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Episode 72: Bradley Schumacher, European Adventure & A New Normal (blog post)
Bradley Schumacher 0:00
One thing that I’ve learned is that you need to have that eye contact and that connection and really listen and try to relate. Don’t Don’t just listen and nod and then think about what you’re going to ask next.
Curt Carstensen 0:29
This is People I Know Show. I’m Curt Carstensen Episode 72. In my guest today is Bradley Schumacher. I have referenced Bradley in most of the recent episodes, he was my travel partner through my entire trip to Europe back at the second half of February. Lately my guests have been other people I had seen or had met on that trip and now that I I’ve gotten through all those conversations, I was ready to have a conversation with him. However, of course, these are not normal times. So instead of being side by side, we connected over the internet. And since we were going to do that I decided to try something new, and do a live video podcast on Facebook. So that happened on Thursday night, April 9, this podcast gets released on the 10th The next day, I’ve done very little editing to the conversation what you will find listening audio only there are some references to the video. There will be some screen sharing on the video showing a website that we talked about and photos from our trip. So if you have the ability to take this one in on video on the People I Know Show Facebook page or the People I Know Show YouTube channel that might be better and if you’re going To listen, that’s perfectly fine as well. Often we describe what is on the screen. And if you want to check back to any of what we describe later, the links are in the show notes. To find everything that we talked about specifically, this is a good reminder, I’m going to do more of these live video conversations. Some will turn in the podcast, some might, they might just be Facebook or YouTube channel or Instagram page only. I’m going to try some new things here. These are not normal times. We’re all adjusting to something some of us to a lot. And this will be an opportunity for me through the podcast to try some new things. I’d love to have you there for as much of it as you would like. So this is a better time than ever to like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram, subscribe on YouTube, to the People I Know Show pages and channels and I’ll promote when I can what I’m going to do, but from week to week I don’t have necessarily a long standing plan. I’ll be working on these things kind of on the fly, trying new things out learning through this opportunity as I look at it, I’m at home a lot. It’s an opportunity for me to try some new things and I advise you as well dabble in the things that you haven’t dabbled in before, but you wanted to follow your curiosities, wherever it might take you. And I hope that during these times that you learning just a couple new things, either of things how to do or about yourself, that will help you in the future. Now to my conversation with Bradley Schumacher. The first live, People I Know Show episode on Facebook. Mr. Bradley, I think I can see you can I hear you?
Bradley Schumacher 3:49
Yes, I think so. Unless you have me muted. Can you hear me?
Curt Carstensen 3:53
No, not yet. I think I’ll meet you later when I get bored with the conversation or something.
Bradley Schumacher 3:59
There you go.
Curt Carstensen 4:01
All right, well, I’m learning all kinds of new tools here. It’s amazing. We spent so much time together just a few weeks ago that I thought, okay, when the time comes to have this conversation with you, we can just get together in my house, where your place or wherever and we’ll record it, but things aren’t that way right now.
Bradley Schumacher 4:27
It doesn’t look like it. No, a lot of things have changed since we returned from our traveling together and it just keeps changing every day. So no, this is kind of cool to get this way. So we can definitely give each other space and do our due diligence and no social, you know, interaction within a meter or two meters, whatever it is, so no, this will work.
Curt Carstensen 4:53
Yeah, I think we had enough time together in Europe that having more space isn’t like we’re needing more time together. anytime soon, I had a good time. Let’s not make a point that we didn’t have a good time together, we can chat about our trip, but I think it is okay to have a little space here until things get normal again.
Bradley Schumacher 5:14
I agree. I agree.
Curt Carstensen 5:17
So what I’m doing now, something I haven’t done before, and I have to draw attention to it because I’m not quite capable enough yet. To do it without saying anything. I’m trying to share it back to my my Facebook page, my own account, and it’s gonna take me Just a moment. So Bradley, tell me as I’m doing this. Explain how your life has changed now, since I’d say about the middle of March, when the state began to shut down the governor impose different rules. And what since that time have you been doing and how was your life changed?
Bradley Schumacher 5:52
Well, that’s a good question. And I’ll buy us some time while you’re figuring out some of the technical stuff on your end. I I’ve changed a lot in terms of I don’t go out and go grocery shopping as often as I used to. I only go probably once a week now, I am fortunate enough where my full time position right now allows me to work from home. So I’m doing a lot of zoom calls and, and conference calls with all of my clients and my customers. So I did that before. But now I’m just doing that, you know, primarily, and I haven’t gone to visit a customer in person for about two, almost three weeks now. And it’s a little different having that conversation without being able to see them sometimes because sometimes they don’t like being on the video. So you just hear them. And when you’re in sales and business development, you have to read some of their nonverbals and the nonverbals are there so I can’t tell whether or not they’re they’re agreeing with me, or whether or not they think that hey, I’m just wasting their time. So I kind of missed not being able to see them. So even while we’re talking right now I can see whether or not you’re interested, you are interested, but you’re still interested in making sure that, hey, I gotta get this live on my website. And that’ll even be cooler. But I get still gotta listen to Brad, you know.
Curt Carstensen 7:19
So I think that’s something as someone that’s been in broadcasting years ago, something I kind of get good at, because you need to, you need to be into the conversation, you still need to have some awareness of what’s coming next. And I think that happens with any kind of conversation. And we can chat more about your background with communications and psychology. Like people are doing this all the time. It’s very clear right now that I’m looking now at the camera I one thing I did well this week because I set up this big monitor that I had from years ago that I hadn’t been using, but now instead of doing it on this screen in front of me where it might almost look like I’m looking at you, I’m looking This big screen over here and in trying to learn something new so yeah, this is and Ron, this is another two so we got some tools here. Your your buddy Ron, I’ve not met him but he asked what about going live on YouTube as well, that is something that I intend on doing. I’ve done that a couple times before I can do that with this software that I’m using today called stream yard. Of course, they’re they’re giving to me for free. And that’s why the logo is attached to the upper corner of Red’s head for the entire conversation. But I wanted to see how well it worked before I paid them for it. And I think this is a good time. While we’re while we’re kind of all stuck in place more than usual to try some new things. So I thought, hey, let’s do a live podcast. It’ll go through all the same podcast locations, beginning tomorrow. But in the meantime, try something new. Try out the stream yard see if it works for me and for my purposes and if I think it’s good enough, and I want it To go to YouTube live as well, or some other locations, I can pay them they’re 20 $25 a month for now and, and see how long I need it. But these are, these are cool tools that are out there. And I’m just happy to have you on the other end to try this with me.
Bradley Schumacher 9:14
So I feel so used again, you know, time and time again. Just feel so used. You’re gonna use me for this. No, I’m glad to be the guinea pig. That’s fine. We can work this out. And I’m glad you can use our interview to see how long
Curt Carstensen 9:30
I need it. But these are the cool tools that are out there. And I just started a watch party on the Facebook. So then it started talking to me now now we’re good. Now let’s have a conversation. Everything I’m going to do is done. I’ve got to recorded here got the video there. Now we can get into more of the conversation. So explain more than you’re having these conversations at home with your clients. And you said you’d done that before but now you are there every day. Are you getting sick of it like being at home? Or what’s your mental, your attitude and your mentality and your focus and everything? How is that? How are you adopting and adapting to that?
Bradley Schumacher 10:12
It’s actually difficult. The last three weeks, I’ve been the busiest I’ve ever been with my company. And it’s this last week, week and a half. I have breakfast about 6:30-7:00 in the morning. And then I have my lunch about 630 at night. And I have to, I have to get into a routine where I give myself and force myself to get up from the computer and do something else. Otherwise, I’m sitting there the whole time. And I don’t like getting into that routine because by the time I’m done, I have to get something to eat my lunch basically lunch and supper and then I really don’t have time to work out. I’m, I have to, you know, de stress for an hour or two. And then by that time, it’s 10 or 11. And I go through the whole thing again, So, the last two three weeks have been pretty tough. And it’s forcing me to change my schedule and and make sure that I have to give myself a break because it’s just otherwise I could just be nailed to this screen all day, talking to clients talking to my customers talking to colleagues, and taking care of business and I need to get away. So that’s one thing that I have to change. The other thing that I do have to change is get outside a little bit more, even though we want that spatial distancing. I can still go for bike rides to go for a walk. You know, as you know, a couple days ago, we had 60 degree weather here, and I kind of brought my motorcycle out, but I didn’t because by the time I was done working, it was already 6:30 7 o’clock at night got to eat after that, then the sun’s going down. So I definitely have to change my schedule up a little bit, but I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s, you know, trying to find their new norm. With this, you know, environment today. So
Curt Carstensen 12:04
what about your diet and eating habits? I know there was a time not too long ago that that was one of the biggest focuses of your life. And then of course, we were in Europe for two weeks. And I’m a witness that kind of went out the window I always seems to go out the window for me when I’m traveling for you. It seemed to as well, being at home so much I’m finding that I’m just eating more often because it’s so convenient. And I wish I wouldn’t but not my normal life I’m gone a lot not home not like with food within reach of me now. It is. And that’s a struggle for me and you know, watching Facebook and means I’m like, I’m thinking this is a common occurrence for people that suddenly their time able to eat is way more than it used to be. And we’re all probably challenged with that in some way. How’s that going for you?
Bradley Schumacher 12:57
Well, I wasn’t gonna say you know, I know that you mentioned That you are kind of sitting farther back from the table than normal. I don’t know why that would be. No for me, I think ever since we went traveling, I’ve allowed myself to eat a little bit more of the things that I normally wouldn’t. And now that I’m not going to the grocery store as often then I’m eating I’m forcing myself to eat anything and everything in the house so I can avoid going to you know, the store. I’ve reached a point either Today Tonight, literally after this interview after this broadcast, I’ll probably have to go to the store because I am running out of certain things. But to answer your question, no, I’ve allowed myself to eat and the people that know me, I usually eat pretty healthy, but I’ve allowed myself to eat a little bit more and more starches and more breads. And, you know, I’ll have to adjust a little bit. But I’m, I’m having fun I had ice cream last night I’m going to have ice cream. begin tonight. So I guess there’s a there’s a silver lining to it, it’s allowing me to eat some of the some of the good stuff and you only live once I might as well eat but I don’t want to I don’t want to have to sit this far back, you know, in the future. I want to keep that nice, fuzzy. So thank you for asking though.
