway to get there. No one in life really has a smooth journey. We might think it is. And maybe on the outside we’re looking going, oh my gosh, this guy’s had it easy, he’s got it made. We don’t know about those times when maybe that individual doubted themselves or because of the social media world that we live in. No one puts all their failures on display or their mishaps or their downholes. They don’t do that. We talk when it’s good. And so as much as we looking and seeing, oh, that person has a guy they got there, we don’t know. And their story is their story and ours is ours. And I think that’s a good segue into the L in the framework, which is live your truth, right? Live your truth. What is meant for you. This is directly tied into us being our authentic selves. One of the biggest challenges to that is comparison. People compare themselves to what others are doing, where they’re at, what they have, what they don’t have. They’re thinking of a lack mindset as opposed to an abundant. Here’s what I have, here what my strengths are. Here’s what I can do and the reason why. I’m a big fan, big fan of the entire firm, a big fan of the L because of the impact we can have on others. And I’ll give you a share, a quick story. A friend of mine is an accountant here in downtown Toronto. She’s an accountant, big corporate firm that she works for, been doing over several years. She doesn’t love it. She loves accounting. But not working in corporate, it doesn’t inspire her. It doesn’t get her excited. She just does it because it’s her job. We were talking one day, and she was sharing just talking generally, and she was sharing a story of an accountant whom she knows, to whom she’d heard of. Rather, she doesn’t know her personally. She’d heard of her and heard of her story, and the story resonated because it’s very similar to her own, whereby this individual also worked in the corporate firms, didn’t like the corporate world, and decided that she’d much more interested and passionate about working with small businesses and not for profits. And so she shifted her entire focus. She quit her job. She changed the direction. And as a result of that, she’s doing very well for herself, but she’s also working with a group of individuals who she loves to be around. I remember saying to my friend, pause for a second. Stop. Just stop for a second. Think about that woman’s perspective. At one point in time or another, when she was on the verge of making her decision, she was probably scared. She was probably nervous. She was probably second guessing herself, and she probably had some fear. Fear is that acting for fear is false evidence appearing real, right? You’re afraid of something that hasn’t happened, but you’re just afraid. She probably was going through all those things, but the most important thing that she did is, despite that, she made that step anyways. And as a result of her making that step, it’s now become a story that inspires you. And you’re sharing with me, and now I’m sharing with others. So the point is, when we live our truth, the impacts that we can have and the ripples that we can have are tremendous, and that’s why it’s so important for us to do so. And then lastly, in the framework is the letter D, which does disrupt the norm. I’m talking to all those innovators out there, right? The Steve Jobs and the Bill Gates of the world. The people that were told that they can’t do something or they shouldn’t do something or they’re not supposed to do something. They’re the ones that know, I’ve got to go off the beaten path here. I’ve got to try something new. Yeah, everyone else has done it, but there’s something over here that I need to try out. I oftentimes use the analogy of the example of the Wright brothers right? Learning how to fly a plane, right? Imagine how many people told them they were crazy, it couldn’t be done. Flying is just for the birds. How many times did they try? I’m sure through their journey they had failures and they had mishaps. And I’m sure during those failures and mishaps, people told them, again, you can’t do it. It’s not possible. We can fly. But they proceed anyways. They disrupt the norm. They went off that beaten path and became their old trailblazers. And now flying is an acceptable part of our life. We all do it. We can’t think of what our world is without it. And so that’s a framework in a nutshell, bold better than you were yesterday. Outlast adversity live your truth and disrupt the norm. And I can tell you that if you are able to incorporate these things, and maybe you can’t do them every single day, but if you can incorporate them into your being and until they come to that point where they are part of your you’re not thinking about it, you’re just doing it. I can assure you, no, I can promise you that you will live your best audacious life ever.
00:25:57 – Jerry Dugan
I love that. And hanging on disrupt the norm for a little bit. The norm is in essentially, probably somebody’s rut that they followed what everybody else is doing or what everybody else said, this is what success is. And they get there and they’re like, I feel stuck. I feel like I’m doing same nonproductive behaviors and activities that aren’t getting me to where I want to be. And you talked about the Wright brothers when they were designing the first craft to fly. And something I learned recently was that they weren’t the only ones working on how to get a plane up in the air. The interesting thing about them was that everybody else was looking at how do you build a strong enough engine, a big enough, powerful enough engine that’ll just overcome air, right? The Wright brothers were like, oh, that’s cute. We’re going to kind of be like birds, and we’re going to get the lightest frame we could come up with and use the lightest engine we can use, which went against everybody’s paradigm. You obviously aren’t going to make this work. And then however much time went by, they’re the ones who actually got their craft off the ground, because they not only disrupted the norm of you can never fly, they also disrupt the norm. The approach to how to solve the issue.
