What I'm Up To
​Volume 98

Hey friends,
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Here’s what I’ve been up to since Vol. 97…
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1. August Happenings
​The Austin Convention Center is under construction, so we hosted our mid-year convention, MegaCamp, in San Antonio this year. It was a nice change of pace! 🏙️ Highlights for me included recording podcasts with Liz Bohannon and Sahil Bloom and launching my new book, Rookie Real Estate Agent. We've sold over 7,000 copies since the launch! I'm psyched! 🎉📚

On the final day of the event, I was facilitating a panel when screaming erupted in the back of the hall. Mind you, this is a dark room with almost five thousand people. Everyone was instantly unnerved. Your mind starts checking through a list of potential threats. Sadly, “active shooter” was first. Do I ask everyone to calmly exit? Will they panic and stampede? Quickly, it became clear there was a medical emergency. We got the house lights on and asked everyone to stay seated. A woman had collapsed and had no pulse. 😰 Thankfully, three off-duty firefighters and a cardiac nurse were nearby. They administered CPR until paramedics arrived. 🚑

Here's the thing: the screaming was someone calling for an AED, and there wasn't one in the hall. It's insane that they aren't required under Texas law. After the event, I called and thanked each of the first responders. I also connected with the attendee who had collapsed. Thankfully, she made a full recovery. ❤️‍🩹
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I also decided I would never step on a stage without an emergency plan again. At our site visit for our upcoming The ONE Thing Summit, the manager let us know that their entire staff was trained in CPR ✅ and that an AED was at the fire station nearby. ✅ Our team agreed to create a plan for different emergency situations. ✅
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To all my friends who host training events, I hope you will do the same. It just takes 100 people in a room to make a "one-in-a-hundred" long shot likely. PSA over. 📢

On a lighter note, Mia started kindergarten and had her first soccer game! ⚽ If you didn't know, she is named after soccer legend Mia Hamm. Her mom was an excellent athlete.🏃‍♀️ I'm curious if Mia will catch the sports bug.
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One of my former coworkers, Chris, started a landscaping company this year. We've been hiring him for our real estate clients and decided to give our backyard a makeover. If you, too, lack a green thumb, please check out his new business, Austin Artscapes. 🌿✨He transformed our outdoor space under budget and ahead of schedule.
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We celebrated Wendy's birthday last month! 🎂 We had a dinner with her friends and business partners in San Antonio, her bestie took her for a walk and a makeover, and we lavished her with gifts and cupcakes from Hayley Cakes & Cupcakes at home.
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Gus moved into his first apartment before starting his junior year at Southwestern. It’s way too nice. He has a balcony with a view of the river, new IKEA furniture, and a washer and dryer. He used to come home regularly for laundry and to retreat from his dorm roommates. I guess we'll be driving to Georgetown a lot more now. 🚗
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I drafted a very so-so fantasy football team in Port A. 🏈 On the way down, we arrived just after an elderly woman had run into a tree at speed. A friend and I helped her out of the burning vehicle and got her and her dog to safety before EMTs arrived. I honestly feel like I'm a magnet for crazy sh*t right now! 😅 Hopefully, my poor draft will be salvaged by good karma.
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One of my commitments this year was to get back into my hobbies (fly fishing, lock picking, etc) and learn some new tricks. Last month, I spent some time learning how to properly sharpen a knife. 🔪 I got some Messermeister whetstones with a giftcard, watched too many YouTube video, and restored some of our kitchen knives.
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​2. What I’m Reading
​My friend Carly gave me Beartown by Fredrik Backman. It’s been on my bedside table for two years. I’m so pissed I didn’t read it earlier. Every character is finely wrought. The town is a character, as is hockey. It’s haunting, beautiful and real. “There’s a town in a forest that loves a game. There’s a girl sitting on a bed playing the guitar for her best friend. There’s a young man sitting in a police station trying not to look scared. In a hallway in a hospital, a nurse walks past a lawyer talking loudly into her cell phone. In the stands in an ice rink in a capital city grown men and women are on their feet, shouting that they are the bears from Beartown….” Wendy jumped in and is now reading the third book in the trilogy.

I interviewed Liz Bohannon at MegaCamp. To prep, I read her book Beginner's Pluck. It’s the story of her unlikely entrepreneurial journey from journalist to founder. “We love being the one who gets to help. Being a helper is safe and it feels good to be needed. But when you finally take off the one-dimensional Helper costume you've so carefully crafted over the years and let yourself grow into the Giver/Receiver that you really are, this act of bold truthfulness will be a light.” ​
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Finally, I read an advanced edition of The Long-Haul Leader by my friend Chris Ducker. The book shared lessons learned from pushing himself beyond rational limits for too long. After a hard crash, he wrote this book to help leaders avoid burnout. My copy is at work, but this mic drop from our podcast says it all: “Self-care isn’t selfish. It’s a strategy.”
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​3. What I’m Watching
​We watched a few movies last month. Notables include The Fantastic Four (PPV), Nobody 2, and KPop Demon Hunters (Netflix). We loved KPop and are glad we don’t have young kids demanding we listen to the catchy songs every day.
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I watched Ballard (Amazon), where Detective Renée Ballard (Maggie Q) picks up where Bosch left off. It’s a worthwhile sequel if you’re a Bosch fan. We devoured Murderbot (Apple+), which is fun and well done.

That’s it for this month. Please reply back and let me know what you’re up to!

Be well, do good deeds, and eat tacos!
Jay

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