Curt Carstensen 14:22
It’s hard to tell. So I can I can do some tools here on the stream yard. I can back it off just a little bit. But I don’t know if that really adds to what we’re seeing from from either one of us. When you mentioned the ice cream just yesterday, I’ve been running a lot like I’m, I am a runner, I suppose because I compete at least one 5K every year now for eight years. And I’ve done 110 mile competition in just a couple of weeks ago realizing I had a lot of time and I was in the house all the time. I decided to start running. So then I started running with one mile one and a half miles the next day miles and so on. And I was adding a half mile every time I went out and I was going out basically every day. And at a certain point, I decided that this is getting probably to be too many miles to run every day. So I backed off a little bit, where I ran six and a half miles two days ago, took a day off ran three miles yesterday. And I’m going to run four miles tomorrow and then seven miles, I’m going to add up the two numbers to build up once a week going a half mile further and just I’m coming up with this on my own. I’m sure there’s some running experts who could give me some better advice, but I’m just trying to be creative on my own. But anyhow, is gonna run yesterday. And my roommate came home or called me just before and said he was stopping at Dairy Queen is gonna give me a blizzard. And I can’t say no, I mean, I didn’t want to say no to that. And I was about to go for the runs. I had to run like two and a half hours later after the blizzard. So these are the challenges of being home. Too much. Some of them there’s there’s a lot of them probably.
Bradley Schumacher 15:59
Yeah, I find that you didn’t turn down any of the food that I got for us. So you always had to eat it up. And I remember that a couple times where we did have to run to try to get to our, our next visit or get to the plane or do whatever. And we both did some running near the end there. So I think we’re still both of us are still in pretty good shape. So
Curt Carstensen 16:23
yeah, the the running seven mile, like, I’m gonna run seven miles in a few days, I’m realizing that my foot hurts when I start the run, which is my main indication, I thought maybe I shouldn’t run this many miles every day. But by the first mile, I loosened up, and I feel pretty good.
Bradley Schumacher 16:38
cool. No, that’s good. And I know that you used to do a couple bike runs with a colleague of ours. And I kind of invited myself to join you guys. Anytime that you you have those bike runs, so I’d be more than willing to do that this summer as well. So
Curt Carstensen 16:56
yeah, the bike has not been pulled out of the garage yet but it will be very soon. As a way to not run all the time and still get outside active most days. No. So are you willing to get into your your main job a little bit more? I had a couple questions about that because in addition to doing your job differently, it sounds like you have a lot more complex things going on with with shipping packages throughout the world, the way that things move, not just people who like people aren’t moving anymore. So it sounds like the move packages. They’re not moving in the same way.
Bradley Schumacher 17:32
No, they’re not. And you know, I it’s it’s no secret I can I can tell everybody that I work at UPS been there 17 years. I’m in business development. And right now I’m focused on the international so I’m an international account manager, and especially with what has happened as a result of the Coronavirus coming to the United States and the world. You know, first of all, I have to remind everybody that the reduction in passenger flights going down 60 to 70% we as well as our competition lease out space on those planes. We have our own brown tails, of course. But as soon as you cut off 60 to 70% of the passenger flights, that is a huge, huge reduction in capacity. On top of that, then you have the cargo flights as well. And those have been reduced about 30 to 40%. So now that China is back up and running, we import a lot from China and so many many of our customers are calling us calling me and saying hey, I need your help to bring in this product and it becomes a challenge because there are wait capacities that are divvied up to each of the shippers in China, her shipper per day you’re allowed 300 kilograms per day or 100 changes daily, based on capacity and so my life on the on the up Yes, it has changed dramatically. Not only not being able to visit them in person, do it through zoom video audio conference, but also getting these, you know, fires put out and helping them get their product. And a lot of people are thinking, Well, what, what are they bringing in from China, I don’t need new computers. I don’t need any laptops. I don’t need any of that stuff. Actually, what’s happening is more and more of our customers. And you probably heard it here domestically, they are changing their manufacturing, to either bring in product to make masks or full suits, peepees, you know, personal protective equipment, anything like that. And a lot of that comes from the Asian countries and over in China. So we have a lot of customers that need to bring in the material, and so they can actually make it or the finished goods that are already over there. And so our government and the Chinese government have worked together to prioritize these PP E. You know, products and they take precedence over Oh, I gotta bring in some sneakers, I gotta bring in some, you know, other apparel, the PP takes precedence over any of those to try to help each of our countries out. So I’m proud to say that ups is doing a lot behind the scenes not me personally, but we’re bringing in a lot of additional flights to bring all of that equipment over as well as the PP you know, equipment and in the garb that everybody has to wear. So it has changed. I mean, ever since I came back from traveling with you, we’ve been thrown into this because it slowly got worse and worse. And I think you’re well aware of the the curve and trying to flatten out that curve. And we’re not even into the peak yet. I think the peak is supposed to be the 14th or 15th next week, so a little less than a week from now. Hopefully it’ll reach the peak and then slowly plateau and then come down again. So it’s been very busy. It is complicated because we have to fill out certain forms for FDA regulations. Not anybody can just ship these, you know materials in this product, you have to get FDA approval, both on the receiving end in the United States here and on the shipper origin and over in China as well and China recently put together their own requirements over and above FDA as well. So it gets into the political side of things as well as just Hey, we need to help each other out. So it’s an interesting time.
Curt Carstensen 21:36
In would you say day to day, are you more staying ahead of it? Or are you just constantly putting out fires?
Bradley Schumacher 21:44
No,
Curt Carstensen 21:44
stay up, say this, try to not let things get too far behind.
Bradley Schumacher 21:49
I would love to say that I am all the way on top of it on my head of it. I’m usually well organized and I’m pretty efficient, but then I’m still still drowning. I I’m still putting out fires, still putting out requests for quotes. And I’m still trying to help our customers and, and they see me as an ally and a, you know, they can come to me with some of their problems and requests, but I’d love to be able to provide the solution right away and help them but sometimes I have to wait until the next day to get some approval. So we do prioritize because the space is so limited. I can’t have one of my customers one of my large customers take up the entire cargo space of our plane, we have to divvy it up into you know, different areas and make sure that everybody has access to certain you know, space in our planes as well. So
Curt Carstensen 22:45
and as people are popping on to the live video here on Facebook, if you have a question or a comment, definitely put that in there and some comments from Vina and Ron, already one that I put up, I’m trying to learn on the fly. Use some of these tools that this stream yard has just seeing what, what this has to offer. I think I’ll do more of these to learn since I have the time I’m home. And like you’re working constantly, I suppose you could, you can employ me to help you if I if you think I could help because I really have a lot of time right now I’m not working, I’m working on projects, trying to be healthier, at least athletically, I think I’m eating worse. But working out more as that can happen sometimes that I have time on my hands and trying to live video podcasts is one of the things I’m doing tonight. And I’m going to bring on more guests into in the future just with different different people that are dealing with, like we’re all dealing with some level of change. I think with some people what they do, there’s huge levels of change. And I’ve thought of a few people that I’m going to invite on that just to get some perspectives like I never thought about what what’s this person doing right now? And I think it’s kind of interesting, at least to me, it’s
Bradley Schumacher 23:52
well, I think you’re right, I mean, what I like about your shows, and I think your audience realizes as you you have a wide variety of guests on You get to know the people that you interview a little bit, they get to know you during this, but you bring a different perspective. And I appreciate you, you know, having me on and having everybody else on because, you know, like you said, everybody has a different way of dealing with this situation and they’re impacted in different ways as well. And everybody has a different view of it. You know, I’m fortunate, like I said, I still have a full time job. I still miss not seeing everybody on the weekend during our weekend job. And, you know, we still stay in touch on Facebook and other social media sites and stuff, but, you know, it’s different than seeing them in person and catching up with them and finding out how they’re dealing with everything in their life is how it’s impacted. So I think it’s important to, you know, stay connected with people as much as possible during this even though we can’t be, you know, with somebody you know, physically right now, so I know that I’m still working on it. project’s behind the scenes. So I know that you have a little bit more time than I do. And I like staying active. But my other projects are keeping me busy as well. I almost feel like I’m not spending as much time as I could with those other projects. But after 1011 hour days, you need a little break. And then you need to, you know, focus on other things. So that’s why I had to be careful scheduling this with you. Because I knew yesterday, there was no way I was going to be able to make it work yesterday, I didn’t get done until 730 or eight o’clock. So today, I forced myself to finish early and get ready for that. So
Curt Carstensen 25:35
well, let’s bring in one of those other projects here, a little bit Mastersinpsychology.com is the website I’m about to pull up here. This is something I’ve heard about for a while that you’ve been working on. And you’ve claimed to have launched it here recently. I don’t know how you found the time now especially the way you’re describing what’s going on to get at launch but maybe knowing that you’ll be on my podcast as a motivation. So it’s so awesome. Regardless I’m gonna try to pull it up here using the tools of stream yard nope that’s not what I want. I want that one Nope, that’s not what I want. I want this one I think no come on there it is. Alright, that is Master’s in psychology so on this site as we go through it and there’s of course people listening to this on audio only right now you can go to masters in psychology com. Tell me why this is a thing and why you’re behind it.