00:27:13 – Audley Stephenson
Yes.
00:27:14 – Jerry Dugan
For those of you listening in, you may not only disrupt the norm from what you’re facing, but the way you go about it may be different than what other people say is the key to got it. So I just love that.
00:27:27 – Audley Stephenson
Got it.
00:27:27 – Jerry Dugan
So now your podcast, in case everybody you forgot earlier, it’s the Audacious Living podcast, the Apple podcast spotify. All the places where you can listen and. Then you got your website, Bestaudaciouslife.com. I recommend you guys go check it out anywhere else where you like people to reach out to you. If they say, I want Odly to come talk to my organization, yeah, certainly.
00:27:50 – Audley Stephenson
Bestauddationlife.com is a starting point. I’m an IG guy, so you can find me at the oddman T-H-E-A-U-D-M-A-N as opposed to oddmanaudman and I’m accessible approachable. Absolutely. I love this stuff. I truly do, Jerry. I mean, this stuff charges me in a major, major way, naturally. I feel we all sort of come to a point where my purpose is, and I truly feel that my purpose is to be encourage your audaciousness, to let people know that it’s okay. You can take that risk. Yeah, I know. We can’t see what’s coming down the stairwell because it’s dark, but you still should go anyways. And if you have a mishap and it doesn’t go right and you can say, okay, fine, I’ll try again. Being bold is scary. There’s no question about that. Being bold is scary. It’s risky, without question. But I guarantee you the risk of not taking that first step, the risk of not demonstrating courageousness, the risk of not being bold is greater than the unknown fear that you think is around the yeah, I love this stuff. I encourage it. And thank you, Jerry. This is awesome. Awesome.
00:29:05 – Jerry Dugan
Odly, that is the perfect final word of wisdom right there. And I’m so glad that we were able to get you onto this show.
00:29:10 – Audley Stephenson
Appreciate you, man. Thank you. You’re doing a great job. Love your work. And yeah, keep it going, man. Let’s make this world a better place. And for those listening, if there’s someone out there that’s listening and they’re on their cusp of making that decision, and they’re wavering, they’re uncertain, I encourage you that audacious, it’s inside of you. We all have that seed of potential. Very last final story. We’ll get out of here. I’m a father of three. My second daughter, her name is Jaleesa, and she was born on the autism spectrum. At the age of five, we had her diagnosed and we found out that and this was brand new us, we didn’t know anyone that had it. I think over the years, autism has become more and more widely known, more common, and people understand it more. But this was at a time was still kind of fairly unknown. And the thing about autism, those on the spectrum is that it appears in different forms, individuals, it’s not the same. And in the case of Jalisa, her speech was severely delayed. And so here I am as a father going, oh my gosh, my daughter is never going to say daddy ever again. What’s this mean for us? And again, this was my fear, that false evidence appearing real. It wasn’t a real fear. It was based on sort of what I thought, and I could vividly remember one day we were driving downtown Toronto, and I was driving through this sort of semi business residential area. And so they had, like, stores and shops on either side. And I was in the front seat, jaleesa was in the back. And I can hear these random words that were just being spit out and for the life of, you know. Now, by this time, we were doing things like speech therapy and that kind of stuff. So there were some words in her arsenal. I was hearing stuff I had never heard before. Butcher flower store open. And what I realized is she wasn’t just spitting out random words. She was reading the signs of the stores as we drove by. Wow. And Jerry, what that says to me what that says to me is that her potential was always there. She’s operating on her own clock. And I think that’s a really strong lesson for all of us. When I choose to exhibit my greatness and demonstrate, it could be very different than you, very different from Sally, Tom or Jim. But what they do and what I do is totally different. And I don’t have to worry about them. I’ve got to worry about what I do for myself. And so that was a real eye opening experience. And I will say to your listeners, your seat of potential is there. And when you choose to unlock and when you choose to let it out, it’s on you. But don’t hold back. Don’t stay small because of what you think may happen. Take that first step and be audacious.
00:32:03 – Jerry Dugan
Wow. Oddly said it best. Your potential is already there, waiting to be tapped into. It was there for his daughter. It’s there for you, too. Now, if you’re taking notes and somehow you missed one of the elements of the Bold framework, b stood for better than yesterday. O was outlast adversity, l was live your truth, and D was disrupt the norm. If you do that, you’re going to be audaciously and boldly going after your rut to get out of it and live beyond it. Now, if you want to get in touch with Oddly or just see related episodes to this or the interview I did on his show, go to the Show [email protected] three eight five. We’ll have all that information in the Show Notes just for you. Now, I’m glad you joined me for this episode and look forward to joining you again on the next one. But until then, go live life beyond the rut. Take care. Bye.