Bradley Schumacher 26:28
Well, I can’t take all the credit. I have another partner of mine. We’ve been working on this for quite some time. It it takes a while to put everything together do all the research but Master’s in psychology comm is our website. We’re trying to do a couple things here. Number one is we’re trying to allow people who finish their undergraduate degrees and they’re interested in psychology and continuing on for their master’s degree in psychology. We are trying to be the number one resource for them. Just Go to one website. And you can find the 25 most affordable doctorate degrees 25 most affordable master’s degrees and in psychology and we haven’t broken down by state, we have a broken down by branches of psychology and by degree types as well. And then we also have some top psychology resources in the United States. And so all you’d have to do is literally click on your particular state that you’re interested in. And then it would actually go into a little bit more detail of all of the schools that are available in that state. And then we kind of rank them in terms of the cost and the money involved with how much it’s going to cost to finish and enroll in a master’s degree in psychology. Now, it’s also nice because we also have the links to their websites as well. And then we also talk about some resources that you can utilize. And, you know, for those of you who are watching live, you can see Kurt kind of scrolling through some of these resources. Some of the degree programs, and then of course, some of the schools that are on there as well. And you know, a lot of people might look at this and think, well, it’s not as flashy as some other websites out there. It takes a lot of work and time and effort to a put all of this information on there and be kind of put it in a spatial sense on the on the website, because there are certain programs you have to use to actually convert what you have in your mind or on paper or on word or anything, and then convert it to how it looks on an actual website. And so, you know, some of the people might be familiar with WordPress is one of the ones and we’re using WordPress, one of the newest versions of WordPress to bring everything to life on our website. And then you also have to think about well, how else are we going to help the customers of you know, not only and I use customers, I’m still in the, in the frame of ups. How are we going To help all of the people that are interested in, in going on, and that could be anywhere from, you know, people that are still working on their undergraduate, others that are already in their master’s program, others that have gone on to other advanced degrees as well. But we wanted to bring something else to the website. And so I’m actually in charge of the blog posts. And I’m in charge of the podcasts. And so our goal is to actually go in and provide some really good resources and information for those who are in the academic field or those who are practicing. So I mentioned earlier, my mom was a licensed psychologist. And so it’s not only for those undergrads who are going on for their master’s degree, it’s also for those people who are in the academic world, their psychologists or psychiatrists, their counselors, their volunteers, you know, a lot of people volunteer in a certain capacity to help out in that sense Psychological approach and help people overcome some of their fears of public speaking, overcome their fears of any kind of anxieties. And so it could be people that are employed in the academic world. It could be people outside the academic world, in their own practice, other people that are working for the government, and then of course, those volunteers as well. And so our resources are going to hopefully be beneficial to all of those people I just mentioned. And we’re also going to interview many different psychologists, psychiatrists, those people within the academic world and outside as well. So I’m kind of in charge of the podcast, I shouldn’t say kind of, I am in charge of the podcast, and I’m in charge of all of the blog posts. And so I’m excited. I already have a list of all of these viable candidates who I want to talk to add width and bring on to the website and possibly even do it. You know, some live broadcast as well. But we have to build up to that. And our goal is to have them talk about timely topics that not only reflect what’s happening in today’s society, but also what, you know, somebody who’s interested in getting an advanced degree, what kind of questions would they have? And then we bring that to the forefront and provide some answers from those who have been there, been through it, and now are out in the world practicing, you know, in a private practice, or they stayed in the academic world. So it’s kind of a long winded answer to your question, but I appreciate you bringing up the website. It’s it’s one thing that we’re proud of. Just today, I was talking to my partner who was working on making sure that some of our social media links were working. So we have LinkedIn up and running. We have Facebook now we’re working on Twitter, making sure that that’s up and running and one follow those are up and running, then we should be good. So you Notice, if you hover over the Twitter doesn’t work. Facebook isn’t live yet. We just had it tested LinkedIn. And then we’ll obviously go into the feeds for the podcast as well. So no again, I appreciate you bringing it up. But it’s, that’s one of the projects I’m doing. And I did stop doing some other things that give myself more time to do this. And so right now I just have ups and then the website and then if and when we are allowed to go back on the weekend and start working on the weekends again, in that entertainment gaming industry we can we can do that again. And that would be a third or fourth thing on my list. So I’m kind of jealous of your current that you’re saying oh, I have all this time. I would be nice if I could say I had all this time I don’t have all the time so
Curt Carstensen 32:50
I have too much time right now. It’s I can say that clearly are my structure. I’m working on my structure to get more out of each day. I’m not like that. Upset myself when the day passed, like I didn’t do anything but with 24 like everyone has 24 hours a day, but I’ve never really had 24 hours in a day. And I do now, like in the same way in any adult point into my life, like previously if I have time off and I’ll pull down the website now Master’s in psychology comm if someone wants to check it out, and I’ll go back to our justice on the screen, but like, if I’ve ever had time off, it was when we were on vacation. For instance, when I, when I’m not working, I’m gone. I’m somewhere else not working. It’s weird to be on vacation. It’s not really a vacation. But I guess in a sense, it can be depending on how you use your time when, when we’re like not able to go certain places we used to go all the time. So I had one more comment on that before I then I’m going to want to get into the trip a little bit and I’ll pull some photos up here on our Live video, but with me not going almost anywhere besides running. I think I’ve driven my car three times in three weeks, something like that the car and my, my brand new Toyota Prius of just just about two years ago I bought a brand new Prius. And a big thing in my podcast and most episodes is I like to have guests on with me that have impacted my thinking or my actions in some way. And a lot of guests have impacted me in or influenced me in a few ways. And among the things maybe the first thing you really influenced me on Brad was when I was in the market to buy a new car a couple years ago, you were pushing pretty hard on me that I should get a Prius I think I’d considered it I maybe would have like, gotten some more thoughts on that. But if not for you, I would not have gone to the particular dealership in the particular salesman that You bought it from. So I think without you, I would not have a Toyota Prius right now. So explain to me remind me again, why you were so convinced that I should get that car and a couple years later we can I guess each of our perspectives and how it’s gone with your Prius and my Prius?
Bradley Schumacher 35:17
Well, let me ask a question of your first Do you regret making that decision and get that Prius?
Curt Carstensen 35:23
No, I love the car, and I wouldn’t have gotten a new one most likely. In fact, you were the one you did you meet. I don’t know if you maybe I talked today, but Josh Torgeson, who sadly passed away about I guess about a year and a half ago. He went with me the day I bought the new car without him that day. I don’t think I would have gotten the new car. But without you. I went to even gone to the dealership the first time a few days previously. So it was a combination of him. And you that that got me to decide this is okay. Not only can I buy this Prius, but I can couldn’t buy a brand new one. And no, it’s been a great car every time I tell someone my miles per gallon, like almost everyone’s just blown away like you can get 50 plus miles per gallon. And I’m underachieving. I’m at about 53. I know you’re like, wait. I’m either my foots a little heavier. Or you’re that Prius driver that all the people that don’t like Prius drivers especially hate because you’re really working the car to perfection by not pushing it any harder than you would want to for solid miles per gallon.
Bradley Schumacher 36:33
So I’ll answer your question that you asked before. So what led me to get a Prius and then what what led me to kind of push you to get the Prius as well? I, that was the first time I ever bought a brand new car. I usually always buy us because hey, as soon as you drive a new one off, the lot, you’re already depreciates automatically and so I thought, well, you know, I deserve a new car. I might as well look at it and I started doing the math on it and I calculations and I could have bought something used that I didn’t know how it was treated or something could go wrong with it anything and I should preface for those of you who may or may not know me I had a hybrid before I got the Prius. So I actually had a Honda Civic Hybrid of 2003. That’s the first year they made the Honda Civic and a hybrid. And I bought that one use that about 70, almost 80,000 miles. And back then I was getting 4445 miles to the gallon back in you know, back in those days, that’s huge. Even today. It’s still very good mileage. But I eventually drove that into the ground and I retired at like 315 320,000 miles and so I definitely got my use out of it. And I definitely was going to get another hybrid and I actually went out and I looked at all of the different hybrids. I test drove about four or five of them, and surprisingly enough when I was sitting in the Prius Prius felt the most open to me. And and with the most room and even today, I’m six foot four, a little bit over six foot four 215 220 pounds. And now, I still don’t have my seat all the way back, I still have it for just a little bit because the leg room is that much. And I still have room above my head. So that was a big contributing factor into why I chose that one. And the other reason is that it is a hybrid versus a full battery. If I you know, I was in I’m in sales, and so I’m out visiting while I was out visiting, you know, customers all the time. I can’t run out of battery if I’m out there driving, so I definitely needed to cut that out of my, you know, prospective cars. And so I came back to the hybrids, and then again, I drove all of them out there. And the Prius seemed to be the best one that best and it actually had the best Got gas mileage, and I wouldn’t be caught, you know, someplace and with a dead battery. So that’s why I went that route. But I also I should give credit to my mom, you know that she, she said, Brad, if you’re going to get a brand new car, you might as well get all the bells and whistles because you’re going to be in it all the time. And at that time, I was not only driving for ups, but I was also doing lift, and I wanted to be comfortable. And she said, Brad, you’re going to be in this how many hours in a day, you might as well splurge and get the best Prius out there. So that’s what I did. And I love it. I enjoy driving and I look forward every day that I go out there and I get to drive this car. And to your point. I’m not the person that is slow on the highway. You saw me you know how I drive. We can talk about that later, but I am not the slowest out there. But if there’s nobody behind me, then I let off the Gas and I let it go a little bit more so my average view go in it right now it’s probably I think it’s 57.5 or something like that and when I first got it I was averaging 59 and 60 but now that it was winter you know you know as well as I do it goes down a little bit but I’m still in the 57 you know, range and even if you go up and down one, you know if there’s an error of one mile I’m still well above 55-56. So no, I really enjoy it. I I know that I saw yours. Yours is a nice one too. I like it. You got the nice color red. I got my my Blizzard, winter white. And I have the sunroof, I have the upgraded speakers I rock out on that thing. Leather seats, heated everything you can want. So I love it. So that’s why I went that route. And the reason I was pushing you to go that route is a you weren’t sure if you should go you used or new, like I said, when you go new, you can actually get zero percent financing. And so it’s free money for them. Now people are going to come back and say, Yeah, but you have to pay more in the long run. Yeah, you do. But what’s nice about it is you are covered, you know, you have that insurance on that vehicle. And so if something went wrong, you’re covered, versus I still have a lot of friends that have used cars, that something goes wrong, and they have to come up with 1500 $2,000, just to keep it running again. So, you know, there are many different reasons, but you and I sat down and we did the math a little bit for you, because you were doing more of Uber and Lyft that I was at that well, for a while, I was doing as much or a little bit more because I really jumped into it at the very beginning. But on average you were doing more so we just figured out the miles and it would pay for itself. The ROI on it was was clear to me and so I think that’s the main reason why I pushed you to go ahead and get up because You’d be able to see the return on investment much much faster with that thing versus some of these other ones that were not a hybrid
Curt Carstensen 42:08
I have a difficult time making certain decisions. So I created a spreadsheet and I maybe I showed it to you at the time I can’t quite remember with my previous car was some other cars I was looking at some estimates in there based on miles per gallon and different fuel prices. But it was clear over the life of the vehicle or not even the life of the vehicle over a certain amount of years beyond like five or seven or eight years which I plan to drive this thing as long as it’s a good car however many miles that is that by far and away the best value was the Prius even though it cost more up front. So I’m I got my point 9% interest rate so not quite zero. And yeah, I feel like that’s free money because normally I like to pay things off right away. But with this, no, it wouldn’t make any sense. I’ll pay as little as possible for it for the five years of the loan And in when the five years are up by, I’ll be driving that baby for free basically until until it stops running and hopefully there’s a lot of years left and I do so I appreciate your influence on that. And had it not been such a big jump for me to buy a new car I probably would have done what you did and spend what two or $3,000 more and get all the bells and whistles and leather and heated seat and everything else that yours has that mine doesn’t have.
Bradley Schumacher 43:29
Now I shouldn’t say that since we returned from our vacation. I did pay off my Prius so I am I’m done with that and everything is just icing on the cake now and it feels good to have that paid off. So
Curt Carstensen 43:42
well done, sir. Yes. Well so now anyone that has questions about being a future Prius owner now you have at least two people that you can reach out to either Bradley or I. Now I’m gonna pull up my my screen sharing again and we’ll learning on the fly how to do this again. Okay. So, we went on this trip, and I’m gonna pull back here a little ways, different photos that I’ve posted online. What was it like traveling with with me? What did you learn about me over two weeks that you didn’t quite realize until then? I’m curious to know. And I think it’s fair that anyone else gets to know what you learned.
Bradley Schumacher 44:23
Or are you sure you want to ask that question?
Curt Carstensen 44:25
That’s fine. Or exciting for the audience.
Bradley Schumacher 44:29
Hey, I must say that a lot of those pictures are very good. That one on the right right now. I think that’s one of your favorite pictures right there. This one? Yes. I think that’s one of your favorites. And look at that. Look at the clarity of that thing. You know, that phone that phone must have been a nice camera on the phone, don’t you
Curt Carstensen 44:48
think? Yeah, I was fortunate for you to have purchased a brand new iPhone right before the trip or not long before we left on the trip so I could get some good photos out of it.
Bradley Schumacher 44:58
Yeah. So that’s it. Question all fun and games. We had a great time I I can’t speak for you. I had a good time. I know right when I met you that you you had a good heart, you and I clicked right away because we shared some of our stories of traveling and I you know, I love traveling you love traveling. And we kind of joked with each other and said, Hey, if we’re going to travel in the future, you know, let each other know. And for those of you who don’t know, I kind of mentioned this to Curt that I was going to go see my daughter while she was traveling. And she was going to be out in a certain area at a certain time. And we’re going to try to meet up and I mentioned it to Curt and there was a long pause and he said, Well, if you’re looking for somebody else to join you, I could possibly join you. And I said yes, of course. So yeah, we had a good Yeah, we had a good time. We can talk about some of the specifics that we you know, certain places that we went to certain people. I think the overall trip was Great i the only downside I can think of offhand was I accidentally left my watch at your friend’s house. And I had to use my my own company ups to actually pick it up and then get it back to me and, and that add a little bit more time. But yeah, there’s the tulip museum. For those of you who are watching right now, that actually I enjoyed that I didn’t think it was gonna be a big deal. But there are so many different kinds of tulips out there. And then the history of the tulips. And then there’s some of the canals and we took a tour on the canal and met some people from all over the world on the tour as well.
Curt Carstensen 46:40
And that was Amsterdam. So we had a eight hour layover in Amsterdam, and I think for four or five hours we got into the city and did stuff which we planned it and it only ways it could have gone better as if I would have done my research on the Anne Frank House and knowing that we needed tickets way in advance or what the Van Gogh museum I think we might have done that as well. And I didn’t do any of my research like I should have otherwise we still like we would never gone to tulip museum except Okay, what do we do now? We looked across the street, there was this tulip Museum, we walked over and thought for five euro do this little tour. And it was it was cool to learn about how big tulips were back in the day. And why, even though they originated somewhere in I think, China or Central Asia, that now Amsterdam and the Netherlands is like the biggest producer.
Bradley Schumacher 47:31
Yeah, yeah. No, I didn’t know that either. And you wouldn’t have found that out unless we walked into that tulip museum and found that information out. And if they were local, I would have bought some of the tulip bulbs because somebody were pretty cool. And I would have brought them home. But that was at the beginning of our trip. So there was no way I was going to hold that all over the place. But yeah, you’re right Van Gogh and in the Anne Frank House, if we had known better, we would have been able to go to both of those as well. But I mean, just look at the show. So I mean it’s it’s cool being able to visit these places and you know if you see something on the news or something, I always tell my friends I’ve been there it’s cool Not to brag or anything but just to recognize and it brings back the memories of when you travel to these places and it’s, it brings back the culture and it brings back the experiences and you know, a picture’s worth 1000 words you know stroopwafels I wouldn’t have even done anything like that and you found this place and this was actually good I could have eaten five or six of those those were very good
Curt Carstensen 48:35
as it’s on the screen here and for those listening to this as an audio only podcast later you can I think do one of three things you can hear explanations and be satisfied but if you want to see these photos go to my personal Facebook page or I think for sure, my personal Instagram page at Kurt pics p ik s as in People I Know Show I don’t know if anyone even knows that secret. It’s kind of a plan words. Instagram. But I put these photos up there. And it’s all it should all be public, at least on Instagram. It definitely is. And you can look through like this stroopwafel I didn’t want to stroopwafel is but now as I’ve learned from traveling and these are some traveling tips that I’ve learned, you can share some of your own grad that I’m in a new city. I I like to do some research before I go. But if I haven’t done enough research before I go, I just I google to see what other people say are the things to do the things to see. I had been in Amsterdam, and we’ve already tried a few things that we couldn’t do like the Anne Frank House and Van Gogh Museum. So what do we do as we’re walking around? Someone said the number one thing to eat was a stroopwafel. And I didn’t know what that was, but we first went to a few places that were selling them but they didn’t seem legit, like they seem to premade and not quite, we’re looking for. So using Google, we’re able to find this place. mellie stroopwafels and we got the experience and these were delicious.
Bradley Schumacher 50:02
Yep, they definitely were. And one other thing that I add is that, you know, if you don’t want to use your cellular coverage or your minutes or anything like that, there are multiple applications out there where you could download maps, and then it would still use your GPS and give you directions to certain areas or certain places. And so you could actually do that. Now what’s cool about this picture for those of you who aren’t seeing the visual, this is a picture of one of the canals that we probably went down, traveled on and you see, you know, some of the greenery on the side there even though some places you know, we still had some snow in certain areas, you still have some of the green grass there. And then you have a wide variety of vehicles. There’s one van a large van and medium sized car and then you have all these motorcycles and mopeds as well. And so the other thing that I should highlight here that he probably brought up and maybe I don’t know if he did this on purpose or not, but in the middle of The screen on the middle there you see ups. So thank you for pushing ups again,
Curt Carstensen 51:06
the photo, you took one and I use
Bradley Schumacher 51:09
theirs, I took that photo because there was a UPS truck. And so anytime I go to any other country, I try to get some pictures of the UPS, you know, truck or drivers. And one thing I didn’t bring with me was my ups ID and I, you know, I go up to a driver or somebody else who’s a UPS or what we call them, and I show my ID and then we’d have that link right there right then in there, we’d be able to connect even though we might not be able to talk to each other, we’d be able to recognize that, that ID and then take a picture and that’s another way to connect with other people. So it’s always fun to connect with other people. And I think you and I both enjoy doing that when we meet other people and and find out where they’re from, what they’re doing, what they’re up to what their life is like. And then we learn from that and we You know, we definitely come back. And we don’t take what we have for granted anymore because you see a lot of people that are in different kind of situations. And so that’s part of the reason why I like traveling is is opening up your eyes a little bit more and you don’t have the blinders on anymore. So
Curt Carstensen 52:18
get to understand how different cultures how they, they do things differently. So this photo is another great example. There’s a lot of bicycles in the background in Amsterdam, maybe I think more than any other city I’ve been to. I’ve been there twice now. It is a Viking city. You mentioned the van and the UPS truck. I wouldn’t want to be a UPS driver in a city like that because I think a lot of places end up going the streets are just not designed for vehicles of that size. You can fit there. Like it’s big enough, usually. But there’s not all the space like in United States. The country is so big, especially outside of the downtown areas of the major cities. You can get get around pretty easily no matter what you’re driving, but in some of these cities, they are designed for small vehicles at best and a lot of people might be driving a moped or some other kind of motorized bicycle or otherwise just be on your bicycle or be on foot.
Bradley Schumacher 53:15
Yeah. And I you know, believe it or not that ups depending on where we are in the country. We do actually have mopeds. We have bicycles. We have hybrid vehicles that are both moped and bicycle driven, and mechanical, as well as battery operated. So depending on where we are in, in the country, and in the world, we do have different vehicles that allow for us to accommodate and I love this picture for those of you who are just listening to the audio, we’re walking and we saw this parking ramp, three levels, and no, you know, motorcycles, no cars, nothing on there. All of it is just bicycles. And so that shows you how valid bowl they, you know, look at this type of transit and biking and they build these, you know, that’s three levels right there.
Curt Carstensen 54:10
It’s right by the train station. Station instead of like a big parking ride maybe in Minnesota where we live, wherever you want parks or vehicles and gets on to the transit, you’re riding your bicycle to the train station and you’re getting on it from there or maybe you took the the train into the city, and you’re bringing your bicycle with you leaving behind. I’m not sure if that’s the case here. But there’s these types of ramps for bicycles. It’s every train station I went to in my previous time, mostly, it’s like, well, where do all these bicycles come from? It’s because basically everybody that’s how they’re getting from point A to point B in connecting with the mass transit.
Bradley Schumacher 54:49
Yeah, you’re gonna have to pull out your bicycle sometime current, so we got to go biking.
Curt Carstensen 54:54
Alright, we can do that. So I’m gonna keep bouncing through these photos here and and we can mention as well As I pulled to this one, there’s Mariah moss. You’re your daughter and I guess the reason for our trip the three of us on a mountain top and Athens, Greece. Yep. And this, I think was one of your favorite early adventures and photography. We found a bunch of turtles at this. Was it I forget what kind of a park? It was, but you’re, you’re watching the turtle for a while eat its grass. And this might have been my photo might have been yours. But it was pretty cool to get it in the zoomed in slow mo like you did.
Bradley Schumacher 55:35
Yeah, yeah. So this is just a picture. But the video is actually cool, because, you know, I’m not plugging iPhone or anything like that. But it was kind of cool to get the 4k going. And then not only that, but I was able to get the slow mo. So you know, even though the turtles are slow enough, when they’re eating, they actually chew pretty fast. And they actually, you know, outstretched their neck really fast and great. Grab some leaves. And it’s actually cool to watch it in slow mo as well. So yeah, you’re right, that was the first time that I actually use the slow mo function on my iPhone during that trip with these turtles. So it’s gotten kind of cool. You got to see all the detail on the turtles and, and on the leaves and everything and then all these museums that we went to. We just saw a lot of different cultures and then here of course, was our first night in our I think it was the Airbnb. Yeah, that was our first night was
Curt Carstensen 56:33
Our first night was technically on an airplane flying to Athens. Oh yeah. We had an overnight flight from Amsterdam, but yeah, then we for most of our meals, usually Mariah sometimes Ro would cook a great meal at the Airbnb. And this was a picture of one of those times. Then later in Athens, we we went to so many of the The ancient ruins and it was in the back of this photo was the Acropolis where we met Kiki like right in the space. And Kiki was a guest on episode 69 of the podcast a few episodes ago from Kyrgyzstan. We met her there and saw her on the inside of the Acropolis and became friends with her as that’s what I’ll think about anytime I look at this photo, it’s like within a minute probably of meeting her.
Bradley Schumacher 57:25
Or you don’t think of me That’s great.
Curt Carstensen 57:27
No, because you’re already in an audience. You’re in so many of my photos. And this was the Parthenon, which, disappointingly It’s huge. It’s cool, but when you get close to it, all you see is scaffolding and the construction stuff in the background. So it’s kind of hard to get a photo of that without it without it in there. And this Yeah, this actually I liked it better the temple of Ephesus which resembles the Parthenon, it’s not quite as big. That was at one of the other locations of the the ancient ruins. ones and this one is in better shape. I would say maybe they they did some work on it previously, but to the I can tell something about it. I guess I look better to me, I think.
Bradley Schumacher 58:13
Yeah, and you don’t really appreciate the length or depth of that last structure that we were just looking at as well.
Curt Carstensen 58:20
It’s hard to take a photo of these things are so huge, like,
Bradley Schumacher 58:24
yeah, they are, but it is interesting. And just to know how old these structures are, it’s just, it’s just unreal. We think that some of our old houses in the United States are old, they’re not even close to being old compared to anything else that is out there. I mean, I’m not even talking about some other houses. You know, I remember traveling in Scotland, England and Brussels and parts of Italy and just the houses there are much older than the ones that we have here in the United States. And there’s of course, that’s a that was a nice picture of all of us and Kiki there and Riah and Ro and we were on the top of, I think it was something bar restaurant, Kaka bar or what is it? 360 cocktail bound bar. There you go. Yeah. So that was nice to be in there. But, you know, again, if we didn’t travel, we wouldn’t have bet. Kiki, we wouldn’t have met a bunch of people on that. You know, we’re still, we’re still keeping in touch with so. Yeah, it was definitely It was definitely fun. And then this one was fun for everybody involved because this was the music museum and you got to see all these old instruments that were both, you know, some of them you could recognize some you wouldn’t recognize and you would say, Well, what is that? And I know that my daughter and Ro really loved some of these because these were the stringed instruments and they will like playing guitar, but they have wind instruments there as well. So So
Curt Carstensen 1:00:03
you got to hear that some audio setup to hear some of those too fast there yeah so we ended up taking so many photos together that it would joke that these were our engagement photos Bradley if we were to have an engagement photo which I don’t think we’re going to because it’s not neither one of our plans for anything in life. This would probably be my favorite one. You think so? I don’t know just the colors of the national gardens of Athens. I thought that was pretty cool.
Bradley Schumacher 1:00:32
Yeah, this was a good photo. This was good. I like that one that Kiki was in because we we played around with the portrait mode. And so we we focused in on our faces and there’s a nice phone we saw so many different phones and different areas during the trips, but this one was kind of nice. He saw the phone pretty large behind us and then all three of us. One of my favorite photos is when I when I got kicked To laugh a little bit and she had to cover up her mouth and her face because she was embarrassed so that was a nice photo of us too.
Curt Carstensen 1:01:07
And that’s the end of my Athens photos. I guess we’ll keep kind of going through these mostly quickly and we can stop on the occasional one. These here are from Balos beach and lagoon. I would like to be in Crete during the travel season. To see what it’s like there the day that we walked down there was not easy to get to. The colors are amazing but it was so windy it was gorgeous. The walk these in some of the other photos, the secret’s out I use a filter from from Instagram or Facebook or something. These no filters it the color of this water was just something I don’t think I’ve ever seen before anywhere else in my travels.
Bradley Schumacher 1:01:48
You know a lot of the bodies of water that we saw the oceans and everything else. You know, you could see the water and the different colors of the water and I didn’t use any of my filters or anything. on any of my shots, the ones that I shared with you, I think you you did use some filters. But, you know, some of my favorite ones are and it’s too bad. We can’t show any videos on here. But you know you you already know where I’m going with that, you know, one of the first days that we got there, we went to a beach and we saw some waves and I was able to get some good video of the waves. But there’s a nice photo there of all four of us, you me Ro and Riah. And we took the rental vehicle or smaller car Way up high on these mountains. And then here’s a shot of us with the ocean behind us and some more videos and pictures along with that. So it was it was definitely fun. I don’t know if you heard but about a minute ago, you heard a ding. I don’t know if that ding was somebody who was commenting or somebody was asking a question.
Curt Carstensen 1:02:56
If they did that, it was probably If someone wants to interact with this, there is an actual live feed of comments on this live video. I think if someone’s commenting on my personal Facebook page, it’s a little harder to capture at the moment. So if you want to comment, I can bring a comment down to the screen. If someone does comment on the actual live broadcasts, comment location on Facebook. Yeah,
Bradley Schumacher 1:03:24
I see. I’m sorry for interrupting. I do see that on the right now. And so I see the people that have been helping like Vina Vina has said, Yeah, the stream yard is good. And she was saying hi earlier. So yeah, this is one of our favorite cats that we that we met so those of you who can’t see any pictures we were we were visiting a castle in a an area where this one cat was very, very friendly. And I think I think Curt, you got a little just because he, he latched on to me as soon as he saw me, he was with you. But then when I came in the picture I think he followed me for awhile.
Curt Carstensen 1:04:02
We spend so much time away from you was roaming these castle grounds and it’s a huge space. And I found this cat and the cat became my best friend for about 15 minutes I was talking to the cat and singing to the cat. And then eventually I decided I could try to find the rest of you and then I found you and the cat one with you and left me behind. That was kind of sad.
Bradley Schumacher 1:04:24
No, he was very nice. He was actually surprised that he was in such good shape being you know, a homeless cat. But the weather there is
Curt Carstensen 1:04:33
the greatest home of all time.
Bradley Schumacher 1:04:35
Yeah, you have that whole castle to play around with and I’m surprised that dog that we eventually saw there, didn’t find that cat and try to chase after it. So
Curt Carstensen 1:04:48
we went to another beach. On the drive over to man I can’t think of the names of these places anymore. After a month or so I forget everything but we found a beach Photos I’m going through here again the colors that you see the I’ve seen these in photos before colors like that. I don’t know that I’ve ever really experienced this the different levels of blue right in front of me and the water, the sand beneath it the way the sun hits it all that, of course impacts the colors. But that was pretty special. And we went throughout a season.
Bradley Schumacher 1:05:23
Yeah, we did. And it was still fun. And for those of you who are, you know, listening in or will listen in later, I do have pictures of Kurt actually going into the all of the bodies of water that we went to. And so if you need proof that we were actually there, and this isn’t a photograph or anything, I do have proof that we are actually at these places. So
Curt Carstensen 1:05:46
fair enough. And I suppose for the audio version, I can upload a few other photos that haven’t been a part of this yet. demonstrate some of these things that we’ve talked about this 2000 year old olive tree. That was It’s kind of neat. I went inside of it, except I wasn’t agile enough. And I I got my pants all dirty.
Bradley Schumacher 1:06:06
Yeah, no, that was interesting too. You know, I didn’t know how old the olive trees could be and, and, you know when, when you talk about all of us, we had a lot of good olives out there as well. But I didn’t know that those olive trees could get that large. And that hold as well. So that was interesting.
Curt Carstensen 1:06:26
And now are suddenly in Denmark as I go through my photos. We were in Athens for four nights Crete for three nights for the Denmark for two nights. And this was right before we actually left there. We went to mols bjerge National Park. I’m sure I didn’t say that with the proper Danish accent. Oh, we went for a lovely walk together. Yeah, it’s kind of cold, actually. But we did. We did well, I think and I encourage everyone, no matter and maybe this is a good time to do it because there’s obviously parks that we’re allowed to go to now if you have the time. Different hiking trails and such. We had some hours remaining before our flight. And that day we made the most of it. I think from the moment we left, we went for a walk around this park for an hour or so. And then the next photo on the screen is the long walkway to the castle back in the distance here. Kalo slotsruin in the Kalo castle. And we had the hustle. I wanted to get to the airport like an hour and 15 minutes early or something we got there about 45 minutes early. It was fine. But we were we were I was like running down this rocky pathway, which wasn’t good because I think I turned my ankle once.
Bradley Schumacher 1:07:37
Yeah. And you know, earlier in our conversation today, I mentioned that we both ran a little bit. And this is one of those times where we we tried to walk a little bit and then we ran a little bit more. And then we realized, oh my gosh, we’re staying too long here. We better get going. And so we started running back to make sure that we hit our flight so yeah, that was fun. So yeah. Good photos here. What a good camera. Oh my gosh, any good.
Curt Carstensen 1:08:07
And here, we stayed the two nights. The reason we went to Denmark, and I don’t know how you will travel in the future, or how other people travel. But for me, I needed a couple of reasons. I had never been to Greece and you were going to Greece. So and I was going with you. So that was perfectly fine by me. And then we’re going to go to Sweden as we’ll get to, but Denmark. My buddy Tibor, who I met in Australia, lives in Denmark and Denmark close to Sweden. I thought, if I’m ever going to visit them, I’m going to visit them on this trip. And I told you what I was thinking in negotiating and how much time we thought we could spend there because you were leaving your daughter to come. No, go see my friend on your trip that I join you on. But you decided to trust me, and I think you had a good time there. And I think you Glad you got that experience, but you can tell me.
Bradley Schumacher 1:09:02
Yeah, we had a good time there. I was glad that you introduced us and your friends were really nice. They were very, very hospitable toward us. They actually made one dish one night and then another dish the other night and so Yuki on her night, made homemade, you know, you see the platter there for those of you who can’t see you see 123456 rows of probably eight to 10 sushi rolls and so we between or among the four of us, we were able to finish off all of those sushi rolls and that was very good. And then the night before Tibor made his he’s from Where is he from? Again,
Curt Carstensen 1:09:43
Hungary,
Bradley Schumacher 1:09:44
Hungary, he made a hungry goulash that was very good and you and I just kept eating and eating and eating and you know, they they shared with us, their experiences of coming together, meeting and getting married and And working in deciding to live where they live, which is kind of a remote area, but it’s very convenient for where both of them are working. They don’t have to drive. They don’t have to do anything. They could literally walk, Yuki could walk to work and then Tibor could take his bicycle to work. And it’s very, you know, everybody has their own way of living and they don’t have to use any of the car. They don’t have any car. They don’t need it. And there’s another wonderful shot of all the sushi as well as some of the chicken that they had for us. So yeah, I was glad that I was able to make it with you to meet those two. I of course, cherish the time that I was with my daughter, and I’m glad that both of us made it home, and we weren’t trapped anywhere and I was glad that Mariah could make it home just in time before they kind of locked everything up in the states here. So yeah, we had a good time.
Curt Carstensen 1:10:57
And of course, Tibor and Yuki living Nowhere near the city caused us to kind of need to rent a car. But that gave us some advantages to because we’re able to see some things we wouldn’t have seen if we were using public transportation there so I like when we didn’t need to have a car but in Crete seeing you drive like a crazy man, you did you get any mail from the Crete authorities buddy
Bradley Schumacher 1:11:19
I didn’t get anything. And what’s interesting is, you know, I’m laughing because there were times you know, we call them police traps here. They did have police traps in Crete. I’m an island of all places. And I didn’t realize until maybe halfway through the trip that they had those please traps and I was probably going over the speed limit a couple miles.
Curt Carstensen 1:11:42
A couple more. A couple of kilometers an hour.
Bradley Schumacher 1:11:44
Yeah.
Curt Carstensen 1:11:47
We saw the Aros Art Museum. That was cool. And then we and I think I posted a couple videos of the colorful circular roof. I forgot what they call it exactly what that was. That’s something I’ve ever seen before. It’s like a, you walk around in a circle and you get to see the city through the filters of those colors. And this is a photo of it from above at night.
Bradley Schumacher 1:12:07
Yeah. So we had somebody comment in the live section, he didn’t say speed traps, and I recognize who that audience member is. And he probably realizes that I I speed a little bit too, but he actually speeds a little bit more than I do, actually. Surprisingly, but yeah, you wouldn’t think that I would have ended up with a Prius But no, it was a good buy. street food. This was one of my favorite places.
Curt Carstensen 1:12:38
We this was in Aarhus Denmark, second largest city in Denmark, a place you’ve probably never heard of, unless you’ve been there, but it’s doing my research later. The second happiest city in the world. According to the the happiness index, the people there are the second happiest in the world only second to Helsinki, Finland. It was a great city very clean, a lot to do. And this place like this, we were looking for one Danish meal. And I googled it. It took us a while to figure out how to find it. But that’s a whole another story. But we got to the street food place. And inside of it, there was I think 23 of talking to the guy that ran the Danish food place. 23 different vendors in here. All kinds of different food, really a great venue. And we settled up on on the traditional Danish food had three items there. And we one thing we got really good at Brad, sharing food, we three plates two people, and we just both ate off that night. I appreciate having someone to travel with that’s very willing to share. Because not everyone is like that probably but I like to try different things and we we shared like we were siblings or significant others or something. Really good friends. Apparently we got to be good friends sharing food on our trip.
Bradley Schumacher 1:14:04
Yeah, yeah, no, it was, you know, I, I enjoyed that as well. It’s almost like we didn’t have to figure out our rules. It just came naturally to us. Whenever we sat down, we always kind of said, Okay, here we go, here’s your portion. And here’s my portion, and we just shared everything because we wanted to experience everything and share that with each other. And I, you know, I didn’t get I didn’t get fed up with any of your idiosyncrasies or anything like that. I don’t think you got fed up with me either. Maybe you did. I don’t know. Maybe off the air you have. Oh my gosh, that’s the last time I’m going to talk to Brad. Have him on my show or anything but no, I think we worked well together. And to your point, there are some people that you may not want to travel with, or you already know, hey, I can only spend so much time with that person and it goes for both women and men, you know. So I think everybody’s a little different, but you’re not keeping up with Live comments here, that same person who talked about the speed trap said, You can’t speed in a Prius? Oh, I would challenge that I would challenge that for sure.
Curt Carstensen 1:15:11
I don’t have any speeding tickets in my Prius, and I doubt I ever will because I don’t like to because I know it’s not the way you’re supposed to drive that car. But I have I guess it’s just it’s super rare.
Bradley Schumacher 1:15:21
Yeah. So I should comment on this. My dad is really into clocks and watches and everything. And we went to a watch museum that actually showed all of these old watches and old grandfather clocks and it was kind of cool to see all of these and the mechanics behind it, and how it originated and how it evolved. And I should you know, I’m leading up to your time and you know, where I’m going to go with this, but it evolved into all of the newer watches and the newer grandfather clocks and then it eventually showed some of the newest watches that were out there and We saw some watches that actually caught Curt’s attention. And for a day or two, we were kind of having a search, kind of not a full fledged search. But anytime that we were walking around, or we searched in Google to find out if we could find this particular brand and style of watch, we actually went into about three or four different stores. And I think you would have actually bought one of the watches if they had the right color, and the right design there, but we didn’t we didn’t find one that you wanted. And to this day, I was gonna ask you, did you ever go back and try to find that watch that you want it?
Curt Carstensen 1:16:39
No, I haven’t. And since the I’m not like making money right now the way I normally do, I’ve decided to, to not go in search of that at the moment. I’m going to pull up onto the screen here. It’s called a picto Watch. I think you can see it. Yeah. Yeah. I like this design and I will eventually buy one of these probably, I don’t know which color I haven’t spent a lot of time on once my finances are back into some sort of normalcy. I think I’ll end up buying something. I like the simplicity. It’s got one.in the what is it the 1010 o’clock spot. And just one one hour hand, and I think it looks sharp, but I think it’s kind of modeled off of a more expensive brand that you might be familiar with. But this was more of my style.
Bradley Schumacher 1:17:31
Yeah, it’s almost Art Deco. You know, when I first saw it, I saw that it was kind of art deco. And it’s very simplistic. Colorful. Yeah, it hasn’t. It has an appeal, but you and I have different. I would rather go with something else. But no, that’s a nice looking watch. And it’s simple and everybody has their tastes and preferences, but it was interesting nonetheless, to see the evolution of Watson And pocket watches and grandfather clocks in this in this watch museum so
Curt Carstensen 1:18:05
that was at den gamble the and I think I pulled the photo up before old dead, what 1870s 1920s and 1970, something like that you walk through time, and in one of the old buildings and the old clocks and stuff. And it was a really cool place, it took a long time to go through it. So by the end of it, I think we’re both kind of sick of it because it just took so long. But it’s really a cool place and probably something that if you’re there longer or you live there, you’re near there you can go see it a few times and take a little more time and not feel so rushed to get through everything. And here are we so many times. It’s something you don’t do in the United States. I don’t think unless you have like your own private jet and maybe you have one brad I don’t know about it. You’re board from the tarmac and you get on the little ladder into the plane, which is always kind of fun.
Bradley Schumacher 1:18:57
Yeah, no, I was gonna say it. You know It was fun visiting all the places we went to but we did kind of feel rushed at the at the end of a lot of them because we got so enthralled and interested in what we were doing and then all of a sudden we’d look down at our watches and figure out oh my gosh, we got to keep we got to get going here because we got another thing planned. And so here’s here’s our Sweden picture and, and you rarely see me with some hair on my on my chin like that, but I allowed myself to go ahead and grow that out. But this was fun to see Megan and Megan was on a previous episode was at 70 or 71. Yep. So yeah, Megan actually used to work with us and in our other job as well. And so it was kind of nice to see her and, and your interview with her was interesting as well. And then yeah, this this place, she brought us to this group graffiti Park and she hadn’t been there for some time. Some of these pictures if you’re not watching this, go, go on to the website and go to his Facebook page and see some of these pictures because these are just this is graffiti. These are spray cans. It’s not it’s not brushes, it’s spray cans. And that’s what really hit me on a lot of these murals in these pictures. Let like that one look at the depth and look at the reflection. And these are all done with spray cans, just the artistry and the mastery of being able to do all that it was. It was fun to go to this place.
Curt Carstensen 1:20:34
And something I didn’t mention when I posted these things to Facebook and Instagram is these masterpieces get painted over all of the time. Like Megan had one that was her absolute favorite from the year before maybe two years before and we were looking for it she could find it because it was gone. They paint over these things and they’re so amazing, but they’re there for a while and then then they move on. The next one. So that kind of blows my mind because they’re really good. We got to see some people like, no if they’re practicing, or I, it’s kind of for real. I don’t know how they like, designate which space you get to paint over, but we saw some people out there doing that. And the thing to me that was so surprising was this is a Saturday morning. Like 11am, maybe close to noon. We were one of just a few people that was there that wasn’t to paint.
Bradley Schumacher 1:21:30
Right, right. Yeah. As we recall, Megan was explaining that, you know, there’s a main walkway that are the prime, you know, canvass areas. And he, the owner of this place actually tells people hey, you’ve earned the right to be on the main street and you can paint on these main areas and throwaways and then the places that are on the inside where you have to kind of find on the other side of the fence and the gates and stuff. That’s where you get to practice your Your skill, and we saw a lot of people practicing and even on the inside, I was still impressed with all the people that were, you know, painting some of the murals on the inside because those were, were just as good as some of the ones on the outside. But I guess you have to earn your right in order to paint on that main, throw away or walk away.
Curt Carstensen 1:22:20
Yeah, I didn’t catch her saying that that is must be quite the privilege. But then again, those are going to be painted over after a while anyhow.
Bradley Schumacher 1:22:27
Right.
Curt Carstensen 1:22:29
What else we have yet a few more that I posted here on Facebook, or on Instagram? photo vos in front of one of them. Yeah, this there’s just so detailed. It’s really cool. We went to the Royal armory, which was in this was a free museum. There’s a lot of free places to go probably in most cities, but we found several in Stockholm, seeing the Royal armor and the history stuff from hundreds of years ago, walked through that place and maybe an hour and a half, two hours. It wasn’t that bad. Like for time, we could really enjoy it and also be done with it. That’s what I like, I want to see something really cool and then not have it take forever. And that that was a good opportunity to do that. Later that night, we went to Oh, what is it called Eifer Krog and bar. It’s a Viking bar, all the the the waitstaff the workers dress like Vikings from hundreds of years ago, and there’s a video that’s attached to this for you and Megan are climbing over the table, because that is the way you’re supposed to leave the table. If you’re not on the end.
Bradley Schumacher 1:23:37
Right, right. Yeah, I remember that. And I remember questioning, I’m saying I’m telling the guy. Are you sure I’m supposed to walk on this table? Yeah, yeah, that’s what you do. And so it was interesting and fun to do that, you know, in America usually don’t do that. I guess I could share a story real quick to let people get to know me. I actually did this one time, and it’s In America, I stood on a table while I was in North Dakota and one of our audience members knows about this, but I wasn’t supposed to stand on the table. And I got in trouble for standing on the table. But here at this place, though, it’s nice about this Curt remember, we had to go down in the basement. So it’s almost in the cellar, we went to a few of these places and these bars that were down below the street, and they each had their own special theme and feel, and attraction. And all of them were always busy. But this one was, was fun, because the people that we’ve met that night, their husband, well, one of them had a husband that was actually in the band and playing in the band at this place that night as well. And then I met a fellow teacher, I was a teacher for a long time. And we talked a little bit about the education system there and what she was teaching. And and so we kind of related that way and again, just stepping on On the on the table and leaving, everybody sees this six foot four, six foot four and a half foot guy, tall guy stand on a table, it attracts attention. So
Curt Carstensen 1:25:11
when you go to Stockholm, go to the old town for your nightlife go to the old town and there’s so many of these bars that have the cellars This one was different because of the Vikings. Stuff like the Viking hats and this the layout, but there’s others that we went into that you have low ceilings and and it’s like cut out in a way that you normally wouldn’t have a bar in these spaces. You’d never see that in the United States, maybe in like northeastern part of the country, possibly in New York or Boston. There might be things like that, I’m not sure. But it’s not going to be commonplace and most of the country here in old part of Stockholm from hundreds of years ago, they put these bars and restaurants into these places that have so much character that that would be one of the things if I’m Back there when I’m back to that, I’ll make sure I go to a few of these spots.
Bradley Schumacher 1:26:03
Yeah, definitely I agree with you, you know, they, they would convert these old, you know, houses that that were so old and so many different rooms and characters. The character of one bar compared to the next compared to the next was just unreal, a wide variety and you wouldn’t have even thought of oh my gosh, is this the entrance to this place, and then all of a sudden you get down in it, and oh my gosh, it opens up and you see all of this and the food was good, the drink was good. And everybody was so very friendly to us. And, you know, we didn’t really stand out. I don’t think we stood out too much as as tourists but who knows, you know, maybe we did, but everybody was friendly nonetheless, and, and was more than willing to talk about where they’re from, why they’re there. why we’re here and we kept talking and talking And this was a picture that was us enjoying. What is it? Fika
Curt Carstensen 1:27:05
Fika
Bradley Schumacher 1:27:06
Fika yeah is just another way of of having coffee time respite getting out and getting away and having a relaxing time and and we have three of us there so as Megan you and me and we went to this muffin bakery and and Megan wanted us to try one of her favorite items and Do you remember the name of it?
Curt Carstensen 1:27:31
Oh, I don’t remember anything. I can visually remember it but the names No,
Bradley Schumacher 1:27:35
I remember it and I something heavenly. Something I want to say it was a
Curt Carstensen 1:27:42
princess cake
Bradley Schumacher 1:27:43
What was it?
Curt Carstensen 1:27:44
princess cake. Now I remember
Bradley Schumacher 1:27:45
Princess cake. Yeah, there you go. And so
Curt Carstensen 1:27:47
this one over here at the green and white.
Bradley Schumacher 1:27:50
Yeah, so that was very good. And then I decided well, we might as well get three or four more other choices because we wanted to try a lot of different things and Instead of just getting one or two things, we ended up getting four or five things. And I liked I liked all of them. So it was it was fun. Of course, that didn’t really fit into my diet or your diet.
Curt Carstensen 1:28:10
Well, by the end of the trip, it was the diet. Yeah. And I think Megan was embarrassed by how many things we ordered, because that’s not a normal Fika. Normal Fika is to like each get a coffee or tea and then maybe share or share a treat, and we want to try everything. So we got way too many things, but Fika I’d never heard of it before going to Sweden, but it’s an important part of the culture, where daily several times daily, they take these coffee breaks, but the purpose is to like really socialize and more intimately and usually with one person, maybe two people to meet together and in bond with the people in your life and really take time out of your day, every day a few times a day to do this. Something that and the fast paced culture that we experience in the United States. I don’t think Most people go about it that way at all.
Bradley Schumacher 1:29:02
No, I agree with you, we definitely don’t do that. I mean, we do get together. And some people do, you know, have lunch and stuff. But Fika is a little different where you just have your coffee or tea, and maybe something to whet the appetite. It’s not really a huge lunch. It’s really isn’t a lunch and then you can take multiple speakers throughout the day, and socialize and give your your your body and your brain a break. And then you feel refreshed. And that’s that’s the goal is you feel refreshed, you feel connected, and then you can go back to work and be efficient going back to work.
Curt Carstensen 1:29:38
More FIKA, please, I like that. A few more photos from Sweden and then we’ll get to the final part of the conversation. Some colored buildings in Gamla Stan that’s a part of Old Town, Stockholm. And something we noticed and we’re on a couple of walking tours is, as we learned, there’s these lions statues, they’re all identical, I think all parts of the city, they are there to indicate a pedestrian area, like you can’t drive your vehicles past those places there to protect the pedestrians and they had something that happened like six or seven years ago where someone I think purposely drove down a pedestrian area. And I don’t know if they had as many of these things then but they certainly do now to indicate both where you’re supposed to walk and also that protect from vehicles even possibly get in there. So that was something that we learned by doing the walking tour things that otherwise we would have seen a ton of these. And if we went to Google that or thought about it, we would have never known what the lions were for.
Bradley Schumacher 1:30:41
Yeah, the tour guide was interesting because she gave the history behind it. And I do recall her saying that, hey, these these were around before this accident happened, but somebody actually, you know, they had some injuries and deaths and since then they actually put more and more of these up to make it obvious that hey, you’re not supposed to be driving these areas so we wouldn’t have even guessed that unless, you know, they told us something about that. So yeah, it was interesting to see all of that.
Curt Carstensen 1:31:13
Well, Bradley, let’s get to my final part of the podcast and you can tell me if you if you want to do both segments, one of them is I’ve got the personal growth segment I normally do being wrong segment but I know that you have other things you might want to get to. So it’s up to you at this point in the conversation.
Bradley Schumacher 1:31:30
I am good you can you’re in charge here. This is your interview. So whatever you’d like to do, I’m good. I appreciate taking the time and you know it Time flies here. We are almost an hour and a half into our conversation. We probably lost a lot of the people watching live I don’t know if Vina is still out there or Ron is still out there or anybody else’s out there. But thank you for holding on. We enjoy talking to each other and sharing a little bit but I’ll leave it up to you. If you want to go down and one direction or another that’s fine
Curt Carstensen 1:32:02
we can go down both but before that and this is this is going to serve for us like years from now I’m going to make sure this video in this podcast like remains for me at least and for you also we can remember our trip together we’re doing it publicly Of course it’s a podcast is a few things in this conversation I think can be really helpful to other people that you know are are looking to buy a new car or to travel or are looking for degree in psychology, a master’s in psychology, different things that we talked about a plus us getting into what we’re dealing with currently with everything that’s going on in the world with Coronavirus, and so many things shutting down. But on a personal level, I have so many of these conversations now that I’ve been captured with people from my life. And I advise people to do something do your version of this to capture moments with people that have been in are important to you because at some point, we’re not going to be able to. And I’m really pleased that I have it. And I mentioned our mutual friend, Josh torgeson. Earlier, we recorded conversations, weeks, months, and literally two days before he tragically passed away in a car accident. And I have that forever. And that’s something that I’ve learned throughout this. And it’s, it’s special that the guy I have that I can always if I want to hear what he has to say, at least I can go back to that. So on a personal level, it’s been really important and that’s one of the the personal growth things that I learned about myself by having a podcast and it’s worth, reach out to people talk to people and whoever happens to be interested in listening to me have this conversation. It’s almost a certainty that they’re taking something out of it, and that’s why they’re listening and continue to listen. from you. So I’d like you to share something from your life a personal growth story that you think is important. You pass along to others.
Bradley Schumacher 1:34:02
Yeah, you know, it’s not really one instance or one story. It’s just gradually learning that, you know, when you’re growing up in high school, and even college, and then you start your job or you travel, at some point, I realize that it’s about connecting, and not only existing, but connecting. And so, and being in that space and that time and focusing on that other person or that group, instead of just kind of going with the flow because you take for granted and you even alluded to it, you cherish the moments that you share with people but it’s also a bonus when you have it recorded, whether it’s audio or visual or both. You can look back at it, you know, just the pictures. I was, you know, scrolling through all the pictures of just a month ago and some of them I forgot already, and oh my gosh, we did that and Brings back those feelings. And so one thing that I’ve learned is that you need to have that eye contact and that connection. And really listen, and try to relate. Don’t Don’t just listen and nod and then think about what you’re going to ask next. I mean, we have to do that a little bit. But you do have to have that connection. So you can relate. And so you can connect, and I’m using all these words, and a lot of people are thinking, Well, yeah, I’ve heard that before. But what I really mean is, Hey, I can share a story with you because I feel confident and comfortable talking to you openly. And be. I do that because I trust you and hopefully you trust me back. And then that way when you you know, increase that level of trust, you can open up a little bit more and be yourself and then they can truly get to know you and still accept you and then that bond even grows even more and so you know, you said At the very beginning, before we went on that trip together, he said one or two things are going to happen, Brad, either we’re going to go cold closer, or we’re just going to go, you know, further apart. Well, I’m glad to see and you know, I knew it was gonna happen anyway, we, we are closer after that we’ve gotten to know each other, we respect each other, we’ve gotten to know each other, and our family and our history. And and we can go to each other and trust each other in the future as well. But it’s difficult to do that, as I mentioned earlier in our conversation. That’s why I like being in front of people when I’m out there talking to them, my clients, even though I’m there for a reason, and they’re there for a reason, we can still relate and we can still communicate and connect. And I’m glad to say that a lot of my customers from years ago, who I had in two or three territories ago, still reach out and say hey, I need some help with this or I need your advice on This and then I asked him, Why are you still calling me? I’m not your, your account manager. Yeah, but I trust you, you know, and, and so it’s those sort of connections that make you feel like you are worthwhile. And you’re not just doing a job, you know what I mean? And so that’s my growth kind of kind of lesson is try to connect on a on a personal level with your friends. And obviously be selective with those friends because not everybody is ready to have that connection. And they can take advantage of that and take advantage of you.
Curt Carstensen 1:37:37
That’s great advice. And really similar to the advice that I came with came up with yesterday, after having a conversation with my siblings, and my nieces and nephews. We had a little zoom conference call to kind of see what everyone was doing and see what we could work on. And I drew back to the word connections, something I wrote down about a year ago. Realize I have more time right now the normally and I have been connecting with people somewhat, but it can be a focus of every day to reach out to one or two people that maybe I haven’t in a while. So that’s something that’s going to be happening more for me and maybe that’s for others that they have more time right now. That’s that’s not to not I was an opportunity, maybe not for you. I know you’re super, super busy. But for the people that have it, you’re gonna find those opportunities in life where you have extra time and how are you going to use that time? And I’m realizing that I have more time I could use wisely and I’m going to do more of that. So thank you for that. Now, the being wrong segment, Bradley, you you had the opportunity to witness a few of my podcast recordings. You’re You’re very nearby for the like three or four of them that I recorded. Four of them in on our trip. The one little Does anybody know that when I was talking to Megan, that you’re up in the top bunk? I think so. Sleeping part of the time that we put you to sleep. But anyhow, for the being wrong say when you’ve heard me go through this several times before, what is a story from your life where you’ve changed your mind? And you can say the old Bradley was wrong?
Bradley Schumacher 1:39:13
Um, I actually honestly haven’t thought about this. And so I wasn’t ready for this question.
Curt Carstensen 1:39:18
Oh, come on.
Bradley Schumacher 1:39:20
One. So you’re you’re asking for an example where I was wrong, and I learned from it.
Curt Carstensen 1:39:27
Yeah. And realizing that other people may not have realized that perhaps they’re wrong about the same thing right now and they haven’t even thought about it. So that’s the point of it.
Bradley Schumacher 1:39:35
Okay. Um, one thing that I realized quickly was whether or not we realize that we have these blinders on and what we think is right or wrong, and I saw that ronnie came up and said, Oh, boy, where to start? good friend of mine, Ron, Ron, and I go back, but Oh, One thing that I did realize, and I still realize when I’m talking to people is that we have these blinders on. And we always view things from our perspective. And it wasn’t until some people would challenge me on my perspective that I wouldn’t realize, yeah, you’re right. I didn’t think about it that way. And it could be about anything. And so, um, a lot of times I, I play devil’s advocate, and I think, okay, while I’m talking to them, I am listening to myself. And I’m trying to realize and think about how are they interpreting me right now? And how are they going to take what I’m saying right now? And then I start to think about, well, they could be thinking about it this way. And then I try to add that perspective into it, or I just stopped mid sentence and I say, you know what, it just occurred to me that you might be thinking this, and then I try to answer that or address that in So it’s not necessarily that it’s wrong, but I think that we, as a human, it’s just human nature to share our experiences, from our angle, our perspective, but we always have to be aware that there’s always a second, third, fourth and fifth perspective on the same exact topic, or even the same experience. So even though you and I had these experiences together, your experience was a little different than mine because of your past history and your your past experiences and now it comes together. And you know, you might not have even mentioned I didn’t hear Megan talk about you, the main street being the premiere canvas. I think you were off looking at the dinosaur picture, one behind the car there. And so we have pictures of those. And I think she and I were talking about that, so I experienced that. differently than you did. And similarly, people that have a different experience a different culture. And nowadays, you know, we used to call the United States the melting pot. Now it’s called the salad. And I’m sure there’s something else that it’s called now, because the melting pot meant that you were losing some of your identity. Whereas in the salad, you you still have your identity, and it’s distinct, but it still adds to that whole, the bowl, that whole experience in the whole United States. And so I’m always realizing and always thinking, how is this going to be interpreted differently from a different perspective? And how can I play devil’s advocate all the time, I think that helps you learn empathy, a little bit more, and, and sympathy as well. And those are two different things. But you can you can learn more about sympathy and empathy. If you take another person’s point of view, and try to do that actively. Instead of afterwards. You always have that hindsight is 2020 I should have said this, or I should have done this or I should have, you know, reacted this way. We’ll try to do that live while you’re talking to that person. And then you can have that connection. And when you have that connection, you’re looking at that person’s eyes and reading the nonverbals. Some of the nonverbals are universal across the world. So you’re going to be able to recognize happiness, sadness, frustration, anger, you know, all of that. And so while you’re feeding off of that nonverbal start to think about that different perspective. So you a try not to offend that other person. And I’m not saying walk, you know, walk on glass or or, you know, don’t hold your ground or give your opinion, but try to do it in a respectful way. And they’re going to realize that, and then they’re also going to respect you in in kind. So I think that’s my that’s my best first initial reaction to you asking me that question is I keep continually learning From that learning from other people, and especially traveling, you do learn from other people as well.
Curt Carstensen 1:44:06
And it ties into the connections to the better able to do that and use perspectives in the conversation, you’re likely to be able to connect with people better, because they’re going to appreciate the way that you ask questions and respond to them and, and all the different ways that you can apply the perspectives that I think some people just don’t think to do or don’t know how to do. So it all adds into better communication and better connections, I think.
Bradley Schumacher 1:44:33
Exactly. I agree.
Curt Carstensen 1:44:36
Well, Bradley, we will end it there. I want to thank everyone that was watching this first Facebook Live podcast. I’ll do more of these a little bit differently in the future, make sure you subscribe to the page. And that’ll make it easier to see the notifications in the future. And Bradley, I’ll see you again someday. But for now, we’ll we’ll talk from a distance
Bradley Schumacher 1:44:58
Alright. Thanks again Curt. Thanks, everybody for hanging on in there. And yeah, if you want to hear more stories and see more pitches and First, let us know because we have a bunch and bunch a bunch of pictures and videos so appreciate it, Curt.
Curt Carstensen 1:45:13
Thanks, Brad.
Bradley Schumacher 1:45:14
All right bye